Chapter Two
In Which I Find Another Fabula Creaturis
"Ms. Aithne, you're late," the professor said. Normally he would be angrier, but I was one of his best students, and this was the first time that I had been late this year."Yes, I know," I said, sitting down. The American was second nature to me, and sometimes I would flit between my home accent and Standard American English. In fact, it was becoming difficult at times to call up my Irish. Soon I was going to have to rely on my Gaelic for my roots in terms of language.
Halfway through class, I got up to look closer at something written when a man two rows in front of me turned around and smiled. He flashed gleaming fangs and I sat down without getting what was on the board. I had lost interest in what was there.
When class was over, I was one of the first to get up, going over to the guy who had smiled at me. He was talking to a group of friends, but as I went up they quietly dispersed.
"What are you?" I asked in an anxious whisper.
"What do you mean?"
"Why do you have fangs if you're totally human?"
The guy laughed, and I saw the fangs again. My eyes turned "cat", yellow with pupil slits, and I showed him my fangs. He stopped laughing.
"Good; I only suspected that you were a fabula creaturis. Cat Sì, right?"
"Yes. And you?"
"Black Shuck. Listen, I need to get to class, but I'll see you tomorrow. We can talk then."
