by Martha Carr
“You got some kinda medical condition or something?”
Snatching up two napkins and a fork, she turned to look at him and cocked her head. “No, but if I did, it’d be none of your business.”
“Only trying to look out for you, Coulier. That’s all.”
“Yeah, well, I’m pretty good at looking out for myself, thanks. Especially when it comes to food.”
The boy laughed as she hurried away from the table to pour herself a glass of orange juice at the salad bar. Amanda was smiling too, but it faded as she focused on filling the cup.
I’ve been here for almost two months, and no one’s picked up on what I am. There’s no way they wouldn’t bring it up all the time if they knew.
The Academy’s carefully selected faculty and staff all knew who Amanda Coulier was—and what she was. It would’ve been impossible to keep the fact that she was Johnny Walker’s ward a secret for very long. The other students knew that much, at least. Ms. Ralthorn had approached Amanda on her first week on campus, way before the actual school year had officially started, and asked if she “needed special allowances to use her abilities in private.”
Amanda had told the woman no right away but didn’t have the heart to ask the Light Elf teacher if she knew anything about shifters at all. It wasn’t like she couldn’t control herself and had to go running through the swamps to kill something on a full moon or anything. After six weeks of being here, she still hadn’t shifted in front of anyone else. Not after what had happened the last time she’d changed in front of strangers.
Not like any of the kids here are trying to kidnap me from my house or come after me in the middle of Nowhere, Everglades. If I don’t have to shift to get through school, I won’t.
With a firm nod of determination at the ice-buried pitchers of juice and milk, Amanda snatched up her plate again and headed toward one of the picnic tables beneath the pavilion. She dug into her eggs and sausage the second her butt hit the bench, then the usual crowd of what she’d almost come to think of as her friends joined her.
“Every single meal, Amanda.” Grace Porter laughed and set down her plate across from the shifter girl. “How do you go through so much food all the time?”
“I’m hungry,” Amanda replied through a mouthful of eggs, then tried to catch the bits falling out of her mouth. “The food here’s really good.”
“I don’t know about that…” Grace tucked her short blonde bob behind her ears and shrugged. “But sure. It’s better than whatever we managed to…borrow back in LA.”
“Borrow, huh?” The orange juice was so cold, Amanda braced herself for a brain-freeze as she gulped down her second mouthful.
“Yeah. Borrow.” Grace smirked and stabbed a bunch of cut melon onto her fork. “With an extended timeline for returning it when we’re done.”
“Not our fault if the stores didn’t want it back in its new form.” Jackson stepped over the bench and sat beside Grace. “Not that we ever really tried…”
“Breakfast, Jackson.” Amanda pointed at her plate. “We’re eating breakfast.”
“Hey, it’s not like I painted a super detailed picture or anything.” The wizard turned over his shoulder toward the buffet table, which now had a much larger line growing steadily longer by the minute. “Alex! Grab me an extra cinnamon roll!”
The half-Wood Elf with his dark brown hair tied back in a long ponytail reaching the middle of his back raised an eyebrow at their table. “Should’ve thought of that before you sat down, man.”
“I ran out of room! Come on. Just one.”
Alex rolled his eyes and slowly shook his head as he made his way down the breakfast table.
“Ran out of room?” Grace snorted and gestured at Jackson’s plate. “That’s, like, a half-full plate.”
“No…that’s a perfectly segregated plate, okay?” Jackson touched his fork against each of the neatly separated piles of different food. “They touch even a little, and I can’t eat it. The whole thing’s ruined.”
“You have some serious issues to work out.” Grace looked up at Amanda and grinned. “Hey, you know any other magicals with OCD?”
“Um…” Amanda wrinkled her nose and instantly thought of the oddly organized way Johnny operated in his home despite the fact that she’d seen the bounty hunter blow up more than anyone’s fair share of buildings and creatures. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe he’s the first.”
“Hey.” Jackson shot the witch a playful frown. “Because I like to keep things clean and organized doesn’t mean I have a problem.”
“Yeah. Okay.”
Amanda was already halfway through her breakfast but started yawning again before she got to the cinnamon roll.
“Whoa.” Grace leaned away and looked Amanda up and down. “You’re usually running around like you drank three Red Bulls first thing in the morning. What’s up with you?”
“Didn’t get much sleep.” Amanda rubbed her eyes, then dug into the rest of her bacon and yogurt.
“Aw…” Jackson leaned forward over the table with a frown of mocking concern. “Little kid still scared of the dark?”
He laughed when Grace elbowed him in the ribs.
“No.” Amanda cocked her head at him. “I don’t have a problem with milk or my food touching, either.”
Grace burst out laughing, and Jackson shook his head while narrowing his eyes at the shifter. “Are you sure you’re only twelve?”
“Last time I checked.” She shoved the last two pieces of bacon into her mouth and shrugged. It didn’t bother her one bit that she was almost the youngest student at the Academy. Jimmy took the blue ribbon on that one; he was only eleven. None of the other kids knew what kind of magical he was or even his last name. She’d picked up from random conversations that the other kids who’d all lived together beneath the city of LA had tried to figure out anything else about Jimmy, but he barely talked, and even the teachers couldn’t get him to say more than two or three words at a time.
She glanced across the outdoor cafeteria and found the tiny kid standing in line between a tall, thin wizard she thought was named Ben and an equally tall seventeen-year-old girl she recognized but didn’t know. Jimmy stood with his hands in his pockets, occasionally leaning sideways to peer around the much taller kids in front of him to get a good look at the buffet table.
I bet even Jimmy’s not afraid of the dark. Not after living in tunnels for whoever knows how long.
“What kept you up, then?” Grace asked.
“I bet she was trying to get herself in trouble.” Jackson snorted and carefully lifted a forkful of eggs to his mouth. “You know, trying to fit in with the rest of us.”
Amanda shot him a crooked smile and finally dug into her cinnamon roll. Just because I didn’t drop out of school to live underground doesn’t mean I haven’t seen some shit.
“It’s not a competition,” she muttered.
Grace barked out a laugh and slapped Jackson’s arm with the back of her hand. “You’re really digging yourself a hole, here.”
“Yeah, I know.” Jackson pointed at the shifter girl. “I’ll get you to crack eventually.”
“You can try.” She bit off a huge chunk of cinnamon roll and waggled her eyebrows at him.
“Try what?” Alex rounded the table with his full plate and sat next to Amanda.
“To crack her open like an egg,” Grace said. “He thinks she’s fragile.”
“Trying to figure her out is all.” Jackson shrugged. “I know you have secrets, Coulier. Only a matter of time ’til they’re out in the open.”
“Yeah, okay.” Amanda tried to smile but focused on her cinnamon roll. Secrets are secrets for a reason. Not gonna happen.
“Hey, sweet!” Jackson stood and reached across the table toward Alex’s plate. “Thanks, man.”
“Dude. That’s mine.” Alex glared at the cinnamon roll the wizard had snatched right off his plate.
Jackson froze with his mouth open and the cinnam
on roll poised for a bite. “Come on. I asked you to get me one, and you brought two.”
“Yeah, for myself.”
“Here, I’ll split it with you—”
A green light flashed on the grass behind the wizard, then two snaking tendrils of thick brown roots burst from the lawn and wrapped themselves around Jackson’s belly.
“What the—” He looked down at his middle before the roots squeezed and made him cough up a wheezing grunt. “Dude…”
“Mine.” Alex flicked his fingers toward the stolen cinnamon roll, and it zipped out of Jackson’s loose grip before plopping down on the half-Wood Elf’s plate.
With a sharp snap, the vines unwound themselves from around Jackson’s middle and slithered back into the gaping holes in the grass. The wizard gasped and slammed a fist down on the table. “Not cool, man!”
“Then don’t take my stuff.” Alex’s deep brown eyes flashed with a pale green light as he stared at the other boy and took a huge bite of the returned cinnamon roll.
“Jeeze.” Jackson rubbed his stomach and cleared his throat. “You’re trying to kill me.”
“OCD and paranoid.” Grace shot Amanda a crooked smile.
“Whatever.” The wizard focused on his plate and crammed food into his mouth, chewing angrily.
Amanda glanced around her small group of friends. “Hey, you guys excited for Combat Training?”
“What?” Jackson looked sharply up at her. “What the hell is that?”
“Our first class.” Grace snorted. “You don’t pay attention to anything, do you?”
“Aw, come on. We haven’t even had a stupid class yet. How am I supposed to know what everything is?”
“The schedule,” Alex muttered.
“What schedule?”
“They handed them out two days ago.” Grace frowned at the wizard. “After dinner. In the center field. You don’t remember?”
As the other kids at her table argued over the when, where, and how of knowing the classes they’d be taking for the Academy’s first-ever official semester, Amanda tuned them out and stared across the outdoor cafeteria.
Summer had finally arrived from wherever she’d been since wake-up, and now Candace, Emma, and Megan surrounded her. The trio of older girls had their heads bent toward Summer as they viewed the now crowded buffet table and pavilion.
Great. She’s getting the grand tour from the saltiest girls in the whole school.
Then Summer’s sweeping gaze landed on Amanda at the picnic table and stayed there while Candace kept chattering away in her ear.
Amanda gave the new girl a small smile and raised her hand in a mostly subtle wave. Summer’s upper lip twitched, and she rolled her eyes before turning away and facing forward at the end of the breakfast line.
Grace turned around to look behind her and frowned. “Who are you waving to?”
“New girl.”
“There’s a new girl?” Jackson whipped around on the bench and scanned the line. “Where?”
“End of the line.”
“Oh…” With a sigh, the wizard faced forward again and scowled. “Candace already snagged her up to be her new slave. Figures.”
“You know her?” Alex stared at Amanda as he chewed his food.
“Not really. She’s right across the hall from me, though.”
“Huh. Wonder what got her here.”
“She looks pissed off about something,” Grace added. “No wonder Candace and the yes-brats swooped in.”
Amanda kept her mouth shut and quickly finished the rest of her breakfast. Not my place to tell someone else’s story. Guess we’ll find out what she can do in class.
Chapter Four
The entire student body of the Academy of Necessary Magic gathered in the center field of the campus just after 7:00 a.m. for Principal Glasket’s little opening speech for their first day of school. A deafeningly loud alarm like a fog horn blared across the field, making everyone duck or cover their ears or grimace. Glasket jolted and stumbled forward against the podium on the small stage, making the microphone buzz with static before erupting into a loud shriek. She fumbled with the mic, finally got the sound to stop, then shot a burning glare toward the congregated teachers standing off to the side. “Mr. LeFor—”
“Yeah, I’ll get that fixed.” The tall, wiry wizard who would be teaching Augmented Technology rubbed his short, fiery-red hair vigorously until it stood on end in every direction. “Still working out the kinks.”
“The kinks? You—never mind.” Glasket waved him off, then faced the gathered students again and broke into a wide grin. “Good morning, everyone. You’ve all been here for quite some time and have gotten to know the campus and the various rules that keep this place running. Now it’s time for your first day of classes. I wanted to tell you that I’m so glad each one of you is here, and I’m very much looking forward to seeing how your skills, abilities, and knowledge develop over this first semester at the Academy of Necessary Magic.
“Just a reminder. You all received your first-semester class schedules on Friday. Every schedule was assigned a color. Green for freshmen. Yellow for sophomores. Purple for juniors. Red for seniors. You’ll be in these same classes for the entire year, with the same students on the weekly rotation through your studies. So.” Glasket glanced at her bright-pink wristwatch. “You have about fifteen minutes until classes begin. Your teachers for Block One will show you where to go with your year’s assigned colors. Enjoy the rest of your day, and let’s have a great first year.”
When the principal clapped, the mic shrieked again. She quickly righted it, cast another scathing glance at Mr. LeFor, and the students covered their ears, grimaced, or laughed.
“Freshmen!” Mr. Petrov barked. “Eyes on me!”
He marched across the back of the central field toward the long concrete building on the southeast side of the campus. When he stuck his finger high above his head, a shower of green sparks burst from the tip and shot five feet into the air.
Grace gently elbowed Amanda and muttered, “Guess we better fall in line, huh?”
“Yeah, before he throws the sparks at us.” Chuckling, Amanda headed off toward Mr. Petrov, her heart fluttering at the thought of starting her first class on the first day of bounty hunter school with Combat Training.
“You guys have any idea what we’re about to get into?” Jackson glanced across the field at Mr. LeFor throwing up red sparks, Ms. Calsgrave tossing a spiral of purple, and Mrs. Zimmer shooting a thin stream of yellow.
“If it’s with the lieutenant, it’s gotta be good,” Alex offered, shrugging as the group of friends made their way toward Mr. Petrov.
“How do you know he’s a lieutenant?” Amanda shot the half-Wood Elf a playful frown.
“The guy barks orders like one.”
“Which I honestly expected a lot more of at a bounty hunter magic school,” Alex added. “Thought this place was gonna be more like boot camp or something.”
Or a Quantico for magical kids. The thought made Amanda smirk. Johnny had called it that once too. More than once, actually, but it hadn’t turned her away from wanting to come here and learn whatever she could to be the best at everything she did.
When they reached their combat teacher at the far end of the center field, they turned to watch the rest of the designated freshman class come toward them while the rest of the students shuffled toward their other teachers for the day’s first class.
“Oh, my God.” Grace’s pale blue eyes grew wide.
“What?” Jackson stared at her, then fervently searched the field.
“Look at Jimmy.”
Amanda scanned the field for the small form of the youngest kid on campus. When she found him, he was shuffling along in a crowd of other kids toward Mrs. Zimmer.
“No way.” Jackson’s mouth fell open, then he turned toward Grace and gestured at the sophomore class gathering by the alchemy teacher. “The baby’s starting as a sophomore?”
A small frown flick
ered across Alex’s eyebrows. “Interesting.”
“It’s not interesting, man. It has to be a joke. What is he, eight?”
“Eleven,” Amanda muttered.
“Not much better, Coulier.”
“We all got tested.” Grace shrugged. “Guess he’s been holding back on us.”
“If that little shrimp can skip grades, I should be in that class too.” Jackson folded his arms and scowled at the sophomores following Mrs. Zimmer toward the main building for indoor classes.
“You didn’t even try to fight me at breakfast.” Alex watched with a blank expression as the other students finished separating into their various classes. “Probably ’cause you couldn’t think of any spells to try.”
“No, probably because I couldn’t breathe.” Jackson scoffed. “You think Jimmy could’ve fought you off?”
“He can obviously do something better than the rest of us.” Grace nodded at the hulking half-Kilomea kid stalking toward the freshman group with a scowl. “Doesn’t look like everyone tested up, though.”
“You gotta be kidding me.” Jackson turned away and shook his head. “We shouldn’t be lumped in with that guy.”
“Baker!” Mr. Petrov shouted. “What the hell are you doing over here? Get to your color.”
“I did.” Corey stopped at the edge of the group of freshmen and folded his arms. He stood a full head and then some above everyone else and glared at the combat teacher.
Mr. Petrov looked the huge kid up and down and grunted. “Let me see your schedule.”
Corey removed a crumpled sheet of paper from his pocket and handed it to the teacher when the man approached and held out a large, calloused hand.
Petrov grimaced as he unfolded the schedule sheet, scanned it, then handed it back. “Huh. Looks like you got some work ahead of you. All right. Everyone shut up and pay attention. When I say fall in line, that’s what you do. So fall in line and be quick about it.”
The freshmen shuffled around into some semblance of a line that petered out at the end. The man looked them over, sighed, and rolled his eyes. “Good enough. Let’s go.”
