Chapter 6: The Terrors

The next day, I kept my ear open, alert for any passing gossip about yesterday, but strangely, the word 'arctic' remained an unspoken name in the halls of the school. It seemed no one had heard yet, or the wolf, platinum-eyed wolf, was yet to sing like a canary of what happened yesterday. The lack of eventfulness in comparison to what happened last night made the school day go even quicker. That was until PE, the second-to-last period. I sat quietly in the corner of the bleachers, listening to fragments of different conversations of the students around me, talking to their friends. But there was one conversation that piqued my interest, "... So after the kiss, he said, 'it was a waste of time' and 'he could never be with someone like me'" I recognized this conversation as a retelling of what happened at lunchtime yesterday. I turned and, sure enough, it was the human girl who Marcus had rejected previously. I had to admit, those were some harsh words to say to a human who didn't know anything about werewolves. She must be heartbroken. I sighed quietly with sympathy as she continued, "He's the most beautiful man I've ever seen, but always so cold and unreachable and unfeeling. He's so innocent, he's like...." A monster, a douche, a jerk, all reasonable conclusions to this sentence, I thought to myself. "A god!" She finished, and her friends squealed in agreement. My jaw slacked at her conclusion. How he treated her was anything but godly. "Of course, he could never be with someone like me! Through that kiss, he made me realize something: he didn't want to burden me with the intensity of his feelings, and it all dawned on me, he keeps to himself because he's too kind to want to overwhelm any girl with the weight of his feelings!" All the girls sighed dreamily at their new make-belief image of Marcus. ..... Nope, I was sure that none of that was true about him; he was just a guy that had no interest in anyone else, hence the nickname, 'one above all'. But I had to admit that I was impressed at how Marcus could make a girl he'd cruelly rejected fall even harder for him simply by rejecting her. But before I could mull over the ridiculous notion any further, the whistle blew, a nd I could tell by the sadistic expression on Mr. Pierce's face that he was going to make us do 'The Lap'. All the humans in my class groaned, but I could hear faint sniggers amongst the werewolves. 'The Lap' was the longest lap ever, around the school, which was huge. But there was something worse hidden in it. We all got started, and the Werebeasts took off at sprinting speed, remaining in their human form. But I kept at the same pace as the humans, keeping an exactly 'average' speed, as always. But, as always with 'The Lap', the 'terrors' began to appear when 'we humans' reached the back gate of the school, halfway into the lap. The back gate led to the woods and was always conveniently left open for 'students in special need of nature's therapeutic walks' –which was a coded way of saying 'for werebeasts that have the sudden urge to shift. As we ran past, several sets of animalistic eyes and teeth appeared from the woods behind the back gate and began chasing us. I mimicked the speed of the humans as they ran for their lives, from what they dubbed the 'terrors'. But, unlike them, I knew that it was the Nightmare wolf, who purposely sped ahead of everyone else, so they could take pleasure in chasing down poor humans as they ran, scared senseless, a nd found fun in, then, watching the humans try to explain to our PE teacher how the 'terrors', that were supposedly chasing them, had suddenly vanished. This happened every time we had 'The Lap', and I could only imagine that the humans would probably be thinking that this was a bad case of Déjà vu or some fragment of their imagination. I could hear a guy next to me mutter, "This can't be real, I seriously need to lay off the weed." Then he went running ahead of me. But for me, this time, while fake running for my life, I was trying to, unsuspiciously, look back at the eye colours of the wolves, in hopes of finding one with platinum eyes that resemble the black wolf from yesterday night. But by the time I had concluded that he was none of them, a wolf had nicked me on the heel. I bit down on the pain and decided it was time to use some of my wolf speed to run fast enough to lead the frantic humans in the race from the 'terrors' and to the end. By the time we'd got to the changing room, the werebeast girls were laughing and throwing backhanded compliments and shade at each other. It often went something like this: "Oh, I forgot to tell you, I had dinner with Marcus and his Father yesterday. My father had just become the new Grand Elder, and they came to celebrate.e," Gwen ran her tongue over her fangs, which made an appearance only once before retracting. Her vampire crew around her gushed and whispered praises. "Oh,h that's great," Amber, a were-fox, congratulated from the other side of the changing room, "Your mother must have been so happy to be there to celebrate. Oh, I forgot, she's still locked up in a mental hospital." Gwen stiffened as the werbeasts laughed. She whirled and snapped at a nearby Nightmare laughed, "Oh I know your not laughing, after all, you're just his underling, the most you could ever hope to be to him is whore," The werebeasts didn't dare laugh at a Nightmare, but shared a humorous glance. The Nightmare, Jane, spoke with a sweetness that laced with deadly promise, "Oh dear, please do be careful, vampires are such clumsy creatures, who knows, the next cup of blood you drink may be your own." If you ask me, they're all bitches in their own right. But nobody was asking me, so I was wise enough to keep my mouth shut. I looked at where the werewolf from earlier had nicked my heel, only to see it was much deeper than a nick. Isighe., I'd have to take care of it when I got to the house. I had one more class, and I could handle that. I was rather late, and there were only a few people in the halls as I hobbled to chemistry from the changing room. I felt an arm collide with my back as a guy walked past, and the instability of my heel made me tumble down. But I didn't hit. Quick hands made a swift move to pick me up, mid-fall, put me straight, and plant me on my feet as though I weighed nothing. "Woah, I'm sorry, are you alright?" a deep, shocked voice asked. I didn't turn around at first. ,h please, tell me it's just a human, please, please, please, please be a human. Please- I turned. Of course, such a small mercy was too great for life to grant. It was a Nightmare, though he showed no tell-tale sign, I could sense it, just like I could sense other werewolves. "Hey, are you good? You seemed like you had a limp. Do you need help?" I looked him in the eye, about to tell him I didn't need his help or that he should have just ignored me when I was caught in his eyes. They were a murky green at first glance, but when you looked longer, they could easily pass for grey, "Hey," A shy small smile tugged on his lip, "You've got to stop looking-" "Hurry. Up. What are you still doing?" A deeper voice sounded, no matter how low it was, the power still ricocheted off the walls and lockers like a command rather than the question it was. Only one person's voice could do that. My gaze slid, in slow-motion horror, from the green-grey eyes to the terror that was Marcus, a slight distance beyond. Marcus was looking at me. My whole being screamed, 'Don't look at me!' I was beyond petrified. "Oh, shut u, Marcuss, just give me a second'm coming.ng," Green-grey eyes flung the words over his shoulder and looked back at me. "At least tell me what class-" I was up and out of their presence so fast, not even the sound of the rest of his sentence could follow me. I'd never been so happy to see the door to my chemistry class.