“Oh, yes,” she said. “We’re just getting used to everything. Bloodline doesn’t allow necromancy.”
“Yes, of course. This will take some getting used to.” He turned to me. “But I understand both of you are gifted in this field. I’m glad you have decided to venture out of your comfort zone.”
Sadly, we stayed well within said comfort zone for the rest of the class. The others summoned and extinguished spirits left, right, and centre. Sophie and I merely watched.
It was both a relief and a disappointed when the bell rang. I groaned silently as I got up off the cushion. I was massaging my right thigh to dispel the pins and needles when Professor Flint appeared again.
“Alessia.” I glanced up to find him right beside me. How did these supernaturals move so silently?
“Yes?”
“I understand Andrei Popescu had been giving you a bit of a hard time.” Hah! Total understatement. It was only then I remembered I still had the cat’s heart in my backpack. “I know it’s hard to see right now. But Andrei wasn’t always so...bleak. I apologise in advance for his actions. And I hope you’ll try and be open-minded for his sake.”
I didn’t know what else to say. He gave me a nod. “Oh, Professor? How exactly would someone go about removing a curse from a still-beating cat’s heart?”
He didn’t even blink an eye at my strange question. “You need to pierce it with a magical weapon and speak the words of light for rest.”
I scratched at me cheek. “And those words of rest would be...”
Okay, now that chagrined look I was used to. “Shamayin.”
He made me repeat it a couple dozen times until I wasn’t completely destroying the pronunciation. Then he made me repeat it again for good measure.
“Is it just me,” Sophie said as we raced to Herbology, “or were the Nightbloods a hell of a lot nicer than the other so-called enlightened species?”
I had been thinking the exact same thing.
Sophie and I were a tiny bit late for Herbology. Thankfully, this was the one class where I could coast a little. It was no surprise that only one or two of the Fae from Pantheon had chosen to join this class. It wasn’t even all that popular with the Bloodline students. I wasn’t surprised to see the Evil Three amongst the weeds. Peter and Thalia were making us “identify” foreign plants. Otherwise known as weeding the raised beds using free student labour. I was hunched over the Tuscan Kale bed cursing the prolific nature of chickweed when Peter found me.
“How are things going?” he asked. He sat down heavily on the knee-high wooden sleepers that bordered each bed.
“Not bad. Though right now I’m wondering why we don’t use spells to stop weeds from growing in here.”
He only smiled at me. “Weeding gives you time to think.”
True. Unfortunately, all I could think about at the moment was whether the cat’s heart was leaving blood stains in my backpack. It occurred to me that he was referring to his own thinking. While he was talking to me, his attention often strayed to where the Evil Three were kneeling in the dirt. I suspect it wasn’t them he was actually seeing.
“Is she still not speaking to you?” I asked. Though I had been able to force her to let go of Terran, Rachel was on no-speaking terms with a lot of people.
Peter sighed. His entire body hunched over as though he was weary to his very bones. “Her mother was always the one who dealt with this kind of thing,” he said. “I never know what to say to get through to her.”
I reached out for his hand. “Maybe she just needs some time.”
“I suppose so.”
After helping me with a small patch of chickweed, he groaned and got up. “Peter,” I said. “Any chance I can leave class ten minutes early to do something important?”
He cast a wary glance at my backpack. “You can leave now if you like. Thalia is already saying she needs to do a cleaning spell to get those bad vibes out of the garden.”
“Why didn’t you say something earlier?”
He shrugged. “I wasn’t sure if it was something different you’re trying on account of your newly acquired powers.”
The indignation was strong. Huffing, I grabbed a trowel from the potting shed and stole out of the kitchen garden. I cast around in all directions. Where the heck should I do this? Definitely somewhere obscured. The last thing I needed was for someone to walk in on me. If I were a cat, I’d like to be buried close to a wide-open space where I could run and climb.
There was a dense patch of catnip in the grove of olive and fig trees in between the junior and senior campuses. Giselle would rip my arm off if I was late to training so I bolted as quickly as I could. The shifted Academy layout didn’t help. Finally, I found the right path. The high brick wall of the walled garden came into view. It was only a short distance from there to the junior campus bridge. I turned the corner at a breakneck pace and almost snapped my spine when I screeched to a stop at the sight in front of me. Beneath the dappled shade of a pair of figs, Kai was standing there with his arms around Chanelle.
19
They raised their heads at the sound of my stomping feet. For the millionth time I cursed my human noisiness and my inability to teleport. I wasn’t sure which of the two of them was more surprised. What got me was that I wasn’t. Somewhere in the back of my mind, the voice of my twelve-year-old self piped up. “Told you so,” she said. “Did you really think you could hold on to him?” Everybody you care about goes away.
Kai immediately dropped his arms but Chanelle
