The orientation hall is an expansive space with high ceilings and rows of long, narrow benches made of black wood. Heidi and the rest of the omegas shuffle in. They are all wide-eyed, stiff-backed, and evidently shuddering with fear.
Some are still bruised from the welcome they received earlier in the courtyard, obviously healing slower than Heidi who is almost healed of all the bruises inflicted on her by Sierra and her crew. The only visible one left is the elbow bruise from when that jerky Grayson let her fall.
One boy from the Omegs has a bleeding lip. A girl's sleeve is torn. Heidi's elbow is scabbed over, and her face still throbs faintly where some of the kicks lands.
The Omegas sit in silence. Then the door slams shut, and in walks the woman. Heidi doesn't know what she expects. Say, a motherly figure or a counselor-type. Someone to say, "You're safe now. We're here to guide you."
Nope.
The woman who enters is built like a blade. She's long, lean, and mean-looking. Her black hair is pulled back into a bun. Her lips are painted wine-red, and her eyebrows arch sternly. She wears a fitted black suit on red bottoms.
"Good morning, Omegas," she says with a tight smile.
"Good morning, Ma'am." They all murmur incoherently.
No one answers confidently. She doesn't seem to care. "My name is Ms. Vesper. You may call me Miss, or Ma'am, or 'Please Have Mercy.' Any of those will do."
Please have mercy? Oh, please… who prefers to be referred to as such? Heidi internally wonders.
A single nervous chuckle echoes in the room.
Ms. Vesper strolls forward with her chin up. "As of today, your lives as humans are over. Whatever you were before; nerds, wealthy kids, or small-town nobodies… it no longer matters."
She pauses at the front of the room and taps a black folder against her thigh. "You are now werewolves. I—I mean, barely, whatever. By some… divine twist of fate, the Moon Goddess has seen fit to hand out the gift like it's on clearance."
A few students stiffen. Heidi doesn't even move or react. Her mind is heavily weighed with questions about what the Alphas want from her and how to avoid Sierra and her friends for the rest of her time in Duskwind to be fully present in the orientation hall.
"You've been placed in packs for integration. You've been housed with different families—noble or not, whatever your fate chooses for you. You've been given new names. You will take on the surnames of the bloodlines you now belong to. In other words… congratulations. You're their property."
Heidi's stomach tightens at that. She is the Castell's property. Theirs to treat like a piece of shit. And oh, were they doing a good job of that?
What do you think?
"The truth is," Ms. Vesper continues, glancing at her folder, "none of us are prepared for this. The Moon Goddess doesn't give us instructions. No visions. No prophecies. Just… humans turning werewolves. The werewolf councils are then dropping you all into packs across the globe like mail-order problems."
She flips the folder open.
"New Omegas are showing up every day. The numbers are swelling. And the packs? They're not exactly thrilled."
Heidi notices a girl to her left subtly raise her hand. Ms. Vesper lifts a brow.
"Yes?"
"What are we supposed to do if someone hurts us? Are we allowed to—like… report it?"
The entire room leans forward like fools hoping for a yes.
Ms. Vesper scoffs like this was the most absurd question of the year. "Report it to whom? The nobles who are already praying you don't survive the semester?"
What the heck? Heidi thinks gasps. Are they saying they're left to fend for themselves in this pack of literal wolves?! These toxic kids with little to no empathy for their plights?!
The silence that ensues says more than words ever could.
"You want protection? Earn it. Survive. Cement your place. Or get used to being a footnote in someone else's legacy," Ms. Vesper shrugs.
Heidi swallows hard. That isn't a threat but a promise. They'll all die here.
Ms. Vesper claps her hands sharply. "Alright. Uniforms are in the changing rooms. Your new names are embroidered into them. Find yours. Wear it. Come back in ten."
The students all file into the room and soon, they change and return to the hall.
"Classes begin tomorrow. You get today to goof off and familiarize yourselves with the environment. I wouldn't recommend arriving in class late. The teachers here aren't pretty with their punishments. So improvise your free periods well... We'll see who's still standing by tomorrow." Ms. Vesper announced before striding away.
.
.
Heidi decides to lay low.
After the orientation ends and the others shuffle off in tight clusters, whispering about how unlikely they are to survive the semester, she ducks out the back of the hall.
No thank you to more socializing. She already got slapped once today and she'd very much like to keep the rest of her face intact. Her plan is to find a quiet corner, nurse her scabbed elbow, and maybe cry a little without anyone watching.
Crying is fine if nobody sees.
She wants a corner, a wall, or a shadow to lean against until the world stops spinning. Maybe somewhere to ice her cheek and wonder… again, why in the name of every deity she's been tossed into this brutal reality.
So she does what she's always done best: she fades.
At least, that's the plan. She begins to search for any quiet space, and that's when she hears voices. It's masculine and seems to belong to a group. Sharp laughter follows.
Heidi stops short. She's not snoopy by nature since self-preservation doesn't usually leave room for nosiness, but there's something about the voices. The low, gruff, and serious tone that screams "wrong."
She peers around the corner without thinking. An arched door is open halfway. Just inside is a group of students. Maybe five in numbers, standing in a loose cluster, and speaking in silent tones.
Heidi strains a little to listen in on the conversation, although her heart is thudding fast.
"…We take five this time. Any more, and the faculty gets nosy," says one of them who is tall with a lollipop lazily sticking out the side of his mouth.
"Five's enough. That rogue Alpha from the wastelands will pay double if they're untouched."
Heidi's eyes widen. Untouched? What the hell is that supposed to mean?
Another boy snickers. "You saw the new ones today, right? Half of them don't even know what a wolf shift is. It'll be easy. We throw a fake dorm assignment in the system, isolate them at night, and boom… gone."
"Rogues don't ask questions. They just pay."
Heidi clutches her stomach at the realization of what she has just stumbled on. They're planning to sell off Omegas?
Her heart kicks into panic. These guys… these shiny demons in school blazers are trafficking students. Newbies like her. The Moon-Blessed. Omegas who don't know how to survive yet.
Her pulse crashes in her ears. She should walk away. Right now. No one's seen her. She'll just…
Her foot scrapes the wall, letting out a loud scraping sound. One of the boys snaps his head around.
"Wait."
Crap. They heard that! She ducks back, feet already stumbling in retreat.
"Did you hear that?" the lollipop guy says.
Okay, that's enough shock for one day. Heidi bolts. She runs blindly down the hallway, rounding the nearest corner. Behind her, footsteps draw nearer as they chase after her.
"She heard us!"
"Get her!"
She doesn't even wait to think or breathe. She knows she's literal dead meat if they find out who she is or what she looks like. She might as well be one of the five they are looking for.
Hence, without thinking, she dives into the first door she finds. Luckily for her, it's wooden and slightly ajar. It clicks shut behind her. She stumbles breathless into the room and presses her back to the door, panting.
"That was close." She whispers, heaving heavily.
She finally turns around after two good minutes of catching her breath. By the way… where the hell is she? She swerves and oh, no. No, no, no. The room is not empty.
A male figure sits in a high-backed leather chair at a carved wooden desk. He's tall, dark-haired, and shirtless. W-why? Where's his shirt?!
He's holding a black blazer in one hand. His abs look like they were handcrafted by ancient Roman gods, and the way the afternoon light slices across his torso feels downright illegal.
His eyes lift slowly. They are gold-flecked and sleepy, and… they settle on her.
Ugh… not again. Her stomach drops in fear.