to divulge another person’s destiny, but I can tell by her mere facial expressions that she saw something important.
A scream echoes through the corridor loudly and my attention flies to the door of our room. Coral looks at me curiously and I do the same. I throw my shirt over my head before running from my room with Coral on my tail.
The hallway is crowded with curious teenagers of all different origins. A few pixies float through the air and the magicians stand in the front of the crowd. Vampires make up the majority of the group. There are more vampires than any other species at the academy. A few mermaids are in the hallway, speaking among themselves curiously.
It’s odd to have so many different species gathered around when we are usually separate. We have classes with our own kind and avoid other groups the majority of the time. I try to push myself to the front of the crowd in general curiosity. Coral leads, but I am grabbed from behind and pulled backward quickly. I don’t struggle against the grip of the person. Once I am in the back of the crowd, I am met with the calculated silver eyes of the academy’s Headmaster.
“Miss. Annesley,” he greets me, “I have an important matter we need to discuss.”
Chapter 2
On the way to the Headmaster’s office, I can’t help but wonder what had happened. He walks silently and I follow closely. When we arrive, I am ordered to sit. “Snow Annesley, it looks like you have killed your roommate,” he says with a firm, unreadable tone.
I gasp and stand, ready to defend myself. “No, that’s impossible. I was waiting in my room with Coral. I received my mark and she saw it. Jasmine,” I begin, thinking about where my second roommate had gone. “Jasmine went to get an early dinner,” I recall. I look at the Headmaster in surprise, coming to a shocking revelation.
“That’s right,” he begins, “she was killed. She drowned in the dining hall, but there is no water near her and she is in her human form.” I look at my feet and take a seat. Jasmine was also a mermaid, so the only way to drown her is to ensure she doesn’t shift forms, and only someone with extremely advanced abilities would be able to kill a mermaid with water.
If even a drop of the liquid were to have fallen on her skin, she would have transformed into her fishlike form. If she had gotten wet, she would have been able to breathe both water and air, making it impossible to drown her. As a mermaid, we are able to control water and weather elements, so in theory, an exceptional mermaid should be able to use someone’s internal body fluids to drown them. After all, a human is roughly sixty percent water and a mermaid is eighty percent.
Out of everyone, I am the only person in the school that should be able to accomplish such a thing.
“Sir, I would never kill someone. You have to believe me,” I beg. I can’t bring myself to harm a fish, let alone a person.
“A month ago, a vampire was killed. His head was torn from his shoulders, and the only person strong enough to tear off a vampire’s head is another vampire. The Elite was framed. A week ago, a shaman was killed by a horde of angry spirits, and the only person able to do so is the Elite. Do you see a pattern, Miss. Annesley?” I stare into his silver eyes for a moment and nod.
“Or an assassin,” I whisper.
“Precisely my point. If the assassin were a magician, he would have access to the spells necessary to kill his classmates and frame the Elites,” the Headmaster says. He is a powerful magician, so he knows exactly what can be accomplished with a spell book.
Magicians can achieve almost anything with their books, but if they are also an assassin, they are far more powerful, thus able to mimic the abilities of another species. If we are dealing with an assassin who is a magician, it will be exceedingly difficult to find the party responsible—especially if the magician is being controlled by another creature.
Assassins