I clutched the tokens in my hands. “Eloquent as always.” I turned my back on him, something I wouldn’t have done even a week ago and headed out to where the others waited. I tucked the tokens into my pockets, all except one. I held it up. “House of Shade!”
They grinned along with me and I let them think I was happy, excited, and not a little bit freaked out.
A host of buses were lined up at five intervals, ready to take us to the academy. Each of the houses had a retinue, and most had two flag bearers holding up a banner. They were decked out in colors and designs matching the house they represented. The House of Wonder was a trio of triangles, the lines interlocked, made out of silver and gold of course.
House of Night’s banner was a deep blue, a pair of back to back ravens holding a bone between them.
The House of Claw was a giant multi-branched tree and each branch was covered with animals in a forest scene, from wolves to squirrels to the alicorns, and even… “Pete, there’s a honey badger on that banner!”
He grinned and high fived me. “Hot damn, cats on fire, there is!”
The House of Unmentionables had a simple sign, the unfinished figure eight, the ends of it curling in on itself. Two gargoyles waited at the front of that bus.
And then there was the House of Shade. Black on black, the banner seemed to be one color, but within it was the Web of Wyrd, just like the patch on the Sandman’s jacket. The more you looked at the banner, the more things you saw in the darkness. Figures. Weapons. A man on his knees. I gasped and started shaking. It was Jared in the banner. I was sure of it.
We started forward and then suddenly we were walking apart from one another. I wanted to tell them to stop, that we couldn’t separate. But that wasn’t how this worked.
Wally waved at me, but she was sad. Pete wasn’t much better. Orin stared straight ahead, and Gregory kept shooting glances my way.
Ethan didn’t look at any of us. Of course not, he was done with us now that we’d finished the trials.
That hurt more than I’d thought it would.
I stopped walking and spoke without looking at them. “We’re still a crew. No matter how far we go.”
I felt more than saw each of them straighten.
“Damn right,” Pete said. “To the end.”
“Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. Again,” Ethan said, and I laughed.
“Yeah, let’s not do that again.”
We all stepped out at the same time to our individual houses.
At the banner of the House of Shade, I waited. There was a good cluster around us, and damned if everyone wasn’t shooting me fervent glances. No one spoke, though. I noticed some of the girls from the Shade challenge, those who’d baited the group of dumb boys to follow them. I nodded at one of them. She nodded back, an eyebrow arched.
“I will be your chaperone to get you to your new home, the campus of the House of Shade.” Rory’s voice cut through all the other noise as he stepped out of the passenger side of the nearest bus. “If you have any questions, I will be the one to answer them.”
My mouth got ahead of my filter. “How do you punish someone when they’ve wronged you in the House of Shade?”
Rory didn’t miss a beat. “You challenge them to a sparring match.”
I nodded. “I challenge you to a sparring match, Rory. You need an ass kicking.”
The other kids pulled away from me. But I wasn’t afraid, not of Rory.
He grinned at me, and a piece of the hurt I’d been carrying slid away from my heart. History was a strange thing. It made you forgive when you otherwise might not.
I sure hoped it would help him forgive the ass whooping I would be giving him.
I sure hoped I could fit into this new world. Maybe I would find out what it meant to be a Chameleon.
I crossed my arms. “And you need to tell me how you survived zombies.”
“Only if you win.” His grin widened, and I found myself grinning back.
He stepped back from the bus and waved a hand toward the many behind it.
“Welcome to the House of Shade.”
Let the games begin.
The End.
* * *
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Shannon Mayer is a lot of things, and most of these are true. She’s an author, mom, rider of horses, farm girl, heathen, softie, badass, Canadian. Juxtaposition incarnate.
She is the USA Today Bestselling author of the The Rylee Adamson Novels, The Elemental Series, The Nevermore Trilogy, A Celtic Legacy series, and the Venom Trilogy. Please visit her website for more information on her novels.
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K.F. Breene is a Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Washington Post, and Amazon Charts Bestselling author of paranormal romance, urban fantasy and fantasy novels. With over two million books sold, when she isn’t penning stories about magic and what goes bump in the night, she’s sipping wine and planning shenanigans. She lives in Northern California with her husband, two children and out of work treadmill.
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Shadowspell Academy: The Culling Trials, Book 3 Page 17