Academy Obscura

by J. J. Krzemien

  Liam must have sensed my rising panic. “Shh. It will be all right.” He scooted closer, pulling me the last couple of inches into his chest. I let him, feeling his arms wrap about me in the most protective way I’d ever been held.

  Tears overflowed down my cheeks. A sob burst through my lips, and I let myself fall apart in his arms.

  13

  Caprice

  Aimes, MacTavish, and Bennett acted like nothing had ever happened. They ignored me a little more than usual for the next few weeks, but that was the only change in their behavior. I still refused to tell anyone about them, and Liam, Jaxon, and Angel soon stopped asking.

  “I have to get above a ninety-five percent on my mid-terms.” Madison sat on her bed, surrounded by textbooks and notepads. “Or mom will give me hell and ride me even harder next term with her idea of daily magical affirmations, and let me tell you that they are not helping! Look at the one she sent today.” She waved her wand, making the piece of black paper float across the room to my bed.

  I snatched it up. White script words showed starkly against the matte black.

  Once you fall into the Culling ten percent, there’s only a seventeen percent chance that you’ll rise out of it.

  “If that’s not encouraging, I don’t know what is.” I tossed the note into the trash bin with all the others Madison had already discarded.

  Madison sent me an exasperated glance. “She’s making me so nervous that I can’t focus on my studies. I haven’t slept peacefully in like forever, and that’s muddling my brain too.” She went back to reading the book in her lap.

  I was in real trouble with mid-terms. Madison saw how I failed in all the magic-based classes. Over the past couple of weeks she started to talk less about it. Now she hardly ever brought it up. I tried to see it from her perspective. How would I act toward my roommate if I was positive that they were going to be culled at the end of the year?

  I wouldn’t want to get too close to them, for both our sakes. I might be afraid they’d be a negative influence on me. Mostly, I’d want to protect myself from the eventual emotional grief over losing them.

  Scooting off the bed, I smoothed out my grey and black sweater. October had brought cold, wet nights. It was a different kind of cold from Baltimore, more wet and seeping.

  I had one more person to turn to before I gave up on my life.

  I trekked across the lawn. On a Sunday, I had to hope May would be in her office. A heavy mist hung in the air, and the water particles glimmered in the numerous lamp light. May was nice and much more competent than Ms. Duinn. I should have turned to her sooner.

  As soon as I knocked on her office door, she answered it.

  “Caprice, come in.” May opened the door wide, then closed it behind me. “What brings you in?” Her soft green eyes met mine. A wave of deja vu swept through me and I blinked several times.

  “You’re related to Liam.” I couldn’t believe I’d never seen it before now. They were both redheads, but their eye color confirmed the family tie.

  May laughed. “Yes, he’s my little brother.” She sat down behind her oak desk, motioning me to take the seat opposite.

  “I’m sorry, I just now realized that. It caught me a little off guard.”

  “It’s fine. Happens all the time.”

  My brow knitted. “But he’s a fae and you’re a witch. How..?”

  “Ah. Well, our mom’s a witch and dad’s a fae.”

  “So you’re both only half and half?” I chewed on the inside of my cheek.

  “Supernatural bloodlines don’t really work like that.” She leaned forward, her strawberry hair curtaining her face. “We have both fae and witch blood in us, but one supernatural gene takes dominance over the other. For me, my witch genes are dominant. For Liam, he’s a fae.”

  “So…if you were to have a kid with a…werewolf, then what would the kid be?”

  She shrugged. “Either witch, fae, or wolf.”

  That was kind of crazy. “What about a witch and a human? What would their kid be?”

  “Supernatural is always dominant. So the child would be a witch.” Her calm green gaze studied me. “Did you come here to talk about genetics?”

  “Not really, but it’s interesting. I need your help. I’m still trying to figure out how to access my magic, and mid-terms are only a couple of weeks away.”

  “I assume you already went to your Magic 101 teacher about this?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Yep.”

  May snorted. “Ms. Duinn was my teacher too. I guess she hasn’t changed, or become any more useful to her students. So what exactly is the problem, do you think?”

  “Honesty, I don’t think I’m a witch. But…there is something different—weird.” I already liked May. Finding out that she was Liam’s sister made me like her even more. And maybe trust her a little. Keeping secrets wasn’t working for me. So I dived in.

  “A while ago, I tried to practice on my own. Nothing happened with my wand, but my hands felt really warm. Then these black scales covered my hand, and they were glowing like coals…”

  She rested her chin in her hands, her eyes growing round. “That’s most unusual.” May regained her composure. She straightened in her chair. “You’re sure your mother was human?”

  “I’m not sure of anything. Well, I know that my dad was a witch, but that’s all. I don’t remember my mom.”

  “Did Isabella know her?”

  I shook my head. “Not personally.”

  May took in that information with a frown. “Black scales, warm hands, coals. Caprice, I don’t want you to use your wand anymore until we have this figured out.”

  “But what am I going to do about mid-terms?”

  “Take them. Although, you’ll be excused from the Potions mid-term. I still want you to come to class and do your homework. But, give me some time to look into this. Okay?”

  I nodded. Isabella had said that my mom wasn’t one of us. Had she meant not a supernatural, or not a witch? I’d have to wait a week to find out…or maybe not.

  After excusing myself from May’s office, I went to get my phone from the dean. Since that first week, her secretary had taken over handling the checking out and in of student cell phones. Up in the tower, I sent a quick message to Isabella asking for everything she knew about my mother.

  A text from Elena popped up on the screen. OMG! I have a boyfriend. Remember that guy I met at that beach party we went to? The hunky blond dude? Well, he asked me out a few weeks ago and last night we had sex!

  Dread sent a chill over my skin. No, no, no! I knew exactly which guy she was talking about. He was friends with that creep who tried to rape me. The one who’d tried to use compulsion on me. Compulsion wasn’t a witch’s gift, it was never mentioned in class. My best guess, was it had to be either vampire or fae. Either way, he was a supernatural. Which meant so was the guy Elena was dating.

  She was in danger. Who knew what that guy had done to her already. Was she dating him because she wanted to? Or was he compelling her?

  I drew a blank on how to explain this to her without telling her about supernaturals. Oh, to hell with it! I texted: Don’t trust him. I can’t explain how I know this, but he’s either a vampire or a fae. He’s not human. You need to get away from him. Remember the creep from the beach who attacked me? They’re friends, and he wasn’t human either. Please, trust me on this.

  I pressed the send button, then let out a long and colorful string of expletives. The cat was out of the bag now. But I didn’t know what else to do. I couldn’t ignore the situation and pretend that she’d be fine. Those two guys were supernatural creeps. Predators of the worst kind.

  May had excused me from the Potions mid-term exam, so I thought I’d try to get out of the Magic one too. After class on Monday, I stuck around to talk to Ms. Duinn.

  “Yes, Ms. Sorrentino? What is it now?” Today her flowy skirt was blue polka dots on a field of yellow.

  “My Potions teacher thinks it’s dangerous
for me to use my wand. She’s postponing my mid-term exam in that class. I wanted to know if you would do that too.”

  “May was always a silly, dramatic girl. There’s nothing dangerous with your wand. You simply have no aptitude for magic, so I’d say it’s the opposite of dangerous.” Ms. Duinn eyed me, it was the most direct look she’d ever given me. “Failure is no excuse for postponement. You will take the Magic mid-term. And don’t even think about not showing up, or I’ll deduct points from you.”

  “You’ll take points away from my zero?”

  “Negative numbers do exist.” She turned away.

  “But—”

  “There are no buts, dear.” She called as she left the classroom.

  My fists clenched at my sides. She was the worst teacher!

  In Potions, May had us pair up. She wanted less advanced witches to watch as a more adept one brewed a complicated protection potion.

  “Sorrentino, you’ll pair up with Aimes,” she said.

  The blood drained from my face at the same time my chest clenched in terror. I crossed my arms to hide my shaking hands.

  Aimes leered at me.

  I stood near enough to his cauldron that it didn’t look like I was keeping my distance. Aimes moved past me to get herbs. When he returned, he brushed up against my arm.

  In a low voice, he said, “You’ve been a good girl, Sorrentino. You know we’ll kill you—or worse—if you tell on us. Part of me wishes you’d tell, because I really want to do worse.” He squeezed my ass.

  My yelp was drowned out by the conversations in the room. I wasn’t going to turn him in, but I also wasn’t going to stand there and take it. I retrieved my backpack from the wall of cubbies.

  “Are you all right, Caprice?” May asked, as I headed for the door.

  I faced her. “Yes. No. I’m not feeling well. Sorry.”

  She let me go. Her gaze flicked to Aimes and a frown pulled at her mouth. I hoped she hadn’t picked up on what had happened. I darted into the hall.

  The lawn was filled with a PE class. I skirted around them, until a tall, dark figure stood in my way. Angel taught PE. I should have guessed that. He was in shorts and a tank top, even though it was only about forty degrees tonight.

  “Shouldn’t you be in class?” He threw the football in his hands across the field.

  “I should be. But, I-I can’t right now.”

  His deep amber gaze pinned me. “Your attackers are witches.”

  “No!” I said it too fast, and too forcefully.

  Angel growled. The sound low and threatening, yet somehow I knew the growl wasn’t directed at me. He wanted revenge, for my sake.

  “Please don’t.” I put my hand on his bicep. His muscles tensed under my palm. “Just drop it, please.”

  “Can’t do that.”

  “Why do you care so much? I’m not your sister, or even your friend. You barely know me.”

  “No one should ever be treated like that. No one should have to suffer like you did.” He took a step back. “I take care of my own.”

  “But I’m not—”

  He jogged into the lawn, shouting, “Blue team, to me!”

  Angel was almost as bad as Jaxon when it came to confusing the shit out of me.

  May said she was going to look into my scaly skin episode, but I decided to do my own research too. It couldn’t hurt. And I hadn’t heard anything from her in days.

  The library was on the third floor of Sorrentino Hall, which had no windows. Row after row of ten foot tall bookcases seemed to go on forever. At the end of each case, was a plaque stating the subject for that section. The place smelled of dust and old paper.

  I gathered books from several sections, including mythology, history, and sociology, plopping the heavy volumes down on a desk. The student at the next table over glared at the loud noise.

  “Sorry,” I whispered, taking a seat. Their glare deepened. People really took their studying seriously around there.

  Black scales, heat, and the look of burning coals. That’s what I had to go on, and assuming that it wasn’t a disease…and keeping a completely open mind about it…my best guess was salamanders or dragons. Liam had lectured on dragons once. He’d said that they were on the uncertain list. Were they mythological or actual supernaturals?

  A part of me balked at that line of thinking. I wasn’t a freaking dragon! That would be mind-blowing and impossible. Right? But so was being a witch—at least that was what I’d thought a couple of months ago. For the sake of my investigation though, I was going to keep an open mind until I could rule out the most obvious explanation, given the clues that I had.

  For several hours, I dug into those books. It turned out that there was no such thing as salamander supernaturals. And I’d only thought of them because I’d once read about salamanders being associated with fire. So I moved on to dragons. My research reiterated what Liam had said in class. More specifically, no one had seen a dragon-shifter, apparently that was what they were called, in the past several hundred years. Yet, several authors refused to rule out the possibility of their existence because of some old folktales, which were mentioned, but not covered, in the books.

  One passage I found particularly interesting…

  Dragon-shifters, a rare type of supernatural, choose a home and rarely leave it. As we know from various legends, they adore and collect jewels, gold, and other treasures. They are hoarders. One of their obsessions is protecting their hoard of goods, the other is accumulating more. They are greedy beasts. Female dragon-shifters are rumored to often take several mates.

  That passage seemed to rule out dragon-shifter as the answer. I didn’t have a home, or mates, or hoard any kind of valuable treasures. I closed the books and put them back on their shelves.

  I needed to see May, and at least ask her for an update on her research. She’d know more than me what to look for. My patience of waiting for her to come to me was wearing thin.

  In the Academy Hall, I headed toward the hallway that led to the teacher’s offices. It was late and the building was quiet. My rubber soles whispered over the stone floor. As I turned the corner at the end of the hall, my feet stuttered to a halt.

  May was on her knees in front of an office door, wand in hand. She leaped to her feet as soon as she saw me. Her face turned a truer shade of red than her hair.

  “Caprice—I, er, who are you visiting at this hour?”

  “You. Unless you’re busy.” I glanced from her to the plaque on the door. Ms. Duinn. Had May been trying to break into Ms. Duinn’s office?

  “No, not busy at all. I’m, uh, just over here.” She walked the two doors down to her own office.

  I followed, entering as she turned on the lights. “What were you doing just now? In front of Ms. Duinn’s door?”

  May stood behind her desk, her face flaring again. “I was—” she interrupted herself. “Any chance that you could forget that you saw that?” She wrung her hands. Her brow knitted up so tight, it had to be giving her a headache.

  I regretted asking about it. I didn’t want her to see me as a threat. “Of course. I’m sorry.”

  Her face relaxed with the relief. “What can I help you with?”

  “I just wanted to know if you’d had time to look into my scaly skin thing.”

  “I’m sorry. I’ve been so busy with preparing for mid-terms that I haven’t yet. I will though, as soon as those tests are done and graded. Okay?”

  I nodded, a bit disappointed. Of course she’d have a lot on her plate. Suddenly, I felt selfish for coming to her for an update. “Of course, that’s fine. Have a good night.” I turned to leave.

  “Caprice.”

  I faced her.

  May visibly swallowed, her eyes glistening. “Thank you for…” she trailed off. We both knew what she meant.

  I inclined my head before leaving. The desire to know what she’d been up to burned in me. May sneaking around after hours? Trying to break into a fellow teacher’s office? That didn’t
seem like her at all.

  14

  Caprice

  Mid-terms at the Academy were unlike anything I’d ever experienced before. My two lecture-based classes had a half night each dedicated to the exam. They were both on the same night, with a long lunch break in between.

  I felt good about them, sure that I had aced them both. Spending several hours filling in answers about History and Mythology had been relatively normal and easy. It was tomorrow’s exam that I was not looking forward to. I went to bed early, tossing and turning through the whole day.

  To make matters worse, I was the last to be called in for the Magic mid-term. Ms. Duinn was not going in alphabetical order this time, probably so that no one could predict when their turn would be up. What was more unnerving was that no one reappeared after they’d been called in to the side room with Ms. Duinn.

  Madison spent the two hours leading up to her exam practicing all the spells she’d learned so far that term.

  “Where do you think they go?” I asked her. “Is there some other exit in this building?”

  “It’s a magical test, so I don’t think Ms. Duinn wants to risk any of them telling us what the test is. We just need to be prepared for anything and everything.” She went back to moving objects around the room, opening and closing the cupboards, and producing first fire then water with her wand. She was so talented.

  Ms. Duinn emerged from the smaller side room. “Ms. Swan, you’re up next. The rest of you will be served lunch here before we continue.”

  Madison’s lifted her chin as she gracefully walked toward the teacher. I had no doubt that she would do just fine. “Good luck!” I called to her, and Ms. Duinn shot me a brief glare. What? Were students not supposed to wish each other luck? This place was weird. Backward.

  Lunch was brought into the classroom on rolling carts. The twenty or so of us left all ate in silence, focused on our inner worlds of anxiety, hope, and determination. I was all anxiety, with no hope at all that I’d get anything other than a zero for this exam, unless it miraculously didn’t involve using my wand.