Love and Darkness (The Cause Book 2) Read Online Free Page A

.  In desperation, Del screamed at herself, inside, for quiet.  Screamed for deliverance from her attacker.
    Inside herself, inside her panic and desperation, Del sensed something new.  Something akin to a lever, or a dial, on the juice itself.  A way to use the juice directly, to do what needed doing.  “Burn juice,” a voice murmured through Del’s raw throat.  With an extra bit of juice, she could quiet the thoughts.
    Juice she had little of now.  Her instincts forbid its use.
    Instincts be damned.  Juice wasn’t everything.  In her mind, Del twisted the dial, and in her mental hands, she metasensed power.
    “Quiet!”
    Del visualized the quiet as still pools of water and, with the juice, built the pools in her mind.  She became the quiet pools, and the thoughts and voices vanished.
    The woman continued to run at her, to deal her a final fatal blow.  The power of the juice had other uses, Del realized, and she willed the juice into her muscles.  Del stood, moving quicker than before, and jumped out of the way.  Her opponent hit the side of the battle pit, attacking the wall as she meant to attack Del.  She fell back in agony.  Del twisted the mental dial back to its previous position before she exhausted her juice.  In her quiet pools, she sensed only a few points of juice remained before she went into withdrawal.
    The voices didn’t return.  Her broken bones and dislocated shoulder didn’t pain her.  The pain sunk out of sight in her quiet pools.  Only a single self remained.
    Del turned to Ma’am Keaton, and nodded.  Speech was unnecessary.  Ma’am Keaton nodded back, leapt to Del’s opponent, and kicked her.
    “Ma’am!” the woman said, as she landed on the far side of the pit.
    “Congratulations, Arm Kent,” Ma’am Keaton said.
    Arm Kent was Del’s former opponent’s name, now.  The Arm, no longer Student Kent, stood, looked at Del, and then at Ma’am Keaton.  She bowed in full, touching her head to the ground.  “Ma’am,” Kent said.
    “Your official graduation ceremony is tomorrow evening, at seven.  I expect you to be fully presentable.”
    “Yes, ma’am,” Kent said.  She stood, backed three steps away from Ma’am Keaton, bowed again, and then nonchalantly climbed the rusty ladder out of the pit.  Del sensed the fierce pride in Arm Kent, pride over her success at yanking Del out of her madness.
    Ma’am Keaton turned to Del.  “Juice count?”
    “93, ma’am.”  Dangerously low, and painful.  Del’s voice echoed through her quiet pools and vanished alone, raising no other voices in return.
    “Huh.”  Ma’am Keaton looked Del over for quite a long time, unreadable as always.  “This is your last free Transform, Del,” Keaton said.  “Next time, you hunt.”
    “Yes, ma’am.”
    The thoughts and voices still did not return.
     
    ---
     
    “Would you like to explain your hunt to me?” Ma’am Billington said.
    The passionate heat of the post-kill lust flooding Del’s body vanished into her quiet pools, as did all distractions since her discovery of the quiet pools a week and a half ago.  Her left arm ached from the still-healing break, but her other injuries had healed.  Nothing disturbed the quiet peace of her mind.
    They returned to the school past cast-iron fences hiding expensive homes.  Del wondered why Ma’am Billington had shadowed her on her first hunt.  She assumed she would succeed or fail on her own.
    “Ma’am, I located my assigned territory, found a Transform, approached him in his car, persuaded him to drive me to a secluded location, took him, and then drove his remains to the student graveyard.  I then entertained myself for the allowed eight hours.”  Del paused, savoring the stillness in her mind.  So quiet, so controlled.  “Did I do anything wrong, ma’am?”
    Ma’am Billington shook her head and stopped by the cast-iron fence hiding the extensive grounds of Ma’am Keaton’s Arm school.  “Follow your