Free Blood Fever: The watchers by Verónica Wolff Page A

So instead I’d get a shooter of refrigerated blood. Maybe sneak a second one. Anything to take the edge off.
    I steeled myself, waiting with gritted teeth while Mei-Ling pulled on her uniform.
    This wasn’t
real
. This was the bond ruling my body. He wasn’t my boyfriend. This wasn’t real attraction. It was a chemical reaction. I’d gotten hooked on a drug and was detoxing. My drug was Carden.
    I almost knocked on Emma’s door as we passed it, but the silence on the other side told me to leave her alone. Maybe she was showering. Maybe she’d been up late and was sleeping in. Maybe she’d already left. I had no clue. I was psyched for her and her relationship with Yasuo, but it had also inserted the smallest, vaguest bit of distance between us.
    It was just as well—Emma would see that something was wrong with me, and I didn’t have the energy to lie.
    Mei-Ling and I were walking down the path toward the dining hall when I saw her.
Masha.
And she had two of her Guidon pals with her.
    “Oh shhhh-sugar.” I didn’t even get the pleasure of a real curse—I dared not while I was outside and vampire ears could be listening.
    I panted a few quick breaths.
Focus
. I needed focus.
    “What is it?” Mei asked, her eyes uncharacteristically bright.The girl might’ve been quiet, but at least she had good instincts when it came to danger.
    I didn’t have time to answer. We’d been spotted. “Acari Drew,” Masha purred. “Who’s your little friend?”
    I sensed Mei standing tall next to me.
Good.
    “Mei-Ling Ho,” she announced in a clear voice.
    Speaking openly to a Guidon.
Bad.
    Masha’s face lit as she glommed on to the name instantly. “Hohhh.” She walked a circle around her. “Ho, ho, ho. You having fun…
ho
?” Her friends snorted and snickered.
    Oh crap…Here we go.
    But Mei didn’t respond. It struck me that she must’ve heard that joke a million times growing up. Did she even register the taunts? Did she care? Either way, her nonresponse riled the older girls.
    Masha stalked up from behind, one hand stroking the bullwhip she kept looped at her hip. She leaned close to Mei’s ear and said in a menacing whisper, “Would you like to play, little ho?”
    A dump of adrenaline cleared my mind, and I reveled in it. I pushed away my hunger, but I could almost sense it in the back of my mind, like a Pandora’s box, waiting for me.
    I shifted my weight, parting my legs into a more solid stance. It was a subtle move, not so much that the Guidons would notice, but just enough to brace myself. At five two, I didn’t have as much weight behind me as the other girls and I liked to take extra precautions.
    I flexed my calf, feeling the leather boot pull. My stars were strapped in there. Finally, I’d found focus. Like a battle calm.
    But wait. I glanced at Mei. Where was her weapon? Thisdamned headache—I hadn’t been thinking properly. I’d been so preoccupied, I’d forgotten to ask what her weapon even was.
    “She’s a
ho
,” one of the Guidons said with a snorty little laugh. She was rewarded by a bunch of snorty little laughs from her friends and so she added in a lower tone of voice, “Ho, ho, ho.”
    What was this, sixth grade?
    But then my roommate shocked me—shocked me more than I think I’ve ever been shocked.
    Mei-Ling turned to me and in a cold, clinical voice asked, “Does she have a tic? She keeps repeating my name.”
    I momentarily forgot my chattering teeth and felt my eyes bug out of my head instead.
    The Guidon stepped forward. Her cheeks were blotchy with outrage. “What did she say?”
    I’d been wondering the same thing. I opened my mouth to speak, but had no clue how to de-escalate.
    But then Mei piped up again, in a tone so flat she might’ve been discussing a specimen in a lab. “There are disorders that result in repetitive speech. You kept repeating,
Ho, ho, ho, ho
. I was wondering if maybe you had that problem.”
    I almost laughed. I was
dying
to let loose a