Paranormal Academy

by Limited Edition Box Set

  "Um, sure. Okay." I gave her a false smile. "But should we have six in the back, then five in front of that, and get progressively smaller until we form a perfect triangle?" I had no idea what I was saying or why we'd need a triangle, but the look on her face as I watched her lips move as she tried to count and figure it out made me stifle a wicked smile.

  A sharp elbow to my ribs made me wince. I spun around as I rubbed the area only to see Holly right behind me. Her pretty face was set in an annoyed glare. "Stop doing that," she hissed. "She's the best choreographer we have." As annoyed as Holly sounded, her intelligent brown eyes were sparkling with humor. She lowered her voice. "Besides, she's only got about an hour of usable brain time inside that vacant little head of hers, and we need to make sure it's used on us instead of Geography class."

  I grinned. "Sorry. I can't help myself."

  She waved a hand at me. "I know it's hard, but until we get a new captain, let's avoid confusing the one we have."

  "Party pooper," I said good naturedly.

  Holly stuck out her hand. She was pretty in a surprisingly non-cheerleader way. Her stick brown hair was styled in a neat ponytail with the telltale silver ribbon of a Merlin Academy shifter cheerleader. Holly's nose was straight and framed by high cheekbones. I couldn't tell what type of shifter she was, but the yellow stripe at the top of her hair led me to believe she was some kind of cat shifter. Though ... I wasn't sure about that either, especially since her eyes were a pleasant brown instead of the greenish colors of most of the cats.

  I'd also found out quickly it was impolite to ask. Shifters, no matter what kind, liked to growl about things.

  I, too, wore the silver ribbon, though mine was a sham. Whenever Mr. Mago and the administration tried to place me in a specific house, they couldn’t agree and finally had to settle on the mixed dorm. The desk might have told them I was a shifter, but it didn't tell them what kind. Considering my eyes were a cool, silver gray and not a single shifter had the same kind, they couldn't guess based upon the way they looked.

  The mixed dorm wasn't so bad. It was for the unplaceable and the rare shifters, those who had no pack or kind of their own. At least in Ravenscliffe. More than likely there were other un-packed shifters roaming around the human world, but they were most likely in hiding. All of us knew that colored contacts were the only thing we could use to conceal our nature. We didn't have to wear them at the academy, and since we weren't allowed to cross the border anymore, none of us had any in our possession. But those shifters who hadn't yet made their way to us yet had to be reliant on them.

  I'd met one short, twitchy female who kept some in her possession simply because she'd crossed over to our lands and promptly broke our laws. She came to the academy with two boxes locked in a chest.

  How did I know this?

  I made a point of going through everyone's things on my first two nights spent in the dorm. I'm not a thief, but I do like to know what I'm up against. I hadn't found anything super incriminating on anyone, though I did suspect at least one person was not who they claimed to be.

  I couldn't hold that against them. After all, I was a witch untied by moon cycles, living in a shifter dorm, and praying every night someone didn't figure that out and eat me. One thing I'd noticed over the last week was shifters absolutely loved to joke about eating people. How did I know they were joking? I didn't exactly, but no one ever got eaten so ... I drew what I hoped was the obvious solution.

  Also, one had to assume the school had strict rules about eating the students.

  I gripped Holly's hand in mine, noticing with delighted surprise hers was rough and warm. So many shifters had sweaty hands. Maybe something to do with their metabolism? Or all the meat they ate? Every time I thought about it, a shudder rocked me and I felt like gagging.

  "Nice to officially meet you," I said. The captain, Kelly, loudly cleared her through in a passive aggressive way.

  Holly rolled her eyes, and I sighed. "Ready to twerk, twerk, twerk?" I asked quietly.

  She snorted beside and got into the position. As did I.

  Butt shaking Day 3 was ready to commence.

  4

  The first sign something wasn't quite right at the academy came in the form of a ghost.

  If I was made of less stern stuff, I would have peed myself. Instead, used to the weirdness that was officially becoming my life, I merely stared at the apparition for a moment before I said, "Excuse me, trying to pee here. It's pretty rude to watch someone peeing, don't you think?"

  The ghost rolled its eyes and disappeared in a puff of cold air.

  I washed my hands slowly, trying to stop the shaking, and was just drying them when it showed up again. If I had to guess, I'd say the girl was around 15 or 16 when she passed.

  Violently, if the slash marring the smooth skin of her neck was any indication.

  I waited. Not having much experience with ghosts, I wasn't sure if she could speak or if we were about to play an exhausting game of charades.

  The ghost had been pretty. Long, curly brown hair flowed down her shoulders and into the middle of her back. Her lips were full and blush colored. She appeared to have been wearing makeup when she passed which told me her death occurred sometime this century. Plus she was dressed in the same outfit I was currently wearing. An unflattering plaid skirt that brushed the knees and a white button up. We all wore an annoying necktie with the colors of the academy - green and red, like a Scottish clan or something.

  So far I'd yet to see a single Scotsman around here, but there was a decidedly plaid air going on around the school if you noticed those sorts of things. I did. I thought about bagpipes and the Highlands every time I tried to remember how to knot the stupid thing.

  The ghost pointed out the door.

  "Obviously," I muttered. "Can't very well sleep in here, can I?"

  The ghost rolled its eyes again.

  I huffed a laugh. "Don't you think it would be easier if you just told me what you wanted?"

  "Shhhh," the ghost hissed.

  A smile formed on my lips. "So you can talk," I whispered.

  "Curfew is in ten minutes, idiot," the ghost hissed. "I need to show you something, so shut up."

  "So bossy," I whispered. I dried my hands on the rough paper towels the school provided. A shame those were, considering almost everyone here was rich. Or their parents were. You'd think we'd be a little more upscale with all the money pouring into this place. Instead, the rooms were drafty, the toilet paper offended my nether regions, and the lunch menu never changed.

  I opened the door and gestured for the ghost to go ahead. Manners were manners, after all.

  She brushed past me in a gust of cold air and didn't look back.

  Oookay, I thought as I followed her.

  I walked out of the shifter dorm like I had a purpose. I suppose I did, but only the ghost knew what it was right now and she'd stopped talking. No one batted an eye as we passed. Either ghosts were completely normal around here or I was the only one who could see her. Since I had yet to see a single ghost since I arrived, I figured it was the latter.

  She looked back once to make sure I followed. As the door to the dorm shut behind me, the second warning bell rang.

  The first was the fifteen minute warning for curfew. The second was the five minute warning. I hurried to catch up with the ghost. I could ill afford to get caught out after hours. You only got so many warnings before you got stuck with kitchen duty, and I wanted to make sure I stayed out of as much trouble as I could. Trouble tended to flock to me so I wanted to make sure if I got stuck with duty, I'd really earned it.

  Preferably in a super fun way.

  It was still noisy around the halls of the dorms. I passed by the witches' dorms and cast a longing glance back at it as I passed. I'd told no one what I truly was, anticipating the Goddess had something in store for me. It would be nice to have some friends around here, though. I had high hopes about Holly, but she was still a cheerleader.

  A
nd most definitely not a witch.

  After we passed by all the dorms, the ghost took an abrupt right.

  Directly through a stone wall. I stood there, agape, and wondered how in the hell she wanted me to follow, when a gray arm shot through the wall and hauled me through.

  An undignified screech came from my mouth.

  "Shut up," a voice hissed.

  I bent over, practically hyperventilating. "Next time warn me before you pull me through a freaking wall!" I hissed.

  The ghost merely tapped her feet and waited for me to get myself together. When I straightened, one of her eyebrows rose.

  "It wasn't a wall," she said.

  "Gray stone, made to look like a wall?" I motioned.

  She pouted. "Well, not really a wall," she clarified.

  "Helpful," I said.

  "Whatever." The girl waited as I looked around.

  I was in a room, if you could call it that, full of old, dusty books and shelves full of more books. "A library?" I questioned.

  "Great guess," the girl said, her tone as dry as one of those deserts I'd read about but never visited. I could only imagine the air could take the moisture out of your mouth. Much like her tone.

  A sigh escaped me. "Why am I in a library," I checked my watch, "two minutes before I break my curfew?"

  "I knew I should have picked someone else," the ghost muttered.

  "Good idea," I said as I spun on my heel and was poised to step back through the wall. I'd never been a curious girl when it came to this sort of stuff. The only mystery I liked was when it came to my magic and the limits of it. I was the perfect friend for these reasons. I never pried, never asked any questions unless it was apparent someone wanted me to ask. I'd always been comfortable without knowledge I didn't need, especially when it came to someone else. I was the tragic death of a gossip mill or rumor.

  "Stop," the girl said. A pleading note entered her voice. "My friends, they say you have power."

  I rolled my eyes. "Everyone here has power."

  "Yes, but not like yours."

  I shifted on my feet, uncomfortable now. Did she know my secret? "Maybe," I admitted. "But the other students here expend power they shouldn't on a daily basis. That's why they're here. I didn't knowingly do anything wrong."

  The ghost studied me and I squirmed under her scrutiny. "But didn't you?" she asked.

  "No," I said sharply. I was still having trouble admitting to myself that I'd wanted to and the fact my spell actually worked was oh so troubling to me. But again, so far I was too scared to poke at it and really flex my magical muscles.

  "Never mind that," the girl said. "You can live in denial if you want to, but we need help."

  I gave her a hard-eyed stare. "Who's we?" I asked. "It's bad enough I'm even in here with you, especially since this place appears locked down and inaccessible to students."

  Grief etched hard lines down her face. "Me," she said. "And my friends. Students here."

  I blinked at her. "Friends?" I looked around the room searching for anyone else. "If you haven't already noticed, there's no one else here."

  She turned from me and raised her hands in the air. Gooseflesh rose on my arms. "Stop," I demanded. I wasn't sure what she was doing, but I didn't like it.

  I let out a breath and stiffened as it turned white. The temperature abruptly dropped twenty degrees.

  In front of me stood three other girls, dressed in the same stupid tie we were all forced to wear.

  Students.

  And all of them were dead.

  5

  My knees went boneless, and I sank to the dusty floor. All the girls had been killed in the same way, garish slashes marring the smooth skin of their throats.

  "What happened here?" I croaked.

  One of the girls, a pretty blonde, spoke. I couldn't help but marvel that they were able to especially with the injuries they suffered. In death, there was no suffering. Maybe that was why.

  "We don't know. Only that we were taken away from our beds in our senior year. We never saw who did it or what they wanted."

  The second girl, one with bright red hair and a pretty smattering of freckles on her face, spoke. "It was a ritual of some kind. They needed blood."

  " A lot of it," the third girl said. She gestured to her throat. "Apparently." A bright smile broke over her face and I stared at her in horror.

  "How can you smile?" I asked her.

  "Because if I don't I'll become something worse at the rage of it," she said. The smile fell from her face, leaving her looking too young to have suffered such a horrible fate.

  I scrubbed a hand over my face. "How is it you think I can help?" I asked. Even the thought of it made me nervous. I could ill afford to get kicked out of the academy. If there were nefarious dealings around here, it seemed like the adults should be the ones handling it.

  Not me.

  A delinquent whose parents had abandoned her. I had no real power here.

  "The moon," the redhead said. "You are one who is not tied to it."

  Dread pooled in my stomach. "Says who? All the witches are tied to the moon." Belatedly, I remembered I wasn't even supposed to be a witch here. "I'm a shifter," I pleaded. "I don't know what I can do."

  The first ghost smiled sadly at me. "Lies do not exist in the realm of the dead. We know what you are, Daughter of Selene. And we know your power is no more tied to the moon than ours is."

  My shoulders fell. "Why does it matter if I'm tied to the moon?"

  "Because the person who did this to us, or helped was. We were all killed four months apart on the nights of the full moon."

  "What was the goal?" I slowly stood up and brushed off the seat of my damnable skirt. I couldn't wait to get out of this thing.

  "We don't know," they intoned together in a not at all creepy way.

  "You want to know who it is?" I guessed.

  Nods all around.

  "And what will you do with that knowledge?"

  The second ghost gave me a grin that sent a cold finger down my spine. "Justice," she said. "No more and no less."

  I looked back longingly at the wall that wasn't a wall and wished I could step back through it and pretend none of this ever happened. But it was too late. Four girls stood in front of me, gone way before their time. All of us at Merlin were unusually long-lived. I didn't know what kind of creature, if any, these girls were, but they were young, too young, to have lost their lives in such an unnatural way.

  "Fine," I said on a huff. "I'll help you. But you have to do something for me."

  The first ghost crossed her arms. "And what is that?"

  "Ensure I get back to my room without getting caught for breaking curfew."

  Surprise flashed in her dim eyes. With a short nod, she headed for the wall. I followed behind her and waved lamely at the other girls standing there, like broken dolls.

  I was sure I wouldn't sleep a single wink tonight.

  The next morning I was woken up by being poked repeatedly in the shoulder by a small, annoying Asian girl. She was my roommate and neither one of us was fond of the other. She was too quiet and secretive. I wasn't sure what I was to her, but every time I caught her staring at me, her expression was one of distaste. Like she'd seen a roach on the floor and couldn't figure out if she wanted to squish it or never see it again.

  "Wake up, loser," she said. I marveled at how someone could live in a perpetual monotone voice. She reminded me of the professor on that movie who spoke only in one single tone no matter how exciting the subject matter was. I couldn't remember the name of it, but the humans loved it. I couldn't figure out why it was so beloved because the main star was kind of a brat.

  Regardless of her robotic voice, she'd done me a solid this morning by waking me up. I couldn't afford to be late to any classes. Like I said, I was saving up all my bad behavior for the future. It was hard being this good.

  I blinked up at her, only to see her hovering in my personal space. She was so close I could smell the
peppermint tea she drank every morning lingering on her breath. She didn't seem like a peppermint lover, more like a warm water drinker. Water didn't taste like anything and she could be anyone on the street - nameless, faceless, loveless and forgettable.

  "Good," she said and abruptly stood.

  "Thank you," I murmured as I raised my head up.

  "Punishments for tardiness are harsh at Merlin," she said, which might have been the most words she'd spoke since I'd arrived here. I knew she was a Kitsuné, simply because at her waist she wore a belt with three tails hanging down from it. Two of them were false, one of them true. Destroy the true one and she'd lose her skin and powers. She'd become human and eventually die from the madness of it.

  "Lolly?" Her name was weird as hell but it suited her.

  "What, shifter?" She rummaged through her closet until she found her cardigan. With jerky movements, she put it on and turned back to me. Long black hair fell in shiny sheets to her waist. Her skin was porcelain perfect, and I was jealous because I'd never spotted a single skin-care product on the bathroom sink. She was on the short side, though I knew her build was lithe and athletic, not uncommon with shifters. If you wanted to get technical about it, Lolly wasn't a shifter. She was a demon. Who could turn into either a fox or a terrifying creature.

  I woke up every day and whispered a prayer I'd never see the creature come out.

  "Do you want to sit with me at lunch today?" I swallowed hard. I rarely reached out to anyone, but after a sleepless night filled with terrifying dreams, the thought of a friend comforted me.

  I hated trying to make friends. It felt forced and weird and all kinds of awkward.

  Lolly hesitated for a moment which gave me hope for the future. "No," she snapped as she buttoned the last button.

  "Oh." We stared at each other. "Okay then," I said.

  She snatched up her backpack and reached for the door. Just as she was about to go out, she said quietly. "Ask me another time."

  I blinked at the door she abruptly shut behind her. "Well," I said to the empty room. "That could have gone worse." I smiled up at the ceiling.