~*~*~*~*~*~
A series of light polite knocks on his dorm room door woke Neil from a deep sleep.
He knew this in the way he was fast asleep one minute and painfully awake the next. The sound was too loud to his adjusting enhanced senses and the jolt back into the land of the wakened, left him tumbling off the edge of his bed and onto the floor in a tangle of wings, sheets and colorful language.
Bleary-eyed, he wrestled his way out of the sheets, rubbed at his aching arms, trying to think of what he’d done to convince his wings to retract the last few times. Nothing came to mind as the knocking continued and Neil tried his best not to panic outright. The ache in his arms grew worse and he scratched at one elbow, absently, only to find himself staring at the swirling tattoos.
Experimentally, he rubbed a hand over them, watching as the tattoos moved out of the way—so he couldn’t touch them. He stared for a moment then threw up his hands. It was too early for this sort of thing. He checked the time projected on the wall and frowned. He’d slept through breakfast and his morning class, which meant the person outside his door was either Kendall or Elyenka.
That, he could deal with. Grabbing a towel from the bathroom, he slung it around his neck and sucked in a deep breath for courage. He would only open the door just far enough to see what they wanted and reassure them that he was fine. Then he’d deal with the wings.
The knocking grew more insistent at that point and Neil was quite annoyed when he slid the door open part way, prepared to yell only to find himself staring at a complete stranger.
Shoulder-length, white-blond hair, lovely grey eyes and three puckered scar marks over his left eye and temple, the tall fellow simply smiled. “Hello there. Neilson Hewitt?”
Neil swallowed. “Who wants to know?”
The fellow chuckled. “Dexter Baronsworth. Calida sent me over to fetch you, since you don’t have class with our charming Terius this morning.”
The news took a moment to sink in. Neil stared. “Calida?” He repeated, latching on to the one thing he could make sense of in that phrase. The name only made sense when he recalled the petite, dark-skinned beauty he’d helped to the MedBay the previous afternoon. She’d seemed perfectly fine when he’d left. “Is she alright?”
“She’s fine. Can I come in?”
“No!” Neil grabbed the doorjamb, bracing his weight against the door. “I mean—I’d rather—what do you want?”
Dexter blinked. “Alright then. I’ll just wait for you.”
“I-”
“Calida wants to see you,” Dexter said, speaking more slowly this time. “She hasn’t stopped talking about you since I saw her yesterday and due to an emergency administrative meeting, the Magical Arts class has been suspended for today and possibly tomorrow. She learned from Terius that you were in his class and figured that you would be free during this period. Hence, I have been sent to escort you to our personal quarters in the private wing.”
Neil slowly relaxed, feeling his shoulders droop. That was not as terrible as he’d thought, but now he had to think of a way to talk himself out of it. “That’s very—kind of her. I’m a little busy at the moment. Maybe tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow?” Dexter repeated. “I—see. Is your mentor present?”
“My what?”
“Your mentor. I would like to have a word with them, if you didn’t mind.”
“What mentor?”
“Your Oret or Oretta,” Dexter explained, patiently. “It’s nothing to worry about.”
Neil twitched. That particular phrase always made him worry even more. “I don’t have a mentor,” he said, slowly. “And I don’t know what you’re talking about. If you don’t mind, I don’t really know you and I’m not-”
“Everyone has a mentor,” Dexter began. His grey eyes narrowed and he leaned to the side, looking over Neil’s head through the narrow gap in the door. “Your wings are out, aren’t they?”
Neil’s eyes grew wide. “I don’t know what you’re talking about-”
“You have to stretch them,” Dexter looked up and down the hallway. His cheerful air had been replaced by something more serious and his grey eyes had darkened.
A cool wind wafted through the empty hallway, ruffling Neil’s bedhead and causing him to shiver. The whisper of magic was so slight and faint, that if he hadn’t been staring straight at Dexter, he would have missed it. The glimmer in those grey eyes right before the odd, cool wind blew past him, stirring through the dorm room.
“What?”
“Your wings. You have to stretch them and rub them from the bottom to the top, then reverse for the spines. Do you need any help?”