The Silver Moon Elm (13 page)

“Mr. Sheep!”

The school principal wrinkled his plain nose, and his plain eyes widened a bit in surprise. “My name is Mr. Mouton,” he allowed, letting the French word for sheep roll off his tongue a bit. “Do I know you, Ms. …?”

“Scales,” Skip finished for him. “She’s a friend of my family’s. She’ll be staying with us for a while, and of course we’ll need to get her registered here at Winok—er, here at Pinegrove High.”

“Oh.” Mr. Mouton shrugged. “Well, that shouldn’t be difficult. Welcome to Pinegrove High, Ms. Scales. Do you have a written and signed communication from your parents? We would need that to—”

“Her parents are dead,” Skip interrupted. Jennifer felt her chest tighten, but took a deep breath. Whether Skip believed that or not, it was a convenient excuse to get through this meeting.

“Oh! I see.” Now Mr. Mouton’s simple features were tinged with embarrassment. “My condolences, Ms. Scales. At some point we’ll require some formal documentation, but given the fact that Skip’s mother and Edmund Slider both work here and can no doubt speak for you—”

“They will,” Skip promised. Just as soon as I talk to them, his expression told Jennifer.

“—then we can certainly get you started. My assistant will get you going on the paperwork, and then perhaps Mr. Wilson here will be kind enough to escort you through your classes for the day…?”

“I can find my way around,” she assured them both. “Skip, go on. If I don’t see you around, I’ll just meet you out front at the end of the day, okay?”

He took a tentative step back. “Are you sure?”

She nodded. “I’ll be fine.”

“All right. I’ll, you know. Check things out. We’ll talk later.”

“Sure.”

Once Skip was gone and Mr. Mouton had put her at an assistant’s desk with a small ream of paperwork, Jennifer carefully considered her options. It was the first moment she had to herself since Skip had told her the horrible truth.

First, she could fight. She had her daggers on under her skirt and a throat full of fire. The plan: Start here in the office, destroy as much of the school and its ghastly occupants as possible, and work her way over to that horrid building in the soccer field.

On the plus side: This would feel really, really good, and that building was important for sure. How could anything that huge and ugly not be a headquarters? Which meant she might smash something hard enough to change things back.

What were the cons? She would probably die before getting out of this building, much less into the other one.

Her second option was to do as her father asked and give up completely. She would forge a new life here in Pinegrove, come to love spiders and other supercrawly things, and occasionally get out to the countryside just to stretch her wings in peace and quiet. Decades from now, when she was on her deathbed with lots of adoring grandchildren around her, she’d flick over to dragon form and give them all a nifty scare. They’d be shocked but they’d love her anyway, because she made really good Christmas cookies, like all grandmothers do, except these wouldn’t be shaped like frosted snowmen and cinnamon angels. Instead, they’d be shaped like little gingerbread ticks and chocolate-sprinkled tarantulas…

Ennnh! No go. Third option?

Her third option was to finish this paperwork, start classes, and keep her eyes open. She could not possibly be the only dragon left in existence. There would be a few others at least. Maybe they were the dregs of the school social classes, the untouchables of the community—but they would befriend her and introduce her to others. Same with beaststalkers. If the kids wouldn’t talk about it, maybe their parents would. She could slowly build up a group who would be willing to—

“Do you need help getting started, dear?” The kind administrative assistant was leaning in closely, and Jennifer suddenly realized her pen had been frozen over the paperwork for a full minute or more. “Are you feeling all right?”

Jennifer smiled at the white-haired woman, imagining her with eight eyes and trying with no small difficulty to refrain from stabbing six or seven of them with her pen. “No, thanks. Just got lost in thought for a sec.”

“Happens to me all the time,” the assistant said, waving a hand in kind dismissal. “Sometimes, it feels good to pretend you’re somewhere else.”

“You said it.”

Her schedule of classes was a bit different from what she was used to. Her first two classes—arithmetic and geometric applications, and history and literature—had already passed by the time she was out of the principal’s office. Ahead was music, then lunch, then chemistry, then study hall, and then Spanish. Spanish had an asterisk in front of it. At the bottom of the page was the notation:

*Excused from Introductory Astronomy for one semester.

No straight English class, she noted on her way to the band room. And why don’t they just call math “math?” And what’s with the Astronomy class, and the excuse? There were never any Astronomy classes at Winoka.

She didn’t have good answers to any of these questions by the time she got to the band room. Which was good, because she would have forgotten all of them anyway.

The band room was lined with an array of instruments: some typical brass and percussion, and others of completely foreign design. One such device in the center of the room—what at first appeared to be a collision of three or four different harps—had an elaborate wooden frame and reminded Jennifer of multiple legs on strings.

At least twenty other students were in the class, but none carried an instrument. Instead, they were gathered around a grand piano, where Tavia Saltin sat. Tavia looked exactly the way Jennifer would have hoped, with chocolate hair wrapped in a tight bun topping a spindly frame, but the older woman betrayed no sign of recognition.

“So you’re our newest student!” she greeted Jennifer with a mixture of warmth and interest. “Tell me, have you had much musical training?”

“Just the normal music program from my regular school. It’s, er, a bit like this one.”

“That’s fine. And do you prefer to morph when you play?”

“Oh! Geez, Ms. Saltin, thanks, but I’m not ready…I mean, I’m more comfortable…”

“Not a problem at all!” Tavia’s beam was wide and understanding. Just as when she first met this woman, Jennifer was unnerved by the overfriendliness. “You just take whatever form makes you most comfortable.

“So let’s get started!” she announced to the class as she absentmindedly poked at the piano keys. A simple but catchy melody emerged, perfect background music for conversation. “I believe we left off yesterday in the middle of our discussion of the more complex stringed instruments. The piano, like the one I’m playing now, is an example of such a stringed instrument—though many would call it a hybrid of string and percussion. But of course you’ve all seen a piano, so I don’t expect that’s very exciting for you.”

She grinned at the students, some of whom granted a giggle.

“Far more interesting is the web harp,” she continued, motioning to the massive instrument Jennifer had noted when she came into the room. “This complex harp was devised in the late eighteenth century when the Welsh settled in Patagonia, now known as Argentina. Nearby native South Americans adopted the simple Welsh harp and…improved it. Over the years, the web harp has found favor as a niche instrument, and the past few decades have seen a resurgence in its popularity, especially in South and North American music.”

I’ll bet, Jennifer thought bitterly. She made a note of the time line—“the past few decades.” Clearly, the instrument in this room was of werachnid design. If werachnid culture had increased in dominance gradually, then whatever change paved the way must also have happened decades ago.

How am I going to go back in time and switch everything around again?

“The resulting music,” Tavia continued, “can be astounding. I am not an expert on the device myself, but fortunately, we have a prodigy here at Pinegrove High who can provide a demonstration. I believe many of you know Andeana?”

“Please,” came a quiet, tired voice from the front of the crowd around the piano. “Just call me Andi, Ms. Saltin.”

Tavia shrugged as a tanned whisper of a girl slid away from the piano, through the tiny crevices between unmoving students, and up to the enormous web harp. Andi’s modest nose and cheekbones were of a dark complexion, rooted perhaps from Colombia or Brazil. Her straight dark hair with a soft magenta streak was tucked behind her left ear. Wearing navy slacks, a loose blue sweater, and blue flats, the girl looked fashionable but forgettable, especially next to a work of delicately strung, carved wooden art.

Looking up at the web harp, Andi sighed and began tuning it. Her sleeves kept rolling down, only to be quickly propped up to the wrist again. The instrument dwarfed her; had Jennifer not known any better, she would have mistaken the girl for one of the shorter strings.

“Andeana has agreed—”

“Andi.” The girl pouted, rubbing her forearms through the sleeves.

“Woot, Andi!” cried out one of the girls—a well-dressed, handsome blonde of unusual size. This got the class chuckling, but Jennifer saw admiration and anticipation, not mockery, in their faces.

“Andi has agreed,” Tavia continued amiably, “to play an excerpt from a beautiful composition called ‘Sekidera Komachi.’ This piece is based on an old Japanese play of the same name about a woman who has lived too long and been forgotten. It is unusual in that it was originally written for two harps, a flute, a koto, and a soprano. I will play the flute part here on the piano; Andi will handle everything else.”

If Jennifer expected Andi to turn into a spider and start plucking strings with grotesque tarsi, she was bewildered to find that the girl did not change shape at all. Instead, the girl kicked off her flats (revealing long toes with nails painted ten different shades of blue), sat on a chair placed close to the center of the harp, and began to play. Her feet strummed a sequence of strings that lay along the base of the instrument—something that looked like the sort of koto Jennifer had seen in Japanese art movies.

Even more impressive, Andi’s arms were a blur of movement along the arrays of harp strings. There must have been at least four, maybe five or six—and they produced simultaneous flows of music, some soft and gentle, others more staccato or agitated. The musical rivers cascaded alongside each other and splashed over the room, washing the class in a dizzying spectacle of sound. Jennifer squinted at the source of this display: Did she only have two arms? Or was it more?

Before she could figure it out, Andi began to sing. It was a simple sort of tune, with not much in the way of range and some repetition. But it was still gorgeous coming from this girl’s plain throat, and her words were perfectly accented Japanese.

Even without knowing what the girl was singing, Jennifer could understand the sorrow and pain of the woman in the song. There was tremendous loss.

Suddenly, Andi switched to English:

Where are my loved ones?

I grieve for my family,

And my friends are nowhere near.

With that, the song ended, and Jennifer nearly leapt over the crowd and into the harp. They’re playing with you! She steamed, as the class applauded and whistled, forcing Andi to take a tiny bow. They all know what they’ve done, and they’re rubbing your face in it!

But she saw as Andi stood up straight that the girl had tears on her cheeks. This was not a performance for an outsider’s benefit, she realized. This was a song very personal to this particular musician.

Noticing the girl hugging herself hard and staring at the floor, Jennifer relaxed enough to take in some detail. First, Andi did not look happy even after this fine performance. Second, she did not make eye contact with anyone, even though several students and Tavia were all lavishing praise upon her.

Third, just under the girl’s sleeves, Jennifer spotted an angry red railroad of marks traveling up each arm.

Andi’s a cutter, she realized with grief and alarm. She feels pain inside, cuts herself to bring it out, and hides the marks.

Then a few more pieces clicked into place. She clearly doesn’t feel she belongs around here. She sings about suffering and loss. And she doesn’t morph when she probably should while playing what is obviously a werachnid’s instrument.

What is she hiding?

Straightening when a thrill ran up her spine, Jennifer realized she had her answer.

She’s not like these others.

She’s like me.

After music class, Jennifer struggled through the hallways to catch up to this strange young woman. The delicious possibilities sped through her mind—weredragon? Beaststalker? Both?

She felt a thrill as she spotted the back of the smaller, darker girl’s head. How does she move so fast? In addition to speed, Jennifer would have to overcome another obstacle: Andi’s companion, the tall blonde who had shouted out to her in music class. The two of them were talking. Well, the blonde was talking, and Andi was just nodding and listening and trying to keep up with the other girl’s mammoth gait.

The two of them appeared to be friends, since the blonde was laughing and Andi revealed a small smile when she turned her head from side to side. Another recruit? Jennifer wondered. Then she realized she might be getting ahead of herself.

“Jennifer!” It was Skip, racing down the hall to catch up. He had a tentative look on his face. “Hey, you’re still okay? How are you getting along?”

She shrugged, trying to contain her excitement about Andi. “Okay. I’m trying to keep up with a couple of girls I just met in music class. Thought I might try having lunch with them.”

“I’ll come with you.” He fell into step next to her. “So how was music class?”

“Interesting. Your aunt was friendly enough. Didn’t seem to know me.”

“I told you.” His voice held a gentle reproach. “Apparently, she’s not even an eye specialist in this universe, since the average person’s eyesight around here is 20/10. So instead of using her love for music as a therapeutic approach for patients, she teaches the subject here at school. Crazy world, huh?”