Touch of Sibyl

Chapter Thirty.two

Holy Wednesday.

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Despite my sour mood, the day passed by with its usual mix of classes, lectures, and boring homework assignments. The last bell rang after sixth period, and I headed outside, along with the other students.

It was early December, and I pulled my black plaid coat a little tighter around my body, trying to keep warm. Even though it was mid-afternoon, the sun's rays did little to penetrate the thick, heavy, gray clouds that cloaked the sky, and my breath frosted in the air, like a stream of icicles before flowing away to the ground.

Winter had already spread its chilly blanket over North Carolina for the season.

That's where the academy was located, in Teide Mountain, a suburb tucked up in the mountains above the artsy town of Isheville.

You could tell Mythics was a place for rich kids just by walking around campus. All of the buildings were made out of old, dark, gray stone covered with curling coils of ivy, and every single one of the perfectly manicured lawns sported a thick layer of grass, despite the cold. Plus, the open quad that lay in the middle of campus looked like something you'd see in a brochure for an expensive college-lots of curving, cobblestone walkways; lots of iron benches; lots of shade trees.

In a way, Mythical Academy was a kind of college, since the students ranged from the first-years, who were sixteen, all the way up to the sixth-year kids, who were twenty-one.

Since I was seventeen, I was a second-year student, which meant I had roughly four and a half more years to go before I'd graduate. Oh, goody.

The main quad spread out like a picnic blanket that had been thrown across the top of a grassy hill overlooking the rest of the lush academy grounds. I stepped onto one of the ash gray cobblestone paths that led down to the lower quads, where the student dorms and other smaller outbuildings dotted the landscape.

All around me the other students headed down to their dorms or back up the hill to attend whatever after-school clubs, sports, or activities they were involved in. Not me, though. I hadn't joined any clubs, and I wasn't coordinated enough to play any sports, especially not at Mythics. Everyone was so much faster, stronger, and tougher than I was, thanks to their ancient warrior genes and the magic that went along with them.

I made a quick stop at my dorm-Styx Hall —to drop off Nick and some of my schoolbooks before heading out again. Instead of going back up to the main quad, I went the opposite direction toward the edge of campus, and I didn't stop walking until I reached the twelve-foot-high stone wall separating the academy from the outside world. A closed gate stretched across the entrance, with two sphinxes perched on the wall on either side, staring down at the black iron bars between them.

My steps slowed, then stopped altogether as I stared up at the statues. The sphinxes were reportedly imbued with some kind of magic mumbo jumbo, and only folks who were supposed to be at the academy-students, professors, and staff-could pass through the gate and get by the sphinxes' watchful eyes. I didn't know exactly what would happen if someone tried to force his way in past the statues, but I felt like there was something underneath the smooth stone facades-something old and violent that could erupt at any moment and gobble me up if I so much as breathed wrong.

But it always seemed like there was a loophole when it came to magic, and with the sphinxes, it was the fact that they were designed to keep Chitauri out-but not students in. That's what Professor Tin had told me, and I believed her, since the creatures hadn't come to life and clawed me to death yet. Still , it always took me a moment to suck up enough courage to dare to slip past them.