by Lucy Auburn
Get what you can while the getting is good.
“Phoenix are special, even among the paranormal world of shifters, mages, and more. We have a wing form—you’ll learn all about that in your phoenix fire class. And we have special powers, like the ability to regenerate, heal others, and use our fire to defend ourselves from harm. But our real power, the one that made legends of us for a long time, is the ability to turn things into gold.”
That gets my attention. “The Midas touch?”
She nods. “That’s part of where the legend comes from. Many of our modern scholars believe that Midas was a super powerful Gold Phoenix. Normally the touch is dormant—while it used to be strong, across the centuries it’s grown weak. Most modern phoenix can’t turn much more than a single eyelash into gold.”
There goes the hope that, if I am one of these crazy bird things she’s talking about, I could just stick my finger on a bunch of stuff and sell it for enough money to buy Sara’s house. “So why mention the power if no one can do it?”
“Because our hearts can.” She sobers now, leaning forward across her desk like she wants to make sure I really pay attention to the next part. And I do; my coffee mug is empty, and I figure if I humor her for a while she’ll be nice enough to get me a refill. “You see, Dani, when a phoenix dies, our heart becomes super concentrated with many of our powers. The ability that lives in a phoenix’s stilled heart the strongest is the power to turn things into gold. Certain paranormals can steal this power by taking the heart, as well as other phoenix powers. When a contingent of German and Dutch Grims discovered this in the 18th century, they made it their mission to hunt down all phoenix that they could, to tear the heart from our chest and use its golden touch for as long as possible.”
A chill runs through me, and it’s not because I’ve just downed enough caffeine to raise a pig from the dead. Last night I sensed that Creeper guy wanted to shoot me and tear the heart from my chest. I thought I was crazy, and when I started to hallucinate the demons, I felt like maybe the crazy was confirmed.
But I didn’t tell anyone about it. There’s no way the headmaster could know. Which means this is something she’s saying independently—and maybe my sense was right.
If nothing else, it means that guy thought he could do something with my heart, which sounds like madness.
Disturbed, I set my mug down on the desk, and the headmaster continues, her voice somber now. “Hunted across Europe and even Asia and North Africa, phoenix fled to the one place we thought we would be safe: North America. Some joined in with Native nations, like the Cherokee and Mohawk, who accepted phoenix for what we are. Others settled land for the king, or became fur trappers and pilgrims, hiding out from society and pretending to be human. For a while there was peace; over a thousand phoenix thrived in what soon became the United States, and knew what it was like not to be hunted.
“Until one day, the Grims came to the New World too. And with them they brought a new ability, one they passed down to their children, honed to precision: the ability to find a phoenix’s trail and follow it to wherever they were. They hunted and killed hundreds of phoenix, close to a thousand, and anytime a new one was born they would be the first to arrive, ready to take their heart from their chest. Soon the Grims had so much wealth, so much power, that they were unstoppable.”
“You keep saying that word.” My mouth feels dry at the thought of someone killing me for my heart, and I have to resist the urge to put my palm over my chest protectively. “What exactly is a Grim?”
“A hunter.” Her mouth turns down unpleasantly. “Grims are dark paranormals, capable of controlling demons and harnessing their power. They can see the paranormal, sense their abilities, and have superior strength, speed, and vision. But don’t worry, Dani.” Leaning forward, she looks softly into my eyes, as if to comfort me. “We have classes here at the academy that teach students how to hide their powers from a Grim’s eyes and cover their trail so they can’t be found. That’s why the academy was formed: to protect phoenix.”
Sitting back, I let her words swirl in my mind. “So... this place. How many students are there?”
“Four hundred and twenty-two total. We have sixty young phoenix here right now training, sixty-one if you join.” She beams at me. “It’s more student than we’ve had since my great great grandmother’s day, when she founded the academy. She was a Red Phoenix, you see, powerful beyond measure, and she knew that if she brought phoenix and shifters together she could protect the next generation—and more to come.
“I know you had a rough life, Dani. But that all changes now.” Standing, the headmaster grabs my mug and puts it under the fancy coffee machine to fill it a second time. “You’re a phoenix. That means you get this second life, and others, to live to your fullest. You don’t have to be an orphan anymore. You don’t have to start fires to get our attention—though you can, in your phoenix fire class, where our rooms are warded to prevent arson accidents.”
My head comes up. I don’t remember telling Petra or any of the others about the bathtub incident. “How did you know about that?”
“I looked into you this morning, on my train ride back here.” Setting the mug in front of me, she gives me a sympathetic smile. “It can’t have been easy, living the way you did. I’m sure it’s affected you, made you feel as if the world is quicksand underneath your feet, constantly shifting. But you don’t have to feel that way anymore. Here at Phoenix Academy, you’ll have solid ground beneath your feet, a routine, a reliable place to rest your head, and more than anything a future to look forward to. All our graduates make their way into the world and find lucrative positions that take advantage of their unique abilities. I’m sure that if you just spend some time here, give this place a chance, you’ll see the world in a whole new way.”
I feel a rising bitterness in my throat. She doesn’t know me, doesn’t know a single thing about me, but she certainly thinks she does. “My records are supposed to be sealed. I didn’t even go to juvie for setting that fire.”
The headmaster has the gall to look completely unashamed. “I have my ways. As I said, our graduates find themselves in high places. And I consider it my duty to know the past of all my students—especially the phoenix. I couldn’t possibly greet you properly without knowing a thing about you, and you’re the first prospective student we’ve had in a long time who hasn’t come from a family of legacies.”
Before I can answer, can find a way to tell her thanks but no thanks and also, shove it, lady, there’s a knock at the door. She calls out, “Come in,” and I cover my bitter anger with a too-hot sip of the coffee.
Damn but it’s good. Eyeing the machine, I try to figure out if I could abscond with it, maybe stash it on the roof of my second favorite fancy apartment building, hook it up to an extension cord and wake up to this stuff every morning.
It’s not like they wouldn’t replace it the instant it was gone. Clearly this fancy place has money somehow. Maybe they keep one of those gold-changing phoenix things locked up in the basement or something.
I’m so wrapped up in eyeing the coffee machine that it takes me a moment to concentrate on who just walked through the door. It’s Liam, and he’s holding a pink reusable bag with a giant happy face on it, filled with things.
A very familiar reusable bag. “Is that... my stuff?”
“Yeah.” He hands it over to me, and I take it, dumbfounded. “I got up real early to get it for you, so you’re welcome.”
I stare at the things, stunned. Liam, meanwhile, is trying—but failing—to cover an obvious yawn.
“How’d you find my stuff?” He blinks at me, looking confused. “I didn’t—I don’t tell anyone about my hiding places.”
“We could only find just the one bag.” Glancing at the headmaster, he tells her, “We tried to find more, ‘cause it seemed like this wasn’t much stuff for her to have, but this was all her trail led to.”
“I kept this hidden,” I mutter, mostly to myself it seem
s. Then I glare up at Liam. “Where else did you go? What else did you find?”
He holds his hands up, face defensive. “Nowhere! Your phoenix trail led to that one building’s laundry room, and that’s it. That’s all!”
“You took my stuff!”
“It’s my fault,” the headmaster says in a soothing voice, and I glare at her now too. “I should’ve mentioned that I put one of our shifters on your phoenix trail to retrieve your things. Anything you leave out there in the world can be tracked by a Grim—best not to make it easier for them.”
She sounds reasonable enough, but my hackles go up anyway. “I could’ve gone back for it myself.”
Liam butts in to defend himself. “It wouldn’t have been safe for you to go back there. Even though we got rid of that one Grim, there are plenty more out there who he could’ve told about you. The headmaster just wanted to make sure you weren’t in any danger—and isn’t it nice to have your things?”
It would be, if I had any emotional attachment to them. Stuff is just stuff to me; you put it in a black garbage bag when the social worker comes to take you to a new home because the people at your current one don’t want you anymore. Nothing in here really matters, except that it at least isn’t a wool blend school uniform with an emblazoned logo of a flaming bird sewn onto the left breast.
Also, I do have some makeup in here. Not that I think I’ll have a reason to get dressed up again anytime soon.
Begrudgingly, I tell Liam, “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” He stands up a little straighter, looking way too puffed up for a guy who found a bag in a storage room and nothing else. “If you need anything else, let me know.”
The headmaster tells him, “Thank you, Liam.”
Sensing he’s being dismissed, he backs out of the room and closes the door softly behind him. For a guy who supposedly has a lion living just beneath his skin, Liam is surprisingly gentle.
Which makes him not at all my type.
“So, Dani, do you have any other questions?”
The first one that comes to mind is where’s the exit, and how soon can I go, but I tamp down on it. This place is safe, at least, and maybe if I stick around for a while I can swipe enough things to sell for cash and buy Sara’s house.
I don’t tell her that I’m absolutely, one hundred percent certain I’m not this “phoenix” thing she keeps talking about. Wings, healing, regeneration, turning stuff into gold, it all sounds unfamiliar. About the only thing I can appreciate is the bit about fire, but I’ve only ever done that with matches.
No one needs to know that, though. They’ll figure out soon enough that I’m not what they’re looking for, and kick me out, just like every other place I’ve ever lived. That’s why I’ve got my ten thousand dollars; it’s why I’ll figure out a way to nab that fancy coffee maker and sell it for some serious money.
The only question I really have is this: when will you get rid of me, just like all the others?
Instead of asking it I plaster on a fake smile and chirp, “I think you told me more than enough! It’s all a lot to take in.” Just in time, my stomach grumbles. “Is there any place I can go to get breakfast?”
“First floor, double doors down the hallway to the right. I can take you there—”
“No need.” I practically jump out of my chair and back towards the door. “I can find my way. If I get lost, I’ll just uh, shout Liam’s name or whatever.”
“Well, if you need anything, just—”
“Let you know. Got it.”
I know this song and dance. I’ve played the brand new kid game before. So I slip out the door and, as I head down the stairs and follow her directions, I let my eyes rest on every single decoration, rug, book, painting, and small piece of furniture that I pass.
They all get rid of you, in the end.
The only thing you can do is get what you can while the getting is good, before the new kid shine wears off and they see you for the disappointment you really are.
Chapter 8
I’m almost to the dining hall when I feel it. A strange, sudden presence in the air behind me.
At first, I’m pretty sure it’s Liam again, showing up with more of my stuff despite the fact that I most definitely didn’t give him the impression that I want to be stalked. I already dropped the bag of crap he dragged here in my new room on the way down—at least I’ll have something to carry the coffee maker in, if I figure out how to steal it.
But when I whirl around to snap at him, there’s nothing there. It was all my imagination. Or maybe after last night, I’m just paranoid.
I could barely sleep, even in that big, soft bed they gave me. I kept walking into the bathroom, looking for one of those demon guys again, worried somehow they’d followed me. Even though it was clear they were hallucinations, I just couldn’t escape the paranoia.
When I finally did drift off, it was by reminding myself that I was surrounded by giant walls, behind a gate with a keypad and a retina scanner. I don’t even know where we are, not really; there’s no way those murderous bastards followed me.
A creak gets my attention. Whirling to the left, I spot a door that’s somehow opened that was closed before. It’s not the dining room, but there’s a shiny gold picture frame hung on the wall I can see, and the street rat thief in me can’t resist a little snooping around.
Checking to make sure I’m still alone—most of the other kids who live in this monstrosity of Gothic architecture have gone to class already—I slip through the door and close it carefully behind me, then glance around the room I’m in.
And stifle a scream. “No.” Shaking my head, I reach out to grab the knob of the door and get the fuck out—but it’s stuck, somehow locking me in here. “This can’t be happening. I can’t be seeing you.”
“Seeing us?” Poisoner snorts, looking perturbed. “You’re summoning us.”
All four of them are here, arranged around the room in various places: Choker near the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, Swordwielder leaning up against a desk, Poisoner hovering near me to scowl intently, and Bomber by one of those giant fancy globe things made out of gold, his fingers passing through it as he tries to make it spin.
They’ve trapped me in a rich person’s study somehow.
“How did you follow me here?” I demand. “This place is supposed to be safe! That’s the only reason why I stayed.”
“Followed you?” Swordwielder pushes up off the desk and stalks towards me, green eyes intense. I flatten against the door, fingers scrabbling uselessly at the knob. “We didn’t follow you anywhere. We’ve been trying to get the fuck away from you since we realized that you somehow summoned us and anchored us to you. But you just. Won’t. Let. Go.”
“I let go!” I babble at him, voice rising in fear, even though he still looks mostly translucent and hasn’t gotten his sword out again. “Begone, or—whatever. I don’t want you here.”
Bomber chimes in, “Clearly your subconscious thinks differently, or you wouldn’t be yanking us around the mortal plane like we’re chew toys.”
“I didn’t summon you, whatever you are.”
“We’re demons,” Choker supplies helpfully, his fingers brushing uselessly against the spines of the books. “D-E-M-O-N-S.”
I knew that, but it’s not reassuring to hear my post-death instincts confirmed out loud. What does it make me, that I have a pack of translucent demons haunting me in my not-an-afterlife?
Some part of me whispers, that lady upstairs was telling you the truth. Normal people don’t come back from the dead.
But no, I had nothing to do with that. It was whatever Richard did with that book he had on him right before he passed out.
“Listen, I don’t care what you are.” Steeling myself, I push off the door and stalk towards Swordwielder. “I don’t even care what your name is.”
“Ezra,” he supplies.
Choker calls out, “Lynx.”
“Mateo.” Bomber motions towards Poiso
ner. “And that’s Sebastian, though he probably won’t tell you.”
Poisoner sneers and mutters, “Tête de noeud.”
I don’t know how, but somehow I know it’s French, and I know that he’s insulting Bomber—who I refuse to remember as Mateo—and moreover, as Choker chuckles, I know he speaks French too.
It all comes to me in a blink, like some part of me holds the four of them in my hands, ready to peer into their heads whenever I choose—or maybe, even, summon them.
Except that’s crazy, because I don’t know how.
“Whoever you are, I don’t care.” I move towards them, boldly brushing up against Ezra—Swordwielder—and actually walking right through him. A shiver goes up and down me, powerful and undeniable, and I immediately regret it. “Just go away. Get out of here! Stay away from me.”
“We’d love to.” Lynx whirls away from the book, an irritated expression crossing his face, and for a moment all I can see is the way he choked Jake to death with a single length of cord. “We’ve been trying to get back home all night. But you’ve anchored us to you, like Ezra said. So undo it and we’ll all say goodbye.”
I open my mouth to tell him off, only to hear the door open behind me. Whirling around, I meet Olivia’s eyes, and sigh in relief—only to realize I’m standing with four demons, suspiciously conversing with them. “I can explain!”
“You got lost? Don’t worry, I was sent to give you a tour. I’ll show you around.” Sounding amused, she walks towards me—and right through Swordwielder, who she doesn’t even seem to notice at all. Scowling, he steps to the side, muttering curses beneath his breath.
She can’t see them.
Only I can.
“It’s no big deal. People get stuck in here all the time. The lock is finicky from both ends—it’s Yohan’s study. He probably won’t burn you alive for trespassing in it.”
“Burn me alive?”
She laughs. “Just kidding!”
“Oh. Right. Of course.”
Bomber mutters, “Watch out. Some of them really do burn people alive. Especially the red ones.”