Mystic Academy

by Scarlett Haven

  We make our way up to our room so I can get dressed, and I see quite a few Target bags. They were probably the only store open this late, but that works for me. Probably fifty percent of what I own are Target clothes anyway.

  When I start pulling out clothes, I’m amazed that Cayson knows my style even though he’s never seen how I dress. The only thing he’s seen me wear, other than his t-shirt, is that stupid dress that my step monster had me buried in. Just thinking about that makes my blood boil.

  I was going to be forced to wear the ugliest dress for the rest of eternity, a dress that I hated, just so my dad could please my step monster. Even in death he took her side. It’s… annoying.

  “Is everything good?” Cayson asks. “I didn’t know what to get. I just grabbed a bunch of random stuff.”

  “Graphic t-shirts are my favorite,” I say, holding up one of them. It’s a Pac-Man shirt. “How did you know I like Pac-Man?”

  “Aren’t you a little young for Pac-Man?”

  I shrug. “When I was really little, my dad bought a Pac-Man machine for our living room. I was too short to even reach the controls so my dad had to buy a stool for me to use.” I smile at the memory. “I actually forgot about that. My dad… he and I used to be close before he got remarried.”

  “What happened to your mom?” Cayson asks.

  “She died when I was three years old.” I take off Cayson’s shirt and slip on the Pac-Man one. He looks away when I do, which is cute. But also, I’ve decided he doesn’t have to look away. He’s my soulmate.

  “I’m sorry about your mom.” He clears his throat. “My mom died too. The girl who changed my brother, my sister, and me… she killed both my parents.”

  “I’m sorry.” I frown, thinking how horrible that must have been.

  “It was a long time ago.”

  It doesn’t change the fact that it must have been awful to go through.

  “I still wish I could have been there for you.” I step closer to him, putting a hand on his arm.

  He grins at me. “The more time we spend together, the more I realize just how much fate got it right. You really are my soulmate.”

  “Did you think fate made a mistake at first?”

  Cayson laughs. “When I saw your dress… maybe.”

  “That stupid dress.” I take off the jeans I borrowed for the day, trying not to think about that dress anymore. I grab a pair of jeans from the bed. “I have a question, though. Is this all the vampires there are that are my age?”

  “Uh, no,” he answers. “Mystic Academy used to be a school for all vampires when they’re teenagers. But about ten years ago, there was a big divide. So only the vampires who are turned go here and the vampires who are born go to another school.”

  “Vampires can have babies?” I raise an eyebrow. I was curious about that.

  “Of course,” he says. “You can’t believe everything you see in movies. Certainly you realize that by now.”

  I do realize that. I’m learning vampires are nothing like they are on TV. I can see myself in mirrors, I don’t burn, or sparkle, in the sun. I don’t feel like running around and biting people. And I definitely don’t have the urge to kill. I mostly feel the same, except I don’t think about food anymore. A cheeseburger doesn’t even appeal to me.

  “Does that mean vampires age?” I ask.

  “Yes and no,” he answers. “When a vampire is turned, they age until they hit their early to mid twenties and then they stop.

  I tilt my head to the side. “But you look… maybe nineteen.”

  “I have a theory.”

  I pick my dirty clothes up off the floor, tossing them into the hamper. “What’s your theory?”

  “My brother found his mate right away. So… he aged fairly normally. And my sister… found her mate a few years later. She aged normally, too,” he explains. “But I always stayed the same. I think that now that I’ve met you, we will age together. It’s like… fate knew what it was doing. I mean, it would be weird if I looked twenty-something and you looked like a teenager. At least to humans who see us.”

  That’s actually kind of cool. “I like the idea that we’ll be growing up together. Even though you’re technically two hundred and something years older.”

  He grins and takes a step closer to me. He slides his arms around me, pulling me into his embrace. “I’ve been waiting for you for so long.”

  I feel his lips in my hair and I sigh, leaning into him. “I hope I’m not a disappointment.”

  “Never,” he whispers.

  Wednesday, November 13

  12:30 am

  Friends?

  After class is over, I’m approached by a couple of girls.

  The first girl has a huge smile on her face, dimples on both sides of her cheeks. She’s got her long, blonde hair pulled up into a ponytail with a ribbon in it and she has the biggest blue eyes I have ever seen. If she wasn’t smiling so big at me, I’d be terrified that she was coming up to bully me. But then again… the jury is still out on that one.

  The girl beside her isn’t smiling quite as big, but she still has a pleasant look on her face. She has black hair that is cut into a bob, and big brown eyes. She almost reminds me of some kind of girl I’ve seen in an anime. She’s adorable.

  “Hi,” the blonde girl says, her smile growing even wider. “I’m Hannah, and this is Abigail, but everybody calls her Abi.” She holds her arm out toward her friend.

  “Hi, I’m Riley.” I smile, but wait for the other shoe to drop. I tense a little, expecting a joke at my expense or for somebody to throw something at me. But none of that happens. The two girls just smile.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Riley,” Hannah says. “I saw Ashley passing you notes earlier and just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

  I nod, gripping onto my books tighter. “I’m fine.”

  “Don’t be put off by her,” Abi offers me a smile. “She’s part of the elitists. Which would mean something if we went to the other school, but it doesn’t mean anything here.”

  “What does that mean? The elitists?” I shift my weight from one foot to the other. I know Cayson is standing outside the classroom, but he can wait a moment. I want to make friends here and these two girls seem kind of nice.

  “You’ll learn more soon, but basically there is a huge divide between the born vampires and the bitten vampires,” Abi explains. “Ashley thinks she’s special because her dad was a vampire and her mom was human. But she ended up being just human. Her dad had to change her, which is why she’s here. But she thinks she’s better because it’s in her blood.”

  I roll my eyes. I truly hate that kind of mentality. “She was trying to warn me to stay away from Cayson.”

  “Ashley has had her eye on him for a long time.” Hannah shakes her head, giving me a sympathetic look.

  “She knows he was changed too, not born,” I say.

  “But he’s different. His older brother is the king,” Abi says. “And they’re different because they’re the first vampires.”

  I raise an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

  “You’ll find out more in history, but Cayson and his two siblings are the first vampires,” Hannah answers.

  “Wait…” I look between them, feeling confused. “Ashley told me that Cayson had a girlfriend, which wasn’t true, obviously. But she thought his sister was his girlfriend.”

  Abi rolls her eyes. “She was pretending, obviously. I guess she was hoping she’d scare you away.”

  “But he’s my mate. I’m not going to let some girl bully me into running him off.”

  Abi and Hannah’s eyes grow wide and they look from each other to me.

  “That’s incredible. Congratulations.” Hannah smiles, like she genuinely means it. “I don’t envy you. Being mated to a member of the first family is…” She shakes her head, letting out a breath. “It’s a lot.”

  I shrug. “I still don’t fully understand what the first family means.”

  “A
sk Cayson,” Abi suggests.

  “I will.” Because I genuinely want to know what all of this means.

  “Maybe tomorrow you can hang out with us during free period,” Hannah says. “I know you’ll want to hang out with your mate after school. I understand that. But it might be nice to have some friends too.”

  I grin. “I would like that.”

  Because I genuinely would.

  The door to the classroom opens and Cayson sticks his head inside, looking at me. I wave at him, then glance back at Hannah and Abi. “It was really nice talking to you. I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “See you.” Hannah and Abi both wave at me, so I turn and walk to Cayson.

  I have a lot of questions for him.

  1:00 am

  First family.

  “Do you still want to go to the beach?” Cayson asks, as soon as I walk from Abi and Hannah toward him.

  “Uh, yeah.”

  Hearing about the first family can wait.

  I have always wanted to go to the beach and I’ve always wanted to see the ocean. My dad always promised me that he would take me someday, but then he married the step monster and that never happened. He actually took her to Hawaii for their honeymoon, which I’m still a little salty about. But whatever. What happened before doesn’t really matter anymore.

  Cayson holds my hand as we walk out of the school. People still look at us, even more when he’s holding my hand. They’re probably wondering what’s going on between us. Especially if Cayson is as ‘important’ as Hannah and Abi say he is.

  His brother is the freaking king? How crazy is that? But being the first vampire family is huge. Like, really huge.

  We walk over to a car that is sitting in the parking lot of the school. I don’t know a whole lot about cars, but this one looks expensive. Which would make sense. If his brother is some kind of king, he’s probably rich.

  Suddenly, the private jet makes sense. I had kind of written the whole thing off because I had other things on my mind—like the fact that I’m now an immortal being, which is completely insane.

  Cayson opens the door for me and I thank him as I get in.

  Nobody has ever opened the door for me before. Like, ever. And the fact that he does it is kind of sweet. I always thought it was cute in movies when a guy would do that for a girl.

  He walks around the car and slides in the driver’s side.

  “Do you know how to drive a stick shift?” he asks.

  I shake my head. “Never tried.”

  “I’ll teach you later.” He puts the car in reverse and backs out of the space before we take off toward the beach.

  It’s only a few blocks away from the school—within walking distance. We didn’t need to drive at all.

  Cayson gets out and runs over to my side, opening my door again. He holds out his hand to help me out of the car and I accept it, my eyes on the view in front of me.

  The waves are slowly crashing into the shore. Not huge, crashing waves. It’s all very gentle and peaceful. The smell of the salt water in the air is so strong and I wonder if it’s really that potent or if my sense of smell has improved since becoming a vampire. These are all questions I have for Cayson.

  We walk hand in hand to the water, and I take my shoes off and roll up my jeans, wanting to wade in the water. I want to feel the ocean. I’ve never felt it before. And maybe it’s a silly thing to want, but now that I’ve thought about it, I have to do it. I walk out into the water and Cayson follows. He has a huge smile on his face, like it’s also the first time he’s done this too, but that can’t be true.

  “This is wonderful,” I say, awe in my voice.

  “It really is.”

  “Do you live by the ocean?” I want to know. I realize I don’t know a lot about Cayson at all other than the fact that he’s my soulmate and that he’s beautiful. Another wave rolls in, this time high enough to get the bottom of my jeans wet. I just laugh, not caring at all that I’m wet. But then I remember we’re in his car, so I back up a little.

  “Come sit with me.” He tugs on my hand, so I go with him.

  He sits on the sand, patting beside him.

  “But your car…”

  “It’s just a car.”

  Is it?

  I sit beside him and stare out at the ocean. The moon is nearly full and it looks so beautiful over the ocean. If I could paint a perfect picture, this would be it. A couple, holding hands on the beach, looking out over the water. It’s breathtaking.

  “I do live in Florida,” Cayson points out. “A lot of the supernatural community lives here, so it’s just easier. I live in Southern Florida, on the east side.”

  “Do you live close to the beach?”

  He nods. “I own a home on the beach.”

  My eyes grow wide. “Do I get to see it someday?”

  Cayson grins. “I think that’s a definite possibility. It’s your house now too.”

  My house too?

  I don’t know about all that.

  “That doesn’t seem fair.” I pull my knees up to my chest, hugging them to me. “I mean, I haven’t worked for anything in my life and you have. You’ve obviously worked hard.”

  “You’re younger.” He shrugs. “It would be weird if you did have the money to buy a house and car. Your focus is school right now.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t feel like I deserve it.”

  “I don’t either. Not really.”

  “But you do because you’ve worked for it,” I protest.

  Cayson gazes into my eyes and it feels like he’s looking directly into my soul. “What good is having stuff if I don’t have somebody to share it with?”

  My heart melts.

  If Cayson Ingram didn’t already have my heart, he completely has it now.

  “I have some questions.” I angle my body toward him so I can look at him better. “Some girls in my class mentioned something about you being part of the first family.”

  His entire body tenses up at my question. “I should have told you sooner, but I didn’t want you to think it’s a big deal.”

  “Why would I think it’s a big deal? I don’t even know what it means.”

  “My older brother, my younger sister, and I were the first vampires.”

  “What do you mean the first?” I raise an eyebrow in question.

  “I mean… a witch experimented on us. Whatever they did killed our parents, but it changed us into this,” Cayson says. “From us three, the vampire species was born. Well… I’ve never actually turned anybody but you. My sister and brother have.”

  “That sounds horrible. I can’t even imagine how awful it was to go through that—being experimented on and watching your family be killed,” I say, putting a hand against my aching chest. “It’s something out of a horror movie.”

  He gives a short nod. “Yes, it was.”

  “What happened to the witch?”

  “My brother killed her,” he says, shrugging. “Actually, after that, witches lost a lot of their powers. The witches used to be really strong—not as strong as the dragons or the fae, but they were pretty kick butt. But a generation or so after it happened, it was almost like nature punished them. It wasn’t just this one witch who did bad things. It was pretty much all of them.”

  “I’m glad they got punished, but I’m so sorry you had to go through that.” I reach out my hand and grab onto his.

  “It’s okay. We all go through bad stuff. Even you have gone through horrible stuff. It’s how we react that makes us who we are.” He smiles at me and my heart flutters.

  “I have more questions.”

  “I figured.”

  “What is the deal with the elitist?” I ask. “I mean… for there to even be born vampires, there had to first be turned vampires. So… what is up with the snobbish attitude?”

  “That is my brother’s doing.” Cayson shifts uncomfortably. “My brother is a good guy. He’s just… misguided. Right now, it’s kind of turned vampires against born v
ampires. Turned vampires are being treated crappy. Hence why there is a completely separate school for turned vampires. I don’t like it, but I can’t really reason with my brother right now. He’s made up his mind.”

  I frown. “I’m sorry. That’s got to be awful for you. You always talk so fondly of him, like you’re close.”

  “We used to be.”

  His words break my heart, so I get up on my knees and knee-walk closer so I can give him a hug. I can tell he’s not expecting the hug, but he squeezes me back tightly and I know he needs this.

  Once we pull apart, I study him.

  My heart feels so full.

  “I can’t remember ever feeling this happy in my life,” I admit to Cayson. “Is it crazy that I feel like I’m falling in love with you even though we just met? Like, I feel like I’ve known you forever.”

  His entire face lights up. “You’re so beautiful, Riley.” He grabs the end of my hair and plays with it, which reminds me of when we were on the plane together. That was back when I thought he didn’t like me. “I am already in love with you. I think I have been from the moment you ripped that dress off.”

  I laugh, shaking my head. “You must have thought I was insane.”

  “No. Though, I did wonder about your age when I saw you in that dress. I just… you looked like you were seventeen. But that dress…”

  “That dress was from my father’s wedding when I was thirteen.” I roll my eyes. “I hated that stupid thing. Just because I could still fit in it doesn’t mean I should’ve been wearing it. That still makes me so mad.”

  He smiles but tries to hide it. “I’m sorry that you were so miserable in your human life, but I love how feisty you are. It’s what most attracted me to you.”

  “I thought you hated me.”

  “I hated myself for turning you,” he counters. “I tried not to. I mean, it should have been your choice. But I couldn’t stop myself. I tried. I really tried.”