Chapter 10- Her Majesty's Partner(s)?
Next period was summoning class with Lilith. As I headed down the hallway, Gianna and I talked, Lukanatian still on my shoulder. She said something about blue flames being a sign of demon royalty and I stopped in my tracks. What would she think if I were royalty? Would she still want to be my friend? Our group of friends was never the popular group, but we liked to think we were just a bit. The one thing that Gianna never could stand was to be treated like she meant nothing. How would she feel if I had all of the attention and she had none? I mean, of course I would give her attention, but would that be enough? That was what bothered me the most.
"Me, royalty? There's no way I could be royalty." I said to her trying to dismiss her thoughts of me being royalty. I hated lying to my friends, but I would if it kept them safe.
"Well, you always were a bit special." She said with smile.
"Very funny." I said feeling guilty for lying to her.
"I'm not talking about in the head; I'm talking about the feeling around you. The feeling of supremacy, distinguish and valor. That's the reason why you're my friend, because you're unique in your own way and don't let people talk down to you. Plus, you were the first person who ever invited me somewhere. You're the kind of friend everyone wishes for." She said with awe. It made me feel even guiltier then I already had.
When we reached the classroom, Gianna and I took seats next to each other in the front of the class. When I looked up, I noticed Lilith at the front of the room she was beautiful. She had long pale silver hair and magenta colored eyes that looked at me softly. She called me up to her desk and I quickly got up.
"Hello Tori. Has your day been well?" She asked.
"Good, maybe. I don't really know." I replied.
"Well, that's alright. So welcome to summoning class. Today, watch the other students then try your best to do the same. If you wish not to participate then just tell me." She said in a kind voice.
"Ok." I told her then I walked silently back to my desk. Geez what was it with the teachers telling me I didn't have to participate?
"What did she tell you?" Gianna asked curiously.
It was quite normal for humans that were turned into demons such as her to be very curious. For, they still possessed the human characteristics that their souls had become attached to during their time in the human world and it was like they were born again and were just children again. Demons like Gianna were known as fledglings because of their newly changed status. Demons such as Lukanatian who was never a human don't usually act that curious, unless it was just a part of their personality to be that way, which for Lukanatian it was. Demons who had never changed into humans like Lukanatian or who had been born as demons then changed and died as humans were called the Shaded Ones. Everyone thought there was no way for a human that was once a demon to return to being a demon.
"Oh, nothing." I simply replied to Gianna, and then continued thinking to myself.
Never once was there a demon that was in quite the same situation as myself, but based on the other two types of demon I would be somewhat more demon like. I would most likely act as though I was any other demon except for the small amount of curiosity that remained in me from my time in the human world. I decided that because I was most likely the only one of my species of demon, that I would give it a name. I cogitated for a few seconds then decided that we would be called the Alpha Purebloods. It was a combination of my former species, a Pureblood and Alpha for my ability to travel between the human and demon worlds. To me, it was quite clever, but I refused to tell anyone for fear of them thinking it was stupid, not that I cared.
Lilith cleared her throat and I broke off from my unrelated thoughts to stare up at her. Apparently the bell had rang while I was lost in my thoughts and everyone had taken their seats.
"Any questions on what I taught you yesterday?" She asked with an open mind.
A few people raised their hands and she answered each of their questions and then told us that everyone was to try their best to summon their beast. She let her knowing eyes rest on me and she conveyed through her eyes that I was to try my best along with all the students, but to wait and watch them before trying.
"Can I go first?" Ahnia asked, a bit impatient.
Apparently, she thought that if I saw her beast first and it was better than my own, I would allow her to be the dominant female in class. Boy was she going to get a rude awakening.
I didn't even have a clue if there was a beast as strong as I was. I mean, I could end up summoning an unknown species of beast to the classroom.
I turned to look at Ahnia as she began to summon her partner. That was what the beasts' true name was. She stood with her summoning paper in hand and whispered a few words to calm herself.
Raising her left arm, Ahnia drug her nails across the skin on her right arm, causing the skin to just barely break. Small beads of the precious crystalline red liquid showed at the marks on her skin and the back of my throat burned with a hunger for it. Yes, I did like blood, I had learned, but I didn't like it has much as Eurynomous, or a succubus. I mean, I was a demon, why wouldn't I like the taste of blood? I held my breath to keep myself from smelling anymore of the intoxicating scent that rose off her arm.
With her small square of paper in her left hand, Ahnia smeared the blood onto it in one quick swipe of her arm. She lowered her head and began rattling off some long random sentence to a heavenly being in a voice that was almost inaudible to my ears. Then, a bright light enveloped her figure entirely and a warm feeling surrounded the class. All of the demons leaned away and hid from the light while the angels and humans leaned toward it. It was a difference of preference and feel.
All demons have a very acute sense of temperature change and something like this felt to us to be around one hundred degrees, so if you didn't like the heat, then this wasn't the best time of your life. For me, because I don't like the heat all that much, it truly disgusted me and felt suffocating. It was bad enough that it was coming from her though.
Slowly, the light dissipated and there stood what looked to be a six foot tall bleach white Pegasus, wings and all. I have to admit, it was good for an angel of her class at the time, but I wasn't that impressed.
"Good work Ahnia." Lilith said quietly, then she asked Ahnia to take a seat with her partner.
"Everyone, now you try yours. Oh, and Tori, you can go last." She announced to the class.
One by one, each type of creature, be it human, demon or angel became enveloped in some kind of light. The demons' color of light was actually more like shadows, seeing as it was black. The angels' color of light was bright white and the humans' colors were between silver and gray.
Slowly each of the lights dissipated and each creature stepped out with a partner either standing, sitting, flying, crawling, or slithering next to them. I watched as Gianna walked out of her light with not one, but three kitsune. Kitsune are fox like Japanese mythical beings that are supposed to be very hard to summon or have as partners and yet here my friend stands with three of them all watching her obediently. As she walked over to me, I noticed that each of the three females had a different symbol in black on their foreheads. A moon, a star or a flame were on each of their heads.
"What are their names?" I asked her wondering if the symbols meant anything.
"Oh, the one with the star is Tiku, the one with the moon is Shey and the one with the flame is Rai." She said happily.
"Oh, thanks Gianna. It's nice to meet you three." I said with a genuine smile. They looked back and forth from me to each other. Then one spoke to me in my mind, it was Shey.
'Is that you my queen?" She asked surprised.
'Yes, but do not let anyone know besides the other fox okay?' I whispered in her mind.
'Yes, your majesty.' She replied.
She and the other two kitsune bowed and then, the four of them, Gianna and her partners walked over to her desk and each took a seat. I inspected the room and came to the realization that I was the last one standing. I looked sheepishly over at Lilith and noticed her partner. It was a jet black snake like dragon and it sat in a tangled coil by her feet watching intently. Lilith noticed me and then smiled sweetly and spoke.
"Okay class, because this is Tori's first time summoning her partner, let's wish her luck." She ordered the class.
"Good luck." Most of them whispered to me in hushed voices, probably tired out from summoning their partners. It was understandable.
"Thanks." I replied in a somewhat cheerful voice.
Lilith handed me a summoning paper and whispered 'use the classroom however you like.' Not that I knew what it meant, but I soon figured out that she was talking about the summoning circle in the middle of the classroom. Only advanced summoners or summoners who had very high level partners could use it, because I was in both of these two categories, I thought that it would be appropriate that I use it; I would do it in style though.
I ripped the paper up in my hand and listened as the whole class gasped at my acts of, what they thought, was defiance. I put the small pieces in the palm of my hand and walked over to Ahnia and blew them in her face, noticing her furious look, then stalked over to the huge summoning circle on the floor. This caused even more gasps to arise from the class. The reactions were my favorite part of my little act of defiance against Ahnia.
I licked my lips as my claws sharpened and drug my nails across my arm causing the blood to flow forth and drip off my arm, pooling on the floor. The other demons in the class looked slightly hungered by the smell, it was usual though because royal blood did taste the best apparently, although I'd never tried it before of course. I raised my bleeding right arm and thrust it in a diagonal motion toward the floor causing the blood to splatter. I put my head down and focused on the floor and began to summon my partner or partners.
"Those who have served me eagerly and lovingly and have remained in my possession during my long absence step forward through the darkness and join me in my world of shadows and death and you shall be rewarded greatly." I whispered fiercely making sure that none of the other students could hear.
Just then a huge cloud of black enveloped me, hiding me from the class and I could hear all of the voices of my partners. There must have been at least one hundred voices, but I could only have the best of the best join me in the classroom.
"Those of you who represent the five strongest come forward and out of the shadows and into my world of shadows and death known as Hell." I called out to the voices with a grin, knowing that the class couldn't hear me.
They quieted down and five shapes manifested one by one around me and slowly came into view. It pleased me to know they were all obedient and this caused blue streaks to appear in the darkness around me. The first one of the beasts to appear was apparently the fifth strongest. He was a snow white dove with black streaks on his wings and his name was Zonri. He flew over and landed on my shoulder then introduced himself. The second one of the beasts to appear was a Siberian tiger and her name was Sabbele. She padded over to my side and sat on her hind legs. I reached a hand down and lovingly pet her head, receiving a deep rumbling purr in response. The third of the beasts to appear was a huge almost all black griffin, her name was Ekeyre. She leisurely strolled over to my other side and relaxed her wings as I whispered a few words to her.
The fourth of the beasts to appear was Jack, my jet black vampragon. He flew over and said hello to me then landed on Ekeyre's back and folded his wings accordingly. The fifth and most powerful of the beasts to appear was none other than Luna, my royal demon horse. She trotted over and whinnied in happiness then allowed me to climb upon her back so that I could rest my legs because frankly, I was tired of all the standing. After all of my partners were assembled, I allowed the cloud of black and blue smoke to vanish so that my presentation could be unveiled. The whole class just sat there eyes wide and mouths gaping until someone started to clap. It was the slow kind of clap that starts off with one person and ends with all of the people. I glanced at Ahnia and noticed that she was just shaking her head back and forth staring at the floor in what I presumed was disbelief.
Out of nowhere someone called out "All her partners have black on them!"
"Oh my G- , I mean that's so awesome. That means she's really strong right?" One of the angels asked.
"That's true. I never thought about it that way." A couple of the students answered each in their own way.
In the first day I'd been to school in Hell, I'd learned a Hell of a lot more than I ever had when I went to school in the human world. One of the things that applied to me most was the color code.
White-fairly powerful
White with Black-pretty powerful
Black- very powerful
Black with blue-powerful and royal
Black with red= exponentially powerful
Black with red and blue= as powerful as can be
I myself actually fit under the last category because during the summoning my magic was black and blue, and though I hadn't seen much of it, there was some red. Truth be told, I knew I was powerful, but I didn't think I was this powerful. I surprised myself to absolutely no end.