Chapter 74 It Feels Like A Warning

Chapter 74 It Feels Like A Warning
DESIREE

"They go to East Side Academy," Jane says, still staring after them like the rest of the crowd, even though she's the one who's supposed to be explaining this to me. "Which, first of all, should tell you everything."

"It's telling me nothing," I say. "Jane."

"Right. Sorry." She shakes herself out of it and grabs my sleeve, pulling me a little closer like this is information that shouldn't travel too far on the wind. "Three of them are vampires. Not regular vampires, either — the special kind. Old-blood. The kind that don't need sunlight rules or any of the usual weaknesses because their bloodline is different."

"Different how?"

"Nobody really knows. That's the point." She lowers her voice further. "And the other three are dragons. Dark dragons. Not the shiny, majestic, save-the-kingdom kind. The kind that make headmasters nervous."

Brittany appears on my other side, breathless, having apparently sprinted the entire way over just to be part of this conversation. "Do you mean them? The cool kids?"

"We're talking about them," Jane confirms.

"Names," I say. "I need names before I combust from curiosity."

"Dmitri, Zachary, and Edd are the vampires," Jane says, ticking them off on her fingers. "Grant, Theo, and Jeremy are the dragons."

"And they've been kicked out of, what, four schools now?" Brittany chimes in.

"Five," Jane corrects. "Five schools. Fighting, mostly and property damage. There was a whole thing at Ravensmoor where half a training hall just—" she makes a small explosion gesture with her hands, "—gone. Poof."

"And they smoke," Brittany adds, like this is somehow the most damning detail of all. "And do other things. My cousin says they don't even try to hide it."

"So everyone hates them," I say.

"Everyone hates them," Jane agrees. "And everyone also thinks they're unbelievably hot, which, annoyingly, checks out."

"It's the carelessness," Brittany says dreamily. "Like they don't need anyone's approval. They just exist and let the rest of us deal with it."

"They dump girls constantly," Jane says. "Like, constantly. It's basically a school sport at East Side. Girls fight over who gets the story of being the one who almost tamed one of them."

"I don't need to tame anyone," I say. "I have enough on my plate."

"Sure you do." Jane gives me a look I don't love.

Brittany is still staring at the retreating group, chin propped on her hand. "I don't care about any of that. I like Jeremy."

"Brittany."

"What? He's the dragon with the dark hair. The one who barely talks."

"He almost burned a boy to death last semester," Jane says flatly. "As a dragon. Full shift, lost control, nearly turned some poor kid at Ravensmoor into ash."

I actually stop walking. "What? What did the authorities do?"

"Nothing." Jane shrugs like this isn't the most insane thing I've heard all week. "His parents paid it off. Big settlement, quiet transfer, everyone signed something and moved on."

"That's — that can't be legal."

"It's very legal if you have enough money," Jane says.

"Fine," Brittany says, entirely unbothered. "I'll like a different one, then. The vampire. Zachary."

And as if the universe has nothing better to do than mock me, one of them — dark hair, sharp jaw, an expression like he's already bored of everyone watching him — glances back over his shoulder and winks. Directly at Brittany.

She makes a sound I've never heard a human being make before and grabs both of our arms so hard I nearly lose my footing in the snow.

"Did you see that? Did you SEE that?"

"I saw it," Jane says, laughing despite herself.

I'm laughing too, mostly at Brittany's face, when the bell rings — a deep, resonant clang that rolls off the mountainside and silences everything, including Brittany, mid-squeal.

"All students, gather!" Instructor Volkin's voice booms across the clearing. "The headmaster has an announcement!"

We funnel toward the main courtyard with everyone else, breath fogging, boots crunching, and something about the mood shifts the moment the headmaster appears — cloaked in deep gray, flanked by fairies with wings so dark they look like torn shadow, their faces set in a grimness that doesn't belong on anything that small.

"Good morning," the headmaster says, and his voice carries without him raising it at all. "Today is a very bad day."

Nobody moves.

"Authorities and school spirits are working to hold the culprit responsible for what happened last night," he continues. "I will say plainly — this individual has a spiritual signature strong enough to be evading our tracking methods. For the first time in this camp's history, our methods are being defied."

He flicks his hand, and a massive screen blooms into the air above him, flickering to life.

The gasp that rips through the crowd hits me before the image even fully registers — a girl, blonde, lying still in the snow, her face streaked and matted with blood.

"No!!" a voice tears loose from somewhere in the crowd. "Not Alice!! Not Alice, she can't be gone!!!"

The girl breaks down completely, sobbing into someone's shoulder, and the whispers start immediately, rippling outward.

"Calamity struck last night," the headmaster says, grim, steady. "While most of you slept, two students — a boy and a girl — were discovered in the woods. The girl has been identified. The boy's identity remains unknown; his hair color could not be determined at the scene. What we do know, from what remains, is that he is very likely a vampire shifter. He bit her. He drained her completely."

"I don't know why bad things keep happening to me," the crying girl chokes out. "That was my damn sister!"

The whispers turn into a low roar, dozens of conversations at once, everyone turning to everyone else. Who could it be. Who would do this. The headmaster raises a hand for silence, condemns the act, promises a full investigation, and announces a strict new curfew — no student outside after eleven, mandatory check-ins, patrols doubled.

"Class is dismissed," he finishes. "Go directly to your dormitories."

The crowd breaks apart around me, but I don't move right away. I'm still staring at the space where the screen used to be, that image burned into the back of my eyes.

A vampire shifter. Strong enough to dodge tracking spells that are supposed to be unbeatable.

My mind goes, without permission, straight to six boys walking up a path like the mountain owed them something.

Three of them vampires. Old-blood. Different.

I don't say anything to Jane or Brittany. But that cold, tingling feeling from the slopes earlier — the one I thought was just my ice power waking up — settles low in my stomach again, and this time it doesn't feel like magic at all.

It feels like a warning.