New routine. I avoided any emotional attachment to the girls, stuck as close to Kanesha as school allowed and, when possible, got a ride from Thruor. Which got me an interesting reputation.
They thought I was a lesbian, which was part right, and they thought Thruor was my older girlfriend. That amused her to no end. She was not at all interested in women, from what she said, but she still found the obvious conclusion amusing.

“Honestly. Why don’t they assume we’re related?”

“I guess they figure if we were we’d be living together.” We were outside the school and I glanced around. “I wish we could. You can look after yourself. Those girls can’t.”

“This time, we’re ready for something to happen.” Something fiery, no doubt, but Surtur hadn’t touched the modeling agency and had seemed to be satisfied with the damage already done.

Or they had overstepped their orders and he’d beaten them up or even killed them for it. I rather suspected the latter. Or that he hadn’t anticipated just how mad I would be. I was still mad, but I knew there wasn’t much I could do unless more of them showed up.

“I guess. Be careful.” She turned back to her bike and I reluctantly went through the gates.

There was a tension in the air that seemed to me to be part magical, part mundane. I wasn’t happy about it at all. Something or someone seemed to be watching, and I couldn’t tell if they were on my side or not.

“There’s a new history teacher,” Kanesha said as she fell in next to me. “I don’t trust him.”

I nodded. “I’ll…take a look.” If it was a potential enemy or spy I needed to know. “As long as it’s not you know who.”

She shook her head. “No. I don’t think he could play a role that had no sense of humor whatsoever.”

Maybe it was an angel, I thought wryly. Maybe it or he even had nothing to do with me. “Yeah. He’d not last more than a couple of days.”

“Who wouldn’t?”

Dang it. Chuck had overheard us. Hopefully not everything. “We’re just teasing a friend of mine about how he couldn’t pretend not to have a sense of humor.”

Chuck rolled his eyes. “Tease him in his presence. It’s more effective.”

I grinned. “He doesn’t come to this school, though. Come on.” We left him in the hallway, but I kept my eyes open for the new history teacher.

Just in case.