Chapter 186: 186-Never call her name again
"Surrender, Miss Maisa!"
The leader raised his weapon. Maisa’s heart lurched. She thrust both hands forward and the corridor erupted.
A wall of fire swept across the floor, forcing the guards to retreat. Before they could regroup, massive roots of stone tore through the ground, twisting around their legs and pinning them in place. Wind slammed into their defensive formation.
The guards scattered and Maisa ran through the opening. "Sorry," she shouted as she went.
Behind her, Regina stopped beside the fallen security personnel, her face pale with fury and disbelief.
"Who is that girl?" one professor demanded.
"Maisa Loven," Regina replied.
Professor Primrose stared at her. "The famous redblood?"
Regina’s jaw tightened. "Yes."
"But redbloods can’t..."
"I am aware of what redbloods are supposed to be capable of!"
The sharpness of her reply silenced Primrose. Regina looked toward the corridor where Maisa had disappeared.
There was something deeply wrong with that girl’s blood. Something that had escaped the archives’ ordinary classification systems, something connected to the sickness that had nearly killed the students and now she had demonstrated power that defied everything Regina knew about vampire magic.
The examiner’s fingers curled around the tablet in her hand.
"Send an urgent report to the palace," she ordered. "Inform them that the subject is displaying multiple elemental abilities. Request immediate reinforcements."
"And the trial?" Professor Primrose asked.
Regina’s eyes hardened. "There will be no trial if she escapes. We can see to it when she is in custody and bound."
The whiteblood tower rose ahead of Maisa. She could see its pale walls beyond the academy gardens, towering above the surrounding buildings like a beacon.
For the first time since the guards had dragged her from the archives, she felt a flicker of hope. She was almost there.
Her body was beginning to weaken. The magic pouring through her veins was powerful, but controlling so many elements at once demanded more than she understood.
Her hands trembled, her vision blurred at the edges and each breath scraped painfully through her throat.
Still, she kept running faster and pushing herself forward. She had to reach them, she had to... Just then, a group of guards emerged from the entrance.
Maisa skidded to a halt. "Oh, come on!" She cursed. "No," she whispered.
They had already sealed the way leading to the tower. Her hope was getting crushed right when she was so close to reaching her destination.
"Miss Loven," their leader called, "you are ordered to surrender yourself to the authorities."
Maisa shook her head desperately. "Please. I need to see the princess."
"You will see her after you have been secured," the leader spoke again. "Right now, you need to stop. Surrender and let us help you."
"I can’t wait!"
The guards raised their weapons. They stood firm and determined not to let her pass.
Maisa’s elemental magic surged in response and the air grew heavy with the pressure of her power and then a voice rang out from behind them.
"What is happening here?"
Maisa recognized it immediately. It was Varitreya who spoke. Hope burst through her chest so fiercely that, for one breathless instant, she forgot everything else.
She pushed past the edge of her exhaustion and ran toward the tower entrance. "Vari!"
The guards turned in attention and so did the princess. Varitreya stood near the doorway beside Addessa, both of them dressed in their usual elegant academy attire. Their expressions shifted as Maisa came into view. First with surprise and then alarm at the destruction following in her wake.
"Maisa?" Varitreya exclaimed.
Addessa stepped forward. "What in the blood moon’s name have you done?" she asked but despite her accusatory question, she raised her hand and sparked a huge fireball, ready to fire at the guards chasing her.
Maisa stumbled toward them. "Please," she gasped. "You have to help me."
Varitreya’s eyes swept over her. The torn fabric of her clothes, the trembling hands, the wild elemental energy circling her body. Behind Maisa, guards and professors were closing in.
"What happened?" Varitreya demanded. Her fingers twisted and naturally the earth beneath the entire academy threatened to break open.
"They’re taking me to the palace. Regina says my blood poisoned the students. She says I’m dangerous and they’re going to send me to the Dark Forest."
Addessa’s expression darkened. "What?" she was stunned, her fire grew more aggressive.
"I didn’t do it!" Maisa cried. "I swear I didn’t! But they won’t listen to me. Please, Vari. I don’t know what to do."
For a moment, Varitreya looked as though she wanted to reach for her and then Maisa saw her expression change.
The princess’s gaze had moved beyond her, the guards and the destruction and landed toward the open doors of the whiteblood tower.
Two attendants were wheeling a covered stretcher out of the building.
A royal physician walked beside them, his head bowed. Addessa’s attention shifted toward the stretcher as well, and the anger in her face gave way to something quieter and grave.
Maisa followed their gaze. "What is that?" she asked, she’d only been gone an hour at most, why was there a dead person in the tower?
The stretcher rolled closer while no one answered her. A white sheet covered the body lying upon it. One pale hand hung over the side, the fingers motionless. A familiar silver ring glinted faintly in the light.
Maisa stopped breathing, moving and went dead motionless. She knew that ring. She had seen it on her aunt Evelyn’s hand countless times.
She remembered how her aunt used to twist it around her finger whenever she was worried, how she would tap it against a table when thinking, and how she had once promised Maisa that she would never take it off.
’No!’ her soul screamed. Maisa stared at the motionless hand. ’No, no, no!’
Her feet moved before her mind could catch up. She stumbled past the guards, past Varitreya, past the attendants who were trying to make room for the stretcher.
"Move," her voice was barely audible.
One attendant reached for her. "Miss, you shouldn’t..."
"MOVE!"
A blast of wind swept through the entrance, throwing the attendant backward. The stretcher lurched, and the white sheet slipped enough to reveal the face beneath it.
Evelyn? Her aunt’s face was pale and still. Her eyes were closed, her lips parted slightly, and the familiar lines of worry that had always appeared between her brows were gone.
For the first time in Maisa’s life, Evelyn looked peaceful and that peace was unbearable. Maisa stopped and the world stopped with her.
She stared at the woman who had raised her through some of the darkest moments of her life, the woman who had helped her after her transformation, the woman who had risked offending the Everhearts just to keep her safe and now the woman who would never call her name again.
"Aunt Evelyn?" she called, her voice breaking as a slow tear trickled down her cheek.
Her aunt gave her no response. Maisa took one step forward, her body moving subconsciously, she herself was too tired and too shocked to process her own actions.
"Au... auntie?" her voice cracked.
She reached for Evelyn’s hand but her fingers hovered above the cold skin. She couldn’t make herself touch it. Some part of her still believed that if she waited long enough, Evelyn would open her eyes, sit up, and scold her for causing a commotion.
That she would smile and ask why Maisa looked so frightened.
"What.. what is going on here?"