Azure Dragons (Supernatural Shifter Academy #2) - G. Bailey Page 0,26
of the guys’ bickering continues on the other side of the door until it’s joined by additional voices that I recognize as belonging to Hazel and the Murakami twins. By the time I emerge, it’s damn close to a party in the common area, with the others all hovering around the table.
“I hope you don’t mind if we tag along with you,” Hazel says when I enter the room. “It’s going to be crowded today, and if they let us roam around, we might lose track of one another.” She’s sitting between the twins, who are in the middle of an animated conversation with Landon. The others quiet at her question, all turning their gazes on me at once as if waiting for me to give my permission.
I blink, realising in an instant that they’ve come to see me as some sort of de facto leader—or at the very least, someone they can trust to make decisions. I’m not sure I like that, not least of all because that implies that this is an us versus them situation, but I guess I can’t blame them. For better or worse, I’m in the middle of all of this, and the sooner I can accept that fact, the better.
Clearing my throat, I reply, “Of course. The more the merrier.” I turn to the Japanese-American siblings. “You guys are… Ruby, right?” I ask. “And Xander?”
“In the flesh,” Xander replies, grinning. “And you’re the hybrid.”
I rub the back of my neck. “I guess Hazel must have filled you in.”
“I’m sorry,” Hazel says, holding up her hands, “I didn’t mean to-”
“No, no, it’s all right,” I assure her quickly. “Any friends of yours are friends of mine.”
“And we’re no friends of the Academy administration,” Ruby adds, meeting my eyes with her own. “We won’t go around blabbing about your history. At least… I won’t. I can’t speak for my brother, but-”
Xander elbows her. “Ruby!”
They both start to laugh, and the rest of us join in after a moment’s pause. It’s nice to know that all the U.S. students aren’t as mean-spirited as Lyle. Maybe things will turn around, yet.
“So what are we waiting for, then?” Hazel asks, getting to her feet. “We’ve got a peace talk to attend - don’t want them leaving without us.”
“Remind me again why we’re using human transportation,” Landon says, taking hold of one of the railings in the Blue Line train car, a wave of white and gold clad students that couldn’t stick out from the Saturday-morning traffic more if we tried. It’s impressive to me that we were even all able to get underground and into the metro station without incident, although with a dozen magically equipped faculty fellows herding us around like sheep, maybe I shouldn’t be so surprised. We didn’t get nearly as many weird looks from the humans as I was expecting us to; considering the campus’ proximity to the city, they’re probably used to seeing Academy students out and about. If only any of them knew what we really were.
“If you were a witch, would you want to bother tapping out your powers just to jump us from the suburbs to downtown?” Hazel asks him. “It’s exhausting.”
Landon sighs. “Fair point. It’s just weird, is all. I’m not used to public transport.”
“None of us are,” Hunter replies from his seat.
“Think of it as a learning experience,” I say. “That’s what this is all about, right? Learning to coexist with humans?”
“Fair point.” Although he looks visibly uncomfortable amongst the crowd, the vampire-shifter’s blue eyes meet mine for an instant, and something approaching a smile appears on his face. We haven’t really talked since last night, and the kiss we shared; I don’t think either of us is really sure what to say. It’s not that I’m worried about him blabbing about it—Hunter’s always been reserved, bordering on shy, and I doubt he’ll bring it up unless I do. The problem is how he fits into everything else, and what a certain dragon shifter might say if he found out that we kissed. I realise I’m making a lot of assumptions about Silas here, but I’ve never been in a situation like this before, and overthinking things is sort of my specialty.
Deciding it would be better to focus on something else, I let my eyes drift to Hazel, who’s standing next to the twins. Her eyes slide over to Xander for a moment before meeting mine, and she winks at me before sticking out her tongue. I can