When Adrianna reached the academy, it was deserted. Being a holiday, she didn't expect anything other than that. She walked to the administrative block and her thoughts were still tangled. She wondered if she should complain about Shay. After all she had taken care of it. After the finals, there was another competition, which would be held between the students in third and fourth place in order to get the winner for bronze medal. That meant that Shay would be fighting with the student whom Lile had defeated.
As she was walking, she noticed a wizard who was standing on the corner of the garden that was in front of the administrative block. She narrowed her eyes because she thought she had seen him somewhere. She stared at him for sometime as he looked away and in fact even walked away from there. Adrianna pursed her lips and reprimanded herself for looking at people suspiciously all the time. She stepped in the block and found a few professors walking in and out of it.
The administrative block was one of the most beautiful buildings she had ever seen. The floors were made from marble. Marble pillars rose on the sides, which supported the ceiling. The ceiling from where large chandeliers were hanging, had numerous flower motifs so delicately and intricately carved that the craftsmen must have lost their vision after work. The walls of the rooms were made from white tiles each of which had miniature paintings. As she walked she could help admiring the beautiful vine plants that had adorned the marble pillars with roses.
Professor Coral was also there. She was walking out when Adrianna stepped in. "Oh hello there Adrianna!" she greeted her with excitement.
Adrianna greeted her back. "Good afternoon Professor Coral."
"How come the finalist is here on a holiday? You should rest at home. Tomorrow is a big day," said Coral with a smile.
Adrianna smiled back and said, "Umm… actually I am here to lodge a complaint against Shay."
"Regarding what?" asked Coral with a frown on her face.
"He went against a rule."
"Which rule?"
"He casted the spell 'Ponos Maxima'," replied Adrianna.
"Hmm…" Coral's facial expressions became serious. "Come with me," she said and walked towards Professor Ziu's chamber. Adrianna followed her.
Suddenly as they were crossing the various rooms, Adrianna picked Shay's voice and stopped. "What happened Adrianna?" asked Coral when she walked a few steps further and found that Adrianna had stopped following her. She went back to her.
Being a werewolf, her sense of hearing was much more than any witch, wizard or human. She kept her finger on her lips and motioned her to follow her to the source of the voice. Shay was speaking to someone she had heard before but that person was speaking in whispers. So she couldn't make it out that nicely. Along with Professor Coral, Adrianna tiptoed to the rooms on the left of the alley. She stopped after covering three rooms. The voices were coming from the fourth room on the left.
"I tried to kill her by going against the rules. What else do you want?" said Shay with exasperation is his tone.
While Adrianna could listen to the people inside, Coral was still confused. "What is it?" she whispered.
Once again Adrianna signaled her to stay quiet.
"If you were going against the rules, you should have fully gone against them. Why did you leave even a small route for her to escape? You should have casted more death spells!" whispered the person whom Shay was talking to.
"If I had done that, I would have got noticed and they would have disqualified me immediately. I had to do it slowly and in a way that none of them would have understood. Do you take me for a fool who is going to listen to you and follow you blindly?" shouted Shay.
There was a pause.
"Arghhhh!" shouted Shay suddenly. "Stop it!" he was in immense pain.
"No one talks to me like that," the man whispered back. "You have lost a golden chance. Our only hope is Lile. She is a strong witch and we are sure that she is going to give Adrianna the worst time of her life!"
Shay stayed quiet.
Adrianna was shocked - Lile! Before she could think of anything else, she heard more.
"You will have to face the punishment for not being able to follow the orders of the leader," whispered the man.
"What punishment?" fear evident in his voice.
"There is only one punishment for such failures and that is death. We cannot leave any traces behind," said the man in a slightly raised voice.
"Ahhhhh! Stop! Stop!" shouted Shay wincing in pain.
"Cy!" Adrianna spoke aloud.
Coral heard her and she was shocked. "What?" she asked as her skin was lined with goose bumps. She saw stunned face of Adrianna and looked at the door. Adrianna pushed it open hurriedly to catch Cy. As soon as the door opened, they only saw a wizard's hands being sucked in a vortex. "Who was here?" demanded Coral.
Shay was sitting on a chair with his hands and legs tied with a white light. He was profusely bleeding from mouth, nose and ears.
Adrianna immediately removed those white lights from around him and Shay slumped in front. Coral came to him. She created a portal for them to walk to the infirmary. Two men walked inside and they picked Shay. The two ladies followed them inside the infirmary.
When the healer saw his condition, he was shocked. "Who casted the death spell on him? If you hadn't rescued him, he would have died by now?"
Adrianna said, "We have to meet the principle of the academy now," and she held Coral's hand to get sucked in a vortex.
As they walked towards his chamber, Adrianna asked, "How did Cy get into the academy? What kind of security do we have here?"
Coral was deep in her thoughts. Being appointed from the ministry, she was really finding it odd that didn't come to know anything about the loophole in the security. She had to report it to Isidorus immediately.
When they reached Professor Ziu's room, they found that the door was open. They went inside and saw that he was talking to other professors. All of them stopped talking and looked at the two of them. There was some blood on Adrianna's clothes. Ziu immediately got up from his place and went to her, "Adrianna, did you get injured? This blood? Are you okay?" He was panicky.
Adrianna looked at him with wide eyes and he felt like cupping her cheeks with his hands. He waited for her to say something otherwise he felt he was being drawn by her to kiss her.
"Someone tried to kill Shay," said Adrianna breaking his thoughts.
Everyone in the room was stunned.
"We have just admitted him to the infirmary," said Coral.
Professor Ziu's facial expression became stern. "Explain," he said.
Adrianna and Coral looked at all the professors out there. Ziu asked them to leave. Once everyone had left, Adrianna started speaking. Suddenly she remembered that the wizard that she saw in the garden was Cy's man that she had seen in the battle along with him. She explained everything in detail.
After she had told everything to him, his first question was, "Why are you here?"