The Gathering Storm (3 page)

The doorknob rattled. “Gabriella?” her mother asked.

Gabriella shut off the water and took one last look
at her eyes. Normal. Safe. She took a deep breath and opened the bathroom door. Ma and Maritza were standing in the hallway, waiting for her.

“Sorry!” Gabriella said, forcing her voice to sound bright and cheerful. “I was feeling a little, uh, sick, but I'm better now.”

Ma nodded sympathetically. “Your stomach, huh? Nerves. I always used to get them on the first day of school. You look kind of pale, though. . . .” She reached out and pressed her hand against Gabriella's forehead. Normally, Gabriella would have ducked away, but she stood very still and let her mother check to see if she had a fever, like she used to when Gabriella was little, before Maritza was born. Back then, Gabriella used to think her mom could fix anything. Now, though, Gabriella knew better. She remembered those glowing cat eyes staring back at her from the mirror and looked down.

“Nice and cool,” Ma said, and Gabriella could tell she was trying to decide if Gabriella needed to stay home.

“I'm good for school, Ma,” Gabriella said quickly. What would be the point of hiding out in the house all day? Just in case her eyes got weird again? Besides,
Coach Connors would be beyond mad if Gabriella wasn't at soccer practice.

“You sure?” asked Ma.

“Positive,” Gabriella said.

“Okay,” Ma said finally. “Let's go. I'll drop you off.”

Gabriella slung her backpack over her shoulder and followed her mother to the front door. She paused for a moment before stepping into the sunshine. Maybe it
would
be safer to stay at home . . . just in case her eyes changed again.

But Gabriella knew she would have to face school—and her friends—eventually.

When it was time for lunch, Gabriella breathed a sigh of relief for the first time all day. She was in the home stretch now: five classes done and her eyes hadn't changed, not even once. Gabriella knew that for a fact because she'd taken a peek in her compact mirror whenever she thought she could get away with it. She'd even dashed to the bathroom twice between classes—just to be sure. After Gabriella grabbed her lunch tray and headed over to her usual table, she was ready to forget all
about her eyes. That was good because Gabriella could see that she had a new problem to deal with: a backpack blocking Gabriella's regular seat next to Lizbeth.

That was a bad sign.

“Hey,” Gabriella said, hoping Lizbeth would move the backpack as soon as she noticed her. Hoping it had just been a mistake.

Lizbeth looked up. Her eyes grew wide at the sight of Gabriella.
Is it my eyes?
Gabriella wondered anxiously. If they had changed, Lizbeth would notice. She noticed
everything
.

“Did you . . . want to sit here?” asked Lizbeth.

“Yeah,” Gabriella said, but it came out sounding like a question. “Is that okay?”

Lizbeth pursed her lips. “It's just . . . I haven't even
seen
you,” she said. “You didn't come to my locker before school, you are
obviously
ignoring the text I sent last night about your hair—”

Ponytails. Of course. Everyone else at the table had one. Gabriella set down her tray and awkwardly pulled her hair back into her fist. “My elastic broke,” she said quickly. It was surprising how easily the lie came to her.

“Ohhhh,” Lizbeth said. She flashed her most dazzling smile as she pulled an extra elastic off her wrist. “Why didn't you say so?”

As soon as Gabriella pulled her hair into a ponytail, Lizbeth moved the backpack. Gabriella slipped into the now-empty chair and started eating. With her mouth full, Gabriella knew she wouldn't have to join Lizbeth in mocking everyone else in the caf.

Near the end of lunch, Lizbeth held out her hand. “Give me your schedule,” she ordered Gabriella.

Gabriella dug it out of her backpack and obediently handed it over.

Lizbeth scanned the crumpled paper and then wrinkled her nose. “ ‘Independent Study: Physical Education'?” she asked. “What's that? Like, ‘Jock Gym for Superjocks'?”

Jock Gym for Superjocks actually sounded like a class that Gabriella would love to take, but she couldn't let Lizbeth know—especially when there was a jealous glint in Lizbeth's baby-blue eyes. Instead, Gabriella sighed heavily, as if she were dreading her next class. “It's in the ancillary gym,”
she pointed out. “Can you imagine? What a dump.”

It was the right thing to say. Lizbeth's expression immediately changed from envy to sympathy. “You poor thing. I can't believe they haven't torn down the ancillary gym yet.”

“Yeah!” Daisy spoke up. “It should be condemned!”

Lizbeth fixed an icy stare on her. “Why are you talking?” she asked.

When Daisy clamped her mouth shut, Gabriella knew that she wouldn't say a word for the rest of the day. A hot rush of anger flared inside her.
Who does Lizbeth think she is?
Gabriella thought. She was about to say something when she suddenly remembered exactly who Lizbeth Harris was: the mayor's daughter. The most popular—and most powerful—girl at Willow Cove Middle School. And the meanest, too. One wrong word from Gabriella, and Lizbeth would destroy her.

It was safer to keep her mouth shut.

Just then, the bell rang. Lunch was over. Gabriella had never been so grateful to escape from the cafeteria—not even on fish sandwich day.

Thanks to Lizbeth, Gabriella didn't need to check her
schedule to know that her next class was in the ancillary gym. Though she played three sports at Willow Cove Middle School—soccer, basketball, and softball—and ran track, Gabriella had never been inside the ancillary gym before. She had often wondered what was inside that dark and deserted building and behind those padlocked doors.

Today, though, the locks were gone, and the building blazed with lights. A woman stood in front of the doors with her hands behind her back. She wore a purple tunic over simple dark pants; her black-and-silver hair had been twisted into a thick braid that cascaded down her back. The woman's eyes seemed to see right through Gabriella, as though they were looking into her soul.

“Gabriella Rivera,” the woman said with a slight nod. “Welcome.”

“Hi,” Gabriella replied, wondering how the woman knew her name. “Is this—”

“Go inside,” she interrupted. “The others are already here.”

Gabriella pulled open the doors and stepped inside
the ancillary gym. With that first step, all her expectations vanished. The ancillary gym wasn't a run-down, dilapidated, old dump. It was clean and bright inside, with gleaming equipment that looked new: balance beams; hurdles; punching bags; scratchy, yellow climbing ropes; and shiny rings that dangled from the ceiling. At the far side of the room, a large pool rippled with clear, blue water.

This is insane,
Gabriella thought as a grin spread across her face. The gym was perfectly equipped for high-intensity training. How was it possible that the ancillary gym stayed locked up all the time? Nobody else at Willow Cove Middle School even knew about the pool—Gabriella was sure about that. The swim team always had to take a bus to practice in the high school pool. There had to be some reason why the ancillary gym was such a well-kept secret, but in that moment, Gabriella didn't even care.
If this is Jock Gym for Superjocks, sign me up!
she thought.

“Go take a seat with your friends,” the woman said as she joined Gabriella inside the gym. Gabriella turned around fast, half expecting to see Lizbeth, Daisy, and
Katie behind her. Her tense shoulders relaxed when she realized that the teacher meant the other students in the class: Makoto Kimura, Darren Smith, and Fiona Murphy. Gabriella knew them—barely. She wouldn't exactly call them her friends.

“Sure,” Gabriella replied quickly, and then crossed the gym to the single metal bench where the others were sitting in a row. Darren moved over a little, smiling at Gabriella as he made room for her. That's when Gabriella realized that the ancillary gym didn't have bleachers. Her forehead wrinkled in confusion. She'd been in a lot of school gyms—all over the state, in fact—but she'd never seen one without bleachers.

The teacher strode across the room until she was standing directly in front of the bench. Under her sharp, watchful gaze, everyone sat up a little straighter.

“I'm Ms. Therian,” she said. Her voice wasn't loud, exactly, but it carried across the gym, echoing off the concrete walls, as if she had a megaphone in her hand. “This is Independent Study: Physical Education—at least, that's what the outside world thinks it is. But you all know better, don't you?”

Do we?
Gabriella wondered, shifting uncomfortably on the hard bench. She had a strange feeling that this was no ordinary gym class . . . not even Jock Gym for Superjocks.

Fiona's pale hand fluttered into the air. “Gym is a requirement for graduation,” she said. “Are we getting a special exemption?”

“In a manner. To everyone else at this school, you're in gym class,” Ms. Therian explained. “But what you're going to be learning in this room is far more important.”

A heavy silence settled over the students as they waited for her to continue.

“There's no easy way to tell you this,” Ms. Therian said. “In the many years that I've taught, I've found it's best to go ahead and say it: you are Changers. What humans might call shape-shifters. And you're here to begin your training.”

Gabriella blinked.
Surely
she hadn't heard correctly. . . .

Surely
this was some kind of a joke. . . .

She didn't even know what a shape-shifter
was
. . . .

Mack's hand shot up. “Ms. Therian, you're kidding, right?” he asked. “I mean, shape-shifters are awesome
and all, but they're about as real as . . . I don't know, superheroes or zombies . . .”

“Comic-book stuff,” Darren scoffed.

Fiona stood up. “May I go to the main office?” she asked. “I need to make sure my transcript will be okay, and this definitely doesn't sound like gym class, which is a requirement for graduation, like I said, and—”

What happened next was so sudden, and so surprising, that none of the students could quite describe it. The lights of the ancillary gym flickered unevenly, as though a sudden surge of power had drawn electricity away from them. The air crackled. A brisk breeze ruffled Gabriella's hair, like a storm was brewing. But that didn't make sense; they were indoors.

There was a flash of light so blinding that Gabriella had no choice but to shield her eyes.
A fire,
she thought wildly as she caught the acrid scent of burning wires. Gabriella pulled her hand away from her face, searching desperately for the exit as her eyes adjusted.

But there was no escape, even though the doors were still unlocked. Because there, in front of the exit, stood the most massive, terrifying creature Gabriella had ever seen.

The beast's sharp claws went
click, click, click
on the cold wooden floor. Gray, shaggy fur covered her tense muscles. When she turned to look at the students, she peered at them through hard, glittering eyes over a long snout.

Darren had seen wolves before—his uncle had taken him camping last winter, and for Darren, once had been enough—but this wolf was so much more terrifying than anything he could have imagined. Instinctively, he thrust his arm in front of the other kids to protect them. Gabriella batted his arm away. Darren glanced at her in confusion and got his second surprise: there was something wrong with her eyes . . . Their color and shape—

Another flash blinded Darren. Bright sparkles crowded his field of vision; he rubbed his fingers against his eyes, trying to clear his sight. As the sparkles began to fade, Darren realized the wolf was gone. In its place was Ms. Therian. She regarded them with a calm, even stare.