2015 Entries
1st Place Winner
Not the Rain by Chloe Brzoska
Drip… Drip…
Deep Shadow Woods.
Drip… Drip… Drip…
What type of name is that?
Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip-
I just know I’d rather be anywhere else but there, or rather, here.
Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip-
“Hey. Maggie. Move over. The water’s pouring on my head.”
I groaned groggily and wiggled over a few inches in my sleeping bag like a lethargic caterpillar, giving my brother Jack a much needed escape route from the patter of rain coming in through the hole in our tent. Staring blankly at an empty space to my left, I thought about what my dad had said an eternity of 24 hours ago.
“Come on gang! Camping will be fun! Roasting s’mores on an open fire, hiking through beautiful woods, sleeping under the stars, family togetherness-we’ll have an amazing weekend!”
I hate to disappoint my dad, but from my experiences on our first camping trip, I can conclude that whoever came up with those definitions of camping has never done it themselves. In the span of one day in Deep Shadow Woods, I dropped most of our food in the river, my brother fell into a patch of poison ivy, my mom twisted her ankle, my dad got us hopelessly lost, and it started pouring before we could start a fire. We had a dinner of cold canned ravioli and pitched our tents in the middle of a circle of gnarly black trees.
Flipping over onto my back, I held my stomach in a futile attempt to muffle the rumbles issuing from its depths.
“Maggie?”
“What?” I asked, maybe a little too sharply.
“What’s that noise?”
“The rain.”
“No, seriously. I hear something.” His voice was hushed and strained, and eve in the dark I could see that he was sitting rigidly, peering in the direction of the tent flap. Great Jack. Like I need a 12 year old’s fears added to my anti-camping list.
“Well I don’t care Jac-MMPH!”
Jack had clamped a sweaty hand over my mouth - the universal sign for shut up - and guided me away from my corner to the tent opening.
Then I did hear something.
And it wasn’t the rain.
Scritch… scratch… scritch…
It sounded as though something - or someone - was prowling around outside the tent. And, I noted with growing alarm, was drawing closer. Jack’s head turned in the dark to face me and breathed the word, “Dad?” I shook my head. “Mom?” he added with a hint of desperation. I shook my head once more. They were sound asleep in the other tent. Dad slept like the dead, and mom had a twisted ankle.
The scuffling drew closer… and closer… and soon the being was so near I could practically see it, a large mass of denser darkness moving in and out of focus through the rain. I could tell even in the dark that it wasn’t an animal, but some sort of person, and a very large one at that. A ranger? A prowler? A thief? Or something worse? Whatever it was, the pain of my heart beating against my chest told me not to find out. While I was distracted, Jack had reached into his backpack and grabbed a flashlight. It was when he rose to a standing position that I noticed and realized what he was doing.
“NO!” I hissed frantically, and I grabbed at his shirt, clutched it for a moment, and then had it wrenched from my fingers as he opened the flap and walked outside.
“W-who’s the-AAAAH!!!”
The scream tore through me like a thousand knives, and I had barely a second to process what happened when a body fell back through the tent flap, the upper part illuminated by the circle of light cast by the now discarded flashlight on the ground.
It was Jack, and his eyes and mouth were wide open.
His mouth was frozen in an eternal scream, and his eyes… weren’t seeing.
“Oh God.”
I threw myself at his side, lifting his head with my hands and staring into his still, chalk white face. My fingers brushed his neck, and I stiffened. There was something sticky there, and there was more every second. All activity in my brain halted for a split second, and then it just exploded, launching into hyperdrive. Is he - was he - who? What? Where? Why? Why couldn’t I process what was happening? Why couldn’t I keep up? Why couldn’t I stop this?
I was still clutching my brother’s body when the thing… no… monster reached in with long and knobby hands and grabbed me by the collar. Flailing helplessly, I was pulled flying through the tent flaps and onto the soaked and muddy ground outside. Gasping and choking, blinking away the rain and my own tears, I was hauled up by the same deathly clammy arms and held, feet scrambling at the ground for purchase, dangled in the air in front of my brother’s murderer. I could see nothing, vision obscured by rain and night, and I briefly wondered if my parents were safe in the second tent. It was then that the creature spoke in a rattling voice that sounded as dry as the desert and as hollow as a rotten tree.
“Who are you?”
“M-M-Maggie,” I spluttered in the direction I assumed the being’s head was, still in shock so that I was willing to answer its question.
“A… girl?” it rasped. “I haven’t had one of those in a while. You’ll be a fresh change in my diet.”
“P-please just… w-what?”
“Silly child. You think that boy was the first I used? One’s soul doesn’t keep me alive for long. It dies out and I need… another. Girls’ souls have an… exotic feel in my body.”
By now I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t functioning. I wasn’t even forming coherent thoughts. I spluttered and wailed as I was brought close and closer to the undead human’s face, and that was when the flash of lighting wracked the sky, and I saw its face.
It could’ve been a human once, but centuries of being dead (if you don’t count living off another’s soul as being alive) had rotted and discolored his face into a wrinkled, shrunken white mess. The ten or so hairs that dangled from its flaking head were bent, and its eyes… weren’t there. Where they should’ve been were empty sockets. but the third empty hole on his face was the one I wished was nonexistent. Its cracked, rotten mouth creaked open with a whooshing rattle, and I felt as though a part of myself - the part that mattered - was drifting farther and farther away, each second fading faster, until it - and I - couldn’t really be at all.
*****
“And so when Maggie and Jack’s parents awoke the next morning, it was to see their children pale and lifeless on the ground, blank eyes wide open.”
The troop leader said to his scouts around the flickering campfire, the light illuminating his face with upside down shadows.
“The soul sucking creature was never seen again for several years, but right now is about the time when it reemerges, searching for another victim to donate their life… for his.”
He paused for a long moment, flames flickering across his shadowed face, and then his disposition switched from creepy to cheerful as he clapped his hands and said, “Alright everybody! It’s almost ten, so everyone pack up and head to your tents. I’ll see you all in the A.M.!”
There was an immediate fluctuation of chatter as the boys, some more spooked by their leader’s ghost story than others, began to rise from the ground, gather their backpacks, walk in pairs to the tents pitched on the outskirts of the clearing surrounded by gnarly black trees. Two lads, twin brothers, lagged behind to kick out the embers in the campfire.
“That was a stupid story, don’t you think?”
“Definitely. If he wants to scare us, he’ll have to try a lot harder. I mean, a soul sucker? Sheesh, like that’s believable.”
“I wouldn’t scorn if I were you two.”
The twins jumped in fright, whirling around in unison to see the looming figure of their troop leader standing right behind them.
“W-what?”
“I wouldn’t scorn,” he repeated, dangerously calm, “because that story took place in these same woods, in this same clearing. And every group that comes in here-”
At this point the man began to walk past the silent boys, and entered his own tent. Just before he closed the flap, he turned around, stared them right in the eyes, and said: “Never leaves intact.”
A moment of silence passed between the twins after their troop leader disappeared, but then the on on the left snorted and laughed apprehensively, dissolving whatever unease the man could’ve left.
“Like we believe that junk. Let’s say the story was real. How would he know this is the spot? He’s just yanking our chains, trying to work us up to hysterics so he can smirk when we come running into his tent like spooked tots.”
His brother chuckled as well. “Totally. He’s just mad ‘cause he couldn’t rattle us. Those groups who come in here never leave intact. Don’t make me laugh.”
But they did laugh. All the way to their tent, taking turns mimicking the man’s tidings of doom. For a while as they slept, it seemed that they were indeed right, that the story was a bunch of hogwash. However, as soon as midnight struck and the moon dashed behind a cloud, they awoke. To a sound.
A scritch.
Scratch.
Scritch.
Not the Rain by Chloe Brzoska
Drip… Drip…
Deep Shadow Woods.
Drip… Drip… Drip…
What type of name is that?
Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip-
I just know I’d rather be anywhere else but there, or rather, here.
Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip-Drip-
“Hey. Maggie. Move over. The water’s pouring on my head.”
I groaned groggily and wiggled over a few inches in my sleeping bag like a lethargic caterpillar, giving my brother Jack a much needed escape route from the patter of rain coming in through the hole in our tent. Staring blankly at an empty space to my left, I thought about what my dad had said an eternity of 24 hours ago.
“Come on gang! Camping will be fun! Roasting s’mores on an open fire, hiking through beautiful woods, sleeping under the stars, family togetherness-we’ll have an amazing weekend!”
I hate to disappoint my dad, but from my experiences on our first camping trip, I can conclude that whoever came up with those definitions of camping has never done it themselves. In the span of one day in Deep Shadow Woods, I dropped most of our food in the river, my brother fell into a patch of poison ivy, my mom twisted her ankle, my dad got us hopelessly lost, and it started pouring before we could start a fire. We had a dinner of cold canned ravioli and pitched our tents in the middle of a circle of gnarly black trees.
Flipping over onto my back, I held my stomach in a futile attempt to muffle the rumbles issuing from its depths.
“Maggie?”
“What?” I asked, maybe a little too sharply.
“What’s that noise?”
“The rain.”
“No, seriously. I hear something.” His voice was hushed and strained, and eve in the dark I could see that he was sitting rigidly, peering in the direction of the tent flap. Great Jack. Like I need a 12 year old’s fears added to my anti-camping list.
“Well I don’t care Jac-MMPH!”
Jack had clamped a sweaty hand over my mouth - the universal sign for shut up - and guided me away from my corner to the tent opening.
Then I did hear something.
And it wasn’t the rain.
Scritch… scratch… scritch…
It sounded as though something - or someone - was prowling around outside the tent. And, I noted with growing alarm, was drawing closer. Jack’s head turned in the dark to face me and breathed the word, “Dad?” I shook my head. “Mom?” he added with a hint of desperation. I shook my head once more. They were sound asleep in the other tent. Dad slept like the dead, and mom had a twisted ankle.
The scuffling drew closer… and closer… and soon the being was so near I could practically see it, a large mass of denser darkness moving in and out of focus through the rain. I could tell even in the dark that it wasn’t an animal, but some sort of person, and a very large one at that. A ranger? A prowler? A thief? Or something worse? Whatever it was, the pain of my heart beating against my chest told me not to find out. While I was distracted, Jack had reached into his backpack and grabbed a flashlight. It was when he rose to a standing position that I noticed and realized what he was doing.
“NO!” I hissed frantically, and I grabbed at his shirt, clutched it for a moment, and then had it wrenched from my fingers as he opened the flap and walked outside.
“W-who’s the-AAAAH!!!”
The scream tore through me like a thousand knives, and I had barely a second to process what happened when a body fell back through the tent flap, the upper part illuminated by the circle of light cast by the now discarded flashlight on the ground.
It was Jack, and his eyes and mouth were wide open.
His mouth was frozen in an eternal scream, and his eyes… weren’t seeing.
“Oh God.”
I threw myself at his side, lifting his head with my hands and staring into his still, chalk white face. My fingers brushed his neck, and I stiffened. There was something sticky there, and there was more every second. All activity in my brain halted for a split second, and then it just exploded, launching into hyperdrive. Is he - was he - who? What? Where? Why? Why couldn’t I process what was happening? Why couldn’t I keep up? Why couldn’t I stop this?
I was still clutching my brother’s body when the thing… no… monster reached in with long and knobby hands and grabbed me by the collar. Flailing helplessly, I was pulled flying through the tent flaps and onto the soaked and muddy ground outside. Gasping and choking, blinking away the rain and my own tears, I was hauled up by the same deathly clammy arms and held, feet scrambling at the ground for purchase, dangled in the air in front of my brother’s murderer. I could see nothing, vision obscured by rain and night, and I briefly wondered if my parents were safe in the second tent. It was then that the creature spoke in a rattling voice that sounded as dry as the desert and as hollow as a rotten tree.
“Who are you?”
“M-M-Maggie,” I spluttered in the direction I assumed the being’s head was, still in shock so that I was willing to answer its question.
“A… girl?” it rasped. “I haven’t had one of those in a while. You’ll be a fresh change in my diet.”
“P-please just… w-what?”
“Silly child. You think that boy was the first I used? One’s soul doesn’t keep me alive for long. It dies out and I need… another. Girls’ souls have an… exotic feel in my body.”
By now I wasn’t listening. I wasn’t functioning. I wasn’t even forming coherent thoughts. I spluttered and wailed as I was brought close and closer to the undead human’s face, and that was when the flash of lighting wracked the sky, and I saw its face.
It could’ve been a human once, but centuries of being dead (if you don’t count living off another’s soul as being alive) had rotted and discolored his face into a wrinkled, shrunken white mess. The ten or so hairs that dangled from its flaking head were bent, and its eyes… weren’t there. Where they should’ve been were empty sockets. but the third empty hole on his face was the one I wished was nonexistent. Its cracked, rotten mouth creaked open with a whooshing rattle, and I felt as though a part of myself - the part that mattered - was drifting farther and farther away, each second fading faster, until it - and I - couldn’t really be at all.
*****
“And so when Maggie and Jack’s parents awoke the next morning, it was to see their children pale and lifeless on the ground, blank eyes wide open.”
The troop leader said to his scouts around the flickering campfire, the light illuminating his face with upside down shadows.
“The soul sucking creature was never seen again for several years, but right now is about the time when it reemerges, searching for another victim to donate their life… for his.”
He paused for a long moment, flames flickering across his shadowed face, and then his disposition switched from creepy to cheerful as he clapped his hands and said, “Alright everybody! It’s almost ten, so everyone pack up and head to your tents. I’ll see you all in the A.M.!”
There was an immediate fluctuation of chatter as the boys, some more spooked by their leader’s ghost story than others, began to rise from the ground, gather their backpacks, walk in pairs to the tents pitched on the outskirts of the clearing surrounded by gnarly black trees. Two lads, twin brothers, lagged behind to kick out the embers in the campfire.
“That was a stupid story, don’t you think?”
“Definitely. If he wants to scare us, he’ll have to try a lot harder. I mean, a soul sucker? Sheesh, like that’s believable.”
“I wouldn’t scorn if I were you two.”
The twins jumped in fright, whirling around in unison to see the looming figure of their troop leader standing right behind them.
“W-what?”
“I wouldn’t scorn,” he repeated, dangerously calm, “because that story took place in these same woods, in this same clearing. And every group that comes in here-”
At this point the man began to walk past the silent boys, and entered his own tent. Just before he closed the flap, he turned around, stared them right in the eyes, and said: “Never leaves intact.”
A moment of silence passed between the twins after their troop leader disappeared, but then the on on the left snorted and laughed apprehensively, dissolving whatever unease the man could’ve left.
“Like we believe that junk. Let’s say the story was real. How would he know this is the spot? He’s just yanking our chains, trying to work us up to hysterics so he can smirk when we come running into his tent like spooked tots.”
His brother chuckled as well. “Totally. He’s just mad ‘cause he couldn’t rattle us. Those groups who come in here never leave intact. Don’t make me laugh.”
But they did laugh. All the way to their tent, taking turns mimicking the man’s tidings of doom. For a while as they slept, it seemed that they were indeed right, that the story was a bunch of hogwash. However, as soon as midnight struck and the moon dashed behind a cloud, they awoke. To a sound.
A scritch.
Scratch.
Scritch.
2nd Place Winner
Bloodbriar by Daniella Giese
I stood in front of the wrought iron gate that surrounded the old brick building. Here it was. The entrance to my new school, Bloodbriar High. I shifted the strap of my bag on my shoulder. Nervous didn’t even begin to cover it. In addition to the normal first day jitters, I had a pretty big secret to hide.
There are cliques in Bloodbriar, just like in any other school, or small town for that matter. Zombies stick with zombies; Necromancers hang with necromancers; vampires chill with vampires; werewolves run with werewolves… you get the picture. In school we have to mix more with the other creatures because classes aren’t segregated, but for the most part we have to stay with our own kind.
My parents are another story. The vampire clan was furious when my mom fell in love with my dad. The werewolf pack was enraged when my dad proposed to my mom. The two of them moved to the outskirts of town, and after two years of a happy marriage came me, the surprise. Although they were expecting a baby, they weren’t expecting me to turn out the way I did. The mixing of species was unheard of. When my mom’s pregnancy was announced, everyone expected me to either be a vampire like my mom or a werewolf like my dad. No one expected me to be both.
My parents kept it a secret from everyone else because the vampires and werewolves were still uneasy about the whole thing. To hide me more successfully we moved to the human world when I was 7, where we’ve been living ever since. But there’s only so long a vampire, werewolf, and hybrid can stay in the human world. It was decided that we should move back to Bloodbriar. Since my werewolf side is easier to hide than my vampire side, my parents agreed (after many arguments) that we just tell everyone I’m a vampire. As long as I stay out of sight during the full moon and don’t lose control of my temper, it should work out fine.
Yeah, right.
“Juliet!” I was jolted out of my worries by the sound of my name. Lillian Cadwell of the Cadwell witch clan stood on the stone steps, waving.
Yes. My childhood best friend is a witch. Not a vampire, or even a werewolf. As if I wasn’t weird enough already.
“Hey Lil!” I called back. I stepped through the gates and walked until I stood at the bottom of the steps.
“Are you ready for your first day back?” Lilli’s newly layered blond hair bounced as she practically jumped with excitement. With her sparkly green eyes and paler complexion, we couldn’t look more opposite. My brown eyes and thick brown hair are definitely credited to my dad. I linked my arm with Lilli’s and together we walked into the building.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.” I answered.
I saw the crowd of vamp kids as soon as we stepped over the threshold. More accurately, I smelled them. More accurately, I smelled the blood they carried with them in little silver flasks. As soon as I caught the scent my fangs sharpened. That’s the reason I’m posing as a vampire instead of a werewolf. No matter how old a vampire got, bloodlust is impossible to control. One of the boys in the group watched Lilli and I walk down the hall. he raised an eyebrow and held up his flask, offering me some. My lips curled back in a hiss. I may be new at Bloodbriar High, but the rulebook had been clear: no blood unless it was mealtime.
Lilli steered me towards a classroom. “History’s first!” We set our bags on the wooden desks. Lilli handed me a slip of paper. “here’s your schedule. I already picked it up for you. I’ve been assigned to show you around since we have all the same classes. Except period five. I have ‘Human Studies’.” She rolled her eyes. I had been exempt, given that I was pretty familiar with humans from living in the mortal world.
I smiled and looked at my schedule. History, Biology, Chemistry, lunch, English, Study Hall, Algebra II. Huh. I guess you could never really escape Algebra. It also seemed very similar to the schedule I had back in the mortal world. I thought my classes at Bloodbriar High would’ve been a little more… I don’t know, freaky? I sat down at the desk next to Lilli and pulled a notebook out of my bag. We hung out until the bell rang for the start of a class. A short man with curly brown hair, goat horns, and thick brown glasses walked into the room. He set his bag on the big desk in the front of the room and picked up a piece of chalk. Then he began to write on the board. “1239. Who can tell me what happened in that year?”
A girl two seats behind me raised her hand.
“Delia?”
“The first battle that started the war between the werewolves and the vampires.”
Oh. Apparently this would be nothing like the human history class I was used to. Today just got a whole lot more interesting.
Apparently learning about the war between vampires and werewolves in a class full of vampires and werewolves sparked a lot of debate over who kicked who’s butt. My parents hadn’t been exaggerating. They really did hate each other. Biology wasn’t much different. Vampires sat on one side of the room and werewolves sat on the other. I noticed the zombies prefered to stay in the back. Witches like Lilli sat in the middle near the gnomes and goblins. My stomach churned. Where do I fit in?
Our teacher wore a long fitted green velvet dress. Her bright white smile revealed her fangs. She wanted to make it clear that she was a vampire. She must’ve been a new teacher. I saw some of the vampire boys sit up a little straighter. One even smoothed his hair. She was very beautiful, but she made me feel a bit uneasy. She seemed to radiate power and arrogance. It made me a little nervous. “Today class, we will be learning about werewolves.” She smiled a wicked smile. “Specifically, what effect wolfsbane has on werewolves.”
Uh-oh.
My dad had taught me about wolfsbane. it’s used as a wolf-repellent, like garlic is for vampires. As soon as she said it, all of the wolves in the class began growling. wolfsbane brings the inner wolf closer to the surface. We can’t help it.
You have got to be kidding me.
She pulled a flower pot out from under her desk and began walking towards the werewolf side of the classroom. I was in the middle with Lilli, but it was still too close. My palms began to sweat. Lilli had been my best friend since we were born, but even she didn’t know what I truly was. What to do, what to do? I couldn’t ask to go to the bathroom. That would be too suspicious. Instead I got up and grabbed a tissue. I stood in the corner of the room by the garbage can. I didn’t have to try too hard to pretend to blow my nose. I could smell the wolfsbane from where I was standing. My nose began to itch and my eyes started to water. I could see the other werewolves shifting in their seats.
“Notice, class, how the flower begins to stimulate change. Even now, scientists aren’t sure what it is in the werewolf gene that reacts with this particular plant.” She held it closer to a boy in the front. He growled at her. His eyes turned yellow and his canines sharpened. He dug his now longer, sharper nails into the sides of the desk. Werewolves can shift form whenever we want to. The only times we have no choice to shift are during the full moon, and when we encounter wolfsbane.
The teacher carried the plant to the rest of the werewolves. Then she carried it over to the vampire side. “And observe, class, how it has no effect on the vampires. It all has to do with genetics.”
Worst. Biology class. ever. I missed mitosis.
She circled back around and began walking towards the front of the room. Towards me. Of course. She held the plant out and smiled that sickly sweet smile. “Would you like to smell?” I sneezed. She frowned and held the flower closer to me. I automatically stepped away.
“Aren’t you Juliet, the new vampire student?” I nodded, not knowing what else to do.
She narrowed her eyes. “Hold this.” I shook my head and took another step back. I realized that this was probably the worst case scenario. She stepped forward again and held the pot out. It came too close. I couldn’t fight the wolf anymore. My eyes turned the golden yellow of the wolf and the canines in my mouth sharpened. The wolf that was usually easy to control went wild. I curled my lips back in an automatic snarl. She stepped back in alarm, looking at me with horror and fascination.
“Well class,” she breathed, “it seems we’re moving on to a new topic.” She looked me up and down. “I would’ve thought that it was impossible for the DNA of a vampire and a werewolf to mix. Logically you should be one or the other, but by some scientific miracle, your genes coincide with each other. The world’s first Vampire-Werewolf hybrid.”
I looked at the rest of the class. They all stared back at me in shock. I locked eyes with Lilli. I could tell she was startled and hurt that I hadn’t told her. Everyone had seen my fangs. And now they could see my wolf. My secret was out.
And it was only second period.
Bloodbriar by Daniella Giese
I stood in front of the wrought iron gate that surrounded the old brick building. Here it was. The entrance to my new school, Bloodbriar High. I shifted the strap of my bag on my shoulder. Nervous didn’t even begin to cover it. In addition to the normal first day jitters, I had a pretty big secret to hide.
There are cliques in Bloodbriar, just like in any other school, or small town for that matter. Zombies stick with zombies; Necromancers hang with necromancers; vampires chill with vampires; werewolves run with werewolves… you get the picture. In school we have to mix more with the other creatures because classes aren’t segregated, but for the most part we have to stay with our own kind.
My parents are another story. The vampire clan was furious when my mom fell in love with my dad. The werewolf pack was enraged when my dad proposed to my mom. The two of them moved to the outskirts of town, and after two years of a happy marriage came me, the surprise. Although they were expecting a baby, they weren’t expecting me to turn out the way I did. The mixing of species was unheard of. When my mom’s pregnancy was announced, everyone expected me to either be a vampire like my mom or a werewolf like my dad. No one expected me to be both.
My parents kept it a secret from everyone else because the vampires and werewolves were still uneasy about the whole thing. To hide me more successfully we moved to the human world when I was 7, where we’ve been living ever since. But there’s only so long a vampire, werewolf, and hybrid can stay in the human world. It was decided that we should move back to Bloodbriar. Since my werewolf side is easier to hide than my vampire side, my parents agreed (after many arguments) that we just tell everyone I’m a vampire. As long as I stay out of sight during the full moon and don’t lose control of my temper, it should work out fine.
Yeah, right.
“Juliet!” I was jolted out of my worries by the sound of my name. Lillian Cadwell of the Cadwell witch clan stood on the stone steps, waving.
Yes. My childhood best friend is a witch. Not a vampire, or even a werewolf. As if I wasn’t weird enough already.
“Hey Lil!” I called back. I stepped through the gates and walked until I stood at the bottom of the steps.
“Are you ready for your first day back?” Lilli’s newly layered blond hair bounced as she practically jumped with excitement. With her sparkly green eyes and paler complexion, we couldn’t look more opposite. My brown eyes and thick brown hair are definitely credited to my dad. I linked my arm with Lilli’s and together we walked into the building.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.” I answered.
I saw the crowd of vamp kids as soon as we stepped over the threshold. More accurately, I smelled them. More accurately, I smelled the blood they carried with them in little silver flasks. As soon as I caught the scent my fangs sharpened. That’s the reason I’m posing as a vampire instead of a werewolf. No matter how old a vampire got, bloodlust is impossible to control. One of the boys in the group watched Lilli and I walk down the hall. he raised an eyebrow and held up his flask, offering me some. My lips curled back in a hiss. I may be new at Bloodbriar High, but the rulebook had been clear: no blood unless it was mealtime.
Lilli steered me towards a classroom. “History’s first!” We set our bags on the wooden desks. Lilli handed me a slip of paper. “here’s your schedule. I already picked it up for you. I’ve been assigned to show you around since we have all the same classes. Except period five. I have ‘Human Studies’.” She rolled her eyes. I had been exempt, given that I was pretty familiar with humans from living in the mortal world.
I smiled and looked at my schedule. History, Biology, Chemistry, lunch, English, Study Hall, Algebra II. Huh. I guess you could never really escape Algebra. It also seemed very similar to the schedule I had back in the mortal world. I thought my classes at Bloodbriar High would’ve been a little more… I don’t know, freaky? I sat down at the desk next to Lilli and pulled a notebook out of my bag. We hung out until the bell rang for the start of a class. A short man with curly brown hair, goat horns, and thick brown glasses walked into the room. He set his bag on the big desk in the front of the room and picked up a piece of chalk. Then he began to write on the board. “1239. Who can tell me what happened in that year?”
A girl two seats behind me raised her hand.
“Delia?”
“The first battle that started the war between the werewolves and the vampires.”
Oh. Apparently this would be nothing like the human history class I was used to. Today just got a whole lot more interesting.
Apparently learning about the war between vampires and werewolves in a class full of vampires and werewolves sparked a lot of debate over who kicked who’s butt. My parents hadn’t been exaggerating. They really did hate each other. Biology wasn’t much different. Vampires sat on one side of the room and werewolves sat on the other. I noticed the zombies prefered to stay in the back. Witches like Lilli sat in the middle near the gnomes and goblins. My stomach churned. Where do I fit in?
Our teacher wore a long fitted green velvet dress. Her bright white smile revealed her fangs. She wanted to make it clear that she was a vampire. She must’ve been a new teacher. I saw some of the vampire boys sit up a little straighter. One even smoothed his hair. She was very beautiful, but she made me feel a bit uneasy. She seemed to radiate power and arrogance. It made me a little nervous. “Today class, we will be learning about werewolves.” She smiled a wicked smile. “Specifically, what effect wolfsbane has on werewolves.”
Uh-oh.
My dad had taught me about wolfsbane. it’s used as a wolf-repellent, like garlic is for vampires. As soon as she said it, all of the wolves in the class began growling. wolfsbane brings the inner wolf closer to the surface. We can’t help it.
You have got to be kidding me.
She pulled a flower pot out from under her desk and began walking towards the werewolf side of the classroom. I was in the middle with Lilli, but it was still too close. My palms began to sweat. Lilli had been my best friend since we were born, but even she didn’t know what I truly was. What to do, what to do? I couldn’t ask to go to the bathroom. That would be too suspicious. Instead I got up and grabbed a tissue. I stood in the corner of the room by the garbage can. I didn’t have to try too hard to pretend to blow my nose. I could smell the wolfsbane from where I was standing. My nose began to itch and my eyes started to water. I could see the other werewolves shifting in their seats.
“Notice, class, how the flower begins to stimulate change. Even now, scientists aren’t sure what it is in the werewolf gene that reacts with this particular plant.” She held it closer to a boy in the front. He growled at her. His eyes turned yellow and his canines sharpened. He dug his now longer, sharper nails into the sides of the desk. Werewolves can shift form whenever we want to. The only times we have no choice to shift are during the full moon, and when we encounter wolfsbane.
The teacher carried the plant to the rest of the werewolves. Then she carried it over to the vampire side. “And observe, class, how it has no effect on the vampires. It all has to do with genetics.”
Worst. Biology class. ever. I missed mitosis.
She circled back around and began walking towards the front of the room. Towards me. Of course. She held the plant out and smiled that sickly sweet smile. “Would you like to smell?” I sneezed. She frowned and held the flower closer to me. I automatically stepped away.
“Aren’t you Juliet, the new vampire student?” I nodded, not knowing what else to do.
She narrowed her eyes. “Hold this.” I shook my head and took another step back. I realized that this was probably the worst case scenario. She stepped forward again and held the pot out. It came too close. I couldn’t fight the wolf anymore. My eyes turned the golden yellow of the wolf and the canines in my mouth sharpened. The wolf that was usually easy to control went wild. I curled my lips back in an automatic snarl. She stepped back in alarm, looking at me with horror and fascination.
“Well class,” she breathed, “it seems we’re moving on to a new topic.” She looked me up and down. “I would’ve thought that it was impossible for the DNA of a vampire and a werewolf to mix. Logically you should be one or the other, but by some scientific miracle, your genes coincide with each other. The world’s first Vampire-Werewolf hybrid.”
I looked at the rest of the class. They all stared back at me in shock. I locked eyes with Lilli. I could tell she was startled and hurt that I hadn’t told her. Everyone had seen my fangs. And now they could see my wolf. My secret was out.
And it was only second period.