Chapter Nine
For the rest of class Professor Korba discussed werewolves and pixies. He explained that werewolves were similar to vampires in that humans could become them if they were bitten. They were also similar in that both were shape-shifters. I had known that werewolves were – obviously – they could change into wolf form at their convenience. But it surprised me to learn that vampires could shape-shift into mist at night. Only very skilled vampires could do it, and even they had trouble doing it for any length of time. But still, it was a very powerful ability.
It reminded me of my last few nights at home. Mist had always surrounded me as I walked. Now I wondered what, or who, that mist had been. There was a very good chance it had been one or more vampires.
Professor Korba also talked about pixies. Most were pretty and petite, and they liked attention. (Sounded like the perfect description of Camilla.) They loved clothes and were known tricksters, but once their loyalty was won they would stick with you until the end. Many could also fly for a short distance if they chose to.
Professor Korba concluded the class by saying that later in the semester we would learn about fallen angels and mages. He said if we were good he might even throw in a lesson on hellhounds.
“I’m not sure that’s an enticement,” I heard Lough grunt as we left class. I grinned.
I had dreaded the second-half sessions, mostly because Professor Zervos hated my guts. I had expected him to go to the President yesterday and immediately demand my removal from his presence, but since no one had come to me to say I was kicked out of his class, I went anyway.
It wasn’t as bad as I had thought it would be. He basically acted like I wasn’t there. Most of the rest of the afternoon went like that, until I was relieved to find that I’d gotten through my second day of classes. I tried very hard not to notice Keller and mostly succeeded. At one point he caught me looking at him, but I quickly looked away.
After dinner Sip and I went back to our room. She had been unusually quiet and I asked her why.
“Are you going to stir up trouble with Camilla?” she asked worriedly.
“I wasn’t even talking to Camilla,” I told her, trying to play dumb.
“Yeah, you were doing worse than that. You were talking to her boyfriend,” Sip accused.
“He asked me,” I informed her. “And I didn’t know they were dating when I said yes.”
“Did she see you?” Sip wanted to know.
I looked away, unable to meet her eyes.
“Awesome,” said Sip, exasperated.
“She hated me before,” I told her.
“Because you knew him before,” said Sip. “This is worse. Now you knew him before and you’re talking to him here at school.”
I heard a faint tapping on the door. Relieved at the distraction, I went to open it.
Lisabelle was framed in the doorway. She was dressed in her customary black, but instead of her usual scowl a huge grin spread across her face.
“Ready for your tour?” she asked.
I put my hands on my hips. “Is this really necessary?”
“Come on,” said Lisabelle. “The vampires are out and about. We will blend right in.”
“Because they have class,” I told her. “We don’t have an excuse. Plus, look at Sip….” I pointed to her white-blond hair and large purple eyes. “She doesn’t blend in anywhere.”
“Thank you,” said Sip. “I think.”
“So, it’d be better if we didn’t get caught,” Lisabelle informed me. “Come on!”
I glanced again at Sip, who was sitting on her bed. “It would be kind of fun,” she said, shrugging. “I know a lot of older students do it. And you really haven’t gotten a very good look at the grounds.”
I wanted to go. If the President wasn’t going to kick me out for not having magic, then why would she kick me out for being outside past curfew? “Let’s go.”
I don’t know what we expected when we went outside. Fire breathing dragons sitting around drinking tea, maybe, but the campus outdoors at night wasn’t anywhere near that exciting. It was just like campus during the day, only with fewer students walking around and more shadows.
It felt nice to be outside when we were the only ones there. Defying the professors’ orders was oddly freeing. Besides, they didn’t own me. They’d already made my first few days at Public miserable, now I was going to have a little fun.
Sip, gleeful to be out at night, raced around in ever widening circles in werewolf form. Her whole body looked fast and strong.
In fun, she raced towards us, then turned around and backtracked. Suddenly, she paused. Repeatedly she used her nose to point in a direction off to our right.
A grin spread across Lisabelle’s face.
“Look,” she cooed, pointing far into the distance where we couldn’t see. “It’s the fallen angels’ dorm. Charlotte, we could go see your new tutor!”
I shuddered. Part of me wanted to see Keller, but the other part, the part that said he was my tutor and had no reason to like me, and was a fallen angel so he couldn’t like me, dreaded the moments when my eyes would flick in his direction.
“He wouldn’t want to see me,” I said. Sip was still running around. I had the strange impression that she was laughing.
“Sip, stop that, you’re making me dizzy,” protested Lisabelle.
Sip raced towards us, transforming mid-stride. Once she was back to human form she said, “I’m just practicing. If you practiced maybe you’d have more control over your magic.”
Lisabelle raised her black eyebrows. Without warning, black fire snaked out of her hand to whirl around Sip. Instantly Sip changed back to werewolf shape and zipped away, the fire trying to catch her. I watched in awe as the magic spun and curled, trying to keep up with Sip. Chunks of grass flew up in dark patches.
“Can’t you do anything but throw fire?” she taunted.
Lisabelle didn’t stop the fire, but while she was throwing it she reached into her robe and pulled out a wand. At some point I’d been told that darkness mages carried wands, but I’d forgotten it until I saw Lisabelle’s. It looked like a branch that had been thrown into a fire and cooked. It was black and studded with what seemed to be black jewels. Sip never took her eyes off it. Lisabelle twirling it idly, eyeing Sip in turn.
Standing next to her, unable to do any magic, I felt useless. I would not always be this helpless, I told myself. I. Would. Not.
Without warning, Lisabelle swung the wand and sent a burst of power towards Sip. At the last possible second the power transformed. It wasn’t just raw magic now; it had burst into a dozen small black birds. Sip squealed in surprise and I gasped. The birds were darting after Sip.
Sip hadn’t been working hard a minute ago, but now she was doing everything she could to avoid the birds and the black swirls of magic. Lisabelle wouldn’t actually let anything hurt Sip, at least I didn’t think so, but the birds looked dangerous.
It quickly became clear that the birds were not that fast or that smart. Lisabelle must not have the magic or the control yet to make them deadly, which at the moment seemed like a good thing. Sip was running and dodging, staying far ahead of the little black creatures.
When Sip came back towards us she didn’t even look tired. I wasn’t sure how hard Lisabelle had tried to trap her friend with the fire and the birds, but she had failed.
In the blink of an eye, Sip transformed back to human form. I was relieved when she gave a short laugh.
“Did I know you could do that?” she asked Lisabelle.
Lisabelle scoffed. “Of course not.”
Sip grinned and I rolled my eyes. “Now we just have to get the magic out of you,” said Sip, looking at me intently.
“Yeah, well, apparently that’s Keller’s job,” I muttered.
“Do you think Keller’s cute?” Sip asked suddenly. They had some second session classes together, so she spent a lot of time with him.
“He’s easily the most be
autiful guy here,” said Lisabelle. “And that includes all the vampires and pixies. It even includes Cale, despite what Camilla wants everyone to think.”
I cleared my throat. “He’s alright,” I said. “Cute” wasn’t the word I would have used to describe him; neither was “beautiful.” But did I think he was attractive? Yes, yes I did.
“He’s a fallen angel, you know,” said Sip. “From one of the purest and most famous families.”
“So?” I asked.
“So, he’s expected to marry another fallen angel and continue the line,” she explained.
“Did you want to marry him?” I asked. I was getting irritated, but I wasn’t sure why.
Sip grinned. “Nope, but I’d do other stuff with him.”
Lisabelle laughed.
“Where are we going?” I asked, pushing my brown hair out of my face. The wind had picked up and my hair kept breaking free of its ponytail.
“Towards the woods,” said Lisabelle. “It’s beautiful, and it’s a shame you haven’t seen it.”
Lisabelle pointed ahead of us. I looked in the direction of her finger.
We were heading straight towards the pond and the President’s offices. The moon, which was nearly full, shone down, lancing a streak of pearl through the black water.
“We are breaking the rules and you are taking us straight towards the President’s office,” Sip said. “What, are you just trying to save her time when she gets around to punishing us?”
Lisabelle just grinned.
“They use it for Dash some years,” Sip added, pointing to the pond. “I think this year Dash is on the field, though.”
“What’s Dash?” I asked as we walked closer to the water.
“What?” Lisabelle and Sip cried at the same time.
“I keep forgetting she has no idea about paranormals,” Lisabelle muttered, shaking her head. “Complete shame.”
“It’s not my fault,” I retorted.
“No one said it was,” said Sip quickly. “We just forget.”
“What’s Dash?” I asked again. “What kind of game can move around?”
“It’s a school-wide competition that’s held every year. It’s an obstacle course that every student who enters gets to go through. The best student from each dorm then competes, and the student who wins that wins all sorts of honor and gifts for the dorm,” Lisabelle explained. “It’s a really big deal. The student who wins is a hero. And the obstacle course can be put anywhere, so some years it’s here.”
“An obstacle course?” I asked skeptically.
“Yeah!” said Sip. “Any student can enter his or her name at the start of term. You do the course three times, and your best time gets entered into the school-wide competition. Then the best four individual times compete in the finals.”
“I wish I could enter,” I said. I pulled the scarf closer around my neck, trying to protect myself from the wind.
“Yeah,” said Sip chewing her lower lip. “It’s too bad that since you’re on probation you can’t.…”
“Oh, well, I’d be no good at an obstacle course anyway,” I said, lifting my shoulders. I didn’t want them to know how disappointed I was. I didn’t even know why I was disappointed. I wasn’t athletic; I’d never competed in anything. But somehow, navigating an obstacle course to compete for school-wide honor sounded fun. Plus, my friends were excited about it.
“When’s the first competition?” I asked.
“This weekend,” said Lisabelle. We had come to a stop in front of the water and were all just taking in the breathtaking view in front of us. I loved water and this lake was the prettiest I’d ever seen. “We’re both doing it. You have to come and cheer Airlee on.”
“Yeah,” I said. I kicked a pebble and waited until I heard it splash. “Great.”
Lisabelle cocked her head. “Do you hear that?”
Sip and I both quieted to listen. Murmurs. Voices. People were coming towards us.
Sip’s purple eyes grew huge and alarmed. She grabbed my arm and the three of us started running. If I got caught roaming the grounds at night after we’d been warned not to do just that, the very least we’d get is detention, and I would probably get expelled, since you couldn’t put someone on probation who was already on it.
The three of us raced for cover. We dashed into the closest building.
It wasn’t until we were inside and had slammed the door behind us that we realized our mistake.
We were in the offices of the President.
I felt like I’d just swallowed a rock. It hadn’t been long since I’d been there, but somehow the building was different at night. Any friendly charm that had been there during the day had been replaced by shadows. The only light was a lamp that burned at the far end of the hall. My eyes were still adjusting to the dark and I could barely see my friends.
Every second that ticked past I expected someone to come through the door, saying that they’d seen us running and that we were finished.
“Think we’re safe?” asked Lisabelle in my ear. Her breath tickled my skin.
At the sound of her voice I jumped, and she was forced to put her hand on my shoulder.
“Calm down or you’ll get us caught,” she hissed.
I nodded, telling myself to take deep breaths. I wasn’t going to get expelled when I hadn’t even been there a week. I wasn’t. Was I?
Sip looked upset and was chewing her lip. I could tell she thought this was a terrible idea.
“We have to get out of here,” she said, her voice barely audible.
“And go back out there to get caught?” demanded Lisabelle. “No thank you.” I could just imagine her eyes snapping in the dark.
“So what do we do?” I demanded.
“Wait,” said Lisabelle, shrugging. In silhouette I could see her folding her arms over her chest and leaning against the wall.
“I tell you it’s not good,” a muffled voice said from down the hall. I could see where it was coming from and it made me feel queasy. The light in the President’s office was still on. We had thought that the building was empty, but there were other people in it with us. We weren’t alone.
“We’re dead,” said Sip, putting a hand on either side of her face. I could see her pale hair illuminated by the moonlight. It was trembling.
“Shut UP,” Lisabelle hissed. She crept closer to the door the voices had come from. Sip and I tried to pull her back towards us, sure that at any second the President’s door would be flung open and we’d be caught. But she ignored us.
Now that I was listening, the conversation behind the door was clearly audible.
“The demons are growing in strength. They’re even trying to penetrate the walls of Public,” said a female voice I didn’t recognize.
Another voice, male this time, said, “That’s nonsense. They aren’t that strong.”
“Of course they are. Why wouldn’t they be when our defenses are down?” snapped the first female voice.
“Our defenses are not down.” That was the President.
“Yes, they are. And now they are going to be permanently lower,” said the first voice.
“Just because we do not have an elemental to complete the Power of Five does not mean we are defenseless,” said the President.
“We should have protected them better,” said another voice, muffled.
“We tried to protect them, but we couldn’t force anyone to do anything they didn’t want to do,” said the President. “We can’t save everyone.”
“There have to be some out there,” said another voice. “Somewhere.”
“Enough,” cut in a man’s voice. It was harsh and grating. “Demons are everywhere. They are attacking paranormals across the country. Their confidence is growing by the day, by the hour. As long as we do nothing to stop them they will continue to kill us one by one.”
“We could call the paranormals in. We are safer together. They would be safer here, at Public.” That was the first female voice again.
“You think Public is safe?” the man spat out. “What do you think those light flickers and trembles mean? That the electricity is cutting in and out? No, they mean that the demons are getting closer to breaching our defenses.”
I tried to swallow the rock lodged in my throat. The President was having a conversation with at least three other people, and they were talking about demons attacking paranormals. And not just any paranormals. The demons were trying to attack Public. I felt a stabbing fear radiate out from my stomach. Seeing the hellhound at my house had been bad enough, but I didn’t think I could take seeing demons overrun Public.
“Well, well, well,” said Professor Zervos’s voice behind me. “What have we here? Students out of bed at night, I see.”
We were caught.