Academy of Mages and Shifters 2

by Laura Wylde

  Felicia wasn’t hesitant at all, she allowed me to help her immediately with no fuss, but Evan seemed more stressed out by the idea. I tried to silently communicate with my look that I was sorry, and I wouldn’t mess up again, and eventually, he got on board with my plan. He allowed me to take his body in my hands and assist him in scaling the wall. I couldn’t help but think that it was probably a step in the right direction for us. I wasn’t sure if we were ever going to be friends as such, but being cordial was something else. We could do that.

  Once I got myself over the wall, we headed inside. It seemed that we really were sticking to the plan of keeping together for the foreseeable future, which I had to admit was a good thing. We didn’t do well apart. It seemed like our separate skills worked better together than it would if we were apart.

  “To the well,” Felicia whispered. “Let’s go and see if my theory is right.”

  She was nervous, there was a thrumming of anxiety racing through her body that was probably being matched by all of us. Well, aside from me. I wasn’t so much anxious as I was determined. I already knew that I was going to be the one going in to the well, I had made that decision earlier. With Evan getting hurt by the demon because of me, I had a lot to make up for, and I had the right skill set to make it work. I could get down there and take a picture in a heartbeat.

  My nerves amped up the closer we got to the well. It even started to get to me a little bit. But nowhere near enough for me to stop. I raised my hand and told them my plan.

  “Will you be okay?” Felicia asked me quietly. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “I can do this. Don’t worry about me. I can get it done in a moment. It will be fine.”

  “Are you sure?” Trent joined in. “Because we don’t want you to sacrifice yourself…”

  “Trust me, this is why I am here. This is what I was made for. I can do this.”

  Felicia pulled me in for a warm hug. “Take care of yourself in there. Call out if you need help.”

  Even Evan looked a little worried, but I wasn’t put off.

  I used my longer fingers and grippy toes to climb in to the well and go down a bit, and sure enough, I found the symbol. I saw the sign and snapped a picture of it. Actually, I took a few photographs because I wanted to be sure that I had a good shot even in the dark, before I began to scale the wall again. In and out, just like I said. No issues at all. I certainly didn’t need any help from anyone else to get this done. There was no trouble here at all. It wasn’t until I almost reached the top of the well and got my head out, that I heard everyone calling out my name in a panicked tone. That was so strange, there had to be some magic down there around the symbol to block off my hearing. Not a single voice got to me while I was down there. I moved quicker…

  “What’s going on?” I demanded as soon as I was free. “Another demon? Has someone been attacked? Oh God, where is Joshua? He hasn’t been captured or anything has he? Where has he gone?”

  My eyes immediately went to Evan, he was physically fine but looked terrified. Not as scared as he seemed when the demon was on top of him Though.

  “The authorities,” Felicia filled me in, her voice shaky. “They are after us. We need to get running, and we need to get our stuff. Joshua has gone on ahead to get our stuff from the hotel because we need to move quickly.”

  “What the hell happened when I was down there? How do you know all of this?”

  I was only in there for a moment, wasn’t I? But when I shimmied inside, everything was fine, and now that I was back out it seemed like the world had turned upside down. It was madness. Really disorienting. It took me a few moments to get my head on straight.

  “Evan… he thought that there was another demon, and he went out to check. In his wolf form, he overheard that the authorities are coming after us. They don’t know where we are yet, but we don’t have much longer.”

  “Shit.” First a demon was after us, now the authorities. This was bad, I felt like we were making a real mess of this and that the academy wasn’t going to be happy when they found out. “So, we should move, right?”

  Felicia grabbed my hand and shot me through the magical traveling sphere until we were at the hotel with Joshua. He was hurriedly throwing stuff in to bags, not caring what belonged to who because he was in such a rush so we joined in and did the same. My heart was in my mouth as I thought about all of us being caught and locked up. The others had families who could help them escape the confines of prison, but I had no one. I was probably going to be the one who had to take the fall because I was alone in the world.

  I would do it, of course, for them, but that didn’t mean that it wasn’t scary.

  “Where now?” I demanded as we all ran outside the hotel. “Do we have a plan?”

  “No,” Felicia admitted. “We’re just going to run. All of us together. Don’t get lost. We need each other now.”

  And then it was time for us all to take off. We all remained in our human form because we could all stay together that way, but it made us much more visible. I couldn’t help my brain from desperately trying to work out who the hell reported us. Was it someone on the side of the demons interfering with us? Or just a concerned passer-by who saw us breaking in to the castle who thought that we were pranksters or something?

  I didn’t do well with not knowing. The not knowing killed me.

  Chapter 11

  Felicia

  “Where are we going?” Evan called out from behind me. “Felicia, we can’t just keep running. We need a plan.”

  To be honest, as I slowed down and glanced around, I could see that Evan was right. We couldn’t just keep running in a frenzy because we were already pretty much lost. I had gone in to the nearby for forest to get some shelter and to give us options to hide, but now I realized that might have been a bit of a mistake.

  “Shit.” I raked my fingers through my hair as the fear and adrenaline continued to race through my body at the speed of light. I was hot and dizzy, from my head to my toes, and it wasn’t helping me think straight. “What do we do? We don’t even know why we’re being chased. You think it was demon somehow?”

  “No.” Evan shook his head determinedly. “Someone called a tip in because we were breaking and entering. I guess someone spotted us hopping over the walls.”

  Yeah, that was true, and it was also something that I kept forgetting with this. It didn’t matter how confusing this mission was, how little I understood what we were doing, it was ultimately for the greater good. We were helping people and soon I hoped that everything would make sense. Perhaps we would even be heroes.

  “That’s what you heard?” I just needed to check, and Evan nodded, confirming this. “Okay, so at least it isn’t something demonic coming our way. Although we can’t be certain that we aren’t still being followed, I suppose, since the demon just disappeared. It didn’t die, so it could still be on our tail…”

  “Yeah, we are fucked,” Evan agreed. “We need to get somewhere out of sight, if possible” He tapped his chin thoughtfully, sliding into the role of an alpha as always, trying to protect us all from whatever was coming our way. “We need somewhere to stay where we won’t be found. Someone to protect us… oh, Andrew!” The idea popped in to his head and he lit up like a light bulb. “Don’t you have family in Wales? You said that you have been to this castle before. Can’t we just stay with them? Just for a few hours while we work up a plan or something…”

  “No.” Andrew immediately became incredibly uncomfortable. It was clear from his body language. He stiffened up and his shoulders practically rolled up around his ears. “No, I don’t have anyone that I can contact…”

  Instead of letting it go like he clearly should have done, Evan’s irritation got the better of him. “Andrew don’t be a little bitch right now. We our up to our eye balls in shit here. We need someone and you could help us right now.”

  “I’m sorry, Evan. If there was something that I could do, then I would. I’m in this mess wi
th you…”

  “Well, you aren’t acting like it.” Evan glanced at me as if I was the reason for his mood. “You are acting like you don’t give a damn about any of us. I know that we might not be the best of friends, but I would look after you if it came to it.”

  As he started to get closer to Andrew, almost as if he was squaring up to him, Joshua and Trent both felt the need to move closer to prevent anything from happening. That made me nervous. I didn’t want them to fight, I didn’t want either of them to get hurt. And what if Evan decided to shift? His wolf form could be pretty terrifying.

  “Stop!” I called out as I saw both of their expressions change in to something more sinister. “Stop this.”

  “Andrew needs to help us out,” Evan growled like a beast. “He is being very unreasonable right now.”

  “I can’t.” He shrugged helplessly. “I can’t help any of us out. If I could then I would but it isn’t possible…”

  “You are being stubborn and I won’t stand here and listen to this.” Evan snorted with anger. “I just can’t believe that you don’t want to keep us all safe. Not even Felicia, who you clearly have a thing for.” I froze to the spot, even more afraid of what direction this was going in. “Don’t try to deny it, we have all seen the way that you look at her.”

  “I don’t see what that has got to do with anything.” I couldn’t help but notice that Andrew didn’t deny it. “We are in trouble here. We need to figure out what we are going to do…”

  That was too much for Evan, it shoved him over the edge, and he charged at Andrew angrily. If it wasn’t for Trent jumping in the way and grabbing Evan to stop this from getting out of hand, then there was no telling what would have happened. It scared the living hell out of me. Andrew flew backwards like he was afraid too.

  “Evan, for fuck sake! I don’t have any family, okay?” Andrew snapped. “That’s why I don’t have anywhere for us to go. I was abandoned by my family because of the way I look. Don’t try and pretend that you haven’t noticed how I don’t look anything like a normal elf. Well, I guess my family must have been very traditional and they didn’t want me, the freak…” He snapped bitterly. “So, they just left me. I grew up in a children’s home here, that’s why I know this area, that’s why I have been here, but the kids at that place have enough troubles on their hands without us turning up as fugitives. So, I would really appreciate it if you kept your temper in check.”

  It was as I suspected, but even though I had an inkling, it was still hard to hear all of that come from Andrew. It shocked the other guys as well, Evan in particular, who now appeared to be absolutely swimming in guilt.

  “Oh, shit, I’m sorry…..” Evan said rapidly, the words almost blending together as they flew out of his mouth like a waterfall. “I didn’t know any of that. Not that it excuses my behavior. I shouldn’t have pushed you like that.”

  Andrew nodded as if it didn’t really matter, but I could see the pain in his eyes. This seemed to be something that he had carried with him for his entire life, the sensation that he just wasn’t good enough, which simply wasn’t true. I didn’t want to see that look on his face any longer, so I strode towards him, closing the gap, and I hugged him tight.

  “I get it,” I murmured quietly to him. “I know what the elves can be like. I have experience…”

  “You do?” Andrew pulled back to look at me in surprise. “But aren’t you a druidess?”

  “Yes.” I tucked my hair behind one of my ears, ready to reveal something that no one knew, not even Evan. He had probably suspected, but I had never confirmed anything. “There is a reason that my ears look like this. Because there is elf in my family, on my father’s side. His grandfather, actually. But because he didn’t behave in a way that was expected of him in the elf community, he was ostracized. Even my father can recall the abuse that he got when he was a kid, which meant he had to suffer it for his whole life. They aren’t very forgiving, are they?”

  That was why I didn’t tell anyone, because I didn’t want to negativity to come my way. I had successfully managed to slide under the radar tsohis far, but this needed to be shared with these people because it would make Andrew feel more welcome. It would show him that he wasn’t the only person who felt different, who was different. It would hopefully bring us that much closer and make the others realize that we needed one another, and we could trust each other as well. That would help us survive all of this. If we were on the same team then we could do anything.

  “Can I?” Andrew asked as he reached out to touch my ear. I nodded and let him feel it. Funny how he was the elf, but my ears looked far more elf like than his. “Wow, your ears are beautiful. I love them.”

  Butterflies flapped violently in the pit of my stomach as he continued to touch my ear while gazing lovingly into my eyes at the same time. Evan was definitely right, Andrew had a thing for me, and I was pretty sure that I had a thing for him too. He was creating a storm cloud within me and I wasn’t sure how long it would be before lightning struck. I had the intense urge to reach up for him and to kiss him, but the eyes of everyone else upon us was too much. I could practically feel Evan burning holes in to the back of my neck… I guess that made sense since we hadn’t yet talked about the kiss that we shared, which was a conversation that needed to happen.

  Unfortunately, because of that, I needed to pull away from Andrew now, so we didn’t lose control.

  “So, where are we going to stay?” I asked. “Because we can’t go back to the hotel now, can we?”

  “I actually packed some camping stuff, just in case,” Joshua admitted. “Like a Boy Scout, I always think that it makes sense to be prepared. Which has come in handy right now… oh, but I chucked everything in to bags all over the place, in my haste to get out of that room, so it might all be mixed up. Bits in everyone’s bags.”

  I wasn’t massively keen on the idea of camping out in the middle of the forest when we didn’t know who was after us, but we couldn’t exactly go anywhere else either, could we? The authorities were on the lookout for us which basically made all hotels out of range. I couldn’t use magic to transport us either, just in case they were tracking any magical traces around the area to find us, which meant camping was our only option.

  “Let’s go and hunt for a clearing then,” I replied a little grumpily. “Get somewhere with enough space for all of us. If a night under the stars is what we are destined for then so be it. We might as well stop fighting about it.”

  “What fun,” Evan grumbled, immediately back to his unpleasant mode, his humbling moment with Andrew all but forgotten. But hopefully, not forever because I didn’t want more fighting. “Camping out here. Great!”

  There was no way that this would help ease the tension between us all, considering we would be having very little sleep during the night. But all I had to do was hope as the plan was to stay out of sight and get just enough rest to be on the move again tomorrow. Wherever we went next, it would have to be somewhere where we didn’t draw attention to ourselves. I’m sure this was not what the academy expected of us. We really needed to be more careful.

  The tents surrounded us, hopefully blocking out any light from the crackling fire we had made, because I was a little frightened of the light giving up our location, but it had been burning for about an hour and we hadn’t been caught. Andrew didn’t want to do anything rash or crazy to test his opinion, but he did think that if the authorities were still after us then we would have been found already. Still, I was grateful when Joshua continued to shift ever so often to patrol the area from above, and Evan and Trent taking turns to search on the ground.

  “So far, so good?” I asked Joshua as he joined us on the ground again. “You think we might be okay?”

  “I really do. But I will keep checking for as long as you need me to. I want you to feel safe.”

  I smiled brightly at him. “You will make someone a wonderful husband one day.”

  The comment was only supposed to be a joke, but J
oshua took it far more seriously than I was expecting, and he actually responded, as if being in a romantic relationship was all that he thought about.

  “Oh, I know.” He nodded with his mouth in a very serious line. “I think that I will enjoy being in a harem because I love the idea of being in love, I mean, who doesn’t, am I right? But I also like the idea of having a group of best friends around me. Guys who I can protect and can have fun with, and they can so the same for me. When I consider having a harem of my own, it’s about so much more than reproduction. Of course, everyone wants their species to survive, but I want people that I can trust. I want my people, somewhere that I fit in.”

  Oh my God. His words had me speechless. I had spent such a long time avoiding any kind of romance out of fear and a need to focus on my studies, that I had never thought about it this way. The way that he worded it made it sound really nice. Safe, and fun as well. Something that I could get on board with, given half the chance. Shit, was Joshua changing my mind?

  “What about you?” Holy hell, I should have known that he would spin this on me. “A stunning woman like you. I’m surprised that you weren’t snapped up in your first week of being at the academy.”

  He let out a laugh which only stopped when he sensed the possessive, angry look from Evan. He was staring at Joshua like he didn’t want me to be a part of a harem, he wanted me for himself. But that wouldn’t work. One on one magical relationships could never sustain the test of time because something would always be missing.

  I knew that it was up to me to clear the tension between us all because the question centered around me, so I decided to continue in a teasing tone and treat this as a bit of a joke. It was the easiest way.

  “Well, all the guys that I seem to know are loners,” I laughed. “Evan doesn’t have more wolves with him, Trent is a lonely fox, Andrew is a lone elf, and even you are a hawk by yourself at the moment. What is a girl supposed to do if she wants to follow tradition?” I smirked and shrugged. “I guess that leaves me to be alone too.”