Page 24

Chapter Twenty-One

RAIN

" W ilder, give her the chair," Hawke said as he clambered to his feet.

"I'm fine," Ms. Rhodes assured him.

"There's a chair in my room!" Aspen called at Hawke even as he headed that way.

"We need a few more," Keir pointed out. "It seems these group meetings are getting to be a regular thing."

"Which is part of what I wanted to talk to you about," Ms. Rhodes said, finally taking the chair, then smiling as she relaxed into it. "This is nice!"

"It's for the girls to study in," Wilder explained. "I wanted them to have a place where they could curl up and relax."

"Add a loveseat," Ms. Rhodes told him. "You can use the table by the window for materials to convert, because I have a feeling Rain doesn't use that one."

"No, but I do use the one by the door," I said.

She nodded. "Then arrange this to be useful. I have a feeling the same will be done to Torian's room. I also want you all to make sure your gates are secure and in working condition."

"Which gates?" Torian asked.

She blinked her eyes over to him. "All of them, Torian."

Which was when Hawke came back, carrying the wooden chair from Aspen's room that matched the one Torian was sitting on.

He set it down by Jack's perch and gestured for Wilder to take it.

When Wilder paused as if unsure, Hawke made his way over and sat on the edge of the bed beside Aspen, right by the foot.

Keir shifted closer to the pillows, making more room for us girls in the middle. "That makes it sound like something big is going down," he said.

Ms. Rhodes dipped her head in agreement.

"I think so, but I have no proof. That's why I want our royalty to be careful.

The student Rain and Pascal stopped today?

Cedar Murphy. He's been known to spend time with the Children of the Exodus in the past. His first two years here, he was definitely a part of that group. "

"But he's not anymore?" I asked.

Torian grunted as if I'd missed something.

But Ms. Rhodes confirmed it. "Rain, when I questioned that boy, he couldn't say anything. Silence was the only response I got to who had sent him, what his purpose was, why he attacked Nevaeh in particular or if it was just a random thing, and so on."

"And there's no way to make them talk?" I asked. "I mean, could I help with that? Because if you're catching people and just letting them go..."

"He's been expelled," she assured me. "Unfortunately, some of these students have nowhere to go."

"Then how are they mixed up with the Children of the Exodus?" Keir asked. "I'm pretty sure there's a direct lineage required to be a part of them."

"It's more about the ideology," Ms. Rhodes told him. "From what we know about their group - the parents, I mean, not the students - they aren't as worried about lineage as thinking the same thing."

"What thing?" Hawke demanded. "Ms. Rhodes, what exactly is their ideology?"

"They want to remake the fae system of power," she said.

"We're not sure if that's a new court, no court, or something else.

Sadly, they don't want to talk about it and the information we have is conflicting.

They do, however, know how to blend in. The parents all seem a bit off, and they have concerns about the ideology their children will be exposed to, but they won't tell me what they want avoided. "

"Sounds like weird religious freaks," I mumbled.

Ms. Rhodes murmured as if I wasn't necessarily wrong. "Similar, but their god is magic. That's true for most fae, though. I'm worried they might be recruiting right here at Silver Oaks."

"I thought you knew everything that happened here," Wilder taunted.

The look the dean gave him was icy. "I know enough. I also do not invade your privacy. Yes, we pay attention, and yes, we have both age and experience on our side. That doesn't mean we have magical listening devices spread around the school."

"But you tend to know when we do something," Torian pointed out.

"Because you can blow up the building," she reminded him.

"I know that. You know that. Everyone in this school knows that, Torian.

I can feel the use of power in my building, bouncing off my protections.

So yes, I'm aware of much of what you kids do.

We also ignore it when we can because learning isn't always about obeying the rules. "

"So I can break more?" he asked.

"You," she told him, "won't care about my answer either way.

The problem, though, is that in trying to be fair to all of my students, some will always fall to the wrong side.

It doesn't matter how you define that, it will still happen.

But in this case, the 'wrong side' seems to be becoming dangerous rather quickly. "

"Morrigan!" Jack muttered in annoyance.

"I'm not sure Rain can do anything about this, Jack," she told him.

Caw! He belted that out loudly, as if angry about it.

"I'm trying," I told him.

"Jack, Jack, Jack!" he said, hopping along his perch. "Court. Bitch! Jack-Rain. Dads." Then he nodded. "Bitch!" And he shook his head.

"Are you using that for Ms. Rhodes this time?" Aspen asked.

Jack chattered as off offended, then shook his head.

"Do you mean the people attacking Winter users?" I asked.

"Morrigan!" he agreed, nodding emphatically.

"You need a new word," I told him. "Maybe enemy?"

Jack twisted his head. Caw! Then he turned it the other way. Caw! Caw-caw. And he pulled in a big breath and forced out "Enemy!"

"Nice!" Aspen said. "You are one impressive prince, Jack."

He slung his beak up and down in agreement. "Enemy! Bitch. Court. Jack. Rain. Knight. Dads!"

"Exactly," I agreed, since he'd just listed off his words for people. "But what are we supposed to do about this enemy, Jack?"

He made a disgruntled noise and ruffled his feathers before sinking back down on his perch. Clearly, he didn't know either, or maybe he just couldn't tell us? Either way, it all ended up the same. We had to figure this out for ourselves.

"So what do we do?" I asked, looking at all of my friends.

Ms. Rhodes leaned forward. "Sadly, I can't answer that. I also wouldn't be telling most people any of this, but I think our highest-ranking royalty needs to be aware of it. Majesty. Highness." Then she pushed to her feet. "And please watch your backs?"

"We are," I assured her.

"Then I don't want to know what rules you might be breaking," she said as she headed for the door. She paused to dip her head toward Spike. "Good evening, my lady."

We all sat in silence as she left. Surprisingly, the silence spell on the room didn't fade. I had a feeling it eventually would, but if Ms. Rhodes simply "forgot" to lift it, then that was a mere accident, right? It also meant no one would overhear us making plans by accident, so a win-win.

"Ok," Hawke said, leaning back on his hands. "I'm worried about Wilder. Jack's sticking with Aspen, but everyone knows Wilder's a Winter user too. Babe, how many classes do you have alone?"

"Most of them," he said. "I share third period with you and Rain. Fifth and sixth are with Aspen, then Torian. Seventh is taught by Ms. Rhodes, so I think I'm ok there."

"So most of your morning classes," Torian said. "That's a problem."

"I'm in the same hall as him during first period," Hawke pointed out.

"Which only helps so much," Keir said. "Shit. Ok, Aspen's going to be the main target, and we have her covered, but how much help is Jack really going to be if there's more than one of them?"

"Jack!" he squawked as if offended.

"Two of you against ten?" Keir asked, making his point.

"Shadow!" Jack clarified. "Jack-Shadow. Morrigan. Court!"

I tossed up my hands, wishing I could make sense of that - but on the ground, my shadow did nothing. It was enough to make me look down, checking to be sure. That made everyone else look. Right on cue, Shadow waved to prove it was aware of our inspection.

"Shadow," Jack said smugly.

And my shadow reached out toward Keir's. A pair of no-shadow holes opened like Shadow had lifted its lids, then its gaze bounced between me and Keir. Tentatively, its fingers touched Keir's shadow's shoulder area while all of us watched.

"Yeah, I feel that, Shadow," he told it.

"What does it feel like?" Aspen asked.

"Like someone is plucking your soul like a guitar," Keir said. "Sorry, but that's the best I have."

Shadow simply pointed to the hand touching Keir, then lifted its thumb up. After a pause, it turned the gesture downwards. I was confused for a second, and then figured out what it meant.

"It's asking permission!" I told Keir.

"Oh," he said. "Yeah, sure. I'll be the guinea pig, Shadow."

So Shadow grabbed a handful of Keir's darkness and ripped it off.

"Fuck!" Keir gasped, grabbing his own shoulder. "Ok, that's seriously weird."

But Shadow simply pulled the piece of Keir to its chest and cradled it there for a moment. I swore my shadow became darker, but after only a few seconds, Shadow lifted its hands, exposing they were empty.

"Cool?" Keir asked, looking over at me like he was confused.

"Yeah, I'm not sure what that was about either," I admitted.

"Court!" Jack said. "Jack-Shadow!" And he cawed loudly at the floor. Beside me, Keir jumped in place, and Jack cawed, "Court!"

"Fuck me," Keir breathed.

"What?" Wilder asked.

"It didn't grab you," Hawke said.

Aspen had leaned forward, looking at both me and Keir. "I don't think it had to. I think that's what it was doing."

"Is that right?" I asked Shadow.

So it made a production of touching itself. Well, more poking in the chest area, although it was hard to make out exactly where since it was facing us. Keir tensed again.

"Guys, I think we have our alert system," he said. "That is impossible to miss."

Torian was still watching my shadow. "So you can notify us when you need to, but how do you know what we need?" he asked. "I mean, if Rain knows, that makes sense. What happens if someone jumps Wilder and she doesn't know?"

My shadow turned and pointed right at Jack.

"Jack!" he announced.

"Nope, not following," I told him.

"Jack!" he said. "Jack, Jack. Jack-Rain. Jack-Shadow. Morrigan! Jack-Shadow-Court!"

"Shit," Hawke breathed. "Jack? Do you have the ability to predict what's going to happen?"

Jack slung his beak up and down. "Jack!" he said.

Aspen's mouth fell open. Keir's brows rose into his hairline. Wilder tilted to see my crow better. Hawke was blinking at that as if trying to force it to sink it. Then there was Torian. He smiled slyly at the bird.

"Let me guess, Jack. You can talk to Shadow, huh? Is it your court?"

Jack nodded, paused, then shook his head no.

"So yes on the talking," I explained. "No on the court."

"Shadow!" Jack declared. "Shadow. Shadow-Jack. Shadow-Jack-Rain. Shadow-Morrigan!"

Hawke was tapping at the air as if trying to put all of that in place. "Shadow is somehow a part of your bond with Rain?" he guessed, sounding like he wasn't sure of that at all.

But Jack nodded. "Morrigan!"

So I decided to take a stab at it. "Shadow is what let you make me a Morrigan?"

"Rain!" And Jack both nodded his head and hopped in place excitedly.

So Torian leaned forward. "Then add me to that, Shadow. If Jack knows when something's going to happen, and you can ping us, then I'm in."

Shadow quickly snatched a piece of Torian's hand and pressed that to its chest. Oddly, Torian's own shadow didn't really shift, but I swore it was just a bit lighter. Then again, I was pretty sure my shadow was even darker now.

But suddenly, Keir jumped, looking down at his left hand. "Whoa," he breathed. Then he twitched, grabbing at his shoulder.

So did Torian. "Weird," Torian said, looking at his hand, then his shoulder. "I'm going to guess the hand part means me?"

Shadow offered an excited thumbs-up.

Hawke kicked out a leg. "Calf, please?"

Wilder leaned forward, spreading out his own shadow. "Don't care what you take."

But Shadow turned to Aspen's, those hollow eyes looking up at her as it reached for her head.

"Go for it," she told the thing.

One after the other, Shadow grabbed all three pieces, then held them to it at the same time.

All that was left was me, but I had no clue how that would work.

But when it was done with them, my shadow calmly walked away from the floor, moving to the wall so we could all see it better - and it hadn't taken a part of me.

Then it tapped its head. Instantly, I felt something.

It was like ice under my skin, but pitched like one of those tuning forks.

There was both an almost inaudible sound and a physical sensation.

Then it touched its hand. Next, the opposite shoulder.

After that, it patted its belly before moving to its leg.

When all of those were done, the thing smiled.

Immediately, all of me lit up. Not that it was painful, but it was very clear and impossible to ignore.

Shadow's smile grew bigger, then bigger still until it looked like some kind of demented horror show on the wall.

But the moment its smile disappeared, so did all of the sensation - and it pointed at me.

"And now we won't have to wonder how to alert each other," Wilder said. "Damn. Jack, you and Shadow are impressive."

"A little creepy too," Aspen pointed out.

Torian merely murmured, somehow acting completely unsurprised. "Although it seems the Morrigan is the most important person here. Shadow made sure her alarm bell is the biggest of them all. Guess that means the rest of us just got put in our place, hm?"

My shadow pointed at him and then lifted its thumb upwards.