Come -- said Alaric, letting go of his hand and walking toward the door. -- I'll show you the place. We'll sort out the rest later.
He opened the office door, and Ethan followed him into the hallway.
The first thing that hit him was the smell. Old wood, floor wax, books, and a faint hint of food coming from the cafeteria—a mixture he hadn't smelled in so long it almost made him stop walking. The second was the feeling that time had passed through there without asking permission. Some things were different: the walls had been repainted, there were new paintings in the hallways, a colorful mural where there used to be only bare stone, and the door to one of the classrooms had been replaced. They were just details, but each one reminded him that the world would keep spinning without him.
He walked beside Alaric, hands in his pockets, and soon realized he wasn't going unnoticed.
Students crossing the hallway turned to look at him, some briefly, others without any disguise. There was curiosity in their eyes, and in many of them, something more. Especially the girls. One stopped halfway, books pressed to her chest, staring until she almost crashed into the wall. Two others whispered to each other, giggling softly, and a third, passing by, blushed to the roots of her hair upon catching his eye.
Ethan couldn't say he wasn't getting a little nervous.
He, who had faced dragons, who had survived years of darkness and blood, now felt his face grow hot under the gaze of a dozen teenagers. It was ridiculous. He scratched his head in an automatic gesture, trying to look relaxed, and cast his eyes to the side of the hallway, looking for anything to distract him.
That was when he saw Lizzie.
She was standing by a window a few meters away, talking to a group of girls. She had changed. She was taller, with a less rounded, more defined face, her hair tied up in a more adult way, and there was a new confidence in the way she gestured, as if, in the time he had been away, she had stopped being the girl she used to be. But it was her. He was sure of it. He would recognize that way of lifting her chin, that half-sided smile, anywhere.
Lizzie laughed at something one of the girls said, and didn't even look in his direction.
A light, almost forgotten ache touched Ethan's chest. He looked away and kept walking.
It was strange to see the place like this. There were too many people he had never seen, new students, unfamiliar faces that filled the corridors and gave the impression that the school was bigger, more alive. And there was the absence of the others: those who had been there before and were no longer around. They had probably graduated and left, or drifted away for some other reason. Two years was enough time to change a lot of things.
That was when he felt it.
A scent. Faint, almost lost among the other odors of the hallway, but unmistakable. Soft, warm, familiar—the kind of scent he would recognize in the dark, with his eyes closed, in the middle of any crowd.
Ethan stopped walking for a second.
He closed his eyes, and his mouth curved into a small, involuntary smile—the first smile without a trace of bitterness since he had returned.
She's here.
Hope.
-- Listen, Ethan -- Alaric's voice brought him back, and he opened his eyes. The headmaster had slowed down beside him, and his face, previously calm, was now more serious. -- We've been having some trouble at the school lately. Monsters have been attacking us. That's why I need you with me now. I'm going to talk to the other students about it, and I think you should hear what I have to say too.
Monsters.
Ethan almost laughed. After everything he had seen and faced, the word sounded almost domestic. But he kept the comment to himself.
-- Alright -- he replied.
Alaric nodded, satisfied, and picked up the pace.
The room he led him to was large, with rows of chairs arranged in a semicircle and a white screen on the wall. It was full. There were a lot of people there, dozens of students talking in low voices, most of whom Ethan had never seen in his life.
When Alaric walked through the door, with Ethan right behind him, the murmuring died down. One head turned, then another, and within seconds, every eye in the room was on him.
Again, the same sensation. The curious looks, the spreading silence, the girls who looked away and blushed. One, in the front row, dropped her notebook. Another hid her face behind her hand, laughing.
Ethan arched an eyebrow and, unable to help it, let out a smirk, a crooked smile.
Could it be that I actually got better-looking?
The thought was so absurd, after everything, that he almost let out a laugh. He didn't answer anyone, just crossed the room with his hands in his pockets and sat in a chair in the back, behind everyone else, from where he could see the whole room without being seen. Alaric went to the front and began organizing some papers on the desk.
A few students turned their heads to look at the newbie over their shoulders. He ignored them.
That was when the door opened once more.
First came a tall, broad-shouldered Black boy with firm strides, whom Ethan had never seen. Then, behind him, a shorter one with a somewhat spacey face, looking like someone who hadn't woken up properly yet, also unfamiliar. And between the two, with crossed arms, hair falling down her back, and a calm walk, came Hope.
Ethan stopped breathing.
She was even prettier than he remembered, prettier than the memory he had carried for all those years—and his memory was generous. There was a confidence to her, a new serenity, and something in the way she looked around that said she was no longer the frightened girl of before.
She probably wouldn't recognize him. Ethan knew that. She would look at him the way Dorian and Alaric had looked: with nothing, without a sign.
But when she turned, and the light coming through the window touched the back of her neck, he saw it.
A thin black cord, and hanging from it, a small wolf pendant.
The same cord. The same pendant that he had placed in her hand that day in the forest, before everything went wrong.
Ethan smiled. It was a small, silent smile that none of those present noticed, and that lasted only a second. Then he looked away, straightened up in his chair, and looked back to the front, where Alaric was already clearing his throat to speak.
He wanted to hear what he had to say.
Alaric went to the front of the room and waited for the murmuring to stop.
-- Good morning, everyone -- he began, resting his hands on the desk. -- I'll be direct, because you deserve to know what's going on. Our new problem is a pisadeira.
Some students exchanged confused glances. Alaric continued without rushing.
-- It's a malevolent spirit, trapped in the astral plane. It has no body, and therefore cannot interact with anyone in the physical world. The only way to reach a person is through dreams. In this case, through nightmares.
A Black boy sitting in one of the front rows raised his hand.
-- So it's like Freddy Krueger?
Some giggles rippled through the room. Alaric didn't smile, but the corner of his mouth twitched slightly.
-- If you're asking whether what happens in the dream also happens in real life, then yes. -- His tone grew more serious. -- If the pisadeira hurts someone in the dream, the injury appears on the body. That's why I need you to take this seriously. -- He paused and took a deep breath. -- The good news is that, for now, we are safe.
Relief swept through the room in low sighs and relaxing shoulders.
But Hope wasn't listening.
She was standing near the door, next to the two boys who had accompanied her, with her arms crossed and her gaze wandering across the room, with the half-attention of someone who had heard that monster story more times than she would have liked. That was when the girls in the next row began whispering among themselves in a tone louder than they intended, and almost without wanting to, she turned her face toward them.
And she saw him.
There was a boy sitting in a chair at the back of the room, away from the others, wearing a leather jacket and dark hair falling messily across his forehead. He was sitting sideways to her, his gaze fixed on Alaric, his hands relaxed on his thighs. He wasn't doing anything special. Just sitting there, quiet.
Hope's heart skipped a beat.
It was a strange, physical thing, as if an invisible hand had squeezed her chest from the inside and suddenly let go. She blinked, confused, and tried to look away, but couldn't.
Who is he?
Her breath hitched again. She opened her mouth, pulled in air, and realized that for a few seconds, she had forgotten how to do it. What an absurd thing. She didn't even know the boy, had never seen him in her life, she was sure of it, and yet there was something about him she recognized—a deep, ancient feeling, like the memory of a song heard once, a long time ago, that lingered on the skin without a name.
Without realizing it, her hand rose to her neck and closed around the wolf pendant.
What is this? she thought, almost in panic. Why am I feeling this?
The boy wasn't looking at her. He kept paying attention to Alaric with a calmness that bothered her, as if he knew exactly where she was and preferred not to look. His profile was illuminated by the window light, and there was something in the way he tilted his head, how he clenched his jaw slightly, that made her chest ache, and she didn't know why.
Who was he? Why did he affect her so much? Where did that absurd urge to cross the entire room, stop in front of him, and ask his name come from?
The tall boy beside her said something, and she didn't even hear it.
-- Hope. Hey, Hope.
The tall boy's voice reached her as if from very far away. Hope blinked, and slowly, she looked away from the back of the room.
-- Hm? -- She turned to him. -- What is it, Rafael?
Rafael was looking at her with an eyebrow raised, arms crossed.
-- Did you hear what I said?
-- No. -- Hope ran a hand through her hair, awkwardly. -- I'm sorry. What did you say?
Rafael stared at her for another second, like someone trying to decide if it was worth repeating.
-- Ah, forget it. I need to do something anyway.
He walked away toward the door. Beside Hope, Landon, who had watched the scene in silence, tilted his head, trying to understand what was happening to her. It was rare to see her like this, distracted, with a lost look, and he, who knew her well enough to notice when something was wrong, couldn't tell what it was.
Alaric finished his speech to the class.
-- That's all for now -- he said. -- Anyone with questions can come to me or the teachers. You're dismissed.
The students rose in a mob, dragging chairs, filling the room with voices and footsteps. Within minutes, the place began to empty. In the back, Ethan stayed seated, not moving, waiting for most of them to leave. Only when half a dozen people remained did he stand up and adjust his jacket.
Alaric walked toward him, leaving the papers on the desk.
-- Ethan, come on. Let's go.
Ethan nodded and followed him to the door.
Hope, standing next to Landon, saw Alaric talking to the new boy. She didn't hear what they were saying, but she saw the way he nodded, the way he raised his eyes to the headmaster, and a restless wave took over her again.
-- Hope -- Landon called. -- Did you have any nightmares today?
Hope kept her eyes glued to the two of them as they crossed the room.
-- Hope...?
-- Hm? -- She turned around suddenly with a start. -- Hey, Landon.
-- I asked if you had any nightmares today.
-- Ah. -- She shook her head. -- No. I didn't even sleep properly. Too much on my mind.
-- Yeah. -- Landon gave a small, sheepishly awkward smile. -- Me too. First-day jitters.
There was a brief silence. Landon shoved his hands into his pockets and continued in a more hesitant tone:
-- By the way... have you managed to remember anything yet? About our trip, the amnesia? It can't be a coincidence, right? All this happening at the same time, the monsters, the...
-- Landon. -- Hope's voice came out tired, harder than she intended. -- I think it's better if we focus on one problem at a time, okay?
-- Alright. -- He nodded, but didn't give up. -- But I can help you with this problem, right? I'm your research assistant, after all.
Hope closed her eyes for a second, took a deep breath, and when she spoke again, her voice was softer, but firm.
-- Landon, I know it's not what you want to hear. But the best way to help me is to go with the others.
Landon looked at her, and something on his face hardened slightly.
-- You're leaving too?
-- No. -- She shook her head. -- I need to stay.
Alaric had decided to evacuate the students from the school until they solved the pisadeira problem, and Hope, no matter how much Landon disliked it, had no intention of leaving with the others. Someone had to stay, someone had to find a solution, and she wasn't the type to run away.
Landon kept quiet for a few seconds, biting the inside of his cheek.
-- Fine -- he said finally, his voice carrying a dry tone he couldn't disguise. -- Thanks, then. But I need to get back to class.
He turned and walked out of the room without looking back, his shoulders stiff, probably angry.
Hope watched him leave, and felt a pang of guilt. For a moment, she thought of going after him. But her legs didn't move.
She looked again at the door through which Alaric and the new boy had already exited. She stared at the emptiness they had left behind, and her hand rose once more to the wolf pendant on her neck.
Enough, she thought, tightening her fingers around it.
She was going to look for Alaric. She needed to know what he intended to do, what the plan was, when the students were being evacuated. That was why, and only why, she was going after him. It had nothing to do with that boy she had just seen.
Nothing.
She left the room with determined steps, without looking back, and tried, unsuccessfully, to convince herself.
Inside the headmaster's office, Alaric sat behind the desk with a pile of forms spread out in front of him and a pen in his hand. Ethan, standing on the other side with crossed arms, listened with a neutral expression as the headmaster explained, with the patience of someone who had been through it a thousand times, what would be necessary for a provisional enrollment.
-- No records, no report card, and no legal guardian -- Alaric muttered, striking a line through one of the papers. -- It's going to be fun explaining this to the board. But we'll figure something out.
-- I appreciate it -- Ethan replied.
That was when there was a knock on the door.
Knock, knock.
Alaric looked up from the paper.
-- Who is it?
-- It's me -- answered a voice from the other side, muffled by the wood. -- Hope.
Ethan's heart, which until then had been beating at a calm rhythm, gave a leap. His lips curved into a small, almost imperceptible smile, which he wiped away instantly, straightening his face into an indifferent expression. No one had seen. Alaric was already looking at the door.
-- Come in, Hope.
The door opened, and Hope stepped into the room.
Her first look was for the headmaster. Her second, too fast to be casual, was for the boy standing before the desk. The new boy. The same one she had seen in the back of the room in a leather jacket, who had taken her breath away without doing a thing.
Great, she thought, swallowing hard.
-- Mr. Saltzman -- she began, her voice firmer than she felt. -- I wanted to talk about the pisadeira.
She spoke while at the same time her eyes darted from Alaric to Ethan, from Ethan to Alaric, in a back-and-forth she couldn't control. Six, seven, eight times in a few seconds. Every time she looked at him, her face grew hot, and every time she looked away, she felt a crazy urge to look again.
Alaric noticed, of course. But being polite, he pretended he didn't.
-- Of course, Hope -- he said, resting his elbows on the desk. -- But first let me introduce you to someone. This is Ethan. He's a new student, just arrived at school. Ethan, this is Hope.
Ethan turned to her, and for a moment, the two stood face-to-face, just a few paces apart.
He extended his hand.
-- Hello -- he said in a calm voice, looking straight into her eyes.
Hope felt her face catch fire. It was absurd. She had faced monsters, she had confronted witches and vampires without flinching, and now, before a boy in a leather jacket, she couldn't even hold a gaze. She dropped her eyes to the floor, to his extended hand, to the wall, anywhere except his face.
But her eyes betrayed the rest of her body.
For a second, unintentionally, they returned to his. And they locked.
They were green, a deep, intense green like a forest in the dark, and there was something in them she couldn't understand: an ancient sadness, a heavy longing, and beneath it all, something that looked like immense relief. As if he were looking at the only thing he had searched for in years.
Hope forgot to breathe. Again.
Without thinking, almost by instinct, she reached out and took his hand.
A current surged through her entire arm.
It was like a shock, a wave of electricity that started in her palm, traveled up her wrist, and spread across her chest, leaving a strange, tingling warmth in its wake. The hairs on her arm stood on end. The wolf pendant beneath her T-shirt seemed to warm her skin in a brief, weak pulse, like a heartbeat.
Hope caught her breath.
What was that?
Hope let go of his hand as if she had been burned.
-- I... -- She took a step back, eyes wide, her face red to her ears. -- I need to go.
Alaric raised his eyebrows.
-- Hope? What about what you wanted to ask concerning the pisadeira?
-- I'll talk to you later. -- Her hand was already on the doorknob. -- Sorry.
The door slammed behind her, and the sound of rapid footsteps in the hallway faded until they vanished.
The room fell silent.
Alaric stared at the closed door for a few seconds, pen suspended in the air. Then slowly, he turned his eyes back to Ethan, who remained standing, his hand still half-extended in the air as if he hadn't noticed she was no longer there.
-- Wow -- Alaric said.
Ethan lowered his hand and gave a discreet smile.
-- Wow?
-- I'm not one to say these things. -- Alaric scratched the back of his neck, awkwardly. -- But I've never seen Hope act like that.
-- Really? -- Ethan asked in a playful tone, raising an eyebrow. -- What way?
-- Like that. -- Alaric made a vague gesture with the pen toward the door. -- Blushing, stuttering, running away. I've known that girl for a long time, and she's never done that, not once. You affected her in a way I've never seen before. -- He let out a low laugh, shaking his head. -- And here I thought she was dating Landon.
Ethan's smile vanished.
His hands closed slowly, fists tightening so hard his knuckles turned white. A warm wave rose up his chest, something old and dark that he had buried deep down since the clearing, and which was now trying to return to the surface.
-- Landon? -- he repeated, his voice lower and more controlled than he felt.
-- Yeah. One of our new students. -- Alaric looked back down at the papers without noticing the change. -- They hang out a lot, she takes care of him, he takes care of her. I figured they were together. But I shouldn't meddle. -- He raised his head and smiled slightly, like someone apologizing. -- Forget what I said.
Ethan unmade his fists, one finger at a time. He took a slow, deep breath and forced his shoulders to relax.
The spacey-faced kid, he thought. The one who was by her side.
He had seen the two of them walking in side by side and hadn't thought much of it. He thought of Hope looking at the other boy with that calm manner, with her hand near his. He thought of two years, of how the world had moved on without him, of how she was to blame for nothing.
It's not her fault, he repeated to himself. She doesn't even know who I am.
Yet the palm of his hand was still tingling where she had touched him, and try as he might not to think about it, that was the only thing he could think about.
-- It's fine -- he said finally, with a half-smile that didn't reach his eyes. -- I wasn't going to meddle either.
Alaric watched him for a second, suspicious, but being a sensible man, decided not to press. He pulled one of the forms closer and went back to writing.
-- Let's continue with this, then. Where were we?
Hope didn't stop running until she reached her room.
She entered, slammed the door behind her, and turned the key in the lock with hands shaking so badly she missed twice. Then she leaned her back against the wood, slid down to the floor, and sat there with her knees drawn to her chest and ragged breathing.
Her heart was beating so hard it hurt.
She drew in a breath, let it out, drew it in again, and her breath hitched once more in a choked sob that wasn't quite crying. She dragged a trembling hand across her face, which was still burning, and closed her eyes—and that was worse, because doing so only allowed her to see his eyes, that deep, weary green, looking at her as if she were the most important thing in the world.
What was that?
It wasn't a question she knew how to answer. She had never felt anything like it. She had felt fear, anger, affection, sadness; she had lived through so much in such a short time, but nothing that resembled that. It was an enormous, overwhelming sensation that came from within and took over everything, as if a dam had burst without warning, letting in water she didn't even know was there. Her chest tightened while at the same time feeling impossibly light. Her hands tingled where he had touched them. And beneath it all was an absurd, terrifying certainty that she tried to push away and couldn't.
It was as if she were hopelessly in love with him.
Hope let out a short, humorless laugh and covered her mouth with her hand.
-- This is ridiculous -- she whispered to the empty room. -- This isn't possible.
She didn't even know his full name. She had never exchanged more than three words with the boy. He had appeared out of nowhere that morning in a room full of people, and she had seen him for less than ten minutes total. People didn't fall in love like that. People didn't fall in love with someone they had just met, just because of a glance, a handshake, a current of electricity that ran through her arm.
But what if it wasn't the first time?
The question arose on its own, and she didn't like it. She pushed the thought away, shaking her head. It made no sense at all. She had never seen him before, she was sure of it. If she had seen him, she would have remembered. Someone like that, with a face like that, with a look like that—no one forgot.
She stood up slowly, walked over to the bed, and sat on the edge, looking down at her hands. Her right hand, the one he had held, still felt warm. She opened it, closed it, and opened it again. Then she raised her fingers to her neck and touched the wolf pendant, which still held a remnant of that strange warmth.
And Landon?
The name hit her like a bucket of cold water.
Landon. The boy who walked everywhere with her, who helped her with research, who had an awkward smile and a sincere look. The boy she liked, the boy she cared for, with whom she spent hours talking in low voices in the corridors. She thought she liked him. She thought whatever was between them was something, even if it didn't have a name yet.
Then why did this feel so different?
When she was with Landon, there was affection, there was comfort, there was a nice tranquility of feeling safe. But never, not once, had her heart raced like that. Never had she forgotten how to breathe, nor felt her legs weaken, nor wished she could run away and at the same time stay frozen there forever.
Guilt came heavy, as if she had done something wrong. She hadn't betrayed anyone. She hadn't done anything, just shook a stranger's hand. But feelings didn't care about logic, and the guilt stayed there, nailed to her chest along with everything else.
Hope let herself fall backward onto the bed and stared at the ceiling, her hand still resting on the pendant.
Why is this happening? she thought. Why right now? Why him?
The room gave no answer. Only silence, the distant sound of footsteps in the hallway, and somewhere on the other side of the building, a green-eyed boy signing papers in a headmaster's office, unaware that he had just turned her world upside down.
Who was he?"