Guardian Academy 1: Seeds Of Magic (The Mystery Of The Four Corners)

by Maria Amor

  “We know that someone is stealing relics,” Julia said. She met Dylan’s gaze. “Personally, I think it’s Dimitrios.”

  “How do you get there?” Dylan shook his head, more than a little bewildered. He’d heard what Ardan had said, but so far it seemed just like there had been some kind of theft scandal—different from, but similar to the one involving the air-aligned students—and that was all.

  “Remember what Ardan said?” Julia raised an eyebrow. “They never found anything missing with the relics.”

  “And you think someone’s stealing relics because there are no stolen relics?” Julia rolled her eyes.

  “Remember? They were going to do something about it, and then somehow everything got turned around, and suddenly the professors were getting fired?” Julia stopped and pinned Dylan down with her gaze. “What do you want to bet that the accusations came from the professors originally, but somehow Dimitrios turned it around on them, in spite of there being no evidence—the same way that these air-aligned students keep getting accused and punished for thefts they’re not committing?”

  “Okay, there’s definitely something weird going on,” Dylan said. “I’ll give you that. But it doesn’t mean that Dimitrios is the one doing the stealing.”

  “Do you think the professors were stealing?” Julia raised an eyebrow again and Dylan sighed.

  “I don’t think so, but we can’t put aside the possibility.”

  “If the professors had been doing it, Ardan would have said so,” Julia pointed out. “It would be way easier to just say that they were—especially if it was true—and make Dimitrios look like he did something right. Remember: Dimitrios is riding him, too.”

  “But there’s no thefts—how could he be stealing if there are no thefts?” Dylan crossed his arms over his chest. For a moment, he almost thought he had Julia stumped.

  “He’s covering up the thefts somehow,” she said. “He’s duplicating the relics, or something. Maybe it’s not just him that’s stealing.”

  “You think the new professors are doing it with him?” Dylan remained skeptical, though he had to admit that Julia had certainly come up with an explanation to the lack of stolen relics.

  “Maybe,” Julia said, shrugging. “The thing is, we know Dimitrios has a history of being into relics. We know that there was some scandal involving accusations of stolen relics. We know that there wasn’t any evidence. We know that he’s pulling something now with air-aligned students being accused of stealing things with no evidence.” Julia crossed her arms over her chest. “Those things are too similar for me to think that they’re just a coincidence,” she said.

  “Okay, it doesn’t look good,” Dylan admitted. “So now we go to the party and ask the students about accusing people of stealing from them?”

  “That’s exactly what we do,” Julia said. “We still have to figure out how far this goes.”

  CHAPTER 19

  Julia looked around the convocation hall, trying to sort through the swarming, teeming mass of students and professors to find the ones she wanted in particular. The professors that Dean Dimitrios had hired were very much in evidence—the ones who had been at the school longer were scarcer, scattered, almost hiding amongst the students.

  Julia could feel the energy tingling through her body, alert and unfocused after the confrontation with Professor Ardan. Come on, Jules. You can do this. She took a deep breath and reached for Dylan’s hand, finding it without even looking. His energy—calm, stable, cool—flowed into her for a moment, directing her own energies, making everything clearer.

  She spotted one of the students who had made a theft accusation: a gnome, who had accused a changeling of stealing one of his geodes, in spite of the fact that when they searched the changeling’s room, there was no sign of the geode, and when they went back to the gnome’s room, it was right there.

  What’s his name? Yes—Marwin. The supernatural humanoids who attended Sandrine had “human” names—usually adapted from other languages—because in most cases, it was next to impossible for humans to pronounce their names. In the case of gnomes, Julia remembered, even when humans could pronounce the gnomish, the students—and all gnomes—were not allowed to share their names with anyone outside of their own communities, or with earth-aligned Guardians.

  Marwin wouldn’t make a good subject for what she had in mind, Julia decided; his energy—earth-aligned and ancient as it was—wouldn’t budge under any of her normal charms, and Dylan’s ability to manipulate emotions wouldn’t be as effective on him. She needed someone who was a Guardian, or maybe someone who was fire-aligned, to get the answers she sought. She wracked her mind, trying to remember who it was that had made accusations, and what alignment they belonged to.

  At the same time, Julia knew, she had to be conspicuous; she had to be as present as possible with Dylan at her side for their plan to work out. Make everyone think that we’re both here the whole time, don’t give enough of an opening for someone to remember that Dylan was gone for fifteen or twenty minutes, or I was, at some point in the party.

  Dean Dimitrios had skimped out on hiring a DJ for the event; instead there was a console that different students could use to access a playlist on Spotify and add songs to it for the duration of the evening. It would, Julia thought, end early—the dean wasn’t generally in favor of parties, and she was fairly certain that he only let the event happen at all to try and recoup some of the damage to his reputation for the changelings leaving the school.

  What they needed to find out was why the accusations were made in the first place. Julia spotted Ellis, a fire-aligned Guardian, and another one of the accusers. She considered him for a moment; he had come into his full abilities the previous year, and was still trying to get used to them—he wasn’t, she knew, as strong in his elemental alignment as she was in hers, even without having full control of her abilities.

  Definitely possible. But would it be better for Dylan to take him on? Dylan’s water alignment would make it much, much easier for him to dominate Ellis—at least on paper—but he didn’t really know what it was that Julia was trying to find out, specifically. She needed to get someone that she could question, that she had a good chance of getting some information from.

  She made her way towards Ellis, and Dylan followed in her wake, looking as unconcerned as ever, as bored as a person could possibly look without looking miserable. Ellis was in the midst of a conversation with a were-dragon girl, and Julia resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

  It was technically not against the laws, or even especially frowned upon for Guardians to flirt with or even date members of species that belonged to their alignment, but she couldn’t think of anything more stereotypical for Ellis to do than to chat up a good-looking girl who happened to belong to his element.

  Ellis was, in his own way, cute, Julia thought as she drifted closer to the boy. He had dark hair, a pronounced nose, and eyes the color of flames right next to the embers, a deep blue that anyone who paid half a minute’s attention would know was not, strictly speaking, a normal human attribute. He was laughing at something the were-dragon, Astrid, was saying, but Julia had missed it.

  How to get his attention without being obvious? Julia glanced at Dylan—this was something, she knew, they should have discussed. But she’d been so confident of her abilities, and so engaged with just the need to get the answers, that she hadn’t thought as much about the logistics.

  “Did you see the dress that Hestia put on for this?” Julia made sure to pitch her voice so that Ellis would overhear her as she spoke to Dylan.

  “Shame on you, talking trash about a fellow Guardian, and one of your own alignment,” Dylan said playfully.

  “I’m not talking trash,” Julia said tartly. “I just asked if you saw the dress.”

  “You were about to say something about it,” Dylan countered.

  “Just that it’s the same dress that I wore to the Berwyn party the week after Thanksgiving,” Julia said. “Look at
her, it’s the same one.”

  “Trend setter,” Dylan said, making it a light accusation.

  “If I knew I would be setting a trend I’d have worn the Siriano,” Julia countered. She could see, in the corner of her eye, that Ellis had started paying attention to her and Dylan, almost against his will. There was something about fire-aligned creatures that drew them to air-aligned Guardians and supernaturals; the same was often the case for air-aligned Guardians. Fire needs air to expand and grow; air fuels fire. Air moves faster in heat; fire fuels air. She needed to draw him in a little more, needed to get him to come to her.

  “You’re just worried that people are going to remember her in the dress instead of you,” Dylan suggested.

  “I’m worried that people are going to see the pictures of me and think that I copied her,” Julia countered.

  “No one would ever think that you copied anyone else,” Ellis said, appearing at her elbow. Julia felt a surge of victory, and slowly turned to face him.

  “Good to see you, Ellis,” she said, glancing upward slightly to meet his gaze. Ellis had—obligingly—moved up close to her, enough to force her to look up through her eyelashes at him. You are making this entirely too easy for me, she thought, smiling slightly and letting some of her air-aligned energy flow through her body like a breath, in his direction.

  “I’ve been wondering, why do you have to be chaperoned to school events?” Ellis gestured absently in Dylan’s direction.

  “Grandmother’s rules,” Julia said with an impudent shrug. “She holds the purse strings, so I have to obey.”

  “I didn’t think air-aligned creatures were all that good at doing what they’re told.”

  “We are when it’s in our best interests,” Julia said tartly. “But Dylan isn’t a chaperone; he’s just a companion and guard, making sure that no one harms me.”

  “Who would harm you?” Ellis frowned in exaggerated anger. “Show me where they are and I’ll kick their ass.”

  “No one has shown any signs, but you know how the elderly water-aligned Guardians can get,” Julia said, giving Dylan a quick glance so that he could see her roll her eyes at her own stereotyping. “Sometimes they get paranoid.”

  “I’d say Ruth has plenty to be paranoid about,” Ellis chided her.

  “So then why do you have a problem with Dylan keeping me safe?” Julia leaned in a little closer. “Unless your problem is that you think you’d do better?”

  “I think I could,” Ellis said, half-shrugging. “I mean, elemental fire is about protection, purification, things like that.”

  “Very true,” Julia said. She stepped slightly away from Dylan, one hand slipping behind her back to give him a quick signal with her fingers. “But fire is also about burning up, about passion. I think my grandmother would worry that with a fire-aligned protector, we might lose focus.”

  “You could bring the focus to anything,” Ellis said. Julia wanted to roll her eyes at the cheesiness of the line, but instead she twisted her face into an expression of delight. Okay, need to get him to come with me. How to do that? Julia glanced around the convocation hall, trying to figure out the best method to get Ellis alone to question him about the theft accusation.

  “It’s so loud in here,” Julia said, as one of the students set a new song: the “cleaned up” version of Jay-Z’s “99 Problems.”

  “We can go somewhere else,” Ellis suggested. “The professors aren’t really paying attention.”

  “Too many of us to really do the job,” Julia agreed. Ellis looked at Dylan, who was—Julia saw—pretending to be distracted by an undine who had walked up.

  “Does he have to come with us?” Julia shrugged.

  “He’s not my chaperone—just a bodyguard. I think I’m okay.” She leaned in closer to Ellis and suppressed the sneeze that rose up at the smell of his body spray. “Let’s get out of here quietly, though. Don’t want anyone asking too many questions.” Ellis nodded his agreement and Julia looked around as if she were truly worried that someone was watching them. “Follow me, okay? Give me like one minute before you go.”

  Ellis signaled his agreement again, and Julia slipped away from Dylan’s side, moving through the crowd of students as subtly as she could. Fortunately, no one at the party was paying much attention to her, so she was able to get to the closest exit out of the hall and then look around for a room—a closet, or somewhere at least a little private—she could bring Ellis to talk to him.

  She knew without having to need a shred of telepathy that he was not interested in talking; he wanted to flirt at most, and she could see the interest in his eyes, almost feel the pulse of his energy. He’s going to try and make out. Gotta get to him before he makes the move.

  Ellis appeared in the hallway, and Julia grabbed his hand. “Come on,” she said. “We don’t want to be caught in the hallway.”

  “I never figured you for someone who would be so obvious,” Ellis said as Julia steered him to an empty classroom further down the hallway. It was unlocked—the classrooms tended to be during big events—and almost eerie. Julia shook off the impression and closed the door behind them.

  “Obvious how?” Julia tilted her head slightly. “I just wanted to be somewhere quiet, where we can talk.”

  “What did you want to talk about?” Julia sat on top of one of the desks, meeting Ellis’ gaze. She tried to focus on her air-aligned energy, to bring it to bear on the other student without actually letting him know what she was doing. It felt like a pressure in her skull—not painful, but uncomfortable.

  “I’m curious about something,” Julia said, keeping her voice as light as possible. “You’re one of the students who had something stolen, right?” She raised an eyebrow.

  “Yes,” Ellis said. “It was messed up—I didn’t think anyone would steal from me here at Sandrine.” It was a rote thing, that much Julia could tell. But she couldn’t prove anything with that; she needed more. Be careful.

  “But they found the thing you said was stolen from you right where you said it was, which confuses me,” Julia told him. “How was it stolen from you?”

  “Someone snuck into my room while I was gone and took it—Niall did.” Julia caught the hesitation in his voice.

  “It doesn’t seem like something Niall would do, though, which is weird,” Julia said, frowning. She made sure to wrinkle her nose just slightly, to make her expression as endearing as possible. “I mean, Niall was one of the guys who welcomed me the most when I first started here, and I’ve never heard of him having light fingers before. How did you know it was him?”

  “Professor McClary suggested that it was him,” Ellis said. Julia filed that away in the back of her mind, nodding. One of the new Profs. Fire-aligned. Of course, he’d be the one to talk to a fire-aligned Guardian. “Why?”

  “I just thought, how would anyone other than you—and your roommates—have seen him? So, I guessed maybe one of your roommates saw Niall sneaking away.”

  “No, no one saw him come or go,” Ellis said. Julia resisted the urge to stare at him, and kept her expression quietly receptive.

  “So, if no one saw him, how did anyone know?” She tilted her head again slightly, playing up the angle of being a little ditzy; if Ellis didn’t know better from an air-aligned Guardian, that was his problem.

  “Professor McClary just said, it was probably Niall,” Ellis said, shrugging. “Why are you so fixated on this?” he moved a little closer to her, and Julia could feel the heat of his energy, feel the intensity of his gaze on her.

  “Just wanted to know,” Julia said, smiling brightly. “You know, even as distracted as they are in there—we should probably head back before someone notices we’re gone.” She slithered free of Ellis’ instinctive grab for her, and gave him a sharp look. “You should know there’s no way you can coerce me into staying if I don’t want to,” she told him firmly. Julia brightened. “Come on, Ellis. Back to the party.”

  Julia turned her back on him and moved quickly—tho
ugh not so fast that he would think that she was giving him a reason to chase her. She left the classroom and went straight back into the convocation hall without even checking to see if Ellis had followed her, spotting Dylan along a wall and slipping into place next to him as one song changed to the next.

  “Get what you needed from him?”

  “Apparently McClary told him it was probably Niall,” Julia said tartly, giving Dylan a significant look.

  “That doesn’t sound promising,” Dylan said.

  “You find someone you can talk to,” Julia suggested. “See if you can get someone else to confirm how they ended up accusing who they did.”

  “What do you think is going on?” Julia turned to one of the refreshment tables, to look as much like normal as possible. Dylan moved so that he would still be able to hear her.

  “Someone is putting students up to accusing other students,” Julia replied. “Maybe a few people. We won’t know until we ask around a little more.”

  “So, you want to take turns with as many of them as possible?” Julia nodded.

  “Got a problem with that?” Dylan met her gaze and she saw the telltale look of him deciding not to argue.

  “I’ll find a good earth-aligned student to talk to,” he said. “But we need to give it a while, let everyone see us together at the party for a bit.”

  “Take your time,” Julia told him, smiling sweetly as she saw Ellis making a beeline for the were-dragon girl he’d spurned to talk to her before. “But not all night.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Dylan stepped into Professor Braden’s classroom, feeling the relief that came along with being amongst his own kind, people of his own alignment. He was getting more and more used to being around Julia’s wild, variable energy, but there was definitely something soothing about Professor Braden’s class, being surrounded by other Guardians, undines, nymphs, and water-aligned were-creatures.

  “Good afternoon, class,” Professor Braden said, striding into the room. The whispering burble of water in the fountains provided a counterpoint for his words as the class went respectfully silent. “Everyone seems to be in good energies today—is that so?” Dylan half-smiled in spite of himself. Professor Braden was a few inches taller than he was, with sea-green eyes and graying black hair. He was friends with Ruth, and Dylan had heard that he was one of the few water-aligned entities on the planet—Guardian or otherwise—who was able to stand up to the old woman without fear.