Quick Study by Katherine Kim

Author:Katherine Kim [Kim, Katherine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-05-24T22:00:00+00:00

6

Caroline managed to coax Darien out of the bushes and back into the house. He decided that the safest place for them for the time being was right under the noses of their captors. They found a window that was cracked open and once Darien decided it was clear, they hopped inside and ducked through the darkened room to wedge themselves behind some armchairs in the corner. From there, they crept through the house to find somewhere more defensible. The elves inside were not quite in an uproar, but there was a significant amount of activity inside. Darien was adamant that fighting any of them at this point would only draw the whole group down on them.

Finally, they crept into what had probably been a store room for the kitchen. It was full of shelves and there was a large mirror screwed unceremoniously to the back of the door. Dust lay thick everywhere in the room, and Darien guessed that it wasn’t big enough to be useful to the gang. Still he stood by the door, listening, for a long time before turning away and sitting beside Caroling on the floor.

“So… no backup then?” Caroline asked.

“Not unless we can figure out who it is. I’m not going to risk your safety.” He shook his head and snarled.

“Do you have any thoughts on it?” she asked. She could hear the anger still simmering away in his voice. The betrayal must really hurt.

“Not really.” Darien sighed. “I don’t know these guys very well yet, honestly. I transferred about four months ago, so I’m still the new guy.”

“Wow. So tell me about them? What’s it like being a… what do you call yourselves anyway? Paranormal? Superhuman? Imaginary-but-not-really?” Caroline asked. Darien laughed, and she was glad. It was a definite improvement over depressed and angry.

“Paranormal, if we have to. Mostly we just call ourselves people.” He shrugged. “A lot of us don’t have a lot of interaction with humans. It’s dangerous. Humans can be very… ummm…”

“Don’t hold back now,” she said.

“Reactive?” He glanced over at her.

“You were going to say violent, weren’t you?” She screwed her face up at him.

“Hey, I am the last person to cast stones like that. I know the reputation that my people have.” Darien shrugged. “But… it’s true that historically speaking humans have not reacted well at all when they discover one of us living nearby. Generally speaking, at any rate. You seem to like to imagine that things like us exist, but when presented with the reality, humans get scared and panic. Again, just a generalization, but that seems to be the way it usually works. You, Caroline, have surprised the hell out of me, honestly.”

“Yeah? Well, it’s been one of those days, I guess. After being stuck in a robbery, caught, kidnapped, passing out, and imprisoned, I didn’t have much room for panic when the nice guy who tried to keep me calm and relatively safe turned out to be a movie monster.” Caroline shrugged.

“Really?”

“What?” Caroline shot him a quick grin.

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