Hidden (Hidden Series Book One) Read Online Free Page A

us, it was how to tell if a creature was
lying about being human. One drop of their blood over a flame.
Since witch was the most plausible explanation of my powers, my
blood would send purple smoke into the air. One flick of a match
and my life was over.
    It was far fetched. I knew that. Who here
would think to test the Spaz’s blood? But I couldn’t stop the panic
in my chest. Or it from rumbling in my stomach. Or it from raising
turkey and oranges to my throat. I ran with one hand covering my
knee, the other over my mouth. Fast. Spastic.
    “Seriously, she makes this too easy,” Sienna
shouted, loud enough that I heard her over the laughter.
    My stomach twisted again, and I jetted
through the doors just in time to make it to the bathroom on the
first floor. Then it came up. The puke and the tears. And the blood
from my knee smeared on the tile beneath me.
    I cleared the floor of my curse, the evil
that would cause my death if anyone ever held a flame to it. I tore
a line of tissue from the roll and dried my face, furious with
myself for crying. I would never live this moment down. Sienna and
Whitney and all those who seek to impress them would keep this
memory alive for the rest of our time here.
    Death. That was what being here was. Why did
I fear Lydia Shaw catching me if I was already dead? Why did I care
so much about living? I leaned my head against the toilet, rocking
myself, trying to erase the notion of not existing. Thoughts like
that, hopeless, dark thoughts directed at myself, felt like
drinking acid. A burning, bitter feeling that I couldn’t hang on to
for long.
    Sister Phyllis knocked on the open door of
the stall. “Leah, are you okay?” she asked.
    “Yes, Sister.” She took my word for it and
left me alone like every authority figure here did. I guessed as
long as I was okay , they didn’t have to do anything about
how I was treated here. And I was treated no better than the vomit
swirling around the flushing toilet.
    And I supposed I deserved that. But they
didn’t know why. They didn’t have a reason. They saw some helpless,
quiet girl. Someone who would never speak up, even when they
encouraged her to kill herself. Innocent. Defenseless.
    But I wasn’t. Nothing in me was good. Our
library had pictures of things like me with horns protruding from
their heads. That’s what I was, and every part of me wanted to own
it and punish them now. Burned to.
    I shuddered as that thought possessed me,
enraged me. My heart crashed in my chest. I couldn’t hear the
toilet anymore, and the bathroom walls blurred. I was no longer in
control. God couldn’t help me now. Or them.
    I opened my hand and allowed the fire to
form there, hovering over my palm, not burning me at all. Their
skin wouldn’t be so lucky. I made it shrink in my hand, hiding it
until the right moment. That way they wouldn’t have time to
run.
    I stalked into the hall, knowing that with
my distraction and her limp, Sister Phyllis hadn’t made it to the M
names. Sienna Martin would still be out there. So would Whitney
Nguyen.
    The part of me that wanted to be good, that
had fought and strained for years against this rage, stalled my
feet at the door for a moment. Long enough to notice the hairs
standing on my arm. Then I saw her, laughing and enjoying a soul
she didn’t deserve. I couldn’t hear the sound, that shrill cackle
that had nagged my ears for years, but I did hear the growl
rip from my throat.
    I moved closer, covered in mud, but as my
true self finally. I didn’t want to bother trying a spell. I wanted
to see my will move her bones. I wanted to feel the heat of the
flames coming off her body. She’d burn. She’d feel like me.
Tortured and dead.
    My feet were steady now, sure that I was
ready to misbehave. I lurked closer, and a bright light flashed in
the stretch of grass between us. An older woman was there in the
middle of it. Her hair was pure white and long, like it had never
been cut. She held her hand out to me, her