We pause outside the next classroom and peer inside. It’s a pretty standard class; lined with neat rows of desks and narrow, barred windows looking out at the tree-lined mountains to the west.
Most of the seats are already filled, but it isn’t hard to spot them amongst the crowd. Piers, Owen, and Bennett have already pulled a clump of desks close together at the back of class. Piers is stretched out, his arms crossed over his head and his feet resting on the back of the chair in front of him. Bennett, meanwhile, is just struggling to fit into the restricting desk while Owen keeps organizing and reorganizing the pens on his desktop.
I stop short in the door, and all three look up at me.
There’s a slight pressure on the back of my elbow as Sawyer guides me away to some desks on the other side of the small room, as far away as possible, before we can cause a scene. They aren’t the only eyes on me as a settle in. A couple of the other new recruits straighten up and train their eyes forward, all the while watching me from the outer corners of their vision.
They might not be outright bullying me, but the rest of this class is certainly determined to find out what stuff I’m made of. I find myself shrinking into my seat. Up until a year ago, I didn’t even know this world existed, but everyone is already treating me like I’m some kind of threat to be summed up and destroyed.
Piers and his boys are staring at me still, but I focus on my notebook, trying my best not to stare back. Sawyer helps by leaning forward and blocking me from their view until the professor
finally sweeps inside and draws everyone’s eyes forward.
“Good afternoon!”
I look up too. Professor Waldman, the female professor I met last night on the way back to the dorms, is at the front of the room writing her name on the whiteboard. Her voice his high and almost sing-song, like that of a nursery-school teacher.
“I hope everyone’s here,” she says, clapping her hands together and waving the long, bohemian sleeves of her dress around under the marker in her hand, “Welcome to creature studies. You lucky kids get me this year!”
I bristle at being called a kid. I glance at Sawyer, who also doesn’t seem to like it. I’m one of the youngest students here, and I’m eighteen. Professor Waldman’s smile grows even wider, and something tells me she’s going to be making me bristle a lot.
“I know I might not look like your typical monster hunter,” she’s continued, her eyelashes batting under heavy makeup, “But I can promise you, I’ve seen nearly every creature in these books we’re going to be studying … and here I am, lived to tell the tale. That must tell you something.”
“Yeah,” Sawyer says, leaning closely to whisper under his breath, “It tells us she didn’t work alone.”
Professor Waldman looks up sharply from where she was supposedly picking a name from random off her attendance list to pass out textbooks. For one second, I catch something dark on her face as she searches out the source of the comment.
But then her eyes land on me, and they soften. “Ah, Avery. Why don’t you do the honors?”
Her eyes meet mine. She’s beaming, but I can’t get the image out of my head of how she looked. It might have been just for a second, but there was something … unsettling … in her gaze. I scoot my chair back and stand up to do as she asks before I get the chance to see it again.
She’s still grinning at me as I walk to the front of the room to pick up a stack of thick paperback books off her desk. A Beginner’s Guide to Creatures and Monsters. The image on the cover looks like it could belong to any old book on mythology I could pull from any library shelf. One quick flip through the first couple pages, however, and it’s already clear this is something more. A knot tightens in the pit of my stomach.
It was nearly impossible to get my hands on real monster books before the start of the year. I had to reply on piecing together half-fictionalized stories from the internet and mythology textbooks. I’m aching to learn the truth at the foundation of this new world.
The world of monsters is finally within my grasp.
I start passing out the books as quickly as possible, starting with the row nearest the door—Piers’ row. His eyes are trained back on me, their pupils tiny dark pits of black trying to draw me in.
“While she’s doing that, I’ll tell you a little bit about what we’ll be doing today—this may be an introduction, but it’s still important you pay attention.”
I make my way up the row. Piers, Owen, and Bennett watch me.
“For this first quarter, we’ll be learning about the easiest monsters and creatures to handle; this class is meant to be a sort of companion to creature handling, which you’ll have tomorrow afternoon.”
I place a book on Piers’ desk. He grabs it and immediately knocks it onto the floor with a loud thump.
“Professor,” he says, his gaze locked on mine as all other eyes turn to look at the source of the commotion, “Avery dropped my book on the floor.”
Professor Waldman is in the middle of writing something on the board. She’s the only one who doesn’t stop what she’s doing to see what’s going on.
Her voice stays warm and friendly, as she tells Piers, “I’m sure Avery meant nothing by it. Now, class, if you would take note of this schedule here—”
“Wow,” I whisper to Piers as she continues on as if nothing happened. “What are you, twelve?”
“Pick up my book,” he hisses, one finger pointing down at the offending object by his foot.
“Pick it up yourself, asshole.”