Year Two: Rebels - Cara Wylde Page 0,19

my gift. Eventually, he wrapped the dried flower into a sheet of paper he ripped from the notebook that sat empty and ignored on the table and put it in his pocket.

“Thank you.”

I set the cup down and covered my mouth with my hand. No matter how many times I drank the concoction, it never got better. It stank to high Heaven, and tasted like old, dirty socks. On the bright side, I was feeling better already.

“It will slow down the aging process. It can’t make her younger than she is right now, but it will freeze her body and mind at the age she’s at. From my experience, I believe it will last her for about 30 years, maybe 40.”

“That’s more than I could ask.”

Adrian left, eager to talk to Headmaster Colin as soon as possible. Corri stayed with me. Little by little, my mind cleared and my memory started coming back. I remembered what had happened in semester two, I remembered how I’d felt and what I’d seen each and every time I had jumped to the universe of the cosmic beings. I remembered the cave, the candles flickering in the dark, melting as I climbed onto the edge of the well and looked deep into the dark abyss.

I closed my eyes and focused on my breath. I’m alright. I’m here, I’m breathing. I’m alive. No, I hadn’t tried to kill myself, but the monster living under the Academy had. It had infiltrated my mind, altered my thoughts. It had called to me, and I’d followed.

“Mistress?”

I snapped my eyes open. “I’m fine.”

“You do look better. What next?”

“Next?” I grinned. “How about you use your talents on the good doctor? He might need some convincing that I’m ready to go home.”

But I wasn’t going home, was I? For the first time since I’d started attending Grim Reaper Academy, I thought that I might never return home after it was all over.

CHAPTER SIX

It was the beginning of November, and the Christmas spirit was already in the air. I rejoined my classes after missing half of the semester. Everyone was talking about the Yule Ball, and there I was, asking myself whether it was even worth trying to improve my grades or my score. What was I doing here? The only reason the headmaster and the professors had accepted to give me a second chance this year was that they knew I was still ahead of everyone, even after I’d spent the entire summer vacation and then September and October hospitalized. In PE, Adrian was struggling to teach the students to teleport using the teleportation pins they’d received at the end of year one. Some of them were sufficiently good at it, but most of them were… not there yet. Oh, speaking of the end of year one… I’d missed practice, too. My life was a mess. But then again, I didn’t particularly want to become a Grim Reaper, so why was I even stressing over these things?

I arrived at the Academy in the early morning, just as the students and the professors were getting down to breakfast in the dining hall. With a little magic, Corri sent my bag to my dorm-room, and we stepped into the dining hall together. As all eyes turned on us, we made our way to the buffet. Actually, I did because Corri had claimed my right shoulder as her throne from where she scowled at the VDC and the RDC students, and wasn’t doing much flying, let alone walking. I grabbed a tray and some plates and fell in line. Seth and Davien were all over me in seconds.

“Welcome back, normie,” Davien said in a playful tone.

“We missed you.” Seth tried to make it sound like he wasn’t saying he’d missed me, but just stating that people at the Academy in general had missed me. “That human friend of yours… I wanna say Hayley? She can’t stop asking about you.”

I smiled. They were so sweet, weren’t they? Here was something that I wasn’t going to admit too soon: I’d missed them too. They looked hot in their uniforms. Seth had lost weight, though, and it was so obvious. His black shirt seemed to be one size too big now, and his uniform jacket hung a bit on his shoulders. Davien had the brightest smile I’d seen on him in a long time. The light coming in through the tall windows played in his red hair, highlighting it in gold and crimson. His green eyes