Insidious Winds (5 page)

“It’s the same scent as the one at your friend’s
house,” Henry said as soon as they were gone.

“Figures.” Henry and I spent the rest of the
afternoon taking pictures with my phone and cleaning up. Darwin finally arrived
and we drove back to my apartment, which was only a couple of minutes away. I
half expected my apartment to be destroyed, but fortunately, it wasn’t.

Henry sniffed the door and searched the unit.
“Anything?” I asked.

He returned to the living room. “No one has been in
here.”

*          *          *

I had dreams of Heather and Astrid, but they were
actual dreams, where I couldn’t communicate with the very real and very dead
Heather or my trapped vampire friend. I woke to a loud crash and Darwin yelling
that he didn’t do it.

I got up, dressed, and only then noticed that my
phone was missing. Whatever mess Darwin had made was cleaned up by the time I
went out to the living room, where Henry and Darwin were sitting on the couch,
eating breakfast, and watching the news. The takeaway bags from the nearby fast
food place were open beside the coffee table to be used as little trash bags.

Henry could make a full-time career out of
cleaning up after Darwin
. With his insanely high I.Q., Darwin could create
advanced computer programs, crack any mathematical formula, and make
predictions based on probability that could pass for magic, but he wasn’t the
most functional man alive.

Aside from experiencing horrible pain if anyone
touched his skin, Darwin was extremely socially awkward when he thought he was
being judged. He was also raised to stay with his family indefinitely.
According to his father, the university was the only thing that kept him from
sitting in front of the computer for days at a time without sleep when they
were at home.

“What does Maseré think of your wolf?” I asked
Darwin. He stopped shoving bacon into his mouth, looked at me, and shrugged.
“You didn’t tell him you can shift now?”

Despite eating with his mouth full quite often, he
took his time chewing before answering me. “It came up a time or two. He can
sense the wolf. My wolf sensed him, too.” He chugged down his coffee. “Dad’s
wolf is a part of him, so his wolf should technically be as much my wolf’s dad
as Dad is mine.”

“So your wolf was fine with him?”

“No, he wasn’t. He would have challenged Dad if I let
him out. It’s not the normal behavior for wolf shifters. Are we gonna go or
what?”

“I used your phone this morning and took care of the
insurance for the office,” Henry said.

I managed to get a bite to eat before Darwin scarfed
it all. Of course, as thin as he was, nobody could guess how much he ate. After
we grabbed our bags and locked up, we took Henry’s maroon, extended cab pickup,
since my car wouldn’t hold everything and Darwin didn’t have a car.

The first few hours were great because Darwin napped.
Then he woke and spent the rest of the drive harassing Henry with personal
questions. He wanted to know everything about Henry’s ex-wife, what it was like
being a thief, and where he was going from here. Fortunately for the jaguar
shifter, his fiancé disappeared after falsely accusing him of killing his
parents. Henry was not an open person, but his patience was improving all the
time. When Darwin asked about Addison, the jaguar growled and told him there
would be no more talking. To my astonishment, that actually worked; Darwin
didn’t say another word until we arrived at the university.

It was pretty majestic as far as schools went, and
pretty creepy as far as castles went. Strangely, it also felt like home.

*          *          *

A few dozen students had also already arrived, but
the professors were nowhere to be seen. It made for a very quiet few days. I
went to Hunt’s office on Friday to see if he was okay and interrupted a very
vocal dispute between him, Flagstone, and Remington. I understood Hunt’s issue
with the situation; he could see through his familiar’s eyes and no one wanted
to see that much of their daughter. Still, I thought the wolf shifter was good
for Remy. They were both visibly happier together.

I returned to my room to find Henry in this jaguar
form playing with his pillow. I couldn’t find any appropriate response until I
saw Darwin sitting in his chair. “What did you do?”

He grinned and shrugged. “I might have accidentally
put a bit of catnip in his pillowcase.”

“He’s going to kill you when he comes out of it.”

“No worries. He’ll do that for ten or so more minutes
and then walk away from it.”

Addison arrived on Saturday, so she and Henry spent
the three days of the full moon hiding away in her private professor’s room on
the top floor. One very interesting change I discovered was that Zhang Wei was
not only a teacher, but also the new head of all the feline shifters. Since
many of them, like Henry, were solitary creatures, Hunt thought that Zhang Wei
would be better suited than Alpha Flagstone. The wolf alpha was still in charge
of all other shifters. Li Na never looked so heartbroken.

She sat next to Darwin on Sunday morning and my young
roommate asked her something in Chinese. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

She answered in Chinese and Darwin turned to me. “She
said her brother is trying to kill her. He doesn’t think she works hard
enough.”

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to a symbol on her
wrist. It looked like a tattoo of the four elements inside a black circle, but
she tugged the sleeve of her red blouse over it before I could get a better
look.

“Is nothing,” she said, then got up and left.

“That wasn’t weird or anything.”

“Amy!” Darwin said excitedly, forgetting about Li Na
when he saw his girlfriend. He stood, pulled his hood over his head, tightened
the drawstring, and then hugged Amelia as she reached us. The woman held still
so that her clothes wouldn’t crease and expose skin that could hurt him.

She turned to me when he let her go. “How’s… oh…
sorry. Astrid is still missing then?”

I nodded. “You can tell that from my emotions?” Her
power wasn’t all that different from mine.

“I can see it on your face.”

*          *          *

On Monday morning, knowing my element was air this
semester, I made several guesses as to who my elemental mentor was. I was only
half listening to Darwin’s lecture on recycling plastic at breakfast when Henry
made a soft sound in the back of his throat. Darwin and I both turned to see
who was walking up behind us. My jaw dropped.

Vincent handed me my schedule. “Good morning, Devon.”

“Morning. Are you a teacher here now?”

He smiled brightly. “It is much better than being on
the council. I am teaching the advanced divination classes, which you will be
in.”

“But I haven’t taken beginning divination classes.”

“You’re going to be my assistant this semester.”

“I’m not getting up at five to wake everyone else up,
deliver messages, and run errands,” I said. I got a dirty look from one of the
assistants who happened to be handing Henry his schedule at that moment.

“Not every assistant does that. We should save this
conversation for private. Come to the library where you practiced with me last
semester after you finish your classes today.” He patted my shoulder and walked
away.

I checked my schedule. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and
Fridays, I had
Tools of Magic
,
Mythology
,
Summoning Your
Familiar
, and
Mixed Martial Arts
. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I had
Defensive
Magic
,
Psychology of Shifters
, and
Advanced Divination
.

“Did you get the classes you asked for?” Darwin
asked.

“Yes, except I also got the class on familiars.” I
didn’t have Professor Langril, but that was probably a good thing since he
basically trapped Astrid in Hell.

“You said Hunt and them told you not to summon your
familiar.”

“I doubt Professor Watson knows that, though,” I
said.

“Maybe you should do it. Your familiar can be a huge
help.”

“Not until I can get rid of this curse.”

*          *          *

Tools of Magic
was taught by Meredith Aros in
an outside classroom. Professor Aros was a tall, thin, middle-aged woman with
soft brown eyes and curly brown hair done up in a ponytail. The “classroom”
consisted of three picnic benches and a ten-by-twelve wooden gazebo canopy. On
the benches were small leather packs.

“Everyone take a seat.”

There were fifteen students, myself included, who
were all wizards. Most of them I had other classes with before. I sat down and
one of Jackson’s gang, Theo, immediately sat to the left of me. I knew this guy
had an agenda. Jackson himself was growing up and learning some humility. I had
no mercy for his racist and violent friends, and Theo was the worst of the lot,
especially when Jackson wasn’t around.

“After many years of requesting, I finally got an
outside classroom. This will help tremendously, as you will see as the semester
progresses. Now, unlike most of your classes, I did not assign a classroom
text. There are too many books you will need, so you will rent them from the
library. Instead, you will all have a carving kit. They’re all the same, so the
one in front of you will be fine.”

“Do we have to pay for this?” Theo asked.

“It is covered by your tuition, since you have no
assigned textbook. You all probably noticed your is tuition slightly higher
this year. Some of that is the fact that your more advanced classes cost more,
but also, you will be using a lot of material in this class.”

“My husband said that the council would be paying
most of our tuition and donating tons of money to the school when their taxes
are started,” one of the women said.

Her sister beside her nodded. “Only us, though.
They’re not paying for the fae, shifters, vampires, or throwbacks.”

“Don’t start that shit here,” Theo snarled. “The
council isn’t shelling money out to anyone. They’re all liars and stupid as
goats.”

The woman stood. “You won’t be saying that when the
council locks you in their dungeon. Once the council stops having to pay for
the other paranormals, they will have more for us. We have to stand together or
the other paranormals are going to take over. You of all people know that!”
Theo stood, about to start yelling.

“Sit down,” Professor Aros snapped. They both sat.
“You both have detention. This is not a political debate class and I will not
tolerate such behavior. This is your fourth semester; act like adults and keep
your views to yourself in class.”

The rest of the class went by without argument. I
found several carving and cutting tools in my pack as well as a polishing cloth
and several empty vials and pouches. We learned that we were going to be making
a number of magical devices, but exactly what we made was up to us, since they
were tailored to us individually and we all had different tastes. I was looking
forward to making a tool that would help me in getting the key and saving
Astrid.

When Theo pointed one of his carving tools at another
student threateningly, Professor Aros took it from him. As she did, I saw the
same tattoo on her wrist as Li Na had. She continued reading off the syllabus
without a word to Theo.

My
Mythology
class was taught by Professor
Roswell, who I had in my first semester for
Metals
. Although I knew I
could pass the quizzes and tests easily, he failed me before for missing too
many classes. Since I was trying to get the key this semester, it wasn’t
looking good.

“The semester will be divided into regional myths,
but there will be quite a few crossovers. In fact, we will spend a great deal
of time discussing human vampire lore.”

“I didn’t know there were human vampires,” Becky
said, sitting a few rows down from me.

“Oh, I did miss that humor over the break, Ms. Adams.
I see quite a lot of detention down the road for you.”

Summoning Your Familiar
was taught by Julien
Houx, a French man who didn’t look any older than me with dark brown hair and a
small, groomed goatee. Instead of the normal wizard’s robe that most of the
teachers wore, he just had on a business shirt and slacks, a matter which had
most of the women in the room whispering and ogling.

The classroom was spacious with large windows on two
walls. Three of the walls, including the two with windows, were rounded. There
were six tables and a syllabus at each seat. I sat down in the closest seat to
the door. Although I planned to learn as much as I could about familiars, I
pretty much expected to flunk the class, because endangering the life of my
familiar was immoral.

“Not every one of you will be successful in summoning
your familiars, as many of you will not put in enough effort. You cannot pass
my class unless you are able to call your familiar and bond with it. Before you
begin calling it, you must learn to treat the being with respect. Familiars
have been known to try to kill their wizard if he was not powerful enough to
complete the binding. No familiar wants to be bonded to someone who is weak.”

He might as well have been speaking directly to me.

My last class was
Mixed Martial Arts
, taught
by Zhang Wei. The tiger shifter greeted me kindly and then glared at his sister
when she tried to hide from him behind one of her friends. Li Na ditched the
kimonos and hair pins Zhang Wei wanted her to wear and was often seen in skirts
or sundresses. As she discovered her own style, she began gaining the attention
of quite a few men. Of course, her brother was not pleased.

After class, which consisted of rigorous practice
moves, I dressed into my regular t-shirt, jeans, and leather jacket, said
goodbye to Zhang Wei, and went to the tower library. Vincent was already
waiting for me when I arrived. With his attention on his book, he indicated the
seat across the desk from him. I sat and waited.