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I guess she was hungry, which made sense as we hadn’t gotten to finish our lunch, on account of this trip to the headmistress’ office.
“Well, it’s too late now, so we’re just going to have to make the best of it,” the Headmistress continued. “I’m adding this class to your schedule, but not the year one class. Even though that’s probably what you deserve, it’s not what you need. You’ll be with the other year three students, which means they’ll be quite advanced compared to you, so I’m also assigning you a tutor.”
Seriously? This was all that idiot wolf, Taggart’s fault.
“Elliot Markham is taking this classwith the fourth years, for the fourth time, but not because he needs it. The truth is, he didn’t need it hisfirstyear. He’s been in perfect control of his dragon from the moment he walked through our Academy doors.”
“Dragon?” I burst out. Whatwasit with dragons in my life lately?
“Is that a problem?” The look on her face clearly expressed that saying yes would only irritate her.
I shook my head. “No, Headmistress.”
“Excellent. I will let Elliot know to expect you in the library Monday and Wednesday afternoons at sixteen hundred hours, starting tomorrow.”
I wanted to protest that I already had a full schedule, which meant that adding a class plus two tutoring sessions was cruel and unusualpunishment, but I held my tongue. No sense in irritating her. With my luck, she’d make itthreetutoring sessions.
By the time I got back to the cafeteria, new schedule in hand, the remains of my lunch were long gone, as were the students I’d been eating with. The second part would be a bonus, except I felt bad for ditching Jasmine. She’d been left behind to deal with the aftermath of my outburst.
I went exploring in the kitchens and helped myself to snacks from the pantry while I fixed a towering sandwich from leftovers in the fridge.
That was one of the nice things about the Academy. No matter what time of day or night, food was always available for the hungry.
Or in my case, for the newbornleopard who was now jumping up and down in excitement over our impromptu meal. This was the first time I sensed excitement and happiness from her. Up to now, it was always either fear or anger.
It suddenly occurred to me that she’d been in fight or flight mode her entire lifetime. I’d called her a newborn in Headmistress Blackthorn’s office, but not once had I actually treated her that way.
While eating my sandwich standing up in the kitchen, I contemplated how I might bridge the gap between the two of us and help my leopard feel safe. I then went to find Jasmine, who as it turned out, was waiting for me in my room.
Apparently Jahrdran and Kasi werestill going at it.
“I saved your lunch,” Jasmine greeted me the minute I arrived. “You got here just in time too because I’ve been eyeing your pie. Another five minutes and it might have been gone.”
“Hands off my pie, woman.” I might have told her to go ahead and eat it, except the minute she heard the word pie, my leopard began bouncing around in my head, radiating joy. It couldn’t possibly be this easy, but I was going to take what I could get.
So I sat down to eat dessert and told Jasmine all about my meeting with Blackthorn and the mandated tutoring sessions.
“That sucks,” Jasmine concluded.
I nodded glumly. “I tried to convince her to let me drop Dragon Riding 101?—”
“What? But we’re taking that onetogether!”
”—but she wouldn’t let me. She said it’d be good practice for me, learning to control my leopard while around other predators.”
“Well, thank goodness! I can’t believe you tried to ditch me.”
“You know I never wanted to take that class in the first place.”
“Whatever.” Jasmine rolled her eyes. “You’ll end up thanking me later, you know.”
I didn’t say what I was thinking, that the likelihood ofthatwas practically zero. Or less than zero. Probably less than since I wasn’t exactly enthused about learning howto ride a dragon. Unfortunately, back in the spring when we were signing up for classes, Jasmine had insisted that thisparticular one would be epically fun.
Even then, I’d known she was full of shit.
“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” I said now, glaring at her. “I’ve had enough danger at the Academy to last me a lifetime.”
“Oh, please. This is an educational institution. How dangerous could it possibly be?”
