Page 23 of Reckless Witch

“Taken?” Miss Mack repeats.

“Taken to fight The Shadows,” a boy says.

“The illusion of Shadows,” Miss Mack corrects. “We never know when a Reaping will occur, which is why Reaping Preparedness is your first class. It’s our hope that we have time to train you before a Reaping takes you, but, inevitably, some will be taken before they’ve had much training.”

She takes three paces and stops in front of the desk of the delicate, fairylike blonde dorm RA. In a t-shirt and gray sweats, I look like a maid next to Ariel’s blue mini skirt with a tight matching tank top. Her makeup is perfection. I ended my morning toiletries by brushing my hair into a ponytail.

“The one thing you must remember is that The Shadows cannot be beaten with magic—not regular magic, at any rate,” Miss Mack says.

“Regular magic?” a young boy asks.

“Spells, curses, elemental magic,” she says. “Earth magic, herbs, meditation and the like can help protect you, but cannot defeat The Shadows.” Miss Mack slowly walks along the front desks. “You see, The Shadows feed off magic.”

“We all know that,” a young boy cuts in. “What we don’t know is why.” I recognize fear in his voice.

“That is correct,” she replies, and I’m surprised at the compassion in her voice. “We aren’t certain when our ancestors first encountered The Shadows. All we know is they appeared sometime before the Hell Gates were sealed. We don’t know exactly when our ancestors created the Reaping, but we suspect it happened sometime after the Great Shadow War of the fifth century.”

“Didn’t do us much good in the last war,” says a guy who looks a little older than me.

“Are you sure?” Miss Mack asks. “How do you know what we learned in the Reaping isn’t what saved us?”

“Saved us?” the guy snorts. “We got our asses kicked.”

She tilts her head. “But we are still here.” Miss Mack runs her gaze across the class. “The one thing we know for sure is that one of our ancestors discovered The Shadows’ one and only weapon is the sowing of fear and hatred.”

“That sounds stupid,” a guy in the back says.

Miss Mack takes a few steps left and stops in front of another desk. “You think so? Let’s say that”—she glances around the room and her gaze halts on me—"Leilah Crowe tells Commander Vanderkoff that you intend to spread a rumor that he tried to kill you because you want his job.”

Every head swivels toward me as if I’m guilty of Miss Mack’s hypothetical accusation.

“Raith would never believe such a ridiculous lie,” I blurt.

Something flickers in her eyes and I realize she’s peeved that I called Raith by his first name. What the fuck, are we in junior high?

“He might,” she says, “if The Shadows have infected him. Feed fear, and doubt multiplies, leading to psychosis leads, which can result in violence.”

“How do we stop them?” a dark-haired girl asks.

“Stopping The Shadows is both simple and difficult,” Miss Mack says. “The greatest weapons used to defeat The Shadows are trust, love and harmony.”

Murmurs of “What?” and “You’ve got to be kidding,” and “That’s stupid,” ripple through the room.

Miss Mack walks along the front desks. “Yes, at first glance, the idea that love and trust can defeat The Shadows is preposterous. But consider that, with trust present, fear and doubt have little foothold. Trust accompanies some positive emotional attachment—real trust, that is.”

“Sounds easy,” another student says. “So why were The Shadows able to infect so many people?”

“Is it easy not to get angry when you learn that someone has told lies about you?” she asks.

More glances come my way and it occurs to me that Miss Mack is exacting revenge for my fooling around with Ethan. Yeah, she’s got a thing for him.

“It’s far easier to become angry when we perceive we have been wronged than it is to remain calm and try to ascertain if we really have been wronged, especially if you are already angry, bitter or just very sad.”

“So, you’re saying The Shadows fuc— mess with our heads?” asks the young boy I peg as a wolf. “They use our emotions against us.”

Miss Mack pushes her eyeglasses up the bridge of her nose. “Right, Billy. They play upon our vulnerability. If a husband lost a wife to illness and blames the doctors or maybe just fate, The Shadows can amplify that sorrow and anger. An enemy that can sow dissent can walk away and let their enemy destroy themselves. What’s tricky, is that they first center you, give you a sense of peace, of purpose. Then that sense of purpose is funneled into your greatest fears and sorrows. The most important thing—the one thing that can save your lives and your sanity—is to remember that you need one another. You must resist the urge to distrust. Stay in the light.” She points at the chalkboard. “Light versus dark. What does that mean?”

“Light vanquishes dark,” Ariel answers with a smug note in her voice.