Captive Monster: Blood Moon Academy Book 1 Read online

Then the Headmaster turned to the guards. “Did you guys run the proper background checks?”

  The guards nodded and broke into grins. All of a sudden, the Headmaster seemed annoyed by their presence.

  At least we had that in common.

  “You may go,” he said to them. They filed out quickly, shutting the door behind them, and then it was just me and the Headmaster in the room.

  “Great,” I said. “Now the adults can talk. If those are your employees, then I guarantee you can do better.”

  The Headmaster ignored my words. He stared at me, his eyes moving up and down until I felt a chill from my eyebrows all the way to my toes. “Name?” He asked, a fountain pen poised above a pad of paper.

  “Keira,” I said. “Keira Rose. But I’m telling you, there’s been a mistake. I was brought here by illegal force, by mistake.”

  He set the pen down. “That’s where you’re wrong, young lady. You were brought here because you used magic in the civilian world.”

  “I’m sorry, what?” I asked. I was sure that I had misheard him. “I was robbed. And that guy’s eyes flashed blue. Was that blue flash magic? Why the hell aren’t your goons chasing him?”

  I remembered the flashes that came out of my hands when he attacked me, when I thought I was going to die. Was that what this was all about? It was too much to take in, and the room started to spin. I put my head between my legs while the Headmaster continued.

  “As I said, it is illegal to use magic out there in full view of the general public. Did you kill him, or did he live?”

  “What?” I asked. “I don’t know. Aren’t you listening? He attacked me.” I looked back up at him. No matter how woozy I felt, this was a conversation I was going to have to be fully present for.

  He picked the fountain pen back up. “When you last saw him, was he moving, sitting up, talking? Did you call 9-1-1?”

  “Did I call 9-1-1 to help the guy who was robbing me? No. But he was fine. He got up and walked away. Scot-free. After trying to rob me. Good thing you’re so concerned about him. I’m sure he cares.”

  He tutted and wrote it all down as a very bad feeling washed over me.

  “Let’s start over, Miss Rose.” He said. “This is the Blood Moon Academy. We teach magic. To underaged supernatural creatures. Cooperate and graduate. Do that, and you will return to the outside world and continue with your life.”

  “And if I don’t?” I asked.

  “We cannot allow you to re-join society once you’ve attacked civilians using magic unless we deem you rehabilitated, you see. Otherwise we’re partially responsible for your actions. And so, if you don’t perform well here, I’m afraid a full-blown penitentiary is the only other option. And frankly, at that point, the odds are not in your favor that you will ever rejoin the outside world.”

  All of that sentence hit me hard. I was being threatened. I didn’t react well to being threatened. “Penitentiary. What the fuck?” I asked.

  “Language, young lady.”

  “I got kidnapped off the street by incompetent rent-a-cops hired by you, and I haven’t even had a trial. Which I would win, by the way. So, I choose trial. I want some real cops, not your cheap-ass dime-store security. And you’d better lawyer up because you’re going to lose your shirt.”

  “You violated magic law,” he said calmly. “Your civilian law no longer applies here.”

  I stood. “Well, I haven’t had anything even resembling due process, and you let your goons go, so I’m going to go too.” I went to the door and opened it.

  There were four more guards. These guards had different logos, all with a red moon crest on the breast pocket of a yellow blazer. Shit. I should have known it wouldn’t be that easy.

  “One more minute, please, Miss Rose.” The Headmaster’s voice said silkily.

  I had no choice except to turn back around and sit. He took out what looked like a shriveled old wand and waved it at me. I repressed the desire to burst out laughing.

  Then the joke was on me, because my left ankle started to burn like it was on fire. My hand went reflexively to the spot and I lifted my jeans to reveal a red-crescent moon tattoo where there wasn’t one before. “Ow!” I yelled. “You put the school symbol on my skin? Is this so I can show off my school pride at football games? Because I’m not into that sort of thing. This shit better be temporary. I don’t remember signing any waivers.”

  He looked at me and smiled. I physically recoiled. I couldn’t help it. He had so many teeth. And they were so sharp and so pointed and so long.

  It looked like there was a terrifying swarm of piranhas on his face. What the hell was he? I knew the vision of his smile would haunt my dreams. He didn’t appear offended by my fear, he seemed to welcome it, like it was the natural order of things.

  Satisfied, he put the magic wand back down. “You are not unique, Miss Rose. All of the students here have that mark. It is a seal that magically prevents you from leaving the school grounds,” he said. “I can personally guarantee that the moment you graduate from this academy, I will remove it.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that at all. I forced myself to confront what was actually happening here. “Let me get this straight. You’re saying that I have magic. And that I used it illegally to keep myself from getting killed during a robbery that you don’t give a damn about. And that now I’m stuck here until I graduate from this magic school or I go to jail?”

  “Exactly,” he said, perking up. “That’s exactly right.”

  I felt a rumble underneath my feet. Confused, I looked around and saw the objects on the Headmaster’s desk shaking. As well as the paintings on the wall. Was there some kind of earthquake?

  The Headmaster looked as surprised as I was. After a moment, though, the rumbling passed.

  "Okay," he said, his voice resigned as he reached for a different stack of files. “Now that that’s over, let's get you started on the test."

  "Hey," I objected, a fear washing over me, reminding me of high school drama. I wasn’t any good at it then and I doubt I’d be any better at it now. I was over that shit. "What was that about a test?"

  "The M.A.T. It’s a Magic Aptitude Test. A formality, really, I assure you," he said.

  I was anything but assured.

  "It's really more of a placement thing." He looked me up and down once more, making sure that I understood his disapproval. “I’m pretty sure you’re just a run of the mill mage. But we’ll find out, won’t we?”

  He got up and led me down a hallway, then turned left down what appeared to be a little used corridor until he stopped outside room number four.

  The door to room four was closed, and he didn't open it for me. Instead, he pulled an actual pocket watch out of his pocket and glanced at it. It was the most pretentious thing I had ever seen anybody do.

  "You have five minutes," he said.

  "For what? Is the test in there?" I asked, pointing at door number four.

  "Yes," he answered. I waited for him to expand on the information, but he did not.

  "Is it multiple choice, at least? I’d like it to be on record that I have test anxiety. Especially when being forced to take weird made-up magical tests in the middle of the night after being admitted against my will.”

  "Noted," he replied, not bothering to write it down even though he still had pen and paper in his left hand. The look on his face told me that he had better things to do than hang out with me.

  "Your timer has started, Miss Rose. I implore you to get to it. The test is not multiple choice. It’s more of a free form exercise. Try to interact with as much of the room as you can for five minutes. Well, four minutes and fifty-one seconds. Good luck."

  I drew a quick intake of breath in exasperation. He was taking up my testing time not answering my questions. He didn't even bother to open the door for me.

  I quickly threw open the door to room number four as he ambled back down the hall. Free form? Interacting with the room? What the fuck does that even mean?
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  The only thing for sure was that I didn't have a lot of time to find out. Inside, the room looked like a regular office. There was a wooden desk with pen and paper and a few figurines on it, but no computer.

  There was a window with an ancient looking curtain pulled back. At the other end of the room, a dim floor lamp did its best to shine some unnatural light. When I entered, it flickered ominously.

  Perfect. Even the appliances are trying to scare me. There was also a standard dusty old bookshelf overstuffed with what looked like leather-bound academic journals.

  Ok, Keira, interact. The desk, maybe there's a test there. I crossed the room to the desk. The pen laying on the desk was a beautiful, gold fountain pen with weird symbols on it and the paper was ancient looking stationary with the Blood Moon Academy logo at the top.

  I always wanted to play with a fountain pen. I wrote some squiggles, then some doodles, then drew a dick. It was as fun as I hoped it would be. Then I remembered there was a ticking clock.

  I flipped through the stationary and rummaged through the desk drawers, but there was no test to be found. Just dust, a few spare paper clips, and a tiny screwdriver, like the ones they use on eyeglasses.

  I got up and went to the window to look outside. Everything was dark, of course. Except for the stars. Despite the light pollution from the city, there were a million stars in the sky. It shouldn’t have been possible. I wondered if it was magic or an optical illusion. It was peaceful in a way.

  I forced myself back on task. Interact, Keira, come on.

  Ah, bookshelf, that'll make me look smart. I ran over to the end of the room and scanned the books. There were giant tomes about biology, physics, music, and philosophy.

  I grabbed the biology book. It opened with a cracking sound loud enough for me to worry I had broken it. I closed it again quickly and inspected it. It was fine.

  Relieved, I put it back and grabbed an advanced philosophy primer. It opened quieter. I read a few paragraphs, but then I feared I would fall asleep before my five minutes were up, so I put it back too.

  I continued to scan, looking for something more interesting. That's when I found it. Magic. There was a book about magic. And it was every bit as old and serious looking as the other ancient books.

  I pulled it off the shelf and opened it. It hummed when it opened, which freaked me the hell out. I shut it again. Everything went quiet. I opened it again, more humming. This time I left it open and read some of the words. It was literally about spells and power and shit. Awesome. Maybe this place would turn out to be interesting after all.

  "Time's up, Keira."

  I jumped at the sound of the Headmaster’s voice and closed the book. Five minutes went by faster than I thought. I hadn’t even heard him open the door. "Okay," I said, replacing the book on the shelf where I found it. "What happens now?"

  "Follow me," he said. I followed him back to his office where we both took our seats like before.

  A printer at the far end of his office whirred to life and the Headmaster crossed to grab a sheet of paper off it. Then he sat down at his desk with his pen and started making notes.

  The room was quiet, and I had nothing to do but squirm in my chair as he silently marked up my test, or whatever he was doing.

  3

  Keira

  I was still sitting there awkwardly in silence waiting for the Headmaster to be done with his paperwork when a tall woman with a beaky nose burst in without knocking. She had long brown stringy hair and wore a multi-colored, knitted slouchy hat.

  "Julius Crowe. Are you out of your mind?" She nodded at me and forced a very unfriendly smile before turning back to Headmaster Crowe.

  I stared, mouth agape. The woman wore a black skirt that dragged the floor, picking up dust, and a black top that was scandalously low cut. I hated to judge, but none of that outfit was working for me. Or for her.

  The necklace she wore looked like a large silver pair of bat wings with a red stone in the middle, and her angular face made her look like the stereotypical witch from every movie and television show I had ever seen.

  For his part, headmaster Crowe indicated in my direction without looking up at me or at the woman. "Keira, you might as well meet Professor Kiln. Professor Kiln, meet Keira. She’s our newest student. So, whatever this is, can it wait? I'm in the middle of something here."

  He continued writing in his notepad, seeming to dismiss her. The look on her face made me think he had badly misjudged the situation.

  "No, it most certainly cannot wait," she said. "You simply cannot bring in a new student on a waxing crescent in the middle of a blood moon cycle. What the hell are you thinking? It could doom us all." She leaned in to hiss at him. “I know you felt that earthquake, Julius, we all did.”

  I sat there doing my best not to roll my eyes. What the hell was she worried about? I was the one getting screwed here. And if I wasn’t crazy, it sounded like she was trying to blame me for the earthquake.

  Headmaster Crowe looked up at me and forced a smile, then he looked at professor Kiln. "Sylvania, don't you think you're being a little overdramatic?"

  "No," Professor Kiln answered.

  I frowned. Were they arguing about admitting me? Why did this woman hate me when she didn’t even know me?

  “Hey, maybe she’s right,” I said, sensing an opportunity. “You guys would probably be better off without me. And vice versa.”

  Headmaster Crowe gave professor Kiln a severe look as he tapped his pen on the paper he was holding. "Doom us all? Her? She won’t be any trouble because as it so happens, she has almost no magic at all. In fact, she just scored an eleven on the test."

  Okay, now I was offended. Probably. It was hard to figure out which side I was on. It was all moving so fast.

  "Julius, can I see you in the hallway, please?" The professor asked.

  The headmaster sighed before getting up and joining the professor in the hallway.

  He closed the door behind them, which muffled exactly zero percent of the conversation they were having about me. I heard every word with no effort at all and wondered why they had even bothered to go outside at all.

  She was saying that admitting me was a very bad idea because of weird auras and cycles of the moon. He was arguing that the school was at a record low enrollment and on the precipice of going under. Then he went on and on about how I was the equivalent of a low maintenance magical idiot.

  I opened my mouth to argue, then realized I had no response to that even if I was involved in the conversation, which I wasn’t.

  After that, the argument devolved into personal insults, name calling, and possibly curses in a language I didn’t understand.

  The professor, who appeared to be losing the argument, started complaining about a lack of leave and vacation time which the Headmaster responded to by pointing out the presence of pictures of her at the beach and skiing in the French alps on her desk. And that frankly, he was jealous.

  It became clear that the professor wasn't going to get her way.

  Bummer. I think.

  They came back into the Headmaster’s office where I stared at the two of them. "You guys know that I heard every word, right?"

  "Sorry about that, Keira," headmaster Crowe said, giving the professor a dirty look. Then he turned back to me. “Let’s get you settled in.” He crossed back over to his desk, sat down again, and then hit an intercom button.

  "Hi, Karen, can you send Ian in here to show the new student around?"

  Wow, I thought. Apparently, the Headmaster had an assistant named Karen. I glanced at my watch. His assistant was up and working at eleven-thirty at night? Along with the Professor? Weird. Don’t these people ever sleep?

  "Look," I said, mostly to the professor who was still standing there trying to bore a hole in my soul with her eyes. “Whatever threat you think I am, I'm not. I was assaulted and then dragged here against my will."

  I blinked, expecting to get a reaction. I frowned when she and the headma
ster continued to say nothing. “That doesn’t bother you people at all, does it?”

  The professor broke her silence. "Keira, it's just that we take the safety of our students very seriously here."

  I sat there stunned, trying to figure out how the hell I was a safety threat when the door opened and the hottest guy I had ever seen in my life walked in.

  Seriously. It wasn't even close. He was tall and dark with electric, piercing blue eyes and messy black hair that looked perfect. It must have taken him an hour in the bathroom to get his hair to look that good.

  He wore jeans that showed enough of a bulge to cause a flutter in my stomach and parts below. Above the jeans, he wore a crested academy tee shirt. Apparently, there wasn’t a very strict dress code here at Blood Moon Academy.

  I couldn’t take my eyes off of him. A guy that sexy simply shouldn't exist. He was a living, breathing, breach-of-the-peace. It was like somebody broke into my subconscious and rooted around in my panty drawer until they found a guy impossible for me to resist.

  I looked to the headmaster and professor to see if either of them was drooling like me, but no, it was just me. That was the moment I believed this was truly a magic school. Because if this guy were to ever walk down a normal street, he'd get jumped on by every passing girl he met.

  The Headmaster cleared his throat. “Keira, this is Ian, he’s going to give you a quick tour of campus and then show you to your dorm room.”

  He gathered a few papers in a stack off of his desk and folded them into an envelope. Then he opened a desk drawer and added a key before handing the envelope to Ian.

  4

  Keira

  I grabbed my purse and duffel bag and followed Ian through the door, happy to be away from the Headmaster and Professor Kiln.

  I didn’t want to be here at all, but I was tired and over it all by now. I could use a good night’s sleep and it sounded like everything here including food was free.

  And as a bonus, I got to follow Ian. I’d follow that ass anywhere. I walked the hallway with him looking at the dingy wallpaper.