Chapter Five
Finally, the President rose one last time and walked to the podium, commanding respect with a razor sharp back and a hard look around the room. Without her even having to ask, silence fell. I stopped eating so that I could listen to what she had to say.
“This concludes the evening,” she started, folding her hands in front of her. She spoke with a clear and commanding voice. I had a feeling that only really crazy students defied her.
“Welcome once again to students and Starters,” she said. “This is going to be another wonderful year. For everyone who is new here I just want to set a few ground rules.” She paused to clear her throat.
“For everyone familiar with Dash, the first competition will be this weekend. Any student not on probation is allowed to sign up to compete. Finals will be at the end of term. Two teams will compete for the grand prize along with individual finals.
“Also,” she said, and here her voice lowered and became urgent, “I have an announcement for everyone. Under no circumstances are you to help anyone onto these grounds. I do not care how well you know the person. I do not care if it is your own mother. You will take her to the security office where she may be issued her clearance. Any student found violating this directive will be instantly expelled.”
She glared around the room. It felt like she was going to make eye contact with every student before she sat down, just to make sure she’d gotten her point across.
“That is all. Good luck and have a wonderful start to term.”
I gulped. “That’s who I have to go see now?”
“Uh huh,” said Sip. “I’m sure she’s not as bad as she looks.”
“You’re right,” said Lough, “She might be worse.”
After dinner Sip showed me how to get to the President’s office. She couldn’t go in with me, but she said she’d wait outside.
She led me along a path to the building that housed the professors’ offices as well as the President’s. It was just as modern as the class building, made completely of steel and glass and looking more like a fortress than an office building. Outside it was the pond that the President had mentioned. It looked harmless enough, but I already had proof that not everything here was as it seemed.
Sip led me up the steps and into the building. I had expected some sort of elaborate lock on the front door or someone standing guard, but all Sip had to do was grab the handle and pull it open, and we could walk inside.
“I’m not sure I’ll be staying in Airlee Dorm tonight,” I told Sip.
“Why not? Of course you will,” she said, waving her little hands indignantly. “What are you talking about?”
“I couldn’t do anything paranormal,” I explained patiently. “There’s no way they’ll let me stay.”
“As I’ve already pointed out, they wouldn’t have brought you here just to send you home,” said Sip, putting her fists on her hips and glaring at me. I sighed, releasing my breath slowly. She just couldn’t understand, but I wasn’t going to keep arguing with her.
She pointed at a plain-looking door. “It’s through there,” she said.
I had expected double doors made out of iron or something massively over the top and fancy, but somehow the President’s door didn’t need decoration; the fact that her powerful position spoke for itself made her even more intimidating.
The next second the door opened and the President stuck her head out. She looked around the room as if we weren’t there. Eventually her eyes settled on me. I had the feeling she was looking through me more than at me. “Come in.”
I glanced at Sip one last time and wondered if she could see the despair in my eyes.
Since the President had come to the door herself I expected it to be just the two of us. But I was wrong.
In the room were two professors I thought I recognized from the panel at dinner, but I’d been so terrified that I hadn’t really looked at the other adults sitting at the table, so now I wasn’t sure if these were the same people.
The room was sparse except for a wall of books behind a heavy oak desk. The President slid into a chair behind it and invited me to sit in front of her. A professor went to sit on either side of her, making it three against one.
The President first pointed to the rosy-cheeked woman on her right. “This is Professor Lambros,” she said. Professor Lambros had lively brown eyes. “I teach pixies,” she explained with a wide smile. “Because I am one.”
The other professor was named Zervos. He had sweeping black hair, shadowed eyes, and a ferocious glare, which at that moment was directed right at me. The President explained that Professor Zervos taught vampires in the morning and one mixed class later in the day.
The introductions over, the President leaned back in her chair and steepled her fingers. “What happened tonight was…unusual,” she said drily.
I started to say something, although what it was going to be I had no idea, but before I could get a word out the President raised her hand, silencing me.
“It shouldn’t be tolerated,” Professor Zervos cut in.
“It has happened before,” said Professor Lambros, defending me. “With me, for example.”
“And I didn’t think it should have been tolerated then either,” Zervos snapped. “I thought you should have left until you had a clearer handle on your abilities as a pixie.”
“Good thing it wasn’t up to you,” Professor Lambros said under her breath.
Professor Zervos was a lot older than Professor Lambros. He must have been teaching here even when she was a student.
“The protocol is flexible,” said the President. “Since we went to the trouble of getting her here I’m inclined to let her stay for the first semester.”
The three professors kept talking about me as if I wasn’t even there, as if what I thought didn’t matter. Professor Zervos was completely against letting me stay, even tonight, while Professor Lambros argued passionately that I deserved a chance.
I was in college. I was an adult now. Yes, these people were in charge, but this was my life. I said, “Don’t I get a say? It’s my life.”
Professor Zervos’s mouth curved up in an unpleasant smile, like I’d said the worst thing in the world and it was exactly what he had expected me to say.
“No, you don’t get a say,” Professor Zervos sneered. “You Starters always think you’re adults. You always think you know better than your betters. You know nothing. You are not even the paranormal we thought you were.”
I felt my hands clench in my lap, but I knew I should be quiet.
The President was looking at me consideringly.
“Why do you want to stay?” she asked.
Why did I? I wasn’t sure if I could put it into words, but I had to try. “I want to stay because of my mother,” I said slowly. “She was the best person I ever knew. I want to be like her.”
Professor Zervos snorted, but I plunged on. “She taught me well. She told me I had magic and I…I didn’t believe her. Then when she,” I had never been able to say that she had died. Somehow saying it would make it true. On a practical level I knew that I had lost the thing I loved most in the world, but that didn’t mean I was going to talk about it. “After that I stopped believing I had magic. I lost faith in what my mother had said.” I hung my head. “It’s something I’ll always regret. But now I’m here,” I continued slowly. “I may not have the years of training other students have had from their families, but I have desire. I will work hard, harder than you can imagine, and I’ll make my mother proud.”
The President nodded. “I do hope, Charlotte Rollins, that over the course of your time here you come to want to stay for yourself, as well as for your mother. You will have the first semester if you want it. If at the end of that time you have shown no paranormal abilities, you will be asked to leave. Until you prove that you have magic you will be on probation. If you put one foot out of line,” she warned me menacingly with her finger, “you will be sent home. Since it w
ill be difficult for you to accomplish your course work, I will assign you a tutor.”
Great, she already thought I couldn’t handle it.
Professor Zervos started to protest, but the President cut him off. “This is not a negotiation,” she said. “I am the President and I will thank you to remember as much.”
Professor Zervos looked like he wanted to say more, but instead he sank down in his seat, silent.
“I want to stay,” I said. I had already come too far to leave with my tail between my legs. Plus, I couldn’t let that embarrassment tonight during my Demonstration stand as my only act at Paranormal Public. I could do better, and I would.
Professor Zervos made a scoffing noise while Professor Lambros clapped.
“Thank you,” I added.
“Oh, don’t thank me,” said the President. “Until you prove you are paranormal you will be miserable here,” she said with a thin smile, “which apparently will make professor Zervos very happy.”
As Professor Lambros started to rise I felt a slight tremor come up through the floor. Instead of standing, I gripped the arms of the chair harder for support. The tremor came again, stronger this time. The President sprang to her feet. “This meeting is over. Ms. Rollins, think about what we’ve told you. Zervos?” But he was already on his feet and heading towards the door.
The two swept out of the room before I had a chance to say anything else.
“Students playing pranks,” Professor Lambros said, shaking her head sadly. “It takes up a lot of the professors’ time. “Anyway, come along,” she continued, putting her hand on my arm. “Let’s get you out of here.”
I followed Lambros out.
Once we were in the hall my legs sagged. I felt like they had suddenly become more like jelly than flesh over bone.
“Are you alright?” asked Lambros, concern in her bright brown eyes. “Don’t worry. The President is hard on everyone.”
When Professor Lambros saw Sip waiting for me she said, “Ah, delightful. Sipythia, can you escort your new roommate back to the dorm, please? I believe she’s had rather a long day at this point.”
Professor Lambros didn’t know how right she was. When I didn’t move, she peered at me. “What is it? Getcha going!” She made a shooing motion with her green-tinged hands.
I pushed myself away from the wall. Whatever I had just gotten myself into, it wasn’t going to be good.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Of course. You deserve your chance,” said Professor Lambros, beaming.
I followed Sip out. The dark sky was cloudy and I could barely see the moon. I had expected the campus to be quiet and empty, but it wasn’t.
Vampires walked everywhere, shaded hair and pale skin luminescent in the night. None of them paid much attention to us, but being around so many vampires at one time made me nervous.
Sip didn’t seem to notice. “How’d it go?” she asked as we walked outside.
“She said I was on probation. I have until the end of the semester to prove that I’m a paranormal. If I can’t do it by then, they’re kicking me out. But Sip, don’t they have some kind of test they can perform on me? My mom was a paranormal, so I should be too, right?”
Sip was quiet for a moment. “I’m not sure. Werewolves can become werewolves, same with vampires. Fallen angels definitely have to be blood and so do pixies. Mages are a little more complicated.”
“Right,” I said, “Well, I have this semester to prove myself or I’m going home.” Or, at least I wouldn’t be allowed back at Public. There was no way I was going back to my stepdad’s house. I might miss Ricky, but I could still see him even if I didn’t live at home.
Sip took me to Airlee Dorm, which was a fascinating mix of building styles. It rose out of the ground as if it had been built into the side of a hill. The building itself was old brick, painted blue. Slides extended from the upper floor windows to the ground. “For us werewolves,” Sip explained.
Inside, there were a few other students around, but we passed them without saying anything. As Sip had explained earlier, each dorm was unique, decorated in the style of its occupants. Since Airlee’s students were a mishmash of paranormals, Airlee’s style was hard to define. The wood trimmings were brown. The carpets were the same blue as the outside, while the walls were covered with paintings of paranormals that looked like they had been done by students.
“Who are they all?” I asked Sip.
Sip shrugged. “People who were in Airlee Dorm and then became famous for one thing or another.”
She led me to a room on the third floor. I was just about to follow her inside when the door to the room next to ours came flying open. It banged hard against the wall and bounced back. The wall was left with a small dent where the door handle crashed into it.
I could hear a voice yelling, “I’m not living with a freak like you. Get out!” And stepping out of the room was Lisabelle Verlans.
I came to a dead stop. Lisabelle didn’t look upset. It hadn’t occurred to me that we were actually part of the same dorm, never mind that we would be neighbors.
“What are you looking at?” she wanted to know. She examined her cuticle while she asked the question, and somehow we both knew she was threatening me.
“Nothing,” I said, trying to look anywhere but directly at her. I wasn’t a chicken, but being scared of Lisabelle was just common sense, a healthy dose of realism to keep me alive.
“Alright,” said Lisabelle, looking up at me and grinning. “Keep it that way.”
“Are you going back in there?” Sip asked. Lisabelle was still holding the door to her room open, and her soon to be former roommate was still ranting and raving inside. Lisabelle slammed the door closed, cutting off the sound.
“Not until she’s gone,” said Lisabelle coolly.
“I’d hate for something to happen to her,” said Sip sternly.
Lisabelle threw back her head and laughed. “Are you threatening me, little werewolf?”
Sip stood her ground, even though I could see she was scared. “I’m telling you to do the right thing,” she informed Lisabelle.
Lisabelle thought that was really funny.
“Do you want a place to crash tonight?” I asked impulsively.
Both Lisabelle and Sip looked at me like I’d lost my mind. Probably because I’d just offered the only darkness mage in the school, who clearly had issues in polite company, to stay with us.
Her eyes trailed over me slowly, then she said, “You have more backbone than it looks like.” With that she turned on her heel and walked away down the hall, whistling.
As I fell asleep that night I wondered if the next day could possibly be any worse.