Page 7 of Misfit Monsters (Pack of Outcasts #1)

Periwinkle

A s she leads me to the room for our Geography and Culture class, Fen perks up. “I wonder what place we’ll be hearing about today. I think if I can ever really integrate, I’d want to visit a whole bunch of them.”

I think of the many different landscapes and styles of humans I’ve glimpsed images of. “I want to see all of them!”

I have a brief daydream of gliding around the mortal world, sampling all its flavors… Brief because when we walk into the classroom with its rows of tables, I find myself staring at the sorcerer who compelled me into my latest cage.

My muscles tense so swiftly I nearly trip over my feet.

Jonah glances over from where he’s standing by a whiteboard at the front of the room. He’s smiling, white teeth bright against his cedar-brown skin.

When his deep brown eyes meet mine, his friendly expression falters .

I get a whiff of sour-stale discomfort that makes me wish I could chug more of the maple syrup we left back in the cafeteria.

Fen tugs my wrist. “We should sit in the front. Then we get the best view of the pictures.”

It shouldn’t be a surprise that the sorcerer has other roles at the academy. I wouldn’t want there to be so many shadowkind upending mortal lives that he’d need to make a full-time career out of dragging them here.

When I risk another glance at Jonah, his smile has come back, though it’s a little cautious. “It looks like you’re already making friends, Peri. That’s good to see. I know Fen will help you find your footing.”

His tone stays steady and professional, but my new friend beams at the compliment anyway.

“I definitely will,” she promises, and drags me over to the table that’s front and center.

It’s only after I’ve followed her lead that I realize sitting up here means I’m as close as possible to the sorcerer in our midst. Minor miscalculation.

I breathe slow and deep. The last thing I need is my hair shining with anxiety for all to see.

There’s nothing to be afraid of anyway, is there? I’m glad I’ve ended up at the school.

I should be grateful Jonah stepped in, really.

It’s just hard not to remember the strands of sorcery digging into my essence every time I look at him. And that memory stirs up echoes of so many other times…

So I do my best not to look at him at all. As our classmates file in, I check out them instead.

The icy man with the unnervingly dark blue eyes enters and drapes his lanky frame into a chair halfway back at the edge of the room. When he catches me looking at him, he gives me a smile so cold it feels more like a knife-stab .

Thankfully Gloss won’t be joining us, since she isn’t even in the reform division. I do spot a few of her other friends—they all sit by the chilly guy, like they’re forming a barricade around him.

To my delight, Mirage bounds through the doorway, grinning with a flash of his fangs. He vaults over one of the tables to land on the chair feet-first. Spinning around, he drops into the seat. Conjured applause kicks in like the laugh track in a TV sitcom.

Jonah gives him a stern look. “Let’s keep the illusions to a minimum today, Mirage.”

“Just giving myself the recognition I’m sure I deserve,” the fox shifter replies cheerfully.

A few dozen more beings drift in and take their seats until almost all the chairs are taken. None of them is the big sinewy shadowkind who yelled at me to get out of our dorm room yesterday.

That’s strange. Shouldn’t he have this class too? He was level one like me.

As I consider asking Fen, Jonah clears his throat. A shadowkind woman wearing a staff badge has arrived, now standing next to him.

Well, that solves one problem. I’ll just look at her instead of him and still be perfectly attentive.

Jonah taps the whiteboard, which must have a computer display built in. Its surface flickers and forms what looks like a digital photo album.

“Today, we’re going to be talking about Berlin. That’s the capital city of the country of Germany, in the continent of Europe. The location is convenient for shadowkind, with a few rifts around the city if you need to quickly return to the shadow realm.”

He brings up a map of the entire mortal realm to show the city’s exact location. It takes my breath away seeing how big the human world is.

I guess the shadow realm might be equally large, but it’s so vague and dark that it’s not as though any one part is particularly different from another. No cities or countries, just endless gloom.

I restrain a shudder.

Jonah goes on. “If you like an urban atmosphere, Berlin is one of the best cities to blend in among humans. Many alternative subcultures have a strong presence there, with a wide variety of unique fashion and personal styling. In some cases, your shadowkind features won’t raise any eyebrows—people will assume they’re body modifications. ”

The photos he flips through show young people with ink coloring their skin and hair all the colors of the rainbow. Metal glints from every place I knew you could insert piercings and a few more besides.

I wind a lock of my hair around my finger. No one would see the turquoise shade as strange in that kind of crowd.

At least, unless it starts glowing.

At the drumming of fingers on a tabletop, I peek over my shoulder. The icy man’s lips have curved with amusement.

“I’ve heard they have clubs where you can be free with your desires, for those who might want to indulge,” he says languidly.

His cool voice gives away no suggestion that he has a personal interest, but he aims a suggestive look at one of the female students sitting near him. She flushes with a flirty giggle.

Oh. Memories flit through my head of club scenes I’ve seen on screens—limbs twining, mouths melding together. And more intimate embraces that always cut off so quickly…

A faint flush ripples over my skin. I dabbled in that kind of bodily play with a couple of other shadowkind years ago, but it was never as thrilling as humans make it seem. Maybe these people in Berlin are better at it?

It might be worth a quick trip just to find out…

My imaginings are cut off by the wasabi-bitter irritation that wafts off Jonah, though his expression stays mild. “That’s a topic better addressed in your Personal Relationships class, Hail.”

The icy man—Hail?—leans farther back in his seat with a blasé attitude, but I taste a lick of satisfaction like a dab of whipped cream. “It seems like a key feature of the place to me.”

His remark provokes another giggle from his neighbor.

A slight edge creeps into Jonah’s tone. “When you’re teaching the subject, you can make that call.”

He cuts off the conversation by turning toward the woman who joined him. “Our guest instructor, Crinkle, has spent the past few decades living among the mortals in Berlin. She’ll be able to fill in details I can’t and give you a shadowkind perspective on life in the city.”

Jonah and Crinkle go back and forth discussing the benefits, the potential problems most likely to arise, and which types of supernatural inclinations Berlin can best accommodate.

Throughout the presentation, the sorcerer encourages us to think about whether we could see ourselves fitting into this place.

“It might seem far off,” he says, “but brief real-world practicums start at level two, and by level three we want you seriously considering and trying out locations where you might settle down for your first year of integration.”

A lot of the aspects he mentions sound lovely, but I have another voice in my head from years ago: Gracie’s awed tone as she told me about the city on the lake where she wanted to go as soon as she was old enough to leave home—the music festivals, restaurants with every kind of food you could imagine, so many parks and trees…

She drew pictures in my head with her words. I haven’t seen her since that last night—since the night when I escaped?—

I already know where I’m going when I’m ready to leave this school. As soon as I’m sure I won’t accidentally blaze her away, I’ll go find her.

If there’s anyone I owe a heap of joy to, it’s her.

The talk shifts to questions from the students. After the first few, the brawny woman behind me raises her hand. “Isn’t there a higher chance of having a bad interaction with a mortal if you’re living in a city? I mean, with so many of them around?”

“Being surrounded by a lot of people can actually make you safer,” Jonah says. “If someone hassles you, you can slip away, and the chances of running into them again are a lot less than in a small town.”

The woman lets out a jovial chuckle. “Right, of course. And it’s not like any of them would stand a chance against us if push came to shove anyway.”

Her posture is all bravado, but a current of lemony terror touches my tongue.

I turn in my seat to give her a reassuring smile. “You don’t need to be scared of humans. Most of them aren’t bad at all. They want to be happy just like we do.”

The woman stares at me and then pulls her lips back in a snarl. “I wouldn’t be scared of any puny mortal.”

Her tablemate extends claws from her fingertips and flexes them at me with a menacing scowl. “A runt like you should think before you speak.”

Even if she’s trying to look and sound ominous, all I can taste from the second woman is more fear. I have to show them I mean well .

She doesn’t have any starburst points on her badge—she’s never hurt anyone before. Her implied threat is all defensive.

I try to make my smile even kinder in apology. “I only wanted to make her feel better. Neither of you need to be afraid of me , I promise.”

The second woman growls and shoves to her feet. “What are you trying to say?”

I open and close my mouth, my thoughts turning into babble that won’t help anyone.

I thought I’d said exactly what I meant. Why is she acting angry?

Jonah lifts his voice, calm but firm. “Sit down, Vim. I’m sure Peri wasn’t trying to insult you.”

A faint scoff carries from Hail’s seat. “The newbie’s going to have to fight her own battles sometime. From the looks of her, they’ll at least be short.”

Jonah shakes his head. “If we could get back on topic, please?—”

The chime of the bell interrupts. Everyone pushes back their chairs.

As soon as I can tell we’re meant to leave, I hurry to the door.

Fen touches my arm. “Don’t worry about any of them. We’ve got an hour before the next class. Do you want me to show you the courtyard? It’s really nice.”

I don’t want to upset her too, but my faith in my cheering abilities is shaken. I manage a smile. “I think I just want to rest in my room for a bit, but I’d love to see it later.”

Despite my best efforts, Fen deflates a little. “Oh. All right.”

I rush through the halls to the dorm area, my stomach twisting into knots.

Why do things go wrong when I’m trying to do something good? Why can’t I fit in properly even here where I’m surrounded by beings who are supposed to be like me?

It’s okay. Not everyone hates me. I’m still figuring things out.

It’ll get better. It has to. I insist.

When I reach the dorm, I walk straight to my room. I’ll take the next hour to sort myself out, and then I’ll be ready to face whatever’s next.

Except I’m not alone. The instant I walk into the small space, I pick up on my roommate’s stormy energy from the shadows.

I turn toward the spot where I can tell he’s lurking. The question tumbles out before I can think better of it. “Why weren’t you at class?”

If he spoke from the shadows, I’d still hear him, if in a distant, blurry kind of way. Instead, he ripples out into his full, immense form, glaring down at me with his ropey muscles tensed. “Some of us have to go to different classes. Because there are more important things to worry about.”

He points at his badge—the ten-pointed star, the circle around it.

“Oh,” I mumble. “I just wondered.”

He grunts and vanishes again. I sink onto my bed and draw my knees to my chest to hug them.

I seem to be pissing people off left and right, and one of them is a shadowkind so fearsome he needs special classes to make sure he doesn’t hurt the rest of us.

All I can do is keep going, doing my best.

Because it’s either that or starve in the shadow-realm gloom.