Vampire High Sophomore Year - By Douglas Rees Page 0,10

first period sounded its low note through the halls, and the jenti disappeared into their classrooms. I was left alone with the dim light, the marble walls, and the scent of cedar from the doors.

I had never thought it would feel like I belonged at Vlad, but I had to admit, that was exactly how it felt now. It would be too much to say that I was glad to be back. But it was familiar, and I knew I had a place here. A place I’d earned.

The sound of quick, heavy steps coming down the stairs made me look up.

Gregor Dimitru came down them like a tall, angry wolf, and brushed past me with a short nod.

I had a sort of touchy relationship with Gregor. He’d touched me on my first day at Vlad, when he’d started to beat me up. Then Ileana had marked me with her protection. Another touch. Then she and I had fallen for each other, and Gregor had felt frozen out, even though Ileana had never wanted him for a boyfriend, or for anything else. So he and I had spent last semester, up to the last day, basically hating each other. Right at the end, things had improved a little between us. I had no idea what to expect now.

“Hey, Gregor,” I said.

He nodded and went past me into the office. I heard the door to Horvath’s inner office open and close. A minute later, an odd sound came from behind it. It might have been a sort of strangled yelp. And it did not sound like my cousin had made it.

A second later, Turk and Gregor were standing beside me. Horvath was right behind them.

He smiled when he saw me. It was not a friendly smile.

“Master Cody,” Mr. Horvath said. “Welcome—back.” Horvath was not a member of the Cody Elliot Fan Club any more than Gregor was.

“Thanks,” I said.

The door closed.

“Come with me, please,” Gregor said to Turk.

“No wolf, so I get this guy to show me around,” Turk said. “See you, Cuz.”

I had my own classes to get to, but I couldn’t leave without knowing what had happened in Horvath’s office.

“What did you say to Horvath?” I whispered.

“Not much,” Turk said. “He asked me what I was interested in. I said, ‘Rage, despair, and vengeance.’ Then he asked how I saw myself fitting in at Vlad Dracul. I said I didn’t. He didn’t seem to like that, so I said, ‘It’s cool. If I have to go to school for a few more months, I’d rather do it with a bunch of vampires than anybody else.’”

Gregor’s pale skin turned dark.

“Listen, Turk. You have got to stop calling people vampires,” I said. “It’s rude.”

“I don’t care,” Turk said.

“You should,” I said.

“Oh, should. That’s my favorite word,” Turk said. “Know what should really means, cousin? It means ‘I don’t like what’s happening now.’ That’s all.”

“No it doesn’t.” I was practically speaking in a normal voice now. In the halls of Vlad, that’s like shouting. “It means—it means—Look, your English teacher is Shadwell. He writes poetry and textbooks. Ask him what should really means.”

“Gee, do you think I should?” Turk said.

“It is customary not to speak above a whisper in the halls,” Gregor said.

We were at the top of the stairs, where most of the junior and senior classes were.

“This is the class of English,” Gregor said. “You are to enter.”

Gregor was from Europe, so sometimes his English got a little odd. Usually, this was not a good sign. It tended to go with his skin turning dark, and his beating people up.

They went in, and I went back downstairs. Gregor and Turk. If Horvath had wanted to put the two wrongest people at Vlad together, he couldn’t have done better. It was like putting one of Justin’s angelfish in with something else, a clown loach, maybe, and waiting for the fight to start.

I got through the first three periods without hearing that Turk had been expelled, or thrown out a window. I collected my first batch of impossible assignments in math, biology, and history. Ah, yes, history.

Mr. Gibbon, the same teacher I’d had last year, told us our semester grade would be based on the book, treatise, or dissertation we would write on a subject from New Sodom history. That was in addition to the readings we would do from Hidden Heritage: The Jenti Presence in American History and the essays we would write on what we read, and the thousand pages of