CHAPTER ONE

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"Be scared, and do it anyway."

That's my new mantra, and I'm gonna live it and breathe it.

Because a lot of crazy shit has happened to me in the past three days.

Understatement of the century!

One day, I'm a high school drop-out barely scraping by as a waitress. The next, I'm a student at a secret college of magick.

I just got to Atlantis Academy this morning, and I've already made some new enemies, got arrested for murdering a siren—it was self-defense, I swear—and blew up the main building on campus. Oh, yeah, and... I died.

Yep. I died. My heart stopped three times, the doc said.

How's that for making a grand entrance?

But everything's fine now.

Really.

More than fine!

How could it not be?

I let out a half-crazed laugh and drop my new turquoise suitcase—first one I've ever owned—to the ground.

So much has happened, it's true... but I'm right where I've always wanted to be: in an old-growth Redwood forest in Northern California.

I can't believe I'm really, really here!

I twirl around on the path, letting out my nervous energy, inhaling the earthy, citrusy fir tree scent of the gigantic Redwoods swaying in the breeze hundreds of feet above me

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I twirl around on the path, letting out my nervous energy, inhaling the earthy, citrusy fir tree scent of the gigantic Redwoods swaying in the breeze hundreds of feet above me.

Then I fall against the nearest one, trying to catch my breath, and press my hand into its soft reddish bark, careful to avoid the spiderwebs crisscrossing it.

I close my eyes and send all my love through my palm and into the tree. A rush of happiness and love come back to me, along with the high-pitched vibration of the beautiful magick the Redwood trees hold.

"Ah." I let out a contented sigh as my nerves settle down.

Magick is real, and I get to use it. I just gotta learn how to use it in a way that doesn't kill people... including myself.

Simple, right?

It better be... 'cause if I don't pass the Entrance Trials, the Academy will hand me back over to Cerberus Supernatural Law Enforcement agents so they can execute me for murdering a siren.

Can't have that.

"Start before you're ready," I whisper, repeating Chloe's words of advice yet again. "Be scared, and do it anyway!"

I can pass the Trials, and I will.

'Cause I'm an Atlantean, and I belong here.

I smile and let out a loud whoop.

Something rustles to my right.

My hands fly to the straps of my backpack, and I go still, peering into the enormous ferns that carpet the forest floor.

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