Page 24 of Malcroix Bones Academy (Bones and Shadow #1)

Worm Hall

We walked into Eustacia Morwormer Hall amid a steady stream of students.

I immediately decided the map hadn’t done it justice.

The stone gods that lined the walls stood twenty to thirty feet tall.

They gazed down at us with faces so detailed, so utterly lifelike, they were positively alarming.

Expressions carved into the stone fluctuated between fierce, stern, protective, pensive, dreamy, angry, and downright dangerous.

A few looked vaguely familiar from books. I also suspected at least some were echoes of gods from Overworld, or vice versa.

Jolie knew a few of their names, but, being significantly more interested in magical medicine and science and far less in ancient gods and history, she admitted she wasn’t the right person to ask.

“That’s Zarthus, I think,” she spoke up brightly at one point. “And I think that’s Kite?vara, with all the heads… and Ba’Tasia, with the head of a cat…”

“I think they call the cat one Bastet in Overworld,” I offered. We looked around at more of the stone giants. “That one there, with the head of an ibis, could be Thoth,” I added, pointing at the stone body of a muscular man in an Egyptian shendyt with a jeweled belt.

Jolie’s nose crinkled. “Never heard of him, sorry.”

I wasn’t surprised.

“Are those Kachinas?” I asked Jolie next, pointing to another two figures.

“I think they’re called Norquikas here,” Jolie said, her brow furrowed. “I don’t know any of their names,” she added after a pause.

“Neither do I,” I admitted.

We studied a few more faces. One reminded me of Tláloc, the Aztec god. Others looked vaguely Japanese. A few reminded me of Indian gods from the Hindu pantheon.

“I guess I’ll need to read up on ancient deities,” I muttered.

I wondered how important any of that was to the study of magic.

No one mentioned gods or goddesses in the bridging course. Was it simply tradition to have statues of them in a ceremonial hall like this? Some eccentricity of the school or its founders? Or did most Magicals actually believe in this stuff?

It seemed like something I might need to know.

I looked up then, and gasped.

The ceiling was a giant, writhing block of carved marble.

A gold serpent took up a large part of the mural, along with bones and vines, roses in silver and gold, rippling banners of the school colors, and more mythological beasts than I knew the names for.

A giant winged horse flew over a sphinx with a beautiful woman’s face.

Wood and water nymphs, harpies, a griffin, what looked like a faun, and a herd of monoceri walked and lounged over the grass.

A cat with the rear body of a snake hung from a tree covered in silver fruit, thick with blue-green leaves.

I stared as the gilded snake coiled and uncoiled sensually while something that might have been a phoenix lazily flapped its wings.

“Leda!”

The sound of my name made me jump, then panic when I realized how loud it had been, and how many people turned to look.

The voice itself was friendly though, and familiar, which was funny to think after not even twelve hours.

Draken grinned from a few tables over, waving for us to join them, and that time, it was my turn to drag Jolie over to one of the dozen, long, wooden tables, where Draken, Miranda, Luc, and another mage I didn’t recognize sat.

Introductions were exchanged all around, and I learned the new face belonged to Luc’s roommate, a nineteen-year-old mage from York who came to study ancient magistory.

His name was Darragh Torrick, and he was soft-spoken, wore glasses, had brown, curly, messy hair, tons of freckles, and eyes of such a light brown they were nearly amber.

I liked him instantly.

Draken, Darragh, and Luc began peppering Jolie with questions, who took it all good-naturedly and asked just as many questions back. While those four were distracted, I took the opportunity to check in with Miranda.

“Draken’s roommate?” I asked first, quirking an eyebrow.

“Sitting with other friends,” Miranda said, scowling and folding her arms.

“And yours?” I asked, even more cautiously.

Miranda grimaced, hesitated, then gave me a fierce look.

“She’s a nightmare,” the lavender-haired witch declared in a low voice.

“Took one look at me, asked who my parents were, then informed me I would be introducing her to my mother as soon as possible so that she could… I don’t know?

Become a movie star? Shag a movie star? Sell skank clothing to movie stars?

” Miranda gritted her teeth. “She apparently wants to be a fashion designer, and imagines herself quite the important person I should be falling all over myself to do favors for. Including subjecting my mother to her bullshit, apparently.”

Miranda paused, her eyes drawn to someone at another table.

Still scowling, she jerked her head in that direction. “There she is now. Should’ve known she’d be chummy with the absolute worst mage in existence.”

I followed Miranda’s gaze.

I startled as soon as I had, shocked to see Elysia Warrington, that haughty, blonde, snobby witch from my bridging course, practically in the lap of the prince prick himself, Caelum Bones.

Warrington slung her arms lightly around his neck as I watched, smiling into his face like she’d just gotten a present.

Bones, for his part, barely seemed to notice. He leaned his head in the opposite direction, speaking in a low voice to another mage, who sat on his other side.

I jumped again when I realized that other mage was Alaric Greythorne.

Good God.

How was my world in Magique this small already?

“You know her,” Miranda said wonderingly. “How in Magique do you know that horrible witch, Leda?”

“I wouldn’t say I know her,” I answered. “But yes, I know who she is.”

I continued to watch the group at the other table.

Nine of them sat there together, likely friends from secondary school.

Three of the dumbest, meanest-looking mages I’d seen so far had unfortunately noticed my stare and stared back with undisguised interest. One leered openly, his small eyes cold as he stared at my chest, only looking away to stare at Miranda in the same general vicinity.

“She was in my bridging course,” I said, still watching the hulking, muscular mage and his two, equally mean and stupid-looking mates. Realizing there was no reason to get that lot more interested in me, I pulled my eyes off them with a grimace.

I looked back at Miranda.

“You’re right,” I said apologetically. “She’s absolutely horrible. How soon can you petition to change roommates? I think it’s warranted in this case.”

Miranda pulled a face.

“I’ll definitely be asking that question tomorrow,” she muttered.

“Or else I may not finish my degree due to being in prison for murder.” She quirked an eyebrow at my laugh.

“Is it really murder, though,” she asked with mock-seriousness.

“If you accidentally throttle someone while you’re sleepwalking one night? ”

I snorted again.

It came out louder than I’d meant, and I covered my mouth.

I felt a stare burning a hole into me then and turned, still smiling, to find Caelum Bones had shifted his gold eyes in my direction.

I met his gaze jarringly.

For some reason, I didn’t look away immediately, or even flip him the bird. Maybe more strangely, he didn’t look away, either. His gold eyes held mine, a faint sneer on his lips.

With an effort, I finally forced my gaze to Alaric.

My summer drinking and study and Dragon’s Keep mate was watching the two of us, his expression alarmed as his hazel eyes flickered between me and Bones. He looked like he was trying to figure out how we even knew one another.

As soon as Alaric noticed me looking at him, he raised an elegant black eyebrow. If we’d been sitting closer together, I would have thrown the question right back at him. What are you asking ME for? He’s YOUR psychotic friend.

I looked back at Miranda.

I realized only then that she was still speaking.

“…Jolie seems completely lovely,” she was complaining.

“She’s funny, smart, nice, and has impeccable taste in clothes.

She even laughed at Luc’s nerd humor just now, which Draken and I usually don’t even get.

How is it you got the absolute best witch on our floor?apart from me and you, of course?and I got the absolute worst? ”

I smiled, and patted my friend on the back.

“We’ll get rid of her,” I sympathized. “If the academy won’t do it, we’ll cast so many uglifying, itching, and incontinence spells on her, she’ll run away on her own.”

“Promise?” Miranda asked, still pouting.

I solemnly drew my finger twice over my chest. “Cross my heart.”

“I would like to welcome all of our first year students,” the middle-aged witch at the podium intoned, her squashy, potato-shaped nose twitching as she tilted it higher in the air.

“We are very pleased to have you with us… despite the Academy having a well-earned reputation for being tough on first-years.”

Her eyes scanned through faces, as if looking for individual Magicals she wanted to make that point with personally.

“Do not expect to see all of your classmates next year,” she intoned gravely. “Generally, one in three of your fellow students will not return after the summer break. The friends you make over the next few years may change as a result…”

I glanced at Draken, who raised his eyebrows with mock menace in return.

“Quite the cheerful message for the first night,” Jolie muttered.

“I bet she’s fun at parties,” Miranda muttered back.

“…We very deliberately separate the serious from the unserious at this school,” the headmaster droned on.

“I do not apologize for that fact. You are meant to be the future of the Magical world, and of Magique itself. Those of you who succeed will not be ordinary Magicals. Therefore, it is perfectly natural not everyone will be up to the task. It is our job to determine who is, and who isn’t. ”