Page 4 of A Dusk Of Stars

How amazing would it be, to have access toeverything— all the censored materials, all the forbidden works, even the Lexarcanum?

Talk about magic.

Squeezing my suitcase handle tighter, I watch the last of the students before me enter the Pull Chamber and close the door. In my mind, I’m trying to figure out whether I have a chance by listing all my qualifications.

This will be my fourth year working at the Academy, I’m already a librarian and I’ve been an exemplary employee. When the Academy needed more space for the Eastern Runology section, it was me who reorganized the entire system to house it. When that student got cursed by that book, it was me who saved him from certain death.

I wait for the green light meaning that the student before me has been successfully transported and I enter the Pull Chamber myself, which from the inside looks much like a bathroom stall without the toilet.

I thought working as a librarian at the world-famous Grimm Academy would be the highest I could go.

What if I was wrong?

The magic sucks me in and spits me out — nauseous and wobbly as always — into the Chamber on castle grounds, on the grass near the central Dame Gothel statue. This particular Chamber is just a tall, round cast-iron fence. I open the door and step outside, pausing in the hopes that my knees will stop shaking.

They don’t, but the Pull Chamber starts glowing again so I get moving, not wanting the next traveler to bump into me.

I’d normally say fuck it and head straight for the Grimm Tower, but now I get drawn to the Dame Gothel statue. It’s one of my favorite places on Academy grounds, probably because it was the first I’d ever seen with my own two eyes. There’s the large cobblestone ring with grass shooting from between the stones, and at its center, one of the biggest statues I’ve ever seen. Rising from the weathered stone pedestal, there’s one of my fondest depictions of Dame Gothel — standing with her feet firmly on the ground, as if preparing for some important moment in history, her long robe and wild hair billowing in the wind.

I come to sit on one of the lichen-covered benches surrounding the statue. I take a deep breath and let my eyes sweep over the castle grounds. Behind me, to the south, there’s the somber Grimm Tower and the only stretch of the wall that can be seen without venturing too far away from the garden.

To the west, north and east there are the student towers. There’s the elegant, smooth Lilith Tower with barren Graf Hill watching its back, the rough-looking Lycan Tower with the Lycan Forest looming from behind, and the leaning, vine-covered Ydril Tower shooting up from the shore of the Sobbing Lake.

The effects of the thrill of thinking about going for the job are still there, but now, watching the newly arrived students buzz around the gardens…

Vampire. Shifter. Fae. They were all born to go to places like the Academy, to fit in, to find their purpose there. Am I kidding myself even thinking about this?

Let’s say everything goes as planned and I actuallygetthe position of Archivist, the Chief of Grimm Academy Library Restricted Sections. It’s one that comes not just with perks, butwith great responsibility to very delicate, valuable possessions. To all my not-so-welcoming colleagues, it would mean a better opportunity to get rid of me once and for all, if they only wished to.

Fuck, that’s not good.

If I go for this job, I’m risking losing everything I’ve worked for since I finally managed to put the past behind me.

My eyes get drawn to a spot just outside the cobblestone ring, to the north, where the beaten patch of grass marks the place of the ‘secret’ entrance into the underground castle itself. At least it used to be secret, before it got turned into an Academy and before the towers got erected.

No wonder they called it The Castle that Isn’t…

It makes me remember those times I’d manage to sneak out to go to the local library and read Grimm’s fairy tales.

I’m a shifter, I’d recite to myself, and I can turn into an animal so small, there’s no place I can’t hide.

I’m a fae and I have sight so powerful, there’s nothing that can escape me.

I’m a vampire and I can run so fast, there’s no place I can’t go.

I’d spend hours daydreaming about getting a chance to meet some of the characters from my favorite fairy tales — Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, Vasilisa the Wise.

It makes me let out a soft scoff, remembering how naive that child was. It was only years later that I realized things aren’t as straightforward as that. Sure, fairy tales are based in real life. Sometimes, the characters you come across while reading them are actual historical people, like in the case of Dame Gothel. More often than not, the tales were just desperate attempts by us humans to explain what was hiding in plain sight, like predatory wolf shifters being merged into a single figure of the Big Bad Wolf.

Then again, what was truly naive of me was daydreaming about the Pied Piper using her Flute to whisk my sorry human ass to an Academy for Originals.

But for some reason, even now, this place is the only place I want to be.

So no, I won’t be letting someone else take on the role. If I did that, I’d be missing out on what could turn out to be the opportunity of a lifetime.

Chapter 2

Acup of coffee in my hand, I’m almost through the door into the already buzzing Lounge when I hear Carrel and Nolan’s voices drift up to me. I stop and turn around, my lips curling into a smile as I give my two Librarian colleagues a tip of my chin in greeting. Carrel — the tall, energetic wolf shifter throws me a grin, while Nolan — the smirking, pale vampire just walks up to me and starts lifting a fist to my upper arm.

---