Fearless The King Series Book One - By Tawdra Kandle Page 0,51
his lock. “And that’s not suspicious?”
“Well, it is, but I mean that I’ve never picked up any of her thoughts. And having heard Nell’s mind since then, I am pretty sure it was her. What if she’s pressuring Amber into something really bad? And what if that’s one of the reasons for my talent—to help people like Amber?”
“Ah, so now you’re a superhero?”
I knew he was teasing me, but I wanted to be serious. “No. But if someone is given a gift, aren’t they meant to use it for good?”
Michael considered that as we left his locker. “I guess I can see that. But I don’t want you to make yourself crazy over this, whatever it is.”
“I won’t. I’ll just take a little glance at Nell’s mind this afternoon—” I made a face, “—and see if I can figure anything out. I don’t like doing that on purpose, but I call these extenuating circumstances.”
“The ends justify the means?”
“Not exactly, but I just want to make sure Amber isn’t getting herself into something really dangerous.”
We were in the thick of the crowd by now, and Michael leaned over to speak softly in my ear. “I really don’t think Nell is into anything dangerous. Mean, maybe. Cruel. That’s her thing.”
I shrugged. “We’ll see.” We had reached my classroom, and I turned to face Michael. “Wish me luck.”
He leaned into me again, brushing my cheek with his lips. “Good luck. See you at my car?”
I nodded with a smile and gave him a quick wave as I went into History.
I’ve heard some dark thoughts before. It’s just one of the delightful little benefits to my particular talent. Usually, I can’t isolate whose mind is thinking these disturbing things; it happens in a crowd, or on a busy highway, with thoughts flying at me from all the people in the vicinity.
Today I knew exactly where the creepy feelings came from, and it wasn’t making it any easier.
I slid into my desk, which was a row over and two back from where Nell was sitting. History was one of my favorite classes, and I was annoyed that Nell was ruining it for me.
We were scheduled to have a lecture on the early battles of the Civil War, which I realized would be an excellent cover for picking Nell’s brain. She didn’t spend much time paying attention in this class as a rule, and Mr. Frame’s lectures bored her silly. Her mind would wander, and with luck, it would move toward Amber and whatever she was doing to scare the poor girl.
Mr. Frame put up the first slide and began to speak. I took some cursory notes, scribbled down his outline points and slid my eyes toward Nell. She was doodling on her notebook and twirling a lock of her dark hair. Slowly and carefully I let down the wall that blocked my mind from probing hers.
It wasn’t the sweet relaxation that came when I was alone with Michael. Instead it was like an assault, as the random mind meanderings of twenty-seven high school juniors hit me full force. I tensed, and then concentrated on narrowing down to find Nell.
It was something odd that finally caught my inner ear. It was almost like a chant. My mom had a CD of Gregorian monks doing meditative chants, and this sounded vaguely like it, although I was pretty sure I wasn’t hearing Latin. It wasn’t English, and though I wasn’t completely fluent in French, it didn’t sound like that either. Perhaps slightly Germanic? No, too melodious for that. I couldn’t be sure.
I was thinking that maybe I wasn’t tuned into Nell yet, since she didn’t seem like the chant type, when there was an abrupt change in the direction and tone of what I was hearing. Suddenly the darkness I had associated with Nell was there in full force. And while I wasn’t hearing concrete words, I began to have flashes of images.
This doesn’t happen often. As I’d told Michael, the largest component of my talent is hearing thoughts. The feelings I can detect are also fairly common and harder to block. And every now and then, instead of hearing fully formed thoughts in words, I get flashes of images. It’s harder to understand and interpret these images, since often they are impressions or memories, frequently out of context.
That’s what I was getting from Nell. I saw a group of girls, sitting outside in the dark. I couldn’t see individual faces, but I felt familiarity. I couldn’t get