Page 6 of Monster's Pet

“Of course I will,” I promised. “I have my whole life ahead of me with Aiden. I only have a year and a half with you.” Suddenly, that didn’t seem like long enough, and my heart clenched.

What is wrong with me?

I thought I couldn’t wait to get out of here.

How am I feeling homesick for a place I haven’t even left yet?

“I’ll see you in the foyer in ten minutes?” Aiden asked once we got to our floor. “You said something about going to talk to Darragh?”

“Yes, ten minutes should be fine,” I agreed, and followed Hazel down the hall to our room.

“Lilia arrived a little earlier than you this morning,” Hazel said. “Umm, I have to warn you—”

I pushed open the door to chaos.

Lilia’s two mini dragon familiars were circling above the beds, coughing out fireballs and keening shrilly.

I clapped my hands over my ears and stepped further into the room.

“I’m sorry!” Lilia shouted, speed-reading through a book on dragons. Her normally long, brown hair was singed short, as if Pinkie had started breathing fire while still huddled around her neck. “I don’t know what’s wrong with them! This is new!”

I didn’t need her to tell me that. I also, unfortunately, had no idea what to do about it.

But I did know someone who did.

“I’ll go see if Rhiannon is in yet,” I shouted, hoping Lilia could hear me. “Give me a moment.”

Hazel followed me out of the dorm. “I’m scared to go in there. Fire, you know.”

I nodded sympathetically. Even though dragon fire didn’t affect witches in the same way as objects, Hazel was a dryad.

Who knew how it would react?

Rhiannon answered the door immediately, looking tired.

“We have a situation,” I began.

“You and everyone else,” Rhiannon said, grabbing a bag from the counter beside the sink. “I’m coming.”

“What do you mean, ‘everyone else’?” I asked.

“I’m guessing that Lilia’s dragons are acting up?” Without waiting for my nod of agreement, she continued, “Everyone’s familiars are completely out of sorts. It starts about an hour or so after they arrive, and it doesn’t stop until I put them to sleep.”

“Put them tosleep?” I repeated, alarmed.

“Not that kind of sleep,” Rhiannon reassured me. “Rest, not death.”

“What happens when they wake up?” Hazel asked anxiously.

Rhiannon shrugged. “I don’t know yet. One emergency at a time.”

Hazel and I let Rhiannon take the lead into our room, Hazel hiding behind me to stay even further out of the way.

Rhiannon dug through her bag without looking, whistling a soft tune that I could barely hear over the shrieking dragons.

But the dragons must have heard it, because they flew in front of the witch, hovering in mid-air.

Their eyes were whirling red, every muscle in their bodies clenched tight.

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