‘You know, you don’t have to do anything to impress Ivy. She thinks you’re totally cool just the way you are.’ Olivia took a hesitant step forwards, wondering if she should give him a hug, but stopped herself. I’m not sure I’ve ever hugged Brendan.
She let her arms fall to her sides. She wasn’t sure how he’d react. As Olivia pulled back, she noticed something. Brendan’s neck and forearms were splotched all over with strange grey patches. Like some kind of weird zombie rash.
She remembered the horrible reaction she’d had to the Bloodbite Nettles she’d got tangled up in back in Transylvania. The vampire plant had made her skin red and bumpy and it itched ten times worse than any case of the chicken pox. She hoped Brendan wasn’t coming down with a weird variation of that. Maybe he misses Ivy so much he’s made himself lovesick – literally!
‘Brendan . . .’ Olivia said, not taking her eyes off the grey blotches. ‘Are you feeling OK?’
Brendan cracked his neck and wiggled his fingers, shaking out his arms. ‘Yeah, I feel fine.’ He paused. ‘How have you been, since Ivy left?’
‘Me? Well . . .’ Olivia chewed her lip. ‘You know.’
Brendan gave her a smile that was tinged with sadness. ‘Yeah, I know.’ The two of them gazed out across Franklin Grove. It just wasn’t the same without Ivy. Then Brendan cleared his throat. ‘Um, I like your . . . erm . . . outfit today, Olivia. Very, um, pretty.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Olivia asked. Brendan was nice and everything, but she didn’t think he’d ever noticed any outfit she’d put together until now. He looked at her hopefully. Uh-oh, she thought. I smell a rat.
‘That’s so sweet of you,’ she said, folding her arms and fixing on an overly bright smile. ‘What is it that you like, in particular?’ She swivelled her body from side to side, as though to give him a better view of the ensemble.
She tried not to laugh as two pink spots appeared on Brendan’s cheeks. He waved a hand in the direction of her tunic. ‘Um, the colour. It’s very . . . grey.’
‘Anything else?’ Olivia prompted.
‘And the . . . um . . . Your hair is . . .’ He gave a big sigh. ‘OK, you’ve rumbled me. I give in.’
‘So what’s the favour?’ Olivia said, laughing. ‘You know, the one you’re buttering me up for.’
Brendan lowered his head and peered out from behind his shaggy hair, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. ‘Well, see, there is one thing.’ Olivia knew it! ‘Ivy forgot about something when she decided to stay behind in Transylvania.’
‘She forgot something?’ Olivia repeated. ‘Like a toothbrush? Because I’ve seen the place and I’m pretty sure she’s all set. It’s like she’s going to school at the Ritz! They probably have a twenty-four hour concierge service and everything.’
‘No, nothing like that. Ivy, Sophia and I had made, um, plans,’ he said.
‘Plans?’ Olivia cocked her head.
‘Yeah, and they’re sort of the type of plans that need Ivy.’
‘OK . . .’ What kind of plans would the three vampire friends make? Blood-drinking? A coffin slumber party? A crawly feeling began to spread up the back of Olivia’s neck. She had a hunch that she wasn’t going to like where this was going.
Brendan sighed. ‘When I tell you, you’re going to freak out. It’s a pretty big favour . . .’
Uh-oh. Olivia felt another item being added to her to-do list – and if it was something that Brendan and ultra-goth Ivy had cooked up together, it was bound to be something that would take her totally outside of her comfort zone.
What was Brendan going to ask – and, more importantly, was Olivia ready to hear it?
Chapter Three
Transylvanian vampires might not suck blood any more, Ivy thought, but I’m pretty sure they’re about to suck the life right out of me. Petra was seated in the desk next to her, doodling bats in a new black notebook. The whole classroom was arranged like something out of a bad historical movie, with row after row of single desks and chairs. Ivy was dreading this class more than the beep-beep-beeping of her morning alarm clock. I don’t even understand why I have to be steeped in vampire mythology and etiquette, she thought, tapping her foot against the floor. She was a twenty-first-century girl, after all!
An uptight vampire sitting on Ivy’s other side kept playing with her pearls and it was driving Ivy batty.
‘Hey, where are all the boys?’ Ivy asked aloud, looking around at the other students.
No sooner had the question escaped her mouth than every girl around her burst out laughing, including Petra.
‘The boys?’ exclaimed the girl with the strand of pearls. ‘You thought we would have class with boys?’
Ivy shrank back. ‘Sort of?’
Petra leaned over her desk. ‘Have you forgotten? I told you when you first came to Wallachia that boys and girls don’t get to mix. We’re completely segregated! We’re not supposed to talk to them and we never get to have class together.’ She sighed. ‘The only time we come halfway close to mingling is Herbal Science and that’s because there’s only one greenhouse available to the entire student body.’
Ivy did remember now. When she’d visited the Academy to look around, a duel had broken out on the school fields and everyone had run out to watch. It had made Petra’s day because they had got to be with the boys for a while. But it had only made Ivy feel uncomfortable – and she felt the same now.
‘Wow, how third grade!’ she said. There are some things I still can’t believe about this place.
The room went quiet again as they waited for their teacher to arrive.
‘Pssssst!’ Petra poked Ivy’s arm with her pen. ‘Have you seen the Gauntlet yet?’ she asked.
‘No, who’s in it?’ Ivy was asking, when suddenly the door to the classroom was flung open. In flew a gigantic black bat, wings outstretched, with beady eyes and long, curved claws. Ivy ducked as it swooped over the heads of the class. Girls screamed and scrambled under desks, while others pinned their bodies against the classroom walls, wailing. Haven’t they seen a bat before? Ivy thought.
The small black mammal finally looped back to settle on the shoulder of a statuesque female vampire, who had slipped into the room unnoticed. She was wearing a mustard-coloured, ruffle-necked blouse tucked into a ballooning hoop skirt and her hair was slicked back into a ridiculously tight bun that pulled at the skin of her face.