“So. Tell me about yourself. Are you a Satanist?” asked the shrewd lawyer. He sat there as if he did this everyday—and he did—his elbows propped up on the table, fingertips touching.

The girl sitting opposite him began to smile wickedly at the question. It started first by the glint in her eyes, and then the corners of her mouth turned up slightly. He must have noticed the small pentagram tattoo on the back of her neck, currently exposed by her ponytail of blonde hair. Her green eyes fixed on his blue ones with a piercing stare.

“Satan,” she mused. “He’d be an interesting sight to see.” She smiled again briefly. “No, I’m not. I’m an atheist.”

The girl tapped her fingernails against the metal table. The lawyer was an intelligent man, but he just didn’t know who he was dealing with. What he was dealing with.

The lawyer’s eyes looked toward the two-way mirror quickly, and then refocused on the teenager in the room with him. She had an attitude, alright. He wasn’t sure whether to interpret it as guilt or amusement with the situation.

“Your school grades are outstanding,” said the lawyer. “Harris Academy is one of the best non-religious private schools in the country. Your parents must be proud.”

She only smiled back at him. He wanted her to talk about her parents. It was a very sneaky way of getting to the point. She hated sneaky people. She also hated coyness, liars, and lawyers. They usually went hand-in-hand.

“Miss Cooper, I’d like it very much if you could tell me about your father. Were you very close with him as you grew up?”

“As close as any other father and daughter,” she said curtly.

The lawyer leaned back in his chair, his hand resting on his chin. “Do you know where Edward Cooper is right now?”

“Not a clue, Mr. Shawley,” she said. “I hate to disappoint you. See, there are boundaries in our house. He never nosed into my business, and I stayed out of his private affairs. I didn’t say a damn word to my mother when he slowly killed a woman in their bedroom.”

Shawley lifted his chin up, tensing. “You witnessed a murder?”

“No. I heard the screams even from my room. I had to turn my radio up full blast to drown them out.”

The man jumped out of his seat and placed his palms on the table, staring at the girl. “Audrey Cooper, do you mean to say that you were aware that your father had killed, and you kept this from the police?”

She tilted her head innocently. “Well, Mr. Shawley, they never asked.”

“I’m asking now.”

“Then yes, my father killed a woman sometime last month. When we lived in Hawaii last year, he also murdered two men. And before that, in France, it was a little boy who tried to steal from our house. In Australia in 2004, he—”

The lawyer closed his eyes. The girl stopped and studied him. He was about forty, his dark hair turning gray in places. The traces of good looks from years past remained in his face, and he had a tall figure. His ring finger was bare, so he was not married. It was hard not to wonder why the successful, fairly good-looking man was still single.

“Is something wrong, Mr. Shawley?” asked Audrey. Her green eyes glinted red for a moment.

“Miss Cooper,” he said, opening his eyes. “Can I get a written statement from you about these murders?”

“Certainly, if it will help the police with their investigation.”

Shawley straightened his tie smoothly. “I hate to break it to you, Miss Cooper,” he said. “But the next time you see your father, he’ll likely be in prison for life.”

Audrey only smiled. “Oh, I doubt that.”

Harris Academy was a decent-sized school, with just under thirteen hundred students. It had an incredible academic rating, with a teacher-student ratio of one to fifteen. It was a coed boarding school, which was much less common than single-sex schools.

The uniform was strict. Boys wore a clean white polo, the school’s logo embroidered on the chest, with black or navy slacks and a blazer. Girls wore the same kind of shirt, only with shorter sleeves, a black or navy pleated skirt, and a blazer. The skirts the school had came down to the knees, but girls would usually have them hemmed to be shorter. And with all the money their parents provided the school with, what teacher would risk complaining?

Audrey Cooper stared out the window at nothing. Her roommate was combing her hair leisurely on the bed. Leila Walker, a sixteen-year-old African-American girl who had been at Harris since pre-school, proved to be very good company. She had a pretty face with lovely, high cheekbones, and sparkling dark brown eyes. She was tall and thin, but still curvy. Quite the head-turner with the guys.

“Everyone’s talking about your dad,” she said to Audrey. “Is any of it true?”

“What, that he’s gone missing? Yes. That he killed our neighbor’s wife? Definitely, and it wasn’t the first. That I helped hide the body? No. He made his mess, and I wasn’t about to help him clean it up.”

Audrey had just started at this school during second semester of her sophomore year, but everyone seemed to know who she was. Edward Cooper was one of the greatest warlocks of the day. He was also infamous. He was powerful, yes, but he was a brutal killer. No one who crossed Cooper ever lived to tell the tale.

Currently he was on the run, yet again, from the authorities. Most likely he was hiding out in the next meta-universe. Oh yes, they do exist. Have no doubt about it. But only a warlock or a witch can get in.

“That’s so wild,” said Leila. “Aren’t you afraid of him, what with being a murderer and all?”

“Everyone’s afraid of him.”

“Are you?”

Audrey cast her eyes downward. Was she afraid of her father? He’d never laid a hand on her, never hurt her at all. But there was something about him that even her mother feared. She loved her father; but she feared him as well.

“Of course not,” said Audrey. “I’m his daughter.”

She turned away from the window and strode toward the door to leave. She didn’t much like this interrogation. Out in the hallway, students bustled past, staring at her openly. Audrey would have loved to give them something to stare at. Ripping out a seventh-grader’s throat, perhaps.

While Audrey herself had never killed anyone, she damn near did when she was only seven. What could she say? It was in the blood.

Evan Brown surveyed the school from the outside. It was an old building; that much was obvious. It had three floors, but from the outside it appeared to have five. That meant high ceilings. The lawn outside was vast and green, dotted with students in the same uniform he was wearing.

There were gargoyles at the top of the building, directly above every other dormitory window—the whole third floor was for dorms. They all looked very fierce, as is characteristic of gargoyles, but one looked even more vicious than the rest. It was actually very unnerving.

It was above a window whose curtains were open. There was a girl standing at the window, staring out at the grounds. It was a perfectly normal thing to do, but the sight of her seemed eerie.

A hand clapped down on his shoulder. “What are you waiting for, Evan?” asked Adam, his carefree brother, older by a year. “Let’s go scope out the new school.”

Evan nodded and followed him to the large, open doors of the building. A middle-aged woman was just exiting. Evan and Adam both recognized her as the principal—or rather, headmistress, as they said in a boarding school.

“Mrs. Royal,” said Adam warmly. “It’s nice to see you again.”

They had met Mrs. Royal over the summer. It was now September, the start of a new term, and their parents had made sure that they would be acquainted with some of the staff prior to starting. Neither of the boys had ever been to a boarding school before, and only Adam was eager to give it a chance.

“Yes, well, I hope you enjoy Harris Academy,” said Mrs. Royal. “Joey Truman has volunteered to show you around so that you can familiarize yourselves with the layout of the campus.”

Evan suddenly noticed the boy who was standing behind her. Joey smiled. Evan attempted to return the smile, but it became a grimace.

“Nice to meet you,” said Adam.

“You, too,” returned Joey.

“Joey is a junior, like yourself, Evan,” said Mrs. Royal. “I believe you have a few classes together. And, seeing as you are taking some senior-level classes, you should have classes with Adam as well.”

Two girls suddenly walked out of the building together. One was a petite girl with brown hair and pale blue eyes, a light sputtering of freckles across her face. The other had blonde hair and alarmingly green eyes. The blonde caught Evan’s stare, and he abruptly turned away, but he saw her wicked grin out of the corner of his eye.

“Well, the bell should ring shortly for class,” said Mrs. Royal. “Evan, Adam, I hope you enjoy your term here at Harris. Send your parents a hello for me, will you?” With that, she turned and reentered the school.

Evan sighed inaudibly. He didn’t deserve to be here in this godforsaken school. He should have been allowed to stay at his old school for his final two years. But there had been the incident...

“Let me show you around the school,” said Joey. “It’s an easy place to get lost in.” A gaggle of ninth-grade girls walked by, giggling as they stole glances at Joey, Evan, and Adam. Joey grinned. “But sometimes that can be fun.”

“How long have you been going here?” Adam asked someone in the dining hall as he sat beside his brooding brother.

He was getting on well here, and he wasn’t going to let his younger brother’s moodiness ruin what could be a very good final year. He eyed a girl across the cafeteria, not really caring what the response to his question was. The girl had a wicked, playful smile, directed currently at someone sitting across from her. She caught him staring, and he shot her a wicked smile of his own. She seemed to like that.

“Well?” asked the boy sitting next to him. His name was Roger or something.

“Sorry, what was that?” Adam asked.

“I said, where did you go to school before this?”

“Oh, a Catholic school in Massachusetts.”

“Why’d you leave?”

Why had they left? Evan looked up to hear his brother’s response. Adam replied simply that their father had received a promotion at work. Evan returned his gaze to his plate of food. Of course Adam wouldn’t even hint at the real reason, not to a stranger. The truth was rather complicated.

“Like your classes?” Evan asked Adam miserably. He hated his own classes. Hated the teachers, the students, the subject matter, the desks, the posters...everything.

Adam was not paying attention, though. He was staring at a blonde girl across the room. Evan rolled his eyes. Of course that was his main focus: girls. And they tended to focus on him as well.

“Just go over there and talk to her,” said Evan. “Don’t flirt from across the room. Some of us are trying to eat.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” said Adam. He started to stand, but suddenly stopped. Joey Truman suddenly sat down next to her. Her boyfriend? He didn’t know, but he wasn’t about to risk his dignity.

Evan put his fork down. “I hate it here.”

Adam raised his eyebrows. “Shouldn’t have started trouble in Massachusetts, then,” he said quietly.

Audrey ran her fingers through her hair and rose from the table to leave the dining hall. “See you later, Joey,” she said shortly, standing up.

“Kiss goodnight?” he asked teasingly.

She smiled, her eyes traveling back toward the boy who’d caught her eye across the room. He was talking to the miserable-looking boy next to him. The one who she’d seen outside the school earlier. What was his deal, anyway? He looked absolutely pathetic, brooding that way.

“Not a chance,” said Audrey to Joey, whose grin only widened. She patted him on the head and left, walking past the table where the two boys across the room sat, catching the eye of the flirt as she went.

The hallway of the school was empty. Everyone was at dinner. She turned and opened the first classroom door she found. The light was on, and the teacher would probably be coming back soon, but she only needed a minute.

Audrey rested her hand on the wall. All the lights in the room flickered, probably all the lights in the whole school. She didn’t notice. She just had to let it out. She hadn’t used her witch’s magic for a week, and it was driving her mad.

Feeling a great deal better, she left the room. A boy was just returning to the dining hall as she closed the classroom door behind her. He turned. She grinned upon seeing the look of surprise that flitted across his face. It was the boy who had stared at her in the dining hall before. He was cute, with dark hair, blue eyes, and an easy smile.

“Hey,” he said coolly. He held out his hand. How formal, Audrey thought. “I’m Adam Brown,” said the boy.

Audrey held out her own hand. “Audrey Cooper.”

His hand held onto her own for a second longer than necessary. Aren’t you the flirt. She was tempted to loose her magic on him, just for a moment. Shock him, maybe, or chill him to the bone and fill him with dread. But she didn’t. He released her hand a second before she would have done so.

“I saw you in the dining hall,” said Adam. “I’m new here. Wanna show me around?”

Audrey studied him. She saw the faint outline of his aura emanating from him. It was orange. The horny bastard. But there was something else there that alarmed her. Was that a streak of purple? It was fainter than even the faintest of auras, but she could see it there. She had never seen that before. Only read about it.

“Sorry, can’t,” said Audrey smoothly. “I’ve got some things to do up in my dorm. See you around school, though.” She smiled, and then turned to stalk off toward the stairs.

Werewolves. Of all the creatures!

“It’s quicker than quicksand, and you just won’t make it.” –Lillix