by Sarina Dorie
Pro Ro stared at me in bewildered horror. “What? I’ve never even met the woman. Why would she be under my turban?”
“Indeed!” Jeb said.
“Oh my God!” Josie said. “This isn’t Harry Potter, girl.”
Thatch covered his eyes with his hands. He was shaking with anger, or more likely, laughter. Only someone sadistic would find this moment funny.
Josie grabbed the hem of my skirt and tugged it over my behind. Yep, not only had I launched myself at another teacher, but I’d just mooned everyone I had been sitting next to. At least I wore my striped leggings.
Khaba flicked his hand at me, and I slid backward off the table and into the chair.
“You did cast a spell on me. I could feel it.” I pointed at Pro Ro, at a loss for anything else to say.
Pro Ro’s nostrils flared. His cheeks turned crimson. “Indeed. At Jeb’s request.”
Jeb’s eyes were full of pity. “A spell of protection, darlin’. To ensure your safety. Darshan has been having visions.”
“We wanted to protect you,” Pro Ro said.
This just kept getting worse and worse. I smoothed my pink hair out of my eyes and stood. People flinched back. Josie stared with wide eyes. She turned away. Khaba grimaced. One of my heels was missing from my shoe, and I nearly lost my balance.
I righted myself and walked out of the conference room with as much dignity as a drowned cat.
“Someone is getting fired,” Vega said, none-too-quietly.
My heart plummeted even further. I didn’t doubt it.
This was the newest worst day of my life. What I didn’t know then was it was about to get worse.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The Turban Was for Religious Reasons. Duh.
I didn’t know how I would live with my humiliation. I had just reaffirmed the view that I was descended from a crazy psycho bitch and the apple didn’t fall far from the tree. I’d made wild assumptions about my colleagues and discredited myself as a source of reliable information. No one would believe me when I told them Julian Thistledown seduced minors. They would see me as jealous and unstable. Could I blame them?
And if I did show them the evidence on my phone, it would be another mark against me that I’d used the evils of technology on school grounds.
This had to be the moment representing the bitterest of bites in my prophecy chocolate. I had thought there would be way more sweetness this semester. Where was the creamy caramel that my prophecy chocolate had promised?
I passed Imani in the hallway. She sat at the feet of a suit of armor. A girl with green skin and elf ears sat next to her. A book was open in front of them, and they giggled. I wanted to smile for her, to be happy she’d made a friend. But I was too miserable with my own lack of friends. As close as I’d grown to Josie, I doubted our friendship would withstand my level of crazytown.
For no good reason at all, I had attacked a coworker. I had based my rationale on a freakin’ dream—an obsession with a childhood book. If I was lucky, Jeb would terminate my position at the end of the quarter for “budgetary reasons” as opposed to the truth: religious discrimination and harassment of staff. All my fantasies of teaching at a magical school were over.
I couldn’t bear seeing another adult and being asked to explain my fallible logic. The other teachers would be going to the game or out in the forest soon. I went straight to my room and packed my suitcase before Vega returned.
After I completed packing, I headed to my classroom to finish grading mid-terms and marking grade reports. I wrote detailed lesson plans for the next two weeks so that whoever came in to replace me wouldn’t have to scramble to figure out what to do. The normal state of any art classroom was an environment of chaos. Not wanting someone else to walk into that mess, I packed all the pencils and chalk neatly in their containers, stacked the drawing paper, and made piles of student work to pass back. I organized like there was no tomorrow, mostly because I didn’t think there would be.
My belly growled with hunger. Checking my cell phone clock, I saw it was an hour past dinner time. I didn’t want to get anything to eat and risk stumbling into anyone. I should have grabbed a snack from my dorm earlier, but I hadn’t thought about it then, and there was no way I was going back and risk running into Vega. I stacked my own personal supplies in a box on my desk and added my framed drawings on top.
In a stack of student art ready to be passed back, I turned the perspective drawings the same direction. Most were drawn on the recycled paper Khaba had given me from the office. One incomplete sketch displayed the worst perspective drawing I’d ever seen. The student hadn’t used a ruler and for some reason there were two horizon lines. I turned it over to see who it belonged to. There was no name on the back, but there were a series of letters and numbers on the recycled paper. The top said: Spring Exam Answer Key, page 3.
I gasped. Was it really the lost answer key? On the back of a student drawing? I clutched it to my chest, not believing my luck. How had it gotten in a stack of recycled papers?
The papers had come from Jeb’s office. I looked at the back of the other student art. Mostly they were memos, meeting notes, fiscal reports, and detention forms, but I found two additional pages to the answer key on the back of student art.
I could still save the day! Womby’s wouldn’t be fined. No one would have to be fired!
My heart sank again. Except, I would still be fired. A few hours ago I might have been a hero, but there was no way to redeem myself. I couldn’t face Jeb and give it to him now. He’d think I had stolen it.
I placed it in the top drawer of my desk to keep it safe. I could ask Josie for help, but from the way she’d turned away from me in the meeting, I didn’t know if she still considered me a friend. Perhaps I would never see her again after this.
I continued to pack my desk and tidy the classroom. My fairy godmother had taught me to leave every place you left cleaner than when you’d found it.
Next, I started on my posters. I didn’t care about the motivational posters, but I wanted the Van Gogh, Frida Kahlo, Michelangelo, and the Leonardo posters that had cost me twenty dollars each.
I pushed a table up to the wall and stood on it, trying to hook my nails under the edge of the Sistine Chapel ceiling poster to peel it off. The problem was, Josie had used magic to put them up. I didn’t know how to undo that.
“Hello, hello,” Julian called from the doorway. His tone was annoyingly chipper.
I glanced over my shoulder at him and turned back to the poster. “What do you want?” A small edge of the paper tore.
“I didn’t see you at dinner. I thought you might like something to eat. You did say lasagna was your favorite?” He set the plate on my desk.
“Aren’t you supposed to be at the big game, hunting for answer keys some student told you was hidden in the woods? Funny how you convinced someone to tell you when no one else could.”
“What can I say? He gives them the stick. I offer the carrot.” He laughed at his own joke.
Ugh, that was probably a euphemism.
My affinity roiled like snakes inside me. Pro Ro might have been right when he said Julian was in danger of being murdered by me. I stared at the poster, forcing myself to breathe in butterflies and classical art and breathe out yucky thoughts of negativity and murder.
Julian strode over. “Say, what are you doing up there?”
My voice came out about as monotone as Thatch’s. “I’m taking down all the posters Josie magically taped to the walls.”
“Oh, let me help you with that.” He flourished his wand in the air.
The air smelled of musky earth and wet wood. Green light glittered against the walls. All the posters floated down to the floor. My sweater unbuttoned itself and flew off as well. Fortunately, I wore a tank top underneath.
He offered me his hand as I hopped down from the table. I ignored him and retrieved my sweater from the floor.
“Oo
psie,” he said with a chuckle. “Did I do that?”
Fortunately for him, dirty looks couldn’t kill. “Get out of my classroom.” I shoved my arms through the sleeves of my sweater.
“I know you had a bad day. No one blames you. Josie said you were up half the night with worry about something. She implied she had evidence to support your suspicions. And Vega said you had nightmares.” He stepped in closer, arms outstretched to hug me.
I put up a hand. “Don’t touch me.”
His eyes were hurt. “What’s gotten into you?”
“No, not what’s gotten into me? What’s gotten into you? You act like you’re interested in me, like we’re dating, and this whole time you’ve been having sex with minors?”
He stared at me wide-eyed.
I snatched up my posters from the floor. “I don’t want anything to do with you.”
“I would never sleep with a student. Whatever those students said, they’re liars.”
I froze. Students. As in plural. “How many girls have you slept with?”
“None.” He stood there awkwardly, shifting from foot to foot. A tight smile stretched across his face.
“Don’t lie to me. I saw you having sex with that girl last night.” Fury built inside me.
“Oh, that.” He coughed. “There’s a perfectly good explanation for that.” He coughed again. It was a delaying tactic. I’d seen students do it often enough. “Someone cast a spell on me. I couldn’t help it. I wasn’t myself.”
“Right.” I plopped the posters down on a table. “And the other students?”
“Sweetie, you have to believe me. I only want you.”
I fumbled for the key to the closet in my pocket, making my way around the horseshoe shaped enclosure of desks. “I don’t have to believe you. I don’t have to do anything.”
I inserted the key in the lock, opened the door, and strode through it. He rushed toward me. I slammed the door in his face. It closed with a satisfying thud.
I used my phone as a flashlight as I made my way down the stairs. It crossed my mind I could walk all the way down to the dungeon with those stairs. Thatch had come up the stairs often enough, but I didn’t want to encounter my frenemy, the dungeon master, in case he wasn’t out looking for answer keys with everyone else. I stepped onto the landing to my supply closet and unlocked the door. The light illuminated my scant supplies. I took in a shaky breath, anger still rattling through me. I’d made it this far through the day without succumbing to hysterical sobbing. I could make it a little longer.
I set my phone on a shelf. The blue glow of light died away, but the closet wasn’t dark. Green light glowed from behind me, casting my shadow on the wall.
The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. My energy spiked and dipped. A cramp shot through my core. The sensation of a string tugging on my ribcage stole my breath. It was like someone had hooked a line to my insides and was trying to lure me in like a fish.
The air smelled earthy and green with undertones of decay and rotting leaves. His breath was shallow, almost inaudible behind me.
“I told you to leave me alone. I don’t want to talk to you.” I whirled, freezing when I saw him.
Or maybe it would have been more accurate.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
The Green Man’s Monastery
The scream caught in my throat as I stared in horror. I had dreamed Julian was a demon, but this was so much worse.
The creature on the landing before me was Swamp Thing on steroids. Lacy moss and tufts of lichen hung from his body like clothes. A ridge of bark-like horns sprouted from the ferns and leaves of his hair. His skin was made of decaying wood.
His spine was hunched, bent like a snake curling over prey. His feet were more like the talons of a bird than anything human or plant. He was beautiful and dangerous, like a bog on a misty morning, waiting for someone to sink her feet into the earth to swallow her whole. The cramping in my belly grew stronger. A centipede crawled out of a knot in the wood that made up his face and scurried into his ear. He smiled, his teeth sharp points, uneven and rotting like the bark of his flesh.
“W-what are you?” I asked. Part of my brain, that logical analytic side chided me for my rudeness. That was considered an impolite question in this world. The other part of my brain was screaming incomprehensible gibberish.
I snatched up my phone and held it out protectively in front of me.
“Don’t you recognize me, sweetie?” He chuckled. The voice wasn’t quite Julian’s, but close enough to recognize him.
“Do you understand now why one woman isn’t enough for me, for a green man? I am a being of fertility and virility. In my blood flows the magic of ancient gods.” He stepped closer. Vines grew out of his body, curling themselves toward me. One tickled my ankle.
I darted backward, away from him and into the closet. It wasn’t ideal, but there was nowhere else to go.
He smiled. “My magic is stronger than Thatch or Vega or any Celestor at this school. I’m more powerful than Khaba with his limited wishes only to be granted when someone rubs his lamp. Even Jeb couldn’t fathom the depths of my power. What a joke it was to play along with what the other teachers thought of me and pretend to be the blundering weakling who was too inept to even chaperone you to Lachlan Falls. You never stood a chance against my magic.” Another tendril brushed my ankle.
I kicked at it.
“Neither did the other art teachers.” He laughed wickedly. “I’m only surprised you were able to resist for as long as you did. But then, I can blame Thatch for that, always undoing my enchantments. What he called a curse, I call a gift.”
Wings beat against the window, the light flashing in flickering shadows. I glanced behind me at the bird thud-thudding against my window. Was it Thatch’s crow or the Raven Court?
“Stop. Don’t come any closer,” I said, holding up my phone. “I have this phone. I’m prepared to hurt you with it if I have to.”
A vine shot out of his hand, grabbed my wrist and smashed my knuckles against the edge of the shelf. I cried out and dropped the phone.
I cradled my throbbing hand to my chest. “What do you want with me? Why are you doing this?”
“Do you really think I intend to work at this lowly school, making a poverty level wage for the rest of my life? The Raven Queen isn’t the only one who wants you and is willing to pay for your life. She may employ Thatch to spy on you, to guide you to her side, but he isn’t the only emissary working for the Fae.”
My heart sank. Just when I had thought Thatch wasn’t so bad.
Vines slithered around me, grabbing onto me and drawing me closer to him. “Of course that was before I had a taste of you for myself.”
I screamed. The sound echoed in the stairwell. I tried to pull away, to push against his chest, but his vines held me there. I shrieked and thrashed.
His laugh was deep and throaty. “Who do you think is going to come to your aid? Jeb? The old loon is away. All the teachers are in the forest. There are no unicorns to save you. Even Thatch can’t rescue you this time.”
“Thatch?” I tried to yank myself free, but the vines held. “When did he try to save me?”
“He suspected there was a hex on your drink at the pub and attempted to use a counter curse to cleanse it.” Vines slithered against my skin, exploring and prodding me.
I had accused Thatch of enchanting my drink, and he’d purposefully spilled it. For all his assholery, he hadn’t been out to poison me.
“Wait, so Thatch didn’t want to kill me because he wanted my job? It was all you?”
“He’s been trying to keep you safe. But he’s not here, is he? Could it be he’s not half as good at divination as he claims?” Julian cackled.
The vines tightened around me, making it difficult to breathe. All of this was starting to make sense. Julian had thrown the spotlight off himself by blaming Thatch for everything. The last art teacher, Jorge Smith, had be
en snooping around, so he must have found out what Julian had done.
“Please, Julian.” I shook my head. “You and me, we’re friends. Don’t do this.”
“You don’t know what you are, do you?” He licked my ear.
I turned my head away. The vines caressed my arms. One slid under my skirt, tickling behind my knee.
“I knew the moment Alouette Loraline had a daughter, you would have the same affinity. Jeb assumed you might be Celestor, but I knew the truth about what she was.” He brushed the rough wood of his fingers against my cheek. “Your Red affinity solves the Fae Fertility Paradox. You’ll strengthen my powers with your own.”
Did he know about Thatch? About Imani? I prayed no one knew.
He purred against my ear. “Your body will make the perfect vessel to sire my heirs. You won’t break like the other art teachers.”
I screamed again.
“And the best part is, you’ll have no choice but to enjoy it.”
“No, I won’t!”
I struggled against him. He clawed the sleeve of my sweater off one arm. He buried his face in my neck, nibbling his way across my skin and down my arm. Tingles pulsed over my flesh where his lips trailed. My face grew warm. His touch was like a drug. The more he stroked my skin, the more I lulled under his spell. Or was it under my spell?
Thatch had been right. I couldn’t tell the difference between my own desires and someone else’s. Even knowing this, I was powerless to stop it. I sank into his arms. Arousal flushed through me. I smoothed my hand over the frilly texture of ferns and moss covering his chest.
A sharp spasm of pain stole my breath. The hydra had said I was cursed. Perhaps it meant this pain, the spell Julian had cast over me, or perhaps it meant my willingness to give in to any man’s desires that weren’t my own. Derrick in my dreams had told me the same thing—Derrick, who I hadn’t thought of in ages. Was it because of what Julian had done to me? He’d made me forget my vow to find my best friend.
Thatch had warned me not to let anyone know what my affinity was. He had told me someone might use me. Now here I was, about to become slave to someone else’s will.