Almost immediately, my eyes began to droop. My limbs were so heavy it was like I was being weighted to the ground. In my thoughts a shadow crept through the halls. The shadow wasn’t affixed to a physical body. It coasted through walls the way the Nephilim teleported through space and time. I tried to follow but I was limited by being corporeal. I watched as the shadow swept through a hallway I didn’t recognise. One by one it entered the rooms. Though it didn’t spend much time in each, the darkness seemed to grow denser as it moved down the hallway.
I really wanted to lie down. It had been such a long day. Just as the shadow morphed through a wall to come to a stop at the beginning of my corridor, my eyes snapped open. The chilli popped as it boiled.
Remember.
The word reverberated in my mind. Even though my stomach was churning from unease, I picked up a spoon and scooped up some chilli. After blowing it cool, I shoved it into my mouth. When the spicy, savoury sensation hit my tongue, the nausea receded. My stomach growled. Turning off the fire, I sat within the circle taking spoonfuls of chilli from the cauldron. With each bite, the edge of darkness in my mind cleared. My tongue burned from the heat of the chilli peppers, but it was the best I’d felt in days. I ate until my stomach groaned.
I glanced down at the cauldron and smiled. Yeah, my chances of beating the supernaturals in a physical fight were zero. Next year I would have to take part in my first trial to test my knowledge before entering the senior campus. It was something I wasn’t particularly looking forward to. But even if I failed, I had the ability to bring happiness to people through the food I cooked. That had been Grammy’s gift. Maybe Great-grandfather wasn’t the only one I’d taken after.
The whole point of the potion in the chilli was that it would keep me awake for at least a few days. Not wanting to waste the time in my room, I cleaned up the circle and packed the chilli into a container. Then I put away my things. When I was done, I drew a protection circle with the chalk and left to head to the library.
I wasn’t at all surprised when I closed the door to the dorms and a figure stepped out of the tree line. “I don’t really appreciate being stalked.”
His attention was solely on the container in my hands. I passed it over to him. “Be careful,” I said. “It’s spicy.”
“Where do you think you’re going at this time of night?” He fell into step beside me. I could ask him the same question. Instead, I chose one that had been bugging me all day.
“Aren’t you worried someone will see you?”
He opened the container and dipped his finger into the sauce, completely ignoring the presence of the plastic spoon that was ingeniously tucked into the lid. Shifters! They didn’t give a damn about being civil.
“Why would I be worried someone might see me?”
I twined my hands behind my back. “Earlier when those girls saw us, you looked like you wanted to disappear.”
“What girls?” He was seriously eating with his hands. He caught me staring and grinned. “Sounds to me like you’re the one who doesn’t want to be seen.”
“Never mind. You know there’s a spoon?”
“What?” He looked at the lid. “Oh.” So of course he wiped his hands on his jeans.
“Shouldn’t you be asleep?” I asked as we reached the library.
“Don’t feel tired.”
“That’s funny. That’s almost the complete opposite of how everybody else seems to be feeling.”
“You think so?”
“Maybe it’s just a junior campus thing.”
Max frowned. He ran his fingers through his hair. Not many guys could pull off looking good with that slightly floppy haircut. Then again, Max Thompson wasn’t most guys.
“Now that you mention it, I think some of the Fae might have been missing from Weaponry and Combat yesterday.” His frown deepened. His head shook like he’d done the night I’d thrown the wolfsbane fireball at him. “I can’t seem to remember who I’ve seen and when.” He smacked his palm against his temple a couple of times like he thought rattling his brain might help. If his jaw line got any harder, it might fracture.
It was at that point that I realised we hadn’t passed any vampires on the way to the library. I paused with my hand on the door and glanced around us. Max stilled beside me, a spoonful of chilli halfway into his mouth. “What?”
“Where is everybody?”
“It’s the middle of the night. What were you expecting?”
I shook my head. “Normally there are at least a few vamps milling about.”
“Well, I for one am glad they’re not around.”
His tone was breezy, but when I looked up into his face, his eyes had turned watchful. “What do you need to do in here?”
“Nothing in particular, just killing time until the morning. You can go if you want.”
“There’s a no-food policy in the library.”
My lips twitched. I managed to refrain from grinning because of the frown on his face. After a moment, he sighed and placed the lid on the container. If I’d been sitting down, I would have fallen off my chair.
“I hope you realise the magnitude of this,” Max said as he followed me into the library. I did realise how huge this was. What I didn’t understand was why. When I asked, he just winked at me.
“I assume you’ve had friends before?” he said.
I almost tripped over my own feet at the thought of being friends with Max Thompson. It was unheard of. As
