by Lucy Auburn
Olivia warned me it would be hard sometimes, not being a legacy kid. She would know; apparently she’s one of few shifters born to an unknown bloodline. What she didn’t warn me is that one reason why it’s hard is because most of these shifter and phoenix families have money and connections from centuries of doing business with each other.
And all I’ve got is teal hair dye fading from my hair and four snarky assholes I’m going to miss after tonight.
“Alright, class, we have something new to cover today.” Mr. Johnson—I just can’t think of the man as Ocean—glances into our ranks, eyes briefly stopping at me before he moves onto the student next to me. “We’re going to talk about all the varieties of phoenix, and their known origins, most especially White Phoenix.”
Great. I can feel every single pair of eyes in the classroom swing to me, and wonder miserably how long it’ll be before Black Phoenix come up.
Guess I’m popular now, in my own way.
“So.” Olivia plops her tray down next to me at lunch; for the first time, I actually beat everyone else here, maybe because I wanted desperately to get away from all the eyes on me in Phoenix History. “Tell us about what happened last night. Petra gave me some info she got from the headmaster while she was on duty last night, but even she was sketch on the deets.”
I shove a few fries into my mouth to keep from answering, but as Liam and Sam join us at the table it quickly becomes obvious that I’ll have to talk. Even Petra swings by, a fruit salad and two slices of toast on her tray as she sits down.
It’s weird that a carnivorous wolf has a tiny human body that sustains itself wholly on carbs.
Shifters. And here I thought demons were the freaky ones.
“Talk,” she orders me. “You barely even seemed shaken up this morning. Shouldn’t you be like... freaking out or something?”
I should be. A normal person would probably panic for days. Maybe I’m just shell-shocked after everything that’s gone on since that night on the cliffs.
But no, that’s not it; I know what’s going on instinctively. I’ve lived on the street for two years, and barely had a stable life before then. I’ve had a lot of experience with feeling like my life is being threatened.
The others don’t get it.
I just shrug at them. “The danger is past. Meyer said he warded this whole place so no one like the White Phoenix or that Grim from last night can come in again. So why worry?”
Liam stares at me, fork halfway to his mouth. “Are you a mutant?”
“Yeah, seriously,” Sam mutters. “I’d be curled up in a ball on my bed by now if I were you.”
“If I did that, I’d just be giving this crazy demon mask guy more of myself than he deserves,” I point out. “I’ll worry about it by focusing harder in classes.” Easier said than done, Dani. “Plus, aren’t you guys supposed to protect phoenix like me? That’s basically the whole point of this place.”
“Well, Dani, we’d keep you safe,” Petra says drolly, “but you seem incapable of staying behind the protective walls.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Even though the thought of sticking to one place, making it my home, chills me to my core—I know now that I’m going to have to do it. “I’m never leaving here again. They’ll probably find my bones in the basement when they excavate the place. If the academy even has a basement.”
“If it does,” Petra quips, “I’ll gladly chain you up there if it means I never have to stay up all night working security detail again.”
“So tell us already.” Liam leans forward, sparks in his eyes. “What happened?”
Slowly, haltingly, I tell them how helpless I was. How I couldn’t even call my demons. “Can we meet them?” Olivia asks excitedly. I don’t have the heart to tell her they’re going away. “Don’t be stupid,” Sam scowls at her, “it’s not like they’re pets.”
They basically are.
But don’t tell them I thought that.
“So what happens next?” Liam asks aloud.
I blink at him. “Well, we’re safe I guess, so just... classes.”
He looks at me like I’ve misheard him entirely. “No, not that. I mean... there’s a Grim teacher here. You’re a Black Phoenix and you can summon demons. How are things going to change? Will we get to practice fighting actual demons in class? Oh my god.” His eyes widen as a thought occurs to him. “Fisk is gonna love this! I bet he’ll want you to give us demonstrations for Group Combat skirmishes on the weekends.”
“The weekends?”
“Yeah. He has all second years and upperclassmen practice on the lawn. I thought you saw?”
“I was kinda busy dying-not-dying and running away and all that. Plus I don’t believe in leaving my room for anything that doesn’t involve food.”
“Well, he’ll probably recruit you to help train.” I don’t like how excited this makes Liam. “I mean, if you can summon demons, imagine the possibilities! No more theories, just real life combat.”
I groan at this.
Here I thought that at least now, I’d be done with Group Combat forever.
Some tortures never end.
Chapter 5
Monday, 2:00 PM, Grim Training with Leo Meyer
I’m still sweating from Hand-to-Hand Combat—apparently I can throw Sam down to the ground if I try hard enough—when I realize I have no idea where to go for Grim training. All the rest of the classes are marked on a map on the back of my schedule, not to mention it’s pretty easy to find a giant gym full of weapons racks. I have no clue where this class will be held, since all the other subjects have assigned classrooms to meet their needs, from fireproofing for Phoenix Fire to desks for the history classes.
You’d think the headmaster would’ve mentioned this to me. Or Petra. They’re all up in my business in other ways. Staring at the long hallways as students head towards the next class, some of them clutching flowers and notes in their hands, I try not to think too hard about all the things I’ve seen.
Leila with the sword through her middle. Richard getting his just desserts. Kayla, who hated me, dying—but at least not suffering, because I brought Sebastian to her.
Victoria’s haunted eyes as I broke her chains and brought death to her doorway.
I shake them all off, my heart squeezing. For a moment, my pulse races, and I panic—I don’t want to see them. I can’t say goodbye now and again tonight.
But inevitably, here they are.
“There’s nothing here.” Ezra’s voice is quiet; when I glance over at him, where he leans against the wall, his eyes are shadowed. He doesn’t quite look at me, as if he’s hiding something. “I thought we weren’t going to talk again until you were ready to perform the ritual. You’re just in class, Dani. You can’t possibly need us.”
For some reason, for the first time, his sanctimonious bossy tone gets to me. “Yeah, well, I did need you last night. And you weren’t there for me.”
An expression flits across his face. Lynx, flinching, mutters, “Ouch.”
“It’s not our fault.” Mateo sounds resentful. “I didn’t enjoy watching you... watching you...”
“Chained up just like us.” Sebastian is blunt, razor-sharp, a little bitter as always. “Watching you go through what we go through every time you summon us like this.”
My stomach plummets, and suddenly I almost feel like I could lose my lunch.
“Hey.” Mateo’s voice is soft, so unlike himself. “She didn’t pick this either.”
I can hear footsteps behind me in the hallway; if I don’t end this soon, I’ll wind up talking to myself, or worse, getting upset.
And I didn’t even put on my waterproof mascara.
Stupid demons. Stupid powers. Stupid saying goodbye.
I close my eyes. Breathe deep. Consider that Yohan may have actually taught me some useful things, even if I still remain unable to summon my wings on purpose or burn shit up with my hands. I don’t look at them; I can’t. I don’t want to know what they’
re thinking or feeling.
But somehow, just by trying to avoid it, I feel it anyway.
Ezra’s frustration. Mateo’s unexpected sadness. Lynx is moping, inexplicably.
Sebastian is feeling such despair that I wonder why he can’t take his own pain away.
“What’s going on?” It’s Meyer, the lines at the corners of his eyes smudged with tiredness. His eyes flit to me and briefly around the hallway, a frown creasing his mouth. “I can sense something, but I can’t... see it.”
“They’re here,” I tell him, overlapping with Mateo muttering, “Still don’t like that guy.”
“Well, it’s a good thing I came to fetch you and bring you to our classroom, then. The longer you spend tied to this quartet, the tighter the bond will become—and we can’t have that.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ll explain. Let’s get to class.”
I follow him down the hallway, the steps towards the back door, and out into the bright green land that stretches towards the back dormitories and a gymnasium-like building used solely to train the shifters in transformation. As we pass by the glass double doors, I glance inside to see how the other paranormal half lives. There’s a huge ring of space being cleared around a thin beanpole of a boy. He doesn’t look like much, but before my disbelieving eyes he turns into a rhino.
You’d think their shifter forms would match their human ones, but somehow they don’t.
Mateo whistles. “I sure could use some muscle like that.”
“I don’t know, it seems kind of weird.” Lynx shudders. “I like having just the one body.”
I want to respond, but it seems weird to engage them in conversation with Meyer right here. Especially when he seems to oppose their very existence for reasons I don’t understand. I let my eyes wander, and snatch Sebastian’s gaze, the haunted expression in his blue eyes making me nearly miss a step.
He looks away, and Ezra watches him, radiating disapproval. Yet again something is going on that I don’t quite understand. I force myself to look back towards the shifters; one of them is turning into a panther now, sleek and agile, leaping onto a balance beam into the middle of the gym. I wish my own powers came to me with such simple understanding.
Noticing that I’m lagging, Meyer slows his steps and lets his eyes follow my gaze. “Most of those students have been doing that since they were twelve, if not earlier. Shifter powers, unlike phoenix powers, come with puberty.”
“It’s still awesome.” We pass the building, the path beneath us breaking up with scrub. I frown at Meyer. “There’s nothing past this building.”
“Nothing on the map,” he corrects me. “Given my current popularity at the academy, I felt it would be... unwise for us to practice your powers around the other students. Some of the things Grims can do can be a little unsettling.”
Mateo quips, “Does he mean the slavery? Or the rib-cracking and heart stealing, I can never forget which is considered worse.”
I try to make myself ignore him, though after my experience last night, being led into dark, untamed land by a Grim makes me nervous. There may not be a siren around at all, but it’s still unsettling.
So I decide to get my mind off it by feeding my curiosity. “How exactly do I just... know what things are? Last night, I knew that was a siren demon. And when I died and came back the night I became a phoenix, I woke up knowing that the demons were demons. But I didn’t know that before.”
Sebastian mutters, “You’d think it’d be obvious, what with all the disemboweling and dick mangling.”
“We all know you’re proud. Stop distracting her.” Ezra crosses his arms over his chest. “You’ll make her dismiss us, and I want to keep my eyes on this guy.”
I don’t open my mouth to point out that after tonight, he won’t be able to keep his eyes on me at all. Lynx points it out for me, though. “We’re going away.” Then he adds, “So I guess we better make sure that if we’re leaving Dani with this guy, he’s not one of the bad Grims.”
“They’re all bad Grims.”
I ignore Sebastian’s muttering and try to focus back on Meyer. He hasn’t answered my question yet; he’s watching me, glancing around like he can almost but not quite see the demons.
“Right now, I can sense energy fields around me that I’m starting to realize must be this quartet that has attached itself to you. I felt an echo of it earlier, but it’s stronger now—maybe they’re closer, or maybe the emotions are much stronger. Part of what has linked you to these demons against your will is, I suspect, emotional in nature. And we’re going to clear it up together—but first we have to get to the classroom. So I need you to focus on me, not on anything going on around you. And I’ll explain when we reach the classroom.”
I nod, forcing my eyes away from the demons, ignoring the scowl Sebastian sends Meyer’s way and the tension brewing around them. They know by now how to be quiet when I’m concentrating on a class; if they don’t want me to dismiss them to that nowhere place, they’ll let me concentrate.
With a grumble, they subside. And I don’t let myself look at them or think about them as Meyer leads me deeper into the underbrush, through a trail seemingly only he’s aware of, the stalks of weeds and overgrown bushes chopped roughly around us like he came at them with a machete first thing this morning. For all I know he did.
I’d love the chance to get to use a machete, even on some weeds. Kade hasn’t let us use the bladed weapons yet; he says that’s for upperclassman and we’re liable to hack each other’s limbs if he lets us. But maybe stabbing a few weeds would get my mind off, well, everything.
“Alright. There it is: our new classroom.”
Pointing ahead of us, towards a building that hugs the back wall, Meyer shoots me a grin. And all I can do is stare at him.
Does he have a screw loose or something?
“That building looks decrepit. I’m pretty sure the drug den I slept in once was less green-tinged.” It’s true: the building, a squat, old gym from the looks of it, is one story tall and practically the color of a St. Patty’s Day drunk’s outfit. “We can’t practice in there.”
Meyer waves my concerns away. “Minor vegetation overgrowth that I’ll deal with. The inside is perfectly sound, you can be sure of that. It was only ever abandoned because it’s too small for some of the shifters here, and too flammable for most of the phoenix to practice in it. The modern facilities are bulletproof and burn proof.” Casually, he adds, “Just ignore the scorch marks on the front steps.”
Oh, right. Sure the building was a little burned but no worries Dani, step right in. It’s time to learn how to use your powers of evil to do good things. Hope you have a scented candle to light to cover the smell of rot, disuse, and old jock straps.
My skepticism must show on my face, because Meyer just laughs genially and bounds up the steps like he’s not at all concerned by the black marks running up one side of them. “Follow me!”
Well, I guess I’ve done stupider things. Ignoring Ezra’s grumbling, trying not to think of all the spiders that are lurking in the cobwebs that stretch across the staircase and the door, I hesitantly take the first step up. And then figure—fuck it, and bound up the rest right behind him as he unlocks the padlock on the front doors and pushes them open.
Behind me, Mateo can’t stop himself from saying, “Be careful, Dani, this place might be as unstable as the inside of my head.”
I snort, then try not to laugh; I remind myself, again, that it’s nearly time to say goodbye. Eyes front, chin up, step forward. I head into the interior of the small gym, surprised by the intensity of the light that floods it as Meyer flicks on every switch.
He grins at me and motions around at the shiny floor, the mop bucket in one corner, the stepladder leaning up against the wall. “I made sure to fix it up when I got the chance. I don’t want your first impressions of being a Grim to be dingy and dark.”
“Oh, unlike her actual first impressions of Grims, which involved t
hem trying to steal her heart?” I can practically feel Mateo scowling at my back, and Ezra trying to get him shut up already. “This guy is as full of shit as every other Grim.”
Refusing to acknowledge him, I tell Meyer, “Thanks.”
“She’s ignoring us.” Lynx sounds petulant. “Fine, Ezra, I’ll shut up. We’ll just line up against the wall and act like we’re ghosts who don’t matter. Nevermind that he knows we’re here.”
“So, Dani. Let’s get started.”
Meyer strides to the middle of the gym floor; there are no chairs, no desks, so I awkwardly follow and stand opposite him, feeling foolishly like I’m about to play a game of Horse instead of learn how to use powers I don’t understand.
“What do you know about your powers?” Meyer asks me. “Not the phoenix fire or your wings, or the ability to regenerate and come back from the dead, but the Grim side of you. The part of you that makes you a Black Phoenix.”
“Very little,” I admit. “I know... I know that Grims can control demons. And some of them practice necromancy, to bring back the dead. I didn’t really pay attention to much of the stuff besides the part about Grims liking to kill phoenix and take their hearts. That part seemed most relevant.”
“And so it would be, if you were trying to understand your enemy. But we’re here because you need to understand yourself, Dani. While you became a phoenix recently, you were born a Grim.” He studies me, pacing back and forth in a tight line. “Did you never know or suspect? Did no one ever tell you? I know you were raised in the system, but it’s hard for me to imagine any Grim clan giving up a Grim-born child, so explain to me what you know about your early childhood.”
My throat tightens, and I fight a wave of unpleasant nausea that rolls through my stomach. “I was really young when I went into the system. I don’t remember much of my life before. Mostly just that my mom died of a drug overdose.”