Mystik Realm: Celestinia Academy

Eleven: Catch on Fire

My new cat wanders off to god knows where and I don't bother trying to find her, instead, I get to the cafeteria where I find Demi. She is sitting with a couple of random people and Dale still nowhere in sight, I wonder, what’s with that, is he annoyed at me?

“Morning Demi!” I say trying to sound cheery. I look around the room to see if there is any evidence of an attack, there isn't anything noticeable none.

As I turn back to meet Demina’s gaze as she talks to me, my eyes meet Drakes for a second and it's like he can see straight through me, I hurriedly look away and make eye contact with Demi.

“Morning Ally,” Demina says in a somewhat cheery voice.

“Why you here so early?” I ask, after all, it is only quarter past seven.

“Didn’t really sleep…” She says not meeting my eyes.

“Okay…” I sit down at the table slightly uneasy by the way she didn’t really answer my question properly, maybe she just had a hard time sleeping after the attack in this very room.

I eat my breakfast with little to no chit-chat from my friends, Dale arrives at eight o’clock and ignores me the whole time not even glancing my way unless he talks to someone sitting next to me.

We receive our schedules at around ten past via someone giving them out, I don’t know why they didn’t use magic, however, that’s not important, what is important is how completely horrible my first day is;

Monday:

9 am: Double Delta Combat, groan...

11:30 am Recess

12 pm: Betta Flight class, ughh, guess I qualify now...

1:15 pm Double Betta PE, double groan

2:40: Lunch

3:20 pm: Betta English, hopefully, a break and hopefully it’s similar to human English lessons

I’ll die from exhaustion before I find my mum, and if, if Mara is still alive and I highly doubt it, I might be able to find her too. As long as it's not Monday afternoon that I search for them, I’d probably be too tired to see her if she was in front of my eyes.

“Bad luck, Ally at least tomorrow you have two classes with me.” Demi sympathizes, she isn’t acting weird even though I suspect she is keeping the reason as to why she didn’t sleep well last night to herself but why?

“Great!” I say with oversaturated sarcasm as a reply to her comment.

She frowns then looks at my schedule again, “You have Delta Combat?” she says incredulously, I guess she didn’t really look at my results that well.

“Yeah… what?” I say very confusedly trying to figure out why that has any significance at all.

“There are only boys in that class, as far as I know, the only female ever to be in that class was in fact, Celestinia’s daughter, Illyana I think her name was…” I take a second to process that, only guys? Oh, boy, will this be interesting, most liking horrible but interesting too.

And then I process the other piece of information, “Wait…? Her daughter?” what???? Since when did she have a daughter?

“She had a daughter when she was eighteen which was one of the reasons she founded the academy. I must have forgotten to mention that before when I was telling you about her,” she says while rubbing the back of her head awkwardly.

“Oh…” that makes sense, I guess.

***

After some time in the cafeteria I realise I don’t know where The Combat Arena is so I leave to look for it, I forgot to actually ask because, well, I’m an i***t. Anyway, I eventually find the arena one minute before class starts, I open the door which is a little difficult as it’s super heavy.

Before I get to view the room properly a male voice stops me, “You’re late,” He says in a slightly aggravated tone.

I look up to meet the man's eyes before looking around the room to see who else is here. Only five guys stand in a group to my left and they look at the man who I assume is our teacher with respect, the sixth guy, no girls other than me like Demi had said, is standing a little apart from the others, it’s Drake.

“Sorry,” I say trying to look ashamed even though I am more frustrated the sorry, however, I do not annoy the teacher as it can have bad consequences.

“It’s sorry sir, to you, Miss Goldain I assume…” he looks over my body with a disapproving glance and a sneer. At least I’m wearing appropriate clothes I got changed before I went to look for the arena.

The guys look up from their talk and look over at me and I can already feel their anger dripping off them like thick honey.

“A girl? You can’t be serious!!!” one of the guys shouts angrily as another says, “Why is she here? This is a guy's only class.”

This is great, my class are stereotypical idiots and they could all beat me to a pulp, perfect.

“Can we just get on with whatever we’re doing today?” I say irritated, glaring at my new classmates, they all glare back, except Drake, he is just looking at me weirdly but I can’t figure out why.

“Yes, since you were late you can go do fifty push-ups and fifty sit-ups, and fifteen laps around the room,” he says pointing his finger at me. I groan I wasn’t even late, I guess my teacher is also prejudiced towards girls, or just girls who could be good at combat.

The coach decides to ignore me and continues to talk to the rest of the group, “Now class today we are doing an obstacle course to test your abilities and see what your weaknesses are, you can warm up if you like,” he explains to us.

I move off to a mat to start my push-ups so I don't waste too much time. I can barely do five, my weakness is obviously upper-body strength. I stagger my way through the push-ups before starting the sit-ups which I'm usually a pro, but I'm so tired it takes ages to complete fifty.

When I finally finish we’re a quarter of the way through the double lesson, the running was interesting, I am not quite used to my body so I was surprised at the faster speed but I was also clumsier.

“Alright, Lia?” Drake says as he walks over to where I am dying on the ground from exhaustion.

“You know,” I say between trying to gulp down oxygen into my starved lungs, “You’re the only one who calls me that,” I try to catch my breath, I feel the pain of the exercise already forming in my body and I have PE later today.

“I know, that’s why I'm calling you that, Lia,” he puts emphasis on the word just to annoy me more than him just being here already is.

“Ugh,” I groan, I regret flirting with him now. It was just, I couldn’t help it. It was like I was compelled to… maybe he can do that? Maybe it’s one of his abilities…

“Class! Over here, I trust you are all warmed up?” the coach says, I still don't know his name… but right now he should be called the devil because of the torture he just put me through.

Most of the class reply with a yes of excitement or something similar, Drake again is the exception he just looks a little bored. My only reply is a groan of pain and a wish that I never have to do another push up in my life.

We make our way over to him. “Alright boys,” then he glances at me with disdain, “and girl… like I said before we are doing an obstacle course, there are five sections. Each section represents a skill; lower-body strength, upper-body strength, core strength. You get the idea. After each section you’ll get a thirty-second break then you’ll start the next. Each section is also timed which is how we measure your abilities.” Coach says in a no-nonsense voice.

“James, you're up,” he says to a large blond guy who is grinning like an i***t.

The obstacle course is outside but it’s hidden by some sort of magic barrier and once someone passed they have to stand aside so they can't help a friend. I'm last-to-go, the only thing entertaining was Drake wiping the floor with the rest of the class, having done the whole thing done in just under ten minutes.

The first one tests upper-body strength (like I haven’t done enough of that already), I have to swing over a deep drop (that I think is an illusion) and cross over bars using just my arms. I wasn’t able to see the obstacle course before I started, he wouldn’t let any of us see it.

It takes me four minutes and forty-eight seconds according to the coach, my arms are being stretched like elastic bands throughout the whole process.

The second one is mainly about jumping and parkour it takes me three minutes and fifty-four seconds to complete, in the third I have to basically crawl on the ground for half of it, it takes me five minutes and six seconds. The fourth I have to try and find something and return it to an altar which only takes me two minutes and twenty-one seconds. I have very good eyesight.

Part -way through the last section I get a headache, which is why it takes me five minutes and sixteen seconds even though it was just a one-kilometre run. The obstacle course was outside but it was hidden by some sort of magic barrier and once someone passed they had to stand aside so they couldn't help a friend.

“You ended up with twenty-four minutes and forty-five seconds,” the coach says to me when I come out of the last section, he mutters under his breath, “Unsurprisingly you were the one who got the worst score being eight minutes behind Leo…”

“What do you expect? I got a headache! Which I still have by the way!” I don’t know why but I explode, too much pressure I guess…

“Calm dow-” he starts to say something but I interrupt.

“Calm down?! CALM DOWN!! MY MOTHER IS NOWHERE TO BE FOUND, AND NEVER HAS BEEN, MY AUNT IS PROBABLY DEAD AND UNTIL A WEEK AGO I HAD NO CLUE MAGIC EXISTED! MY BEST FRIEND KNEW I WAS… WHATEVER I AM… YEARS, YEARS! BEFORE I DID. HOW DO YOU THINK I FEEL RIGHT NOW? HELPLESS, CONFUSED! MY WHOLE LIFE WENT FROM PRETTY GREAT, TO DOWNRIGHT SUPERNATURAL AND VERY TWISTED. ALL I CAN DO IS SIT HERE! PLAYING STUDENT TO A SCHOOL I FOUND OUT ABOUT A COUPLE OF DAYS AGO! I ALSO HAD NO CLUE THAT MAGIC EXISTED UNTIL A WEEK OR SO AGO!” I rant mixing up my words a little while stumbling through my angry rage.

“Listen he…” I glare at him daring him to finish it. “List…” he bursts into flames and screams, smoke starts to gather around him in seconds and he starts coughing.

“Omigod, Omigod... oh, my, god……” I say in horror. What have I done?

“You have wings?” Drake asks me.

I stare at him, I just lit someone up like a bonfire and all he can say to me is that I have wings? Wait... I have wings? I start to turn to look behind myself, I can feel their weight.

That's when the pain hits me like a punch to the gut and I double over, falling to the ground a few seconds later.

***

I wake up in a white hospital-style room with an analogue clock hanging on the wall, I'm glad I learned to read one in year three. It reads a quarter to twelve, twelve o’clock is when my next class is, Flight class I think.

I get out of bed which makes me slightly dizzy, but I make it out of the room and sneak through the building, it’s a bit of a maze but at least there are exit signs, I regularly check the clocks on the walls as I go. After I leave I look around for my dorm to get changed out of these hospital clothes, it kinda looks suspicious, I'm already attracting stares from the few people around.