by Watson, Rhea
Ugh times a million.
We could pick up the conversation later—again, the healthier, more difficult, more adult thing to do—after I had cooled off.
Petty and selfish and childish as it was, I needed the space to calm down and leave Overreaction City behind for Logic Central and Rational Thinking Junction.
Or, you know, whatever.
“Silly girl…” I stilled a few feet from the stairs, the ice in my veins hardening at the sound of that fucking voice. “Get in here and out of the wet.”
Arms folded, rainwater dribbling down my forehead, I slowly glared over at Benedict motherfucking Hammond blocking the nearest door into the castle, propping it open for me with a patronizing smile and beckoning me through with a wave of his huge hand.
Traditional warlock robes fluttering in the chilly breeze, coal-black gaze assessing me from top to bottom, lingering where my wet oversized sweater-dress stuck to my curves.
This fucking guy.
After everything, not just Bjorn but everything, I so wasn’t in the mood for his crap tonight.
Patience razor thin, I wasn’t in the mood to pretend.
Jaw clenched, I barreled by him, muttering a rough thanks in passing. One stride over the castle’s threshold and Benedict showed his true colors, clamping down on my arm and wrenching me back.
“Wait a minute,” he said, his tone somehow both light and threatening, “a proper thanks is always appreciated for chivalrous—”
“Let go,” I snarled, whipping around and jerking my arm free, air crackling with my aura.
I seldom ever felt my aura; like you never really knew how your own voice sounded, it was just easier to get a read on someone else’s energetic charge, the magical force shimmering out of sight, out of mind, in the ether. But, really, no surprise mine was at a twenty tonight: still fired up from the conversation with Bjorn, heartbroken about Alice, worried for Jack… I was a ticking time bomb, and it was just better to be alone until I got a grip on my emotions.
Benedict must have sensed it right away—because the asshole laughed, like setting me off was so wonderfully droll.
“Whoa, whoa,” he crooned, patting the air like I was some dumb, startled calf. The magical well inside me went from a simmer to a boil, power sizzling through my limbs, adrenaline surging right alongside it. Benedict merely cocked his head to the side, either oblivious to my mood or totally reveling in it. The cruel twinkle in his eye suggested the latter. “Calm down, sweetheart. I was just being a nice warlock—”
“You…” This whole nice-guy façade made me want to rip off his ears and shove them down his throat. I pointed a rigid, trembling finger at him, all the rage I had with Bjorn finally directed at the proper target.
But then reality tickled the nape of my neck.
I needed this shitbag.
I needed him to confess at some point, on a recording or in front of witnesses, so I could nail him to the wall in a court of witch law—and watch him suffer for the rest of his miserable life in a hole with no windows below the council courthouse.
“No,” I whispered, forcing my arm down, the rest of me shaking—from the cold, the unbridled anger, the roller coaster of feeling from the last twenty-four hours threatening to drag me under. I shook my head and turned away, hoping that was dismissal enough. Even one of my kids could tell from my body language, my tone, that now wasn’t the time for a fucking conversation. Nothing about me said I wanted to shoot the shit in some dimly lit back corridor. “No. Never mind.”
Hoping this douchebag could accept that and knowing full well he wouldn’t, I started off down the stone hallway, the ceiling arched overhead and stamped with recessed lights. Not a part of the castle I gave much thought to before, but I had broken up my fair share of canoodling couples on my way to the greenhouses here in the last few months, den mothers nowhere to be found and good security a distant memory.
“I have a gift for you, Alecto.” The wooden door finally clicked shut, noisily blotting out the early spring thunderstorm. “One that I think will finally change your mind about me—about that pesky rule regarding dating coworkers.”
I stopped abruptly and closed my eyes with a deep, centering breath. Clearly he hadn’t just been walking by and decided to hold the door open for me: Benedict Hammond had on been on the hunt with some stupid gift, ever the fucking stalker.
Time to squash this—peacefully.
Swallowing hard, I faced him again with a thin smile and raised brows. “Is that so?”
Seriously, dude. What about making a rain-drenched witch stand around in some drafty corridor while you pontificated on rules and gifts seemed like a good strategy to court her?
Unless the intention was to court badly.
Piss me off.
Make me hate him even more.
Then, you know, mission accomplished.
Benedict lifted a finger, motioning for me to wait, while his other hand plunged into the depths of his deep purple warlock robes, his cloak thick and stitched with gold filigree. So pretentious. A moment later, he produced a black velvet ring box, and my gut bottomed out, my mouth suddenly painfully dry while my throat ached with thick, hot dread.
Smirking, the warlock cracked the little box open, angling it so the piece inside caught the light.
He…
That…
I lilted into the wall—it was either that or drop to my knees while my heart stopped and lit on fucking fire.
That—was my mom’s wedding ring.
I’d recognize it anywhere from all the photos, the keepsakes littered around my grandparents’ house in vintage frames. A shimmering oval ruby on a rose-gold band, diamonds by the dozen, patterned beautifully like shooting stars on either side of the main attraction. The story went that it had cost half a year’s salary for a jeweler to design it, one of a kind, deeply personal and straight out of my dad’s head.
That ring… was a Corwin family heirloom.
No one had ever found it in the rubble of our ancestral home.
He—
This fucker—
He—
“Overwhelming, isn’t it?” Benedict mused, shifting the ring box to make every diamond sparkle under the lights. And they did. They danced for me—just as they must have danced for my mom the first time Dad cracked open the original ring box it had once sat cushioned in. Benedict chuckled, staring straight into my eyes as he said, “Consider it a token of my affectionate—”
I launched myself at him with a banshee screech. No wand. No burst of magic from my palms—just pure, uncut, unadulterated physical rage. The attack seemed to have caught him off guard, because I was on him in a second, slashing my nails across his face, painting his grey stubble red. There was no plan. No forethought. Fists and fury rained down on him, ten times stronger than the storm brewing outside. I punched and raked and kicked and shoved my knee into his fucking groin so he folded over with a wheeze, ring box clattering to the ground just before his back slammed into the door. Finally, with a little support behind him, he managed to grab my shoulders and shove me so hard I staggered backward—right onto my ass.
Pain bloomed up my tailbone, but I barely felt it, barely acknowledged it, magic and adrenaline twining together into something dangerous.
“I knew it,” Benedict snarled breathlessly, bracing on the door and glaring down at me like I was literal pond scum. “I’d know those eyes anywhere!”
“Fuck you!” I shrieked as I shot up, logic and reason out the window, all those cautious plans ashes at my feet. We both drew our wands at the same time, his from a hip holster and mine from the leather strap around my forearm. While mine shook, Benedict’s stared me down evenly, the warlock more in control of the moment. Still, I stood tall despite the chaos swirling inside, the one that made my knees knock and my pulse pound. “Give me back her ring, you fucking psychopath.”
Benedict kicked the ring box in my direction; it sailed by and bounced down the hall, and as much as I wanted to dive f
or it, I stayed perfectly still, wand trained on his seething face.
“The one I bought her was much better,” he sneered. Once again my body wanted to crumble, peter to the left and crash into the wall.
I let one knee buckle, my full weight on the other, and nothing more. “What did you just say?”
He flashed his teeth, that smile all predator. “So, you survived the fire, Hannah? I’d always wondered—”
“My name is Alecto, Benedict.”
We glowered at each other, wands crossed, the air alive with not just my aura, but his, too, the pair colliding like two charging armies.
“And here I thought the Corwin line had finally died out,” he muttered, chin jutted so he could sneer down his nose at me. For the first time since I’d heard his stupid fake voice carrying over the rain, I smirked.
“Nope.” The smirk shifted to full-blown grin when his eyes narrowed. “You fucked up, dirtbag.”
“Trust me, it won’t happen again,” he fired back. “You may have your mother’s eyes, but you have your father’s arrogance…” His black gaze crawled across my face, then up and down my figure so that I really felt it. “And you stink of Corwin mediocrity.”
“Fuck you.”
“There’s that Corwin eloquence,” he spat. “I can’t believe I considered you on par with her—”
Even though I managed to knock his wand aside, Benedict saw this attack coming. He braced for it, brute force driving me hard enough that I slammed him into the door again, only this time he fought back. It would have been cleaner to cast, to fire off a disarming incantation or a stunning hex—something. But the fury inside craved blood, driven by fire rather than fear.
And I just wanted to rip him apart with my bare hands.
Bigger than me, physically stronger, Benedict wasn’t the same fighter he was the first time around, and it seemed the only way I’d get the upper hand was with the element of surprise. Because in an instant his arms were around me, hurling me into the wall. I elbowed him hard in the ribs, forcing out a satisfying grunt, but a second later he grabbed my hair and slammed my forehead into the grey stone. Agony ripped through my skull and stars danced in my eyes, but even in a daze, my body had its own agenda. I kicked back with everything I had, nailing him right in the knee so that something cracked.
“Little bitch,” he hissed, and I grinned again, sporting a little savagery of my own even as blood oozed down my forehead and into my brow.
“It’s less than you deserve, asshole.”
“I’ll give you what you deserve—oomph.”
My elbow finally said hello to his mouth, and even though it hurt, it felt pretty fucking fantastic, too.
Just as his grip tightened in my hair, wrenching my head back, a soft throat clear had us both stilling, going from panting combatants to rigid statues.
At the end of the little corridor stood Iris Prewett, dressed in the same dark grey hoopskirt as this morning, the same busy blouse with its frills and ruffles, the same painfully tight bun and disapproving frown.
“Professor Cedar,” she said sharply, her hawkish gaze sliding from his face to mine. “Professor Clarke. Might I remind you where you are right now—and that brawling is unbecoming of witches and warlocks. We’re not dogs.”
Benedict immediately released me, and I clawed up the wall, needing to grit my nails into the grout for support. Had she heard our conversation? Did I have a witness? Even one as patronizing as Iris Prewett would do.
“He—”
“Miss Clarke.” Iris held up a hand to silence me—not that she needed to. The way she sneered Clarke told me loud and clear that she had heard everything, that even if she didn’t know the whole story, she knew enough to determine I was a liar. My gaze darted back to Benedict, but he was busy furiously wiping the blood off his cheeks, oblivious to the fact that we had been caught trying to tear each other apart in an academy hallway.
Iris, meanwhile, strolled toward us slowly, a witch in total control, her massive skirt swaying side to side with every step. She paused briefly to glance down at the ring box, open and on its side, my mom’s wedding ring still mercifully set in the silky bedding.
Material reminiscent of her coffin, actually.
My heart skipped a beat at the thought.
He wouldn’t—
He ripped Mom and Dad into literal pieces.
He would.
“There are changes coming to Root Rot Academy in the next few days,” Iris remarked, her crisp, nasally voice jostling me out of a huge downward spiral. She sniffed and sidestepped the ring box like she was above it, thin, waifish hands threaded together and resting on her hoop skirt. “Changes you may not be entirely comfortable with.”
I stared back at her like an idiot, head pounding, thoughts muddled.
“Let me be the first to offer you a generous severance package, effective midnight tomorrow.”
Right after the usual Sunday staff meeting.
“W-what?” I stammered. Jack’s unconscious, bloody body flashed across my mind’s eye, and my heart dropped again. Had he—had something happened? Last I heard he was on the road to recovery, long as it might be. “No, I—”
“Let me be clearer,” the witch said primly, finally stopping a few feet away. Benedict pushed off the wall and meandered over to her, squishing around her massive skirt and using it like a cotton-crinoline shield. Blood streaked his face, a trio of bright red lines courtesy of my nails shining like beacons in the night. Despite that, he peered down his nose at me, smug, gloating, glaring—bleeding. Iris, on the other hand, barely acknowledged him, her yellow-grey gaze pinned on me like she was enjoying this. “Substantial changes are coming to Root Rot Reform School, changes you may not be entirely comfortable with—and you may not survive.”
Shock echoed through me.
“No one would blame you for walking away, Miss Clarke,” Iris added, tone kind but everything else about her overtly cruel. “Just a little food for thought. Not everyone is cut out for this line of work.”
She then twisted back to check on Benedict, scratching some of the blood from his stubble with her thumbnail. Shock seemed to reverberate through him, too, but he recovered faster, oozing from stiff to pliant at her touch, the pair swapping private grins like I wasn’t even here.
What—the fuck.
“As with all my staff—” Iris slowly rotated around, struggling to maneuver her massive skirt but clearly trying not to show it. “—I encourage you to think about yourself—to do what’s best for you and your… future.”
She then flashed a smirk over her shoulder and left, heels clicking down the corridor. Benedict pressed up against the wall to let her pass, then faced me again with a look that could peel flesh from bone in a different magical reality. A shiver cut down my spine, the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end and self-preservation demanding I bolt.
I held my ground.
Stood taller.
Glared down my nose at him.
And he stalked after Iris without a word—like a good little puppy who had found a new mistress, an ally in his game of lies, murder, and psychopathy.
I waited until the click of their shoes faded off entirely, then slid to the ground with a stuttering gasp. Head in a world of hurt and blood still dripping down my face, I crawled for my mom’s abandoned ring.
Grabbed the box with both shaking, numb hands and clutched it to my chest, panting, on the verge of hyperventilating.
Held it tight—then closed my eyes and breathed.
Long inhale. Hold. Longer exhale.
Over and over again, forcing my body to settle, breathing out the shock of—that.
“Gods,” I rasped when I finally felt more in control, glancing skyward with a scowl, “what is happening?”
No one would answer, same as always, but this time my ask was rhetorical.
I knew precisely what was happening, what awaited the academy on the cloudy horizon.
A coup.
A ret
urn to the old ways.
And those of us who didn’t approve could either shut up or ship off.
And Jack… Gods, I had no idea where Jack was or what had happened, but I wasn’t going anywhere without him.
Or Bjorn.
Or Gavriel.
Nor would I abandon a single one of my students to that fucking hag and her psychotic new lapdog.
Shivering, I yanked Mom’s ring out of the box, then hurled the velvet square down the empty corridor with a cry. While too small for my pointer, it fit just fine on my right hand’s ring finger, the ruby glistening beneath the overhead lights.
Shimmering like blood.
Which—was weirdly empowering.
I brought my fist to my chest and closed my eyes, Iris’s words still ringing in my ears.
The threat was clear: get out of her way or be crushed under her heel.
My eyes snapped open. No. I wouldn’t stand for this, and no one else would, either. Jack would raise hell. Bjorn would never strike a student. Gavriel would… Well, he’d complain a lot, but knowing his past, that he had a history of wanting to do what was best for his people, I was sure he would choose the right side in all this, too.
Beyond all that, Benedict now knew I had survived, that a Corwin walked the halls of his sanctuary.
He’d come for me. Find a way to silence me so I couldn’t expose him.
The easiest thing would be to leave. Take a chunk of cash and get out with my life.
I snorted weakly.
When had I ever gone for the easiest option?
I knew what it meant to stay.
Fuck you both.
I knew the risk. I knew the consequences. I knew how the game would have to be played going forward.
Make all the threats you want…
I peered down at my mom’s ring, her strength blossoming in my chest and my dad’s stubbornness igniting in my heart.
I’m not going anywhere.
TO BE CONCLUDED…
Coming Soon!
It’s conclusion time!
