“Pack your things.
We’re moving to Rhaen’s dorm.”
Elara turned her head quickly.
She hadn’t even had time to process all the information Magnus had just given her, and now Kael was putting more on her mind.
“Why?
I refuse,” Elara retorted immediately.
“At Rhaen’s dorm, there’ll be more people who can look out for you.
There are plenty of empty rooms, and maybe a few more students will join us in the new year.”
“Just one person like you is enough to make me feel like a burden.
Do you want to make me feel even more guilty?”
Kael turned to look at her.
Elara thought he would say something to calm her down, but instead he shot back, blunt as ever, “If you had any sense, you wouldn’t be arguing about this.
Your safety is the most important thing right now.”
Elara stopped arguing.
Kael’s words really shut her up.
They walked in silence after that, their footsteps echoing off the stone walls.
Kael slung her heavy bag over his shoulder without a word.
“I think Magnus can still hear us,” Kael said, glancing back down the empty hallway.
“Please seal Rhaen’s dorm too, Magnus.”
From his room, Magnus replied casually, “You’re asking too much, young man.”
Elara nudged Kael’s arm.
She felt that such words were inappropriate to say to a headmaster.
But Kael just smiled, relieved.
“Magnus will do it.
Trust me,” he said confidently.
“Can I ask you something?” Elara said.
She was hesitant, but her curiosity got the better of her.
“Since when do you ask permission for your stupid questions?” Kael replied in his usual cynical tone.
“You two seem close.
“Who?
Magnus and me?”
Elara nodded, walking two steps ahead of him.
“What do you want to know?”
“Is Magnus a werewolf like you?
I noticed his skin isn’t pale, so–”
Kael shrugged it off.
“Neither.”
“Then?”
“Magnus is human.
But not a weak human like you.”
Elara turned her head, her eyes flashing with annoyance.
There was something about that answer that made her want to ask more–how could a human lead a school full of vampires and werewolves–but she held back.
There were too many questions today, and she wasn’t ready to add another to the list already piling up in her head.
They were almost at the ground floor when she asked again, “What’s the difference?”
Kael didn’t answer right away.
As soon as they reached the ground floor, he took her hand and pulled her closer to his side.
Elara knew there were vampire and werewolf students up ahead–this was Kael’s way of keeping her safe.
She was starting to get used to his hand, so much bigger than her own, though part of her still found this intimacy strange, considering that just a few days ago she didn’t even know this man’s name.
“I’ll tell you later if we have time.
Right now, we need to get you packed.”
Magnus’s room wasn’t far from their dormitory–just one long hallway stood between them.
That afternoon, the hallway was quieter than usual.
Now and then they heard the hurried footsteps of other students passing by, and the wind sighed through the tall windows, carrying the scent of wet leaves from outside.
Kael led her straight to her room on the second floor.
Without saying much, Elara began packing her things.
The room fell silent for a moment, broken only by the sound of pages turning and the rustle of fabric as Elara folded her clothes into her bag.
For the first time since leaving Magnus’s room, she felt she had enough time to catch her breath.
She looked at the stack of books on the table, trying to convince herself that no matter what was happening at Ravencrest, at least tonight she would sleep in a safer place.
The afternoon sunlight streaming through her bedroom window had begun to change color, shifting from a pale yellow to a deep orange that clung to the stone wall.
Elara paused for a moment, letting her eyes follow the line of light as it crept across the floor, before returning to the pile of clothes she hadn’t finished folding. New chapters come out on novelping.com first.
Something about this simple routine–folding, tucking in the edges, and zipping it up–was somehow comforting; for a moment, she could pretend that this was just an ordinary moving day, not an escape from something lurking behind the walls of this school.
As Kael began to look around the cramped little room, his footsteps suddenly stopped.
“Elara?” Kael called out.
Elara, who was busy packing her books into a large bag, barely looked up.
“Hm?”
Her hands quickly gathered everything she needed.
In seconds, she was done.
She turned to look for Kael, but he wasn’t there.
The room felt quieter than before.
Even the wind outside the window seemed to have gone still.
“Kael?
You there?” Elara walked up to the bathroom, the door half open.
“Don’t come closer!” Kael’s voice came from inside.
Somehow, his voice made Elara take a step closer to the door.
Each step felt heavier than it should have, as if her body already knew what awaited her before her mind could catch up.
As Elara reached for the light so the room wouldn’t be too dark for her human eyes, Kael turned his head.
“You never listen, huh?”
A slight metallic scent reached her nose before the light even came on–sharp and cold, the kind that seemed to lodge itself at the back of her throat.
Then, seconds after the light flickered to life, Elara saw something written on the mirror, scrawled in a dark red liquid that left a blurry mark on its surface.
Hi, human.
There were only those two words.
Short enough to make every hair on Elara’s body stand on end.
The floor beneath her shoes felt colder than usual, as if the temperature in that cramped room had dropped a few degrees since she’d entered.
That moment felt like forever.
She held her breath, and her heartbeat sounded too loud in her own ears.
Her gaze shifted to the shower curtain, which faintly revealed something dark behind it.
Kael quickly pulled back the curtain.
The first thing Elara did was scream so loud that her throat was sore.
She had never seen that much blood before, as if someone had just been murdered right there.
The blood pooled on the bathroom floor, refusing to flow into the drain that was supposed to carry it away–just sat there, dark and thick, reflecting the light from the lamp like a shattered mirror.