Moonveil Academy: Trapped With The Five Kings

Elara:

Silence settled between us after Kairo’s words. For some reason, the quiet didn’t feel uncomfortable this time. I simply sat there with my fingers resting against the edge of the open book, staring at the same line of text without actually reading a single word.

Getting back up was an achievement. Maybe it was a simple statement to him, something he had said without giving it much thought, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

I had spent most of the last several days focusing on everything that had happened to me, the things I couldn’t remember, the things I wanted to forget, and the fact that someone had found me lying unconscious on a road when the last thing I clearly remembered was falling off a cliff. My mind had been too busy trying to make sense of the horror to consider the fact that I had actually survived it.

I finally closed the book with a soft thud and turned in my chair to face Kairo completely. There was something else I thought of to ask him. Something that had nothing to do with magic, spells, homework, or the pile of books waiting to destroy the last remaining pieces of my sanity.

Kairo immediately noticed the seriousness on my face. The teasing smile faded slightly as he arched one eyebrow and waited for me to speak, his gaze fixed on mine.

I contemplated the question for a moment, suddenly wondering whether it would sound completely ridiculous after the conversation we had just had, but eventually, I asked, ”What kind of animals live in the woods surrounding the academy?”

For several seconds, the Greymark heir just stared at me. And I stared back.

The longer his silence continued, the more I started wondering whether I had somehow asked the strangest question possible. He looked genuinely taken aback, as if out of every subject he had expected me to bring up, animals had never even crossed his mind.

It took him long enough to finally catch himself that I was tempted to ask whether he had stopped working altogether. Finally, his eyebrows drew together as he asked, ”Why are you asking me about animals?”

I shrugged, trying to make my tone as casual as possible even though my curiosity had suddenly sharpened. ”I saw something that night.” His expression changed almost immediately, but I continued before he could ask what I meant. ”Something black. Really big.”

My eyes drifted toward the dark windows of the library as the fragmented memory surfaced again. I still couldn’t see it clearly. Every time I tried, the image slipped through my fingers like smoke. But I remembered darkness. A massive shape. And those bright, blue eyes.

”I just wanted to know what kind of animal might wander around in the woods,” I added. ”That’s all. I was curious.”

Fortunately, after his initial shock at the completely unexpected question, Kairo didn’t seem suspicious of my intentions. He appeared to take my words exactly as I wanted him to. Pure curiosity.

His head tilted slightly as he studied me before asking, ”Do you remember anything other than it being black and big?” His eyes narrowed with concentration as he added, ”How big was it? What shape did it have?”

I shook my head. ”I never got a proper look at it.” The words came out with more frustration than I intended. ”I saw it right before I lost consciousness. Everything was blurry, and then I was...” I stopped myself. I didn’t need to explain the rest. I had already spent the entire week being reminded of what happened.

”I don’t know,” I finally admitted. ”That’s mostly why I’m curious. I didn’t see it properly enough to know what it was.” I tried forcing my mind back toward that moment. The cliff. The sensation of falling. The dark shape racing through the shadows. ”It was completely black,” I said slowly. ”And huge. Bigger than any normal animal I can think of. And...” My gaze lifted toward Kairo again. ”Its eyes were glowing blue.”

For a moment, Kairo frowned.

It was brief. So brief that I might have missed it if I hadn’t been watching him so closely. Something about my description had reminded him of something. His expression shifted into concentration, and for several seconds, he seemed lost in thought. Then, almost as quickly as the reaction had appeared, he shook his head.

”Maybe you saw a familiar,” he finally said. ”There aren’t any large wild animals living in the woods around the academy.”

I blinked at him, and Kairo continued, explaining that the wards surrounding the academy prevented dangerous creatures from wandering too close to the academy grounds. ”Whatever you saw, it probably wasn’t an animal in the way you are thinking of it.”

”A familiar?” I repeated.

Kairo’s eyes immediately returned to me. Apparently, he had noticed my reaction because the next moment, he asked, ”Do you know what a familiar is?”

I nodded slowly. ”I know what a familiar is.” I knew what this term meant ever since Crazy revealed himself as my familiar. I just hadn’t realized people at Moonveil actually had them. ”I just didn’t know there were people in the academy with familiars.”

The second the words left my mouth, a slow smile spread across Kairo’s lips.

I glared at him.

He shook his head, clearly amused by something that I didn’t find amusing at all. ”Princess,” he said, and I already knew I wasn’t going to like whatever came next. ”You have been at Moonveil for over a month.”

”Yes,” I replied flatly.

”And you still don’t know that almost every single student at this academy has a familiar.”

My jaw nearly dropped to the floor as I stared at him. ”Almost every student?”

Kairo nodded.

I looked around the library as if I expected some hidden creature to suddenly crawl out from behind one of the bookshelves. My gaze returned to him slowly. ”What do you mean almost every student has a familiar?”

”Exactly what I said.”

”But I have never seen any.” I frowned harder as I thought back to the past month. I had seen hundreds of students roaming around Moonveil Academy - humans and supernaturals. I had attended classes, walked through the halls, sat in the cafeteria, and spent hours in the library. Not once had I seen an academy student casually walking around with a magical animal beside them. ”Not a single one.”