Chapter 17
“You look nervous. Why are you nervous?” Vale questions, crossing his thick arms and glaring at the forest like it is personally against him. “They are just annoying kids.”
I blow out a breath and glare up at my mate. “Wouldn’t you be? It’s a big day for the academy, and we have planned this for so long…it feels unreal that we are doing this. I can feel that the academy is happy today with the changes.”
Vale grumbles but doesn’t say any more. I glance around. “Where is Kane?”
Like I summoned him, he appears at my side as Maz and Black join us. Ever since binding our lives to the academy, we have somehow gained new powers. Like teleporting around the land and castle, and our senses of where people are in the academy is heightened.
“Just finished my new book.” Kane winks at me. “I’ve left it on our bed.”
“Can I watch?” Maz keeps his voice low, and my cheeks burn when Kane nods once.
Kane has written a dozen books since the war, mostly for me, but some on the truth of what happened here in this pocket world, on who the enchantress really was and the Umbral Authority too.
He believes, rightfully so, that we must tell our story for anyone left after us.
I roll my eyes at them both, choosing to look over Black’s new professor cloak, which is dark red.
It matches all of ours, but the dark red really suits him.
It’s been five years since the war. The shifter-witch war, as many call it.
Gwen and her people have been amazing over the years after they managed to get everybody through minutes before the portal closed, minutes before Lyra’s spell worked and destroyed the rest of the world.
It took me two years, filled with time alone with my mates and repairing the academy, for me to figure out a spell for another portal so that I could communicate with Gwen.
It was a relief to see that the people who got to the real world are happy and settled.
They’ve all integrated into Starlight City under Alpha Gwen’s management, and Gwen had come up with a really brilliant idea for when I finally went back, that Bloodstone Academy should still be a school.
A school for witches, shifters, Nexus and Vian to come if they have extraordinary powers.
If they are different from others and need a safe place.
We left the door open, opening a portal every month and trading for supplies, and for people to travel.
Many people wanted to come here, to start again and help rebuild the academy with us because it is safe.
This world, our home, is exactly that. Safe. And it always will be.
This is our first year of students—forty-two students, to be exact—who will be coming through the portal any minute now.
We’ve decided to be professors here to give us jobs, something to do here, even though Vale’s grumbled for a week solid about how they should just stay at our home, and we should lock everybody else outside.
His lesson plans also had to be looked over because he doesn’t understand the meaning of being nice.
Kane is teaching history, Black and Maz are doubling on potion classes, Vale is teaching combat, and I will be teaching spells and Latin.
We have teachers for all other race-exclusive classes and classes on controlling the unusualness of their gifts.
I glance up at my home as we wait. Bloodstone Academy itself is thriving, still as gothic and moody as ever, but now the black towers are lined with gold, the hallways glow, and they’re warm and inviting. It’s happy we are here.
“The portal opens finally,” Black announces, making me look back, and I lift my chin as my red cloak moves in the breeze. I don’t have to say the spell anymore, not now that I’ve figured out a long-term spell that opens the portal every month on the dot.
I walk forward, nodding my head in respect to Gwen.
She is in a black crop top and leggings, her dark hair in braids.
Two of her mates are close by, but they leave this to her.
She nods back at me with a smirk. Somehow we’ve become friends through a portal, and she’s really not that bad.
A bit terrifying, but not that bad under all the scary stuff.
“Everything ready on your end? Do you need any more supplies?”
“No, we’re good,” I tell her. “Thank you for this.”
“Well, I’m all about peace and shit like that these days. The kids are insane, so not entirely not getting something out of this. Managing them has been stressful.” She grins. “Your problem now. Watch the dark-haired dude who makes storms appear. I’ve been electrocuted twice calming him down.”
“Noted.” I chuckle, already thinking of spells to help calm his magic.
“Good luck.” She steps aside. “Everyone through the portal and behave. I will come and find you if you piss off your new tutors!”
I grin, stepping to the left and saying hello to each one of the young twelve- to fourteen-year-olds who walk through the portal into the world, their eyes lighting up as they look around.
Wini and Luke are waiting in the courtyard, and we lead the students there when the portal has closed. They wait until everyone’s through the courtyard doors before standing at the front. We join them at the sides, and I smile at a few of the nervous faces.
“Welcome to Bloodstone Academy,” Luke’s voice echoes.
He holds Wini’s hand, and Aster is in his wolf form at their feet, and in the window, I can see Sookie, Luke’s shifter, who is happy to be near but leave them to it.
They are a strange group but somehow it works, and I’m happy to have a relative, someone from my clan, who can share some of that history.
“I’m your headmaster, and I’m going to walk you through the halls, where we can discuss your first year and what will be expected of each of you.
When you leave here, you will be in complete control of your powers, complete control of who you are, and able to make a life for yourselves with no restrictions.
We are here to help you to learn safely and to have fun. ”
Some of the kids laugh, others look too scared to even smile, but they all follow them through the door, and we stay until we are alone.
I walk away from my mates, going over to the statue of a woman, in the middle of the courtyard.
My mother. I don’t know who created it, but it appeared on the one-year anniversary of her death.
It’s a tall statue made of black stone, and green ivy has begun reeling around the base of her dress. “I can’t believe it’s been five years.”
“It doesn’t feel like it, does it?” Maz agrees, standing at my side.
“She would like this, I think. The academy, us. Everything we have worked towards and made our home. I know she wasn’t a saint, but she saved us in the end,” I murmur, touching her stone hand. I regularly come out here and tell her about things going on, and I hope somewhere she is listening.
“She did it all for you to have this,” Black murmurs, sliding his arm around my waist. I rest my head on his shoulder and smile, grateful for all that we have. “We’ve got something to show you, if you don’t mind a short walk.”
Vale offers me his hand and I look at them, wondering what it is. “Okay, I’m interested.”
Vale and Black lead the way, taking us all through the forest and deep into the dark depths.
The trees have only grown more wild without the shifters here to camp within the forest, and I think it adds to the mystical feel.
After we’ve walked for ages, or it feels like it, we come to an old stone path that has been recently straightened up.
I don’t mind the walk when I’m with my mates.
I’ll take any moment to just be with them, never apart, whether it’s movie nights or days we spend renovating the castle.
We have merged five rooms into one on the left side of the castle, creating our own personal space.
Wini, Aster and Luke have built a house just outside of the academy for themselves, spelled with high walls to keep students out.
Aster even went to Earth and brought Wini a kitten back.
I glance up through the sky, sensing Minnie nearby, seeing a flicker of gold before she disappears into the trees.
She doesn’t come back very often. I think she prefers to fly around out here in the forest and be free, but I suspect she is the guardian of the academy and this world now.
We stop when we come to a clearing, one I know very well, but it’s different.
It’s been cleaned up. The old stone has all been fixed with gold woven all the way through it, and in the middle is a pergola, and there’s a plaque right at the front.
It says our names on it. I grin at them as I turn around. “It’s where we all began. Where we bonded.”
“It’s our place,” Maz agrees, leading me into the pergola, where they have placed thick blankets on the floor, candles all around the edges, and baskets of food for us to eat, with drinks too.
“And it is spelled for only us to come here. We have a lot of new people who’ve just come into the academy and will do so for years, but we wanted somewhere that is just ours. ”
“I love it,” I admit, sitting down. They all sit with me, handing me food and talking about the supposed powers we will see from the new students and what our plans are to help.
By the time the food is nearly gone, all of us are sharing several bottles of wine and laughing as the sun finally sets into darkness.
Fireflies hover around the forest, and the candles give us plenty of light.
The pergola is open on all sides, the forest pressing close around it, dark but beautiful, with the leaves shifting in a low wind.
Somewhere distant is the call of some shifter howl, and the trees creak above us.