The Claddagh Academy

Blaise                           “Tell me the truth Amadeus. Are you sending me to this school to do some undercover job, or are you still mad at me because I let that Banshee bite you in the ass?” I asked, crossing my arms while I looked through the window at Faerie. I haven’t been inside Faerie since I was a little girl. It was a beautiful realm, all green and clean. The perfect place to retire if you had lung cancer and wanted to stay away from cigarettes, and booze, and pollution, and Netflix, and drugs and basically everything that was fun. I’ve never liked it in here. The siren inside of me fed from everything that was dark. Lust, rage, jealousy, wrath. The human realm fed me plenty of those emotions and I was sorry to leave. The High Fae inside of me wasn’t as strong as my siren’s side, hence the reason why I wasn’t very happy at the prospect of staying at Faerie and receiving an education in the Fae version of Smurf’s Village. I sighed and looked at my godfather. Amadeus ignored my pungent look while he read manga. He was fascinated with Japanese culture these days. I rolled my eyes and placed a hand on the pages he was reading, “I told you it was an accident. How the hell was I supposed to know she would end biting your ass?”                           Amadeus sighed, looking at me from under his heavy eyebrows. He was over a hundred years older than me but didn’t look a day older than twenty. The bright side of being a High Fae. We were immortal, although if a werewolf decided to separate your head from the rest of your body you truly died. We couldn’t die by natural causes, but we could get killed. Around twenty-one human years was all it took for a Fae to develop physically and go through Transition. Transition was this scary process that was the Fae equivalent of a young wizard putting the Sorting Hat on and crossing his fingers he got into Gryffindor. The process of Transition was merciless though. A biological revolution inside a Fae’s body. If a Fae wasn’t strong enough it could kill us, or even worse, turned us into a Null. I wasn’t sure what the process of Transition ensured, but I’ve heard stories it involved… s*x. Tons and tons of s*x. I pushed that thought away and focused on Amadeus’s hairy face. His sideburns were long and carefully trimmed, converging into a long beard that was the pride of his existence. He frowned, and two long wrinkles formed in his forehead. I swear those wrinkles were new, probably a side effect of being attacked by a Banshee two days ago. Or a consequence of him being constantly worried about me. I’ve officially given him the first case of wrinkles in the history of Fae.             I was only fifteen, but I’ve made myself a name on the streets. The Darkling. The bounty hunter motherfucker that would track any creature down and brought it to justice. The job wasn’t easy, but sure it was fun. Too fun if you asked Amadeus, when it involved a half siren Fae that got high on violence. Amadeus was always worried about me, but he brought it upon himself.  I’ve been raised by Amadeus in the art of hunting since I could remember. I knew better than no one of my age how to fight, how to track a scent against the wind, how to find track marks and hunt down rogue Fae. If you asked me it was a waste to send me to Claddagh Academy to receive an education. I already knew how to survive on my own. Who cared for a proper education when I knew how to kill a rogue Vampire with my bare hands? Amadeus sat on his side and grimaced in pain. I barely contained the smile that threatened to escape from my lips. He was probably in pain, but the hardheaded Fae wouldn’t admit it still bothered him the Banshee’s bite. If not for his arse, then sure for his pride.             “You will turn sixteen soon Blaise. I can’t pretend you are a little girl anymore,” he shrugged and contradicting his own words decided to pat my head as when I was a little girl, “A proper education is in order and Claddagh Academy is the best school for a Fae.”             “I’m just a quarter Fae,” I said, looking back at the glass windows of the train in which we were traveling. Fae was a plurality. There were low Fae like brownies, pixies and small fairies that looked like Tinker Bell, just a little wilder than Disney’s tamed version. And there were High Fae, which normally resembled humans but a thousand times more beautiful and magically gifted. High Fae were extremely proudful creatures. They believed only pure blood High Fae ought to live inside Faerie. One would think that in the modern times such stupid classist system would be obsolete, but it wasn’t. I’d been discriminated since I was a little girl because of my siren heritage and something told me that inside Claddagh Academy things would only be worst. After all Claddagh Academy was the boarding school were all the Kings of Faerie sent their kids to mingle. I wasn’t expecting the warmest welcome from all those rich princes and princesses. I didn’t care though. Being half siren was the coolest thing ever. I could glamour Fae into doing whatever I wanted if I used the Voice, my siren gift of compulsion. Not to mention I was exceptionally fast, talked the tongue of the sea creatures and was the most beautiful creature you have ever seen. What could I say? My high self-esteem came from my siren’s side of the family. My arrogance was pure Fae.             “You are your father’s daughter. I can see the Blood Fae inside of you and Claddagh Academy could sense it as well. You received a full paid scholarship without even applying Blaise. It’s your blood right,” Of course, my “blood right”. What a joke. Only because my father had been a Crowned Prince from the Blood Court of Faerie. He had died before I was born, so I had no idea who he really was. All I knew about him I’ve learned it from Amadeus, who had been his Caster, the Fae term for bonded brothers. Amadeus explained to me once that a Caster bond was, after a soul mate bond, the strongest connection that could exist between two Fae. A soul mate bond was decided by fate and was the strongest bond of them all. It united two Fae’s bloodstreams and linked their hearts, connecting their powers, their emotions and their thoughts. A Caster bond was a choice. A lifetime choice between two Fae who decided to link their strength to be more powerful in battle. Two Faes couldn’t be Casters if they were already soul mates. It was against the law to do such a horrible thing. When my father died Amadeus felt half of his soul die. He had admitted to me once, after two many bottles of Pixie Dust, that the death of his Caster had been the most painful experience he had ever survived. I could only imagine that if soul mates were also Casters then both would die if one happened to be killed. That was why law prohibited it.             The train gained speed while I rested my elbows on top of my knees and contemplated my options. Amadeus wouldn’t back down on his decision to send me to Claddagh. We fought the entire summer about it and he hadn’t changed his mind. I knew Amadeus. He was inflexible once he made up his mind about something. Like that one time he decided to be Banshee bait and got his ass bit. Pigheaded Fae. I’ve lived my entire life on the human realm and had no idea what to expect in Faerie. I didn’t know their etiquette, I couldn’t understand their laws and if I was quite honest I didn’t give a s**t about their classist system. Still, I was a very pragmatic girl. Amadeus was a smart Fae. Everything he did, he did it to follow an end game and I’ve learned from him to always look at the big picture. Studying at Claddagh would be a pain in my arse. Dealing with all those High Fae princess with daddy issues would probably give me a daily migraine…but, I could gain more knowledge about my Fae heritage. My siren’s side was too wild and neither Amadeus nor I knew how to tame it. My other half had been dormant all these years, letting the siren have all the fun, but I couldn’t ignore my Fae instincts. I would be twenty-one in five years. Only five years to train myself before Transition. It would be a miracle if I survived the experience and didn’t turn into a Null.             Closing my eyes for a moment I let the siren resurface. She was this batshit crazy lady that took control of my mind whenever I let her out. I felt her taking control over my body like a queen sitting at her throne. Whenever she was out, my skin shined, and my eyes turned iridescent. It was impossible for people not to notice if I kept my eyes open. Hence the reason I’ve closed them. The siren’s consciousness awakened like a flower in spring and tasted the emotions surrounding us. From Amadeus all of what that the siren could taste was his constant worriedness about me. Worriedness tasted salty, like tears, with a hint of acidic lemon. Behind me the siren tasted the curiosity of a little boy seated at his mother lap. Boring. The girl with the canary yellow shirt that had been seated at our right was a surprise. Her emotions were the strongest I’ve tasted inside the train. A mix between sadness and contained rage. It tasted like strawberry ice-cream with a cherry on top. Yummy. The siren fed from her like a glutton. Slowly the girl started to fell asleep. Nothing bad would happen to a person if the siren fed from it. They only got tired and sometimes they forget for a moment the reason why they had been feeling so sad, or so happy, or so utterly miserable. If you asked me I was doing a good public service by feeding mostly from negative emotions. They were the tastiest either way.             “I want more…you must give me more…” Said the siren inside of my mind. If my eyes had been open I would be rolling them right now. Didn’t I mention she was batshit crazy? The siren had this constant need to be either a seductress, a glutton or a bloodthirsty creature inside of my mind. It was a circular cycle that never ended. She was very hungry whenever she awakened, then she turned horny and finally bloodthirsty. I was still a virgin and my experience in the romantic field was nonexistent. One of the many reasons the siren always got mad and turned angry very fast. “I want a man…we will sink our fangs in his neck and push him down, down deeper, to the bottom of the ocean, where he can’t breathe, and then we will snap his neck. Snap! Snap!”             “Seriously, what is this need every magical creature has to bite? First Vampires, then Banshees and now Sirens,” I told her inside my mind and the siren hissed at me like a snake.             “Do not compare us to a Banshee! Those pigs would eat anything.”             “You would eat anything too.” I reminded her, and the siren scoffed like an angry kid.             “I have my standards. I prefer juicy young man with strong hearts. The stronger they are the hardest the kill,” I gulped at that sentence. I’ve killed my share of rogue creatures, but in my defense, they were all maddened by time, or hunger, or too much solitude. Amadeus and I only hunted killers of innocents, not innocents.             “I thought you liked to eat more than you liked to play with your food,” I told her and in response she only laughed.             “Now, what is the fun in that, Blaise Darkholme?” The crazy siren kept laughing so loud that I shut her inside of my mind before she could give me the first case of Fae Schizophrenia. I took a deep breath and took a second to recompose myself. I felt my eyes burn for a second and return to normal, my cue to open them and shake my head in an intent to calm the creature inside of me. The siren had fed and now she felt stronger inside of my body. Whenever she fed her gifts turned stronger, which meant I become stronger too. I was a seductress, everything in me lured men in, from my voice, to my perfect face, to my hot body. The effects were always the strongest after the siren fed from emotions and then they leveled down until I became too weak and needed another emotional refill. Get it? Emotional-refill. It was a wonder I didn’t have any friends with this sense of humor.             Amadeus looked at me from the corner of his hazel eyes and passed a page from his book.             “I sense you fed her. Good, you should remember to keep your siren in check at Claddagh. Feed whenever you are away from big crowds and fly under the radar. Remember sirens are a rarity in Faerie, your mother was the last full-blooded siren to be reported and even if you are only a half blood you will still gain a lot of attention,” I sighed and rested my head on the back of my seat. How could I not remember that? My mother was indeed the last siren that had been reported. They were a rarity for a reason. My mother had been the most beautiful woman that Faerie had seen, but her beauty was nothing else than a curse. Siren’s beauty was disproportioned. It was simply too much, contained in one single body. Nature had a way to balance disproportion and create leverage. Sirens were beautiful, yes, very beautiful, but they tended to die horribly young. My mother had died before turning twenty. A complication at my birth had led her to lose too much blood and nobody had been able to find another siren that could donate some blood for my dying mother. After she died my father couldn’t survive without his soul mate and killed himself, leaving a will in which he specified he wanted Amadeus to raise me and not his Blood Fae family. I will be forever indebted to my father for that decision. Amadeus had been the best godfather I could ask for. Right then Amadeus passed another page from his book and scowled while some thought crossed his mind, “Also, stay away from the Unseelie King.”             That made me stop and look at my godfather in surprise. The Unseelie King? Like that king? I’ve grown up outside Faerie and even I’ve heard stories about the Unseelie King that made the toughest bounty hunter shake in their boots. The Unseelie King was the boogeyman mothers used in Faerie to frighten their kids into eating broccoli. The man was legendary for his brutality, cruelty and limitless power. The most powerful king of Faerie and also the most frightening. He was the king of the Dark Fae. The kind of Fae that lived in darkness and drank virgin’s blood. At least, that’s what I’ve heard. I always thought the Unseelie King was centuries old. How the hell had he ended at Claddagh Academy? Amadeus passed another page of his book and looked at me from under those heavy eyebrows that could intimidate even the bravest Ghoul. Believe me, I’ve seen him do it.             “This summer’s biggest news at Faerie was the regicide of the former Unseelie King by his oldest son, now King Kodiak. Should I say p*******e instead of regicide? Hmm. It was never clear to me what was the proper order of events in this case,” Amadeus sighed, closing his book and pointing a finger at me, “You are a magnet for trouble Blaise and that’s why I’m alerting you. Stay away from the new Unseelie King. His power has no precedent in Faerie. For a sixteen-year-old to kill a centuries old King…Let just say, nobody has ever seen power like his own.”             “How could he kill his own father?” I asked in horror and Amadeus shrugged, squinting and looking further away in concentration.             “I would not judge him for the crime. It was well known that the former Unseelie King was a monster, especially so to his own children. But there have been rumors that King Kodiak invoked a horrible power to kill his father. An ancient power. A dark one. Kodiak is trouble, so stay away from him,” finalized Amadeus with an air of dramatism that would have scared any other girl. I joined my thumb and index finger in a Capisce sign, before returning to the same conversation.             “But how King Kodiak will be able to attend school and take care of his court?” The Unseelie Court was a problematic, not to say violent land. The dark creatures that roamed inside the Unseelie Court needed to be constantly accounted for, a job that was probably not so easy to do if you were attending a boarding school.             “Well, it should be handy the fact that Claddagh Academy is inside the Unseelie Court territory,” said Amadeus with a knowing smile that made me curse under my breath. He had known all along that Claddagh Academy was located in the most dangerous Faerie territory and have brought me anyways? I’ve changed my mind. Amadeus was the worst godfather ever. He laughed and pet my shoulder, “Relax kiddo, nothing has ever happened to any student at Claddagh Academy. The schoolgrounds are enchanted and charmed against any possible threat. Every year its defenses are reinforced by the professors, who by the way, are the strongest enchanters in Faerie. Only students and personnel can get inside Claddagh. You will be safe.”             Safe my ass. I will be attending a school that hated half-bloods like me. One of my classmates had committed p*******e over the summer, ending his father’s life and to top it all, I will be sleeping in the land that birthed myths like the Loch Ness monster and the Baba Yaga. I sighed at the same time the train stopped at the creepiest, smallest station in every single realm I’ve set foot in. A powerful mist surrounded the green forest around us. I could see the smoke emanating from the train’s chimney and the summer clouds that had turned gray over the last hour. A storm was coming. How coincidental it was paired with my arrival. Pushing myself up I extended my arm and picked my backpack from the compartment above the seat. Inside I only carried my most precious belongings. The fang I extracted from the first rogue Vampire I’ve killed. The bastard had enjoyed killing children and draining their bodies from blood. I’ve only been ten years old at the time, but I’ve made sure to hit his heart with a stake and make a pendant from his fang. Next to it was the golden hair of a Selkie whom I saved from a fishing net. Supposedly, if I ever was in trouble at the sea I only needed to snap the golden hair in two and Marjorie- that was the name of the selkie- will come to help me. The last object I treasured was the fire cloak I’ve won at a speed race against an Incubus under the name of Hunter. I’ve beaten him at running and won the cloak, which would always warm me, even in the coldest place of the world.  Some might say the coldest place was Hell, but I’ve been at Siberia and I could tell nothing would ever beat that coldness. And even then, my cloak had warmed me up.             Amadeus and I weren’t too fond of public displays of love. Our goodbyes were always short and cold. No point being dramatic between bounty hunters when every day we gambled our lives in our line of work. We bumped fists, our usual way to part ways and then I turn around, heading to what will probably be the worst school year in history.             “Blaise!” Called for me Amadeus when I reached the exit of the train. I turned around and lifted a shoulder at him in a questioning gesture. He looked comical right then, like a father who had no idea how to handle too many emotions at the same time. “Just stay out of trouble, would ya? I will pick you up the first day of summer and take you out to hunt some dumb trolls. Deal?”             “That sounds awesome,” I smiled at him one last time and jumped out of the train. This will be the first time I would part ways with my godfather for so long, but it was a necessary evil. Plus, I would use every new technique I learned at school to become a better bounty hunter and help Amadeus. I walked by the end of the platform and joined a group of Fae kids that looked my same age. The moment I step in every boy in attendance looked in my direction. I mentally sighed. The siren had recently fed, and my beauty was probably beaming irritatingly. I knew how I looked and tried my hardest to null the effect, barely taking care of my appearance and dressing like a tomboy. I was currently wearing black fatigues that were too big for my size, a t-shirt with David Bowie’s face on it and my red Converse. I had been putting all my money on the fact that boys would be deterred by the image of a man’s face on top of my boobs, but once again I had overestimated the brains of adolescent boys.              “Who she thinks she is, wearing that baggy outfit?” Asked the queen bee in front of me, a High Fae with strawberry blonde hair and big green eyes. She was dressed in a short-checkered skirt and a white crop top that revealed the abs she had been working on during the summer. To finish her slutty ensemble, she was wearing kitty heels. Ew, I hated kitty heels. Those weird hybrids between high heels and sandals. If you weren’t brave enough to wear high heels then wear sandals, no kitty heels. Two girls at her side nodded in a completely brainless coordination. I smirked at them all, circling the group of students that will be soon my classmates and walked to the end of the station to check my surroundings. It was an instinct Amadeus had shaped in me. Always be aware of your surroundings, use whatever tool you have in your favor. Adapt. Only the strongest adapt faster. I sniffed the air, letting my siren heritage codify the different scents around me. There was the general smell of pinewood and dry leaves in the air, plus the strong smell of coal smoke from the train. But there was another scent, a nauseating smell that came from up north. I wondered if what I was smelling was the reeking scent of a dead animal. I was inside a forest after all, that would be the most normal thought to have. Frowning I pushed myself further, all the way to the last step of the station. Another step and I would be touching the forest. The scent turned stronger there, putrid, like that of an animal in decomposition.             “Claddagh students! All Claddagh students come over here! Claddagh students!” I squinted one last time, trying to see with my Fae eyes further away and into the forest, but after a couple of minutes I decided it was for the best to go inside the station and stay close to the other students.             A tall man with graying hair and a large staff in his hand was waiting for all of us. Fae didn’t follow any specific dress code. We all wore whatever we felt like wearing. Mostly, every Fae wore modern clothes in an intent to keep ourselves in time with the human society. At the same time there were older Fae that refused to be changed and dressed in honor of whatever historical time they had experienced their Transition. The man with the graying hair had suffered his Transition probably around the same time Moses had parted the Red Sea in two. Although he was definitely Fae, I dared to say his blood has been watered down with a human mix. No true Fae ever looked so old. His mixed heritage made me like him immediately. We were kindred spirits. I could already tell.  His gray cloak was old, as were his sandals and the staff he used to rest his weight on. He didn’t look old enough to be using a walking stick, which meant he was younger than what he appeared to be. Or maybe his staff was primary a weapon. I was betting for both alternatives. He smiled to all of us and opened his arms in a welcoming sign.             “Welcome young students, to Claddagh Academy. Our school is very proud of receiving you all. I’m Constantine Cicerone, your new History of Faerie professor. If you follow me I will guide you to the main castle, where principal Urbino Cauldron will welcome you all to our new school year,” the old man smiled at us all and motioned with his staff to follow him. We all moved in a close formation. Too close, if you asked me. I get it. The mist was a growing mass surrounding us, but I swear to everything that was holy, that if the guy behind me bumped against my back one more time I would break his…             I felt it then, the presence that smelled like a dead animal. What was that? Why it reeked so bad? I stopped, making the guy behind me halt in the ball of his feet. I moved away from the other students with my super speed, courtesy of my mother’s side of the family. Everyone behind me wowed in surprise and true admiration. I ignored them all, sniffing the air and squatting to feel the floor of the forest. I placed my palm over the earth and closed my eyes. Nothing, whatever was coming our way was either too light to make the earth vibrate or too fast to produce any sound waves.             “Mss. Darkholme is it everything alright?” Asked professor Cicerone at my back with a trembling voice. I got on my feet, shaking my head at his worried expression. Something bad was coming our way. I could feel it in the stink that invaded my siren’s survival instincts.             “Take the others away, this path isn’t…” BAM! That was the impact of the Banshee against my body. I’ve been rammed by a minotaur before, but an enraged Banshee? This was a different story. The damned female monster weighted a ton and kept trying to scratch me with her poisonous claws. If she scratched me only once I could kiss my pretty ass goodbye. Banshee’s poison was their second strongest weapon. Their first one was…             “You dare to imprison me? ME? I’m Molly Blackheart! I’M MOLLY BLACKHEART!” She screamed in my ear and the queen bee that had made fun of my pants before fainted somewhere ahead of the path. I didn’t blame her. A Banshee’s scream was hard to survive. The secret was holding your breath until the Banshee stopped screaming. I looked up and had one second to make sure professor Cicerone had finished passing every student to the other side of the bridge in front of us. Including the unconscious queen bee. I sighed relieved and focused on Molly. She was the same Banshee that Amadeus and I had imprisoned and sent to Siberik, the magical prison in Faerie. She probably escaped the caravan that had been transporting prisoners and have followed my scent into the Unseelie Court.             “Look, we need to talk Molly,” I said to her, slapping her blue face to call for her attention. The Banshee hissed, jumping to a side and hugging me in a lock. I crossed my legs around her middle and rounded her neck with my hands. I squeezed hard and Molly started running like a crazy chicken without a head, “I understand you are mad at me and all that jazz, but you kind of bit my godfather’s ass. I need to teach you a lesson.”             “I’M GOING TO KILL YOU!!” I hold my breath until the end of that scream and punched her hard on both ears. She screamed in pain and tightened her hold on my body. I punched her again on her ears and then locked her head in a good hold, squeezing my thumbs inside of her eyes. I didn’t feel any remorse when her blood started oozing unto my hands. Molly’s kill count exceeded more than a hundred innocent humans and that was only the cases registered in our records. Who could really tell how many humans she had killed over the course of her three hundred years of existence?  Her screams of pain were horrible, gut twisting. If I hadn’t had any previous training on killing Banshees I would be dead by now. So far only my ears had exploded, the pain had numbed my ear canals, which was a good thing. Better not to listen a Banshee than die listening to one. Molly convulsed in her last intent to escape from me. I was ready for it and hold on to her tight, pushing my nails inside her eyeballs. She got ready to scream and I held my breath, readying my body for the pain that would follow…and then nothing. Molly fell limp on the floor, carrying me with her. I landed on top of her, still holding her tight in case she was just acting like she was dead to trick me. A second passed and her blue tongue came out of her mouth, her lower jaw opening in rigor mortis. She was dead. Her life had just snapped in front of my eyes. But…how? I was only planning on inflicting enough pain until I could snap her neck but somehow, she had died before. I pushed myself away from her, feeling the cold breeze of the forest carrying new, clean air that didn’t reek anymore. I had been a fool, forgetting how putrid Banshee’s smell was. Next time I wouldn’t make the same mistake.             “Mss. Darkholme!” Screamed a voice behind me, making me look over my shoulder. I blinked, looking at the fat man that was coming my way with an air of scholastic arrogance. Probably principal Cauldron if I had to make a guess. His belly bounced with each step he took, which made it impossible for me to look anywhere else but at his huge belly. Finally the man stopped in front of me. He looked reasonably mad…and red. I didn’t even know that second chins could blush until him. Then the man started speaking, or better yet, screaming at me, “Over one millennia of peace at Claddagh Academy had been destroyed in the first five minutes of your stay in the school grounds. I would not tolerate any of this! You are expelled!”             “Really?” I asked full of hope. If it wasn’t because my hands were covered in Banshee’s blood I would be doing my happy dance and squeaking like a little girl. My five minutes of happiness were soon put to an end by a very large presence that stepped out of the forest.             The moment my eyes locked with his I knew I’ve found my soul mate.