Helsing Academy: A Paranormal Fantasy Series (Overcity Chronicles Book 1) Read online

  Helsing Academy Book 1

  Savannah Skye

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  Chapter 1

  Thirty-three minutes, forty-three seconds.

  Forty-two.

  Forty-one…

  “It’s going to be okay.”

  Kiva’s low voice interrupted my doomsday thoughts and I looked up and forced a smile.

  “Yeah, I’m sure. I mean, if I don’t get a missive, I don’t,” I said with a shrug. “It’s not the end of the world, you know?”

  “Shh!” Professor Walker shot me a disapproving glare and I wiggled my fingers in apology.

  Study hall on the last day of school this year—ever, in my case—and we were expected to study?

  “I updated our list and there are still one hundred fifty-six males that haven’t been selected for the Academy, either. Eighty of whom are still on your ‘don’t despise/not horrible’ list. Those odds are decent. Could be worse, right?” Kiva whispered, a pathetically hopeful smile on her pretty face.

  She was a good friend. The best. But not even her eternal optimism could get me out of my funk at the thought of leaving high school today only to be sent to the Match Center tomorrow and have my mate selected for me.

  You know, the person I was supposed to spend the rest of my life with.

  I pitched forward with a groan and banged my head on the table…quietly.

  The worst part was the fact that tomorrow all my friends would be leaving, including Kiva. This was the last day we would have together until the next holiday—assuming they even decided to come home. Soon, they would be heading off to Mount Manna, where they would spend the next year having adventures without me while I was stuck here being prepped for marriage. I would wake up every morning knowing that somewhere things were happening in their lives—fun things, exciting things. We would grow further and further apart. When we met up they would tell stories about life at Helsing Academy, and I would try to pretend I was happy for them, and they would try to pretend they didn’t pity me for being stuck here.

  I thought about asking Kiva which of the others had gotten missives today, but there was no point; I could tell by the looks on their faces as they reclined on their desks, chatting in small circles with that casual air of privilege unique to the exceptionally talented. Their sense of contempt for the rest of us mortals was palpable. I guess I couldn’t blame them, entirely; I’d have been elated if I had been chosen, if I had had any talent at all. I liked to think I wouldn’t have been so smug about it.

  Kiva wasn’t smug, though. She had been oddly quiet ever since getting her invitation and I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. She had gotten into the Academy on the strength of her lightning-fast running abilities: once in gym, we had been asked to run a mile and the coach wanted to know why she was just standing there when the truth was she had already done eight laps around the track. The only way to prove it had been by going at a slower pace, which was still three to four times faster than that of a normal person. Kiva wasn’t just fast, either; she was diligent and super bright, two qualities that aren’t often found in the same person.

  In school, she had embarrassed the rest of us with her devotion to her studies, regularly foregoing parties so that she could stay in and finish homework. I wasn’t a particularly good student and I had no talents to speak of. “Good at most things but not great at anything” is how I had once described it to Kiva. Some people were destined for greatness, and I wasn’t one of them.

  I know a lot of people say that, but in my case it was true. Even a dumb girl might have her looks to fall back on. Unfortunately, I was average in that regard, too. A little tomboyish, with a lean but unremarkable figure and a regular looking face. My wavy, black hair was pretty much my best asset and, unfortunately, there was no superlative for Best Hair on Mount Manna.

  So, now, Kiva would be continuing her education while I was married off to some untalented boy, someone else who hadn’t been clever enough or lucky enough to make it. Mentally, I ran through the list again, as I had been doing for most of the day. It was hard to imagine myself being married to any of them. Liam was cute but dumb; Noah did terrible impressions of Yoda and picked his nose. Cedric wouldn’t have been so bad—he spent most of his rejuvenation breaks sitting in a corner reading and had few, if any friends—but the thought of waking up next to him each morning was bizarre. I’d love to have chosen my own mate—or none at all, but that wasn’t an option. It was ‘Mount Manna or mount a man’ as the seniors liked to joke right before missives were delivered in a nervous, self-pitying-but-had-to-laugh-to-keep-from-crying kind of way.

  I checked the clock on the wall again—2:45pm—and felt the walls closing in.

  Perhaps sensing my unease, Kiva leaned over and said, “At least we have something to look forward to.”

  I wasn’t in the mood to chat, but I knew we wouldn’t have many more opportunities in future. “What’s that?”

  Kiva smiled and said, “The Delivery is today.”

  Of course. I’d been so caught up in my own troubles I had almost forgotten. Once a year, sympathizers to our cause sent us shipments from the mainland at great risk to themselves. It would arrive via submarine and the prized items—chocolate boxes, paperback novels, new fashions—were always sold within minutes. My first week of school here, some of the upperclassmen had impressed on me the importance of the Delivery, and in four years I had never missed a shipment. They were what passed for entertainment on an island where the most exciting event was the occasional belch of smoke from the dormant volcano on Mount Manna.

  “Remind me again what we’re even doing here,” I said low to Kiva.

  “Waiting for school to end,” she replied.

  “I don’t mean that. I mean, why are we here, on this island? What is the point in being here?”

  Kiva didn’t answer, and she didn’t need to. We both knew the reason from having heard it repeated so often during school assemblies: twenty-five years ago, a colony of gifted people had been moved to Isla De Salvacion following a devastating vampire attack that threatened the long-term survival of the human race. Now, after some DNA enhancements and genetic modifications that had worked on a blessed few, children of those first settlers had become an army trained in covert, hand-to-hand missions with the goal of taking out vampire strongholds on the mainland.

  But of course, I wouldn’t be doing any of that, which made the past few years of schooling seem like a gigantic waste. I was going to become a breeder, one of those women whose sole purpose was to produce as many children as possible so that the human race might stand a chance against the vampire hordes. Not by choice, of course, but because birthing was something virtually anyone could do. It didn’t require any special skills, and I had none.

  I sometimes wondered what it was like over there on the mainland. Of course, I knew it was riddled with vampires who were slowly taking it over in a bloody, decades-long coup. But it was apparently happening slowly enough that factions of humans were still able to send us supplies and help us. Which meant they had lives there, and families, and communities. Did they get to choose their mates? Maybe even their careers?

  I’d once asked my mother and father why they didn’t escape and come join us here on Isla De Salvacion. They’d explained that the bloodsuckers had most of them in a thrall. They needed to ensure human beings survived as a species because, without us, they, too, would perish. So they would seduce them with mind-control, and force them to give their blood for the vamps to feed on.

  Didn’t sound like a picnic, but also didn’t sound that much different than what life for me would be like starting tomorrow, either. Baby on both boobs by the time I was twenty, and a mate I probably wouldn’t even like.

  I shoved the morbid thought away and focused on the positive. At least the Delivery was coming, so the day wasn’t a total loss.

  “You know what would cheer me up?” I asked Kiva.

  “What’s that?”

  “Getting to the dock ahead of everyone else and buying a new pair of boots and some chocolates.” While much of the island was sand and beaches, the rest of it was rain forest. Good boots were like gold here.

  “Good luck,” said Kiva skeptically, but smiled nonetheless.

  There was a knock at the door and the room fell silent. Kiva raised her brows, perplexed. Professor Walker set down the magazine he had been reading (Survival Times) and rose from his desk with a look of annoyance. When he unbolted the door, a man entered the room—a man wearing the tan uniform and navy blue cap of official Helsing Academy delivery-persons.

  “I’ve got some more last-minute missives here,” the man said, and my heart skipped a beat.

  Kiva nudged me in the arm and mouthed the words, “This might be it!”

  “No
way,” I said with a shake of my head. “No way.”

  The uniformed man made his way across the classroom. He wore a large tote slung across one shoulder, into which he was digging as he paused at the foot of my desk. Was this some kind of joke? A fellow classmate playing a demented prank? After a seemingly endless moment of waiting, he brought out first one envelope and then another. With a light shrug, he shifted the envelopes to his left hand and went on digging. Kiva’s foot was tapping the floor, one hand squeezing the upper part of my arm painfully.

  The postman looked slightly bored, apparently heedless of the fact that his next actions would determine where I spent the next several years of my life. He must have handed out hundreds of these letters in his lifetime and it was of little consequence to him.

  He took a step forward—then turned to the left and continued on down the row of desks, handing one letter to Serena Flores and the other to Amber Wiles.

  That was it; there were no more letters.

  He shrugged, as if to say “sorry”, and left by the way he had come. Kiva gave my hand a final squeeze and sank back into her chair, looking defeated.

  Meanwhile, the rest of the classroom had erupted in celebration. Amber and Serena were both well-liked—the first a talented athlete, the second a newspaper editor who had survived the loss of both parents to become one of the most generous, justice-minded women I knew. It was hard to feel bad for myself when they were both so deserving.

  Hilary Reyes—slender, redheaded, immaculately dressed—was leaned against one of the front desks eyeing me with a smile of smug satisfaction. She rolled her eyes as if to say, “Bold of you to have expected a missive,” then turned back to her cluster of friends, pointing and laughing.

  I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but more than one head turned toward me as I sank ever lower into my seat. No one had ever doubted that Hilary would be selected for the Academy—she was one of the handful of Elemental DNA experiments that had been a success and her air-blasting abilities had made her acceptance a given—but I couldn’t help wishing the honor had gone to someone less abrasive and condescending. Being able to bowl over other people with self-generated streams of air was a real gift, but not one that I felt she deserved.

  Professor Walker was standing by the door now. “The submarine should be here within the next fifteen minutes,” he said. “I want everyone to form a straight line for the restrooms, and once you’re done there you can head down to the docks. Class dismissed.”

  We formed two lines, single file, and with Hilary leading as hall monitor, marched quietly down the hall to the restrooms. I paused at the fountains, digging into my purse for my wallet but not finding it.

  “You okay?” Kiva asked.

  I shook my head irritably. “Listen, I need to go to my locker quick. Go on without me and I’ll meet you there.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  She was looking at me with pity again, and that was the last thing I needed. “I’ll be fine. See you in a bit.”

  “Fine. See you there soon,” said Kiva reluctantly, then she turned and disappeared into the restroom.

  What I needed even more than currency was five minutes to myself. The last students were trickling out of the restroom by the time I returned a few minutes later with my wallet in tow. I took one of the empty stalls and sank down onto the commode, fighting back the tears that had been forming in my eyes ever since the postman’s departure. Someone was still standing by the hand dryer and I couldn’t risk crying yet, though. I balled up a fistful of scratchy tissue paper and dabbed at the corners of my eyes, waiting for the door to close.

  Somehow, I had expected my last day of school to go better than this. Every movie I had ever seen portrayed graduation as a bittersweet but hopeful experience of scribbling in yearbooks and taking pictures with friends while the sun set behind them. Granted, they were mostly made in the 1980s, but I’d still taken them to heart. Instead, I was crying in a restroom stall. My failure to get invited to the Academy would have consequences that would reverberate for the rest of my life. I could try to run away, but where would I go? There were only so many places to hide on Isla De Salvacion. Not to mention, worrying my parents and siblings, who I loved dearly.

  “Keep crying about it, you’re going to miss the only good thing about today,” I muttered to myself.

  I slipped out of the stall and rinsed my face off with cold water before drying it off and heading to the door. It was already later than I’d wanted it to be, and my shot at some new boots was dwindling.

  I gave the door a tug, it didn’t budge. Using my free hand for leverage, I tried again. Nothing.

  “What the…” I yanked with all my might as panic clutched at my throat.

  Locked in. The last person to leave had somehow forced the door shut and there was no getting out.

  I banged on the door, yelling, hoping that maybe there was someone left in the hall who could hear me. By the time I gave up, my throat was hoarse and my fists were throbbing.

  Everyone had gone down to the docks for the Delivery and I was presumably the only person left in the building. If I had been stronger… one of the boys in the year below mine had super-strength in his hands and could punch his way through almost any object. Even the ability to air-blast might have helped me. But I had nothing. I was just plain, old Anna Chekov.

  Present prisoner, future brood mare.

  I sank to my knees on the grimy tiles, feeling helpless and exhausted. Unless the Delivery had been late, it was probably half over by now. The submarine only came once a year and I had missed it because I couldn’t even find my way out of a bathroom. Maybe the heads of the Academy had been right not to select me; my incompetence and basic inability to function would have proven a liability.

  In a sudden wash of misery and exhaustion, after all too many sleepless nights of late, I drifted off. I don’t know how long I slept, but I awoke some time later to find a bright light shining in my face and Kiva standing over me with a furious expression.

  “There you are,” she said, and there was a slight edge of fear in her voice. “I was so worried. I’ve been looking all over. Who did this to you?”

  She offered me a hand and I rose groggily, leaning against the counter for support. “I don’t know, honestly. I was in the stall and there was one other person in here and they must’ve locked me in when they left.”

  “There are no locks on the outside of the bathroom, Anna,” said Kiva, her dark eyes flashing malice. “They barred the door with a broomstick. If I find out who it was, I can promise you, they’ll pay. People feel like they can get away with stuff like this because you don’t--”

  She broke off but we both knew what she was going to say.

  ‘You don’t have any powers.’

  “It’s not a big deal, really,” I said, pushing past the wave of self-pity. Though, of course, it was. It had been the last bastion of good in my life and I’d missed it.

  It didn’t take a genius to figure out who was likely behind it. My money was on Hilary Reyes. And if I ever saw her again, I wouldn’t need powers to make her pay. I’d harness my rage and knock her right on her cocky ass. She might blow me off the face of the earth with a gust of air, but it would be worth it.

  We were making our way through the darkened hall now; dusk was falling outside and the classrooms on either side of us lay silent and empty. “How was it, anyway?”

  “Oh! I got you this,” said Kiva, reaching into her tote. She pulled out a large box of chocolates wrapped in green ribbon. “Think of it as sort of a going-away gift.”

  “Kiva, you didn’t have to do this,” I said gratefully, though the thought of us being separated made the shadows deepen. I took the box and we continued to walk, both of us likely lost in our own thoughts about tomorrow. I was just about to open the chocolates and eat my feelings when I caught a flash of something white sticking out from beneath Amber’s locker on the side of the hall facing Professor Walker’s classroom. As I moved closer, I saw what it was.