by D. R. Perry
Hawthorn Academy is technically in another dimension, after all, one Noah's taken to like a duck to water. I watched him saunter in arm-in-arm with his bestie, Elanor. He’d never had a friend who carried on with him like that back at public school, and his entrance wouldn’t have gotten such a positive reaction back then, either. People actually stopped, smiling or rushing over to say hello. My brother was Mr. Popularity. Watching his reception and his reaction to it, I understood.
This was Noah's home now. Had been for a year before I got here, and if he was a duck in this water, I was oil on top of it, unable to mix in or blend. Off in the opposite corner, I spotted someone I recognized from pictures Noah had shown me over the summer—Darren, his boyfriend. An introvert. But even he wasn’t by himself. Another boy I didn’t recognize was over there with him, leaning against the wall.
Suddenly, I couldn’t even bear people-watching anymore. I turned my head, resting it against Ember's flank to hide my eyes. I’d wait this mandatory event out and go back to my room.
Because I didn't want anyone to see the tears I couldn't keep in anymore.
Somewhere in the haze of stomach-dropping anguish, I heard the chandelier loudspeaker apparatus announcing names in alphabetical order. That must have been what Headmaster Hawkins meant about faces and names, so I looked up.
A magipsychic display on one wall lighted up. It was like a mundane electronic screen in function, but completely different in how it operated. It was basically a giant HD device with a psychic source and magical power.
Faces of students with their familiars flashed on the screen, along with their names in both text and speech. My stomach felt even worse when I realized the images were generated directly from each person in real-time. The device was taking our pictures right then and there.
And I looked like a waterlogged albatross.
"GRACE DUBOIS: FAMILIAR LUNE," the magically amplified voice said.
As the alphabet moved past F for Fairbanks and on to H for Hawkins, I wiped my eyes on my sleeve. I managed to dab my nose with the hem of my tunic by the time Dylan Khan's face flashed on the screen. I thought I couldn’t look too bad until the name Aliyah Morgenstern, familiar Ember boomed through the room.
The face on the screen was blotchy and tearstained, the eyes red-rimmed. And my cowlick stood up in full force, making one side of my hair nearly vertical like Bubbe's yearbook back when New Wave hairstyles were cool. At least Ember looked decent, even if her expression was more feral than usual.
"The new dark lord—"
"Should have said Hopewell—"
"Almost burned the school down—"
Fragments of conversation like shattering mirrors came from red supergiant it-girl Charity and her solar system of mean planets. I hoped she collapsed someday to turn into a supermassive black hole.
They even ignored the boy right after me, a fellow with some sort of serpent familiar.
Logan Pierce saved me, but not in person. His model-perfect mug appeared up on the screen next, and the voices switched to squeals and coos as they decided to fawn over him instead of laughing at me.
And the alphabetical listing went on. Judging by the number of first-year students, we'd have six in each class, which was about average for a magical prep school.
"LEE YOUNG: FAMILIAR SCRATCH" boomed out. A kid with windswept purple bangs over black hair flashed on the screen along with a lop-eared Sumxu cat, and the presentation ended. Finally.
I wanted to run—turn the corner as quickly as possible—but Bubbe always told me that running attracts attention. I took measured steps toward the arch, forcing my breath into a normal pattern instead of the frantic gasps my lungs wanted to take.
Finally, I made it to the stairs, just managing to mumble the number three. When the steps began moving, I knew I had made my escape.
Chapter Fifteen
"Is this thing on?"
It felt weird, sitting in bed while talking to a glowing glass orb, but I guess it was better than hiding in the corner on the verge of a panic attack. If it worked, I'd be able to vent to my two best friends. Maybe my only real friends in the world.
The device in question was made from a seaglass orb, one of those items frequently found in antique shops all over downtown Salem. Last week, after I bonded with Ember, my friends and I had bought three of them and spent the afternoon enchanting all the orbs together.
Without Dylan. We didn't want to involve him because it was against school rules to bring a device with a connection to the outside world. That seemed unnecessarily cruel, which was why we decided to break the rule, but if Dylan got in trouble for something like this, he'd lose his scholarship and have to go home.
"Testing? One? Two?"
Closing my eyes, I inwardly bemoaned the fact that it would have taken months plus help from an actual telepathic psychic to get the orbs to transmit thoughts instead of speech. That would also have required more education than we had to create. A simple magical voice device was easy at our level of skill.
After opening my eyes again, I stared into its center, only seeing the bottom of my suitcase through it, tinted pink. That came from the glittery substance Cadence had contributed along with her energies. The damn thing was supposed to light up and glow like a candle with an internal flame. That part came from me and my fire magic. And then we were supposed to hear each other's voices through the glass, a feature fueled by Izzy's psychic powers.
We tested it, so the device should have worked here. Maybe I wasn’t talking loud enough.
"Izzy? Cadence?" I raised my voice as much as I dared.
"Leelee!" Cadence's voice was a bit muffled, but there, thank goodness.
"Psychics-R-Us, you say 'em, we sooth 'em." I practically saw Izzy's eyebrows waggling as she joked around.
"You guys, I'm so glad this works. You have no idea."
"Rough first day?" Izzy's words were snarky, but her tone was more comfortable than cozy socks in the middle of winter. "I mean, was it bad?
"That's an understatement."
"Peep!"
"Aww." Cadence squealed. "Is that cute little dragony-wagony being a good little girl?"
Ember's tail thumped the headboard in response.
"Yeah, she's behaving way better than me." I hung my head even though my friends couldn't see me. I told them all about my no good, lousy, horrible, rotten day.
I told them everything down to the last detail, including poor Zeke Brown, the vampire CNA who had to live in the school every year with a bunch of bigoted magi. As a matter of fact, I started with him because said bigotry was part of the reason I got into so much trouble in the first place.
"Jeez Louise, Aliyah." Izzy clicked her tongue against her teeth. "That Charity person sounds like a total itch with a B in front."
"What's with the censor bar, Izzy?" Cadence chimed in.
"I'm watching the baby." Izzy means her youngest brother Ricky, who was six, not an infant. But that was what her family called their youngest member. "Gotta watch my language."
"So, how was the Open House at Messing, Izzy? I don't want to be a total time hog." I leaned back against the wall with my open suitcase on my lap. It was the only way I could use the seaglass without Grace seeing it if she walked into the room.
"Not as interesting as your first day at Hawthorn, but I do have a couple of annoying little tag-alongs. They practically followed me onto the wrong bus home."
"You guys are so lucky, going to schools where you don't have to stay overnight and swan around at a bunch of stupid mixers."
"That sounded heinous," said Izzy. "The way they put candid pictures up there without any warning. I mean, who does that to a room full of teenagers?"
"I don't know, Izz." Cadence sighed. "It's hard to remember everyone's name and match them up with their faces on the first day, so I think that's something I'd actually like. But I'm a mermaid, so..."
"Oh, you would have been totally at home in there, Cadence." I groaned. "You've never h
ad a hard time fitting in." I grinned at the mental image of Cadence totally showing Charity's mean girl squad up with her amiable chatter.
"We'll see how that goes when I start my first day tomorrow." I heard Cadence take a puff from her inhaler, which told me she was more nervous than she let on. "It's easy getting along with mundanes, but shifters don't have the best view of mermaids since the Boston Internment. I'll probably hang out with the changelings."
"Well, if things go wrong and you need to talk about it, you know where to go." Izzy snorted. "Under the sea."
We all laughed at the old joke. Cadence gave up protesting years ago that she wasn’t allowed anywhere in the ocean besides the shallows in the Bay. Something about her parents' agreement which enabled them to live on land.
"So, are you and Dylan dating yet?" Cadence tittered.
"No, not dating anyone." I cringed, forgetting they couldn't see me. "Nobody would want to, anyway."
"Oh, no." I heard Izzy slap a hand on some surface, imagining her family's kitchen table. "You're not going to get all boy-crazy like our merfriend here, are you, Aliyah?"
"I'm just trying to make friends, not influence people into dating me by mistake." I sighed, leaning my cheek against Ember's flank. "After today, I doubt anyone's interested. Which is good, because I've got too much to worry about right now."
"Speaking of you getting into trouble, maybe we shouldn't press our luck on this little conference call." Cadence was often silly, but any time she said something sensible, she was usually right. "I mean, I'm surprised setting a table on fire didn't get you kicked out, but you're probably on thin ice, so—"
"She's right. It stinks, but I think we ought to get going." Izzy agreed. "Are you coming home this weekend?"
"Yeah, I think so. Unless something else happens. You're the clairvoyant, so maybe you'd know before I do." I couldn't believe I was this unsure of myself, punting a decision this simple at my best friend's extrahuman ability.
"It's in the cards, yeah." Izzy chuckled. "And I foresee Dylan coming out with us for a little while, too. And from what you tell me, I'd like to meet Hal Hawkins, the space magus. Seems like a good guy to know."
"I'll ask." I shrugged. Hearing their voices made it easy to forget they couldn't see me. "Dylan will come out unless he has to work. And Hal, probably. But I can't say for sure until I ask."
“Cool,” Cadence said.
"Hey, you guys, thanks." I closed my eyes, the weight of the day's events falling on me as I prepared to end my lifeline call. "I really appreciate you listening to me tonight."
"I'd say any time, but that horrible rule means you have to be careful." I heard the rustle of fabric on Cadence's end. "I'm gonna give you the biggest hug in the world next time I see you."
"Better make that a group hug," Izzy added.
"Thanks again. You're both awesome, talk to you later."
I took my hand off the glass, watching the light inside it fade as the call ended. The entire room felt darker, like it had closed in on me. As I zipped the suitcase shut around my only connection to the world outside Hawthorn Academy, tears rolled down my face. I barely had the presence of mind to tuck the case back under my bed. After that, I flopped back, displacing Ember. As she fluttered to perch on the headboard, I flung my arm across my puffy eyes.
"I wish I was anywhere but here."
I didn't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't my roommate walking in the door as if in response to my statement of misery. I felt my cheeks heat up and immediately took three calming breaths. The last thing I wanted was an embarrassment-induced firestorm right here in my room.
"I'd say that your wish is my command, but I'm no Djinn." Grace held the door open, letting Lune in behind her. "Are you okay?"
"Um." I removed my arm from my face so I could see hers. I expected sympathy at best, pity at worst.
Grace looked like she hadn't slept in days. Lune was even limping, and she had carried him half the day. I sat up immediately.
"That's a question I could also ask you."
"Aren't we like two peas in a pod, then?" She yawned, slurring some of her words.
"Maybe." I shrugged. "But you didn't almost burn down the cafeteria."
"No." Grace rubbed her eyes. When she took her hands away, they looked dull. "It would have been worse than that if I'd lost it."
Grace didn't sit on her bed so much as drop like a sack of potatoes. She pushed her shoes off with her feet, leaving them where they landed. After that, she turned her head toward the dresser, gazing as though it was leagues away.
"Do you want to talk about it?" I tilted my head to one side, trying to figure out if I should call Nurse Smith.
"Not really." Her head bowed like an invisible hand had pushed it down. "Just need darkness. And probably sleep."
"Okay, then. I was about to turn in. Just want to brush my teeth and put on pajamas." I stood. "Can I get you anything?"
"Dunno. Just do your thing. I guess."
I shuffled toward the dresser to grab some clothes, along with my bathroom bag. This was one of the items on the school list, to make using the dormitory restrooms more convenient. I hadn't been in one yet, but Noah had told me plenty over the summer.
"Come on, Ember. I'll be back," I said as I pushed open the door, which wasn't locked from inside. Her lack of response made me pause, staring at the palm-sized rectangle beside the door. "Do you want the lights off?"
"Yeah."
Ember glided toward me and sailed through the door.
I pressed my hand against that smooth surface on the wall and the solar globes went dark. I stepped into the warmly lit hallway and shut the door behind me, leaving my roommate in darkness, probably for the first time today. My familiar landed on my shoulder. Shuffling across the hall to the bathroom gave me a few moments alone with some new thoughts.
Grace hadn’t told me what element of magic she has. Based on her bond with Lune the moon hare and her need for darkness, she had to be an umbral magus, but without the affinity that makes some of them totally forgettable. This place was brightly lit all the time with solar magic, and her energy's opposite. Maybe that was the cause of her extreme exhaustion.
Ember fluttered to a perch carved into the row of sinks, clearly there just so flying familiars would have a place to sit. While brushing my teeth, I began to wonder whether we'd both been cursed somehow, or perhaps unwittingly angered a luck-wielding Tanuki. This many unlucky events all at the same time felt like more than coincidence.
Extrahumans don't believe in fate. Magic is more complicated than it seems, and it's got patterns. Over millennia of recorded history, we’ve discovered that those can be tracked, and we called it coincidence. When the pattern has a net positive outcome, we call it good and try to repeat events, reinforcing the cycle. But when it's net negative, everything's on hard mode.
Maybe I could look for a pattern, something that would help me find a workaround.
After putting my toothbrush away, I washed my face, then headed to the back of the restroom. Ember followed, swooping behind me. Across from the sinks were toilets, of course, making this section look like a hall with plumbing. But past those, the room opened up. Space wasn't a problem here at Hawthorn Academy, so, of course, the bathing and changing areas were luxurious.
The layout was like a Roman bath, with a section for changing and tubs of three different temperatures, plus a steam room and a sauna. Most students wore bathing suits in the tubs because they're communal.
Plain old showers stood across from the changing section, which had curtained cubbies for privacy. I shouldn't have said plain or old. The showers were great, with three heads per stall and beautiful tiles that changed color with water temperature.
I ignored all that, stepping into a cubby with all my stuff. The wall had several hooks plus another perch for flying familiars. There was even a mat under the bench in there for the earthbound variety. Changing into my comfy pajamas and cozy socks was my only goal, so I did that
quickly. I'd shower in the morning. Just as I sat on the bench and pulled on one striped fluffy sock, I heard a rustle of fabric followed by a sob. The sound pinned me down.
Who besides me would have come in here to have a cry at this hour?
Chapter Sixteen
The curtained cubby hid me from whoever was there. I realized this entire situation could turn into another disaster if I reacted without thinking. The girl out there didn’t need that so I kept quiet, hoping Ember would do the same.
But of course, she didn't.
If there was one consistent thing about my familiar, it was that she loved rushing in. I reached up, trying to coax her on to my lap so she'd sit nicely instead of flying out there.
Because of our bond, I knew that was what she wanted to do.
On most days, that'd also be my choice. Today, nothing I decided to do went right. I waved, flapped my arms, and made silly faces, but Ember didn’t pay attention. She craned her neck, turning one side toward the curtain. I watched her haunches bunch as she prepared to take off.
A moment later, she froze because Faith's Sha Seth whined nearby.
Finally, Ember noticed me and saw something in my posture that undid the tension in hers. The dragonet glided down to my lap, where she let me cradle her in my arms. Arcing her neck up so her mouth was beside my ear, she breathed two times, in and out.
"Peep?" she whispered.
I couldn't respond without being overheard, so I just patted her back, then scratched the ridge between her wings. She trembled, though whether in fear of the Sha or the desire to check on his partner was a mystery to me.
Usually, it was the other way around. Sha feared fire dragonets because fire is the opposite of unliving magic. In ancient lore, the doglike creatures used to seek out desecrated graves, guiding magi with that energy to right the wrongs done to final resting places. During wars between ancient peoples, some undeath magi used their powers to raise dead soldiers right on the battlefield. It was fire magi like me who fought back.