The moment Alexi and Lacey entered their dorm, they dropped their stuff where they stood and each randomly claimed one of the two bedrooms to the left of the spacious living room in front of them. Falling asleep the moment she slipped into her bed, still fully clothed, it felt like mere seconds later when an annoyingly familiar voice called her name, closely followed by the feeling of being gently shaken.

  “Alexi, please wake up! If you don’t get ready soon, we’ll be late for our first day of classes!”

  Alexi’s eyes flew open as Lacey’s words came into focus. She was instantly out of bed and facing Lacey, who looked panicked. “What time is it?”

  “6:30. We have Daemonology in an hour!”

  Alexi relaxed with the information. “Oh, don’t make me panic like that, Lacey. That’s plenty of time.” She studied the other girl, who was already fully dressed.

  Today, Lacey wore a black, knee-length dress covered in cute animal imagery, with a light pink cardigan wrapped around her shoulders. Her strawberry-blonde hair was once again styled in curls, but today she was hatless. “Another one of your Lacey originals?” Alexi asked with a yawn, gently pushing past her and towards her luggage, opening up her suitcase and pulling out a towel.

  Lacey glanced at the ground, lightly tapping the floor with the front of her loafer. “Y-you don’t need to ask about them if you don’t want to. I got your message loud and clear yesterday.” Her voice carried no malice, no accusation, just a sad acceptance.

  Good job. Your temper strikes once again.

  Turning towards the other girl, Alexi was silent momentarily, the tension taut like a rope between them. “Listen, Lacey…” Alexi began, trying desperately to find the words. “I’m sorry for the way I worded things yesterday. How harsh I was. We were in a stressful situation, and if I’m going to be honest with you, getting into Lostvail has been my dream since I was a kid. I was hyper-focused and didn’t think you’re probably here for your own reasons.” Alexi punctuated the last point by motioning towards Lacey’s clothing.

  Lacey looked down at herself, then back up to Alexi, before giggling. “Well then, if you really are interested in my clothing, I’d be more than happy to discuss it over breakfast! This is just my style; every piece is made-to-order and 100% customizable. Now go get ready, time is ticking!”

  Breakfast for the young ladies would be coffee from the small cafeteria on the bottom floor of their dorm building. It served a wide variety of breakfast options buffet style, from fluffy golden eggs, golden hash browns, and perfectly cooked strips of bacon. It was enough to make Alexi’s mouth water. The fact that neither had been able to take part in the delicious array was Alexi’s fault for sleeping in, as Lacey teasingly reminded her. They were in a hurry, so the pair was stuck with coffee to fuel them for the morning, Lacey getting black compared to Alexi’s sugar-filled brew.

  Despite the chilly, early morning air, Lacey seemed perfectly unbothered and was practically glowing as she sipped her drink. Alexi narrowed her eyes as she noticed mascara on her partner’s face. “How early did you wake up this morning?”

  Caught off guard by the sudden question, Lacey lightly choked on her coffee before turning to face Alexi. “Uhm, four? I had to shower, pick out my outfit, do my hair, put on the make-up that would coordinate well, which let me tell you is a time in and of itself- ”

  “Hold on, let me stop you there,” Alexi said, horror lining her voice as she raised her hand. “You woke at four in the morning just to put on makeup? I couldn’t imagine voluntarily getting up early just to pretty myself up.”

  “Oh Alexi, makeup isn’t about ‘prettying yourself up,’” She said with a smile as they walked along the path towards the main school building. “It’s about enhancing what’s already there. Men, women, it enhances anyone's natural beauty. At least, when it's done right. If you’d like, I’d be more than happy to do your makeup sometime.”

  Alexi’s pace faltered as she took Lacey’s words in. She couldn’t remember the last time she had even considered wearing makeup. She thought that maybe it was when she played princess as a little girl, before her sister was born. She had pleaded for her Mom to use her makeup, sneaking into her drawer whenever she was told she was too young. Even hazy and distant, the memory was painful, and she quickly pushed it down. She didn’t need makeup. She was a Daemon hunter. But despite that, she couldn’t help but cling to the sentiment for being so…normal. “I mean…It’s worth a try, once I suppose. You’d really do that for me?”

  Beaming, Lacey replied with an enthusiastic “Of course! I’ll start with something light, see how you like it and go from there. Whatever you’re comfortable with, of course! But you can trust me not to make you look like a clown.” Lacey was bouncing in place, her ringlets bouncing right alongside her.

  “Yeah, I’ll let you know, I suppose,” Alexi said with a small smile, starting forward again, Lacey beside her. “I’m not completely on board with the makeup idea, but hey. We’ll see.” She again regretted how she had treated Lacey when they first met yesterday. Her emotions could be hard to control, especially her anger. Sometimes anger felt like her default reaction, and the previous day was not the first time she had lashed out. She also knew it wouldn’t be the last. She hated how inevitable it was.

  Daemonology was held within the main school building of the Academy, in a semi-circular-shaped room on the first floor. The rows were tiered, escalating the further away from the lectern you were. Beside the lectern was a rectangular desk, scattered with loose paper and stacks of documents. Specimen jars also occupied the space, and various species of smaller Daemons floated in preserving liquid. The opposite wall was covered in writing, diagrams and charts, all breaking down and labelling a variety of Daemon anatomy.

  “Alexi! Lacey!” A familiar voice called from the seats. Alexi turned to see Nathan waving with both hands wildly, grinning from ear to pointed ear. His outburst had caused a few other students to turn their gazes their way. Silently cursing Nathan, Alexi weakly waved back before sitting beside him, Lacey sitting on her other side. Alexi couldn’t help but notice that Vincent was sitting a row below them, arms folded across his chest. She was glad she didn’t have to interact with him.

  Sensing the veil of contempt oozing from her, Nathan nudged her gently. “Hey, I know you and Vincent got off on the wrong foot yesterday, but he isn’t a bad guy. Just a little prickly. In fact, I’ve got a funny story about him-”

  “Nathan,” Vincent said, not turning to look at him. “I suggest you remember who you must share a dorm with for the rest of the year before you finish that sentence.”

  “Oh lighten up! You swore me to secrecy, I’m not about to blab and never hear the end of it after. Don’t you worry, Mr. Tall, Dark and Moody.” Nathan chuckled before winking at Alexi, who couldn’t help but join in.

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  “Oh, come now, Nathan, don’t just leave us hanging like that. Don’t you want to know Vincent’s secret, Lacey?”

  Before Lacey could respond, the entire room went quiet as someone cleared their throat, the sound echoing through the room, over the chatter and buzz of the roughly fifteen students in the class. Standing in the center of the room was a tall, lanky man, his chocolate brown eyes studying them from behind a pair of square-shaped glasses. He had a messy shock of white-blonde, and as he was partially leaning against his desk, not putting his full weight on it, he had his hands resting inside the pockets of his lab coat. She couldn’t help but notice he had entered the class without them noticing. The mystery man smiled warmly at them, surprisingly young-looking for someone Alexi assumed to be their instructor. When he opened his mouth to speak, his voice sounded as young as he looked.

  “Are we all settled now? Excellent! Welcome to Daemonology, I am your instructor for this course, Gabriel Klavis. Now, I’m sure a few of you must be wondering what the point of studying Daemons is when our job as hunters is to eliminate them.” As Gabriel spoke, he pushed himself off his desk and began to walk around it, keeping his hands in his pockets at all times. “Can anyone here answer that question?”

  Only two people raised their hands: Lacey, smiling widely, and Vincent.

  “Yes, Ms. Flos,” Gabriel said, pointing lazily at Lacey. “Please, share the answer with us.”

  “Know your enemy,” She responded enthusiastically. “To efficiently slay Daemons and stay alive while doing so, we must learn all we can about them.”

  “I couldn’t have said it better myself. Thank you, Ms. Flos.” Gabriel walked towards the class, his gaze going to each and every one of them. “Our job here as instructors is to ensure you, as the next generation, have the skills you need to not only survive out there, but thrive. While the Daemon population seems to be at an all-time low, that doesn’t mean much when even the weakest one can kill an unprepared human. My job here in Daemonology is to teach you about these ugly bastards, inside and out.”

  The more Gabriel spoke, the more Alexi found herself liking the man. His words were lined with an underlying venom that she found an odd kinship with, as well as his promise to help her kill Daemons more efficiently. She had no illusion that she was anywhere near the level she needed to be. Her humiliation in the forest yesterday had been a cruel reminder of that fact.

  “Now, I want to go over the origin of Daemons as we understand them, but to do that, we must first define the two categories. Who here can tell me what those two are?”

  Alexi was among the people who raised their hands this time, although, to her slight disappointment, she wasn’t chosen. Instead, she watched as Gabriel pointed towards Vincent.

  “Yes, Mr. Hecate!”

  “Lesser and Greater Daemons.”

  “While that is technically correct, Mr. Hecate, there’s a difference between knowing and actually knowing the difference. Half points for a half answer.” Gabriel jokingly replied, causing Vincent to scowl down at him. “Lesser Daemons.” He continued, now leaning against the lectern. “They are essentially animals in terms of intellect. They are monstrous in appearance and are our basic targets as hunters. Now, despite their name of lesser, as I mentioned earlier, even the weakest Lesser Daemon is enough to kill your average civilian or rookie hunter. Hell, I’ve known a few veteran hunters who underestimated a Daemon on the job and ended up gravely injured, or worse. Never let hubris consume you when facing one. Or you can, but it will be your funeral.”

  “Now Greater Daemons, oh these things are the stuff of nightmares. Walking disasters that are thankfully extinct as far as we know.” Gabriel laughed uncomfortably before moving away from the lectern and back towards his desk. Sitting on top of it, he continued. “We’re lucky that they are, too. Human in size and intelligence, the last Greater Daemon was seen over a hundred years ago. A word of advice for you all: If you ever have the misfortune of finding yourself in front of one, run. One-on-One combat with a Greater Daemon is tantamount to suicide.”

  Alexi swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat as Gabriel spoke. The difference between Daemons had been one of her first lessons after Joshua had taken her in. He told her the story of the last Greater Daemon to appear on record. It had taken the combined effort of five incredibly skilled hunters to bring it down. It cost each and every one of their lives to do so, and there had been many casualties along the way.

  Gabriel continued his lecture, referring to a diagram on the wall behind him. “All Daemons, whether greater or lesser, exude an aura around them, completely undetectable by the naked eye. Although some skilled hunters have trained themselves to sense this aura, the use of this ability varies case by case. The stronger the Daemon, the more aura they exude. Greater Daemons exude the most of this ‘daemonic aura’ as we’ve coined it.” He turned from the diagram back to the class, removing both hands from his pockets and clapping them together. “This aura is what truly makes Greater Daemons so dangerous, for you see their intelligence allows them to use their great amount of daemonic aura as a catalyst to cast magic.”

  The class immediately erupted in furious whispers at his words. Magic was such an infrequent phenomenon that it was often considered the stuff of fiction. To be cast, a power source was required to act as a conduit to power the desired effect, and humanity was at present lacking such a power source. With the extinction of Greater Daemons, magic was slowly fading from the collective memory of humankind. Of all the people in the room, the confirmation of the existence of magic only seemed to leave Aexi, Nathan, and Vincent unfazed. When Alexi glanced over at Lacey, the reaction on her face said it all: Shame, confusion and betrayal.

  “This is, of course, combined with the incredible physical prowess of a Greater Daemon. Despite their human appearance, they had enough strength to make each one worth an entire army.” The room fell into a heavy, thick silence filled with uncertainty. Picking up on this, Gabriel quickly tried to recover his momentum. “As I said, it’s widely believed that Greater Daemons are extinct. The last one to be seen was over a hundred years ago, so I can assure you, your chances of running into one on the field are incredibly low! Please, if I’m the reason a whole class of newbies quit, the headmaster will have my head!”

  This broke the tension a little, a few people laughed, and most of the class followed suit a few seconds later. Gabriel grabbed this chance to regain momentum, leaped off his desk, and moved towards the front row. “Now, I did promise to tell you all about the origins of Daemons. I’m gonna be real with you all, we don’t actually know a great deal. Daemons are chaotic, primeval creatures, with even Lesser Daemons often apex predators, with new information being learned about them daily. I was the first person to document the case of a pair of Daemons working together, which is fascinating stuff! When you throw the Greater Daemons into the mix, you can see where things get complicated in the timeline. Regarding who came first, we aren’t even sure if Daemons or Elves are the oldest race on Deigradus.”

  As Gabriel went on, Alexi couldn’t help but notice that Vincent had leaned forward in his seat, showing the first sign of interest in anything outside himself. She had to admit that she was also drawn in by Gabriel's words now more than ever. The war with the Daemons followed only a hundred years after humanity's last war against the Elves, but not much else was known about that time in history, much of it lost to time. Even in victory, the ramifications of the war were felt to this day, with Daemons being a looming threat in the back of everyone’s mind. It was the sole reason daemon hunting became a job in the first place.

  “If you can believe it or not, it was said that the Daemons were led by a Monarchy, much like our own during the war—a strange concept, I know. While the exact reason is unknown, the Daemon King declared war on humanity out of the blue, and what would follow would be a long and bloody conflict. Humanity was painfully outmatched, as while this creature was called a King, his power was said to be more like that of a God’s, even among the Greater Daemons. Sadly, his name has been lost, along with any concrete historical records of a Daemon Monarchy even existing.”

  Gabriel let out a disappointed sigh before finally finishing his tour around the lecture hall by sitting down behind his desk, resting his feet on top. “Many will dismiss the story as a work of pure fiction. Wars between species break out, sometimes for no real reason. Daemons are destruction made flesh; to destroy is their very nature. Sometimes in this world, bad things happen. And as much as we want to, sometimes we can do nothing to stop it.”

  As Gabriel began to switch gears from the origins of Daemons to explaining how he would be teaching the rest of the year, Alexi felt that odd feeling of liking the instructor once more. There was something more to his words that resonated with her, and as he once again tried to lift their spirit as they left, Alexi couldn’t help but wonder just how similar they were.