die-onaea

part 1

"That school will light on fire if I even step foot in there!" My dad didn't seem to understand that I wasn't technically allowed in schools in Seyboro, being half demon in a school of angels.

He grumbled, his tired eyes sparking with annoyance, "Be grateful, will you? I'm already broke sending you to this damn place."

My father decided to remind me that I'm a burden. For the third time today. Of course, that's why he opted for me to get a dorm. I just hoped I'd be alone. I didn't even really know why he was complaining, all he had to do was buy me a few uniforms and find me transportation to get here. $150 at most. The school told me next to nothing about... anything that had to do with me. I knew where my dorm was, and they said, "go to the main office on your first day," or whatever. Gee, thank you for the information.

Scoil an Winged was a lot bigger than I had hoped. If it were a small building with a couple of classrooms, I would've been fine. However, it looked like it held a couple thousand students... it was hard to believe that this was a high school.

The carriage stopped, and my dad stiffened. I was almost out the door before he tugged on my arm, "Dionaea, wait." The force of it surprised me. My dad never showed much interest in me, so this was a rare occurrence. I stared at him, puzzled. "Don't do anything to get you kicked out of school. This place is fancy and they will not tolerate any of your elaborate stunts."

Well, shit, why don't you just take my free will away. Nothing I do is even intentional. "Got it," I sighed. He didn't care. He wanted a normal child with white wings and a halo and... a purpose.

I fixed my uniform's skirt and hiked my way up the hill the school was placed on. Someone made a very dumb decision. I remembered being told in a letter that the dorms were behind the school, so I thought that'd be a good place to start.

I felt a bit of a chill in the air today, and glanced around the deserted campus. I was glad to not have the wandering eyes of hundreds of angels upon me. Now, at least. Everyone that went here was either rich or talented. I have no idea how I ended up here.

The day I got my acceptance letter still haunts me. It was Saturday, the day I usually spend cooped up in my room (that's a lie, I hide in my room every day), and my dad called me out into the kitchen. I was irritated, of course, but I went to see what he wanted anyway.

"Here," he said, handing me the letter, "you're going to want to read this."

I let out a heavy sigh and tore it open. The first line said something along the lines of, "Congratulations, Dionaea Lust, you've just been accepted into one of the most prestigious high schools in all of Everfall." It droned on and on about all the normal things, and nothing really caught my eye until I read the note stapled to it.

It was very unprofessional, written in a sloppy cursive that was barely legible. "Dionaea," it read, "Scoil an Winged has recently started up a fund to send dark angels to schools, knowing they wouldn't be accepted anywhere else. While they are illegal, they're still people with a beating heart and can do something great in the world if they just get an education."

I continued to read, feeling a spark of anger in my chest, "We are willing to pay your full tuition, you'll just have to pay for your uniform and supplies. This is the second time we've accepted a dark angel into our school, and I believe the first one is still there. You two would be good friends."

"Sorry for the formality of the letter, but I thought it'd be good to treat you as an equal. I'm looking forward to meeting you. Signed, Lydia Morr, principle of Scoil an Winged Academy," I read the last part aloud. "What a bunch of bullshit."

"Language," my father scolded me, "and you're going. You need a proper education. I can't teach you everything. You need real social skills, not just... talking to me."