Hybrid Academy Box Set

by L. C. Mortimer

  She stood in the center of the auditorium at Hybrid Academy and looked around at the faces staring back at her. The auditorium, in my opinion, looked more like the type of place you might watch a bullfight. I pictured two wizards facing off with their wands and robes, ready for anything that might come their way. That’s the type of place this was. That’s the kind of adventure I was ready for.

  I’d spent the summer working hard to find out where my grandmother was and what had happened to her. I’d worked tirelessly to discover the truth about where she’d gone. I didn’t have all of the answers, but I was back at school now. I was ready to keep working, keep searching, and most of all, keep learning. The magic I could learn at Hybrid Academy would help me find answers.

  I just knew it.

  “Welcome,” Headmistress Gregory said. She smiled at the crowd and there were murmurs of appreciation. “I hope you all had a wonderful time traveling today because we are so happy to see you. We have a wonderful year planned with activities, classes, and of course, learning. This year, our students will focus on perfecting the skills they have already learned. They’ll discover how to strengthen their performances. They’ll learn how to make the most of all of their skills.”

  We were all multi-talented.

  Well, more or less.

  That was the draw of the school. Everyone at Hybrid Academy was, in fact, a hybrid of some sort. Me? I was a wolf-shifting witch. My good friend, Kiera, was a fairy witch. Even Henry was a shifter wizard. Each person we encountered could do two very different and very unique things. It meant that, above all else, life at the Academy was never dull or uninteresting. There were a few students who could do more than just two different things, but those students were a rarity. Most of us were just magical beings of some sort who had witch or wizard skills, and that was more than enough for me. My two talents proved more than difficult enough for me to deal with on my own. I was still learning exactly what it meant to be a shifter witch.

  Having a school full of students who were multi-talented meant everything that happened was for a reason, a purpose. Our training regime was carefully planned by our teachers to result in fantastic performances by each student. Our classes were carefully crafted to ensure that no matter what we were studying, we got the most out of it. Even our cafeteria food, which should have been dull and boring, was designed to keep us healthy, fit, and in top condition for our training.

  No, “boring” wasn’t a word that could ever be used to describe Hybrid Academy.

  After the headmistress introduced herself and welcomed all of the new students to their first year at Hybrid Academy, several teachers stood up and introduced themselves. There were a few faces I recognized, but there were a lot of new ones, as well. Riley Roe was going to teach Writing Magical Spells. Thomas Trayson was going to teach Magical Languages. Casper Elkridge was teaching Potions and Passion, Potions and Poetry, Potions and Shifting, and Potions and Promises.

  I glanced over at Aunt Erin when Casper Elkridge’s classes were announced. Her lips had thinned as her smile tightened. It looked more like a grimace now and I knew exactly why.

  Potions and Shifting?

  That sounded dangerously close to something dark from my own heritage.

  Yeah, I was going to need to get into that class.

  My parents had gone missing because they had been on a quest to find a potion that should make you shift into an animal. Any animal. Now there was a class at Hybrid Academy about just that.

  Coincidence?

  I didn’t believe in such a thing.

  It seemed far too random to be a coincidence.

  “I’ll talk to Alicia,” Aunt Erin whispered. She kept her eyes forward as she spoke, so as to not alert anyone to the fact that we were speaking when we ought to be paying careful attention. “And make sure you’re signed up.”

  “Thank you,” I said. I reached for my aunt’s hand and squeezed it. Registration for classes was generally very inflexible. Students would take the courses the faculty thought most appropriate for their magical abilities. For example, all of the shifters took very similar classes, the fairies took the same types of classes, and the demons were all in the same classes, too. It was so that we could each work on honing our magical abilities. There was some overlap – we were all witches and wizards, after all – but for the most part, the class schedules were entirely rigid.

  But Potions and Shifting wasn’t something I wanted to miss.

  It was something I needed to learn more about.

  Why was that class offered this year at Hybrid?

  Did the teacher know something about the quest my parents had been on when they were killed?

  More importantly, could I learn anything in the class that might help me find the answers I’d been searching for? I wasn’t sure, but I had a good guess that I’d at least learn something.

  The rest of orientation flew by in a haze of details and schedules and school rules, but soon the presentations wrapped up and it was time to head to the dorms.

  All of the students would be moving in today, which meant that the dorms were going to be crazy and wild. They’d be packed full of students moving away from home for the first time and full of bossy mothers trying to get their say. For the most part, I’d be able to avoid any drama because I was a second-year student now, so I knew the ropes.

  Things were going to be a little different for me this year. I already knew my way around the school. I was comfortable with the way things operated. When Erin had dropped me off last year, I’d been scared and nervous. I didn’t have a single friend at the school – aside from my cat – and I’d never been away from home before. Things were rough, to say the least, but I had learned a lot in my time as a magic user.

  This year, I was going to dominate my classes and do an incredible job. I was certain of it. Kiera and Henry would be with me to keep me totally in control and everything was going to be just fine.

  “Ready?” Erin asked, motioning to the doors of the auditorium. “Let’s get you to your room. Then I’ll find Alicia.” My aunt and the headmistress were old friends, apparently. My aunt had been a student at Hybrid Academy long ago and apparently, it had been a pretty positive experience for her.

  “Yeah,” I said, gathering the few belongings I’d carted in with me. Everything else was still waiting in the dorms for me. Boo meowed and I petted him on the head. “It’s okay, Mr. Boo,” I said. “Not too much longer. Then you can run around and stretch your legs.” He looked up at me and meowed again.

  “Maybe he’s hungry,” Erin said. “When did he eat?”

  “This morning,” I rolled my eyes. Shifter or not, Henry was always starving.

  “Let’s go, then,” Erin said. “We’ll get to your room, feed your familiar, and then I’ll get you signed up for the shifting class.”

  “Perfection.”

  I followed her out of the main school building, which was incredibly huge and very overwhelming to look at.

  “Wow,” one student walking by said. She was obviously a first-year. Her mother looked just as overwhelmed as I had last year.

  “Yes, dear,” the mother said. “It’s very big.”

  “I’m definitely going to get lost,” the student said.

  “You won’t get lost.”

  “How can you be so sure?”

  Erin smiled. “Don’t worry. They’ll give you a magical map if you need one that can show you exactly where you are and where each of your classes are.”

  “Really?” The mother looked relieved. “That would be wonderful.”

  “Sure thing. Just ask when you check in at the dorms, okay? They only give them out for the first month of school. After that, the enchantment that makes the map magical wears off.”

  “What do I do after that?” The girl asked.

  “By then, you’ll know your way around without a problem,” I told her with a smile. “Don’t worry. You’ve got this.”

  We moved together in a seat of students
and parents who were heading to the dormitories. Aunt Erin seemed completely unbothered by the crowd. Perhaps she was used to the way magical students tended to move together like flocks of birds. I still had a hard time with it, though.

  “I wonder if I’ll like my roomie,” one student whispered to her parent.

  “I’m sure it’ll be fine,” the witchy-mom said.

  Erin looked at me.

  “And you?”

  “I’m not nervous,” I said.

  I wasn’t sure who my roommate was going to be. Last year, I’d started classes late, so I’d been stuck in a single room. I hadn’t minded it at all. It was nice having privacy and the freedom to work on my own magic at my own pace. I wasn’t any good at magic last year, to be fair, so it was nice to have some space where I could practice my spells and learn what it took to improve. I didn’t have to worry about anyone watching me or judging me or teasing me for sucking at magic.

  It wasn’t my fault that I was bad at magic. My parents had warded me as a kid, which had blocked my magical abilities for ten years. I think they thought they had been protecting me. By the time the wards wore off, I discovered that I actually needed to use magic in order to survive and in order to find my grandmother, who had been stolen away. Learning to use magic as a young adult hadn’t been very easy.

  In fact, it had been terrible, but that was last year.

  This year was going to be different.

  This year, my roommate would be around to help me practice and get better.

  Either that, or we were going to hate each other, and the year was going to suck.

  It could go either way.

  Part of me hoped, secretly, that my roommate would be Kiera. We’d gotten along so well last year and in fact, we’d visited each other a few times over the summer. It had been good to see her. She’d been there when I shifted for the first time. In fact, I’d shifted trying to save her, so I was glad that we’d gotten the chance to see each other. I credited her, however indirectly, with being the reason that I’d finally learned how to shift.

  If she hadn’t given me the motivation, the courage, or the strength, I didn’t know how long it would have been before I learned to shift.

  My aunt and I headed inside the dorm. We stepped out of the way of traffic to avoid being trampled by eager new students, but then took a moment to look at the lobby.

  “They painted,” she murmured, pointing out the new designs and colors in the female dormitory.

  “So, they did. It looks nice.”

  “Much prettier than when I was a student,” a mom walking by agrees.

  “I know,” Aunt Erin says. “When I was here, it was all greys and browns.”

  “I’m glad they changed it up,” a fairy says. She looks over and smiles. Everything about her just shimmers. It’s easy to see that she’s a fae. “Last year, it was kind of boring. This year, the colors make me feel hopeful. It’s going to be a good year.”

  I hoped that the fairy girl was right.

  I could use a good year this year.

  Hoisting my cat up in my arms, I moved through the crowd with Boo and Aunt Erin. There was a huge pile of luggage by a desk in the center of the lobby. When we’d dropped my things off earlier, I hadn’t noticed quite so many bags. We managed to find mine and carried them to a demon witch who was sitting with a huge purple book.

  “Name?” She asked when she saw me.

  “Maxine Hawk,” I told her. The woman eyed me up and down. Then she ran a finger down the list in front of her.

  “Ah,” she said, tapping my name after a second. “Fifth floor. Room 508S.”

  “Thanks,” I said. I knew now that the “S” in my room number indicated what kind of magical being I was. Last year, Kiera had been in 510F. The “F” stood for fairy. Did this automatically mean that my roommate was a shifter? Maybe that could be fun, especially if she was something different than me. Erin cast a spell on my luggage, so it followed us as we moved and neither one of us had to carry it up the five flights of stairs.

  We headed through the lounge to the staircase and then climbed up to my floor. I was on the top floor this year. My room was at the end of a long hallway that was wide and colorful. The walls were lined with lovely pictures of other students who had lived in the dorms at one time or another.

  My aunt looked at the numbers painted beside each door and pointed when she saw mine up ahead. At first, I couldn’t even see the doorway because there were so many people mulling about. It was crowded, for sure, and I wondered how many students were first-years. Surely it must be a lot. I didn’t remember there being quite as many students last year.

  “Excuse me,” I said.

  “Excuse me,” my aunt echoed.

  Finally, everyone moved just a smidge and we were able to squeeze carefully through. Henry, in Boo form, meowed loudly.

  “It’s okay, kitty,” my aunt patted him on the head. “Soon you’ll be able to get down and run around. And eat,” she added with a chuckle.

  Boo meowed loudly, whining.

  We managed to make it into my room. I didn’t even have to unlock it because the door was open. Apparently, my roommate was already inside.

  “Hello?” I called out as I walked in.

  “Pretty,” my aunt murmured.

  One side of the room was decorated completely in flowers. There was a pink bedspread with pink pillows and pink stuffed animals. There was a pink trunk at the foot of the bed that was overflowing with pink clothes and pink socks and pink hats.

  “Somebody likes pink,” I muttered. The room was empty. I tried not to feel annoyed that the door had been left unlocked. I suppose it didn’t really matter. Besides, I could talk with my roommate later. I’d let her know that security was important to me. I’d tell her that I wanted my familiar, Boo, to be safe. I’d leave him in the room when I went to classes. Sometimes he’d come with me, but I didn’t like the idea of someone sneaking in and harassing my cat.

  Yeah, Boo was secretly a shifter, but nobody else needed to know that.

  “Well, let’s get your side set up,” Aunt Erin said. “Maybe she’ll be back before we’re done and I’ll get to meet the mysterious roommate, too.”

  “Sure,” I shrugged. My side of the room was very drab, but my purple bedspread, courtesy of Aunt Erin, coupled with a baby blanket from my mother, quickly dressed it up. I added my own pillowcase to the bed. I hadn’t brought a trunk with tons and tons of supplies, but I did have a suitcase with my robes and clothing in it. I’d also brought my backpack, which contained notes and information we’d researched that summer. A few other small bags were all I really needed. Anything else I could purchase later or, if I was in an absolute bind, I could ask Erin to help me.

  For safety, Aunt Erin wanted to keep my grandmother’s magic book with her. We could shrink it, thanks to a spell my grandmother had concocted, and lock it inside a tiny magical chest, but I didn’t want to push my luck. Last year at school, I’d almost lost the book. I wasn’t about to let that happen this year. Mémère had entrusted the book to me, more or less, and I didn’t want to chance someone swiping it when I wasn’t looking.

  Besides, Aunt Erin was trustworthy. Last year, I’d been afraid that she was going to betray me. I kind of thought she had it in for me, to be honest. She’d been weird and quirky, but then again, so had I.

  “You know, a few pictures might make the room sparkle a little,” Aunt Erin smiled. She pulled out her wand, checked to see that no one was looking, and waved it at my walls. Instantly, a few pictures of wolves walking around in the moonlight appeared on the wall.

  “Damn,” I said.

  “Don’t swear.”

  “I’m 20, Aunt Erin. I can swear if I want to.”

  A sigh.

  “Sorry,” I mumbled. “Thanks for the pictures.”

  “They’re pretty,” Erin said. She wasn’t supposed to use magic in the dorm rooms. None of us were, really, unless we were practicing for classes, but no one had seen,
and there had been no harm done. The rule about not using magic didn’t really apply to things like hauling luggage since no one, not even the teachers, wanted to do that, but in general, we were supposed to keep our magical abilities under wraps unless we were working on something for school.

  Last year, one of the students had figured out a spell for transforming other students into little rodents: namely hamsters. This year, the administration was cracking down on the use of magic for things that didn’t help us learn. Alicia Gregory had given an entire presentation about it during orientation, so the new rules for the year were definitely understood by each and every student.

  “I agree. The pictures really are lovely.” In one of the pictures, a wolf was walking beneath a full moon. In another, the wolf was running in the moonlight. There were a few other designs. Each one had a variation on the theme, and for a few moments, I couldn’t look away at all.

  Part of me still wasn’t quite sure that I was comfortable in my wolf form. When I’d first learned to shift, I’d gotten stuck as a wolf and it had scared me. Even though I’d been shifting regularly for months now, part of me still worried that one day, I’d get stuck in my animal form and not be able to find my way back home.

  “Well,” Aunt Erin said once we’d finished unpacking. “It looks like Roomie isn’t coming back for awhile.”

  “She might have gone to eat,” I said. “It’s almost dinnertime.”

  “You’re probably right. Why don’t we go find Kiera?” Aunt Erin said. “I’d like to say hello before I go talk with Alicia. Then I’ll need to get going.”

  It sounded like a good idea. We headed out into the hallway and looked around until we saw Kiera’s bright wings fluttering. She was a fairy witch, but when Kiera got overly excited, she had a hard time keeping her wings quiet. They’d pop out and just sparkle beautifully.