9

Hope POV

After crying on Alette's shoulder for a few minutes with everyone looking at me I pull away puffy eyes and all. For some reason I'm embarrassed to face Arion. I can almost feel his eyes watching me with worry, which feels nice if I am being honest with myself. Finally standing again I take a deep breath and say "Well lets get this tour started shall we?" 

Alette smiles and takes my hand interlocking our elbows as she says, "Lead the way oh wise one" Arion just laughed at his sisters anticks while grabbing my other hand, but instead of locking elbows he interlaces our fingers together while looking at me as if asking for permission. I nod at him and squeeze his hand which makes him smile at me. His smile almost takes my breath away with his green eyes sparkling like emeralds in the sunlight. 

We begin our tour talking about the school and the different types of creatures that go here. I show them the gym, classrooms, kitchen, lounge, library and finishing up our tour in the cafeteria for lunch. Once there we are spotted by Lizzie and Josie. They make their way over with Lizzie practically eye raping Arion and Josie doing the same but to both of the siblings. My hand tightens around Arion's as I pull Alette closer and steer us in the direction of the nearest table. 

Lizzie sauntered over and sat directly in front of Arion while reaching her hand over the table trying to take his saying, "Hi I'm Lizzie and this is my twin sister Josie fraternal of course." 

Arion just lifted our interlocked hand and said, "I would shake hands but I'm all tied up sorry. I'm Arion and this is my twin sister Alette." He said pointing to Alette who was sitting on the other side of me. Alette smiled and laughingly said, "fraternal twins of course, you know how it is." 

I thought Lizzie's head was going to rocket off her shoulders when she turned to look at Alette she almost snarled "Oh honey, you have no idea who your messing with."

Arion cleared his throat drawing everyone's attention towards himself and said, "I'm sure we can all find a way to get along. Sorry about my sister she is very protective of me just as I am with her. Being locked in a tree for a few hundred years will do that to a person." 

Arion POV

I realized to late that I shouldn't have said that when Alette's inner screams pierced my head. Gripping my head with my free hand cause I refuse to let go of Hope I say aloud "What was that for sis? Now I have a headache." 

Alette just rolls her eyes at me and says, "Just what everyone wants to hear that we are a few hundred year old teenagers that were trapped in trees. Get real Arion it makes people uncomfortable."

 Hope looks at me with shock, wonder and questions in her eyes I squeeze her hand and say, "please just hear us out before you judge us." While internally I apologized to Alette who just nods at me and moves to sit next to me grabbing my only free hand for support. 

Hope nods and says, "explain" while quirking one eyebrow up. I look at Alette take a deep breath and begin. "Alette and I were trapped in our tree forms by our Aunt Elida and our father Lysander a few hundred years back to keep us safe. We were stuck until one or both of them could undo the spell that kept us sealed. Two days ago our Aunt was released from Malivore and was able to free us. So while we have been alive for a while we are still very much teenagers and have a lot left to learn." 

Hope just says, "That explains just enough to not be nothing."

Alette chuckles and says, "Look I know it's kind of vague but It is the truth we don't lie or at least we try not to. We will tell you more but please just give us time, this hole human thing is kind of overwhelming to us right now. Not to mention that we haven't been able to talk to anyone other than ourselves and our Uncle in around two hundred years. That time away from the world has left us with a lack of social skills."

Hope squeezed my hand and sighed while saying, "fair enough, but I do want answers." Alette and I just nod and smile at her, glad that we have the time to adjust and come up with what we want to share and what to keep to ourselves for now at least. 

We then begin to eat lunch, with Hope and I still holding hands for I refuse to let go and she seems content enough to allow me this small pleasure. Lizzie just stares at us with malice in her frosty eyes and her sister Josie wont stop ogling Alette who I can tell is uncomfortable with the attention.

A young man walks towards us with a large smile on his face he looks enamored with Lizzie but she doesn't notice so he looks to us and says, "Hi I'm MG. Welcome to the Salvatore school. What's your name?" 

I look at him and smile because he radiates friendliness and positivity saying, "Hello I'm Arion and this is my sister Alette."

He looks at us nodding and said Mr. Saltzman has asked me to have you, your sister and Hope come to his office after your done eating of course." 

Looking at MG I smile and say, "sure, no problems. Do you want to join us until we finish eating?" He smiles even brighter if that is even possible and says, "yea that would be cool." 

We sat talking and laughing for about twenty minutes before we were all done eating and we stood to head over to Mr. Saltzman's office with MG leading the way. Hope hadn't let go of my hand since I took hers and I couldn't be happier with this small allowance. When we got to Alaric's office MG knocked and we entered Dorian was there sitting in a chair opposite Alaric. We all walked in and Alaric had MG leave. Hope went to leave but I held her in place not letting her go. Alette just smiled at me as she led the way to a couch that was against the wall with enough room for three to sit on.

Alaric POV

I watched as Arion refused to release Hope but she said nothing almost as if she was perfectly happy to hold hands with Arion. This is interesting I will have to keep an eye on them even more so if Landon comes back. 

Standing up I look over at them and ask "I know your both new to the human body thing after so long, but I need to know so we can get a baseline for what classes to put you in. Have you had any formal studies before?"

Alette smiled at me and said, "Well there is the internet Alaric and our Uncle made us do online classes for the basics. We should be at high school level in the core classes, although our magical studies are only what we remember from before..."Alette cleared her thought as she trailed off before starting again. "Uncle came across a traveling witch every once in a while but we never met them. He said it was to dangerous for us being stuck as trees, kind of made us sitting ducks plus fire and all. Even if the fire couldn't kill us as trees we were susceptible to injury from it." 

"That is enlightening." I said looking at the twins I looked at Hope trying to get her to leave so I could ask more questions but Arion said, "She can stay we don't plan on keeping secrets from her." I nod and ask "What do you mean that fire won't kill you?" 

Alette again looked at me and said "Because we are immortal we are descended from a fire phoenix on our mothers side so fire can't kill us. it can harm us if we are in our tree forms because trees are flammable but we won't die just be reborn through fire or at least that's what Mama said. We never had the courage to test it though." 

Nodding as if I wasn't freaking out over the knowledge bombs these twins keeps dropping on me I said " We will have to sit down and catalog your powers so that we can better help you with mastering them. I will also call your Aunt and Uncle to get there opinions on this as well. Until then I will ask your Uncle for your school records. Welcome to the school and enjoy the rest of your day. Hope would you mind showing our new students to their room now?" 

Hope stood nodding still holding Arion's hand and then linked arms with Alette leading the two from my office.

I turned to Dorian and said "Did you get all of that cause I think my head is spinning."

Dorian stood and said "I am going to the library to do some research on Dryads and Phoenix's maybe I can help with coming up with a training regime once we get a list of their powers. Holler if you need me Ric. Oh and before I forget, here is the knife."