Shifter Falls Academy- Year One

by L. C. Mortimer

  “Charlotte,” he said. “Please don’t do anything that could put your life in harm’s way. We need you here.”

  “You have plenty of students, Wild. I’m just another one.”

  “That’s not true,” he said.

  “What did Fiona mean when she said something bad had happened before?” I asked him, suddenly remembering the conversation they’d had when she dropped me off at the school.

  He looked at me for a long time. He didn’t seem to be comfortable telling me what had happened, and I knew that it was none of my business. I also knew that Wild was in the kind of mood where he’d do just about anything to keep me from going after Fiona, which was unfortunate, because I was still going after her.

  I should have done it months ago, but I’d been waiting for her.

  I’d been waiting for anything.

  Now it was time for me to take what I’d learned at Shifter Falls and go save my friend.

  “I lost someone very close to me,” he said. “She helped me through that time.”

  “Then it sounds like you owe her everything,” I said simply. “And it’s pretty terrible you aren’t actually doing anything to find out what happened to her.”

  I was being snarky and rude and disrespectful, but I didn’t care. He should have told me long ago that Fiona was missing because now it might be too late.

  That wasn’t going to stop me from trying to save her, though.

  Chapter 13

  I got Kenneth, Jade, and the fox twins, Marissa and Clarissa. I gathered them into one corner of the girls’ dormitory and told them everything. I wasn’t completely sure about bringing Marissa and Clarissa in on everything, but they were the self-proclaimed queens of the dorms, and I was going to need their help if I was going to sneak out.

  “Wild is going to be suspicious of me,” I said. “I was pretty blunt about how pissed I was that he didn’t do anything to help Fiona.”

  “When he’s worried, he usually enchants the dormitories,” Jade said. “He did it the first week of school. A couple of people were really homesick and he essentially forced us to stay inside at night.”

  “Okay, when would he cast the enchantment?” I asked. It was nearly nine.

  “After ten,” Marissa said.

  “So we need to leave before then. How can we get out of the dorms without letting any of the teachers know, though?” I asked. A quick glance around revealed three different professors in various parts of the dormitory lounge. I was certain Wild had sent them to make sure nobody caused trouble.

  “Leave that to us,” Clarissa said.

  “Absolutely,” Marissa agreed.

  “You’re sure?” I asked. “I mean, there’s not really anything in this for you.”

  “You’re going to save a woman,” Marissa said. “That’s all the motivation I need. You know, girl power and all that.”

  “Yeah,” Clarissa said. “Shifter sisters need to stick together, no matter what.”

  Their attitudes surprised me a little. Clarissa and Marissa both often seemed a bit aloof, but they were definitely dedicated to the school and to each other.

  And, apparently, to all women.

  That was going to work for us.

  “I have everything we need to get to Growl Valley,” I said.

  “Except a car,” Jade muttered.

  “We don’t need one,” I said. “You can fly and I’ll ride on Kenneth.”

  “You’re going to ride Kenneth?” Clarissa giggled.

  “Not like that!” I quickly said, but then I blushed.

  “Is she going to ride in your pouch?” Marissa asked. Kenneth was a kangaroo shifter. I didn’t even know there were kangaroo shifters, let alone ones who were good with magic, but then again, I’d learned a lot since coming to Shifter Falls.

  Kenneth blinked, staring at Marissa.

  “No,” he finally said.

  “Why not?”

  “Male marsupials don’t have pouches,” he looked at us each in turn like we were crazy. “Did you think male marsupials had pouches?” He asked, shaking his head. “Because we don’t!”

  I patted his shoulder.

  “Nobody thought you had a pouch. She’s just teasing.”

  “I don’t have a pouch,” he said again.

  “I’m just going to ride on Kenneth’s shoulder,” I finally said, and the other girls laughed and finally nodded.

  “Okay, are you all ready?” Clarissa said. “Because I think your best bet is simply going to be walking out of the front doors. Nobody will expect it. I guarantee Wild has got guards in the basement by now.”

  “I’m ready,” I said. Jade and Kenneth nodded, too.

  “Showtime,” Clarissa said to her sister. Together, the two of them walked over to the center of the room, and then Marissa slapped Clarissa – hard.

  “I cannot believe you!” She yelled.

  “Me? I can’t believe you!” Clarissa yelled right back.

  Instantly, the teachers in the dorm rushed over to see what the commotion was all about. Their acting was so good that I almost wanted to stay and watch. Unfortunately, it really was time for us to get going, so while every eye in the dorms was on the twin foxes, Jade, Kenneth, and I slipped outside completely unnoticed.

  Then we took off running.

  We mostly ran in the dark, but I’d found that since learning to shift, I could see pretty clearly. We ran until we reached the waterfall. We ran all the way back to the main road. Once we were there, we stripped out of our school clothes and shifted.

  We could find clothes to wear once we reached Growl Valley. Right now, the biggest problem was going to be bringing our wands, but Jade had thought of that. She’d collected a little bag and had placed our wands together in it. Now that she was in her owl form, she simply held the bag in her talons.

  Then it was time to go.

  The journey was stressful and tiring. No, I didn’t really have to do too much in my cat form. Kenneth did all of the work, really. By the time we reached Growl Valley, though, it was the middle of the night, and I had spent the last few hours thinking of how scared I was for Fiona.

  I was so upset that I hadn’t gone to get her sooner. I felt like I should have known something was wrong. I should have known that there was a problem. Why hadn’t I gone to save her earlier? I should have realized that Fiona would never leave me without cause.

  We stopped at the edge of town near her house. I motioned for Kenneth and Jade to follow me. We’d start our journey there. I sneaked in through the little door Fiona had left for Petey, shifted into my human form, and let the others inside. We rustled around until we’d gathered some clothing to wear, and then we started looking around for clues.

  We couldn’t find anything at first. Fiona’s place seemed as clean and tidy as it ever had, but then something on the counter caught my eye. A note. She had written a couple of things down about late bloomer shifters, followed by an address with a question mark. It was an address that was close to the shop.

  Could that be Caleb’s house?

  Had she tried to confront him when she went back?

  Could he have captured her?

  “I know where she is,” I said, grabbing the paper. “I think she went here.”

  “Why? What is it?”

  “I think it’s where Caleb lives.”

  Kenneth tensed.

  “He’s the one who tried to hurt you.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Let’s go.”

  THE HOUSE ON FRANKLIN Avenue was big, looming, and dark. Its shutters were dangling by what could only be an ancient rusty nail and the porch looked as though it might cave in at any moment.

  “This is the address,” I said.

  Kenneth and Jade sniffed the air. My shifter senses were better than they’d been before, but I still had a lot to learn. I still couldn’t smell very much.

  “Let’s go, then,” Kenneth said, and we started walking forward.

  We made our way around the house
to the back, which was cloaked in darkness. The backdoor was unlocked, which wasn’t particularly good news. Maybe there were people inside. Maybe they’d just gotten sloppy. The worst case scenario would be that they were no longer residing in this house and Fiona was somewhere else entirely.

  I wasn’t about to let myself believe that Fiona was dead. She couldn’t be. Besides, I would have known. I wasn’t sure how, but I just knew that if something had happened, I would have felt it. I would have felt her.

  We stepped inside the broken-down house and started walking around. Kenneth cast a darkfire spell on a stick he’d grabbed outside, and he carried it around like a torch. The house definitely looked lived in. Despite being dusty and filled with trash and random garbage, it was clear that it had been used – and recently.

  “It’s definitely Caleb’s place,” I said. “I can smell him.”

  How did I never know this was the kind of place my colleague lived?

  How did I never know that Caleb was such a creep?

  Part of me hated that he’d caught me so off-guard, but then again, that was the problem with monsters, wasn’t it?

  You never quite knew who they were.

  “He’s not here now.”

  “Do you smell Fiona?” Jade asked. “Try scenting her.”

  I closed my eyes, but there was nothing. I couldn’t smell her well enough through all of the trash and debris in the house. It was just...gross. I could smell sweat and fear and so many random things, but I couldn’t smell Fiona.

  Then there was a noise.

  It was so faint I wasn’t sure if I had actually heard it, but Jade and Kenneth stilled, too.

  “Downstairs,” Kenneth said, and we started looking around for a staircase that led into a basement. I was too anxious to find Fiona to worry about whether it was somehow a trap or something like that. There were no stairs, though.

  “Trapdoors?” I asked, looking around. “Could there be a trapdoor?”

  But we couldn’t find anything. We stomped much too loudly on the kitchen floor to try to find something, but then Jade stopped us.

  “Wait a minute. This is an older home. Could there be an exterior storm cellar door?”

  It was worth a shot. We all ran outside and started looking around, trying to find anything that could be concealing a narrow staircase.

  And then we found it.

  The wooden doors were probably the nicest thing at the entire house, and Kenneth reached for them and tugged them open. He led the way, with Jade and I following down the stairs. As soon as we reached the bottom of the stairs, though, something swung out and hit Kenneth on the head. Instantly, he crumbled to the floor. Jade and I cried out in surprise and we readied our wands, but then Caleb stepped forward out of the shadows. He was holding a heavy shovel, which is what he had used to hit Kenneth.

  “Welcome home, Charlie,” he said. “I was wondering when you’d be back.”

  Chapter 14

  “Let her go, Caleb.”

  A malicious grin spread over his face. Jade and I stood steady with our wands out, but then Daniel appeared gripping Fiona. She was bound and gagged and she looked thinner than I remembered.

  “What did you do to her?” I hissed.

  “What? The wolf traitor? Not as much as I should have,” Caleb shrugged. “I knew she hid you away somewhere, but this?” He jerked his head toward my wand. “This is something I wasn’t expecting. Do you fancy yourself a witch now, Charlie?”

  “Let her go,” I said.

  I had to stay focused. If there was one thing I’d learned, it was that the villains always tried to distract you with mean comments and awkward jabs.

  “Or what?” Caleb sneered. “You’ll meow at me?”

  Fiona was shaking her head. There were tears streaming down her cheeks, and I knew what she was thinking. She didn’t want us to get hurt. She didn’t want us to do anything that was going to result in all of us getting killed.

  Well, she didn’t have to worry.

  I’d learned a lot during my time at Shifter Falls. I might not be the perfect student, or the ideal student, or the straight-A student, but I was definitely the cocky student.

  That was right.

  I’d finally learned to be a cocky shifter, and I was going to be the type of over-confident cat that would make Fiona proud.

  “Hey Caleb,” I said. “Why don’t you let Fiona go and you can take me instead?”

  He seemed shocked by this, and he didn’t react right away. His eyes widened and then quickly narrowed. Obviously, he thought that I was going to trick him somehow. He’d be an idiot if he didn’t think that.

  “What’s the twist?”

  “No twist.”

  I shoved my wand into the waistband of my pants and held my hands up.

  “Look, no tricks,” I said. I gestured for Jade to follow suit. She was tense beside me, but she did, and she held her hands up, too.

  “Oh, you’re stupid girls,” Caleb said. He stepped forward, as though to take us, but he’d forgotten about one very big thing.

  He’d forgotten that you can’t simply knock a shifter unconscious, especially one that wasn’t exactly a tiny sort of shifter. In the corner, while we were talking, Kenneth had been quietly biding his time, and now, as soon as I nodded to him, he shifted into his kangaroo form and kicked Caleb, knocking him into the wall. Caleb fell down and I yanked my wand back out and held it at Daniel.

  “There’s still time for you to walk away,” I said.

  He pulled Fiona closer to himself.

  “There are three of us against you,” I pointed out the obvious. What an idiot. “Let her go, Daniel.”

  Daniel shook his head. He looked from us to Fiona and back again, and then he shook his head again.

  “You weren’t supposed to come here,” he said. “She was supposed to tell us where you were so we could grab you! You weren’t supposed to get away!”

  His voice came out whiny and screechy, and it was very grating to me. Kenneth couldn’t simply kick or tackle Daniel because he was holding Fiona. Any move that Kenneth made to attack Daniel would definitely hurt Fiona, and we couldn’t have that. I looked around anxiously, trying to find another way, but then I remembered something from the festival on the night we got our wands.

  “Hey Jade,” I said. “Do you remember at the festival how your dress moved?”

  “Yes?”

  “Did your mother teach you the enchantment?”

  I kept my eyes planted firmly on Daniel. He seemed confused, which was good. That was the entire point. I had learned during my time at Shifter Falls that not all shifters could use magic. Some of them steered away from it completely, while others were truly adept and wonderful at using their magical skills.

  During the few months I’d been at the school, I’d not only learned how to harness my skills in order to make my life more fantastic using magic, but I’d learned that magic came in many different forms.

  The basement was dark and creepy, and the tiny lightbulb that swung in the center of the ceiling was the only light aside from the darkfire Kenneth had been holding when Caleb knocked him down. There were shadows playing on the wall, and without another word, Jade pointed her wand at them and whispered a few words I couldn’t understand.

  Light shot out of her wand which caused Daniel to jump. Then the shadows started to move. Kenneth and I knew what they were: simply a spell. Daniel, however, did not. Instantly, his eyes moved to the shadows that seemed to be crawling along the walls. They were moving, and it looked like they were moving toward him.

  “What are you doing?” He whispered.

  “Let her go,” I hissed, and Daniel loosened his grip long enough for Jade to grab Fiona and pull her out of the way. At the same time, Kenneth threw himself at Daniel, tackling him, and then Jade and I pulled our wands out and used them to tie the two men up in magical bonds.

  I turned to Fiona and undid her ties and pulled away her gag. She was crying by then, and she reached
for me and pulled me close.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner,” I whispered.

  “They were going to hunt you, sweetie,” she said.

  “I know. I didn’t know you were in trouble,” I said, and then I started to cry, too. Fiona was the first person who had ever really been nice to me. She was the first person who had taken a chance on me.

  She was the first for so many things, and I hated that we almost hadn’t arrived soon enough.

  “They captured me a few days after you vanished,” she said. “They thought I’d hidden you away.”

  “You didn’t tell them, though.”

  “I never would,” she shook her head. “I kept my mouth shut, Charlie. They knew it, but they figured that eventually, you’d come back, and you did.”

  “What are we going to do with them?” Asked Kenneth, kicking one of the guys.

  “We should take them to the police station,” Fiona said. “The sheriff is a friend of mine. He won’t care that the men attacked non-wolf shifters, but he’ll definitely be interested in the fact that they kidnapped me.”

  “You got it.”

  Together, we managed to get the two men to the police station and Fiona gave her statement. The cops were all very surprised to see that she was not only alive, but that she’d been held hostage. Apparently, they’d been debating on what to do with her house since they assumed she had skipped town.

  Fiona surprised me, though, when she told the men that her house was to be auctioned off and the proceeds given to a nearby charity.

  “Where are you going?” The sheriff wanted to know.

  “I’m leaving my retirement,” she simply said, and then we left the building together.

  We went back to Fiona’s house and she packed a trunk. She filled it with clothes and mementos and pictures of her husband, and then we loaded up her car. She drove us back to Shifter Falls and this time, she took one of the non-waterfall entrances.

  “Nobody is following us tonight,” she said. “We can take a warded or guarded entrance.”

  Sure enough, the guards were more than willing to let Fiona into the castle grounds, especially considering she was accompanied by three missing students.