“Damn.”
Her disappointed expression sparked another surge of laughter from me. We made it to the end of the street and turned onto her lane. A soft crack drew my attention over my shoulder, but I didn’t see anything except pine trees and empty yards.
“Sky?”
“Sorry, thought I heard something.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the Steward’s dog. He keeps busting outta their yard and running around the neighborhood.”
“At least he’s friendly.”
“Michael! Clark! Come inside, guys! It’s a little too late to play in the snow!” their mother called from the stoop. The twin boys in the yard groaned in disappointment.
“But Mo-oo-oom, we’re almost done with our snowman.”
“Fine. Five more minutes.”
“Sweet!”
As we passed the boys, I kept a distrustful eye on both to make sure our backs didn’t become appealing snowball targets until we reached Mindi’s house at the end of the cul-de-sac. Her cozy home resided on a double lot to fit the huge koi pond in the backyard.
“See you tomorrow?”
“I think they’re dragging me out to a movie. The next day?” I asked.
“Sure.”
After Mindi locked the door, I meandered back down to the sidewalk and retraced my steps. An uncomfortable weight compressed my heart, accompanied by a hair-raising tingle spreading over both of my arms.
When I glanced back at Mindi’s house, I expected to find her creepy older brother eyeballing me. Last I’d heard, he’d moved back in because his pregnant girlfriend kicked him to the curb for cheating on her.
A child’s terrified shriek echoed across our peaceful suburb and sent my pulse into a frantic jackhammer. I darted back the way I’d come and found the two boys huddled together behind their trampled snowman. Their mom rushed out a split second later.
“Mommy! There was a monster in the bushes!”
“A monster? Are you sure you didn’t see Mr. Steward’s dog again? Did you see anything?” she asked, looking at me.
“No, ma’am, I got here a second before you.”
The harried woman shuffled her boys inside without another word to me, but she chastised them for raising a ruckus. The door closed, cutting off anything else, but not before both boys insisted it hadn’t been a dog, but a monster.
A wolf’s distant howl raised the hairs on the back of my neck. I scanned the snow and found enormous prints, larger than the paws of any dog I had ever seen. The lingering odor in the air smelled musty and rotten, the choking stench of old gym socks and molding meat. Somehow, it surpassed the nauseating odor I’d smelled in the faerie realm when Gabriel chased us.
Oh no.
Panic flooded my veins with ice cubes colder than the winter chill. I raced home and practically burst down the door to get inside. “Mom, Dad, I think there was a wendigo down the street!”
Dad rose first after trading a wary glance with Mom. “A wendigo in Suffolk? What makes you think that?”
“The twins down the road saw a monster in the bushes, and it smells foul like something dead was there. It smelled just like a wendigo.”
Dad’s forehead creased. “How would you know what one smells like?”
“Uh. My mentor’s sentinel created one with an illusion, and trust me, it isn’t the kind of smell that anyone can ever forget. Ever. And the paw prints in the snow were as big as my face.”
“I’ll call Sam and ask her to have a look,” Dad said. “Make sure it wasn’t a dog.”
I liked Sam. Dad’s current vampire sentinel had a no-nonsense outlook toward most things and was friendlier than his old werewolf. Helga Blackwood used to accompany us everywhere, even when she wasn’t technically on duty. In hindsight, it was a good thing she did travel with us so much, since she died saving my dad from a sect of hags with a grudge when I was eleven. If she hadn’t been there, I’d have probably lost my daddy.
It sucked that someone else lost his mom as a tradeoff though. Poor Dedrik.
Eager for action, I jumped up. “I can go with her.”
“Absolutely not,” my mom said in her most authoritative voice. She even smacked her hand on the table. “You’ve been out in the cold, so go upstairs and take a hot shower. We’ll take care of this. If anything happened at all.”
I blinked. “Wow. Well, okay.”
“Skylar, we’re not sentinels. It’s not our job,” my father said in a kinder voice.
Deflating a little more, I nodded. “Okay. Guess I’ll go clean up then.”
A hot shower didn’t ease my concern or convince me the kids saw a dog in the bushes. After shrugging into my unicorn onesie and zipping up, I moved out onto the stairs.
Mom’s voice trailed up the steps. “What did Sam say?”
“Skylar was right. It’s a verified wendigo sighting. They also found claw marks from a valravn on the nearby tree.”
“The same one who ran us off the road?”
“Possibly. They must have broken the sentinel perimeter made by Sam and the others assigned to protect us. Surveillance in Suffolk will be increased in the meantime…”
It was wrong to eavesdrop on my parents, but what they didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them, especially since they were keeping vital intel from me for reasons I couldn’t fathom.
“We need to tell Skylar what’s happening. To hell with all of this cryptic bullshit,” Dad continued, making warmth and love for him flourish anew in my chest.
“We can’t, Marco. You heard what the beansidhe said. We can’t interfere. If we tell her…”
“Self-fulfilling prophecy isn’t always fulfilled,” Dad argued.
“Do you want to take that risk with our baby’s life?”
After a long pause, he replied in a ragged whisper I could barely hear, “No. I want her to be safe more than anything, and I want her to know if we could tell her more, we would.”
Crouched on the top stair, I waited a few more minutes until one of them raised the television volume. My brows shot up.
Had they turned down the television to guarantee I’d overhear?
My bare feet thumped over the stairs during the bounding descent. Creating excess noise to alert them of my arrival, I jumped dramatically into the living room to find my parents had returned to smiles and doting warmth again. Mom had a fresh batch of cookies and cocoa topped with cream and cinnamon waiting for me.
The wendigo had been discreetly swept beneath the rug, no further mention made of it that night or any day afterward. To be on the safe side, I didn’t go out after dark anymore either.
At the end of the month-long break, Dad packaged a load of goodies for me to take back to school because I told him he’d have to glamour a few extra inches into every pair of pants I owned if they made me eat another cookie.
Somehow, he knew I’d lost five pounds while training with Gabriel, because even the lunch packed for me to eat during the plane ride was crammed full of carbs.
Dammit, I didn’t want those pounds back.
A shuttle from the school picked me up from O’Hare, and an hour later, I was home again.
Funny how PNRU had become my home away from home. Despite angry clay soldiers, vampires, and school bullies, I loved this place.
14
No Secrets on Campus
Pilar fetched and sorted the mail for us each morning, so I emerged from the bathroom after a shower to find her at the kitchen counter with a stack of envelopes.
“Message for you, Sky. This came two days ago from the administrative office, but I forgot to give it to you last night when you got in.” She passed me a sealed envelope bearing the school crest.
“I have to see the provost. Pronto.”
A sinking feeling dragged my stomach downward. Crap, what had I done?
Was this about that terracotta incident or the vampires? Was that finally coming back to bite me in the ass?
I certainly hadn’t done anything else between now and ge
tting off the plane from Virginia last night. In a rush to answer the provost’s call, I dragged a brush through my straight-ironed hair, threw on some clothes, then stuffed my feet into a pair of wool-lined boots.
Snow crunched beneath my boots as I hurried across campus. By the time I crossed the grounds, I was breathing hard and almost winded from sucking frosty air into my lungs. I charged into the main office, sprinted up the stairs to the third floor, and rounded the corner. A line of comfy chairs occupied the vast space where Provost Riordan’s personal assistant worked each day.
Gabriel stood in front of the desk wearing his usual leather jacket and black jeans.
“Mr. Fujimoto, have a seat please,” Ms. Newton said to him.
“Am I in trouble?” he asked.
She shook her head. “You’ll see.”
Looking about the same way I felt, Gabriel settled on the chair and pulled out his phone. His gaze flicked up to me, but he didn’t smile. His eyes were dark and brooding, his features screwed up into a grimace like he’d had a sip of sour milk. “Hey.”
Ignoring the churning sensation in my own gut, I dropped into the seat to his left and touched his shoulder. “Hi, Gabriel. How was winter break in Texas?”
“Great.”
“You don’t look like it was great. What’s going on?” I couldn’t think of many reasons for him to be in the provost’s office looking like he was going to puke.
He slouched down in his seat and tilted his head back against the wall behind him, his eyes closed. “I think I’m in trouble. Hell, maybe even expelled.” He swore under his breath and groaned. “I’m screwed. They’re going to Bind my gift. I’ll be a Talentless forever.”
“What?”
“I kinda—”
Mrs. Newton returned to her desk and sat down. “The provost will see you now. Both of you.”
“That can’t be too bad then, right?” I whispered. If they were going to expel him, I wouldn’t be here. Unless we were both being expelled.
Crap. What if they were blaming me for the loss of that terracotta soldier? What if the museum wanted me to pay for it? I couldn’t afford to replace a priceless relic from umpteen thousand years ago. My pulse lurched into a wild rhythm, pounding against my ribcage.
Mrs. Newton cleared her throat, so I sped into the provost’s office.
Despite the winter gray skies outside, golden rays of sunlight spilled from the window beside the desk, casting the entire office in spring’s warmer tones.
The provost steepled her fingers, gazing at us both with dispassionate blue eyes. She wore a suit as usual, the delicate pinstripes shifting from gold to violet depending on the angle. “Good morning to you both. Have a seat.”
“Good morning,” I whispered back.
Gabriel grunted, or maybe he almost vomited but swallowed it back in time. I couldn’t tell.
“Do either of you know why you’re here?”
Gabriel had settled stiffly in the chair, his spine rigid and brandy-colored eyes wide with anxiety.
“I only did it because she hit me,” he blurted out. The provost raised her brows.
My gaze snapped toward Gabriel. “I—what? No I didn’t. Well, there was that one time I got past your guard, but that happens all the time in training.”
Gabriel closed both eyes like he was in pain. “Sky,” he said in a warning voice.
Provost Riordan raised both brows. “I see none of us are on the same page. No, Mr. Fujimoto, this has nothing to do with your incident in Texas. That remains your business, contrary to what Ms. Harrington believes. And while some members of staff may disapprove of your midnight training sessions with Ms. Corazzi, neither of you have broken any rules.”
“Huh?” Gabriel blinked. “You’re not expelling me?”
“No, of course not. No one is in trouble today. As I said, those are personal matters between you and Miss Harrington. Today, you’ve been summoned to discuss the matter of Monica Cunningham.”
Gabriel shifted in his seat, posture relaxing. “What about her? I haven’t checked in yet since returning this morning.”
“Due to repeated infractions against this school’s honor code and the requirements of her academic probation, Monica Cunningham is no longer a student of this university. I’m afraid you are without a mentor, and you without a ward,” she said to me and then Gabriel in turn.
My heart sped to a galloping rhythm. Without an older fae to lead me through the ropes, I couldn’t continue my education. I’d be campus bound. “Will I have another mentor for the semester?”
“Do I get another ward?” Gabriel asked.
“Of course. I’ve decided pairing you and Ms. Corazzi will be a beneficial experience for you both. I know you’ve expressed great interest in pursuing a degree with our master’s program, which means you and she will remain together for the remainder of your educations at PNRU.”
“What? You mean I’m not getting a new mentor?”
“Considering you handled most of Sharon’s needs, no.”
“You know about that?”
“My dear, I know everything that happens with my students.” She folded her hands on the desk and smiled. “You will take over duties as Sharon’s faerie godmother immediately. I know you and Dedrik Blackwood discussed becoming partners next year, but in light of this new development, I see no reason why Mr. Fujimoto should go without when you work together so well already.”
She couldn’t be serious. No freshman ever received a charge of their own. Ever. I waited for the punchline of the joke, and when none came, I swallowed back the rising glee.
It wasn’t that I was happy about Monica getting kicked out of school, even if she did deserve it, but that her failure had somehow amounted to my success. I pumped one fist in the air and whooped in the most unprofessional way before dragging my emotions back under control.
“Um, that’s great news, Provost Riordan. Thank you.”
“You’re very welcome.”
I peeked at my new sentinel. My new official sentinel. He’d turned to stare at me in return, eyes widened with surprise. My elation threatened to bubble over, I was so eager to text my parents and tell them the good news.
“He’s a good sentinel,” I said, struck by the profound desire to defend and reassure him, “and I trust him. Thank you for the opportunity, Provost Riordan.”
“Do enjoy your time back, and don’t make me regret fast-tracking your advancement. While your test scores were not top marks, Ms. Corazzi, your field experience has been… acceptable. I think you’ll be able to handle things.”
“Thank you, Provost,” Gabriel said. He rose from his seat, bowed to her, and beelined out of the office like the devil was on his heels. I followed him, but the raven didn’t stop walking until we reached the main lobby outside of the provost’s wing.
He sagged against the wall beside the glass doors and rubbed his unshaven jaw. The scruffy look made him appear five years older. And about a thousand times sexier. “Man, what a relief. I thought I was going to be living out of my truck or something.”
With the worst behind us, I had only one final concern. “Did Jada really hit you?” The question tumbled out in a rush before I could stop myself. I leaned closer, searching his face for bruising.
“It’s fine.” He shook his head and glanced away.
“Oh come on, it’s me. I’m not going to laugh at you.”
“Fine, but not here.”
Gabriel led me outside into the frosty morning. Snow crunched beneath our boots once we descended the steps onto stable, heavily salted ground, and the frigid air stung my cheeks. Virginia got cold in the winter, downright frigid at times, but the Chicago wind was the worst. It seemed like no matter how many layers I wore, the cold snuck its way through.
Gabriel led the way into a small alcove with a curved stone bench up against the side of the building. “We can chat over here without busybodies.”
With tall, thorny hedges around us, the wind was cut off entirely, c
reating a surprisingly cozy nook. The bench chilled my bottom even after brushing the fine layer of snow off it, but beggars couldn’t be choosers, and no one ventured this way often.
“Okay. I’m all ears.”
“Right. So Jada usually flies first class to and from Texas whenever we head back, but I like the drive. She tagged along with me anyway and wanted to stop for a hotel along the way back to Chicago. I didn’t want to spend the money or waste the time on the road if we could be in our own beds on campus by midnight.” He shrugged. “So we argued.”
“And then she hit you.”
“Yeah. After I said some things. She has a helluva right jab.” He rubbed his jaw.
Some things? I had to wonder what the hell kind of words motivated a girl to punch her boyfriend. “Not staying at a hotel is a crap reason to argue, especially if you were willing to do all the driving.”
“Yeah well, we did more than argue. Anyway, I told her maybe we should reconsider giving it another try for our parents. She said I’d be breaking my promise to Mom. I told her what she could do with that promise. She punched me and got out of the car… and I kinda left her on the interstate.”
I slapped both hands over my mouth. “You didn’t.”
Gabriel raised his shoulders and hands in a helpless gesture. “I asked her to get back inside first. She refused.”
“You…” For a moment all I could do was stare as my mind conjured up the image of Jada abandoned on the highway. Unrestrained laughter made me bend forward and hold my middle as tears stung the corners of my eyes. “Oh man, I wish I could have seen her face.”
“Yeah.” He smiled. “It was a great moment. I was pretty proud of myself too for standing up to her. Five years of that crap, and I guess I can’t do it anymore, you know?”
“Good for you. So then what happened?”
“She waited for me to come back, and when I didn’t, she phoned my folks.” His amusement faded into a somber expression way too serious for his handsome face. “Dad’s threatening to cut me off this semester. Work’s kinda thin in the winter, but I’ll manage.”
Poor guy. “Sorry your parents aren’t taking it so well. Anyway, it’s her fault for acting like a brat and leaping out the car.”
The Hidden Court: The Paranormal University Files: Skylar, Year 1 Page 18