Somehow, I managed to get to the end of the day without falling asleep or getting a Strike on my Report Card, although I doubted Theo made it through without either. It'd be an understatement to say that Challis High was strict with its pupils; it was brutal. They'd been cracking down on us more and more over the years, and now we were at breaking point. Well-behaved and yet out of control.

I patiently waited outside of Theo's Photography class at the end of the school day. I saw the class get up and leave. Al left first, raking her hands through her unruly, often knotted, brown hair, before twisting it up into a bun on top of her head. She cast a frown at me.

"Please don't tell me you're waiting for that new guy." She tilted her eyebrows up at me, setting her arms akimbo — her entire body language radiating disapproval. "He's an idiot, by the way."

"His name is Theo," I told her pointedly. "I'm gathering intel, okay?"

"Yeah, right," Al scoffed, "And I'm straight."

"C'mon, Al. He's not that bad."

A second before Theo emerged from the classroom door, Al came close, grabbed me and hissed into my ear — "Don't get too close to him. There's something not right about him." She looked me directly in the eyes, "Trust me."

I trusted Al implicitly, and I was probably doing the wrong thing anyway. So, I began to leave as well, attempting to take both her and my inner conscience's advice.

Theo called out to me and caught up easily with a few long strides, "Hey, Em, hold on a sec!"

"What the actual hell?" I span around, my long blonde hair grazing past his too goddamn attractive face. "My name is Ember. E-M-B-E-R."

"Okay, sorry." He shrugged an unapologetic shoulder; his tone was unnervingly nonchalant — doesn't he care about anything? "Where're you going?"

"Home. I... I don't feel too good." It wasn't a complete untruth; the first day back at school had seriously wiped me out. I felt like I needed to sleep for a full 24 hours before I could face people again.

"I need help studying," he persisted as we walked out.

"Get someone else to help you." I groaned, not in the mood at all to put up with him. I flung an arm around at the other kids pouring out of the gate, the sea of heads surrounding us, "I'm sure you could find someone else."

"Please, Em...ber," he added cautiously.

Knowing I probably wouldn't hear the end of this for a long while, I gave up way too soon. "Fine. Whatever." My inner voices scolded me for being so weak, but I quietened them before I started talking back to them.

"So, have you texted your mom?"

"Yeah, she's said she's fine with it." I glanced at him, praying he wouldn't ask me any questions about my family.

"Cool," he smiled, somehow instantly lighting up the dismal afternoon. "You can ride home with me. My dad's picking me up in the main carpark... wherever that is."

"You'll get used to the layout of Challis in no time." I waved my hand dismissively, before flinging his words back at him in a jokey way, "But I'd love to ride home with you."

He merely smirked and carried on walking, barely even casting a glance at me. I'd barely even grabbed his attention the way I found myself wanting to.

Theo's dad's car was a grey 'people mover', as my dad called them. Theo looked nothing like his father. I wondered whether there would be any resemblance between him and his mother.

"Hey, what's this?" He joked, "Bringing home a girl on the first day?" He nudged Theo, who grimaced uncomfortably.

"I'm helping him study Chemistry and French," I explained, forcing a wan smile onto my face.

"But Theo loves Chemistry..." His dad remarked, but after an extremely pointed look from Theo, he added, "I guess he could use some extra help with... some stuff. Though he does suck at French, which is why I made him take it."

"Ah, okay." The wan smile didn't move from my face.

On the journey to Theo's house, the car was silent. Theo sat next to me in the back and his dad, Neal, kept glancing at us like we were about to start making out or something along those lines... Oh, the joys of being a teenage girl sitting next to a teenage boy.

I watched out the window with mild interest before realising where we were. It was Saint Francis, the posher, more polished part of Lake Oldoy — every town has an area like Saint Francis, but not with the same backstory as the one that surrounds the little village nearby Lake Oldoy.

Saint Francis was originally built as a village for resting pilgrims on their journeys, but over time it had grown more modern. Lake Oldoy itself was a beautiful, picturesque town to live in. Situated next to the lake and in front of the vast woodlands — not far from the docks, the town had only one main road running through it.

Many people still believe that Lake Oldoy was haunted by long-dead sailors who had travelled in from the sea and failed to fight the rapids of River Oldoy to reach the tranquil lake itself and the peaceful town.

Some say Saint Francis was built as a safe haven from the spirits that plagued the alleys of Lake Oldoy. The village's motto, the foundations upon which it was built, is something Saint Francis of Assisi himself said: 'a single sunbeam is enough to drive away many shadows.'

"I didn't realise you lived here," I told Theo, even though we hadn't ever discussed where either one of us lived. Theo Aquila was hardly a ray of sunshine; I struggled to picture him fitting in at Saint Francis.

"We rent a house," he replied briefly.

"Yep," Neal agreed, before extending, "We didn't fancy living in a townhouse."

"Dad!" Theo exclaimed, somewhat protectively; clearly having guessed from my surprise at him living in Saint Francis, that I lived in a simple townhouse in the haunted Lake Oldoy.

"What, son?" Neal asked. "I was just stating what we decided to do."

"It's fine." On a whim, I reached out and touched Theo's arm — which send a shock of electric static bolts through my body. I pulled my hand away quickly; what was that? Did Theo feel that too?

Moments later, we arrived at a large house, almost a mansion. Some of the house's largest glass windows stretched from the ground floor to two stories up. Through one of these floor-to-ceiling windows, I could see a staircase stretching around.

Tall and wide yew trees surrounded the house, providing a rustic kind of comfort to the bright white building. Birds flitted in and amongst the trees, eating the red berries which are poisonous to people.

"Nice house." I nodded appreciatively, even though I still preferred my parents' small-ish townhouse.

Theo's 'mom' greeted us at the door, sharing the joke with Neal about Theo 'bringing home a girl on the first day'. Ha-ha. Very amusing; not like Theo and I had ever heard that joke before.

Theo's mom had similar colour hair to him, though hers was slightly sandier, and her skin a shade or two darker. It didn't seem like Theo was related to either of his so-called 'parents'. Well, they were all American, and I never could tell the difference between regional American accents.

A cold chill danced down my spine, like Death's fingertips grazing down my skin — before I realised that they could've just been his foster parents.

All this gathering intel is making me jump to the wrong conclusion, I deduced to calm myself down, but I kept Wednesday's and Al's warnings in mind.

We ate dinner around 5ish, which was early by my standards. If my parents were working late, it could've been 8 until I'd remember that I needed to make myself dinner.

Theo's mom's bolognese wasn't as great as Theo had claimed. Sure, it tasted okay, except for the pieces of onion which looked like mutant rubbery toenails. I pushed them as politely as possible to the edge of my plate whenever I came across one — Theo's mum wasn't going to be winning the Best Cook of the Village Award anytime soon. It was clear he knew that too; as I looked to my right where he was sitting, a look of disgust was etched plainly onto his face.

Theo raised his head and broke the silence. "We should probably go study before it gets too late."

It wasn't late at all, but I took the hint, "Thanks, Mrs... umm, Mrs Aquila."

"Call me Lis, dear." She smiled at me, though not unkindly.

"Okay. Thanks, Lis."

"Don't work too late!" She called as we walked upstairs.

Theo walked slightly ahead of me, but I paused mid-way up the first flight of stairs to look out the floor-to-ceiling window at the dense yew trees.

"Do you think she's the one?" I heard Neal's voice — even though they were downstairs and a few rooms away from the main hall, I could somehow hear him crystal clear as if he was standing right next to me.

"Possibly. But if she is who he's looking for, we can't get involved," Lis replied.

"But the Agency—"

"We're not having this conversation again, Neal."

"They'd want—" Neal's voice cut off abruptly, and I realised that my heart was beating wildly in my ears and that I was grasping tightly onto one of the thin metal balustrades that enclosed the staircase.

"Ember? You coming?" Theo called down to me.

I turned and sprinted up the stairs, unaware that I'd left a slight indentation on the balustrade that I'd been clutching while I eavesdropped on a conversation which I was almost certain was about me.

Upstairs, smooth wood panelling lined the floors — and I only just refrained from running into a slide along it. Theo led me down the corridor, before letting me ahead of him. I expected to open a door into a cute and tidy study with a desk and a few chairs, but instead, I found Theo's room.

"Where's the study?" I turned around and crashed into his chest.

"We don't have one yet — we're, umm, still moving in. But I do have a desk and laptop in my room."

"I guess it'll have to do." I pushed into his room and the first thing I acknowledged was the overwhelming heat of the room. "Oh my God; it's boiling in here! Don't you have any windows?"

Considering the number of windows that I'd already seen in his mansion, I highly doubted that his room would be the only one without great panes of glass.

"I do, but they're... umm, sealed for — weather protection purposes."

"Do you have a fan or something?" I glanced around the room in desperation. Yes, there were in fact windows — but dark grey blinds covering them sheltered the room from any cool autumn weather that might seep through.

In response, Theo merely flicked on a medium-sized fan that lethargically pushed out a small amount of lukewarm air on each swing. That's not gonna be enough to cool me down.

My skin began to prickle with heat — an early warning that I was overheating. I need to get out of my uniform... the thought blurred through my mind. At least at Ashley's, we were outside and there was some semblance of a breeze. Being in nature always managed to regulate my body temperature a little more than being cooped up inside.

I hastily discarded my blazer and tore off my tie. I started undoing my shirt buttons before I remembered with a sickening jolt where I was, and who was also there with me in the same room.

Slowly, I turned to him with three buttons undone, "Erm..." I began, "I have an, erm, whatsit... a sort of heat condition? Basically, I can't get too... hot." I finished stuttering.

Theo continued to stare at me, a baffled look on his face. He'd claimed to know my secret, and even when I'd come so close to exposing myself again (both literally and figuratively), he still hadn't figured it out.

Maybe he's waiting for me to tell him myself.

"So, should we get started on French?" I tried, willing him to snap out of his confused trance. No, I imagined his answer to be.

Yet he replied, "Sure," like I hadn't just started to strip in front of him.

French was one of my strong points, and I wasn't a half-bad teacher of it either so I paced through the basics — connectives, adjectives, pronouns, family members, pets and animals. And then I found where Theo struggled — the vouloir and pouvoir verbs, he got mixed up with which is which and conjugating them.

"So vouloir is 'to want' and pouvoir is 'to be able to.' And you conjugate them like this." I wrote the conjugations down on a sheet of paper – using my own learning technique to help him.

"Okay, so I want is je veux?" I asked, after giving him a minute to study the sheet.

He hesitated, "Is it 'I want'?"

"Yep, now try 'I can/I am able to.'" I prompted.

"Je peux." He said after less of a pause than the time before.

"Okay, now maybe try to add what you want on the end, so that it could make more sense conversational-wise."

"Je veux une banane."

"You want a banana, that's great now try with a pet or a person."

"Je veux un chien."

"You want a dog," I repeated back to him in English.

"Yeah, that's what I meant." He smiled, and I could tell he was beginning to get the hang of it. "Erm... Je veux une petite-amie."

"What's that again?" I flicked through my textbook, before switching to my dictionary, "A little friend? Oh." I found the meaning — "You want a girlfriend?"

He's only just got to the UK... a voice inside my head muttered disbelievingly.

That's when I should've realised that things were going downhill, instead of being so blatantly ignorant about what I didn't want to believe.

"That's what I said." Theo didn't even attempt to deny it, eyeing me intently, "Although you could class as both a little friend and a girlfriend to some other guy." He joked, mocking my height once again.

"There isn't any other guy," I said before silencing myself. I'd gone off-topic, so I veered back on course. "Your French isn't that bad, you know? You're improving—"

"No?" Theo remained off-topic.

I knew by then that he was stubborn, so I replied in French — so it was kind of on topic. "Non, il n'y a pas de petit-ami."

Theo inched closer to me, "Est-ce que tu veux un petit-ami ?"

"Non."

"Ember." Theo breathed in, "Je te veux."

"Oh," I began, taken aback once again by his brash boldness. He'd said I want you; Theo Aquila wants me. "Well, it would be politer to say—"

"Screw this." He aggressively cut me off, grasping onto my wrists in desperation. "I like you Ember, okay? How many more hints do I need to drop before you finally get it?"

"What do you want from me?" I frowned at him but didn't try to pull away. "Ever since you just showed up at Ashley's, you've hardly left me alone."

"I need your help." Casting down his eyes, he admitted, "I came here because I need your help, Ember."

I spat out, "How can I help you? I don't even know what you are!"

He pulled away from me, letting go of my wrists. "I don't know what you mean."

"Pass me your hand," I demanded — I needed the truth.

The truth cannot be found without the trust.

It was his turn to frown but placed his palm between both of mine anyway. Focusing on his steady and strong pulse, I put trust in him, needing to know the truth... Needing to unlock what my mind denied me knowing. So that I could See clearer, I closed my eyes.

Opening my eyes, I spoke, "You're a shifter," it was more directed at myself than him, but he replied anyhow.

"You're telling me?" He scoffed but then puzzled, "How d'you know?"

Ignoring his question, I asked, "What sort are you?"

"Can you not tell from your freaky voodoo trick?" Theo wrongly referred to my Sight — an ability which was a much-treasured gift from Wednesday. It had helped me on so many occasions and came in handy a lot, such as now, with Theo.

I focused in again, his hand still between mine and a clear image surfaced — the full moon rising above a tree-covered hillside.

"You're a... A werewolf." I breathed and let his hand drop. Baffled, I only was just able to get the words out — I had always been warned about how dangerous werewolves were... This was what Wednesday and Al had tried to warn me about.

How could I have been so stupid? Letting someone as dangerous as him get close to me... what was I thinking? I wasn't thinking.

"Yeah..." Theo trailed off before finishing, "And you're a...?"

"What makes you think I'm anything?" I challenged angrily, my fire heating up a little inside of me.

He shrugged. "You're hot."

"Well, yeah. You're kinda stressing m—"

He butted in, "I mean you smell hot."

"You wouldn't believe me even if I told you."

His curiosity only grew. "Are you a shifter as well?"

"Of sorts." I gave in — I knew this would happen as soon as I began to get closer to him. "It's complicated, I can't fully explain it..."

"What are you?" Theo's handsome face was beyond puzzled.

"If you believe in legends and myths and all that, you would call me a... Phoenix." I winced at the word — at how weird it was to call myself that. I don't think I'd ever said it aloud before then.

"Is that even possible? How are you like that? Tell me, I want to know everything," he pleaded, eyes searching mine desperately for answers I wasn't ready or even able to give him.

"Not now, there's too much to say and not enough time." I stole a glance at my watch; there never seems to be enough time.

"Ember," Theo said, "My mind hasn't changed about you. I like you."

I blushed as his voice became softer, but a harsh voice muttered in my ear he's only going to use you to get what he wants; don't forget how dangerous werewolves are.

"Well?" Theo grinned, "I know you like me back."

"We're... just friends, right?" My voice wavered at the end, as I tried to remember everything I'd ever read about the dangers of werewolves.

"We can be more," he said, and then he tried to do what I least expected but should've seen coming all the same.

Theo Aquila leaned in and tried to kiss me. His face was inches away from mine as he flicked his eyes between my eyes and my lips, seeking some sort of permission — just like they do in movies. For a moment, I was frozen — unsure of whether I wanted him to kiss me or not. But then I snapped out of it.

I shoved him away from me, refraining from slapping him. "We're just friends."

"I thought—"

"No. Whatever you thought, you thought wrong." I was furious now, launching all my books, blazer and tie into my bag, before rushing towards the door.

"Ember, wait. I'm sorry." He shrugged.

I stared at him disbelievingly — he was being a real jerk. "You don't just shrug and say you're sorry; that's not an apology," I told him fiercely, but then added, "I can't believe I was beginning to trust you as well."

"Wait..." He called out as I stormed angrily out of his room, bag slung hastily over my shoulder.

"I'm leaving," I grumbled. "And there's nothing you can do to stop me."

He followed me downstairs, "Please, Ember. Let me explain myself, you have to understand I—"

I stopped on the stairs and faced him, "I don't want to hear it, Theo. I don't have to understand anything."

His face fell, "Please... You should know at least some of the truth about me. Please just let me explain what's going on here."

"Not interested." I turned and walked down the rest of the stairs, doing exactly the opposite of what I should've done.

Because I should've stayed and listened to his side of the story. Though, once again, my anger had got the better of me — blocking out all common sense in a blind and fiery fury.