Chapter Six
The next morning, before I opened my eyes, I thought there was a chance that everything that had happened yesterday had been a dream, and my stepdad would come into my room any minute to tell me to get up for lunch. Ricky would probably scold me for sleeping in. He wasn’t a teenager yet. He didn’t understand.
“Hey, Charlotte, you awake?” Sip’s voice asked.
Nope, not a dream.
I opened my eyes and peered at my roommate. Her whitish blond hair was already perfectly combed back and she was dressed in a neon green top and jeans.
Sip was staring at our blank walls. “We have to do some decorating.” She smiled brightly. “I have some neon-colored posters.” Sip liked neon.
Once I was dressed and had brushed out my brown hair, Sip and I went for breakfast. Maybe it was just my imagination, but I felt sure that more people stared at me than at Sip. I couldn’t even bring myself to think about my Demonstration at dinner the night before…in front of the entire school. Being called into the President’s office was just the icing on the cake of the most embarrassing day of my life. I had known college was going to be an adjustment, one of those life milestones my teachers were always talking about, but this was ridiculous. And if this kept up I’d have a lot more embarrassing days ahead of me. Like, a semester’s worth.
At breakfast there was a table of vampires here, a table of pixies there, and I wanted to be a part of it. I wanted to learn magic; I wanted to make my mother proud. She would have wanted this for me. She had once told me that learning mage-craft had been one of the best experiences of her life. I did notice, though, that there were still no tables with mixed paranormals. There were no vampires sitting with werewolves or pixies sitting with fallen angels. And the divisions were clear. Vampires, fallen angels, and pixies had the best seats in the dining hall. They were closer to the door, further away from the professors, and closer to the food.
“Well, look who it is, The Girl Who Can’t Do Magic,” said a sneering voice behind me.
I turned. Camilla Van Rothson, her shiny blond hair perfect and smooth, framing pale, ever so slightly green translucent skin and glaring brown eyes, was standing behind me.
I looked around to see who Camilla was speaking to, but I was the only one there.
“Yeah, I’m talking to you, reject,” she said. Her voice was light and airy, like she didn’t have a care in the world. Two other pixies with her snickered.
“Go away, Camilla,” said Sip, but I could see her hands trembling a little.
“Don’t tell me what to do, little werewolf,” said Camilla, her attention turning to Sip. “You’re only here because of your daddy.”
Sip’s face turned bright red. Her purple eyes locked on Camilla’s brown ones. “That’s not true,” she seethed.
“Riiight,” said Camilla, rolling her eyes.
“Don’t you have anyone else to grace with your presence?” asked Lisabelle Verlans, coming up to our table. She held a breakfast tray in her hands. Lisabelle was dressed in all black today. She had even found time to paint her fingernails black. She should have been a vampire, not that I was ever going to tell her that.
Camilla tried to keep her composure, but I could tell she didn’t like talking to a mage of darkness.
“I guess it figures,” said Camilla, her smug smile returning. “The Daddy’s Girl Werewolf, the Probationer, and the demon all hanging out together.”
Lisabelle moved so fast I barely saw her before black fire sprang up in her hands. Sip jumped to her feet ready to step in.
She grabbed Lisabelle’s arm. “Stop it,” she hissed to the much taller girl. “She’s trying to get you in trouble and you’re letting her!”
I could see that Lisabelle was thinking hard, her eyes still locked on Camilla’s. Slowly, very slowly, the black flame in her pale hand dimmed.
“Good,” said Sip. “Now sit down and eat your breakfast.” Lisabelle gave Sip a look that said she’d never seen anything quite like her before. My guess is that it had been years since anyone had tried to tell Lisabelle what to do.
“You’ll regret staying, Probationer,” said Camilla as she walked off. “Almost as much as you’ll regret hanging out with those two.”
The whole time Camilla had been standing there insulting me and my friends, I hadn’t said I word. I’d always been shy, reluctant to stand up for myself, but I’d never just sat there and taken it before.
“What did she mean about your daddy?” asked Lisabelle, putting her tray down at our table without being invited.
“Nothing,” said Sip fiercely. She suddenly grabbed up her tray and stomped away.
“For someone so tiny she’s definitely got a temper,” said Lisabelle. She was grinning.
“I should go after her,” I said. “I won’t know where I’m going otherwise.”
“We have all the same classes in the first half of the day,” said Lisabelle. “I’ll walk with you.” We finished our breakfast in silence. I didn’t dare ask Lisabelle any questions, and she was shoveling food into her mouth without bothering to make small talk.
Once we were finished we headed out of the dining hall. Sip suddenly appeared at my side, her face doing a good impression of a thundercloud. “Sorry,” she muttered, falling into step next to me.
As the three of us headed to the start of classes, Lisabelle explained how the day would go. Sip, mostly quiet, would throw comments in here and there.
“The first half of the day you have classes just with other Airlee students. Most of them are going to be Starters, but some won’t be. The classes will be about fallen angels, mages, darkness, dream givers, et cetera. You will be taught as whatever paranormal you are…which means I have no idea what they are going to do with you,” she said to me with a grin.
I rolled my eyes. Sip said, “She’s going to be fine. Her mother was a mage so they will probably just put her with the mages.”
“What about the second half of the day?” I asked.
“For second half classes we mix with other dorms. Again, it depends on what paranormal you are…so who knows what they will do with you,” she said, again reminding me that I wasn’t officially a student yet.
I came to a dead halt. Camilla Bitchy Whatever Her Name Was might be able to talk down to me, but not someone I was starting to be friends with. “I’m going to stay here,” I said stubbornly. “I am going to prove them wrong!”
Lisabelle watched me for a moment, then said, “Good.” And kept right on walking.
The morning went about as I had expected. Only one teacher, a Professor Anania, looked frustrated when she saw that I had no paranormal specialty. She had dusty brown hair and a very long nose.
“Well, what am I to do with you?” she asked in A History of Your Paranormal Type. “The class is about studying your own type’s history. You are supposed to develop a better understanding of how your type got to be where it is today, which will help you have a better grasp of your magic. If you do not know what paranormal you are, how are you to better understand? For all I know you are a darkness mage.”
There was a surprised gasp from everyone in the room, and Professor Anania, realizing that she had overstepped, backed away from that accusation. “I’m simply saying that I do not know what to do with a student who does not know her own magical history,” she said. Then she glared at me like this should be obvious, like it was somehow my fault that the President was keeping me around despite that fact that no one went to Public who wasn’t a paranormal.
“I don’t know what you’re supposed to do with me,” I told her honestly. “I thought figuring that out was your job.”
“It shouldn’t be that complicated,” said another of the students. Probably Lisabelle.
Professor Anania pursed her lips. “It is a big deal. I am the professor and you are the students and if I say it’s crucial then I will thank you not to argue with me.”
“My mother was a mage,” I said, trying to be helpful.
“You could put with me them.”
“Ms. Rollins, I realize that it is hard for your young mind to grasp such subtlety, but it would be unforgivably bad of me were I to teach you a history that is not your own. What are we if not a product of our history?”
“Ourselves?” Sip offered.
“What would happen?” I asked, because Professor Anania seemed to expect a response.
“That’s not the point.”
Nothing at all would happen except that I might end up having to switch studies later if they found out I was a different paranormal. I didn’t see why this professor didn’t know it too. She tapped her foot on the floor, thinking.
Finally, she gave a gusty sigh. “You may join the mages unless you would prefer to wait in the President’s office.”
“No, thank you,” I said. “I’ll risk joining the mages.”
I sat with the other Starter mages, a group that included Lisabelle, and we worked quietly for the rest of class.
By the end of the first half of the day I was miserable. The classes had been unbearably hard and most of what the professors had told me I hadn’t understood. Many of the other students had grown up in households of paranormals, but not me. I didn’t understand terminology like “lightmare” (which was a particular type of paranormal animal), and since I didn’t know how to use my magic I couldn’t begin to practice my skills like the other students were doing.
As we left lunch I could see Cale walking towards me. He gave me a smile and pushed one strand of his red hair out of his face as he reached me. I had the distinct realization that he was the sort of guy who looked good effortlessly, while I felt like I was a little sweaty and my face was hot. I was sure that my thick brown hair had started to frizz.
“How’d your classes go?” he asked, beaming at me.
“Oh, splendid,” I said, thinking of all the professors who were irritated with me.
Cale laughed. “It’ll get easier,” he said. “We should catch up this weekend. Maybe get breakfast.”
“Um, yeah….” I said. I liked Cale and it was great to have a friendly face, but he was a pixie and I wasn’t sure what that meant for us hanging out. Everyone seemed to keep to his or her own dorms.
“I’ll find you later and we can talk about it,” he said, and walked off to join a group of friends.
Since my mom had died I hadn’t been anti-social, but I’d been quiet. Cale and I had always been friendly, and that’s about it. I couldn’t figure out why he suddenly wanted to hang out.
I had been pretty sure that nothing could be worse than my first half day of classes, but that was before I walked into A History of Hellhounds and Demons since 1700 and saw that not only was Professor Zervos the teacher, but Lisabelle and the fallen angel Keller, who had stopped the fight at dinner the night before, were also both in the class.
If I had been at a normal college I’m sure I would have been happy to have someone I knew in class, but I felt certain that Lisabelle and Zervos were going to hate each other. Since he already hated me, he’d be directing a whole lot of animosity over to our little corner of the room. Besides, unlike normal school, I got the idea that problems here were solved with violence. While all my other professors had greeted students as they came in, Professor Zervos kept his face invisible behind a manuscript.
When I walked in I could feel Keller’s eyes on me. I wanted to tell him it was rude to stare, but I didn’t have the nerve.
I felt my face turn red and hurried to find a seat. Lisabelle sat next to me, folded her arms over her chest, and glared at Zervos. I hadn’t told her how badly he had wanted to get rid of me yesterday, but she seemed to have her own reasons for hating him.
Suddenly, Professor Zervos slammed his chair back so hard it hit the wall behind him. He tossed his manuscript onto the desk and leaned both fists onto the dark wood.
Smiling a cold smile, he said, “A History of Hellhounds and Demons since 1700.”