Lesson One: Find allies who are willing to go down with you. As a Neutral family member, I, Adeelah Rylie Neutral, promise to uphold the peace of all Naturals. When I made that vow, I never knew I’d be put to the test. One event cascaded into another, and before anyone could grasp what was going on, all the Naturals were being dragged out of the darkness. Then, the real challenge began. I’m expected to pave the way, to find a solution to keep the Naturals safe against the humans who fear too much for little reason. There’s just one problem. I’m the black sheep in the family, born broken. I’m not immortal like I should be, and my clock is ticking. But being more human than everyone else doesn’t stop me from doing my job. My peaceful solution? An academy. My biggest challenge? Surviving until the first day of classes. At least I have three handsome Naturals who are on my side. I’ll just keep the tidbit about me being a broken Neutral to myself. I wouldn’t want to make them think I was prey. Even if they keep looking at me like I’ll make the perfect dinner. Or would that be dessert? A/N: This story was previously published in Magic and Mayhem anthology. Only light changes have been made to the story before publishing.

Lesson Fight bravely for what you believe in. With Halloween just around the corner, I have my hands full. Kids want to have fun, I want to have fun, and something in the woods wants to have fun too. My kiddies start going missing, sending us into chaos and pissing me off. I’m more than happy to go hunting and destroying whoever decided to put their bloody hands on my students. If that was all I had to deal with, everything would be peachy, but then I got a wild familiar who keeps stalking me. I think it's taking lessons from the guys because they’re just as stalkery too. And of course, the Purity Party refuses to be side-lined. If anything else falls into my plate, I’m going to scream until the world shatters.

Be patient, it'll all come to light in due time. Someone is making a bold move against me, testing my patience. Maybe it's because we've been going easy on people recently as the Neutral Family. Maybe it's because they see me as the most vulnerable in my family. Either way, someone out in the abyss is making a very dangerous move. I can only hope that once we resolve this, all the pieces will fall neatly into place, but something is telling me it won't be that simple.