“I went ahead and picked a side,” she says, gesturing to the room. I’m frozen in my spot, watching this girl. She’s gorgeous—like, insanely so—and I feel a spark flare in my belly. Her dark hair is long and wavy, going almost down to her waist. Her skin pale, like alabaster. I can’t take my eyes off her mouth—painted a dark, seductive red. “I hope you don’t mind.”
I force myself to shake my head. “No, that’s fine. I got a little held up on the way here. You know how traffic can be.”
I drop my satchel on the bed, hearing the hard thump of the heavy book inside. I’ll need to find a place to hide it.
“Your luggage was delivered,” Marielle says, pointing to a large, rectangular trunk at the end of my bed. I’m curious about that since we didn’t travel with anything. Just the bags on our backs and our weapons that vanished in the portal.
The dagger. Morgan’s dagger. Good job I did taking care of it.
I make note to check in the trunk when I’m alone, because despite Marielle’s obvious beauty, she’s a potential enemy.
“Is this your first year here?” I ask, trying to put myself in the mind of a student.
“No,” she laughs, running her fingers through her hair. A large gem sits on her ring finger. Could the stone be somewhere like that? Inside jewelry? Increasingly, I feel unprepared. I should be. We’d only had a day to get ready. “My father sent me here when I turned twelve.”
“He must be concerned about your academics.”
She rolls her eyes. “He’s concerned about me finding a proper husband.”
“Oh, well, I doubt you’ll have a problem with that.”
She laughs again, this time darkly. “Oh, I can find a husband. He wants me to find a proper one, with the right breeding and compatibility for our kingdom.”
“You’re a…”
“Princess.”
If Morgan can be a queen, then I can buy that this girl is a princess. Why not?
“What about you?” she asks. “You look like you come from a strong line.”
“I’m a Valkyrie.”
Her eyebrows raise in interest. “Oh, from Odin’s realm. They’re preparing you for the apocalypse?”
I’m stunned she came out and said it, but I nod. “The dead will need to be carried off the battlefield. Odin and Freya want me to be ready.”
“I heard a rumor that some of the new instructors are proficient in warfare. They brought them in to help prepare the academy for the end of days.” There’s a lilt of excitement in her voice. “The legends say they’re brutal, merciless killers, made immortal to ravage societies.”
There’s no doubt who she’s speaking of—who these legends are. Her words make sense because the Legion, the Immortals, they are vile beings and in any other time they would naturally be in this realm, but it isn’t any other time. They are here to fight for the Upperworld, to pay their debt to the Ravens for their freedom.
“Sounds exciting,” I say. “I look forward to learning from them.”
“I hear they’re very handsome. Oh, I also heard there are two new gorgeous students, too.
I can’t wait to sink my teeth into them.” She bares her teeth and note the sharp points of her incisors. “I bet they taste delicious.”
I study Marielle one more time; taking in her beauty, her allure, her very, very sharp nails.
“You’re a vampire,” I blurt, having never met one before.
“A vampire princess, who, by the way, is totally starving. For food,” she adds when she sees my expression. “Want to go to dinner?”
“Uh, yeah,” I say, trying to catch up with everything going on. My roommate is a vampire. Three of the Immortals are instructors here to teach the students how to destroy the world and two are mingling with the students. This is a nightmare and I’m totally going to fail at leading this Crusade. I grab the bag with the book and sling it over my shoulder. “Let’s go eat.”
Marielle gives me a tour of the Academy on the way to the dining hall. Classes are down this wing. Administration down another. Training rooms are in the basement. Laboratories on the third floor. There are rooms for art, the mystical kind, which is probably where the Sam, Damien, Clinton, and Bunny would have been involved if they’d come through the portal. Wide, carved, wooden doors lead to a massive library. Dylan probably never would have step foot outside the walls. I assumed Rupert was holed up inside, but I’m surprised to see him across the dining room, with a plateful of food.
Marshal is across from him, flanked by two attractive girls. One has fangs.