Legacies (Mercedes Lackey) - By Mercedes Lackey Page 0,20
a calendar, so it took her a moment to make out that her classes didn’t start tomorrow, they started the day after. Tomorrow—tomorrow she was scheduled for just one thing.
Testing.
FOUR
Spirit was jolted awake by loud unfamiliar music—something bouncy and upbeat that sounded like the soundtrack of a movie she didn’t ever want to see. She thrashed upright in her bed and forced her eyes open, and the shock of seeing an unfamiliar room made her realize where she was. Oakhurst. Montana.
It took Spirit almost two minutes to discover where the music was coming from. Her laptop. By the time she managed to make it shut up (in the process discovering that the horrible movie music was the Oakhurst School Song) she was thoroughly awake. It was a few minutes after six. Spirit shuddered. She wondered what the penalties for missing breakfast were. She’d give anything for another hour of sleep in her nice warm bed. . . .
Suddenly she remembered that today wouldn’t be an introduction to her classes here at the Orphan Asylum, but some kind of mysterious “testing.” After her extremely unpleasant interview with Doctor Ambrosius yesterday, just the thought of that made her stomach knot. In just twenty-four hours, everything she knew about the world had been turned inside-out.
And worse than that.
When she’d walked out of Doctor Ambrosius’s office yesterday, she would have happily run away from Oakhurst. But there wasn’t anywhere for her to run to. She was fifteen years old, she was completely alone in the world, and she had nothing except what Oakhurst Academy was willing to give her: no money, no home, nobody willing to take her in.
Dad had always told her that it was smart to keep your options open and to know where your escape routes were. Mom had said a Smith & Wesson beat five aces. Phoenix had said she planned to grow up to be an Evil Overlord. Spirit took a deep breath. Right now she was out of options and escape routes, and Oakhurst was holding all the cards. All she could do was hang in there until she grew up. Or maybe until some other option presented itself. Maybe something would turn up.
She grabbed her robe off the back of the closet door (plaid, flannel, quilted, in the school colors) and went into the bathroom to shower.
At least she didn’t need to guess what to wear to find out if you were a wizard. She remembered she had to wear a skirt, and by investigating her dresser drawers, she discovered she had a choice of nylons, tights in any of the three school colors, knee socks, or ankle socks. She decided on brown tights (since she couldn’t wear jeans) and another sweater and turtleneck combo. By the time she got out of here, Spirit thought darkly, she was going to be desperate to wear something in some other color. Bright green, or fire-engine red, or pink with purple polka-dots and orange stripes . . .
Despite the fact that getting ready was so easy, she was almost late for breakfast—she got lost on the way from her room to the Refectory—and the room was full by the time she got there. The servers were already going around to the tables, and Spirit hesitated in the doorway. Maybe she should just leave . . .
But Burke saw her and stood up, and Muirin waved enthusiastically, so Spirit hurried across the room toward them and slid into the empty seat between Loch and Burke. There was already a glass of orange juice by her plate.
“You get a choice of juice in the morning,” Loch said quietly, “but you weren’t here, and almost everybody likes orange juice, so—”
“It’s fine,” Spirit said quickly. She was relieved to see that Loch looked just as nervous as she felt.
“You don’t get a choice of breakfast,” Muirin said darkly. “It’s all healthy. Ugh. Unless you can prove you have a horrible allergy.”
“Well, what if you’re Jewish?” Addie said. “You couldn’t eat bacon then.”
“I guess you’d eat eggs and . . . eggs,” Burke said. “I know Troy’s allergic to peanuts, and the kitchen’s careful not to poison him. That doesn’t mean you’re going to talk them into letting you have your Froot Loops, Muir.”
“Though God knows I try.” Muirin sighed theatrically.
The good-natured bickering among the others was actually soothing, and when one of the servers placed a bowl of oatmeal in front of her,