Through the Storms
Skye MacKinnon
Laura Greenwood
Contents
Laura Greenwood & Skye MacKinnon
Through the Storms
A Note on Language
Blurb
The Original Myth
Glossary
Illustration: Beithir
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Authors’ Note
Also By Laura Greenwood
About Laura Greenwood
Also By Skye MacKinnon
About Skye MacKinnon
Through the Storms
Laura Greenwood & Skye MacKinnon
Paranormal. A Seven Wardens Story
© 2017 Skye MacKinnon and Laura Greenwood
All rights reserved. This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise – without prior written permission of the published, except as provided by United States of America copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher at “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the email address; [email protected].
Cover Design by Arizona Tape
From the Deeps is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
A Note on Language
Please note that the authors of this book are from the UK, and as such, spellings and some turns of phrase will appear in British English.
Blurb
Bullied and lonely, young beithir Amber is not having the best of times at Ben Vair, a college for supernatural teenagers. Until Izban arrives, a mage who is much more than he seems... and his blue hair is rather sexy, too. But when she agrees to help him on his quest, she gets more than she bargained for. Which may not be such a bad thing.
The Original Myth
Described as the largest and most deadly kind of serpent, beithirs live in mountain caves and valleys. When stung by a beithir, the victim must reach the nearest body of water to be cured, before the beithir gets there itself (in which case they would die). Beithir is Scottish Gaelic for a variety of words, including "serpent", "lightning" and "thunderbolt".
To anyone who was bullied at school. And to the dangerous beasts they've probably become.
Beithir
1
They'd stolen her tail! Again. It should have been getting old, but Amber was just as angry as she had been the first time. Stealing a beithir's tail should be a crime. Well, it probably was, but nobody cared to punish those girls. They did whatever they wanted, and if that included bullying one of their fellow students, so be it.
At this school, the teachers swore by the motto to let the pupils fight it out amongst themselves. It was supposed to make them stronger. Well, without her tail, Amber was nothing. She was going to have to grow a new one.
She sighed. Would this drama never end? Yes, it would. Only eight months to go until she'd graduate from Ben Vair College. It couldn't come soon enough.
If only Mrs Battleboard hadn't told the class that story about beithirs. Before, everyone assumed she was a snake shifter, a harmless one at that. They may have seen she had a tail even in her human form, but she usually kept it well hidden under baggy shirts. Luckily, they didn’t have P.E. lessons at college; she would have dreaded changing in front of the other girls. It was normal for her to see her tail sitting just above her bum, but not for the others.
So she’d ignored them, they'd ignored her and she'd been fine with that. Now, they knew differently. They knew she was a relic who could regrow her own tail, just like lizards. And they saw it as a challenge to find out how often she could do it.
She'd grown to hate their transformation classes every Thursday. She'd never seen the point in them either. She'd been born being able to shift, not like some of the others who'd had to learn it. It was second nature to her, no, it was her nature. Nowadays, she spent the entire lesson trying to hide from Tamsin and her friends. They were a wolf pack who had become excellent snake hunters. She'd lost count of how often they'd cornered her and ripped off her tail. If she got it back within a few minutes, she could reattach it, but of course they never let her do that.
If only she had her beithir powers already, but they usually manifested in la beithir’s early twenties, and she'd only just turned eighteen. If she had them... they'd never hurt her again. But for now, she could just as well be a snake shifter - without a tail.
She bumped into something hard and was ripped from her self-pitying thoughts. Something... no, someone blue was looking down at her, obviously displeased she'd not looked where she was going.
It was a man, his hair blue like cornflowers, his ears pierced with dozens of silver rings. He looked so out of place here that she had a hard time not to stare. Ben Vair was a boring, down-to-earth place, if you ignored the fact that all of the students had some kind of supernatural power. There were no punks here. And yet...
"Do I have something on my face?" he asked in annoyance, rubbing his chest where she'd rammed against him.
"No, sorry," she mumbled and turned to leave, hoping he'd forget her. She was in enough trouble already, and not having her tail was making her even less self-confident around others. It also disturbed her sense of balance. It would take at least two days for it to grow back, and even longer to be back to its old length. And for that, she'd need to go down to the secret lab beneath the school to recharge. At least no one else knew about it, and she'd have some peace for a change.
"Bugger off," the man growled and she fled, ignoring the giggles of the other students as she ran through the corridors to her dorm. It was the only good thing about staying at Ben Vair: having a room of her own. Originally, the dorm was meant for six girls, but there weren't enough sixth form students in her year to fill it. The others preferred to squeeze into one room rather than share with her. Amber didn't have a problem with that. She liked her solitude. It gave her space to think.
Right now, she was thinking about the strange blue-haired man she'd bumped into. He looked too old to be a student. But Ben Vair would never employ someone like him as a teacher. The professors here were old and traditional. Even the younger ones behaved as if they were ancient. It seemed to be in the job description that to work here, they needed to be boring. She had no idea where all the good teachers went after their training. There weren't that many supernatural schools out there. She knew of one other in Scotland, and a few more down in England and Wales.
She sat down on her bed, wincing at the reminder that her tail wasn't where it was supposed to be. Such a strange feeling. Did the others ever feel the absence of their tails? Or were they used to it, having been born without one?
For a beithir, a tail was a sign of pride. Amber's mother had hers adorned with rings and colourful tattoos. She herself had had two little rings on hers... before the whole drama started. Now she didn't bother with it. Maybe once she'd left school she could go back to making herself look pretty. Until then, she was going to have to keep her head down and pretend to be invisible.
Which involved not bumping into strangers.
She groaned. She'd made a fool of herself. Again. If she hadn't been one of the college's best students, she'd probably have been expelled a long time ago. Chaos and misfortune followed her, no matter what she did. Maybe it was her beithir heritage. Maybe some of the legends describing her
kind as the bringers of doom were true. But her family had made sure to disprove that rumour. Her parents were respected, much-loved pillars of their community, and with Amber's older sister working in the local nursing home, they were all assets rather than a nuisance to their surroundings. But not her.
She lay down and stared at the bare ceiling. When she first moved into the dorm, she'd drawn little stars on it with a white pen. They were almost invisible unless you knew what you were looking for. It was one of her many secrets.
She walked into class with her head down, hoping no one would notice she’d arrived. It was a stupid thing to try, really. There were only ten others in the class, one person entering the room was going to be noticed.
“I see you’ve finally joined us,” an unfamiliar voice said. Amber looked up, surprised to find the blue haired man she’d run into the other day sat at the teacher’s desk.
“Sorry, sir,” she muttered, making her way towards her desk. He’d better get used to her being a few minutes late every lesson. It was her way of at least trying to avoid Tamsin.
She sat down, pulling out her notepad and pens. Now that she was here, she’d be the best student blue-hair had ever had. Not that he looked old enough to have had many. He couldn’t be much older than her. Twenty-four maybe?
“Where’s Professor Shales?” Becky asked. A good question from one of Tamsin’s lackeys there. She guessed miracles did happen on occasion.
“She’s sick,” blue-hair answered. Amber raised her eyebrows, but didn’t say anything. It seemed unlikely that the bear shifter was ill. They were notoriously sturdy creatures.
The class tittered. Apparently, she wasn’t the only one to make that observation. It made sense others would. For all their faults, only the smartest stayed on to study at Ben Vair.
“Alright, calm down,” blue-hair commanded. Hmm. His demeanour had changed completely. Whereas before he’d seemed laid back but unapproachable, now he was actually commanding the attention of the room. It was a little disconcerting, but that pretty much summed up school in general.
“I’m not sure exactly where you’re up to, but I’ve been led to understand you’re about to start studying storm magic. I want you to get into pairs and try the exercise on page three hundred and ninety-four of your textbooks.”
The sound of eleven people opening their books all at once filled the room.
“But, sir?” Tamsin asked, only raising her hand after starting to speak. “We can’t do that exercise in the classroom.” As per usual, Amber noticed Tamsin had only glanced at her book once, and certainly not for long enough to read the large letters saying: to be done outside.
Blue-hair scowled at her. Amber wasn’t sure why he hadn’t told them his name yet. Most of the teachers seemed to enjoy the power trip it brought.
“If you’d read the instructions properly, Miss Garou, you’d know we need to go outside for this particular exercise.”
Amber hated to admit it, but she liked the way he spoke, or maybe she just liked the way he was putting Tamsin in her place.
“But-”
“Get yourself into pairs, and follow me outside.” Blue-hair busied himself with his things, and Amber watched as her classmates paired up. It was the same five pairs as always, then her. Why hadn’t the school offered a place to a twelfth student? Almost all their practical lessons involved splitting into pairs. Which meant Amber was on her own at least twice a day.
The class trailed after blue-hair, all chuntering about going outside in the rain. All except Amber. Even if she had someone to chunter to, she wouldn’t. She loved the rain. It was where she felt strongest. It wouldn’t regrow her tail though. More's the pity.
Her classmates squared off against one another and began to try and cast a storm. She hung back. Not only was she partnerless, but without her beithir powers, there was no chance she’d be able to summon any kind of storm. Therefore, it seemed better to hang back and disappear into the background.
“Miss Beithir, you should be practicing.” Blue-hair appeared next to her, a stern look on his face.
“I don’t have a partner,” she mumbled. There was something about him that had her on the back foot, and she didn’t like it at all.
Blue-hair sighed. “Right, yes an unlucky class of eleven.”
“I’d hardly call the others unlucky,” she responded.
“But you would yourself? I think you may be letting what you are define you too much, Miss Beithir.”
“Bit hard not to,” she muttered. Especially when her very name was a reminder. “I prefer to be called Amber.” She lifted her chin defiantly.
“You can work with me then, Amber.” His lips quirked into a smile.
“Thanks.” She tried to be sincere, she really did. But she’d much rather just slip by unnoticed.
He rolled up his sleeves, revealing colourful tattoos stretching all the way across his skin. Or all the way that Amber could see. Thoughts of how far they went passed through Amber’s mind, but she quickly dismissed them. These weren’t the kind of thoughts she should be having about a teacher, even a substitute one.
“Do I get to know my partner’s name?” she asked, surprising herself. She wasn’t normally so confident, especially around people she hadn’t met before. Or teachers. She especially didn’t trust teachers.
“Izban - err - Mr Smith.” He coughed as he corrected himself.
Amber frowned. Why would a teacher accidentally introduce himself as the wrong name? Obviously she was right about him being new to the job, otherwise he’d never have made such an obvious slip up.
“Well, Izban - err - Mr Smith, I hope you’re ready to watch the most pathetic storm conjuring ever.”
He ignored her attempt at making fun of his name. "Let's start with looking at the instructions together," he said. "Where's your book?"
Amber was kicking herself inside. So much for going under the radar. "I left it inside."
A frown was appearing on his forehead so she quickly added, "I don't need it. I've got a photographic memory."
"Oh yes, I've heard that about beithirs." He was suddenly looking very curious. "Do all of your kind have that?"
She shrugged. "As far as I know. It's not something special for us. I didn't know not everybody could recall things like I do until I came to Ben Vair." Now that she'd lived among both humans and supernaturals for a while, she was convinced that the conception of snakes being intelligent was based on beithirs.
"Fascinating," he murmured, looking at her as if she was a specimen waiting to be studied. She wasn't sure if she liked being looked at like that. "Let's begin - without your book."
He smiled at her, making him seem like a very different person. But as soon as he stepped away to give her space for the conjuring, he turned into the stern teacher again. Curious.
She looked around. The five pairs were in various stages of success and failure. With a satisfying smirk, she noticed that Tamsin was having trouble controlling the tiny bolts of lightning flashing above her head. Her dark hair was beginning to stand up, destroying her carefully pruned hairdo. Meghan, one of the nicer girls in her class, was swaying her hands above her head, seemingly in total sync with the storm clouds she had conjured. Now if only Amber could do the same...
She sighed and began with the first step in the instructions. Visualise a storm. She huffed. Now that could be anything. A little rainstorm? A summer thunderstorm? A hurricane?
"What's wrong?" her teacher asked and she sighed again. Could this lesson please be over?
"What kind of storm are we supposed to conjure?" she asked and watched in surprise as his eyes lit up.
"Excellent question. Strange that nobody else has asked that. They've all jumped straight into the exercise." He seemed genuinely puzzled by that. What a weird man. "Let's start with something small. A cloud and some lightning, perhaps?"
Amber nodded even though she knew she wouldn't achieve either. She didn't have much magic, and the powers she had were not re
lated to storm conjuring. Not at all. But at this school, everybody needed to go to all the lessons, no matter how irrelevant. Others got additional tutoring in the afternoons, depending on their abilities and species, but so far, nobody had bothered to give her those extra lessons. She was quite glad about that. She excelled in theoretical subjects, partly thanks to her memory, but the practical studies... yuck. They usually ended in her being tailless.
Oh well, she wasn't going to achieve anything by standing here, lost in self-pity. She squared her shoulders and pictured a cloud. Grey, dark, foreboding. About half as tall as she was and just as wide. She added some shading and swirls for good measure. It was just like painting a picture. Except that she was great at art, but not so good with magic. When she had a perfect cloud, she breathed it out of her mind, just like it said in her textbook. She wasn't sure how that was even supposed to work. But that's what it said, 'Breathe out the magic.' Had the people writing it been on some kind of psychedelic drug? She wouldn't be surprised.
She opened her eyes to look at her work. Nothing. Not even a tiny speck of a cloud. Deflated, she sighed. She'd known it from the beginning. She was useless at this. Why did the teachers keep forcing her to try? There was no point.
She was never going to be a mage. Not like him. She could smell it. Opening her mouth ever so slightly, she tasted the air around her. Yup, definitely mage. She may not have a forked tongue in her human form, but she still had the senses of a snake.
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