"What about vampires and werewolves?" Ava asked him. She'd heard a lot of horror stories about them.
"Well, okay, I guess that's magic, too. But it's really different. They can't cast spells or create magical barriers or heal people." He scratched under his chin as he considered the possibilities. "I've always kind of figured they came from magic though. They wouldn't exist otherwise. But it must've been some kind of crazy dark magic, because getting bitten by one of them is a curse that ruins your life forever."
"Can shifters even become werewolves or vampires?" Ava questioned. "That seems a little weird."
"Oh, sure, it's definitely possible." Tarun nodded his head once. "I knew a shifter back in India who got attacked by a vampire. It was terrifying. He tried to fight the urge to feed, but eventually, the bloodlust got to him. He ended up putting a stake through his own heart."
Ava's hand shot to her mouth. "That's horrible!"
"Sure is." He looked away, but then spoke again. "Werewolves are even more common in the shifter community. Because if you think about it, it's easier for them to be trusted at first. They usually go for the wolf packs. Now there are entire werewolf packs. From there, they go for other shifters. But not all of them are bad, they just need to be contained during the full moon is all."
Ava was nodding along as Tarun spoke. This was fascinating. But then suddenly, something he'd said earlier struck her. "When you mentioned magic, you mentioned healing?"
Tarun stopped walking and gaped at her. "Yes, I did."
Ava had a feeling he was thinking the same thing she was. He was thinking about her sudden healing ability in the training room right after she scratched herself open.
"So it's a magical ability then? So why…"
"I have no idea, but I was definitely wondering the same thing when it happened." He started walking again, and Ava fell in step beside him. "It doesn't make any sense for a tabby cat to be able to heal. Unless there's some sort of rare breed of magical tabby cats out there that no one has discovered yet." He laughed uncomfortably.
"I guess," Ava muttered, not sure what else to say.
"But anyway," Tarun went on. "The griffins… They are…special."
"How do you mean?"
"Griffins have special guardian powers. You could call them sorcerers, I guess. It allows them to break reality to suit their needs. In this case, to the taste of the school. It's fairly restrictive though, from what I understand. Their powers only benefit the place they are assigned to guard. So that's why Animage has thrived underground for so long undetected by humans."
"Wow! See, these are the kinds of lessons I'd love to be learning in class. Not just constant training." Ava added a little hop in her step. "I mean, I had pretty much no idea Levine was so cool."
"What, you thought she just stood around watching students all day? Filing her nails and doling out punishments?" he teased her.
Ava grinned, and they laughed together. She enjoyed his laugh, appreciating his deep baritone. "What about family? Does she have any? Of her own, I mean?"
"She does. A nephew, I think. And two sisters."
"You know so much about her family."
“Well, remember, my parents went here. She was here when they were here, too,” he reminded her. “And last year, Deacon, Colin, Elaine, Michaela, and I, along with a bunch of others, spent over a week touring the school and learning about it. Colin knew a lot about her. He claimed he was related to her.”
“School tour? That was an option?"
"Yeah, didn't you get an invite?"
"No, all I got was the acceptance letter."
Tarun slapped his palm to his forehead. "Oh, duh."
Ava clammed up. "Right. Because I'm just a tabby cat, so no one knew I would be coming here. There was no reason to invite me."
"I wasn't trying to be mean." His face looked genuinely apologetic. "But it's kind of the truth. James didn't get an invitation either. I never thought he'd be able to come here with me until that acceptance letter showed up only a few weeks before the semester started. We were all shocked."
"I guess whoever enacted the new policy did it very last minute." Ava dragged her feet a little more. "That's my life. This entire time I've been wondering why I was accepted. I'm a worthless little kitty cat. A noncombatant shifter from America. What the heck am I doing here?"
They had stopped walking again. Tarun looked into her eyes. "It wasn't just you though. They admitted people everywhere. But it's not like they admitted all shifters. They selected a group of you. The question is why."
Ava looked around. The school was almost invisible now. She rubbed her palms over her goosebumped arms and blew out a deep breath. It came out in a white fog.
"You’re cold," Tarun observed, taking off his blazer. "Here, take my jacket."
"I'm not even going to argue, I'm so cold," Ava admitted, snatching the blazer from his lax fingers.
Although now Ava had an additional problem. Tarun's arms were visible because he was no longer wearing the blazer. The boys kept their shirt sleeves rolled up pretty far at all times, to keep their marks visible, so his muscles bulged. Ava could swear his biceps were calling to her. And that beautiful dark skin…from his year-long tan, deliciously browned. She could bite them…
Shaking her head vigorously, she shrugged the jacket on. It smelled just like him. A woody, earthy scent that was all male. Ava pretended to adjust the sleeves so she could inhale the fragrance deeply. Then her hair snagged on one of the buttons as she tried to drag it down.
Yup, he was about to lose all respect for her any second now. Apparently she couldn't even dress herself without screwing it up.
She pulled at her hair, hurting herself, and trying to get it detangled before he noticed. But luckily, he was distracted by something, turned around and facing the other way. She was thankful he couldn't see her head bent in that awkward position.
"We're here," he announced suddenly, turning in that very unfortunate moment to see her wrestling her hair away from the button.
Damn long hair!
"Here, let me help with that," he said sweetly. He didn't laugh at her or make fun of her or anything.
Within seconds, he had freed her from her tangled mess.
And what did he mean when he said they were "here"? They were literally in the middle of nowhere, standing in a wide expanse. The clouds dipping low, rocks jutting from the ground. She had to concentrate very hard not to trip over one in her boots.
Gently, he pushed her long hair back over her shoulder, far away from the button in question. That left him standing close. Too close. She could feel his hot breath on her face, even hear his heart pounding. Or was that hers?
Her breath hitched in her throat at the sight of his deep green eyes so near her own. Then his lashes swept down, shielding her from seeing what was in their depths. Unconsciously, her right hand trailed up his brawny arms, tracing his musculature.
He gasped softly, nearly inaudibly.
It was the last thing she heard—last thing she remembered—before he lowered his head to hers.
His lips, so silky and smooth, on hers surpassed anything she'd imagined. She felt like her head had just exploded in a burst of light the second his mouth touched hers. She’d kissed boys before, but nothing more. And nothing, at all, came even close to this mass of electricity surging through her charged body.
He was gentle but driving her crazy, with little nips on her lower lip, teasing them open and then tickling them with his tongue. Gladly, she welcomed his tongue in the rest of the way, a sigh escaping when she did so.
Someone groaned. She wasn't sure if it came from her or Tarun.
She pushed closer, wanting to feel every inch of him. Her fingers, completely out of her control, traveled up his firm arms, over his shoulders, to his neck, and finally delved into his hair. Oh, that hair was even softer to touch than she'd hoped.
She moaned again, a little louder this time. His tongue explored every part of her mouth
, plunging, enjoying. He gave as much as he took, and she matched his every move. His hands on her waist held on like it was the only thing holding him to the ground.
His fingers trailed over her back, and she couldn't help it—she moaned into his mouth. The sound was a wake-up call, and Ava suddenly had an alarming thought. She wrenched her mouth and hands away from him and took several steps backward.
She knew he was dangerous, but not to this extent.
How dare he.
He knew his confusion was stamped boldly across his face as he struggled to regain his breath. He'd thought they were on the same page, but she was now looking at him as if he were the fungus that grew beneath the earth's surface.
"Is that why you brought me here? Just so you could take advantage of me?"
"What? Ava! No!" He was so utterly shocked that he didn't even know for sure if his words had been decipherable. His original intention had been to get her out here so they could practice partial cat-shifts together at a cool little cave he’d found, but he just couldn’t resist her.
"Tell me it isn't true." She looked furious.
Stunned into silence, he could only watch her as she fumed. Rage had completely replaced the passion he was so sure had just consumed both of them only moments ago.
"You can't, can you? That's what I thought," Ava spat. She hurriedly unbuttoned the jacket, untucked her hair where it was caught inside the collar, and chucked it back at him.
He didn't even try to catch it—it just hit him in the face. He opened his mouth, but then closed it again. He wanted to explain, to exonerate himself, but he didn't even know how to do that. And his brain was still a little foggy from their passionate kiss.
What the heck? Hadn't she felt it, too?
Wasn't she tingling from head to toe, even now, like he was?
He could only watch in astonishment as she stormed away, making sure not to look back at him. He briefly considered going after her, to keep her from assuming the worst about him, but considering how quickly things had turned, he didn't know how he would convince her otherwise.
Instead, he stood, glued to the spot as he watched her until she was a tiny speck running toward the school.
19
Winta was unclipping her earrings when Ava barged into her room without knocking.
“We gotta go.” Ava appeared a bit feverish, but Winta tamped down the urge to test her friend’s temperature with the back of her hand.
“Go where?”
“To the library. Hurry.”
Winta totally, with all her heart, disagreed with Ava about needing to go there. She wasn’t going to the library in the middle of the night. An elephant needed her beauty rest.
"I don't know what's gotten into you, but please sit down and tell me what's going on. Something tells me we don't really need to go anywhere right now," Winta cajoled, subtly craning her neck to see if JiSoo was behind her, in on this crazy plan.
Nope, she was nowhere near. She was probably in her own room, nestled under her sheets—like a normal person—dead to the world.
Ava started moving from one end of her room to the other, too fast to be considered pacing.
Thankfully, Winta's "roommate," Michaela, was out with her friends, so she didn't have to witness any of this.
"I can just tell you on the way." Ava's words tumbled quickly, just like her feet. Winta could feel her floor moving underneath Ava's footsteps. Impressive for a kitten.
She took a deep breath and set her earrings down in her jewelry box. She had to point out the obvious. "The library is closed, Ava. Let's say I do go with you now. How exactly do you intend to get in without being noticed?”
Ava stopped—thankfully—and stared at her, crossed and uncrossed her arms, and then made a couple noises that weren't really words. She hadn't even bothered with real clothes, standing there in her polka-dot nightwear. "We'll just figure it out when we get there. I need to see something, Winta. Please, come with me."
"We'll go in the morning. First thing, will that work? Just please stop running all over the place! You're making me dizzy." Winta was used to her friend’s back-and-forth temperaments, but it didn't mean she enjoyed them.
The semi-insane look dissipated from Ava's eyes as she padded over to the bed and sat down. The bed that would be Winta's if it weren't for her sleep-shifting. Curling up into a ball, Ava looked small and vulnerable. "But I just want to know if I'm right. This will clear up so many things for me."
Winta let out a little cough to cover her sigh. At least they were getting somewhere. And now the risk of being expelled for breaking into the library at this hour was reducing somewhat.
She leaned in closer to her friend, scooting her chair several inches. Then she moved the curtain of brown hair shadowing Ava's face and reached for her hand. But she nearly dropped it as soon as she touched it because Ava's hands were ice cold. That's when she realized Ava was shivering. "Ava? What's going on? You know you can tell me anything…"
"I couldn't sleep and I… I just remembered something earlier." She shrugged noncommittally.
"Yes?" Winta prompted. She had expected Ava to dish out all the details from her afternoon "walk" with Tarun, but this was clearly a different matter entirely.
"Suffice it to say…" Ava trailed off, seemingly changing her mind about what she was about to tell her. "You see, I cut myself in class the other day. When I was doing some partial shifting."
"Oh no. You didn't tell me about that. Poor thing. Can I see?"
"No, you can't, actually. That's the problem." Ava lifted her polka-dot sleeve. "It was right here, but it's totally gone. See?"
Winta looked over her arm. Indeed, she didn't see a single scratch. "Are you sure you cut yourself? I mean, was it just minor?"
"Oh, I'm definitely sure." Ava's eyes were wide. "There was blood everywhere, and it was super painful. I had my claws out, and it just went so deep…I…"
"Just take a breath," Winta coaxed her. She was worried Ava was about to get hysterical.
"It happened that day in Professor Bills’s class. The same day he mentioned my father. But I completely forgot about it because I was so distracted with the fact my father went to the school. Then, on my walk with Tarun yesterday, he mentioned—"
Winta raised an eyebrow. "That walk with Tarun? You seriously aren't going to tell me how that went?"
"You just gotta come with me! I need to see if there are answers in the library!" Ava's breathing grew erratic again.
Winta abandoned the subject of Tarun. "Seriously, just breathe. Relax and think about this because I don't think you have. Like at all. Say we go down there… We get caught, then we get sent back home. You and I never see each other again. You never see Tarun again. Or JiSoo. You don't find your father and you never get answers. Then what?" Winta noticed she was talking too fast, but she was past caring. She wanted to talk sense into Ava, and Ava should be used to her accent by now.
Ava's hand that Winta was holding slackened, and she threw herself backward on the carefully made bed. A plume of dust flew up around her, causing her to make her face. No one really used that bed because Winta still slept outside. She really only used it to lay out her clothes in the evenings.
"Do you know what this means?"
When Winta didn't answer, Ava went on, "That I'm freakier than I thought. Apparently it isn't enough that I'm a wittle kitty."
"Don't say that."
"But it's true. Apparently my cuts heal for no reason at all."
"Has that always been the case though?" Winta reached out and touched her friend’s hand again.
Surely someone would have noticed that she healed instantly. "What about when you were a child? I'm sure you fell from trees and things like that."
Ava chuckled. "Are you kidding me? It's my cat nature. I used to climb trees all the time and then get stuck!"
Winta had to laugh at that as well. Of course Ava did that.
"But I bruised myself and cut myself up all the time. Jus
t like any regular kid would. I never healed instantly."
"Not until you got here."
"That's right. Not until I got here."
Winta had a thought. "How old were you when you started to manifest?"
Ava looked at her. "My shifting abilities? Twelve. You know, pretty typical."
"And how old were you before you could shift fully?"
Ava's face turned slightly red. "Honestly? My first full shift—like, on purpose—was only about a month before I came here," she said quietly.
Winta nodded. "So maybe this healing ability took a while to manifest as well. Like your shifting ability. Maybe they’re related."
"But tabby cats don't heal on command!" Ava waved her hands. "I don't know why, but I really believe this has something to do with my father. He's the only blank sheet in my life. Maybe finding him would explain all this."
"Well, I can definitely understand why you couldn't sleep," Winta reassured her.
Looking suddenly shy, Ava said, "Um, something else happened, too."
Finally! Ava was going to tell her about Tarun. "Oh, that doesn't sound good. Don't tell me an attendant saw you taking off clothes or something…"
"Oh god, no! Nothing like that. He just walked me really far out to the fields…"
"I know. I saw the two of you walk out there together. Remember?"
"Mmmhmm, yeah, so there's that… And so we kissed…"
“Ohhhhh!" Winta squealed. Ava rushed to cover her mouth with her palm to shush her, probably expecting the hallway attendant to push open their door at any moment. Winta pushed her hand away.
"Yes, he kissed me." But then Ava bit her lip. "It just kind of happened. One minute he was untangling his jacket from my hair, and the next, he was kissing me…"
"I'm trying to follow this story, but so many things don't add up."
"Ugh! I totally screwed it up. I had to stop it. It was just too much."
Animage Academy: The Shifter School Down Under Year One Page 14