Alina's smile faltered for a moment.
Inside, a panic rose. It started in her chest, a cold flutter that spread through her stomach, up her throat, into her thoughts.
They couldn't see it.
They couldn't know.
The kindergarten wasn't normal. Nothing about it was normal. The children who shifted between forms. The staff who appeared out of nowhere.
If they saw even a glimpse, if her mother saw a child's ears turn pointed, if her aunt noticed a shadow moving against the light, if either of them caught anything, it would shatter everything she had carefully, painstakingly kept separate.
Her two worlds could not meet.
She had built walls between them, high and thick, and she had maintained them for years. Her family knew she taught children. They knew she worked at a private royal academy. They knew she was happy.
