by Nya Jade
“Welcome back, Cadets.” Professor Yori gestured for them to be seated. “And a special welcome to our newest Hastati class. Your decision to train for the Shaper Intelligence Service is an admirable one, and a decision that I know was not made without long and careful thought. It is why we mark the beginning of the year with a grand Conversion Ceremony in the tradition of the Old Country. It reminds us of what we serve to protect. And now, as is our custom, the Principes class will swear in the new Hastati class.”
Phoebe stood with her classmates as everyone in the middle row of tables rose and turned to face them. Together the second-years said, “We, the Principes class, candidates for advancement to Triarii class, bid you welcome.”
“We are happy to be welcomed,” Phoebe replied with her class, reciting the response they’d been given in their trainee handbook.
The Principes continued: “Please give your enrollment statement.”
“We are here to gain physical toughness. Develop strength of character. And sharpen our mental acumen.”
“Why do you fight?”
“Loyalty to each other. Service to the Royal Court. And in honor of Pompeii.”
“And when called to the task?”
Phoebe’s stomach lurched. Her palms suddenly felt clammy. With a shallow breath she answered timidly, “We will kill Vigos, no questions asked.”
Then Phoebe shook hands with the Principes boy in front of her, who looked at her with concern. Embarrassed, she composed her face into a picture of calm. She pulled her hand from his grasp and sat slowly, caught up in the meaning of the oath. Doubt, sharp and unwanted, coiled in her stomach. What if she couldn’t make her father’s career her own?
“The start of a new moonester,” Professor Yori said, “brings with it a few quick announcements. First, and of most importance, recent reports indicate a spike in Vigo activity in the area—” Gasps and murmurs broke out as every student turned to address his or her neighbor.
Professor Yori’s whistle cut through the noise. The dome fell silent. Maintaining his composure, the headmaster looked out at the sea of students. “In the one hundred years of the Campus Below, Vigos have never once found the school. We remain perfectly cloaked by the presence of humans.”
Phoebe knew that Professor Yori was right. Her father had once explained that because of the warm physical energy that radiated from Shapers, a gathering as large as a school would be a beacon for Vigos to track. Luckily, the presence of a greater mass of cold energy humans, like the Green Lane Academy population, could shield them. This truth failed to stop the shiver that swept through Phoebe.
The headmaster continued, “The concern is localized in Boston. There will be no trips into the greater city area or into the town of Dedham until further notice. Now,” he continued, “on to the more administrative announcements. Hastati years, if you have not already done so, please make sure to finalize your course selections for both campuses by midnight tonight.”
Phoebe frowned inwardly; she hadn’t turned in her Above schedule yet. Shapers were required to take classes with the Green Lane Academy students because subjects such as mathematics, science, and English, needed for assimilation in the human world, were not taught at the Campus Below. Anxious about her double course load, Phoebe was still deciding which electives would require the least amount of work.
“And lastly,” Professor Yori said, “the custodians would like you to know that the door in the narthyx chamber that leads to the Above library is closed for maintenance.”
Just as Professor Yori began to dismiss the students, a thin, gray-haired woman hurried toward the stage, handed him a folder, and then bustled away. The headmaster reviewed the file briefly, a muscle twitching beneath his short graying beard. Looking up he said in a tight voice, “I would like to see Scott Roland, Lewis Baker, Mariko Higashi, and Phoebe Pope in my office tomorrow during the lunch hour.” And as far away as Phoebe was from the headmaster, she could have sworn his eyes had flashed in her direction as he’d said it.
Hayley leaned close to Phoebe and whispered, “Is he talking about you?”
Phoebe nodded. “You think it’s ’cause I was late?”
“Can’t be,” Hayley said, shaking her head. “I’d be on that list too.”
Phoebe stared at Professor Yori, a nervous feeling brewing in her stomach. What could he possibly want?
“Go with Osiah and Gavya,” he boomed and dismissed the crowd with a small bow.
Later, as the rest of the campus slept, Phoebe lay heartsick in the small grassy courtyard behind her dorm. Under a clear sky, she gazed at the brittle-looking moon, willing her body not to succumb to fatigue. If she did not sleep, the nightmare would not come. But Phoebe knew that, whether or not her eyes closed, the memory would still find a way in. Always.
She remembered rain hammering on the roof of the car as her father sped down a road lined by a wall of forest on either side. Behind them, the choral growl of the Vigos rose.
“Seat belt!” her father had shouted. His eyes were focused ahead, his jaw hard. Drawing the belt across her body, Phoebe stared in the side view mirror, seeing the moving shadows growing larger in the distance. Her panic soared.
“It’s going to be okay.” Her father stole a quick glance at her. “They can’t chase us all night. I promise you.”
Phoebe glanced at the speedometer and swallowed; the needle had pushed up past ninety. They turned a tight corner, and then, as her father had promised, the Vigos fell back, their growls receding into the drone of the rain. Phoebe saw triumph flash in her father’s eyes mere seconds before the car hydroplaned, turning and turning as though it would never stop.
Even now, as she lay curled in on herself, her arms wrapped around her body, Phoebe could hear the explosion of the car smashing into the tree. She could taste the gagging heat of blood dripping down her throat as she crawled her way out of the tangled mass of glass, metal, and branches.
“Dad,” Phoebe cried, stumbling over to the broken shape of her father lying nearby.
His eyes flickered up at her. “Honey,” he said, his voice hoarse and urgent. “They heard the crash.” He coughed raggedly, and blood ran from the corner of his mouth. “You’ve got to go.” What her father was asking her to do rattled around in Phoebe’s brain, failing to fully register even as her legs gave way underneath her. Her knees hit soggy earth, and, frantically eyeballing his injuries, she touched his face.
“You’ve already started heal—”
“I can’t heal enough before they get here.” His eyes slid to the darkness behind her, in the direction from which they’d come. Phoebe could hear them coming and the ground beneath her trembled with the vibrations of their advancing feet—Vigos drunk with the scent of a Shaper down. Phoebe felt intolerable pain at the thought of leaving her father. She wouldn’t do it.
“I can get you out of here!” She took both of his wrists in her hands and began to pull with a determination that burned. Then something twisted inside her chest, hard and insistent. Phoebe recognized it immediately; her father was pushing emotion into her: courage and the will to survive.
As if he’d just slapped her across the face, Phoebe glared up at him, blinking. “Stop it—stop it!” Her voice broke. They both knew he needed every drop of those instincts for himself. Phoebe squeezed her eyes with the effort of pushing them back into him, but even in his dying moments, her father’s ability was stronger than her own.
“Don’t fight me on this one, kid.” He ran a bloodied hand through her hair, his voice now just above a whisper. “You have to go. Please.” Tears seeped into the blood on Phoebe’s bruised face. “If they’re distracted with me, they won’t sense you.” Her father looked at her with eyes that held love and the wildness of one last push. When he did, Phoebe felt his power crash though her with a force she couldn’t fight. A burning need to survive controlled every part of her. She scrambled to her feet and ran.
Phoebe fled into the forest feeling none of the branches th
at clawed at her hair and scraped her arms and legs. A few hundred yards from the crash site, her skin flared hot from the physical energy of a nearby Vigo. Daring to look back, Phoebe staggered at the sight of the silver-striped black Tiger approaching her father, its fiery eyes burning bright. Large silver spikes ran down its heavily arched back to the tip of a tail that was poised to strike.
A scream caught in Phoebe’s throat. None of the stories had adequately prepared her for this. The Vigo was huge. A lot bigger than she’d imagined. The beast roared in triumph. And an instant later, it morphed into a tall woman, who wore a dark jumpsuit, her blond hair as pale as early morning mist. Phoebe had barely absorbed the rapid transformation when a violent shiver pulsed through her, sharpening the instinct to flee. And she did.
Now, in the solitude of her dorm’s courtyard, Phoebe listened as a breeze tickled wind chimes someone had hung on a branch above her. Her eyes stung with pent-in tears until she reluctantly began to sob. Her father was gone. Phoebe slid a hand underneath her shirt. She fingered the scar that arced across her stomach, and brushed the one that ran down the fold of her right shoulder with her thumb. Her other hand traveled behind her left ear, tracing that jagged scar along the back of her neck. Her body was a landscape of reminders.
THREE
The next morning, Phoebe felt an energizing sense of peace, as though her dreaming mind had spread a balm over her aching hearts. By quarter to seven she’d showered, pulled on her Green Lane uniform, and taken photos of the sun pushing the navy of night below the horizon, all before anyone stirred in her dorm. A chill wind snaked its way into her coat. She put a hustle in her step, crunching leaves kissed with every hue of autumn under her feet.
Within minutes, Phoebe arrived at the red barn that housed the Green Lane dining hall. As she crossed the threshold, she felt a light tap on her right shoulder. Hayley stood behind her, smiling mischievously, with her hair pulled up into a neat twist.
“Doesn’t anyone see the irony of us Shapers living on a campus that used to be a farm?” she whispered with a smirk.
“At least it’s not a zoo,” Phoebe retorted in a low voice.
Hayley laughed. “The pancakes are to die for. Come join me when you’re done.” She indicated a corner table that held a lone tray of food.
“Sure thing.” Phoebe moved with the river of students around the many buffet stations, quickly loading her tray with more food than she could possibly eat, and arrived at Hayley’s table to find her perusing a copy of the Green Lane Gazette.
“You won’t believe this,” Hayley said, looking over the top of the paper at Phoebe with a slight frown on her face.
Phoebe put down her tray and sat. “What?”
“It says here in this article that three particle physicists from Harvard were recently abducted outside their Boston homes,” Hayley said. “Authorities have no leads.” Phoebe paused as she reached for her scone. “They’re saying,” Hayley continued, dropping her voice, “that this comes at a time when there has been an escalation in unexplained criminal activity in the city.”
Phoebe looked around them. They were two tables away from the nearest group of humans. Still, she whispered, “You think it has to do with Yori’s announcement?”
Hayley nodded solemnly.
Phoebe’s eyes narrowed as she broke her scone in half and began spreading a liberal amount of jam onto both pieces. “What would Vigos want with particle physicists?” she murmured.
“Hell if I know. But what I do know is that the ban on trips into Boston sucks.” Hayley laid down the paper and heaved a dramatic sigh. “Coming here was supposed to be my great escape,” she said, sounding defeated.
“From what?”
“Santa Claus, Indiana.”
Phoebe jerked an eyebrow. “Santa Claus? As in Rudolph’s fat boss?”
“The one and only,” Hayley half laughed with such a distinct note of bitterness that Phoebe stared at her blankly, wondering how a town with a beloved namesake could be so bad. As though reading her mind, Hayley added, “You have no idea how boring it is there. Let me put it this way: Answering the thousands of ‘Dear Santa’ letters our post office gets from around the world during the holidays is the biggest event of the year.”
“That sounds cute—”
“It’s not cute,” Hayley said in an almost indignant tone, “when you have to dress like an elf while doing it. Look at me”—she waved a hand over her body—“do I scream elf to you?”
Phoebe couldn’t stifle a snort. “So you traded one small town for another?”
“Yeah. But at least Dedham has access to a legit city,” Hayley said. She pointed a forkful of pancakes at Phoebe. “Where are you from?”
Before Phoebe could answer someone took a seat on the edge of their table. She and Hayley glanced up at a lanky girl with maple-colored skin and hair that fell in thick, ebony ringlets over her shoulders.
“Where ya been, roomie?” she said to Phoebe. “Didn’t hear ya come in last night and I’m a light sleeper. Then when I woke up this morning, you were gone.”
Phoebe had met her roommate Cynthia and her entire family the previous night when they arrived at the dorm chattering excitedly, with tons of luggage in tow. Cynthia’s father had found it necessary to corner Phoebe and drone on about the family’s school legacy, Cynthia’s stellar junior high grades, and certain future as an Ivy Leaguer. Pushed beyond her endurance, Phoebe had grabbed her camera, politely excused herself, and slipped out to explore the campus.
“Hi Cynthia—”
“It’s Cyn,” Cynthia said, interrupting. “Remember?”
Phoebe forced a small smile. “When I got back you were fast asleep.”
Cyn drew down her perfectly arched eyebrows in a disbelieving expression. Phoebe knew that Cyn wasn’t wrong to doubt her. She had been lying awake in the dark when Phoebe had returned from the courtyard. Using her Shaper silent stealth, however, Phoebe had managed to slip into the room, undress, and crawl into bed unnoticed.
“What did you get into last night?” Cyn asked, still eying Phoebe with suspicion.
“Nothing much. Just wandered around taking photos.”
“All night?” Cyn’s eyebrows rose further.
“Then she was hangin’ with me,” Hayley jumped in.
Phoebe shot Hayley a grateful look and made a quick introduction. “Cynth—Cyn, this is Hayley. Hayley, Cyn.”
Cyn turned her liquid brown eyes to Hayley, regarded her for a moment and then grinned broadly. “You’re reading my article!” she said, stabbing the features section of Hayley’s paper with a French-manicured finger. Phoebe confirmed this with a quick glance at the byline. “Crazy, isn’t it? On the next page I talk about the millions of dollars worth of equipment that disappeared along with the physicists.”
Phoebe and Hayley exchanged quick glances.
“Anyway,” Cyn said, returning her attention to Phoebe. “I came to tell you that the Gazette is looking for a new features photographer. I told them you’d be perfect. The work you did for the paper at your old school was amazing!” Phoebe’s surprise showed, and Cyn didn’t miss it. Smiling brightly, she rolled her eyes, “I Googled you. With my endorsement, the job is yours if you want it.” Cyn smoothed her pleated navy skirt and slid off the table. “Think about it, roomie.” She sashayed off, throwing a “Nice to meet you, Hayley” over her shoulder as she went.
“Damn,” Hayley said, staring at Cyn’s retreating figure. “Why didn’t I think of Googling my roommate, Maya Le—” The end of Hayley’s sentence drowned in a sudden, earsplitting clamor of screams that erupted around them. Excitement sizzled through the room. Phoebe pressed herself back against her chair and stared with puzzlement at several groups of girls fairly quaking at their tables, looking as though they were about to pass out.
“Oh my God!” Hayley said in a pitch that had escalated a few unnatural octaves.
Phoebe returned her gaze to Hayley. “What?”
“I can’t believe
it’s actually true.” Hayley riffled diligently through her backpack, muttering something under her breath about the magazine being in there somewhere. “They said he might be going to a private school in the area, but I didn’t believe it.”
“Who said who’d be going where?”
“Teen Hollywood Dish,” Hayley said, as though explaining the obvious. She threw her hands up. “I can’t find my latest issue. But he’s actually here,” she said pointing, her eyes gleaming, “Colten Chase is here!”
That spun Phoebe in her chair. Her eyes followed Hayley’s wavering hand to a table near the doorway and her jaw hung slack; it was him. When it came to pop culture, Phoebe rarely troubled herself with keeping up, preferring time spent behind her camera or in a book. Even so, she wasn’t oblivious enough to not know Colten Chase, star of the Taylor Hawk—Teen Agent movies. He was practically the teen James Bond.
“Colten Chase is a student here?” Phoebe said incredulously, glancing back at Hayley whose eyes had glazed over.
“He’s so hot,” Hayley gushed. “And tall!”
Phoebe craned her neck to see more of Colten over the chaos of students elbowing each other out of the way just to stand close as he walked by. He had a tan-complexioned face lit by large, expressive eyes. Chestnut hair spilled over his collar, tossed in a fresh-out-of-bed manner that Phoebe knew most girls found appealing but she considered lazy. What is wrong with using a comb, she thought. Still, Phoebe couldn’t deny that even when dressed in the plain uniform of gray slacks, a white button down shirt, and a navy tie, Colten was gorgeous beyond belief.
“I thought he was done with school,” Phoebe said, peeling her eyes away from him.
Hayley, who seemed to have regained her composure said, “Well, according to Dish, he spent more time on movie sets last year than in the classroom and has to redo his senior year.”
“But why here?”
“Why ask why? He’s here and we’re here. All is good! Anyway,” she added with an air of authority, “I know Green Lane is a top-tier school and all but I’m sure he picked us since nothing exciting ever happens in small towns. Probably not worth it for the paparazzi to bug him here.”
