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Mr Pollet continued "You may find and identify the animals by any means necessary There are only three rules One, you must return in exactly one hour Two, you may not touch, move, or relocate the animals And three, you must work alone"

Madame Goût took over "Are there any questions before we begin?"

I feltto panic I had too many questions One hour? To find nine dead ani the sa the tendons in her neck as she peered around the crowd toanyone "Okay Ready yourselves," she said, watching the clock on the wall When the hands hit nine o’clock, she said, "Begin!"

Everyone dispersed Soirls meandered around, unsure of what to do Others set off in one direction with deter ones Clelanced at ht

I was the only person who didn’tuntil everyone had e, mademoiselle," Madame Goût warned

Now that there was silence, I could think I walked to the center of the gymnasium, where there was a circle painted on the floor Not co, I stood in thesmall steps, I turned around in the circle until I felt the air shift, as if it wereout of ly devoid of anything I i the nuht, four paces to the left, up ten stairs Eleven paces to the right Down three stairs Two paces to the left There, I drew an X And without realizing what I riting, I scrawled the word cat in big wobbly letters

Puzzled, I stared at it I had no idea how I kneas a cat, but now that I saw the word on the page, I was certain that was it Next to it I wrote 1

I repeated the process This time when the air shifted, the path see the paces Marking it with an X, I wrote SHEEP, 2 I continued on, the e thinner and thinner CROW, 3 BOAR, 4 SQUIRREL, 5 POSSUM, 6 RAT, 7

When I got to the last tavered Their paths were so narrow that they barely see a little unsure of myself, and then crossed it out and replaced it with CARP, 8 Glancing at the clock, I realized I only had five minutes left until the exam was up But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t identify the last animal As the second hand h the doors in her white tennis shoes, and handed in her list How could she have finished? Giving up, I drew a simple X where the last animal rested, and labeled it 9

After a series of written tests on Monitoring history, we finally finished the exairls in the hall laughing and talking about their suo talk to them, but ould I say if they askeddoctors and therapists? That I’d spentwhen I would hear from my Undead boyfriend?

Suddenly the bathrooirl with rosy cheeks fell intoat lared at her

"Sorry," she said, rolling her eyes, and popped back into Cle, probably abouthall had the feel of awooden tables and three cooks standing behind a counter, flipping meat in skillets The whole rooh there were plenty of empty seats, it still felt like there wasn’t one for roup of her friends whispered as I passed the plates, I could hear Brett laughing as he joined a group of boys by the wall Finally I spotted the girls fro a table with a few people I recognized fro here?" I asked

April looked up at me "Oh, Renée Uh for me to squeeze onto the end

"Thanks," I mumbled

After a solid moment of silence, conversation resumed

"So you had Undead at Gottfried I irl asked April’s twin, Allison

"They’re like us," Allison said, picking at her salad "Except they can speak Latin"

"Do they look different?" the girl pressed "Clementine said that they look like corpses That their eyes are cloudy"

My sto at the St Cléirls on the other side of the table They shook their heads as if it were obvious "Well, Cle about"

"But she’s met the Undead before With her dad"

"So have I," I said "And she’s wrong"