Harmoni bit her tongue. Carefully. She was in no hurry to bleed. She did have one or two questions, but she didn’t want to bother him.

If he didn’t want her to ask questions, he shouldn’t have offered.

People did that all the time, but Fleck’s encouragement helped. She asked one of the two questions she’d been wondering. “Do you have a map? Of the school?”

She could probably find her way around, especially with Fleck’s help. But this place was large, might be nice to speed up the process.

The headmaster frowned. “Ah. No. But one of the teachers is working on one. I’m sure it will be available for you soon.”

Harmoni nodded. “OK.” A pause. “Thank you.”

“Of course.” He held out a hand, and Harmoni finally handed off her application. “I’ll leave you to unpack then.”

He started back down the stairs. He was slow. Harmoni could’ve called out to him if she wanted. She didn’t. She turned to the door.

It was a twist knob. Not very common on Xentron, even amongst the houses. Those knobs were some of the hardest for dragons to use.

Inside was a circle of four beds. There was a dresser next to each one. If they really wanted to fit another bed or two inside, they could squeeze these closer together to make room. But it wouldn’t leave much space in the middle.

A large window let in some light. There was a fireplace as well. But it wasn't lit, and given the shape, it was probably for heat more than light.

The room was very green. The dressers were white, but the bedsheets and bed curtains were green, with a sort of darker green pattern on them that might resemble leaves. Vaguely. It was the closest real-life pattern she could think of. The curtains for the big window were also green. Despite all that, there were fewer plants here than on the first floor, where they’d just been part of the flooring.

Fleck could smell some growing outside, on the windowsill, but you’d have to be looking for them.

Two of the four beds were obviously taken. One bed wasn’t made, while the other had a fuzzy robe hanging on it, and both had some sort of luggage underneath.

The bathrobe smelled like Eddie, so they’d be seeing her again. The other bed smelled like an imp was there.

Harmoni nodded along.

She was getting tired. It had been an eventful day.

She picked one of the empty beds, and sat on it. She didn’t have much to unpack, but she could put her pajama shirt on the bed, maybe put her toothbrush in the bathroom, and get her bag underneath. Then she could get some rest. Classes were still two days away.

~~~

Harmoni did get a little nap in, waking up to the see the sun setting. Fleck was still asleep under the bed, and she hoped she didn’t disturb him. He seemed . . . restful. No bad dreams or restless energy.

She took a look at the class sheet. She still hadn’t gotten a chance to do that. There were the three that were required, but there were also a few optional ones. She certainly had the time for it. So she glanced over them. A lot of them seemed advanced. You had to know how to use magic, and what type of magic you’d specialize in, before jumping into them. But she looked at the ones she could understand anyway.

There was a class focused on “blessing” items. As far as Harmoni could tell from the synopsis, this was what Rial did to make magical items at his store. They all did something beneficial, like the waterproof cloak. The waterproof cloak that she’d had for less than a week.

Conversely, there was also one about cursing, doing something detrimental to an object or person. This one had some stricter rules about who could learn, and a warning that it was harder to make curses stick than blessings. If you wanted either one to be permanent, you’d be better off going to a cleric.

Harmoni thought of Evin. ‘No doubt,’ she thought, sardonically.

The only other one she might learn something from as a beginner, was a class on spoken spells. This one taught you a few basic spoken spells, talked about the translation, the limitations, and pros and cons of spoken spells versus mental ones. That kind of thing.

Harmoni was still studying them, chin on her hand in thought, when someone appeared in her peripheral vision. Harmoni couldn’t make out much. She saw red hair, horns going up, and pointy claw-like nails. Suddenly, Cyep was reaching for her heart again.

Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

“Gyah!”

Harmoni lurched away, looking wide-eyed towards the person there. She also leaned so far to the side she fell off the bed.

Fleck jolted awake at the commotion, and Harmoni’s general distress, bumping his head on the bottom of the bed.

“Ah heck. Are you OK?”

Definitely not Cyep’s voice.

Harmoni grimaced, but still sat up, and opened one eye.

The person standing there, grabbing a bedpost so she could lean over and see Harmoni, was an imp. But she was mostly not like Cyep. She had much darker skin. It was still technically red, but some people might see black instead. The horns went mostly up, but curved forward slightly. She had the same dull red hair as Cyep, and might be the same height, both with and without the horns. But her eyes were the same red as her hair, and she was certainly younger.

She was wearing a turtleneck and some sort of zip up sweater, but she would still probably be considered attractive if you were into imps. Or girls. Harmoni wasn’t sure if she was interested in either. It was very low on the priority list.

The point was, Harmoni’s scream had been quite the overreaction.

‘Extremely,’ Fleck agreed. ‘And hate to make things worse, but you’ve been starring at her in silence for a while.’

Right. Given her interaction with those other students, she should know not to make snap judgements based on species. Knowing this, did not seem to change her expression.

It did not.

Harmoni took a deep breath, tried to calm her irrational heart. “I’m fine. You just startled me.”

The imp frowned. She came around to the same side of the bed as Harmoni, so she no longer had to lean forward. Harmoni couldn’t understand her expression.

“Well, glad you’re alright. I’m Rasha.” She extended her hand.

“Harmoni.”

She didn’t take the hand, busy pushing herself to her feet. She could see Rasha slowly lowering her hand, out of the corner of her eye.

Well Fleck was also glad Harmoni was alright. But he was awake now, and being in the cramped space under the bed was getting uncomfortable.

He slithered out, and stretched.

Rasha turned to him as he stretched like a cat. For a moment she just starred. Then she grinned, all pointy teeth flashing. Also, her slit pupils went round, and she squealed. It seemed abrupt.

Fleck had a moment to snap his eyes open in surprise. Then Rasha dropped lower and hugged him.

“Oh my gosh! You have a pet dragon!”

“He’s not a pet!” Harmoni snapped.

Fleck also let out a little growl.

Rasha stopped snuggling him, pulling away. She wasn’t smiling when he could see her face again.

“I er. I’m sorry. I’ve ne'er seen a dragon before. What are they, then?”

Harmoni was going to have to answer that, as the only one Rasha could understand. She took a deep breath, expression going blank. “Dragons are sentient species, same as you and I. It just shows differently, so people write them off. You can . . . soul bond with one? I don’t know how to explain it.”

Fleck wasn’t either.

“You can share a soul with a dragon, and vice versa. You have a connection.”

“Oh, and you know what they know, without needing to talk or think. And you can share emotions too, in a way?” Rasha asked.

“. . .Yes. How did you know?” She'd caught on very quickly, considering Harmoni's poor explanation.

“There’s a ceremony we can do back at home, on Morgou,” Rasha explained. Right. Morgou was the imp’s home planet. “We don’t really have marriages, at least not in the part I’m from. If you want to live with your romantic partner and have a kid with them, you can just . . . do that. So people who want a little something more will soul bond. Sometimes. I’ve heard of people doing it with their friends or siblings too, but you’ve got to be 'ery sure about that before you become privy to all of their thoughts and feelings forever.”

Harmoni and Fleck exchanged glances.

“I didn’t know other species could do that,” Fleck admitted. Out loud.

Harmoni shrugged. She hadn’t either. It seemed a bit more . . . uncomfortable, in that context. Then again, she liked her bond with Fleck so much, how could she blame anyone for wanting the same?

Yeah.

Fleck looked between Harmoni and Rasha. Harmoni’s blank look wasn’t as blank as she thought. There was a certain intensity there, and it was probably making Rasha uncomfortable.

Attempting to help with that, Fleck went over to Rasha and nudged her hand. When she looked down at him, he smiled, wagging his tail a bit like a dog.

Rasha smiled, but if Harmoni had to guess, Rasha wasn’t sure if she should be happy. “I’m sorry I misjudged you,” she said. “It was very rude of me.”

Now that the soul bond was cleared up, Harmoni noticed Rasha had trouble with the letter "v." Not as bad as Cyep, but there wasn't much emphasis on it, sometimes skipping over the sound in entirety.

She turned to Harmoni. “He can understand us?”

Harmoni nodded, and tried to smile too, taking Fleck’s observation under consideration. “I’m translating for him, basically.” Fleck then spoke to Rasha, and Harmoni translated back. “This is Fleck. And he says he doesn’t mind hugs or scratches. Just as long as you listen to him.”

“OK. . .”

For emphasis, Fleck tilted his head, exposing his neck and chin, and put them near Rasha’s sharp nails.

“Like . . . like this?” Rasha asked, scratching Fleck’s neck.

Fleck smiled, mouth closed, and his tail thumped against the ground in approval.

At the response, Rasha’s scratches got less hesitant, her body less tense, and she smiled.

Then she glanced at Harmoni. “Anyway. Uh. I guess we’ll be roommates now? Only other person in here is Eddie. It’ll be nice to have someone else?”

Now why was that last part phrased like a question?

Probably their weird first impression.

Harmoni shrugged. “I suppose so.”

Rasha stopped scratching Fleck, and stood back up. “Well . . . well I have to eat. I just came up here to get supplies.”

“You have supplies . . . for eating?” Harmoni asked.

“Yeah.” Rasha brought what looked like a spear out from under her own bed. Harmoni tried not to be alarmed by that. “I mean, the school really only serves vegetarian options. I suppose most species could live off those, even if they chose not to, but imps can’t. The headmaster promised he’d do something about that, but I can’t exactly sit around and wait for him to do that.” She brandished the spear. “No worries though. I’ve been having a lot of luck fishing.” A pause. “Anyway, see you around.”

Then she was out the door, and Harmoni was alone in the room again.