LIFE AND DEATH (edythe's pov)

Chapter 1 First sight

This was the time of day when I most wished I were able to sleep.

High school.

Or was purgatory the right word? If there were any way to atone for my sins, this ought to count toward the tally in some measure. The tedium was not something I grew used to; every day seemed more impossibly monotonous than the last.

Perhaps this could even be considered my form of sleep—if sleep was defined as the inert state between active periods.

I stared at the cracks running through the plaster in the far corner of the cafeteria, imagining patterns into them that were not there. It was one way to tune out the voices that babbled like the gush of a river inside my head.

Several hundred of these voices I ignored out of boredom.

When it came to the human mind, I'd heard it all before and then some. Today, all thoughts were consumed with the trivial drama of a new addition to the small student body. It took so little to work them up. I'd seen the new face repeated in thought after thought from every angle. Just an ordinary human boy. The excitement over his arrival was tiresomely predictable—it was the same reaction as one would get from flashing a shiny object at a group of toddlers. Half the obsessive females were already imagining themselves infatuated with him, just because he was something new to look at. I tried harder to tune them out.

Only four voices did I block out of courtesy rather than distaste: my family, my two brothers and two sisters, who were so used to the lack of privacy in my presence that they rarely worried about it. I gave them what I could. I tried not to listen if I could help it.

Try as I may, still... I knew.

Royal was thinking, as usual, about himself—his mind was a stagnant pool with few surprises. He'd caught sight of his profile in the reflection off someone's glasses, and he was mulling over his own perfection. No one else's hair was closer to true gold, no one else's physique was quite so muscular, no one else's face was so flawless and symmetrical. He didn't compare himself to the humans here; that juxtaposition would have been laughable, absurd. He thought of others like us, none of them his equal.

Eleanor's usually carefree expression was crumpled with frustration. Even now, she ran one hand through her ebony curls, twisting the hair into her fist. Still fuming over the wrestling match she'd lost to Jessamine during the night. It would take all her limited patience to make it to the end of the school day to orchestrate a rematch. Hearing Eleanor's thoughts never felt intrusive, because she never thought one thing that she would not say aloud or put into action. Perhaps I only felt guilty reading the others' minds because I knew there were things inside that they wouldn't want me to know. If Royal's mind was a stagnant pool, then Eleanor's was a lake with no shadows, glass clear.

And Jessamine was... suffering. I suppressed a sigh.

Edythe. Archie called my name in his head and had my attention at once.

It was just the same as having my name called aloud. I was glad my given name had fallen out of style in the last few decades—it had been annoying in the past; anytime anyone thought of any Edythe, my head would turn automatically.

My head didn't turn now. Archie and I were good at these private conversations. It was rare that anyone caught us. I kept my eyes on the lines in the plaster.

How is she holding up? he asked me.

I frowned, just a small change in the set of my mouth. Nothing that would tip the others off. I could easily be frowning out of boredom.

Jessamine had been still for too long. She wasn't performing human ticks the way we all must, constantly in motion so as not to stand out, like Eleanor pulling at her hair, Royal crossing his ankles first one way then the next, Archie tapping his toes against the linoleum, or me, moving my head to stare at different patterns in the wall. Jessamine looked paralyzed, her lean form ramrod straight, even her honey hair seeming not to react to the air wafting from the vents.