Page 14 of The Blackened Blade

She struggles to adjust her glasses as she gazes toward me. When she finishes fixing them, her eyes scan down my hair to my uniform. Her nose scrunches slightly, a look of pity in her eyes as she shakes her head.

“You can take the rest of the class off and clean up Micai. I’ll give notes from this lesson to another student to pass on later.” She gives me a nod and a small pat on my uninjured shoulder before heading into the class.

This teacher was either completely naive or oblivious. I wouldn’t be getting any notes, but I could still appreciate the reprieve she was giving me. I didn’t want to give those assholes the satisfaction of me walking in there covered in whatever this crap was.

Mrs. Fleur was the Music of the Arts teacher, and from what I remember she was always very messy and unorganised, but had more warmth to her than the rest of the faculty. She never treated me badly anyway.

I make my way down the stairway and out of the main building, heading toward the girls dormitory.

I needed a hot shower and fast, the sickly smell and spoiled liquid becoming sticky against my skin.

Days like these were tame compared to what they threw at me in my second year,dulleven if I remember correctly.Not that any of that could hold a candle to what I’d survived in The Facility.

Either way, one thing was for sure, I wasn’t as strong as I needed to be to handle all the malice and attacks that were going to be directed at me.

And I had to be stronger, so I could not only stop the hit coming toward me, but break the hand throwing it.

Students here needed to know I wouldn’t take anything lying down anymore.

There were consequences for touching me.

And sooner or later, I would have them all pay in full.

CHAPTER4

Imake my way under the flowing heat, the warm water pouring down my face and purifying me of the sickly smell and chunks of rotten liquid, one I now recognize as spoiled chocolate milk.

I had peeled off my soaked and ruined uniform the moment I reached my room and found the sticky substance stuck to my neck and chest.

I stand below the gentle spray, a small sting on my face with the water's contact reminds me of the boy from earlier, and the small cut there.

Who was he? Why hadn’t I ever seen him before, especially if everyone was so terrified of him?

Was I that immersed in my own miserable thoughts that I didn’t see anyone else?

I slide my hands down my face and hair, trying to wash away any remaining residue and all the annoyance from this morning with it.

A sharp pain slices through my shoulder with the motion.

I rub a hand along my shoulder and down my arm, my fingertips sliding gently across the soft and smooth skin there, as a strange feeling bubbles up from deep inside me.

There were really no scars anymore.

No evidence or proof that I had suffered for more than half a decade in what could only be described as hell on earth.

Without the shackles on me, I could heal, but with it, it could take days to heal wounds or bigger cuts, with broken or fractured bones never mending properly.

It was also why I was so severely scarred. Why every part of my body held hideous scars and disfigured lines of skin from my neck to my toes.

I hated how I looked, trying and failing to cover as much of myself as I could.

Each scar would remind me of what the Facility had done and what they were taking from me. That even if by some miracle I got out of there, I would always be reminded of my torment by my own body…that I could never escape what had happened.

My eyes wander down my arms and chest toward my legs and feet, as a small warm trickle falls down my cheeks and joins the flow of water to the drain.

They were gone.

My skin was soft, young and unblemished. Unmarked or tainted by years of torment and pain.

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