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As for her other classes, she actually had to participate in them. To say they were ‘strange’ didn’t even begin to come close to the truth.

Chemistry was taught by a complete wacko of a professor, Fitzwilliam Grey, who only answered to ‘Fitzy’. He fit the stereotypical description of ‘crazy scientist’ so well that Alex wondered if he had inspired the cliché. Almost laughably, he greatly enjoyed blowing things up—the more explosive, the better. The subject itself was also nothing at all like what she expected. Apparently ‘Chemistry’ was an ambiguous term in Medora, where they dealt with the formulaic creation of what Alex still considered to be magic, despite her friends’ arguments to the contrary. Nothing they did in their class should have been possible, and yet, to Alex’s unending confusion, it was.

The Core Skills teacher, Professor Astrid Marmaduke, was the polar opposite of Fitzy. She was also extremely frustrated by Alex’s inability to exhibit any kind of gifting. Since Core Skills focused on controlling one’s gift, Alex found herself in a predicament. But her anxiety turned to awe when Marmaduke demonstrated her own gift—a combination of low-level mind arts, including moving objects telekinetically and reading surface thoughts from another person’s mind. It was kind of freaky, but also pretty awesome. Alex wondered again what her own gift might be—if she did actuallyhaveone. Until it presented itself, Core Skills was going to be a waste of her time.

Alex’s History class turned out not to be as boring as she expected. The enigmatic teacher, Doc, kept his students entertained with his worldly tales of adventure. He was easily the smartest man Alex had ever met, as evidenced when he randomly broke into other languages. Apparently he was fluent in twenty-seven different dialects—twenty-six of which Alex had never heard of before.

The Equestrian Skills instructor, Tayla, was just as cool as Jordan had promised. But despite her friendliness, Tayla still told Alex that she would have to prove herself before joining the Epsilon class proper—a class that, to Alex’s annoyance, included her still-incensed-for-no-apparent-reason roommate. Fabulous.

As for Alex’s Species Distinction class, it turned out that the teacher had contracted some kind of rare influenza from one of the creatures in his care, which left him quarantined and his students with a free period. Alex wasn’t one to complain—she had alotof homework and was grateful for the added free time—but she was still curious about the subject and looked forward to seeing what it was all about once the teacher was better.

Easily the strangest class she had was Studies of Society and Culture—or SOSAC—but not because of the subject itself. Professor Caspar Lennox was the teacher and one glance had left Alex wondering if he was a vampire. His skin was a mottled grey colour, and his long hair and eyes were the blackest black Alex had ever seen. Even stranger were his feet—or rather, where his feet should have been. It seemed as if he walked on a swirling mass of black cloud. Every step the man—vampire!—took wrapped his feet in the dense black substance. It was downright creepy. Add to that his long, hooded cape, made out of some kind of shimmering black material, and he was officially on Alex’s list of people who she never wanted to meet down a dark alleyway at night.

Fortunately, Jordan was seated next to Alex in her first SOSAC class and he took pity on her wide-eyed stare and whispered, “He’s a Shadow Walker.”

Was that a code word for vampire? Probably not. Akarnae had some admittedly questionable teaching staff, but she doubted that a lean, mean, blood-drinking machine would be allowed to educate students on a day-to-day basis.

So, a Shadow Walker? That definitely sounded awesome.

Despite Caspar Lennox’s disturbing appearance, his voice was melodious and soothing as he delivered his lecture about the dignitaries of Tryllin—Medora’s capital city—and the governing monarchy. Alex learned that King Aurileous Cavelle was the current ruler, and he lived in Tryllin with his wife, Osmada Cavelle, and their only child. Apparently the entire royal family was beloved by the people—or so claimed Caspar Lennox.

When the SOSAC teacher moved on from the royal discussion, Alex quickly lost concentration. How was she ever supposed to remember that Samson Graver, the one-eyed juggler from Dupressa, was related to Preston Ballantyne, the current High Court judge of a place called Mardenia? And really, who cared?

All in all, it was a strange class. But so were all her classes at Akarnae. Alex had no doubt that without Jordan and Bear, she never would have survived her first day at the academy, let alone her entire first week. And her continued existence trulywasa miracle, since half of her teachers were slave-driving psychopaths, her subjects ranged from unethical to downright deadly, and her roommate, D.C., made her feel like a walking disease.

Jordan and Bear were Alex’s anchors; if not for them, she would have left the academy and searched for the headmaster on her own despite having no idea where he was. But the three of them had become rock-solid friends and Alex was willing to keep on waiting for Marselle’s return as long as they continued to cheer her up at the end of each increasingly difficult day. She’d met a few of her other classmates, but everyone was so focused that they barely paid her any attention. Jordan and Bear, though… well, they made the effort. And she was beyond grateful.

Another thing she was grateful for was the meeting she’d had with Jarvis mid-way through the week. The administrator had called her to his office and explained more about Medora, telling her that the world itself was similar to her Earth—Freya—in that it had started out as one massive supercontinent, but instead of the land breaking apart into smaller continents, natural disasters had ripped Medora’s coastlines to shreds and submerged whole chunks of land under the ocean. In the end, what was left was one single land mass which was given the same name as the world—Medora. It was separated in the middle by the Durungan Ranges, a collection of mountains that spread from the eastern shore right across to the western sea cliffs. For the sake of simplicity, anything located north of the mountains was called the Northland, and anything located to the south was the Southland.

The names were completely lacking in creativity, but whatever.

She’d also learned that Akarnae was located in the south of the Northland, right in the heart of Medora. And, even better, the seasons were exactly like what she was used to back on Freya—with the Northland being like the Northern Hemisphere of Earth, and the Southland being like the Southern Hemisphere. Even the dates matched up, including the school year which was from August to June, when the academy broke up for summer holidays. So weird. But it simplified everything for her, at least. Which meant that, once more, she decided just to accept the strangeness.

Sometimes that was easier said than done, and by the end of the week when Friday evening finally rolled around, Alex was exhausted. Classes had finished for the day and she, Jordan and Bear were sitting in the Rec Room with Connor and Mel, two of their age-based classmates who happened to be cousins. The five of them were finishing up with their Med Sci homework, and Alex was struggling to keep her eyes open.

“What do you think, Alex?”

She looked up from her work, trying to clear the cobwebs from her mind. “Huh?”

Her friends laughed at her deer-in-the-headlights confusion, until Mel took sympathy on her and said, “You look wrecked. Maybe you should call it a night?”

Alex nodded in agreement. “Yeah, I think I might. This week has been insane. I’ll see you all later.”

After a round of goodnights, Alex retreated upstairs to her dorm. D.C. was already in bed reading a book and her startlingly blue-green eyes narrowed in displeasure when Alex stepped into their shared space.

“You can glare at me all you want, but it’s not going to change the fact that this is my room too,” Alex said, too tired to care if she sounded rude.

“Maybe I’m hoping that one of these days you’ll get the hint that you’re not welcome,” D.C. said, her gaze moving back to her book.

Alex snorted. “Trust me, I’ve been reading you loud and clear all week. But this is me not caring.”

With that, Alex settled into bed for the night. The week’s events caught up to her the moment her head hit the pillow and she was sound asleep before her roommate could even voice a snarky reply.

Nine

Crunch, crunch, crunch.

A strange noise woke Alex the next morning. It was so out of place in her otherwise quiet room that she snapped her eyes open and bolted upright in a panic. Her quick movement almost caused her to smack straight into the smirking face of Jordan, who was sitting on the edge of her bed, eating from a bowl of cereal.