by Eden Beck
I nearly forgot. I was late already yesterday. If I’m going to pull ahead from the bottom of the class, I’m not going to get there by being late.
Dressed in the first thing I could find—plain, comfortable black clothes I can move in, Erin and I race down the hall and out onto the path leading away from the school. Though the school sits at the top of a hill, the hill itself is situated in the middle of a deep valley. The surrounding mountains are ancient and jagged, their peaks reaching to the skies like the teeth of some massive monster.
A blue light has settled all around us. The sky has already lightened to that faint, gray morning color, but it will be some time still before the sun rises high enough to break above the tops of those same surrounding mountains.
Erin doesn’t make it far before she doubles over and tries to wave me on while she takes a moment to catch her breath. I bounce on the balls of my feet and glance over my shoulder down the path, towards class. I spot a couple other students weaving in and out of the trees there, still within eyesight. I don’t want to fall behind, but it doesn’t feel right leaving Erin. Not after she helped my sorry ass back to the dorm last night, after the trials fully annihilated me.
When Erin does finally straighten back up, her eyes stay trained on the path ahead of us for a moment, trying to get the motivation to start back up. She looks scared, as always, but her jaw clenches with determination. She’s wearing a baggy T-shirt and gym shorts, and her blonde hair is pulled back into a bouncy little ponytail. She looks about twelve.
The morning is crisp and chilly, but it won’t stay that way for long. I rub my arms to keep the goosebumps from forming.
“Come on,” I say, waving her back onto the path at a slow jog. “You nervous?”
She nods. At least she’s honest.
Most of the other new recruits are already gathered at the course when we finally get there. One of the downsides to getting into the most exclusive monster hunting school is that the class is so small, I’m likely to be stuck with those pricks Piers, Owen, and Bennett every day for the next three years. Well, if they make it all the way to graduation. There’s a good chance that between the dropped recruit at the end of the year and the upcoming monster encounters, at least one of us isn’t going to make it all three years.
I try to ignore them and focus on my own warm up—mostly stretching my sore and bruised muscles from yesterday’s trials—but they’re not making it easy. There’s not a shirt in sight between the three of them, and I am still human after all. Even from the outer corner of my eyes I can see their muscles rippling while they stretch. Owen, in particular, looks keenly aware of eyes on him. He moves methodically, his motions practiced to better catch the light just so.
I’m drawn away from staring at the way that light catches in Owen’s fair hair by another familiar voice.
“Avery!”
I turn my back to the boys before I get caught staring and see another familiar face. Sawyer, beaming, jogs up to me. He’s also shirtless, and I glance over his bare chest as he comes to stand in front of me. This must be how guys feel with boobs. I have to concentrate on keeping my eyes forward, and not down on the soft glisten of sweat across that—
Fuck, Avery. Get it together.
“Hey, Sawyer,” I say with a smile, my gaze held steadily on his face. That fine textured stubble is gone, shaved to reveal smooth, angled features beneath.
“You excited to get started?” he asks. “I didn’t do anywhere near as good as you did on the obstacle course. I could learn a lot from you.” His eyes take on a glazed-over look for a second, and I know where he’s headed before he even gets there. “To think,” he says. “I get to work right along the Black’s kid.”
“I wouldn’t say ‘excited’ is the right word,” I say, hooking one arm up over my head to stretch the ache out of it.
Sawyer spots Erin standing beside me, and quickly introduces himself in his usual, cheery, way. “Hi!” he says, sticking out his hand. “I’m Sawyer!”
“Erin,” she says so quietly I wonder if Sawyer heard. She shakes his hand with an equally unimpressive handshake. “I’m Avery’s roommate.”
“Cool! I’m stuck with Mr. Quiet over there.” Sawyer jerks his head toward Bennett.
“Oh, that so?” I ask. “What’s he like?”
I imagine him turning his half of the room into a full out den, or some kind of shrine to protein powder.
“He’s not so bad,” Sawyer says. “He’s just quiet. I don’t think he said one thing to me yesterday. He spent most of his time holed up with Party-guy and Mr. Bigshot in their room. I don’t mind. Kinda like having the place to myself.”
“FALL IN!” shouts a rough voice, and we all snap our attention towards the source of the noise. It’s our teacher, a woman who looks to be in her thirties and wearing athletic gear plastered with the Saint M logo. “And shut up!” she snaps, looking pointedly towards Piers and his crew. Owen, who had been talking, falls silent and scowls back while she turns her attention to the entire class.
“I’m Professor Davies. But in this class, you call me ma’am. That clear?”
We all stare at her.
“Okay; when I ask you a question, you all respond with ‘yes, ma’am’ or ‘no, ma’am’. So again: is that CLEAR?”
“YES, MA’AM!” we chorus at her. I try my best not to snort. I’m not sure if this hardass persona works on her; she doesn’t seem overly intimidating, what with her perfect blonde ballerina-bun and yoga pants. I guess I should learn soon that in this world, however, not everything is as it seems.
“Great,” she barks. “I have you all until noon. You’ll meet here wearing workout gear every morning, and if you’re late, I’ll bust your ass. Clear?”
“YES, MA’AM!”
“Follow me.”
She leads us further into the woods, and we all walk silently behind her. I spot the obstacle course from the trial flitting to the trees to our left, but we aren’t headed towards it. Instead, she takes us to a course much deeper into the woods. It looks older, and way simpler; tires in the mud, climbing ropes, simple wooden hurdles of varying heights, all integrated into the forest so that the trees themselves become obstacles too.
I can’t see the end of it.
“This is our simplest obstacle course,” Professor Davies tells us. “After a warm-up, you all will run this course over and over until I think it’s a good time to stop. I will be timing each of you. You may think there’s a lot of you and only one of me, and that it’s impossible for me to time each of you when you’re all running this together—but you’re wrong. I have my ways. Do not test me.”
She’s practically begging to be tested; I can see it in her eyes. Owen, Bennett, and Piers are itching to get started. I can see it in their nervous, twitching movements. They might want to test her, but I don’t. I have a lot to work toward, and I can’t gamble on my scores, no matter how much the competitive side of me wants to try and prove something to this loudmouthed woman.
Professor Davies leads us in some group stretches and some other warm-up bullshit; jumping jacks, a lap around the clearing. I don’t complain. I stay in the middle front of the pack. Some of the other recruits are still suffering from a bit of altitude sickness, but my body has already adjusted. Every so often I feel the slightest twinge of lightheadedness if I push it a little too hard, but that’s it. Not like Erin, who’s struggling just to keep up at the very back of the class. Her face is already a deep shade of purple when we circle back around to the start, but still, she doesn’t show any sign of giving up. She’s a determined little thing.
The teacher has us all line up single-file at the beginning of the obstacle course. She sticks her whistle in her mouth and blows it for the first person to start. Once they get going a bit, she signals for the next person to follow.
It’ll be my turn soon. When the time comes, I adjust my tank top and drop down, getting into a running position.
The whistle blows.
&nb
sp; I kick off.
The first stretch is just running, my footsteps melding pretty seamlessly into tires embedded into the ground. The whistle blows behind me, startling me out of my concentration and making my footwork sloppy. I need to focus. All around me are the noises and grunts of others running the course. There are going to be all sorts of noises and distractions out on a real hunt; I need to get used to it and learn to tune it all out to concentrate on myself. One false move here, and the worst that’s going to happen is a twisted ankle.
Out there, it could mean death.
I struggled a little on the trial’s obstacles, but today should be a different story. Now that I’m concentrated, I blast through the beginning of the course and make it to the part obscured by trees. I catch a flash of skin. Owen’s just ahead of me now, right on the other side of the barbed wire mesh blocking off the next part of the course.
I dive under the wire and start my crawl. My hair, pulled back and braided down my back, poses no threat today. Owen is just a few feet ahead of me, his jerky movements costing him precious seconds for me to catch up. Just before he scrambles out, he swipes his foot back and a clod of mud flies up to smack into my face. It clogs my eyes and nose, getting into my mouth so I have to stop for a moment. I cough chunks of wet dirt out of my throat but carry on blinded, crawling the rest of the way out from under the wire before I stop to wipe the mud from my eyes.
Okay, that was a setback, but it didn’t slow me down too much. Owen’s halfway up a set of three climbing ropes ahead. I go to grab the one to his right, but he reaches out and smacks it so it swings up and out of reach. Piers, who started just before Owen, glances down from the top where he was apparently waiting. He grabs the rope to Owen’s other side and pulls it up of my reach again, winding it tightly around a branch before leaving us behind.
The first rope swings back toward me and I reach out to catch it, but Owen smacks it away again. Snarling, I grab the rope Owen’s climbing and start going up after him.
“Hey!” he yells, scrambling away from me. Mud falls from his shoes, sprinkling my hair and shoulders, but I press on. He might be stronger than me, but his footing is all wrong, and I catch up to him before he reaches the branches overhead. He kicks out, and I dodge his foot and grab him by the ankle, ripping his shoe off. It falls to the forest floor below where it disappears into the thick underbrush.
“Hands off, bitch!” he snaps, kicking his foot out, trying to wrench it from my grasp.
I let him get away. He jumps to the next branch and I climb up unhindered. He’s a few branches ahead of me now, so I go ahead and make my first jump, traveling sure-footed over the thicker branches, ducking under the thinner ones overhead.
Smack. A whip-like branch catches the side of my face. I yelp and grab onto the branch below me just before I lose my balance. My cheek stings with a trickle of blood. I look around wildly and make eye contact with Pierce, who is scurrying away out of reach and up ahead. He must have whipped the branch at me.
The rest of the course goes much the same. Piers and Owen do everything they can to hinder me while we’re out of sight of the professor, but eventually I pass them anyway. I’m in the clear until I catch up to Bennett. All he has to do is shove my shoulder and I almost fall off the net I’m supposed to be climbing down. They’re slowing me down, costing me time, but I still manage to pull ahead and overlap most of the students that started before me.
From the sounds of the labored breathing all around, Erin isn’t the only one still struggling to get used to the altitude. I’ve never been one to take long to adapt. I guess it’s just the first time I’ve seen myself in stark contrast to so many around me.
I suppose I have my genes to thank for that. I thought coming here to the academy would help me find answers about my parents, but all it’s done is give me more questions. I need to know who they were, especially if I’m constantly being judged against them.
I need to know what the expectations are if I intend to surpass them.
“Lookin’ clumsy, Black!” Professor Davies shouts to me when I pass by her to start my sixth run of the course. I grit my teeth. Of course I look clumsy; I’m covered in mud that’s been hurled and kicked at me, I’m bleeding from scratches from strategically-held branches, and I have one bruise blossoming over my bare arm from where Bennett grabbed and yanked me back. All that and I’m still nearly two full laps ahead of everyone else.
So, I say nothing. I have to concentrate.
I’m halfway up a climbing rope, dodging rocks—Owen’s upgraded his tactics—when I hear a long, shrill whistle from the clearing.
“This is it! Last run!” Davies shouts.
I could take it easy. I’m already way ahead of everyone else, despite the boys’ antics, but then my eyes meet Owen’s. He’s run out of rocks.
He dodges to the side, expecting me to lash back—but I just run past him, leaving him stumbling to catch back up.
One down; he’s behind me.
Piers is next. He’s waiting on the last branch. There’s no way around him. He’s holding one of those thin, whip-like branches, ready to hit me with it. I spot it in time, however, and manage to duck as he lets it go. It whips over my head and catches Owen instead. He cries out behind me, and Piers’ mouth drops open in surprise.
I pass him in their momentary shock, rushing over the narrow pole leading to the net sloping back down to the ground.
Of course Bennett is on the net again. He’s so goddamn wide that he takes up most of the room. There’s no way I can get out of his reach.
So, I jump.
He watches me fall past him with a shocked expression. Three for three, I think. I don’t fall all the way to the ground, but rather reach out and grasp onto the net as quickly as my flailing limbs will allow. My shoulders yank uncomfortably and my biceps scream in protest; but nothing’s broken. Strains will heal on their own. If I was in the field right now, there’d be no reason to stop, or even slow. These boys all think they’re trying to do something to make this all harder for me, but all they’re doing is making me better.
Or so I tell myself, at least, as I drop to the ground and hurry toward the final hurdles.
All three of them remain a safe distance behind me as I finish the rest of the course. I pass Sawyer again, too, but he just flashes me a friendly smile. At the end of it all, Professor Davies is standing amid a pile of fallen-over students gasping for breath. Most of them are just winded, but one glance and I can tell I’m not the only one with injuries. Mine, however, are more severe, as they were purposefully inflicted.
I’m not the only one to notice this.
“Take a few spills, Black?” Professor Davies asks as she glances at her stopwatch.
I don’t reply. I’m doubled over, hands on my knees, panting. The altitude has finally caught up to me, leaving my lungs heaving for oxygen while the rest of me stings from physical wounds. I can feel blood trickling down several small cuts on my face, arms, legs; wherever there is bare skin, basically, I’m bleeding. The rest of me is covered in mud and dirt.
“You made great time, though. One of the top performers in the class.” She glances at me. “Good work.”
Piers, Owen, and Bennett stumble up behind me.
“Dagher, Collier, Little.” Her eyes are on her stopwatch. “Decent time. Alman—decent time.”
I move out of the way as Sawyer finally stumbles past me, collapsing face-first into the ground. With great effort, he rolls over onto his back and smiles up at me.
“Hi,” he gasps, that puppy-dog look on his face. He’s too honest.
I smile back. What a doofus.
I have time to catch my breath as the rest of the students finish their last run of the course. Each one gets a judgment from Davies as she spots them. I lower myself to sit cross-legged next to Sawyer and begin rubbing dried blood off my various cuts.
“Miller—terrible, absolutely terrible; you should’ve run that at least two more times. I have half a mind to
send you up to the headmaster’s office and have him re-evaluate his decision to take you on.” The student in question hangs his head and watches the last few students jogging up to the line. “Yi—good time, right on target. Stavros, Attar—decent time, both of you. Ah, there you are, Singer,” she adds as Erin walks up on wobbly legs. “Terrible; you should’ve been back a long time ago. Did you stop and take a nap between those last two laps?”
Erin purses her lips and sinks to the ground next to me, her face pale. She, too, is covered in cuts and bruises. A few of them are bleeding. I shoot a glance over at Piers and his lackeys, but they aren’t paying any attention to us. They’re all still lying face down on the ground.
“Anybody give you any trouble?” I ask, still eying them warily for signs they were responsible for her misery, too.
“No,” she says, still panting. She coughs loudly and places a shaky hand on her stomach. “I think I’m gonna be sick.”
I look over her again, taking in her state. She looks almost as bad as me—which is saying a lot if she really did all this just to herself.
Davies waits for the very last stragglers, then clicks her stopwatch a final time and surveys the group of exhausted students. “That’s it for today. Go get some lunch.”
I get to my feet and help Erin and Sawyer do the same. “I’m gonna go clean up first,” I tell them, but when I walk away, I don’t head straight for the showers. I make a beeline for Piers, Owen, and Bennett. Erin might be clumsy enough to cause that level of injury to herself, but I’ll be damned if these boys put me on the same level as her.
The three of them are walking on their own, hanging back from the group. It makes for an easy target.
“Hey!” I bark as I approach. They look up and pause.
“Yeah?” Piers asks coolly.
“What the fuck is your problem?” I demand, stopping an arm’s length away from them. I fold my arms over my chest self-consciously. I probably look awful with my caked-on dirt and dried blood, especially compared to their bare chests marred by nothing but sweat, which only serves to make them gleam in the noon sun.