by Jade Alters
“You couldn’t just make something up?” I dare to say at last. Magister Horace hardly lifts the honey-brown eyes I got from him under his bushy brows. “How will you explain the delay of information? You asked me to wait to tell them about Darius and then-”
“Mind your tongue, boy,” the Magister shoots up a brick wall to stop my runaway mouth. I straighten up again.
“Yes, father,” I mutter through clenched teeth.
“We won’t have to explain it. The girl’s Transformation exam is soon. If everything you’ve learned from your time with her is true, we’ll soon know if she’ll join us. Then this situation with Darius and the VampKing will…work itself out.”
“Work itself out…” I gulp, while the Magister goes right on flipping through Cece’s record. This is my best friend and someone I care about, I want to tell him, but I know what he’ll say. The same thing he’s always said, since I was a boy. We’re all pieces to be moved around, some more valuable than others. The key is to become too valuable for the players to give up. That’s all I could do for Cece, according to him…but this... All this conniving, scheming - I don’t care what it's for - I don’t want to play anymore. “So…is there anything here to actually discuss? Or was this a show, for the Council?”
“You’re free to go,” Horace waves me off with such disinterest, I want to scream. I want to fling him and that stupid, extravagant ancestral desk into a dimension of a million shattered mirrors. But I know better than that. I know The Magister could reduce me to twice as many fragments before I ever snapped my fingers. I turn to go, both fists clenched. “Oh, and Serge? Your attitude. Keep it in check.”
“Yes…Father,” I grumble. When all I want to do is slam the door, I pull it to a ginger click behind me.
Transformations
Cece, Sierra Nevada Academy Training Ground
I’ve never been so grateful for being watched. I have an audience of Dragonlord Thise and the rest of my Basic Transformation class, but theirs aren’t the eyes I need on me. Theirs aren’t the eyes I glance to every few seconds to make sure he hasn’t evaporated somehow. My Council-issued watch, Lee, stands far back behind the rest, where he’ll be able to keep an eye on me as I undergo the test. He waits for me on the beige clay hillside, right where I’ve met him almost every day the past week. Right where I’ve been practicing for this very moment. He smiles at me now from where I wait in line, for my turn to Transform. To unveil my true form.
One by one, the Dragonlord calls her other students to the task. Some burst into brilliant plumes of fire. Some only spark. When the smoke clears from around them, each of them has changed, though how much varies from one Dragon cadet to the next. Some stand with scaly greaves, while everything above remains unchanged. Some manage to shed their human head for the long snout of the firebeast. Others still come out wrapped in a patchwork of skin and scales. Before me, only three manage to walk from the flames as their true selves. Two sapphire and one emerald beasts emerge, complete with wings folded down behind them. Each time it happens, Thise bobs her head and says very well, with mild interest. Each time, I look to Lee, who nods me on.
“Just be what you are,” Lee tells me through the Soul of Fire, just like he’s told me a hundred times before. According to him, that’s the key. I’m not changing. I’m just being me.
“Cece Ford.” Thise’s call shatters my safe little trance. Two words - my name, shoots a tremor down every path of my nerves. The Dragonlord waits patiently for me to break rank, to take my dusty mountaintop stage. A warm wind blows under my arms to coax me forward, but it takes more than that. It takes the eyes of my classmates starting to turn. It takes Thise preparing to call me again. Only then do I step forward.
I stand in the breezy quiet before a jury of my peers. Before my teacher. Before my lover. I straighten my arms at my side, fists balled up at their ends. I force all ten of my fingers to unroll together, just like Lee taught me. The focused activity puts me in a state of awareness. Suddenly, I sense each pore, starting with my hands and spreading, that releases a constant stream of gas. With one breath in, I seal every one of them. I keep my inflated chest up, eyes clenched tight. I can feel it, now - the cloud that circles me. The veil that keeps me human for all intents and purposes, even to myself. Then both of those things take a sharp shift. My intent is to take my true form. My purpose is Darius Jecks, who owes me payment of his life. I put my head back, eyes to the open blue. I light the rising gas cloud around me. I let the flame wash over me, wash away the illusion. I become what I am, what I’ve always been. A Dragon.
Gasps sweep the class like a breeze when a flaming shape shoots straight up from the eye of the vortex of flame. The snap of my wings sends a crack through the air and suspends me high above them. The canvas sails that flap behind me feel as natural as having two extra arms. I can tell my eyes are different by how much sharper everything looks, even from a distance. I sweep them down over the glint of my body, coated in layers of amethyst scales. My test uniform has transformed with me, like armor, just like Lee’s did the night we met. I look down over my classmates, shielding their eyes against the sun to see me. When my jaw cracks to scream out in joy, I find it as the long snout of a beast. My fangs unlock from one another to unleash a banshee screech of elation. The class roars back up at me in approval, none louder than Lee. Thise crosses her arms, but even from hundreds of feet above, I can see her smile clearly.
A single pulse of my wings launches me through a passing cloud. I dive and lean to slice the wind with my wings. I feel the fire well up from within. Where once fear would have me choke it, now I open wide. Without the drive of fury or hate behind it, a firehose of molten red spews out from inside me. My joy becomes flame. I zip across the clay, etching an inconel across the arid mountainside. I drink in every heightened, rushing second of the moment, even as it pours out of me. When the last cough of smoke is spent, so am I. I bank around a pine tree to glide back to my class. My wings fold around me the second my talon touches ground. My body loosens instantly, and my suddenly human knees buckle with the flight of all my strength.
“Whoa!” Lee laughs as he bends down to intercept me. He catches both my shoulders. He stands me up before the applauding class of others. “When I taught you about fire breath, I didn’t mean to try it on your first flight!” He whispers.
“I guess…I’m a natural…” I mumble back to him through the biggest smile I’ve worn in a while. Since before I came to the Academy. The class quiets at the sounding of my evaluation,
“Nicely done, Cece,” says Thise. Lee shifts to the side so I can meet her eyes with mine, full of tears.
“Thank you,” I manage to whimper. Lee’s lips slam into mine. The Dragonlord elects not to comment, while a few rogue whoos! rustle through the class. When Lee lets me go, and I can stand on my own, I rejoin the line of my classmates. But then, Lee never really lets me go. We’re too connected for that. Our embers slide together in the Soul of Fire. With my eyes shut, I can see our own private world of orange and blue forming within.
I feel Lee’s arms around my waist, the heat of his bare body joined with mine. I feel his cock sliding down between my butt cheeks, pulsing harder with each kiss he plants on my neck. Just then, still coursing with adrenaline, I want so badly to lean over, slide up and take him in. But I know that if I let Lee inside me, semi-physically, he’ll get in emotionally, too. Just now, I can’t afford that.
He’s seen the strength of my intent - I can’t let him see my purpose. Darius Jecks. Lee would stand in my way, I don’t doubt it for a second. What’s worse, he’d think he’s helping. Worst of all is that he might actually be helping. But now I have the power. I can do it, and whether or not I do has to be in my hands alone. It’s time to stop hiding and be who I am, whoever that is. Even if it is a killer. When Lee’s fingers flit up over my rigid nipples, I bite my lip to stop myself from giving in. Instead, I grab his hands and pull them away. Our connection fizzles away with my withdrawal. We both
open our eyes, back in the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
“Not here,” I whisper to Lee, behind me, “I’m too wound up, I won’t be able to keep calm.”
“I’ll take a rain check,” Lee whispers back with a smirk. I breathe a shaky sigh of relief, despite the lightest note of suspicion in his voice. I can’t afford it to get any heavier, before I make my decision.
Bryant,
The Broken Academy, Grand Library
I’m stricken with a rare dose of surprise the second I swing open the doors to the Library. She’s already here. I’ve had to wait at least ten minutes for Cece to show up for every single study session, until now. What’s even stranger is that she’s nose deep in a tome already. I roll my cracked heels to the backside of a lumbering stone support pillar in the far corner to peer at her unseen for a moment.
The intensity with which Cece peruses the pages is unusual for her. She isn’t checking to see if I’ve arrived, either. If there’s anything to be said about my progress in the lessons Cece gives me during our study sessions, it’s that I think she looks distressed. I actually recognize the look on her face. If she knew I was there, she might be able to hide it, but from this unknowing distance she bares every one of her true colors. Something is weighing on her mind, and whatever is in that book on the table is the easiest distraction from it. I slip out from my hiding place to pace to the table with her.
“Did you come here early to see just how early I get here?” I ask her as I near the table. Her eyes leap up from her book with some level of alarm. As soon as her giant blue orbs settle on me, though, they relax back in their sockets.
“Why, Bryant, was that a joke?” Cece says. I register after a moment that she’s doing what she calls “teasing” me. My lips curl up in a crackling little smirk.
“Was it acceptable?” I ask.
“The point of jokes isn’t to have them accepted,” Cece chuckles, “it’s to make people laugh.”
“Then it appears I succeeded,” I note as I sit down. Cece laughs even harder. I take this chance to glimpse the pages she’s chosen to distract herself with. I’m surprised yet again by her choice in reading material - a book about the ancient Magicians. The founders of the Academy. “You’re going back a bit far for our project. Dragons and Demons were a much more recent addition to the Academy. I mean...I hope you knew that already. Our project is due next week.”
“Yeah, I know that,” Cece chuckles. Her eyes flit down to the text one last time before she snaps the front and back covers together. “I just…came across something interesting in a different book and wanted to do a little more digging on it is all.”
“Is that what’s bothering you?” I ask her. I can tell from the widening of her eyes that I’ve committed the offense of being “blunt” again. A habit of mine, according to Cece.
“You think something’s bothering me?” Cece asks. I’m not sure exactly how to respond, since I feel that should be obvious, or I wouldn’t ask. “I just noticed that, in some of the older texts we referenced, the Academy…is called the Dalshak Academy, not the Broken Academy. So I went back as far as I could, starting with what’s left from the original Magicians who emigrated here from India.”
“Yes, this place started as a school for Magicians, Witches and Warlocks, but you know that from class,” I realize, mid-sentence. “It was originally named for one of the founding families, the Dalshaks. It was only reassigned the Broken Academy later, when many additions and contributions were made by subsequently inducted races.”
“Ah, alright…” Cece murmurs into her folded hand, “The Dalshak Academy…” Her eyes shoot from one side of her head to the other, as is in pursuit of a troublesome fly.
“Was that…what’s bothering you?” I ask again, when I see the lines of stress linger under her eyes.
“No, I…” Cece starts. For a second, it looks like she might actually be forthright with me for once. Like whatever it is is shaken up like a bottle inside her, ready to burst. But then she asks, “Bryant…what kind of abilities do Demons have?” The question catches even me off-guard. I fold my hands to compose the answer.
“I can alter most matter simply by touching it, if I wish. Sometimes it happens whether I wish it or not,” I explain. In this case, I wish it for an example. From around my wrists, ruby cracks spiral out through the grains of our wooden library table. Charred boils rise up from around them, like it was made from flesh. “This corruption by contact can be…difficult to control. It’s why humans first declared us Demons.” Cece watches with raw amazement as the corruption spreads, then retracts within my curled fists. The table flattens out in its original state.
“Have you…” Cece’s voice trembles while she stares at my fists. “Have you ever thought about using them to hurt someone?” I get the faint sense that she has an idea of the answer long before I give it.
“I didn’t think about it, but I did use them to hurt people. Many people, long ago,” I tell her. Fey Rorelia says, when approached about the topic, open honesty is the best way to handle it.
“Yet, you’re still here, at the Academy?” Cece asks.
“I am. When I began my training here, I was more a prisoner than a student. I was given instruction from a cell in the detention block. The full extent of my abilities is still sealed by a team of managing Witches,” I explain.
“And…did they punish you for what you did?” Cece asks next. With each question, my lessons with her shine a brighter light on the true picture of what she’s asking. Curious as she might be about me, this is about her.
“They sentenced me to death. In that, they discovered that nothing in this Realm can kill a Demon. The only alternative was to…rehabilitate me,” I tell her.
“Do you feel regret, Bryant?” Cece’s eyes finally come around to mine, glittering blue on shimmering orange.
“Cece…” for the first time in my life, I answer a question with one of my own, instead of an answer. “Are you thinking about hurting someone?” The look that crosses her face doesn’t match any emotion I know. It looks like someone has just stabbed her.
“I…” Cece tries. Whatever it is gets stuck in her throat. She slides her chair out instead, and turns to run. My hand flies out before I know what it’s doing.
“Wait,” comes from my lips, before I know what they’re saying. It’s like I’m watching someone else, a stranger, say it to her. The same words Fey Rorelia said to me. “If you do this, you’ll only hurt yourself.”
“Bryant…you understand more than you know, don’t you?” Cece murmurs. I don’t want to hold her arm for too long, as the cracks of corruption are already spreading across her skin, but she keeps trying to pull away. I don’t know why, but I know I can’t let her. Everything good born in me these past weeks came from her. I can’t let her be like me.
“Cece-”
I don’t get a chance to try and sort it out. Cece swings around to grab my other arm. She pulls me out of my seat. She yanks me up into her body. Every inch of her silken skin on my rocky, topsoil shell is intoxicating. It’s overwhelming. Heat floods from her, through the cracks in me. Each one lights with an awakened orange glow as her soft lips sink between my callous ones. It’s like she’s a vacuum, sucking every ounce of strength from my frame, until I might as well be made from the same soft stuff she is. Then, just as quickly as it came, it’s all gone. An instant spike of heat at our lips unleashes a shockwave of flame and smoke. It flings me back, legs in the air. By the time my back hits one of the corner support pillars and I slide to the ground, Cece is near the Library door.
“Wait!” I call out to her. My hand freezes mid-reach for her just before she disappears, but not through the door. By the time my brain can adjust to what’s happening, she’s gone.
A Magician’s portal pops open in the air beside her. Out steps our Mystical History Teacher’s Assistant, Serge Dalshak. At the snap of his fingers, Cece drops limp, into his waiting arms. He turns and immediately steps back through his portal
, which seals behind him. I’m left alone in the Grand Library, my cracked, dark hand out for a girl who is no longer there.
Splinters
Cece
It’s black all around me. Little fireflies, every shade of orange, red and yellow float around me. I still remember how my gut did backflips the first time I came here, not so long ago. Since then, it’s become a place where I can unleash anything and everything. I’ve come here to confess. I’ve come here to roll in the thrall of passion. Just now, I realize I must be here in the Soul of Fire because I’ve been knocked out. It takes me a few seconds to reorient myself before I realize what I need to do.
“Lee!” I call out into the black. My ember shoots off across the dark distance, straight to his. No matter how we drift, it always knows the way.
“Cece? What is it? What’s wrong?” Lee calls back the second we link. The panic in my voice bleeds into him instantly.
“I think I’ve been knocked out,” I tell him.
“What? By who?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t see… I was in the Grand Library. Then, all of a sudden, I was here in the Soul of Fire. I can’t open my eyes,” I rattle off, even as I struggle to peel back my eyelids. The veil is far too heavy to lift, even a little.
“Alright, the Grand Library. I’m on my way. I’ll find you,” Lee promises me with enough confidence for the both of us. “Did you hear or see anything, before it went black?”