Great going, Shade,I chastise myself.
“But we’d better move faster,” she adds, “because right now Satine isn’t the one you should be worried about. We need to get to the dining hall before the professors.”
“Wait, what do you mean the professors?” My heart skips a beat. “I thought this dinner would only be for the students?” What I really want to ask is if a certain four professors are going to attend, but I keep that to myself.
“They don’t always come,” Kenzie explains, “but rumors were circulating about you during my last class. In an academy where people can command shadows, things don’t stay secret for long.”
That makes me pause. “People were talking about me?”
Kenzie nods. “According to what I’ve heard, all of the professors will be in attendance tonight because they want to see the new student before classes begin. AKA you. The professors don’t always attend our dinners, but when they do, you can’t be late.” There’s an undercurrent of fear in her last words, so I don’t argue, and I hurry along with her, half stumbling down the corridors. I try to remember the patterns on the ceiling as we move through the academy, but the dark blobs all look the same, and I don’t have enough time to try and memorize the marks.
We’ve made it down two more corridors when I can’t help but ask, “Why did she call you a reject?”
Kenzie doesn’t immediately answer, and I’m about to tell her she doesn’t have to when she lets out a heavy sigh. “I’d like to say it’s just because Satine is a bitch, but she’s not completely wrong. I… I’m the only one who still hasn’t connected with a shadow creature. It makes me an abandoned one. Forsaken by the shadows.”
“What? How long have you even been here?”
“A few months, but most students connect with a creature in the first few weeks. Gray was the last one to connect with a shadow creature two weeks ago. Now there’s only me.”
“Okay, but that’s not so bad. That means it could still happen, doesn’t it? It doesn’t mean you’ve been forsaken or whatever.”
She looks doubtful. “Maybe…but it gets worse. I haven’t exactly been the most popular around here since Leira.”
“Leira?”
“Yeah.” She turns her attention to the corridor again as sadness makes her eyes glassy. “She was my roommate, and we were…close. She went missing a few weeks back.”
“Missing?” I frown, thinking of how Thane had warned me not to get lost in the academy. “Did she lose her way in the building somewhere?”
“No. Leira had,” she clears her throat, “hasan incredible memory. She’s always been great at puzzles and figuring things out. She loves the academy and memorized most of the corridors on the first night.”
“Okay, now I’m impressed. So what do you think happened to her?”
Kenzie jerks to a halt. Her gaze darts to the walls, and I wonder if she’s looking for Elgyn and Tarlaz, but when she doesn’t see whatever it is she’s scanning for, she leans closer to me and whispers, “Honestly, I think Leira discovered something she wasn’t supposed to know, and she was removed from the academy.”
I blink slowly. I don’t know what I’d been expecting her to say, but it wasn’t that.
When I don’t answer, Kenzie pulls me along again, ducking her head as she leads me further down the corridor. “Leira became obsessed with the idea of figuring out the secrets of this place,” she whispers. “She wanted to know everything aboutit, and on the night she disappeared, she’d said she’d figured something out…something about the missing students.”
“Missing students?” I strain my ears, interested in what she has to say.
“Leira was about to tell me what she’d learned, but she was called away in the middle of the night by one of the professors.” Guilt fills Kenzie’s eyes. “I’d begged Leira to let me go with her, or to at least walk the corridors with her, but she had assured me she would be back soon.”
My heart sinks, because I can already tell where this is going. “And she never came back?”
“No,” Kenzie replies sadly. “Before she left, Leira had said Satine had been summoned as well, so when I saw Satine the next night, I tried asking her about it, but she couldn’t seem to remember anything, and she got angry when I kept pressing. In the hours that followed, word went around the academy that Leira had asked to be sent back to the human realm. That she uttered the words to cancel her enrollment.” Kenzie lets out a frustrated breath. “Rumors spread saying that she wanted to get away from me, but none of it makes sense.”
I feel sick, and I wrap my arm around Kenzie’s shoulders. She stiffens for a moment before leaning into me.
“Okay firstly, that’s terrible, and I’m so sorry you had to go through that,” I say, squeezing her. “And secondly, we’ll find out what happened to Leira. I promise.”
Kenzie doesn’t look convinced, but she gives me a tight smile anyway. “Thanks.”
We both know I can’t really promise that. I can barely find my way around the academy as it is, but a part of me wonders if Leira’s disappearance might be linked to my lack of memory. To my past. Either way, I fully intend to figure out what’s going on in this place.
My roommate sniffs, and I release her, letting her have her space.
“So are you going to tell me your story?” she asks me. “I was one of the last students to arrive a few months ago. They say cohorts are usually selected in batches, and it’s really unusual to have new students arrive in the middle of the year.”
