Page 6

“You are correct, Miss Juniper.” I wonder for a second how he knows my name.

“The biggest threat is us teaching you to be very formidable weapons, with very dangerous shifters bonded to your souls that would turn into Mindless right alongside you. As we all know, the enchantress can turn witches and mortals into Mindless soldiers, drained of every drop of blood in their body.” A flash of a memory flickers into my mind.

A Mindless in front of me, its skin so pale, like moonlight, and its eyes gone.

“They become nothing but skin, bones, and explosive magic. The Mindless do not harm children under the age of sixteen, but adults are their food, and they hunt us.” He begins to pace on the stage.

“I feel I can speak for every soul in this academy when I say that this war has taken someone that we love and turned them into the Mindless—or just killed them. Our race used to be a million strong, hidden throughout the world, but still there. Now there are little more than two hundred thousand of us left alive, and humans? Well, they are much less. Shifters are the biggest surviving race, and why is that?”

A girl behind me shoots her hand into the air. “Because they cannot leave the forest or be turned into Mindless.”

“Correct…but what else can they not do?”

Silence. No one answers and I don’t know either.

He smiles. “Good, you shouldn’t know this.

But shifters cannot shift outside of marked witch areas like the Bloodstone Forest. If they leave these areas, they are nothing more than human unless they are bonded to a witch.

A bond is their only chance for freedom.

” Hushed whispers burst out, and Wini just looks at me with wide eyes.

“The shifters are cursed, and they were cursed by a student who attended this academy in its very first year—the enchantress.”

“What?” Wini blurts out, and I barely hear her because people are not whispering anymore. They are outright talking.

Mentor Parker claps his hands, and slowly everyone goes silent.

“That is a secret not known much outside these walls, but she began here, and she was and forever will be our greatest failure. One day, she will be nothing but dust because we will win. We will take back the world, but to do this, we need powerful witches and shifters to fight with us. There are many witches who side with her, many shifters too, because she’s very good at speaking lies about anyone who doesn’t side with her. ”

“Wouldn’t that make her over a hundred years old?” I ask.

Mentor Parker looks at me. “I will allow it this once, but raise your hand to speak. Yes, she is that age, but she looks no older than I. The enchantress made her own forbidden spells and used them to make the Mindless as well as immortal life and other terrible things.”

Well, I’m not telling them I like making up my own spells, then.

“Tell me next, how do we kill one of the Mindless?” Mentor Parker questions.

“We all know spells and magic do not touch them. If we cannot use our magic, what is our move?” He waits, but no one says anything.

“They are physically stronger than us. They move faster, and they can see us even in the dark. They hunt in packs and it’s rare to come across one alone.

All this is true, so what is the witch’s move? ”

Wini puts her hand up. “The changeling shifters’ magic is their weakness.

Our bonds are sacred because we connect our souls with our bonded, becoming one.

Their magic connects with ours, and then our magic works on the Mindless.

Changeling’s magic is wild and untamed, but weak.

Without the bond, they cannot do spells, control the base magic or use it.

There have been many reports of untamed shifter magic accidently hurting their own people. ”

“Correct, Miss. When you head to the forest, you will see bloodstones on the ground. There are seventy-seven bloodstones, huge stone platforms, within the forest. You will find a shifter, bring them to the bloodstone, and cut your hand. One drop of blood seals the bond on the bloodstone. The shifter doesn’t have to bleed; they just have to be standing on it.

After you enter the forest, do not leave it without a bond—you will be killed on sight by us.

” My mouth dries. No pressure then. “After this, your magic is shared as one and your lives, too. They become connected to your very soul, and when you meet the goddess, it will be together.” He touches Sookie’s head affectionately.

“If they die, you die. If you die, they die. There is no end to your bond. It has never been undone. Now, they, their magic, it’s weak in comparison to ours, and ours does not work against the Mindless. This changes with the bond.”

He walks to the edge of the stage and sits down on it.

“There are, of course, weaknesses that come with the bond. If, say, you bond with more than one shifter, you become the weak point for them. This isn’t something to worry about.

Shifters are known to hate sharing, and in our history, there are only a handful of bonds with more than one.

Anyone who attacks you will go for you first. Your death would end both of the shifters; therefore, we will teach you to tone your body, to defend yourself without magic. ”

My stomach feels like jelly. Wait, what?

Defend myself without magic? No one said anything about physically training.

I thought I’d have to do running or something equally bad, but this is garbage.

I want to be at the top of every class I take, and self-defense is going to leave me right at the bottom.

“You will learn healing spells to be able to heal your shifter, and powerful shielding spells, too. They learn similarly in other classes when they are of age, and together you will leave this academy as one unit, strong and unbroken. Any unbonded return to the forest for breeding. Witches? There is only one way out of Bloodstone.”

A girl at the back puts her hand up. “So we’re not going to learn any attacking spells?”

“Yes, of course you are.” He waves her off.

“You will attend five classes. One on the histories. Being well-versed in the mind is important. A class based on self-defense of your bodies without magic. I will let your mentor explain that to you when you get there. The third class is on defensive spells. The fourth class will be on healing. And your fifth and most important class will be on strengthening your bond between you and your shifter. It does not come easy. It is not a natural bond; therefore, it sometimes becomes very difficult to bond together. But by the end of the three years, you will be as one.” He points at the door.

“You will be shown to your rooms. Males to the right, females to the left. Tomorrow night, when the sun sets, you will go into the Bloodstone Forest of your own accord from your room. The academy will show you the way.”

The doors open behind us, and the hooded man is gone.

I stand up, only for Mentor Parker to clap his hands and catch everyone’s attention again.

“One more rule.” We all turn around. “It shouldn’t need to be said, but having relations with the shifter that you’re bonded to is against the rules.

Pregnancies do not happen between witches and shifters, that much we know.

But relationships complicate the bond, and it is not favored.

Possessiveness and jealousy is a problem with shifter males in particular, and we found it is easier to make sure the relationship becomes like they are family to you, nothing more, nothing less.

You are all witches who chose this future instead of staying in your safe towns and choosing a husband or wife.

Love is second to the academy—to the war. Do not be a fool.”

Wini stays at my side, behind two girls who are talking far too loudly.

“Ew, like we would fall in love with one of them? You know why they’re stuck in the Bloodstone Forest, right?

Why they’re bound here? It’s because they sided with the enchantress in the war, well, not them, but their parents did or their grandparents.

They are all rebel blood and they are sworn to fight with us until the war is over. ”

I look at the floor, the mosaic brown tiles. I remembered Kane, and he is a shifter…so how was he living in the same village as me all those years ago when he was meant to be in the Bloodstone Forest?