"You seem jumpy." Iris noted after Owen had jumped out of his chair when his classmates mentioned lighting fire-crackers during an after-party.
He knew she told him not to think about it, but all Owen could think about was the warmth and feeling of those golden flames licking his skin.
"Yeah, well, it's easier said than done to be calm in the situation we're in." Owen whispered to the girl. He watched as Iris opened her mouth only to take a small bite out of her sandwich. Do witches like sandwiches? Were there such things as Sand-witches? Seeing where his thoughts were going Owen looked away from the girl's lunch.
"Don't worry, I'll make sure things go according to plan. By the end of tonight, everything should come to a close." Iris murmured softly. Owen nodded slightly. He couldn't quite understand it, but he felt warmer when Iris wore the hood.
He was pushed out of his thoughts when he felt Iris stiffen next to him. He glanced at her curiously. She seemed to have paled drastically while staring at... Bernice. Last he knew, she and Bernice were getting along quite well, friends even.
Owen watched as Bernice sat across from Iris with a sly smile. Iris flashed her teeth in a strained smile.
Owen looked between the two of them curiously. They were smiling but the air was ripe in tensity. With a girl like Iris, he expected it but Bernice? She was always in a foul mood but she was never as bad as Iris.
"Nice to see you again, Abigail. Can't say I enjoyed yesterday with you." Bernice smiled at Iris as she tossed an apple between her hands. Iris slowly nodded her head as though she were agreeing with what she was thinking.
"I'm just going to ask, are you human?" Iris asked Bernice suddenly.
Owen stiffened next to her and turned to Bernice. He wasn't the only one, everyone at the table had heard Iris.
Bernice's smile widened as she said, "What do you think? Owen asked you first, now you ask me. I am human, as human as you."
Eyes turned to Iris as she stared at Bernice. Owen couldn't tell if the look in her eyes was of brutal murder or begrudging respect.
"So, you made a new friend?" Iris asked, diffusing the situation before it could turn dangerous. Bernice's smile dropped slowly as she explained, "An old one and a new one. An acquaintance knew her for over a decade, but I only just met her."
Iris tilted her head slightly as she looked Bernice up and down. Bernice grinned. Grinned. Bernice never grinned, at least from the short time Owen has known her. The seventeen-year-old almost always seemed to have a cloud of depression hovering over her.
"What's her name?" Iris asked, her voice deepening. Bernice looked up and sucked in a breath. Dropping her head, she sighed, "I swear if this goes against her plans. Her name was Iris." Iris? Then why was she making it a point to make Bernice leave?
Iris looked away from Bernice and muttered unheard words under her breath. Abigail was Iris but Bernice had only just met Iris and Iris was trying to get Bernice arrested, yet they were all still friends.
What was going on? Owen asked the question to Iris as she turned to Bernice. Iris whispered, her lips barely moving, "There's someone else posing as me. We'll talk later." Owen nodded as he listened to Bernice talk to the others at the table.
#########
"So what's going on?" Owen asked Iris as they walked down the hall, away from the cafeteria. Iris shook her head as she said, "Bernice is not who she says she is. Stay away from her. The imposter must have killed her and replaced her with one of her demon minions."
"But why Bernice?" Owen asked, dodging a swinging bag and almost running into a moving elbow. He didn't exactly miss the elbow.
"You took her on a date. I guess they assumed that that meant she was close to you." Iris shrugged as she move fluidly through the hallway crowd. People just parted for her naturally. Owen shook his head as he continued to gracelessly follow her.
"Look, the dance is tomorrow. We could go together and talk even more." Iris told Owen. He stopped in the middle of the hallway, a mistake since the girl behind him ran into him.
He quickly apologized before he looked back to Iris to find her gone. It was very unlikely that she would ever think to wait for him, even for just a brief second. It just wasn't Iris.
#########
She watched them through the windows of the school as they walked through the hallways, whispering quietly to each other. She narrowed her eyes as the girl, Abigail, looked out one of the windows and noticed her. She growled as Abigail smiled at her and wrapped an arm around the boy's shoulders.
The hooded girl bared her teeth at the smug green-eyed girl. The smile only grew. She knew she had the upper hand so long as the boy was within arms' reach of her.
The hooded girl had to wonder what would happen if the roles were switched. If she were to be in Abigail's place, she would not be making it obvious that she was aware of a spy. Still, the hooded figure knew that it was smarter to just make the spy aware of her awareness. It would do neither good if they were to fight in daylight. She decided to back off.
Getting up and stretching felt orgasmic for her. She doubted the demon she sent was doing her job correctly. She was rather vague in her orders.
She knew better than that. What was getting into her? Her old teacher would be so disappointed in her. Beyond that, the job was taking too long. She should have taken the boy back by now but here she was, on a roof, glaring through the windows of a classroom with nothing better to do than watch while she got an uneven tan on her hands, since she bothered to cover everything but them.
She sighed as she lowered herself off the roof, and back onto the ground and into the cool shade beneath the overhang of the roof. Looking around, she pulled down the silk mask that covered the lower half of her face.
With the sudden amount of fresh, somewhat cool, air, the girl took in a deep breath. The mask was the very reason why she preferred to work in the night rather than the day, especially one as muggy as this one.
Walking around the alley, she found the extra pair of clothes she had kept next to a clean dumpster, compared to the others that oozed a liquid that not even the ancient girl could place.
Pulling off the jacket and the rest of her clothing, she felt chills go up her spine. She should have left the mask on.
"I see that you enjoy public indecency." A male voice chuckled lowly as he walked around her. The girl just shrugged as though nothing bothered her, not even a man she barely knew watching her change although it was incredibly disturbing.
"Why do you want to take the boy?" He asked, his voice somehow deepening. She shrugged the question away as she shrugged on a tank-top.
"I asked you a question." He was getting very annoyed with her silence. She was not going to give him any information.
He scoffed, knowing the same thing she already knew: he couldn't hurt her. There was no use pushing a matter if he was never going to get what he wanted from it.
She pulled on a pair of shorts and walked out the alley, the man nowhere to be seen.
#########
"What the hell are you saying?" Josephine shouted at Iris. She flinched away from the water she was using to talk to the woman.
Looking back into the lake, Iris shrugged and said, "Should've chosen someone better. She actually walked into a dark alley without care or thought of who or what could have been in there. Maybe if you trained them better, things like this wouldn't happen."
Josephine looked absolutely livid with Iris's words.
"Why do you think I had you there? What were you doing when all of that was happening?" Josephine snarled at Iris.
Iris looked around, hoping that there would be some sort of disaster or reason for why she would delay in answering the question. Clearing her throat, Iris looked back at the water.
"The boy brought suspicion upon April. He followed her, questioned her. Hell, he even thought she was a demon! If he hadn't done such a thing, they wouldn't have noticed her."
"Don't blame the boy for your actions and the lack-there-of. April's death was your fault. Do they know who she is, what she is, where she came from?"
"No. I doubt they knew she was a witch. I also had her change her name to Bernice for safety. She wasn't killed by humans, she was killed by a demon, by that damned she-devil that I met earlier, I'm sure." Iris explained. Josephine still looked ready to rip Iris's arms off.
"What were you doing when this happened?" Josephine grunted lowly. Iris sighed and said, "I was too late."
"I know you were too late! I'm asking where you were!" Josephine out-right screamed at her. Iris looked away.
"I was sleeping. April and I had an agreement that she would work in the day and I would work in the night. The she-devil killed April just before dusk. I'm sorry." Iris murmured.
She hated it. She hated that while a child was being tormented and killed, she was asleep in a five-star hotel. She was snuggled up and warm while a child died. It was sick and wrong. If she had bucked up, she would have gotten there in time or maybe-
"Stop it. I lost April, I'm not going to lose the boy because your head's loose. Get going, the sun's going down and I want you back here with the boy by morning." Josephine snapped and was gone. Iris slouched next to the lake. She watched as the ripples stilled into the calm water. She closed her eyes and listened to the sounds of a busy city.
She heard men shout, she heard women scream. She heard dogs bark and cats hiss. Opening her eyes again Iris thought to herself, "This truly is a wretched city."