Wordlessly, she added compulsion magic to her list of things she wasn’t planning to tell anyone she could do. It was an ever-growing list.
No wonder her deception and bluff kept going up like crazy.
Chapter Twenty-Seven – Accounting
It was almost an hour later before she finally felt well enough to get up. She’d started feeding herself about half an hour after help had arrived, and the aching pain had gradually diminished. She’d had Jessica bring in a bucket of water, though she hadn’t told her what it was for. When she eventually felt full and stopped eating, Mike sent the girls out of the room. He sat down beside her, regarding her sternly, “Do you realize how close you came to dying?”
Jade stared at her hands, silently wringing them before she finally peeked up, meeting his eyes as she nodded. “I do. It won’t happen again. I’m aware of what went wrong, and I’ll take precautions against it in the future. Thank you for your help though. I don’t think I’d have made it if you hadn’t come so quickly.”
He sighed, realizing she wasn’t really deterred, just more cautious. “You’re welcome. Just be careful. I know you want to get stronger quickly, but you have time. You have your whole life in front of you here.”
She stared at him blankly for a moment. Now she was doing it too! Still, she had to think about it. Yesterday had been awesome, but it had made her wary. She should probably slow down. What she’d done the previous two nights had ended without a problem, so she’d just scale back to that again. She’d just been too excited after meeting all those professors. Finally, she nodded. “I really will be more careful. I’m not a huge fan of almost-dying.” Even though technically, she’d been living in that state for most of her life. Which, she supposed, made her an authority on not liking it.
Seeming appeased, Mike patted her on the shoulder and ordered, “Very good. Take care of yourself, you hear? And you should probably go downstairs soon. Several fairly important people were arriving when I did, and they’ve been waiting very patiently downstairs for you.” She nodded and he left, instructing Jessica to wait outside in case she needed help.
Using the bucket of water, she quickly magicked it to get herself clean. She had been covered in cold sweat from the pain, so cleaning off felt heavenly. She quickly got dressed, plaiting her hair into a side braid that had been dubbed the Katniss braid by most of her generation. Opening the door, she saw a noticeably relieved Jessica. She smiled warily and began, “Thanks for your help. I’m good now; I just overdid it.”
Jessica shook her head, saying softly, “You almost died.”
Jade sighed. “Yeah, but it was just a stupid mistake on my part. It won’t happen again.”
Jessica pursed her lips. “See that it doesn’t! You were so pale, and you were barely breathing. It was worse than when you first arrived!” Jade winced. Okay, so that was pretty bad. Jessica was hovering over her like a mother hen as she walked down the stairs, only for her to stop dead when she saw a full common room. There seemed to be two separated groups. One consisted of curious students who’d stuck around for the drama and whom she’d never spoken to.
Disliking that she’d become a public spectacle, she stared at that half of the room and asked sardonically, one brow raised, “What? You people don’t have somewhere better to be right now? Shoo. I’m not your entertainment.” Okay, so she probably could have phrased that more politely, but she didn’t like being on display and she’d just almost died. They took one look at her menacing smirk, flashed over to the other half of the room, who were displaying some glares upon realizing that they were there out of curiosity and not concern, and then they hastily started beating a quick retreat. There were only about ten of them, and they quickly dispersed.
Which of course, left her with the other half of the room. Now that the others were gone, she was faced with the full wrath of friends who’d been worried for her. The full group included Raphael, Kaylee, and Will; to her surprise, Jackson, Adam, and Evan were there as well, with a conspicuously missing Britney. She at least understood why they were there. They probably hadn’t left for the day yet when Kaylee found her. What she couldn’t explain was why Camille, Tisha, Eric, Stephen, Lucas, and even Damian were there. All she was missing were Sharon, Tina, Elisa, and Jarom. Otherwise, most of the people she’d spent any amount of time with for her first three days here were gathered in one room.
And yet, they all had one other thing in common right now: they were glaring bloody murder at the girl who’d almost died. She smiled lightly, and trying to break the tense silence, shrugged and chirped as she held her hands out placatingly, “Surprise! I’m alive!”
Unsurprisingly, the first one who broke her indignant glare was Tisha, who bounced over and threw her arms around Jade. “Oh my gosh, I’ll kill you if you ever do that to us again!”
Jade laughed, hugging her back as she quipped, “Doesn’t killing me defeat the purpose?”
“Don’t you sass me!” Tisha pouted back.
Camille pulled Tisha off of Jade before she could smother her with affection and was observing Jade judiciously. Finally, she nodded in satisfaction and proclaimed, “Good, you do look better. Now sit down and tell us what actually happened.” She squeezed Jade’s arm, a surprised spark flitting across her face when she felt a little toned muscle. It wasn’t much, but she had finally normalized and was even making her way towards slim, but fit. Her bust had also grown another size, much to her satisfaction.
Camille literally stood over her until she sat down, at which point Kaylee brought her more food. Well, she supplied everyone else with some as they sat down around her as well, but still. Jade absently played with the food in front of her, trying to figure out the best way to try and explain. She glanced around at those who were supporting her, but her eyes lingered on Jackson, Adam, and Evan.
Jackson noticed her gaze, and he stopped Adam and Evan from sitting down. He walked over, patting Jade lightly on the shoulder as he remarked, “I’m glad you’re doing better, but we have a few things to take care of, so we’ll just be heading out. We’ll see you later?”
She nodded and smiled gratefully. “Thank you. Have a wonderful rest of your day!” Jackson nodded and smiled, then led the baffled duo out with him. Everyone seemed to have realized that what she was about to say was something she didn’t want shared around and seemed a little gratified that they’d been included. She felt a little bad chasing Jackson off now, but that could always be remedied later.
Eventually, she spoke softly, “You all know I’m a traveler, and I’ve been given the gift called accelerated growth. What you don’t know is that I have some control over it. I can choose to accelerate certain skills I’ve come into contact with. The process, as you might have guessed, is somewhat painful and requires a lot of energy, so I’ve been choosing to do it at night so that when I pass out from pain, it’s in my own bed.”
She paused, scanning those around her and trying to gauge their reactions, but no one said anything. Finally, she smiled and shrugged. “Last night, I sort of bit off more than I could chew because it gave me a bunch of new options to learn. So I kinda chose to learn all of them.” She stared guiltily at her plate, and then realizing that she had room in her stomach and began to eat, since that was the extent of what she was planning to explain.
Kaylee marveled in awe, “Good heavens, I put it in front of you because I didn’t want to leave you out, but I never actually thought you could fit anything more in you…”