“That is quite enough. I know you’re up there. You’re only making things worse for yourselves. Come. Down.“
Oh shit. Shit, shit, shit. He was practically whispering the words. Soft as silk. They were so screwed.
Barely daring to breathe, Dree scooted forward on her heels and peered over the ledge of the platform, down past the crisscrossing wooden beams and crumbled remnants of staircase that still clung to the inner wall of the disused clock tower. Far below, softly lit by the lantern he was holding aloft, she could see Kellhavan squinting up toward their hiding spot. Short, dark, neat hair and beard. Keen, black eyes narrowed beneath severe eyebrows. Thin lips pulled into an even thinner line than usual, if that was even possible. Seeing that look on the teacher’s hawkish face was enough to make Dree’s mouth go dry and her pulse sped up, flight instincts kicking into overdrive.
Kellhavan - head teacher at Blackrock and quiet menace of all transformation students in the land - was not amused.
Moija - unfortunately, incredibly - was.
Her bronze-skinned, unruly-haired classmate was practically bouncing with suppressed laughter where she sat curled up beside Dree. In one hand she was clutching the spoils of the night's ill-adviced endeavors; a chubby bottle of amber liquor. Forbidden. Delicious. Pinched right out of the instructors’ own stash in the staff room. And, Dree decided, as she watched Kellhavan stride further into the tower, his tall frame casting monstrous shadows around the cylindrical room - definitely not worth it.
She glanced over at Moija, was instantly reminded of how the sweet liquor had tasted on the other girl’s plump lips only moments earlier, and reassessed: almost definitely not worth it. Not if Moija didn’t have an even brighter plan up her sleeve.
“Will you shut up!”, Dree hissed, smacking the shorter girl on the arm and pulling back from the ledge. “We're trapped! There's no way out of here except straight past him. He's got us!“
"Not yet he hasn't", Moija said, her voice muddled with mirth and drink. "He hasn't spotted us yet, he doesn't know who -"
"He will in a minute! Didn't you hear what I said about there being no way out?" Panic was creeping into her voice now, mixing with anger and excitement to make a kind of breathless snarl. “He’s going to Shift, fly up here, and drag us down by our heel cords. If he doesn’t just push us down”, she added, fatalistically.
Moija glittered at her. It was absolutely infuriating, Dree thought, the way those big, brown eyes could glitter you into all sorts of trouble. Case in point, their current predicament.
“Don’t be so dramatic”, Moija said. “Brute force isn’t Kell’s style. He’s more the... detention-for-a-year-and-using-his-influence-to-undermine-your-chances-of-ever-graduating type.”
From below, as calm and silky as ever: “I’m waiting.”
“We don’t have time for this!“
“Besides”, leaning close, smiling conspiratorially; “I bet we could both Shift fast enough to survive a fall from this height. He doesn’t know that. I bet he thinks we’re fifth years, just from us being able to Shift well enough to fly up here in the first place.”
“It doesn’t bloody matter what he thinks, because any moment now he’s going to know, because he has eyes”, Dree said.
“Fear not, my sweet.” Moija’s smile glittered in tandem with her eyes. “I have a plan.“
Again from below, now right beneath their platform: "I am going to count to ten. If you’re not down here when I finish, detention will be the least of your worries."
“Be ready to Shift”, Moija whispered, “and come help me with these!”
Dree blinked. Moija was gesturing toward a big pile of moth-eaten draperies, coils of old clock rope, jute sacks and other odd debris that had served as a makeshift mattress when they were snogging earlier. It was all pretty filthy, though Dree had been too... distracted to notice it before.
“We wouldn’t be in this mess if it weren’t for ‘your plans’”, she muttered, but she did as instructed. Together, she and Moija pushed the heap of musty cloth and rope toward the edge of the platform.
---
Down on ground level, Kellhavan’s silken patience had run out. To think he would have to waste feathers on a couple of thieving brats... oh, but it couldn’t be helped. They’d had their chance, several times over. He’d see to it that they didn’t break curfew again.
He put down his lantern and stepped smartly out onto the middle of the floor, rolling his shoulders and breathing deeply through his nose. Kellhavan’s already hawk-like profile sharpened. Rows of feathers began to sprout from his shoulder blades, finding their way out through the slits in his robe. In one blink, one dark eye was glowing an intense orange, which he then turned to stare up at the platform above - and was met by a falling cloud of moldy rags and tangled rope. He just had time to leap out of the way before the thing smacked to the floor with a dry fwooph!
Dust billowed thick in the air and rose like smoke pillars all around him.
He drew a sharp breath in surprise and immediately regretted it. He pressed the hem of his robe sleeve protectively over his nose and mouth, but knew the damage was already done. Tears flooded his eyes and blurred his vision as he staggered backward a few steps, fighting the impulse, the urge to gasp again and again. It would only fan the fire. Speaking of which -
He heard a clink and looked down, still resisting the urgent tugging at the back of his throat and lungs that heralded the inevitable. He’d stepped on the lantern and it went out, plunging the tower in gloom.
Kellhavan wanted to curse. Instead, he sneezed. And then he couldn’t stop.
Oh gods, his nose...!
---
“Say”, Moija began conversationally, looking down on the scene unfolding below, “did you happen to be present at the lecture when Nino accidentally Shifted and knocked over a bookcase in the archive?“
Dree joined her classmate and stood with her eyebrows raised high, eyes round. She shook her head.
“Bunch of ancient scrolls went flying all over the place. Stacks of old books that probably hadn’t been shifted in decades... well, you can imagine. Dust everywhere. Anyway, old Kell was with us then. It was hilarious. And... pretty intense, as you can hear. Ready to flap those wings? He won’t be able to see or hear much for a while. Or focus enough to Shift.”
Or breathe, Dree thought, and almost felt a twinge of sympathy.
“Huh”, she said. “Fancy that.” She was chewing on her bottom lip, one corner of her mouth curved in a secret little smile. “Last one down is a chicken!”
They stepped off the ledge, fell, turned, bloomed, streaked down in a tight curve along the wall and out the way they came in. Dree couldn’t help glancing back at the clock tower as they glided toward the dormitory buildings, keeping to the shadowy trees as to not be too easy to spot from the windows. Kellhavan didn’t try to follow them. Not surprising. That is to say, she was certainly surprised by the night’s discoveries, but no wonder... well. Now she knew.
The question was, how to use this new knowledge, how to... benefit from it, without exposing what she knew?
A question for another time. After all, she and Moija still had half a bottle of booze to finish.
---
Kellhavan leaned against the door to the clock tower, panting raggedly. He was glad for the fresh air. And the dark. And that there was nobody there to see him attempt and miserably fail at blowing his nose. Not a squeak of air could move through. He didn’t understand how a nose could somehow feel numb and aflame with itching at the same time, but his certainly did. His head pounded, his throat felt raw, every breath still threatened to fling open the floodgates once more.
Enough of that.
He straightened up, wiped his face with the last dry corner of his handkerchief, smoothed back his hair and started briskly down the short slope toward the main gate.
In the grips of it, he hadn’t of course seen who they were, but he had an inkling which year they might be in. Many of them had been there in the archive last time he’d... Hmm. Definitely quite young to be such skilled Shifters already. He smirked. He knew the type. Cocky. They were bound to sneak out again soon, and next time he wouldn’t let them slip through his fingers.
Or dump a sack load of decades old dust and mold on him, he thought grimly, and resisted the urge to scrub at his nose even as he felt it twitch with lingering irritation. It was the principle of the thing.
