Chapter 66: Where Wolves Spoke and Vampires Lied
{CAROLINE}
The cafeteria buzzed with low conversation when we arrived.
Trays clattered. Silverware chimed against porcelain. The air was thick with the scent of blood broth, spiced meats, and something coppery beneath it all.
We ordered our food quickly and chose a table tucked away from the others, far enough that no one could pretend proximity was accidental.
I had just lifted my spoon—
When hot liquid suddenly poured down over my head.
I gasped, breath tearing from my lungs as scalding soup cascaded through my hair and soaked into my clothes.
The red color slid down my skin in thick streams, clinging, staining, burning.
Iris cried out beside me.
She’d been hit as well.
Both of us stood frozen, drenched in crimson, the viscous liquid dripping from our sleeves, pooling at our feet. The smell hit a second later—iron-heavy, unmistakable.
Blood-based soup.
Laughter rang out behind us.
"Ahahaha! Red looks good on you."
Morgana.
I turned slowly.
She stood there grinning, fangs glinting under the cafeteria lights, her posture lazy and cruel. Behind her clustered a group of vampires, all watching with thinly veiled amusement, their crimson eyes bright with interest.
"It makes you look... appetizing," she added, licking her lip.
My hands trembled as I clenched my fork.
"You..." My teeth ground together as I glared at her, fury burning through the shock. "What the hell is your problem?"
"Oh?" Morgana tilted her head mockingly. "You’re still talking back, human?"
She stepped closer.
"You still don’t understand your predicament." Her gaze dragged over me slowly, as though weighing meat. "Go look at yourself in the mirror. Then maybe you’ll finally realize it."
Her smile sharpened. "You’re merely food to us. Nothing more."
Murmurs followed.
"Humans still enrol here?"
"Haven’t they learned their lesson?"
"Didn’t they know that no human reach it to the second level? All of them dead."
My fingers tightened around the fork until the metal bit into my palm.
"And what?" she purred. "You’re going to stab me with that?"
She leaned in, voice dropping to a whisper meant only for me. "Before you even lift your hand, my fangs would already be buried in your neck."
I glared at her—burning, shaking—but I didn’t move.
The room had gone quiet. Too quiet.
"What is going on here?"
Morgana stiffened.
I turned.
Standing behind her was Professor Elspeth Morvain.
She was a tall lean frog—unnaturally so—and her presence alone seemed to bend the air around her. Her skin was green, her eyes dark like frogs and sharp beneath the shadow of her hood. A long staff rested in her hand, its surface etched with ancient sigils that pulsed faintly.
She looked less like a woman and more like a walking decree.
Professor Elspeth Morvain. Instructor of Blood Etiquette & Noble Conduct.
The one who taught feeding laws, hierarchy, and restraint among creatures of the night.
The one whose violations did not end in detentions—
But disappearances.
Her gaze swept over the spilled soup, the stained uniforms, the tense cluster of vampires.
Then it settled on Morgana.
"Explain," she said.
Morgana only smirked.
"There’s nothing to explain, Professor," she said lazily, lifting her chin as though the entire hall belonged to her. "My hand merely slipped. It just happened to fall on top of her." Her eyes slid toward me, crimson glinting with mock innocence. "Isn’t that right, human?"
The word human was spoken like an insult carved with a smile.
I clenched my fists, my nails biting into my palms. Rage burned hotter than the soup that still clung to my skin. "You threw it at me," I snapped. "You did it on purpose."
A ripple of laughter passed through the vampire tables.
"Huh? Really?" Morgana blinked, feigning surprise. She turned slowly, addressing the hall as if she were a benevolent hostess seeking clarification. "Did any of you see me throw the soup on her?"
Silence.
Not the peaceful kind—but the suffocating sort, heavy and tense.
"I—she did," Iris said suddenly.
Her voice trembled, thin but brave. I turned to her instinctively. The burn mark on her arm was already gone, healed down to smooth, unmarred skin. Werewolf regeneration—swift in its unfairness.
Meanwhile, my own skin still throbbed. Red. Angry. Stinging with every shallow breath. The heat of the liquid had sunk deep, as if it wanted to brand me, remind me of my place.
Morgana rolled her eyes slowly, dramatically. "Did you see me do it?" she pressed, her tone sharpening just enough to draw blood.
Iris froze.
Her lips parted, then closed. Her gaze flickered—fear, doubt, anger. Finally, she looked away.
"See?" Morgana said sweetly.
A murmur of agreement rose from the vampire ranks, smooth and venomous. Laughter followed. Some of them didn’t even bother hiding their amusement, their eyes glittering as if this were nothing more than a delightful interruption to their meal.
I scanned the hall desperately.
"Someone else saw it," I insisted, my voice cracking despite myself. "I know you did."
No one answered.
The vampires watched with entertained detachment, as though they were observing prey squirm.
The others . . . None of them wanted to be implicated. None of them needed to be.
The humans—those few scattered among the hall—lowered their eyes. Shoulders hunched. Silence chosen over truth.
Cowards.
That was why humans remained weak. Not because they lacked strength—but because they had been taught, over generations, that survival meant submission. Silence. Endurance.
"We saw it."
The voice cut through the tension like a blade.
Every head turned.
Near the far end of the hall stood a group of werewolves, their presence always a little more chaotic than the others—less polished, less restrained. From among them stepped forward a tall young man.
He was lean, broad-shouldered without being bulky, carrying the effortless strength of something that knew it could tear through bone if provoked. His hair was a wild, striking violet, falling into his eyes in careless strands. Those same eyes—sharp, luminous—held an unsettling calm.
Handsome, in a rough, untamed way.
"That vampire," he said plainly, lifting a finger and pointing directly at Morgana, "dropped the soup on that human."
