How to Raise the Dead

by Leigh Kelsey

  Kati flinched back in surprise, along with the whole gaggle of students around her, as a deep rumbly purr filled the space.

  “Good afternoon, Giles,” Miz Jardin greeted. “I was just telling the new crop of girls about your kind. Care to demonstrate?”

  Giles stopped purring, the hall suddenly quiet; the boys and Lavellian had moved on, their voices no longer echoing back, and Kati fidgetted awkwardly in the dead silence. “No, I don’t,” a clipped voice said after a long pause.

  Kati peered over the dark head in front of her and saw the cat-sized statue on the arch was moving, its mouth opening and closing with each word and a long black stone tail swishing in clear irritation. “I was having a perfectly acceptable nap until you disturbed me.” As if recalling a warning to be more polite, the catgoyle added, “Thank you for the scratches.”

  Miz Jardin stroked under his chin again, a rumbling purr filling the hall that sounded like stone grating on stone. “It’s my utmost pleasure.” She beamed. “I’ll let you return to your rest.”

  “How gracious of you,” Giles drawled, curled his tail around himself, and went still.

  “So you see,” Miz Jardin said, facing the students again, her blue eyes aglow and her smooth, round face creased with the effort to fit as big a smile on it as possible. “Catgoyles. Not all of them are as irritable as our dear Giles, don’t worry. But even the grumpy ones are sworn to guide and protect the students and faculty of Second Breath Academy. So if you’re ever in need, all you need to do is ask.”

  “Cool,” a girl breathed.

  Even Alexandra Chen and her horsey friend nodded.

  “Right then.” Miz Jardin clapped her hands together. “Let’s show you to your dorms, shall we? Down here, follow me, we’ll take the far west spiral staircase back to the ground floor.”

  The pink-haired woman breezed through the arch Giles guarded over, and Kati followed along with the ten or so other girls, peering up at the winged cat as she passed beneath him. If she didn’t know any different, she’d have thought Giles was plain, inanimate stone. It was pretty damn awesome, and Kati found her heart filling with wonder at the school and everything it contained even as she told herself not to get attached.

  “This,” Naia breathed, close by her side as they headed down the tight corridor, still clutching her stack of books to her chest, “is the best day. Of my entire. Life.”

  Kati wanted to roll her eyes at her overflowing enthusiasm but she couldn’t fight the smile that curled her mouth. She wanted to agree, and maybe she would have if her situation had been different. If the mysterious events of last December hadn’t still hovered over her neck like an executioner’s blade.

  UNLUCKY FOR SOME

  “Right, here we are, dears,” Miz Jardin announced, after they’d taken too many twists and turns for Kati to keep track of, not to mention the spiralling metal staircase back to the ground floor, the steps swaying a bit too much for Kati’s liking. The scenic route, Miz Jardin called it. Never again, Kati vowed, the arches of her feet aching. “Three or four to a dorm, there are rooms for each of you inside, as well as a cosy living room I became incredibly fond of studying in back in my own days here at SBA.”

  Kati blinked, but she shouldn’t have been surprised that the teachers had attended the academy. Everyone with a decent job had gone to one at some point; her parents had met at All Souls University in Leeds. Even Lady LaVoire had attended Académie Éternelle in Paris before she turned into a dark sorceress with an army of reaper and necromancer puppets. And people thought Kati’s brother was like that woman. Ridiculous.

  “Have fun trio-ing up, or quadrupling up” Miz Jardin said with a tinkling laugh. “And just a reminder, today you’re on your regular schedule, but from tomorrow we’ll be switching to SBA’s usual nocturnal schedule. I’ll be back in three hours to escort you to dinner in the dining hall—it’s marvelous, just wait until you meet the ceiling.”

  Meet the ceiling, not see it?

  Kati, Naia, and Rahmi exchanged baffled glances but Miz Jardin went on, “There’s food in the little fridge in your living room, and a kettle to tide you over until dinner. Imagine if you didn’t have proper tea-making facilities.” She gave a little shudder, the beads and fringing on her dress quivering. “Right then, all that’s left is to advise you not to go off exploring on your own just yet—there’s plenty of time for that during the tour tomorrow—and to be open, gracious, and accepting of your fellow students. The roommates you choose now will be your roommates for the entirety of your three years at SBA, so make sure you all get on before picking a room.”

  “I already know who I’m sharing my room with,” Alexandra’s confident voice cut through the nervous mumbling of the other seven girls. “Girls, shall we go?”

  The horsey blonde and a tattooed, dark-haired broad girl with more piercings on her than the frontwomen of Kati’s favourite bands followed Alexandra down the hall towards a room. Alexandra threw open three doors before settling on one, and Kati rolled her eyes. Only the best for Alexandra Chen, apparently.

  “Well, then,” Miz Jardin said with a beaming grin, her hair wobbling as she shook her head. “I’ll leave you all to it.” She gave a little wave and wove through the awkward group of students milling around, not sure what to do, throwing awkward glances at each other.

  A hand dug into Kati’s arm before she could begin to scowl at any women looking at her as a prospective roommate. Not that anyone would want to share a dorm with the sister of an apparent murderer.

  Except for one idiot girl, of course.

  “Shall we team up?” Naia asked, her brown eyes big and hopeful when Kati slanted a look at her. She’d piled her books and duffle bag on the floor, her coat hanging open. The strength of her grip really shouldn’t have surprised Kati; Naia apparently did weightlifting every day with those heavy books. “It’ll be fun. And we don’t know anyone else, but at least we’ve all spoken to each other. Right, Rahmi?”

  “I’m in,” Rahmi replied with a nod, an easy smile on her face. “Definitely.”

  Kati glanced between them, Naia’s oval face dwarfed by big, teal glasses and an optimistic smile, and Rahmi, perfection in human form, not a single crease in her sari, not a fold of her hijab out of place, but a kindness to her eyes where Kati would expect derision. These were nice women. Good girls. And Kati … she’d been like them once, but now she had a reputation whether she liked it or not. Whether she deserved it or not.

  “You want to share a dorm with me? Aren’t you worried I’ll ritual murder you in your sleep?”

  “Well, I wasn’t,” Rahmi replied with a soft laugh. “But I sort of am now.”

  “Ignore her,” Naia insisted, squeezing Kati’s arm. “She’s just being anti-social. She’s not going to hurt us,” she said in a lowered voice, “and I don’t believe her brother hurt anyone, either. All those rumours were so exaggerated and dramatic, they can’t possibly be accurate.”

  “They aren’t,” Kati growled, her eyes flashing a warning. “It’s all bullshit.”

  Rahmi’s expression was thoughtful. She hiked her bag strap higher on her shoulder, drawing Kati’s eye to the shiny gold scythe pinned to it. Shit—if Alexandra Chen’s bag was designer, this one was priceless. Reap It And Weep bags were so coveted that people went bankrupt for them, the supernatural world’s answer to Alexander McQueen. Who the hell were her family, to be able to afford something like that?

  Judgment rose in Kati, and she braced for the superiority and sneering that kind of wealth usually produced in people, but in a warm voice, Rahmi said, “Half the stuff they print are lies. The Skull and Crossbones once said my uncle was embezzling money because he borrowed a pound to get milk for the office fridge. I mean.” Rahmi tossed her head. “How stupid can you be?”

  Naia laughed, hope in her eyes. Why she wanted to share a room with the two of them was beyond Kati, but she supposed she had to sleep somewhere. Why not with two girls who’d been slightly more welcoming than the
rest of the students?

  “I don’t know,” Kati said quietly, smirking. “But if they’re looking for any more idiot reporters, I know just where they can find one.” She jerked her chin at the door Alexandra Chen had disappeared into. “That girl’s a grade A moron.”

  “Agreed,” Naia said tentatively, glancing behind her as if they’d hear her slight.

  Rahmi’s mouth twitched with a smile, her eyes sparkling. “Look on the bright side,” she said. “We have to share classes with her but at least we don’t have to share the same dorm.”

  Kati nodded fervent agreement. “Good point.”

  “Shall we?” Naia asked, bouncing on her heels and finally letting go of Kati’s arm now that she sensed Kati wasn’t about to bolt. “There are two dorms left.”

  “Which one’s the furthest away from the Chen trio?” Rahmi asked, scanning the dark corridor, and Kati decided there and then that she liked her.

  She pointed at a door three doors down. “That one.”

  “Oh no,” Naia whispered as they headed for the door, clumsily gathering her books into her arms. “Green’s my unlucky colour.”

  Kati snorted. “Who has an unlucky colour? That’s like having unlucky underwear.”

  “I have those too!” Naia said with wide brown eyes, warily eyeing the lacquered green door as Rahmi swung it open, light catching the bronze number 13 nailed to the door. “Souls,” Naia breathed, her eyes on the number. “Maybe I should reconsider rooming with you two after all.”

  “Nope.” Kati hooked her elbow around Naia’s, towing her into the small living room despite the fact Naia was a good head taller than Kati. “You made your choice and now you’re stuck with us.”

  Naia’s eyes were so wide Kati could see the whites. “Please don’t murder me in my sleep, or charm my bed to suffocate me, or poison my tea, or something else equally horrific and unlucky.”

  Kati laughed, ignoring the hurt spiralling through her belly. If Theo hadn’t done whatever he’d done—not murder, but he’d got involved in something bad—nobody would look at Kati and think threat. But she brushed it off and with a grin said, “I’ll do my best.”

  DORM ROOMS AND A GIANT EEL

  The rooms were everything Kati had been dreaming off since she was little and first started wishing she’d be invited to Second Breath Academy. The living room of dorm number thirteen was round, with curved walls and a low vaulted ceiling, the walls white but accented with rich green and gold furnishings, a flat screen TV set on the rightmost wall. The far end of the room was interrupted by three tall, thin windows, letting shafts of afternoon light through the lead-paned glass, and oak doors led off from the left and right of the circular room. Like everything else at the academy, Kati had never seen anything like it.

  “Wow,” Rahmi breathed. “I know it looked pretty in the prospectus but … wow. I didn’t think our rooms would be anything like this.”

  Naia seemed to have been stunned out of her terror; she dropped her books and her bag on the nearest sofa, a plush green corduroy thing that swallowed up the books, and she let out a whimpered shriek as she raced for the first door on the left, her long braid slapping her back. Kati trailed after her, curiosity rising. If this was the living room, what would their bedrooms look like?

  Kati peered into the second door on the left, finding a four-poster bed with gold curtains trimmed in green, a wardrobe big enough to hold fifty outfits, and shelves built into the far wall, all of it lit in sunny shades by a big window. Her soul filling up with longing, she dumped her bag on the floor and went to the window, gazing through its square panes at a dark stone wing of the castle, the gravel path leading to a sweep of grass and the dark forest, a hint of silver just visible past it—the lake. Framing the whole scene was the lush valley and the grey-blue sky. It was one hell of a view.

  “Dibs,” she shouted at the other girls.

  “Aw, what?” Naia appeared suddenly, panting for breath. “How come you have a view? And a window seat! My room doesn’t even have a window.”

  Kati shrugged, grinning, more than pleased with her choice of bedroom. “You snooze, you lose.”

  “Hey, look at you,” Rahmi said, appearing over Naia’s shoulder. “Is that a smile on your face? I didn’t know your face could do that.”

  Kati narrowed her eyes, scowling and squeezing her cactus a little too tight, still unwilling to let go of it.

  “Whoops,” Rahmi laughed. “Shouldn’t have said anything. Want to come see my room?”

  Kati followed them, cactus in tow, if only to give her something to do. She’d never felt so self-conscious in her life, or so … off-balance. She kept reminding herself not to take everything for granted, not to assume she’d be able to stay, but the wonder of the academy refused to let her go, sweeping her up every time she saw something new. Her heart was full of it, her soul alive with the magic and history and promise all around her.

  Across the living room, Rahmi’s room—done up in jade tones—looked out on a different angle of the castle, facing the valley and the lake. Here, Kati glimpsed a wider curve of it, water splashing as something within it moved.

  “What is that?” Naia gasped, frantically patting herself down before coming up empty handed. “I need my SBA guide, I swear it never mentioned fish in the lake.”

  Rahmi shrugged. “No idea. But it looks a bit bigger than a fish, Naia.”

  “It’s a giant eel,” Kati said, peering out the window beside the girls, Naia halting on the threshold in pursuit of her guidebook. When the two of them looked at her in surprise, Naia rushing back to the window for a closer look, Kati added, “My brother told me about the academy. The eel used to be a normal size, but students kept going down to the lake’s shore to practise magic and now it’s huge. The size of a football pitch.”

  “Damn,” Rahmi said, her voice hushed, a smile spreading across her face and illuminating her amber eyes. “Pretty sure I got the best room, sorry, ladies.”

  “I want to see it,” Naia breathed, already turning away from the window, a fanatic look in her eye.

  “Naia, no,” Rahmi laughed, catching her before she could run off. “We just got here, there’s plenty of time to see the eel tomorrow. And Miz Jardin said there’d be a tour tomorrow, remember?”

  “She also said not to go exploring,” Kati added, taking a guess at rule breaking horrifying Naia.

  Bingo—Naia stiffened, nodding seriously. “You’re right. We shouldn’t leave our rooms. I’ll ask to see it on the tour tomorrow.” She paused, looking between the three of them, uncertainty creeping into her expression. “What do we do now?”

  Kati shrugged, glancing around Rahmi’s room. “I guess we move in.”

  BE WARY OF FONDUE FOUNTAINS

  “I still can’t believe they just appeared,” Naia gushed for the third time this hour and the eleventh time since their luggage had spontaneously appeared in the middle of their living room, complete with the paper tags they’d wrapped around their handles prior to putting them in the luggage compartment of the shitty bus, each one with their names in capitals printed on the paper.

  “We’re at an academy that teaches death magic,” Kati pointed out. Again. “And you’re surprised by a little object relocation?”

  She, Naia, and Rahmi were following Miz Jardin from the girl’s dorms to the dining hall, the academy walls dark around them but lit by orange magic in sconces and strands of electric lighting hanging above, faint streams of fuschia sunset light striping them as they passed by tall, narrow windows at random intervals. As dark and gloomy as the atmosphere was at the school—there were suits of armour guarding each corner for souls sakes!—it ought to have stunk of dust and mildew, but a pleasant clean scent wove through every corridor, like clothes fresh out of the washer.

  “No,” Naia said in answer to Kati’s question, and then, “Yes! It was all so sudden and so … magic.”

  At their side, Rahmi laughed, a bright, bubbling sound. “Magic does tend to be magic.”<
br />
  The three of them jumped as a sudden, deafening bong shattered the low conversations around them, filling up the tiny corridor between classrooms until Kati couldn’t hear herself think. A girl in the back even screamed at the ear-splitting chime but it cut off swiftly, replaced by a jittery laugh.

  “Just the clocktower, dears,” Miz Jardin said cheerily, her pastel pink hair bobbing as she turned to inspect them. “It goes off every quarter of the hour—you get used to how loud it is.”

  Kati shook her head at herself, her heart slamming into her ribcage. It was just the damn clocktower, one of the three spires she’d seen jutting up from the academy on her way in. “Fucking clock,” she muttered, then raised her voice. “Why is there a clocktower in an academy anyway?”

  “So none of you have any excuses for being late, of course,” Miz Jardin replied with a wry smile. “Now, come along. You don’t want to be late for your first dinner—you’ll miss all the excitement.”

  “Excitement?” Naia whispered, looking from Kati to Rahmi. She looked equal parts intrigued and fearful, clutching a charm hanging around her neck in the absence, Kati assumed, of clutching her stack of books to her chest. It had taken some convincing to get Naia to accept that she didn’t need to take them to tea with them, though Kati knew she still had the SBA mini guide in her cardigan pocket.

  Rahmi shrugged, smiling widely. She was all sunshine and enthusiasm, that girl, and it didn’t dim even when Kati gave her a narrow-eyed look. “Let’s go find out!”

  “I doubt this is what Miz Jardin meant by excitement,” Kati said with a smirk, watching the hawk-like caretaker gesture with his hands as he ran through the academy rules.