It surprised me that she’d brought her daughter to a fight demo. But then again, they were Sabres, not humans. I glanced at the scars on Kitani’s arms. Different world, different rules.
The Sabre gazed down on the arena. “Place has changed. But not enough.”
The words echoed with a sense of dread, and I wondered about it. I glanced around.
Regularly spaced metal pillars surrounded the sand, and along the far wall, a stretch of bars gleamed between two of them.
My skin crawled as I scanned the floor and noticed small circles between the pillars that reflected metal against the stone—the bars had once totally encircled the arena.
It had been built as acage.
I shot Kitani a look.
She kept her eyes on her daughter, tickling the little girl as she giggled and petted my dog. But when Kitani spoke, her voice had undercurrents of anger. “Previous owner used it as a prison for his private entertainment. Suffice it to say, one of the first things we did was to slice out those bars.”
Wowsers.Perhaps those echoes of pain and suffering were what I sensed in this place. How many generations of students would it take to erase the past?
“Lots of Dires,” Mari commented from my other side.
With everyone seated more or less quietly, we were able to scan the student body as a whole. They looked human, unless you knew the type—their broad shoulders tapered to slender hips and powerful thighs. Based on build alone, most of those assembled must be Dires. I counted twelve teams, with six individuals per team. So seventy-two students. A scattering of other, slimmer forms milled among the werewolves—were they human? Likely not.
Almost all were male, though. I searched for the other females, and finally found them. One was tiny and wrapped in layers. Her hand, when it appeared to push back her hood, shone as though it were damp, and was a bright-green color.
The other woman sat on steps emblazoned with a strange symbol—a female warrior with wings. Three impressive guys surrounded her.
Kitani followed my gaze. “That’s the female alpha Dire and her packmates.”
“What is their team name?” I asked.
“Valkyrie,” she said.
Before I could comment further, Amadeus’s thin form rose from the bottom tier and advanced to a podium sitting on the floor. The room fell silent.
The man certainly had a flair for the dramatic. He paused with his hands raised for exactly as long as we skipped a few breaths.
“Welcome, students,” he finally said, “to the Council’s Academy of Shades.”
Okay, that translated to CAS. Not nearly as fun as SLACC, but throwing in the “o” gave you CAOS. Sounded like an old spy sitcom, but it had more flair.
Oblivious to my ruminations, Amadeus continued. “Here you will learn how to represent the council across the realms. You will receive intensive instruction on council policies as well as the information you will require to function among the many societies the realms have to offer. The focus, as always, will be to peaceably resolve any issues utilizing understanding and diplomacy, but our representatives will always be prepared should such things fail.”
Mari shifted uneasily beside me as she scanned the Dires in the audience. I thought of Darius. Diplomacy and the alpha didn’t seem to be compatible, but Matt gave me hope. If more were like him, it was possible.
Amadeus had paused again, but he seemed to think the message had sunk in as much as it would for now, so he continued. “Your basic training will take place over three months. Those that successfully complete it will move into our advanced curriculum for another three. During this time, you will receive field experience, training with more skilled operatives.”
His pale eyes flashed as he scanned us, resting momentarily on me. His brows dropped before he continued. “For most of you, the next three months will be the hardest of your lives. My advice to you is to use any spare time to bolster areas where you find yourself weakest, because only the best of you will graduate to the advanced program. Those who do so will be honed into something powerful. The Shades will use their skills to make the realms a better place.”
Despite my resolve to dislike Amadeus, my heart lifted at the thought of traveling the realms as a team. My gaze fell on Matt and the gorgeous Dragonshifter, then slid to Darius.
Well, I’d like to travel with half my team, anyway.
Amadeus gestured to the arena. “The physical side of your training will be especially difficult. One component is hand-to-hand combat. While many of you are capable of shifting to another, more lethal form, the ability to fight as a human is an important part of being a council agent. Many realms are virgin, and a humanoid form will often blend in, whereas the beast will stand out. Your training will enable you to hone both beast and man.”
“Virgin?” I whispered to Kitani.
“Those are realms where the residents don’t know about the other realms, or the gate travelers,” she whispered back.
Oh. Like the human realm.
