Tiger, Tiger

Tiger, Tiger: Chapter 2

Here's the next bit ;) x 

Enjoy :) 

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The foyer area was quiet as I made my way quickly inside. The large, open room was almost empty apart from the odd group of kids milling around, chatting quietly about the day ahead. The lady behind the office desk, one of the unfortunately few people my mum knew, waved hello and I smiled politely back before slipping into the main corridor.

Anyone fooled by the apparent calm of the school office would have been incredibly shocked when they stepped into the cramped corridor. People were pushed together, moving quickly like ants from room to room. Teachers were dotted throughout the group, clutching cups of tea to their chests like precious objects. Almost instantly I was swept up in the noisy crush and moved along with it, jumping out of the stream at the door to my form room.

I pressed the door closed behind me and shoved my satchel into my locker. Sighing, I turned to head for the weekly assembly. I reached out a hand to the doorknob, just as a hulking form kicked it open. The door smacked into me, hard, and I gasped as the air was knocked from my lungs. Falling against the lockers I managed to push myself up, rubbing my ribs, to face whoever had slammed the door into me.

The culprit, a boy in my form, walked straight past and didn’t even look at me, let alone apologise. If I had been a popular girl then he would’ve fumbled for an apology, tried to see if I was ok. But no, I wasn’t eligible for that. The Omega didn’t warrant any manners.

I scolded myself for acting such a victim. No amount of complaining would change my position. I pulled open the door and slipped into the now thinning corridor group, quietly joining the back of the line that was filing into the hall. I took a seat in the middle. Not at the back with the troublemakers, that would be signing up for teasing, and not at the front with the geeky kids. There isn't anything wrong with being really smart; they're just not my crowd. If I had one, that is.

The assembly began to hush as the head entered, his pointy shoes slapping on the wooden floor. Mr. Sandon was a reasonably young man, with wavy brown hair, grey eyes and a muscular build. He was also the pack's Beta. There must have been some important announcement to make. The deputy Ms. Quellay or another teacher usually gave the Monday morning assembly. I listened more intently than I would usually.

"Good morning everyone," Mr. Sandon called across the hall. He sounded as if he wanted to get this over and done with, like he had more important things to attend to. After speaking about his expectations for the new term, he then announced "Today we have a new student at Markwood High."

Whispers and shouts washed across the crowd, excitement evident. Instead, all that was running through my mind was that surely every child in the pack already attended school? How could there be a new student? Why an assembly about it? My inquisitive brain was whirring.

"She hasn’t attended a school like this before, so I want you to all make her feel welcome. Her name is Rose-Marie Martin, and she's a Werejaguar."

I frowned at Mr. Sandon’s tone when he said the word ‘Werejaguar’. It was as if he was struggling to say it, struggling to admit that there was one of her kind in our school. I felt sorry for Rose-Marie. All she had probably wanted was to have slipped into school unnoticed, without a massive assembly to announce her arrival, let alone to inform the whole school that she was a Were. It was as if Mr. Sandon wanted to make sure that everyone knew what she was and that she couldn’t hide it from anyone. Anger was already bubbling in the assembly.

There were shifter packs all over the world, but we were unique. Our pack could shift into any animal imaginable, they were all real species, but the possibilities were endless. When the pack had slipped from my father's grasp, the new Alpha and a large proportion of the pack had become, in my opinion, arrogant. They believed that any other shifter that could only take one form was below them. 'Were' was like a bad word.