The first month of school passed like a dream in the blink of an eye. I spent my days in class and my evenings with Banecliff. Most of my weekends were spent in the library practicing or hanging out with (aka keeping an eye on) Silvian, further solidifying my place at the school as the villain’s sidekick. I was determined to catch up as much as I could to my peers and I think slowly but surely I was actually doing it.

I was currently in magical animal studies. The professor, madame Tibble, was a a short and relatively stout woman who always seemed so energetic that she practically bounced when she walked.

She came to the front of the classroom now, clearing her throat. “Now before we get today's lessons started I wanted to announce your end of the semester project.”

This earned a series of groans and whines from the class. Tibble rolled her eyes from behind her small round glasses. “Quit complaining. It’s only early October, this isn’t due until the end of December. I just want to announce it now in case any of you want to get started on it early. Your assignment is to create a project based on the anatomy and biology of mermaids. The project will be worth 10% of your final grade. I’ll be handing out a grading key for it at the end of class.”

Most of the class continued to groan at this but Silvian actually looked quite interested.

“I’m guessing you already have an idea for what you want to do?” I said.

Silvian nodded. “Yeah, this might be an opportunity to actually test out a project I’ve been conceptualizing for awhile... but the item I would need for it is super hard to come by-”

He was cut off as Tibble cleared her throat. “Now,” she said, “let us begin today's lesson.” She made her way down the row of desks plopping a small cage in between every other student.

“Inside these cages are nimnims. They’re not dangerous, don’t worry. Those of you that wish to pick them up and take them out of the cage feel free to but be extremely carefully and do not drop them under ANY circumstances.”

“Nimnims!” I said. “That sounds cute.”

Silvian and I leaned forward, trying to get a better look at whatever was inside the cage. When we actually saw what was inside Silvian, looking like he had just seen a ghost, immediately drew back. I had the opposite reaction, immediately grinning.

Inside was what looked like a giant spider but it was covered in a light brown fur. It’s head kind of looked like a teddy bear.

“Aww,” I said. I slowly opened the cage, reached inside, and took the nimnim out. It was surprisingly fluffy. “Pretty adorable right?” I said, turning to grin at Silvian.

Silvian paled even further. “Put that thing back in it’s cage, and wipe that goofy smile off your face. You look idiotic.”

I snickered. “What, are you scared of spiders?”

“No,” Silvian snapped. “Of course not.”

“Then hold it,” I said. “I dare you.”

“Absolutely not.”

“C’mon,” I said, holding the nimnim out to him. “If you’re really not scared it shouldn’t be a problem.” I petted the nimnim and it let out a low pur.

Silvian let out a low shaky breath. “Okay,” he muttered, “fine.” I held out the nimnim and Silvian reluctantly reached out his hand to receive it. As the creature was placed in his hands however Silvian squirmed and the creature in return reacted, jumping slightly. If Silvian had a good grip on the animal this wouldn’t have been a problem but unfortunately the surprise caused him to drop the creature.

The second the nimnim hit the ground it sprayed Silvian and I in the face with some kind of pink ink. Despite ourselves we both shrieked which put the creature and the rest of the classroom into a panic. It scuttled from desk to desk bringing even more screams. Susan Nubs let out a particularly loud squawk of terror earning her and the two girls next to her another spray of the pink ink.

“OH MY GOD!” Susan screamed “IS IT POISONOUS?!?! ARE WE GOING TO DIE?”

This wrought even more hysteria in the classroom. People were jumping up on desks to get away from it. Owen had snatched the open cage from my desk and was running after it in an attempt to catch it, Susan and her friends were sobbing, still probably thinking they were going to die.

Owen continued to chase after the creature until Silvian suddenly stuck out his leg and Owen tripped over it slamming face first into the floor. Madame Tibble, looking extremely annoyed, snatched the empty cage from Owen and placed what appeared to be a sugarcube inside. She placed the cage on the floor and almost immediately the nimnim scurried inside. She quickly flicked the cage shut before picking it up and placing it back on our desk, giving us a chilling look.

She looked to the rest of the class now.

“Well, I think mister Price and mister Greygate have taught us all two important lessons today. One, the importance of following the directions and two, the nimnim’s defensive technique when it feels threatened.” She made her way over to Susan, pulling off a small chunk of the ink which was starting to harden into a gum like consistency. “When the nimnim gets scared it can spray it’s attacker. As you can probably see the ink begins to gain a dense consistency and becomes extremely sticky. For about 8 hours it can hold just about anything together. Luckily there is a spell to loosen it immediately so you don’t have to wait the full 8 hours to get it off.” Madame Tibble removed her wand and cast a small circle first over Silvian’s head,

“Lo͞osən,” she said. Almost immediately the gooey pink stuff all over him began to return to it’s ink like consistency. She cast this same spell over me, Susan and the other two girls. “Now,” she said, “the five of you better clean up before it begins to harden again.”

“That’s what she said,” I whispered under my breath.

“Now is not the time,” Silvian snapped.

------

Silvian and I along with the other three girls ended up missing most of class due to how long it took, even with the help of Tibble’s spell, to get the nimnim’s goo off ourselves. We returned just in time to get the grading key for the mermaid project before heading out for lunch. We decided to eat on the great lawn behind the school.

“That was the absolute worst,” Silvian grumbled as we walked, picking at a small remainder of pink goop that was still stuck in his hair.

“I don’t know, I still think the nimnims were kinda cute,” I said with a shrug.

“You really are a bloody lunatic. Those things looked like they were brought up from the boughs of hell-” that’s when Silvian bumped into someone. “Hey asshole,” he snapped, “watch where you’re going…” that’s when he saw who it was. He let out a low huff. “Hello Thorn,” he said coldly. “I should have guessed.”

I had frozen the moment I had seen Owen and hadn’t even been able to warn Silvian he was about to knock into him due to becoming so tongue tied. Owen stood there next to Morgana looking as radiant as ever.

Silvian and Owen avoided each other as much as possible during school so the only times I saw him was in class. Even then I tried to make sure not to stare at him and keep my distance. But now he was standing so close to us and my heart was pounding again.

Morgana crossed her arms. “Nice going Greygate. You enjoy getting a wad of pink goo to the face?”

“Shut the fuck up Wilds,” Silvian snapped.

Morgana looked to me now. “And what’s up with this one?” She said, arching a brow. “Your new lackey has nothing to say?” Her gaze raked over Silvian. “My, you sure replace them quick. I’m a little surprised you picked a human though. I thought you hated our kind. Guess you were running low on options-”

“Morgana, enough,” Owen said. It was probably a good thing Owen stopped her when he did because anger was flaring in Silvian’s gaze and he looked about ready to hit something. Owen glanced to Silvian now. “I’m actually glad I bumped into you,” he said. “I thought maybe we could talk about what happened.”

Silvian’s eyes narrowed. “What happened with what?”

Owen sighed heavily, pushing his bangs out of his eyes. “You know what I’m talking about Silvian.”

“Oh, do I now?” Silvian sneered, arching a brow which caused a slight twitch of annoyance in Owen’s right eye.

“Why do you have to make everything so difficult?” Owen said, sounding exasperated. “I just think we should talk about what happened last year.”

“I think your actions spoke for themselves,” Silvian snarled.

“My actions?” Owen said, “and what about yours? My entire life you’ve tried to start shit with me. I was just trying to be the bigger man here.”

“Well I don’t want anything to do with you this year Thorn. You’re a useless fuck and if you weren’t the chosen one no one would give a shit about you.”

Anger was flaring in Owen’s gaze now, the twitch in his right eye increasing. “You know what Silvian, fuck you. I tried to reach out to try and work through this but if you’re going to push me away then I don’t know what’s even the goddamn point. I really do wish there was something I could have done about the dragon and I’ll probably have to live with that for the rest of my life. But don’t you dare try to blame me for what happened before that. It’s not my fault that you fell-”

And that’s when I saw Silvian move to throw a punch at Owen. All my thoughts froze. I didn’t even try to contemplate whatever the hell the second thing Owen and Silvian were fighting about was. All I could think about was protecting Owen Thorn.

And so, against my better judgement, I threw myself between them a second before Silvian’s fist came in contact with my jaw.

There was a splitting pain before once again my eyes rolled into the back of my head and I passed out.