“Okay.” I nodded, trying to fight the heat that seemed to creep up the side of my cheeks. Why was speaking to him so painfully uncomfortable? There was no middle ground for us. It was either snide remarks or awkward interactions, and very little in between. “Well, I have to go now so…”
I could feel his eyes on me, but he didn’t say anything else after that—he rarely ever did. And I’m not sure why, but it left a hollow feeling in my chest.
A little while later and a lot more out of breath, I was running up the steps to the building on the far side of the Cedar Ridge campus, the oldest building owned by Aldercrest University. The thuds of my boots echoed back at me, taunting me to speed up, as the cool November air bit at my skin.
Stone-structured with large, arched wooden doors, the building looked like something pulled out of a historical fantasy book. It was a little worn in that old, beautiful kind of way. Sprawls of ivy crept up the side of the building which to me, felt a little on the nose forold-building-with-characterbut I couldn’t deny how wonderful it looked.
It was the quieter of the two main campuses, meaning there were only ever a few people standing outside. Usually smoking or mustering up the courage to go to whatever lecture they had on that day. A few people stood a little way from the door,huddled closely together and laughing. Most people were dressed appropriately for the winter weather in warm coats and fluffy scarves. I noted one particularly brave girl dressed head to toe like a nineties model. She had on black, knee-high boots and a long leather duster, and whilst she looked absolutely incredible, her outfit seemed more appropriate for choosing between the blue and red pill than it did a Darling November.
Walking into the building, I side-stepped people as they lingered in the hallway. A regular occurrence of mine. Between the slow walkers, the groups too engrossed in their conversations to have any manners, and the people that forgot how to walk every time they pulled out their phones, I always arrived at my lecture with a gnawing sense of irritation beneath my skin; only spurred on further by my previous interaction with Thallor. All of which did nothing to calm my nerves because if I arrived even a minute late to my lecture, Professor Caldwell would give me the bollocking of a lifetime.
I tugged on the heavy wooden doors that led into my lecture hall. They were unnecessarily heavy, and I often had to throw my whole body into them (hip, shoulder, and likely part of my soul, too) just to get them open. The doors, so I was told, were from the original structure that stood there before the university. I wasn’t entirely sure what use they could have had before that, butGod,they were impossible to open. They slammed behind me, the loud bang reverberating through the space and catching the attention of a few people in the front row.
I looked up at the clock and found the lecture stand empty.
8:57 am.
Glancing skyward to whoever might be watching from above, I mouthed athank youbefore weaving past desks and half-finished coffees to an empty row near the back. Given thatAncient History & Occult Scienceswas a pretty niche subject, only around forty of us were doing the course. Ahead of me, otherlast-minute stragglers settled into their seats, whilst others scribbled down rushed conclusions to essays. One or two people were staring blankly at the blackboard, questioning their decisions from the previous evening.Tuesday morning hangovers are not for the faint-hearted.
The last person to arrive, looking as relieved as the rest of us that the lecture wouldn’t start with Caldwell screaming at someone, was a guy whose name I didn’t know. On more than one occasion, I’d caught him staring at me, usually when he thought I wasn’t looking. As he walked up the aisle, his eyes found mine, holding my gaze until he dropped down in a seat two rows ahead of me. He didn’t take out a notebook or laptop or anything that would have suggested he belonged in this lecture (I saw him regularly enough, so I was sure he took this course). He proceeded to sit there, twirling his pen and taking intermittent sips of coffee.
Esme and I had come to refer to him asClark Kent.Mostly because he was the perfect description ofboy-next-door.He had floppy, light brown hair and light blue eyes, and wore these thin-rimmed, round glasses that screamed sexyandsmart. He was also the type of guy to command the attention of everyone in the room, including myself (as much as I hated to admit it).
I let my eyes linger on his side profile for a moment longer before Professor Caldwell walked in, acting like the cold bucket of ice water that he was. He was wearing his usual attire, a three-piece suit that looked as worn as he was. He was an older gentleman, likely in his late forties, with thinning hair and a sour disposition. Today, he was ten minutes late, giving me ample time to go over everything that Thallor might be doing in my apartment whilst pretending to jot down a few notes on my laptop.
Once Caldwell had finally settled in, he was in such a terrible mood from whatever had thrown off his morning thathe had decided to set a ten-thousand-word paired project on our current lecture subject.
Spiritual Practices in Ancient Egypt: How They Impact the Afterlife.
“I’d apologise for being late, but the behaviour of morons unable to drive the speed limit is really out of my control. I’ll be keeping you for the full two hours, so please don’t start packing up before you are dismissed,” Caldwell started before beginning to write some notes on the blackboard. “As mentioned yesterday, we will be moving on to talking about Ancient Egypt: Pyramids, mummification, hieroglyphs. Well done if you know that much, you now hold the same amount of general knowledge as a child in the fourth grade.”
I began to type along, trying desperately to filter out the frequent insults hurled at us between actual curriculum information.
“Whilst the Egyptians are mostly regarded or renowned for their skill and success with building monuments, we will be focusing on more spiritual practices that were invoked in the use of medicine and—” Caldwell stopped, slamming a book down on the desk of a particularly unfortunate and sleepy girl in the front row. A girl who now looked as terrified as she did hungover.
“That’s a zero on your ten-thousand-word essay. Get out of my classroom,” he snarled at her. Without so much as another word, she and her tear-stricken face had left the hall, and Caldwell had already moved on to addressing the rest of us. “Today we will be discussingHeka.”
He wrote the word on the board in big bold lettering. I wasn’t a betting woman, but I would have put my life savings, the little that I had anyway, on him telling us that we should really knowall about Heka,despite this being a university, where we, you know,come to learn.
“This is a concept you should already be familiar with. I listed it in book 56 of the recommended reading material.”
Ding, ding, ding!We have a winner.
“Unlike today, where our faith in modern medicine transcends all else, the Ancient Egyptians used to believe in more spiritual practices. Heka was not only a deity but the name encompassing the practice of magic. Often used in medical practices as it was believed the power of the gods could be drawn to stave off illness. In the unfortunate event that this was not the case, Heka was also used in rituals around death and can be seen cited in many a funeral text.” Caldwell turned to address another person a few rows back, a taller blonde boy scrolling on his phone. “Death,Mr McCormick. Something you’ll meet sooner rather than later if you don’t start paying attention.”
Death threats.That’s new.
“Jude Watlings, am I boring you?” Caldwell growled halfway through writing a word on the board.
Ooo, busted.
“No, sir,” he cleared his throat and turned his body so it was fully parallel with the blackboard.
“Perhaps you’d like to explain to the class what you were staring at? I don’t see any notes on Heka scrawled across Miss Sterling’s face, but maybe you’d care to enlighten me?”
“Well, sir,” he began, an air of confidence to his voice that I wouldn’t have expected given he was staring down the proverbial barrel of the gun that was Caldwell himself, “you were talking about the practice of magic, right?”
“I was.”
