This Savage Song (Monsters of Verity #1)(33)

The moves they demonstrated likely wouldn’t stop a human, let alone a monster. Their form was off, as if they didn’t really want to teach the Colton students how to fight. It was just a performance, all for show, something to make the children—or probably the parents—feel safer.

Five of Kate’s six schools—St. Agnes excluded—had taught self-defense courses, since many of the students who boarded there were sons and daughters of influential people—territory ambassadors, big-business owners, some old money and others new—the kind of people whose kids make good targets. No one had ever had the guts to try and kidnap Kate, but over time she’d amassed an arsenal of defensive techniques—as well as a few offensive ones—which just made the current display of ineptitude even more annoying.

When one teacher demonstrated how to disarm an attacker, it was so slow and clumsy that Kate actually laughed. Not loudly, but the gym was basically an echo chamber, and the sound carried far enough for an instructor to hear.

“Is something funny?” he asked, scanning the students. He wouldn’t have known she was responsible if everyone near her hadn’t leaned away.

Kate sighed. “No,” she said, speaking up. “But your form’s all wrong.”

“Well, then, missy,” he said, pointing at her. “Why don’t you come down and give us a proper demonstration?”

A murmur ran through the class. The instructor clearly didn’t know who she was. One of the other teachers shot him a look, but Kate only smiled and got to her feet.

Ten minutes later, Kate was sitting in the counselor’s office. Not for laughing at the instructor, but for breaking his collarbone. She hadn’t tried to hurt him. Not badly. It wasn’t her fault he had poor stance and an inflated sense of ability.

“Miss Harker,” said the counselor, a round man named Dr. Landry, with glasses and a spreading bald spot. “Here at Colton we try to provide a safe learning environment.” There was that word again. “We have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to violence.”

Kate choked back another laugh. Landry pursed his lips. She coughed, swallowed.

“It was a self-defense segment,” she said. “And he asked me to participate.”

“You were asked to demonstrate a defensive maneuver, and in so doing you accidentally fractured the instructor’s collarbone?”

“That’s correct.”

Landry sighed. “I’ve read your file, Miss Harker. This isn’t an isolated incident.” Kate sat back, half expecting him to read the list of her offenses, the way they did in movies, but he didn’t. Instead he took off his glasses and began to polish them. “Where do you think this aggression is coming from?” he asked.

Kate met his gaze. “Is that a joke?” But Landry didn’t seem to be the joking type. If anything he seemed painfully sincere. He opened his drawer and slid a vial of small, white pills across the table. She didn’t reach for them.

“What are those for?”

“Anxiety.”

Kate sat up straighter, making sure her shoulders were level, her face even. “I don’t have anxiety,” she said stiffly.

Landry gave her a strangely weighted look. “Miss Harker, you’ve been rapping your fingers on your knees since the moment you sat down.” Kate pressed her hands flat on her thighs. “You’re tense. Irritable. Defensive. Intentionally distancing.”

Kate offered a very cold smile. “I live in a world where shadows have teeth. It’s not a particularly relaxing environment.”

“I know who your father is—”

“So does everyone.”

“—and I’ve read about your mother. About the accident.”

Her mother’s face flashed in her mind, lit by the oncoming car, those wide hazel eyes, the screeching tires, the crunching metal—Kate dug her nails into her slacks, and resisted the urge to let him talk into her bad ear. “So?”

“So I know it must be hard. Suffering that kind of loss. The subsequent alienation. And now this: a new school, a fresh start, but also what I have to imagine is a great deal of stress.” He nodded to the pills. “You don’t have to use them. But take them with you. They’re less harmful than cigarettes, and you never know, they might actually help.”

Kate considered the vial. How many of the students were on these pills? How many of the citizens in North City? Did the medicated calm keep them from fanning the flames of violence? Did it help them pretend the world was safe? Did it hold them together? Did it help them sleep?

Kate frowned but reached for the pills. She doubted anything would help, but if the gesture got the good Dr. Landry off her back and kept the incident off the school record (and her father’s radar), it was worth it.

“Am I free to go?” she asked. Landry nodded, and she escaped out from under his gaze and into the empty hall.

Kate shook a white tablet into her palm. She looked down at the pill, hesitated.

Where are you? she asked herself.

Away. Whole. Sane. Happy. A dozen different selves with a dozen different lives, but she wasn’t living any of those. She had to be here. Had to be strong. And if Dr. Landry saw the fraying edges, then so would her father.

Kate swallowed the tablet dry.

She looked around the empty hall. Too late to go back to class. Too early to go anywhere else. Through the nearest set of doors, the bleachers stood, soaked invitingly in sun. She pocketed the pills and went to get some air.