018 · Emmaline · I

Stardust Academy

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As I regained my consciousness, I found myself alone but still in that hospital-ish place. The Faes were nowhere to be seen, and that's freaked me out. Especially because the last thing I heard them saying was about my sister, and when I remembered the sensation of being asphyxiated, I got on high-alert again.

["Sister!"] I tried to call her by our link but when she didn't answer, I began to freak out. ["Veevy, are you there?"] I called again and nothing. ["Verena, please, are you there?"]

When I didn't hear anything back, I tried to get out of the bed, now that I somehow had managed to break free from the strings holding my wrists, but there was some kind of barrier locking me to the bed. It was bizarrely malleable as I sat down, but it didn't let me climb down from the damn bed. Panic began to creep inside of me, and I felt something trying to break free inside of me.

I punched the barrier that was invisible but palpable, and when it began to budge, I began to punch with more strength, desperation flooding my insides as a sensation of being drowned blinded my senses. I let out a cry and when I realized, I fell to the ground will a loud noise, but managed to stand on my feet right away. And as I realized I was still only in my underwear, I grabbed the black oversized robe on the chair on the other side of the room.

["Verena,"] I screamed for her. ["Verena, sister, please, answer me."] And as I was still without an answer, I began to feel out of breath again, thinking of what could have happened to her. ["Veevy, call for me."]

["Em… Emmaline…"] Her voice came weakly and faint in my head, as if she was about to faint, and I saw red.

["Veevy, where are you? Call to me. Where are you, sis? Stay awake. Veevy! I'll go to you. I'll find you."] I began to run away from the room I realized was like an infirmary, and as my heart thundered and it became even heart to breath, it all turned white.

There was a blinding light and when I opened my eyes again, I found myself in a white room, that looked like the cell of an asylum, and when my eyes fell to the bed on the side, I found my sister unconscious and handcuffed to it. Her skin reddening, and there was vomit on the floor.

"Veevy!" I cried desperately. Avoiding the vomit on the floor, I jumped on the side of the bed, holding her to me, "Veevy," I felt my tears rolling furiously down my face. "Why are you burning so much, sister?" I put my finger under her nose to be sure she was breathing, "Oh, my God, you are alive. I'm sorry, Veevy. It's all my fault. It's all my fault. You told me not to hold into the visions because it could hurt me, but I didn't listened you. Because of that, I didn't saw the man entering the studio," I cried.

I could almost taste the fear burning inside of her. And there was fire under her skin. She was burning up. It's not the first time she has such a terrible fever.

"And… And you are here because of my paintings. Why didn't you tell them the truth? Why did you take the blame? Why? Why didn't you tell them I was the one painting? Why didn't you tell them Benjamin made us do it? That it was his fault? Why are you always so hungry to sacrifice yourself? What's wrong with you? Do you want to die and leave me here alone? Isn't it enough that we only have each other?"

She gasped and I flinched, and as her body began to go from burning hot to freezing cold, I felt fear creeping inside of me. "Why… are you screaming, Em?" Her voice was a whisper but I could hear it just fine. Is it because of the fae ears?

"Veevy," I gasped, hugging her tight. "You are alive," I cried. "I was so scared. I was so damn scared. Don't do that to me again."

"I'm… sorry… Emma…"

"Don't!" I cut her. "Don't do this again. It's not your fault. Fucking hell, Verena, don't do this. It was all because of me. Because of my paintings. Because of your…" my voice cracked and she wrapped her free arm around me.

"I gave you my blood willingly. You know that," her eyes were still closed. "It's not your fault. I'll be hurt if you blame yourself. You only did that because Benjamin made you do it. You had no choice. And I was glad to give you all the blood in my body if that meant you would be able to pay your debt and be free from him. Because of that the government got to us, sorry, I should have protected you better," she coughed. "We have to… we have to leave this place, but I don't know how."

"Sis," I bit my bottom lip, "it's not the government. It's not the American Government." When she snapped her eyes open, I gasped because her lens were gone and her golden eye was glowing vividly. In the same instant I let out a growl and covered her right eye with my hand. "Your… your eye."

"It's okay, the lens are covering it."

"No. They are not," I growled.

She gasped, "What?" Struggling, she sat down, still with one of her hands handcuffed to the bed, and she cover her eye with the free one. "Not good. Is… is my hair still dyed?"

"Yes."

Sighing in relief, she blinked with her silver left eye, looking around, "What am I going to do now? The agents will find strange the color in my eye. You know how people…" her voice cracked and my heart ached at her struggle, "how people react to it."

"Look at me," I asked but she refused to. "Look at me, Veevy." When she did, I cleaned the blood tears from her face. "Why didn't you tell me?"

She bit her bottom lip, still not noticing the elongated canines, "I'm sorry. I didn't want to lie, but it was different for me, Emma. Yours didn't make much sense to me, but mine… it was too real. I felt like a monster. You were never around when it happened to me, so I thought it would be better not to tell you, because you didn't take yours so seriously either."

Realization stroke me, "You can see the future," she said nothing and I let it settle. "Everything you saw happened."

A nod. "It began with very simple things, like someone falling from a chair, a dog dying, our grades, or when someone was going to mess with any of us, or our foster parents were going to abandon us. The more it happened, the more it freaked me out. I didn't want to scare you."

"You saw it…"

"Karl Finicky?" She clenched her teeth. "Yes. I was… I was doing the work Benjamin told me when I had the vision. It freaked me out. I only saw until you woke up from your vision and he pushed you to the bed, so I got terrified of what he could end up doing. Thankfully, I got there in time. I'm sorry for not killing him, I wanted to, but the agents got there and didn't allowed me. With some shit about me not being able to kill a human," she uncovered her golden eye and blinked.

"Veevy…"

"You know what, Emma? I don't care. They already think I'm a monster either way," she gave that insane grin I am far too familiar with. "Let them see it. What are they going to do? Bully me for it like childish kids? I'm used to it. And… what the hell?" Her eyes widened as they went to my ears, and she touched it.

Not just touched it. She pushed it as if it was fake and it would come out like that.