A Demon's Horns: Vice College For Young Demons: Year One

by Marie Mistry

  “Unless you’ve improved since the last time we practiced?” She smirked.

  Half an hour later, I collapsed into my bed, amused to find Aeron already in it, reading one of the books his mother sent me.

  “I don’t understand why she would give you a book with the answers if she’s working against you,” Aeron muttered, and I gave him a sleepy look.

  Perhaps he and I were more alike than we thought, I mused. Both of us were raised by mothers whose love was very conditional, and both of us were desperate to see the good in them, despite all they put us through.

  “Because the people in that book sound like legends and fairy tales. There’s nothing remotely helpful about the information in it.”

  “It pointed you to the chapel,” he pointed out.

  I shrugged. “I don’t pretend to understand what she thinks.”

  “That’s what worries me. She was in your vision of the people who want to hurt you, she practically interrogated me about you and escorted the Tester straight to you. But she also gave you the book that led you to the people who would protect you.”

  I kissed whatever body part was closest to me, I think it was an arm. “Sleep now. Think later,” I mumbled.

  I felt the brush of his lips on my forehead as I drifted off to sleep.

  The next morning after breakfast, Alicia Pruitt ambushed me in the entrance hall.

  “Lilith!” She called as I left, arm in arm with Nelly and Lulu. “Have you forgotten our lesson?”

  I cursed silently, because I had completely forgotten.

  “Sorry, Elder, I did forget. Will I need anything?” Because it was Sunday, I was without any of my usual things.

  “Not at all. We’re focusing on practical things today.”

  “Etiquette tutoring,” I explained to the twins, quickly. “I’ll see you both later.” I hurried up to Alicia with a smile.

  “My old classroom is empty today.” She smiled. “I’ve taken the liberty of borrowing your mate for your practice, he was one of Calandra’s best pupils, though I hear his brother is giving him a run for his money.”

  I nodded. “I wasn’t very good when your sister taught me.”

  “In my experience, it’s rarely easy to dance when learning from someone you dislike.” She stopped me as soon as we started walking. “I know that this is going to seem stuffy, but from the moment you leave the hall, I’m going to insist on proper deportment from you. The best way to learn is to do things over and over till they stick. As I am an Elder, you should follow two steps behind me unless I invite you to do otherwise.”

  I dropped back instantly, keeping my gaze politely lowered.

  “It’s also very difficult to practice dancing in the uniform, so there’s a longer skirt waiting for you in the bathroom beside my classroom. The hand motions of the dances are designed to be performed with a long skirt in one hand. Without that, you’d be waving all over the place.”

  I wanted to smile, because I’d been doing just that in Pruitt’s classes.

  We arrived at the classroom, and she gestured me into the small bathroom beside it. The skirt was long and light, and I twirled a few times in the satiny fabric before hesitantly entering the classroom. It was large, and looked mostly unused, with all but one chair stacked against the wall with the desks. Alicia sat on the remaining chair in the centre of the room, a gramophone on a stool beside her. Aeron was standing a few steps away in a formal posture.

  “Begin,” she said simply, and I moved towards Aeron instinctively. “Stop!” Alicia called. “A demoness never approaches her partner! He must ask you, make him work for your attention!”

  Honestly, I thought, there was no way Aeron would ever have to work for my attention. He had it the instant he walked into a room, regardless of whether I wanted to give it to him or not. I did as I was told, stopping in place and pretending not to notice as he approached me.

  “Would you do me the honour of this dance?” Aeron asked, his eyes bright with humour, but his tone completely sincere.

  “Slowly turn to acknowledge his request,” Alicia instructed. “The dance is a story that begins before you’ve even taken the first step. You should carefully consider him before you reply, and your response should be something noncommittal.”

  I tried my hardest to do as she said. “As you wish.” I responded quietly, giving him a once over as I did so and taking his outstretched hand.

  Aeron led me over to our imaginary dance floor and assumed the first position. Alicia set the gramophone and music began to play.

  “At this point in the story, you start facing away from him because he’s beneath you,” Alicia narrated as we completed the steps. “Slowly over the course of the dance, you start to flick little looks at him. Then there’s the tumultuous moment you become jealous, and the dance gets faster as he works to reassure you of his affections. The dance ends with him removing your glove and touching you, hand-to-hand, whilst looking into each other’s eyes. It’s a love story acted out through the dance, and every muscle in your body is the storyteller.”

  Her comments were so unlike her sister’s that I actually began to enjoy the dancing. I knew that Aeron must be generating hordes of power from the intimacy of it all, and it felt good to give him that, since he did the same for me.

  “There are seven dances in all,” Alicia announced as we left the classroom that afternoon. “You will learn one a week, and then I will ask you to do multiple dances each week after that until the ball.” She gave me an assessing glance. “You have danced before, haven’t you? I can tell because you have that way of walking.”

  “I’ve mastered ballet already,” I admitted, and I felt Aeron stiffen beside me in surprise. I smiled to myself thinking about how surprised he’d be to find I could dance pole as well.

  She gave me an approving look but changed the subject. “Have you gotten a mask yet?”

  “A mask, ma’am?” I asked.

  “The solstice ball is always a masquerade. The tradition is to be given the mask for the ball from your mother. Has she not brought it up with you yet? Most mothers have booked the tailors to come to the school for dress fittings by this time.”

  I stiffened. “My mother recently disowned me, ma’am.”

  Alicia frowned. “I always found her to be a rather melodramatic woman, but that seems drastic, even for her. Never mind, you will have to find something regardless. I would give you mine if it wouldn’t be seen as favouritism by the other elders.” She turned to Aeron. “Does your step-mother have any daughters?”

  “No ma’am.”

  “Ask her if Lilith could use hers. Leonie’s mask had been passed down for generations, but it’s traditional to cut it up or give it away if you remain unshown, so she may no longer have it.” She looked between us. “I’ll see you both in a week’s time,”

  She left us both in the hallway with a sweep of her long grey hair.

  “That was better than etiquette class.” I smiled up at Aeron. “Whoa, your eyes are literally glowing.”

  He blinked a few times, and the effect went away. “That was a lot of power you gave me back there.” He smiled. “I could get by for days on this, but I do feel a little… out of it.”

  “Will you be okay?”

  “Perhaps I just need to expend a little energy first.” His heated look turned my bones to jelly.

  Chapter 19

  Monday morning dawned slow and dreary. Maddox had returned from his trip, and we trudged into class as normal. He looked more sombre than usual today, and when we sat down we discovered why.

  “Class, the end of year exam was confirmed yesterday. Usually, this class sits a written paper, but this year a group practical exam has been included. To this end, you have been sorted into groups of three. This has been deliberately done to split up your normal groups and make the test harder for you. However, you should all be able to pass without problems. The eight remaining students still in their awaiting will not be required to take the exam and w
ill pass by default if they go through their showing between now and July.” I gave a sympathetic glance at the classmates who hadn’t shown yet, Lulu had told me that it was likely none of them would, now that midwinter had passed, and I didn’t envy them their position.

  He took the blackboard and spun it over, revealing the list of groups and diverting my attention from the unshown.

  “I need not remind you that this test has a real impact on the elders’ decision to declare you as demons at the summer solstice ball,” Maddox explained patiently as I frantically searched the board for my name. “So, I must ask that you all put aside any problems you may have with one another and work together. The pass mark for the practical exam is to be able to complete it. The duration of the exam will be–”

  “I am not working with her!” Rina cried, shoving herself upwards from her desk and glaring daggers at me.

  I looked from the board to her, then back again. Sure enough, at the very end of the list, under ‘Group Q’ was my name and Rina’s followed by… Daron? I glanced back at the bookish guy who kept his seat a few rows behind me. His expression was hard to read behind his glasses, but I couldn’t believe he was happy with being stuck between myself and Rina.

  “Miss Inferna, the groups are final, and you will not interrupt me!” Maddox snapped at her with a glare. “Sit down.”

  Hearing her last name, and seeing her fiery hair finally gave my brain the connection it needed. Rina was the daughter and sister of the two red headed men in the Order of Shadows, the one they said was being considered for candidacy. I snorted quietly to myself. Rina would rather stab me than protect me, and I still had no idea what I’d done to make her dislike me so much.

  “As I was saying,” Maddox continued. “The exam will go on for exactly one hour, during which time you will be required to work together, combining your powers to get through a course designed to test you to your limits. It will take place two weeks before the solstice ball and a week before your other written exams.” His eyes hardened. “In previous years when we have done this, people have died. Do not take this lightly. It is designed to put you in a situation where you would be required to work together in real life, such as a battle.” He paused to let his words settle in. “Get into your groups. You have permission to move desks and chairs as you see fit to discuss. I will hand around texts which describe some useful combinatorial applications for your powers, such as group shielding and attacks. You all have your own strengths. Use them.”

  With that dismissal, he turned and gathered up the lists, and the rest of the class started to move.

  I glanced at Rina who looked back with a stubborn glare that made it clear she wasn’t coming to me. I sighed and grabbed my bag and my chair, beginning the awkward waddle towards her. For an instant, it struck me as odd that she was wearing gloves before I remembered that she was training to become the new Tester. An extra layer of wariness crept over me, and I positioned my chair just out of arm’s reach from her. The look she gave me was one of pure malice.

  “What a coincidence that we are back together after all meeting on the first day.” Daron tried his best to make conversation as he easily lifted his chair over our heads with his exceptional height and placed it between us.

  “It is strange,” I replied, trying to keep my tone even “I suppose a lot has changed.”

  Rina snorted, “You’re the only one of us who put on fake horns.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Try and pull them off, Rina. Keep your gloves on, they’re sharp.” It wasn’t like the people in Lust hadn’t already done the same thing. Babette had actually licked one on my first night.

  Her smug look told me this was what she’d wanted all along. She thought she was going to rip off a prosthesis and embarrass me in front of everyone, and indeed, the whole class had gone quiet.

  She strutted up to me, grabbing my horn with one hand and bracing against my head with the other. With one almighty tug which made my head hurt she fell backwards. Undeterred, she stood up and tried again, but this time, my horn sliced into her glove, creating the smallest of tears beneath her thumb.

  “Doesn’t prove anything,” she muttered.

  “Go behind me and touch one,” I said. “I’ll even close my eyes, but I’ll tell you which one it was.”

  She narrowed her eyes, but did as I told her. I obediently closed my eyes and waited for her to do it.

  “Which one?” she demanded.

  “You haven’t touched one.”

  A light pressure came from my left horn, tickling and I sniggered. “Left,” I told her confidently. “Do you not hate me yet?”

  “It changes nothing,” she asserted, as I opened my eyes.

  Daron, who had looked as fascinated by the scene as the rest of the class smiled genially. “I agree, it doesn’t change the fact that we must work together to pass this test.”

  “Agreed,” I said.

  “We should pick a time to practice,” Daron took charge easily. I let him, mostly to avoid any more conflict with Rina.

  “I can’t do Saturdays,” Rina stated, looking down at her ripped glove.

  “Me either,” I added. “Sunday evening?”

  Daron nodded. “I’ll book the practice pit. We can use Maddox’s lessons for theory work and try things out then.”

  The lesson dragged after that, with Rina criticising my every suggestion. She was so aggravating that it took all I had not to jump up and give her a reminder of how it felt to get punched in the face.

  I ate lunch in the library as usual, but Daron followed me this time.

  “Why does she hate me so much?” I asked him as we found a seat in the busy library. “I haven’t done anything to her.”

  He gave a little shrug and glanced at the sleeping man laid across a full settee on the opposite side of our table. “All I know is that she’s from a gifted seer family. Perhaps she knows something about your future she doesn’t like.”

  “She can’t hate me so much for something I haven’t even done yet!” I protested. “And what would I possibly do to her anyway?”

  Daron shrugged, uninterested in my rant. “Ask her. I’m not getting involved unless it gets in the way of our exam.”

  I rolled my eyes at him. “Let’s get this research over with.”

  The whole week went slowly after that, as if time itself was conspiring with Rina to make every moment with her as long and torturous as it could be. Daron was a good mediating presence, but even he couldn’t stop her hateful glares. It wasn’t until Sunday, when we finally met up for our practice that I finally snapped. Daron was running late, leaving the two of us alone sitting on the sandy floor of the pit.

  “Should we start without him?” My muscles ached from a morning of dancing, and all I really wanted was a rest, but I made the peace offering anyway.

  “Shut up.”

  I groaned loudly. “This… problem you have with me… it isn’t fair to Daron. He gets the same grade as both of us.”

  She spat on the ground at my feet. “Not my problem.”

  “Then what the hell is?!” I demanded. “What have I done, Rina? Or is it something I will do in the future that’s got your knickers in a twist, because that’s not fair!”

  Her eyes burned with hatred as she looked at me. “You’re fated to kill my brother!” She spat. “So shut up!”

  I stood, stunned. “What do you mean?” Of all the things I’d thought she’d say, that wasn’t it.

  “When anyone in my family turns ten, my grandmother scries their future in the entrails.” Rina ground out, as if just talking to me about it was painful. “She’s the best seer in a generation, she has never, ever been wrong. She told my brother, ‘You will meet your mate at Vice College and she will have horns as a blessing from the Strange God. She will make you happier than you’ve ever been, and as soon as you tell her you love her, you will die.’”

  I was numb from shock, but Rina continued.

  “Then five years later, Granny scried for
me. She said, ‘You will be closer than sisters with the Strange God’s chosen one. She will favour you among her friends, and you will save her life as she saves yours’. I don’t want to save your life! I would rather you died right here and now than let you kill my brother!”

  I shook my head. “I’d never... Rina, I’ll never even speak to him, I promise. I don’t even know him.”

  She just glared at me. “Granny is never wrong, and I will never forgive you.”

  “That’s enough.”

  A deep, rumbling voice echoed across the pit, and I looked up to see the man himself, dressed in his dark security officer’s uniform, looking down at us from the rim of the pit. Hastily, I locked my watering gaze somewhere else and started backing away.