Page 10 of Untamed

She shakes her head. “Roll it again. This isn’t a convent.”

I smirk. “Won’t Ms. Ebon yell at me if I screw with the school’s uniform?”

Mia widens her eyes. “Shit, I forgot you had Ebon. You should probably lower it, actually.”

I scoff. “Yeah, I’m not that much of a rule follower, I just don’t want my ass hanging out. Who invented this outfit? The director of Britney Spears’Baby One More Timevideo?”

“We could be so lucky.” Mia holds out her elbow. She chuckles when I hesitate. “Come on, girl. Bring it in. This is normal.”

I laugh at myself for being weird. Who would’ve thought I’d have to meet a girl outside my pack to show me what it means to actually have friends? “Like this?” I slip my arm through hers.

She pats my hand playfully. “I’m about to introduce you to the other misfits. Everyone likes to talk about how this place is all fucked up, but the people are nice. I mean, we all have something very important in common. The hard days are when your friends get to leave and you’re stuck here. They don’t let you keep in touch.”

I kind of expected that, but a twang hits my gut anyway. Mia and I are very new friends, but I’m already hoping she doesn’t get to leave, which is horrible. If she leaves with her fated, she gets to go back to society instead of becoming Feral, so I should be hoping she does.

While we walk to breakfast, Mia gives me the real lowdown on Greystone Academy. “Daybreak and Lunar are in this wing, second floor.” When we get to the first floor, she points down a hallway identical to the one we came from. “Horizon and Eclipse Packs are that way. The opposite wing accommodates the other packs. Moonstruck and Twilight on the first floor. Galaxy and Sunflare on the second.”

More voices echo through the cavernous halls. The closer we get to a place with activity, the more my stomach clenches. I tell myself that Mia’s right: we’re all here for the same reason. We’re all outcasts here.

We round the corner, entering the cafeteria. My short peek into this room last night didn’t do it justice. Rays of sun shine through an enormous glass room, illuminating everything in a halo of light. Stone columns run up the walls, anchoring huge plates of glass that continue up and into a vaulted ceiling. Decorative ironwork melds the plates together. It’s absolutely breathtaking. And in my opinion would make a way better greenhouse than a cafeteria.

My gaze drifts to our right where I take in a buffet line filled with steaming food, and a kitchen just beyond that. How is this Greystone Academy? It seems way too fancy for rejected shifters.

A squeal pulls my attention away from the room itself and finally settles to the people scattered about the tables. I stop, making Mia grind to a halt as well. I blink at the scene before me, taking in the other students dressed like me. “How many people go to Greystone Academy?”

Mia peers out over the semi-filled tables. “About fifty at capacity. Our numbers start to dwindle as the year progresses.”

Fifty fucking rejected mates. That seems impossible. How many people are willing to do this to someone else?

“Some wolves don’t stay very long. Rejections can be caught up in pack politics or power plays.” She leans over and lowers her voice. “You should hear the dumbass reasons some of us are here. The dumber the rationale, the sooner they get to go back. There are a lot of faces here now, but a third might return within a month.”

The fact that anyone would use fate as a power play boggles my mind. I knew I hated people. I swallow at the new information. “How many wolves from Lunar are here?” I quickly scan the tables for anyone I recognize but come up empty.

“One.”

Okay. One. Let’s see.... I start to scan again but stop. “Wait,”—I turn toward my new friend—“I’m the only one?”

“Your advisor’s kind of a freak.” Mia presses her lips together. “She has a very good reputation.”

A warning tingle shoots up my spine even though that could mean good things for me. My wolf doesn’t like it either. Her ears perk up, paying as much attention to what’s going on as I am. Let’s hope Ms. Ebon’s only an overzealous advisor with an uncanny ability to bond mated pairs back together and not the kind that likes to send wolves Feral.

“This way,” Mia says as a guy stands from a table in the middle of the room and waves at her.

She waves back but leads me toward the buffet line, which has so much more food than I ever dreamed of eating for breakfast. I’m usually a cereal-in-the-morning kind of girl, but there are so many choices. Eggs, bacon, toast, pancakes, yogurt, fruit, and an entire cereal section. Determined to get something out of my stay here, I load up on bacon and pancakes, then grab some fruit, too. Our last stop is the drink counter where I’m bombarded with a bunch of juice choices along with milk, chocolate milk, and strawberry milk. I opt for chocolate and then follow Mia further into the glass room.

I get caught up into peering at the clouds hovering in the sky that I almost walk right into a table. “Woah there,” a masculine voice calls out. I glance over at him, and he grins at me. “New here?”

“Very.”

Mia nods toward the oblong, wooden piece of furniture that almost made me a klutz. It’s massive and must be at least ten feet in length. Benches run up and down the sides, so I take a seat across from Mia and the guy who stopped me from making an ass out of myself. “This is Nathan,” Mia tells me. “The other shifter in my fucked-up love quartet.”

I grimace. “That sounds like a nightmare. Sorry guys.” They watch me as I pick up my fork, and it’s as if I’m on display in a store window. I’ve never eaten breakfast with anyone but my parents. Hell, I’ve never eaten inside a cafeteria with anyone before. During lunch at Lunar High, I took my food outside and ate by myself.

“What are you in for?” Nathan asks.

He’s a handsome guy with dark hair and a line of stubble down his cheeks and across his jaw. He’s not as built as Jonah, but no one is. Just looking at him, I can’t imagine why no one would want to snatch him up. The same goes for Mia, too.

When I tell them as much, they laugh.

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