Touch of Death(33)

"You mean she could mix her blood right inside her body?" I turned in my seat so I could see Tony.

"Yes. She described it once as feeling like her blood bubbled throughout her body, combining the powers of both sides." My jaw nearly hit the floor. Bubbling throughout her body? That was exactly how I'd felt ever since I joined my hands with the Medusa statue.

"Is this what we'll learn to do?" I didn't want to mention that I'd already dabbled in this.

Tony laughed. "No, no, no. Ophi can't perform this feat. It was reserved for Medusa alone." More like Medusa and her bloodline. She'd passed this gift on to me.

"What else could she do?" I needed to know more.

"She could release souls from their bodies, which you all will learn to do when you come of age. Most of you know that skill doesn't set in until you turn eighteen."

"But Jodi can already do that," the girl next to me said.

I whipped my head in her direction. I'd almost forgotten Victoria's little speech at dinner. She'd told everyone about what I did in the cemetery.

"Yeah," the guy behind her said. "Leticia and I heard Troy command the servants to bury the body lying in the graveyard before lessons this morning."

Tony stared at me. "Jodi, is this true?"

I nodded. "But Alex told me how to do it."                       
       
           



       

"Still, you shouldn't have that kind of power at your age."

"She has something else she shouldn't have," Abby said. "She has Medusa's locket."

I nearly fell out of my chair. Why would Abby out me like that? I knew she hated me, but why would she draw attention to the fact that I had Medusa's locket? Unless she knew they'd take it away from me. That couldn't happen.

I shook my head. "I don't know what you're talking about." Instinctively, I lowered my chin, hoping no one could see the gold chain around my neck. My shirt came up pretty high, and I hoped it was enough to conceal the locket.

"Really?" Abby said. "It wasn't you who snuck into my room and stole the locket from under my nightstand? It wasn't you who commanded that disgusting servant to keep me from going into my own room and made me late for class? Cause I could've sworn that was you hiding in my closet to avoid getting caught by Victoria."

I stood up, not sure what I was going to do. I never expected Abby to blurt everything out like that, and she'd done it in a way that made me look like the bad guy.

"Why don't you show us what you have stuffed under your shirt, Jodi?" Abby continued. "Oh, and I don't mean the toilet paper you use to stuff your bra."

"I don't stuff my-oh, forget it! This is ridiculous!"

"Jodi," Tony said, "that locket disappeared when Medusa died. According to prophecy, it would reappear to one in Medusa's bloodline. One who would have the power to mix their blood like Medusa did. One who would be more powerful than all the Ophi." He stepped forward, stopping only feet in front of me. "Did the locket appear to you?"

Abby jumped to her feet. "No, it appeared to me, and she stole it!"

"Whatever, Abby," the guy sitting behind Leticia said. I really had to learn everyone's names. "Like anyone would believe Medusa would pass her locket down to you."

"And why not?" Abby snarled.

"Because you're no better than the rest of us," Leticia said.

"You wish, Leticia!" Abby stuck her foot out, showing off her designer boots. "Where'd you get your shoes? Wal-Mart?"

"Okay, girls, that's enough," Tony said. "Abby, there's no need to insult anyone. I'm sure Leticia didn't mean anything bad by her comment. She was simply pointing out that we are all equals here."

"Not all of us," the other guy said.

"Well, Randy, I guess you're right." Tony looked at me again. "Jodi, do you have the bloodstone locket on you right now?"

What could I do? I reached inside my shirt and pulled the locket out. "It appeared to me on my first night here. But then someone," I paused to glare at Abby, "stole it from my bathroom while I was showering."

"Ah," Tony said, suddenly understanding everything. "Abby, I think we need to have a little talk about personal privacy soon."

But no one was really paying much attention to Tony. They were all focused on the bloodstone locket around my neck. All including Abby, and for once, I was glad I wasn't like everyone else.





Chapter 22

Tony spent the rest of the lesson talking about how special the locket was and what this meant for Ophi everywhere. It quickly got a little overwhelming. Suddenly, Leticia and Randy were treating me like I was royalty. They offered to help me train and even write my papers. Which, hello, papers? This was a little too much like real school. After Abby got over the initial intrigue of the necklace, she sulked in her seat until Tony dismissed us for lunch. I couldn't believe I'd been there for hours. Everyone had been so focused on the locket and how special I was. They'd asked me questions about my powers and wanted to know everything about me. I'd gone from the new girl to Little Miss Popular in two seconds flat.

By the time I got downstairs for lunch, everyone was talking about me. Victoria rushed over and put her hands on my cheeks. "Oh, Jodi, darling, why didn't you tell me? This is wonderful news. Even better than we could've hoped for. I mean we all knew you were special, being the one in the prophecy and all, but this! This is simply fantastic." I didn't know what to say, so I smiled and took my seat next to Alex.

"So, busy morning, huh?" His eyes lowered. "Nice necklace. I thought you put that back in your dresser where you found it." I detected a hurt tone in his voice, like he thought I'd purposely kept this from him, which I had.

"Sorry, it was just so bizarre. I felt like the locket belonged to me, and that didn't make any sense at all. I wasn't sure you'd understand."

"Oh." He shoveled mac and cheese into his mouth.

"And then Abby stole the necklace from me while I was in the shower. She used that little key of hers and helped herself. Can you believe that?" I hoped by changing the subject to Abby, he'd forget I'd hidden this from him. I looked around for Abby. She wasn't in her usual seat next to Alex; in fact, she wasn't in the dining room at all. For a moment, I worried she was in my room stealing something as payback for taking my locket back, but I didn't have anything else worth stealing. Unless she wanted my push-up bra.

"Is that what was wrong? You seemed so riled up and angry at Abby when I brought you your food. I thought you were kind of stuck up or something. Like you thought you were better than her."

"What? No! I was upset about my locket."

"That makes a lot more sense. You didn't seem like the other girls here. You know, back-stabbing and catty."

"I'm not like that at all. I just didn't like her invading my private space. She threatened me, and then she stole my locket."

"She threatened you? About what?"

"You, actually. She thought I had a thing for you."

He put another forkful of mac and cheese in his mouth and said, "Do you?"

I couldn't help laughing. "Oh, yes. I think it's the fake cheese sauce spraying out of your mouth that I find so irresistible."

He swallowed, his cheeks turning red.

"Are we good?" I asked.

"Hold on, let me get another mouthful before I answer. I know you like that."

I smacked his shoulder. Yeah, we were good. And he was right. I did like all the weird things he did, like eating mac and cheese for every meal. With all the things going wrong in my life, Alex was the one thing that was right.

After lunch, I had to report to my first training session. I was excited, nervous, and a little terrified when I remembered Troy would be teaching.

"Hey." Alex jogged to catch up to me as I headed out to the backyard.

"Hey, what are you doing? You're going to be late for your own lesson."

"Nah, I talked to Victoria, and she said that since your powers are progressing so quickly, I should help you with your training."

"Really? But I thought Troy was the one who instructed the beginners?"

"Actually, he teaches all of us just at different times of the day. But he decided that Leticia and Randy aren't exactly on the same level as you. He'd have to go too slow for you in order to let them keep up. It's too late to switch you to the other group today-we already met this morning. So, Victoria said I should give you kind of a private lesson." He smiled and gently elbowed my arm.                       
       
           



       

"A private lesson? Did she really say that?"

He laughed. "Okay, not really, but she did ask me to help you. We won't be far from Troy and the others, but we'll be working on different skills."

"Does Troy know about this?" I didn't want to do anything to get on his bad side. The guy was seriously scary when he was angry. I couldn't erase the look he'd given Alex when we arrived from my mind. I didn't want to be on the receiving end of it.