Chapter 17: Suffering Colored in Scarlet (Elly)

Elly was having a crummy day. That was nothing new, but today started bad, and was only going to get worse. In Physical Training today they would be practicing with swords. Elly had never held a sword in her life. Whoever she was paired with would probably beat her black and blue by accident. Or if it was Sabine, just for fun.

But those worries were for the future. She had plenty of problems right now, like her test scores. There had been a surprise practice quiz in Intro to History and Magic Law. Professor Reycom’s tests were difficult, and with her limited knowledge she’d gotten only three questions right.

Maybe lunch would take her mind off of things…

“Hey, Elly,” Blake called out to her as she stood up, and she nearly fell over.

“B-Blake!” Elly gasped, turning to him. He never talked to her, or anybody! “Um, yeah?”

“That test was hard, wasn’t it? I barely got any of them right. What about you?”

“M-Me? Um… Not… not well…”

“Oh, I see,” Blake said, his face softening.

Elly was he could make an expression like that.

She took a quick look around. Wendy and Melody had already left, and the only people still in the room were Audrey, who was reviewing her answers, and Chloe, doing what Chloe always did, sleep. So… it was safe to talk.

“Why… why do you ask?”

“Oh, nothing.” Blake shrugged. “I’ve just been studying with Reed Rivers over the last few days… and she’s been helping me a lot. And since you looked like you were going to throw up while you were taking that test…”

Elly shrunk back and lowered her head, hiding behind her bangs. She… she had been that bad?!

“So I was wondering if, um… you’d like to join us?”

The way he stumbled over his words was a familiar sight to Elly. She could tell he wasn’t used to asking stuff like this.

“I, um… I was gonna study with my roommates, can… can they come too? Wendy and Melody?” Elly asked hopefully.

He winced.

“Sorry, I just… I’m not good around a lot of people, so…”

“Oh…” Elly quickly looked down again. “Sorry, I didn’t want to presume…”

That was a downer, she really wanted to study with Reed! But could she really just break a study session with her friends? What would they think of her? They’d call her a liar and whisper about her behind her back and then treat her just like everybody else and not want to be her friends and pick on her and-and-and-

Elly’s brain began to spin in circles. Stop it, you’re getting too caught up! Wendy and Melody are your friends, they wouldn’t do that!

“If… it’s okay, I’d like to,” she panted, giving Blake a shaky smile. A chance to study with her idol, her friends would understand.

“Okay, well, uh, meet outside the dining hall, after closing, we’ll see you there, then,” Blake mumbled out.

He left quickly after and Elly composed herself, straightening out her thoughts. Finally ready to go, she headed out of the classroom-

And ran right into Sabine Scarlet!

Elly froze under the glare of cruel green eyes and began to shake. Oh, no, I thought they had already left! Were… were they waiting for me!?

“Hey, aren’t you going to apologize?” Sabine snapped, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

“A-A-Apologize?” Elly felt a desperate need to get as far away from the redhead as possible. But her legs refused to listen!

“Yeah, say you’re sorry for bumping into me.” Sabine shoved Elly against the wall, making her drop her bag.

“That was really rude. What, do you knife-ears not know to look where you’re going?”

“You really should apologize.” Mindy nodded in agreement with Sabine. Jasmine said nothing, looming over Elly like a statue with her golden eyes affixed in a cold stare.

“I-I-I-I…”

“You-You-You-You what?” Sabine mimicked her with a mocking tone, stepping in closer. “Got something to say?”

“I’m sorry…” Elly whimpered, looking down and squeezing her eyes shut. She hoped they would just go away. She built a barrier in her mind to block out the girl’s words, curling up behind it. Maybe if she waited long enough, Sabine would leave her-

“Sorry for what?!” Sabine demanded, slapping the wall beside Elly’s head. Her flimsy barrier shattered like glass and she jumped.

“S-S-S-Sorry for b-bumping into you!”

Sabine’s lips curled into a smile, but her eyes were still cruel.

“No no, what else are you sorry for?” She leaned in so close Elly could smell her expensive perfume. The other girls circled closer as well.

“I-I don’t know!” Elly wailed. She’d say anything to make them go away!

“What, are you stupid? Oh, or maybe you’re not really sorry at all, are you? You’re just messing with me, is that it?”

“I’m really *hic* sorry!”

Elly squeezed her eyes shut, desperately fighting away the tears. Why. Why was it always her? Every day, it was always her. You know why, a cold voice in her heart reminded her. Because you deserve it. Because you’re pathetic.

“Are you crying right now? How pathetic,” Sabine echoed her thoughts.

Elly just blubbered and nodded.

“Sabine, don’t you think that’s enough?” Mindy asked. Elly peeked out and saw the wary look on the blonde’s face.

“We still need to talk to Eve about that studying thing, right?”

“Well, I don’t know,” Sabine’s voice was the scariest kind of playful. She knocked Elly’s hood off and began tugging on her ears. “We can leave her alone, after she apologizes. It’s for her own good, after all. Knife-ears like her need to understand how we humans do things. It’s for the good of our whole cohort that she learns what she did was wrong, and says she’s sorry!” She emphasized that last word with a sharp yank that made Elly wail.

“I’m sorry! Whatever I did I’m sorry!”

“Say you’re sorry for running into me.” Sabine’s voice almost gentle. Like she was encouraging Elly to apologize for her sake. But Elly could hear her anger.

“I’m sorry for running into you…”

“Good, good,” Sabine grinned, patting Elly on the cheek. “Now, say you’re sorry for not looking where you were going.”

“I’b sowwie for nod looging where I’b goink,” she blubbered.

“See? Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?” Sabine smiled, wiping away Elly’s tears with her fingers. The cruelty in her eyes and her sickeningly sweet voice terrified Elly. She was going to start crying all over again.

“Now then, how can we make sure that this won’t happen again?”

“Wh-What?”

“I said,” Sabine growled, grabbing Elly’s bangs and yanking them out of her face, “how can we make sure that this won’t happen again? I don’t want you running into me and getting me hurt because you knife-ears can’t see where you’re going. So how do we make sure that you’ve learned your lesson?”

Sabine held Elly’s bangs up with one hand and tapped her cheek thoughtfully with the other. Then her lips curled into a smile that made Elly shiver.

“I know!” She sang. “Mindy, can you get the scissors out of my bag in the classroom, please? Let’s get rid of these ugly bangs so she can see where she’s going next time!”

“Oh, man, that’s such a good idea!” Mindy gasped, rushing into the classroom.

Elly felt her heart stop for a second, before it began pounding again, rapidly. Sabine was coming after her with scissors? That was so much worse than anything she’d done before, until now she’d settled for name calling and insults, and the occasional shove or threat. She wanted to cry for help, but her voice wouldn’t come out. Even if she did manage to scream, who would come help someone like her? Who would stand up to Sabine Scarlet over someone like her?!

Sabine continued to explain her plans. Elly’s scalp burned as Sabine tugged on her hair harder and harder.

“So here’s what I was thinking, after we take care of these bangs, I should help you with the rest of your hair,” Sabine mused, talking about ripping up Elly’s hair with the casualness of discussing dinner plans. “Let’s cut it up aaaaaalll nice and pretty, so that boyfriend of yours really likes it! Wouldn’t that be nice?”

Boyfriend? Elly didn’t have a boyfriend. The word “boyfriend” was about as far from Elly’s dictionary as possible.

“I-I don’t have a-“

“I bet Blake would just love to see the new you, don’t you think?” Sabine snarled. “You knife-ears want to look your best, right? So you can seduce humans into your beds?”

Sabine’s eyes were the nastiest Elly had ever seen her. Blake? She thought Blake was her boyfriend? That’s why she was doing this? Elly didn’t even care, she just prayed the redhead would stop with her hair and not move on to other places when she was done.

She closed her eyes and resigned herself to her fate as the she heard the footsteps.

“Perfect, Mindy, let’s get this little knife-ear slut all- gah!” Sabine gasped in shock and let Elly go, startling her.

She took another peek, and saw that Mindy had not returned alone. The tan girl stared contritely at the ground, cowering behind Audrey Angelique. The silver-haired beauty’s austere features were twisted into a cold glare, and she had a look in her eye that Elly recognized well.

Disgust.

But for once in her life, it wasn’t aimed at her. She at Sabine and Jasmine, and the girls shrank away from Elly.

“What’s going on here?” Audrey’s stern voice was like an angry professor.

“N-Nothing,” Sabine snapped, quickly regaining her composure. She fixed her face into a glare that matched Audrey’s, indignantly crossing her eyes. “We were just giving Elly some advice, that’s all. Some tips to help her open up to the class more and keep her from making any mistakes. It’s not a big deal.”

“Is that right?” Audrey said, narrowing her eyes.

“Yeah, it is! And it’s none of your business! Ask her yourself!”

Sabine turned to Elly, ordering her silent with a glare.

It was a terrifying look, so Elly kept her mouth shut.

“They-They were just helping me,” she muttered numbly, staring at the floor. “I-I ran into her in the hall, so she was telling me that when I mess up like that I could really hurt someone…”

Her voice got smaller and weaker as she continued, wanting this whole mess to just end.

Audrey clearly didn’t believe her any more than she believed Sabine’s lies, but she didn’t say anything. She just stared coldly at Elly.

Elly wilted with shameful guilt before her earnest expression. Why couldn’t she be as amazing as Audrey? No one ever picked on Audrey. Because you’re pathetic and weak, that inner voice reminded her once more.

“You three get going,” Audrey growled.

Sabine opened her mouth to say something, but the terrified look in Mindy’s eye and the frantic way she shook her head made her rethink it. She muttered something under her breath, turned, and stomped away. Jasmine followed and Mindy quickly scurried after them, leaving Elly alone with Audrey.

Audrey held out her hand, but Elly refused to take it.

Those red eyes, so devoid of warmth and affection, they made her feel so uncomfortable. This wasn’the first time those red eyes had driven away a bully, she couldn’t count the number of times she was grateful for Audrey saving her back home. But those red eyes only looked past her. She didn’t even feel pity from them. Nothing Elly said or did mattered to a girl like Audrey, not really.

“Elly?”

“What?”

“Can I help?” Her voice wasn’t gentle or kind. It was as cold as the rest of her. “Are you being bullied by those three?”

Every part of Elly wanted to scream “YES!” at the top of her lungs, but she couldn’t. What was Audrey going to do? Give Sabine and her cronies a stern warning, like just now? Sabine would only do something even worse to her next time, when Audrey wasn’t there. Elly would only make it harder on herself by tattling. And even if, somehow, Sabine was punished and she stopped, then what? Her life would magically be all flowers and rainbows? No, someone else would come along and take her place. Sabine was just the latest. Elly had spent the last fifteen years keeping her head down and taking abuses shoved on her. Because she deserved it.

“It’s fine,” Elly sighed in resignation, shaking her head. “It doesn’t matter.” She was already retreating behind the tatters of her mental barrier again.

“It isn’t fine,” Audrey snapped, grabbing Elly by the shoulder and shaking her a little. “If you’re being picked on again, then you need to stand up for yourself! Or come get me! Those girls won’t mess with me, I promise.”

“There’s nothing wrong!”

Who did Audrey think she was?! It was easy for her to come in with her magic eyes, waving around her shiny sword titles. She’d chase off the bullies like some big hero, but what did she know? She didn’t have to keep living Elly’s life afterwards! She didn’t have to live with the consequences!

“Just leave me alone!” Elly pushed Audrey’s hand away.

Elly’s outburst left Audrey at a loss for words, and Elly immediately felt a guilty. Audrey was just trying to help. She just wished there was some way that she COULD help. “Sorry,” she halfheartedly muttered.

“…If you’re okay with that, then,” Audrey’s face turned sour. “Take care.”

Audrey bowed, an odd gesture to give to a bastard half-breed like Elly. She turned and walked away, her sword rattling in its hilt.

When Audrey was gone, and Elly was finally alone, she let out the breath she’d been holding and slumped back, sinking to the floor. She curled up into a ball and hid her ears with her hood, and began to cry.

Why? Why do I have to be the one to suffer like this?