Conspiracies (Mercedes Lackey) - By Mercedes Lackey Page 0,51

instead, she encouraged them with little nods and the occasional word. And her eyes stayed so … detached. Analytical. It was as if she was taking notes on everything. But why?

It was creepy. It was really, really creepy. Creepy enough that Spirit didn’t want to stand out by not saying anything, so when Ms. Smith’s eyes alighted on her, she blurted out, “I couldn’t stand it! It was a nightmare!” then hid her face in her hands.

That seemed to be enough; when she peeked through her fingers, she saw Ms. Smith’s attention had drifted to one of the other girls, who was in tears and on the verge of hysterics.

Well, so much for that class.…

Ms. Smith did, finally, make the effort to get them all calmed down before the class was over. And she succeeded enough that though some of the guys were flushed and chagrined-looking, and all of the girls were still wiping their eyes, they were all able to walk out and go to their next class without breaking down.

But … if Elizabeth had been right about it being a test, one that had been sprung on them so that no teacher could warn a favorite student in advance … Spirit would have been willing to bet now that Ms. Jane Smith was one of the few who had known what was going to happen in advance.

… maybe even the person who had done it in the first place.

EIGHT

Spirit was normally pretty indifferent about math; she didn’t like it, but she didn’t hate it, either. Right now, though, she would have been a whole lot happier if there’d been more equations on the worksheet on the desk in front of her, because she knew what was going to happen, as soon as Ms. Smith finished going over the last of them—

“Very good. Does anyone have any questions?” she asked. Spirit glanced at her watch covertly and wanted to groan. There was a bit more than half an hour to go in the class. Ms. Smith smiled brightly when no one raised a hand. “All right then. How are you all holding up? You know, as a fellow magician, I am here to help you with much more than just math. Mariana?”

Oh, she would pick Mariana …

“I … uh…” Mariana’s thin face started to crumple, and her voice got choked up. “I can’t sleep,” she whispered, hiding behind her fall of dark hair. “Even when I keep a light on…”

Ms. Smith got a handful of tissues from a box on her desk, as if she’d prepared for this. Which she probably had. It was incongruous; Ms. Smith looked like a super-efficient secretary, with her tightly tied-back hair and her Oakhurst uniform blazer. She didn’t look like a magician, and she didn’t look particularly … empathetic. She handed the tissues to Mariana. “That’s all right, I’m not at all surprised,” she said soothingly. “Why don’t you tell me about it? Maybe it will help.”

Strangely, Spirit seemed to be the only person in the class that found this scene acutely uncomfortable, disturbing, invasive. Ms. Smith leaned over Mariana slightly, not touching her, but really getting into the girl’s personal space. “Every time I start to fall asleep, I get so s-s-scared,” Mariana gulped, rubbing at her eyes with the tissues and smearing her eye makeup. “It’s like I can feel it starting all over again. And when I do fall asleep, the nightmares…” She faltered, and took a shuddering breath.

“Is anyone else having nightmares?” Ms. Smith asked. She looked like she was enjoying this.

“The nightmares are the worst. I keep fighting something I can’t see,” said Taylor Parker, in a low voice, as if he was ashamed to admit he had nightmares, but couldn’t help talking. “It’s—it’s dark, and there’s something that keeps grabbing at me and hitting me, like in blind randori. Only it’s not practice and I’m not blindfolded and every time it hits me it slices into me so fast I don’t even feel it until I look down and I’m bleeding from all these slices—”

“I’m running, I’m back at home and I’m running,” sobbed Mariana. “I’m trying to get to my house, but the street keeps changing and there’s something behind me, and I know if I turn around to look at it, I’m going to die!”

“I’m here at school in my dreams, but my brother’s here, too.” That was Andrew Hayes, and although his voice was steady, his face was so bleak Spirit didn’t even want