by Ivy Hearne
Hunters’ Academy
5: Valentine Dance
Ivy Hearne
Hunters’ Academy 5: Valentine Dance
Copyright © 2019 by Ivy Hearne
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval systems, without prior written permission of the author except where permitted by law.
Published by Belgate Press
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author or authors.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
About Hunters’ Academy 5: Valentine Dance
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Hunters’ Academy 1: Entrance Exam
Hunters’ Academy 2: Winter Break
Hunters’ Academy 3: Crash Course
Hunters’ Academy 4: Independent Study
Hunters’ Academy 5: Valentine’s Dance
Hunters’ Academy 6: Spring Break
About the Author
About Hunters’ Academy 5: Valentine Dance
When a fire threatens to engulf the school the night of the annual Valentine’s Day Dance, Kacie and her friends at the Hunters’ Academy must determine if it’s an accident or the work of the Lusus Naturae, even as they fight to save the Academy itself.
Fans of Dragon School, Fallen Academy, Secret Keepers, Vampire Academy, and Harry Potter will love Hunters’ Academy!
Valentine’s Dance is episode 5 of Hunters’ Academy.
Chapter 1
For a long moment after I woke up every morning, I knew exactly what was wrong with me.
I’d been attacked.
Ms. Hush, an Academy instructor, had removed a spell-slug from my head. And then someone—I assumed the Lusus Naturae—had sent a wraith in to replace it with another.
They had literally bugged me. One of them had even said something about seeing what I saw.
My head hurt all the time. And no wonder, since I had that thing inside me.
And every morning, I remembered that I had forgotten—that I had spent every morning in the week since the attack trying to remember it long enough to tell someone else.
Today, I promised myself silently. Today will be the day I hold the memory long enough to tell someone else.
Keeping my eyes closed, I reached for my phone. My fingers brushed against it on the bedside table, then closed around it. Slowly, I brought it into the bed with me, lifting it up toward my face.
“Are you awake?”
My eyes popped open at my roommate Erin’s words. She stood in the doorway of her closet, wrapped in a towel, fresh out of the shower.
“I am now.” I rubbed at my eyes with my wrist.
“You sleeping with your phone now?” She gestured at my other hand.
I blinked, confused to find I was indeed clutching my phone tightly. “Wow. That’s weird.” I checked the screen. “And apparently, I was sleep-texting you, too.”
Erin’s laugh wasn’t very loud, but it pounded against my eardrums. I sat up, pushing back the hairs that had escaped the braid I kept my long, blond hair in while I slept.
“Do me a favor,” I continued. “If I send out any bizarre morning texts, just chalk them up to sleepwalking, okay?”
“Do you remember what you were going to tell me in your sleep-text?”
“No.” My heart sped up, then skipped a beat. “All this says is ‘I am.’ But whatever it was, it seemed awfully important at the time.”
Erin gave me a sympathetic smile. “Most first-years have some kind of nightmares—especially after the entrance exams. It’ll get better.”
“Promise? Because they’ve been bad this week.” I frowned. “I think.”
“I promise. And I also promise you’ll feel better after you get up and get moving. Anyway, it’s Friday. You’ll have the whole weekend to recover.”
She was wrong about getting up making me feel better—my head still pounded even after I took a shower and got dressed. I popped a couple of ibuprofen tablets and stared wistfully at my bottle of prescription migraine pills. They would get rid of the headache for a few hours, but I would end up sleeping the day away.
Instead, I decided to skip breakfast, opting to lie down with a cold washcloth on my forehead for an extra half hour.
But that didn’t help, either. I still hurt as I staggered out the dormitory’s front door and headed toward Ms. Hush’s class.
“Hey, Kacie!” Tony called from behind me. I turned around, blinking. I was so out of it that I hadn’t even noticed Tony standing to one side of the doorway when I exited.
“Oh. Hi. Sorry I didn’t see you.” Just turning to look at him made my head swim and ache. “What’s up?”
He took a step closer. “I was wondering if you would go to the Valentine Dance with me tonight.”
“I’m really sorry, Tony, but I don’t think I’m going to be able to. I feel really awful. Honestly, I don’t think I’m going to do anything this weekend.”
His expression clouded over. “Yeah, sure. Okay. Talk to you later.” He spun on his heel and jammed his fists into his jeans pockets.
I wanted to call out after him, too tell him again that I was sorry, that I had been feeling awful for ages. But I didn’t—in part because I didn’t even feel well enough to do that. I trudged on toward class, hoping Ms. Hush could help me.
About halfway to classroom building, Angelica trotted up to me. It was amazing to me how, even in her human form, the centaur shifter always seemed to move like a horse. A graceful horse, but one who trotted or galloped and who flipped her hair back with a shake of her head that was perfectly reminiscent of a horse tossing its mane.
“Hey,” she said. “Do you know who’s going to give us our test today?”
I opened my mouth to respond, then simply shook my head and closed my mouth. “I think you’ll be surprised,” I said with a sigh. I’d been having variations of this conversation with my classmates for almost a month now. When Ms. Gayle, our headmistress, had brought in a wraith to teach para-biology, she had done it because Ms. Hush was the best para-biology expert around. She knew more than anyone else about the subject.
The problem was that Ms. Hush, as a wraith, had certain traits that were problematic in a schoolteacher.
For one, almost everyone forgot her as soon as they looked away from her. While that was definitely useful for member of the Lusus Naturae—the freaks of nature who had formed an organization to basically take over the world. They wanted to wipe out the hunters and take control of all humanity. That was the main reason for the hunters’ existence.
We trained to keep the world safe. That was our primary goal, always.
Ms. Hush had been a member of the Lusus Naturae before she had crossed over and joined our side. The side of good and light.
I had not yet figured out yet why the Council, the group that pretty much ran all hunters’ activities, brought her here rather than posting her in the field somewhere, fighting against her former allies. It seemed like her abilities as a wraith magic user would make her more useful out in the world somewhere.
Maybe they forgot she existed as soon as she asked for an assignment.
The stray thought made me giggle, and I shook my head.
“What’s so funny?” Angelica asked as we stepped into the class.
I opened my mouth to explain, t
hen closed it again. I was finding myself doing that a lot. But mostly when it came to Ms. Hush. “Nothing,” I offered lamely.
I paused just inside the door, trying to figure out what had just caught my attention. Slowly, I moved backward, stepping back through the doorway. Angelica watched me curiously.
Outside the door, someone had taped up a hot-pink flier for the Valentine’s Day dance. Without even knowing why, I reached out and pulled it down, staring down at it as I walked back into the room.
I folded the flier into quarters and shoved it into the pocket of my uniform skirt.
“Hello, Kacie,” Ms. Hush said as I headed toward my desk.
“Hi, Ms. Hush.” As usual when I used my nickname for her, she seemed to take on an extra rosy glow of pleasure. I guess when no one remembers who you are, a nickname could be particularly lovely.
“You know her?” Angelica whispered as we headed toward our seats. She blinked, glancing back over her shoulder. “Wait,” she said, “I remember her. She’s been teaching in here for a while, hasn’t she?”
“Yep.” I turned and looked over my shoulder, tossing a wink at Ms. Hush. I’d been having versions of this conversation over and over, too.
Honestly, I didn’t know why I was able to remember her when no one else was. Except Ms. Gayle, of course. My recall of Ms. Hush gotten better once she had helped remove the psychic block the Lusus Naturae had stuffed into my head in the form of a magical slug, though, so that might have had something to do with it.
The test Ms. Hush gave us went okay. I couldn’t decide to be whether to be pleased or horrified that I’d had personal encounters with several of the creatures we were tested over. I was definitely amused that Ms. Hush had included wraiths on the test.
After class, I made my way up to Ms. Hush’s desk.
“What can I help you with, Kacie?” she asked.
“I’m having a little bit of...” I waved my hand vaguely at my forehead. I was trying to say the words a headache, but they didn’t come out.
“Some sort of difficulties with your psychic communication?”
No, I wanted to say. I’m having headaches again, and I want you to make sure I’m okay.
But that’s not what came out. What I actually said was, “Yes. I’ve been practicing my psychic messaging, and the things I send out aren’t as clear as I would like them to be.”
Ms. Hush frowned and reached out, letting her slim, cool fingers dance across my forehead.
“Hm. I can feel some residual...” The frown line between her eyes deepened. “Something. Maybe you should have a talk with Mr. Meriwether about it. You might find he can help you with that.” Her tone shifted from mildly concerned to dismissive. “But now that the bug block is gone, you should find your psychic abilities falling into place fairly soon.” She turned back to the papers on her desk, gathering them and shoving them into a satchel.
Now I was the one frowning. I don’t think Ms. Hush had ever simply dismissed my concerns. Not that I could remember, anyway.
But she was a wraith. And as I had just written on my test, wraiths had the ability to leave humans confused, disoriented, and prone to forgetting the wraiths entirely. So for all I knew, the things I did remember about Ms. Hush were the ones that were out of character, rather this newly dismissive attitude.
“Okay,” I said hesitantly. “I guess I’ll do that.”
She nodded and waved without looking up.
I trudged out of the room, wondering why I had decided at the last minute not to tell her about my pounding headache. Which was much worse now than it had been before I talked to her.
Today was not turning out to be a great day. I had upset Tony by telling him I didn’t want to go to the dance with him—even though that wasn’t entirely true. Mostly what I didn’t want to do was hurt anymore. And now my favorite teacher was brushing off the things I told her. Not that I was telling the truth. Yet another way my day was already full of suckage.
It only got worse when I realized that staying behind to talk to Ms. Hush had made me late enough to my next class that I missed a pop quiz in there.
By the time lunch rolled around, I was ready to call it a day. All I wanted to do was go crawl into my bed and hide with my head under the covers. Instead, I decided, I would go to the Hunters’ Academy’s equivalent of the nurse’s office. Eating lunch sounded like a horrific idea right now, anyway.
But when I got over to the medical office, the person running the registration desk asked me what I was there for. I opened my mouth to tell her—but nothing came out. She peered at me, her eyes kind but concerned. She tapped one long, light pink nail on the desk as she stared at me.
When I didn’t respond for several more seconds, she said, “is something wrong?”
I nodded my head.
Her mouth tightened, and for a split second, I expected her to speak to me in the tone I had heard from so many medical professionals—condescending, bureaucratic, and unwilling to try to help.
Instead, though, she leaned closer. “Can you tell me why is going on with you?”
I shook my head—and at that moment, I realized that there was something truly strange about this headache.
Chapter 2
This wasn’t just a headache. This was...something else.
Something that was making my head hurt. Something was clouding my thinking. And something was keeping me from telling anyone about it.
I could, however, apparently make physical gestures. I pointed to my forehead and temples.
“There’s something wrong with your head?” The receptionist guessed.
I nodded. Her eyes narrowed. “And you can’t tell me about it in words?”
I shook my head. Tears pricked behind my eyes. Whatever Ms. Hush had done to get rid of the darkness inside me, it hadn’t been enough. There had been a slug in my head and taking it out had not solved the problem.
I tried to open my mouth to explain everything that had happened, but instead, I broke out into a hot sweat. Droplets of it trickled down my back, as if I had run here from my classroom.
“Come with me,” she said, standing and leading me down a short hallway to a small room with an exam table. “Have a seat. The doctor will be with you in a moment.”
As I waited in the doctor’s exam room, I began picking at the paper that covered the padded exam table, tearing off long, thin strips, and then ripping them down the center to create more. After about thirty seconds of waiting, my heart started beating faster. I ripped more paper, creating a small pile of confetti next to me.
Run.
It was like a tiny voice my head, separate from me, urging my body to follow its commands.
Get out.
I grasped the edge of the table with sweat-slicked palms.
If you move now, they won’t be able to catch you.
When the doctor finally entered the room five minutes later, I was still sitting on the table, but my elbows were locked and sweat trickled down the center of my back. I clutched the table as if unpeeling my fingers from their death-grip for even a heartbeat would send me hurtling out into the hallway. And really, there was a good chance it would have.
The doctor stood well over six feet, an almost cadaverously thin man with a shock of Einstein-style hair.
“Hi. I’m Dr. Bernie.” He held out one hand to shake mine. I let go of the table long enough to return the grip. His hand was cool and dry—at least, it seemed that way compared to mine. “Janice tells me that you are having some trouble you can’t speak about aloud?”
Despite the inner voice still yelling at me to stop listening to him and flee the scene entirely, I heaved a sigh of relief. Someone else was figuring out what was wrong with me. Finally. I nodded, pointing to my forehead and frowning exaggeratedly.
“You have pain in your head?” Dr. Bernie asked.
I nodded again, fervently.
“On a scale of one to ten, what is your pain level—if one is no pain at all and ten is the worst p
ain you could possibly imagine?”
I hated that question. I had a great imagination, so I could always imagine pains that were even worse that what I was dealing with. I tried to say the word seven, but I couldn’t push it out past whatever was blocking me from talking about this headache.
Eventually, though, I held my fingers up.
Dr. Bernie nodded. “And what happens when you try to speak about the headache?”
Don’t answer, the tiny voice in the back of my head admonished me. I was beginning to think that voice really wasn’t mine at all.
I decided to demonstrate, opening my mouth to try to say something. No sound escaped. All that made it out was a tiny burst of air. I held my hands up in a shrug.
“I see.” With another nod, Dr. Bernie pulled out all the usual medical equipment to check my blood pressure, my heart rate, my ears and nose and throat, and he even tested my reflexes with one of those little hammer things.
When he was done, he crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back a little, tilting his head to one side and narrowing his eyes as he stared at me.
I wasn’t entirely certain what he was doing, until he said, “Well, your aura does look a little smudgy.”
I blinked. “What does a smudgy aura mean?” I asked, managing to speak for the first time since he walked into the room. As long as we were not talking about my head—at least not directly—apparently I was okay and could be trusted to say words out loud.
Lucky me.
Dr. Bernie shook his head and frowned. “I’m not certain in this case. Obviously, something is magically awry. Sometimes smudges can be momentary emotional disturbances, moods that quickly pass. Other times, it could be the result of a spell or curse—”
“A curse?” I demanded, startled at his potential diagnosis. “I could be cursed? I didn’t know that was even a thing.”
Dr. Bernie’s laugh didn’t really match his body. I would have expected a sepulchral laugh to go with the cadaverous body. Instead, his laugh was full and robust, and sounded like something a department store Santa might use during the holiday season.
