Chapter Nine: The school where teachers don't teach.

The school where the teachers don't teach

Kaydra's Perspective

          Ari and I were walking to our first class. We looked down at our schedules. History class. Two more stories up. We'd better hurry if we don't want to be tardy. We found the class and sat down. The teacher was named Professor Lowry. He was a considerably good-looking guy, but the look in his eye told me that he was going to be a stern one. Professor Lowry saw us while calling roll and strode to our seats. "Good morning, students. You must be Kaydra." He said to me, looking up at my ears.

            "Yeah, that's me."

            "There must be a problem with the roll. You see, there's no last name for you, miss..."

            "No. It's right. I have no last name. Please don't rub it in."

            "And who might this be?" he said, looking at Ari.

            "This is-"

            "- Don't tell me. I'm going to look it up on the roll." he insisted. He looked at the script pinned against the clipboard. "Ah, here it is... You're... Miss... Artisan. Good Lord, is this correct?" his face grew pale. I just realized he was doing the roll call out in front of the whole class. The class had become very silent, staring at the new kids.

            "Yeah. Yeah, that's me. You can move on with the class now." she said, sliding under her desk. She put her face in her hands.

"Great," she said to me, "This has gotta be worse than paparrazi."        

            "Okay, students, listen up." he shouted, resulting in an echo in the room. "I have the results of the test on the Humanlands' culture. Do we have any volunteers to pass the papers out?" A few raised their hands. "Good. I'm sorry to say that some of you had trouble with some of the questions. You girls don't have to take it, considering that you just got here, and you came from there in the first place." he added, looking our general direction. "Today we will be starting a new unit: History of Aleron. As you know, I'm not exactly from Aleron, and learning about it's history myself. I thought to myself last night: Colin, you yourself are from the humanlands, and since you are fortunate enough to have the Sons of the Rulers in your own class, why don't you let them tell the story from their eyes?"

            The eyes that were cemented on us for the last 20 minutes were now turned to their Highnesses, which evidently didn't want to be there now. Anyone could see Tao's bright-white head even from where I was standing, practically from clear across the room. And that's something, knowing the room was just about the size of one football field.

            "But that depends on whether or not our majesties are willing to do so." he added quickly.

            Tao stood up first. Alex let his head drop onto his desk. "First of all, we'd love it if you'd stop calling us that.We are students here." (at which point Ari and I facepalmed, hearing girls moon over them and whispering that they're just so sweet.) 

            Tao took a breath and continued, "Secondly... we could try to do that, but considering our situation, we can't quite remember exactly how it went. We can just tell you some details on what happened before the Massacre."

            "Deal." The teacher said.
            "Ohhkayyy." Tao said, heaving a sigh. "I guess we'll start where our government was founded. The land of Aleron was under total Anarchy, and the people of the land were dying out by the millions every week. So, a large group of people rallied up and planned that they'd select three pairs of people to be king and queen over the land. They figured that it would be more like a democracy, having more than one person having the say. They all decided since that most of the land was a huge combination of Vampires, Humans and Elves, they decided to have the people vote who they'd trust the most to represent their race. The votes came in and the results were The Hyperions, my family," he said, pointing at himself, "The Altayrans, the human family," he said, tapping Alex on the shoulder, "And the Artisans, the Elven family." He stole a glance at Ari, who was still hiding under her desk.

            "This is where it gets messy." Tao said. "Over the years, the races have... exchanged, I guess you could say, their races. For example: I saw a bunch of confused faces when I told you that Alex here came from a Human family. The Altayrans became our cousins somewhere between the fourth and fifth centuries, having been married into the Vampire family and turning vampiric themselves. As you know, Vampirism is contagious. You do the math."

            "IF that's true, then why is Alex an elf? I can see his ears from here." A wolf boy said smugly.

            "Alex was born in a Lunar Eclipse. We all know what happens during a lunar eclipse, people. To put it this way, he's just a mixed up child."

            "Hey! My mom was an elf, people. And you, wolf-boy, have bigger ears than I do, so I'd shut up if I were you." Alex corrected, glaring at Wolf-boy from behind his bangs.

            An elven girl raised her hand. "If... All the rest of you turned into Vampires, then how did the Artisans manage to stay Elven for so long?"

            Alex took this one. "Elves have some sort of immunity to vampires. Their blood cells contain something that counteracts the Vampire's venom, making it neutral and harmless. There has to be a sort of ceremony of magic to make an Elf actually become vampiric, and it usually has to be done with the elf's consent."

            "For over 300 years, beings of every race had lived together without problems. Then, well... you know the rest." Alex muttered.  Tao shook Alex's shoulder, and they both smiled, as if to brush off whatever they both had been thinking.

            "Hey!" a faerie-girl said, "Isn't that one new girl's last name Artisan?"

            Ari's face became red. "I'm sure it's just a coincidence. I've never heard of this before." she slunk down under her desk, her eyes peeking out of the side.

            "B-but you even look like them!!" The girl insisted.

            "I assure you that all of the Artisans are dead." Alex answered firmly, getting upset again.

            Then, to both my and Ari's relief, the bell rang. Ari bolted out the door and was halfway across the hallway before the bell had finished ringing. I ran to catch up with her and pulled out my schedule. She and I have already established that we had the exact same schedule, so she didn't bother to pull hers out.

            "What class is next?" Ari said, her face still slightly red.

            "Uhm... the dungeon. Literally."

            "Really? I don't remember having that class yesterday."

            "You forgot that half of our classes were taken up by that beginning of the year assembly yesterday.We only had two classes."    

            "Yeah, well I've been home-schooled for as long as I can remember, and this whole public-school thing is kind of new to me."

            "Good point."

            Ahead of us, Alex and Tao were talking. "Is it 'mention Ari all day' month or something? I thought it was the teacher's job to do the teaching." Alex told Tao sarcastically.

            Tao hung back to talk to us, and he skidded to a stop by Ari. "Hi. What class have you got next?"

So we didn't have to discuss this every time he came to say this, I let him compare our schedule with his. He pulled out his schedule -- which was more stain than white -- and looked at it.

            "Hey... you have the same classes as I do. Each one of them. Same with Alex." My ears perked slightly.  Ari smirked.

We walked down two flights of stairs to get to the dungeon. The air got stuffier and harder to breathe in, and everyone with allergies quickly showed it from all the dust.

            I didn't notice that Alex came to Tao's side and heard that remark right then, and I blushed, knowing how obvious my ears were and hoping he didn't notice the twitching at his name. "Great. Just great." Alex said, shaking his head and walking on by himself.

            "Alex, wait!" I shouted, booking it across the hallway to get to him.

Ari's perspective

          Kaydra shot toward Alex at light speed and hooked her arm into his.

            Traitor.

            Kaydra wasn't the only girl around him, but he payed particular attention to Kaydra, and the others looked dejected.

My face burned with angered jealousy and I fought myself from stomping up there and demanding an explanation that I doubted I'd receive.

            "Hey, I'm glad we'll get to have some classes together this year." Tao said, interrupting my thoughts. I looked up to see a smiling face, which quickly melted away my anger for a while.

            "Thanks." I said, smiling.

            "I... hope you pay no mind to Alex. He's not usually this rude. Or stubborn. Or annoying. Or bitter." he said, listing the latest

qualities of his cousin while running his fingers through his hair.

            "It's alright." I lied through clenched teeth. I think it's better just to pretend it doesn't bother me. Maybe in time I'll convince myself.

            "We'd better pick up the pace if we want to get there on time." he mentioned, glancing at his watch. We skidded down the hallways and turned the corner, only to find another flight of stairs we had to go down. We ran down as quickly as possible and still had to go down to the end of the hallway. Being who he is, Tao lifted me up by my waist and ran down the hallway, suspending me just above the ground.

            "Tao!" I shouted in-between laughter. He cackled mischievously at my plea and kept running. We skidded inside just when the bell rang. There were no seats, no rocks to sit on, no desks, no tables... it looked exactly like you'd think it should being what it was: an abandoned dungeon. There was a single torch lighting up the room on each wall, making it slightly easier to see. Tao put me down and sat down in one corner. I sat down beside him.

            Zane, a blond djinni, whistled. "Looks like we know why Tao's late." he said, gazing at me.

            "Is the professor here?" Tao said, ignoring the remark.

            "No. He's tardy." Kaoru giggled. Zane stepped forward and sat behind us. I could tell Tao didn't like this guy, and that isn't a good sign. Not at all.

            "Hey." Zane said to me in a voice that was too dirty for comfort. "Do you know what one of my powers are?"

            "What? You can make people know you're a pervert without even talking to them?" I answered icily.

            "I can tell just by looking into a girl's eyes exactly how she feels about me."

            "Gosh, that's gotta be embarrassing for you." I said, glaring. The crowd whom had apparently heard my insult grew silent, and started laughing and saying, "ooh".

            "Burn!" One guy shouted.

            "How did that feel, 'Zanester'!" One girl ridiculed.

            The crowd immediatly snapped to silence. The heavy dungeon door swung open. A man with Sunglasses, a Trench coat and a Fedora walked in as the door slowly started to close itself again with a loud thud. He secured the door lock and stepped into the middle of the room. He set his heavy trench coat and fedora onto a hat rack -- which appeared from out of nowhere --  and removed his sunglasses. "Good Evening." he said with a gruff voice.

            "Evening?" I thought, then realized that the classes here were nocturnal. I kinda spaced that as soon as we lost the windows.

            He had a rather handsome face, despite the fact that it had been weathered slightly by past experiences. He had dark, curly brown hair and black eyes.

            "If you would all shut up, we will get on with the lesson. It won't be a moment. This class is called "How to deal with your Enemies." He pulled out a small rat and a dagger. "Observe." He held the dagger directly below the rat's abdomen, then, in a quick, smooth motion, impaled the rat. With a small, pathetic squeak, the rat died. The entire class was caught off guard at this scene, and most were struck dumb. Kaydra huffed from anger. He tossed the dead rat into the corner of the room. Kaydra ran up and picked up the dead rat.

            "Poor guy." she whispered.

            "Class is adjourned." The teacher said quickly.

            "Uhm, excuse me," I said, raising my hand reluctantly, "But, who the heck are you?? And I'm no principal or anything, but I really doubt you could call that a class."

            "I don't recall asking any of the students to speak." the professor said abruptly. "But yes, this isn't really a class. We just think your group is awesome enough to have a free hour and a half to themselves. We had to disguise it as a class so it wouldn't cause an uprising. So, your goal here is to get to know everyone in this room. Alright?"

            The students laughed, and sat back with their friends.

            "You never answered me. Who are you?"

            "Just call me Steve." he said stiffly.

            Alex stood up quickly to assist Kaydra with the rat. Seeing him act like a "genuine Romeo" made me sick. He seemed to be gentle around all girls unless that girl was me. I sat down again, after getting a good look at my friend getting comfortable with my enemy. Ugh.

             Tao wrapped his arms around me and pulled me closer to him until my head was leaning against his chest. "I'm sorry about Zane. He's such a jerk."

            "You didn't have to tell me." I said, rolling my eyes. "I already knew."

            "I'll kill him." he said, hands were balled up into fists from his anger.

            "Did it really bother you that much?"

            "You don't know Zane. If you were left alone in a dark room, and he found you... B-bad..things would happen."

            "You were scared for me?" I said, flattered.

            "Eh, well... Uh... Yeah. I guess I was." he said, suddenly embarrassed, his white skin turning a pale pink around his jawbones.

            "Thank you Tao. You're a good guy." I said, hugging him. He blushed even more, then decided to hug me back. I looked up. He had a funky smile, almost like he was in a dream. He unfurled his fists and wrapped his hands around my arms. "But I can take care of myself."

            I asked if we could stand up. I didn't intend to be rude, but my legs were falling asleep. We did, and he was still hanging onto me as if to warn Zane that he'd get his sorry butt kicked if he ever tried that again. Eventually, he let go, and Kaydra and Alex joined our little group. Joy.