My brain automatically tried to shove my surroundings into earthbound categories. It worked, so long as I didn’t look too closely. The sky was blue streaked with indigo, just as it would be at home, with the brilliant sunset tinting the few fluffy clouds. A flock of birds took off from the lake and winged past overhead.
I glanced at them and then observed closer before they’d gone by. They didn’t have beaks, and although their wings appeared to have feathers, I was pretty sure their bodies had fur.
Then all across the meadow, the brightly colored wildflowers folded up and pulled down beneath their leaves. Others pushed up from below, opening pale silver and cream flowers to the gathering night. The entire thing was animated enough to make me nervous. Were they plants? Or animals?
So not home. Not by a long shot. But then home wasn’t really home, without a past to call upon.
The path curved through the meadow, following the lake. A wider road cut across it, one that traversed an arched bridge that cut the lake almost in two. At the end of it was a building. Huge, resembling a castle with parapets and spires. Its walls, a combination of brick and white stone, gleamed red in the fading sunlight.
Never mind resembling—itwasan effing castle. My mouth dropped open. “Wowsers. That’s amazing. Did you say the place was new?”
“The academy is new,” Cara corrected. “But we’ve appropriated the building. This castle was created by a Dire who had delusions of grandeur. We disabused him of the notion, and now the council has taken it over for the academy. We’ve added on and altered a few things, but the structure was well suited for us.”
I stared. “It’s really something.”
Cody draped a long arm around Kitani. “Who’d ever thought we’d be living here?”
Kitani sighed and shot me a look. “This place and us have a history. A rather dark one.”
“Wasn’t all dark,” Cody said, waggling his brows at her. “Some really good things happened here.Reallygood.”
Kitani elbowed him in the ribs hard enough that he let out a loud “oomph.”
“If you two are finished reminiscing, we have to beard a Dragon in his den. So to speak. Shall we?” Cara gestured for them to precede her.
“Yeah, Ryan’s due for a break,” Cody admitted, taking Kitani’s hand as they moved up the path.
I watched them as they walked off. “They aren’t—students?” Surely not.
Cara grinned at me. “Cody is the best hand-to-hand combat fighter among the Canadian Sabres, and maybe the American ones as well,” she said. “He’s the academy’s fight instructor.”
Matt’s eyes lit up. “Awesome!”
Although it interested me too, I was determined not to drool. I held my hand out to Matt. “I can take my bags. You don’t need to carry them.”
The big Aussie shrugged. “Calm your farm, Angel. S’all good. Back home, I’d be carting calves.”
I arched a brow at him, and he sighed. “It’s making me feel useful, okay?”
I caught the tiniest glimpse of uncertainty in his expression—I wasn’t the only one leaving everything I knew behind.
Relenting, I led Trix in Cara’s wake. My poor dog’s nose was working overtime, assimilating all the new scents. I’d trained her to walk with me, but she was so busy sniffing, she hung back on the leash.
My gaze moved to where the moons rose over the horizon.
Moons. Plural.
For a moment, my sense of reality spun. Like this was the ultimate proof of the weird tangent my life had taken.
Cody and Kitani had gone ahead, no doubt eager to rescue their mate from their twins. Or vice versa. I wasn’t sure which.
The grass—it looked like grass, but as I peered closer, the blades were broader and veined differently—had been mowed closer to the castle. Despite the late hour, people bustled around the grounds and several outbuildings. It wasn’t until we got closer that I realized they weren’t human. They had pale skin and flattened features, and when we passed one pruning a young tree, I noticed they were only about four feet tall.
Cara paused for us to catch up. “The council has hired local residents to care for the property,” she explained. “The builder of this place enslaved them, but we now pay for their services.”
Enslaved them? I’d have to ask for details on that history. I made a point of smiling at every worker we passed, but it only seemed to confuse them. They stared at me with their huge, dark eyes.
Matt scanned the meadow. “Is this where we train?” he asked.
