At the pool, Hunter sat on the bench watching the others finish the last relay for the day. He had been benched by the coach for finishing dead last in the second race. Usually he would be neck and neck with Luka or Anwar, the best swimmers on the team, but today he was barely keeping up with the group.When training was over, Luka and Anwar came up to him on the bench. Luka put a wet arm around his buddy"s shoulder and nearly knocked him sideways off the slippery plastic bench.
"Swimming a little heavy today, weren"t you?" Anwar asked without looking at Hunter. He was concentrating on stretching his arms over his head.
"How does a man from the desert swim so fast anyway?" Luka interjected, smiling at Anwar mischievously, dark gray eyes twinkling.
"How can I not? It"s so hot out there that I cannot help but take to the water. I would rather drown than melt." His caramel skin glistened as he rubbed water off his toned arms. Standing next to the two paler boys, his deep color stood out even more.
"So, what is it, then?" Luka asked, bringing the question back to Hunter.
"It"s not anything," Hunter answered, smiling, waving their concerns away with a dismissive gesture of his hand.
"Ah, so it is not a "what" but a "who" then is it?" Anwar teased. Luka laughed and clapped Hunter on the back, sending droplets of water flying.
"It"s not anything," Hunter repeated, smiling mysteriously.
***
Hunter was an experienced shape-shifter. He was not as seasoned as his father or his grandfather---especially the latter who had been shape-shifting for well over a hundred years now---but he had been shifting in and out of his werewolf form since he was 12 years old.
After just six years of shape-shifting, he thought he already knew all there was to know about being a werewolf. Young people are often like that: buoyed by the confidence of youth, they get a taste of something and they think they know everything there is to know about it.
They believe it.
And why shouldn"t they? If they make it part of their lives, obsess over it, eat, sleep, drink, and breathe it, doesn"t that count for knowledge? It"s one of the most powerful feelings in the world: to be young and to know with confidence that you believe in something with all your heart.
Hunter felt that way about being a werewolf. It was his greatest secret, and also the best thing he loved about being alive.
The day before, at lunch time, he had felt a connection with Ash Parker. And though he did not know it at the time, that connection had something to do with his one great love.
He had been at the cafeteria, eating chicken wings with his friends, when Ash Parker looked his way. He knew who she was: everyone at the Academy knew of the infamous Orphan Scholar. He hadn"t expected it, but that afternoon, looking at her, staring at her, he felt a new knowledge of her creep under his skin, like a golden warmth flowing through his veins.
He knew all the wild stories about her: that she"d been abandoned as a baby, that she was at the school to get knocked up and marry into a rich family, that she was only safe because she sucked up to the Comtesse who protected her and her trashy friend, among other nasty rumors.
He had started the nickname Boots because of the shoes she wore that summer when she first appeared at Saint Blaise"s Academy, and while Hunter had always meant it to be complimentary---a testament to Ash"s guts as an outsider---other students had taken the nickname and attached a sinister meaning to it.
"Orphan Scholar" was too formal to be a nickname, so some of the students in their year had also taken to calling her "Boots," but not because of her shoes. It was meant to be short for "bootlicker."
The other students could not believe that someone who came from a poor background could outperform them with their private tutors and exclusive advanced cla.s.ses, so they started the rumors that the poor girl must have used a different advantage: pity. They believed that she sucked up to the teachers, to the Comtesse, and even the Headmaster.
They believed that everyone pitied Ash and that it was this "special consideration" for her circ.u.mstances that allowed her to excel. They didn"t believe that she was capable of competing with them at their level so they came to the mistaken conclusion that the playing field definitely had to be rigged against them and in favor of the underdog.
Hunter, on the other hand, had very different feelings toward Ash. In the beginning, he had been pleased to see the new student: she had crazy long black hair tied back in an intricate-looking braid and wore heavy boots---so out of place with the posh students and their stylish haircuts and light, comfortable shoes. The new student didn"t even flinch, she looked like she had lived through the Zombie Apocalypse and was disappointed that the promised land was filled with preppies.
He thought it was a pity that the others gave her a hard time, but other than a protective feeling for the underdog and a general friendliness that he felt toward most people anyway, he hadn"t really felt much for Boots.
But that day at lunch, he definitely felt more than friendly toward Ash Parker. Something about her had been slowly drawing him in. He had noticed it earlier in the morning when he had gone out of his way to run into her with her friends. And the days before, he had felt something building in him when he could suddenly sense her out of the corner of his eye.
That day, as his eyes had locked into hers, her gaze triggered something in him. He looked into her deep brown eyes and he had felt a sensation like warm honey spread across his skin, melting sweetly down to his sinews. It was so . . . satisfying. It had felt so good that he could taste it on his lips and feel it on his tongue. And then she looked away, and the feeling was gone.
It had bothered him throughout the rest of the day. The lack of it had itched away at his skin, leaving him frustrated.
The frustration had balled up inside of him and mixed with the adrenaline of swimming, the wolf inside him was begging to be let out.
He didn"t know what that warm satisfying feeling was and how to get it back, so he was going to settle for the satisfaction of hunting something down and eating that instead. A good hunt in werewolf form always helped him get rid of frustration.
Only later, he hunted out something new to get frustrated over: a potential mate who didn"t immediately appreciate his potential. To make matters worse, this rare potential mate was a strange girl he had no idea how to approach as a human.
After last night, Hunter had figured out what the connection between him and Ash Parker was. Her wolf had drawn him to her, and his wolf had answered hers.
He had always loved being a werewolf, and now with a potential mate around, he could be the ultimate werewolf---greater even than his father or his grandfather. He had the chance to be a true Alpha.
***
Back at the Girls" Dorm, however, Celia decided to chuck out Isabelle"s advice and didn"t mention Hunter at all to Ash. She was going to find out where Ash went some other way.
She knew that Ash liked Hunter, and a.s.suming Hunter was just out to mess with Ash, she wasn"t going to do his dirty work for him. If he wanted to get with Ash, he needed to earn her, and Celia wasn"t going to help him with that.