by Alex Lidell
The Last Bell
Great Falls Academy 9
Alex Lidell
Copyright © 2020 by Alex Lidell
Danger Bearing Press
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Credits:
Edited by Mollie Traver and Linda Ingmanson
Cover Design by Deranged Doctor Design
Also by Alex Lidell
Reverse Harem Fantasy Romance
POWER OF FIVE (Reverse Harem Fantasy)
POWER OF FIVE (Audiobook available)
MISTAKE OF MAGIC (Audiobook available)
TRIAL OF THREE (Audiobook available)
LERA OF LUNOS (Audiobook available)
GREAT FALLS ACADEMY (Power of Five world)
RULES OF STONE (Audiobook available)
CRIME AND PUNISHMENT (Audiobook available)
SCENT OF A WOLF (Audiobook available)
CLOCK STRIKES MIDNIGHT (Audiobook available)
DUNGEONS AND DREAMERS (Audiobook available)
HIDE AND SEEK (Audiobook available)
ENEMY TYES (Audiobook available)
PROWESS TRIALS
THE LAST BELL
IMMORTALS OF TALONSWOOD (Reverse Harem Paranormal Romance)
LAST CHANCE ACADEMY
Young Adult Fantasy Novels
TIDES
FIRST COMMAND (Prequel Novella) (Audiobook available)
AIR AND ASH (Audiobook available)
WAR AND WIND (Audiobook available)
SEA AND SAND (Audiobook available)
SCOUT
TRACING SHADOWS (Audiobook available)
UNRAVELING DARKNESS (Audiobook available)
TILDOR
THE CADET OF TILDOR
SIGN UP FOR NEW RELEASE NOTIFICATIONS at https://links.alexlidell.com/News
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Also by Alex Lidell
About the Author
1
Lera
Seven.
The library spins around me, books and faces streaking by in confused flashes, and I stumble from the quint to lean my hip against one of Gavriel’s sturdy wooden tables. The table’s hard edge digs into my backside, giving me something small and concrete to focus on. Which is a good thing. Because if I wasn’t paying attention to the table edge, I’d have to think about the seven heartbeats I felt echoing through the quint bond.
Coal’s. Tye’s. Shade’s. River’s. Mine. And that of the two tiny hearts beating so very quickly inside my womb.
Around me, the world crawls along in slow motion. Gavriel has his hand to his mouth as he stares at the now-unveiled males. A few paces away, Coal stirs from where he fainted upon realizing the truth and now rises as far as his knees before sinking back down to the floor. His normally tan skin is disturbingly blanched, his blond hair in disarray. Tye stands frozen, his emerald eyes sparkling with a mix of joy and apprehension and too many other emotions to read.
Yet it is Shade and River who capture my attention.
Crouching beside the still-unconscious River, Shade stares at me even as his silver magic flows over River’s wound. Golden eyes meet mine with an almost physical intensity.
Wide. Bewildered. Possessive… And filled with the soul-piercing recognition I’ve missed so desperately over the past months. Yes, the magic inside me whispers, tickling my skin from the inside. Yes. Him. Mate.
I lick my dry lips. Shade’s long black hair hangs around his face, framing high cheekbones, a sharp jaw, and full lips begging to be kissed. With the late-afternoon sun streaming through the window and shaping the muscles of his bare upper body to perfection, the male is as beautiful as he is predatory. And once more mine.
“Shade?” I whisper.
“Cub.” The male stretches a shaking hand out toward me. “I’m—the fae I saw in the woods, some part of me knew it was you.”
“Your wolf always knew.”
Shade rises to one knee, his nostrils flared, seeming for all the world like he’s about to carry me off to that stream bank for round two, though there is something haunted in his gaze as well. “Yes. He did. We needed to be with you with every fiber of our being, but only the wolf could make it happen.” His jaw tightens. “I—”
River gives a pained groan from the floor, making Shade flinch. With a curse, he leans over his patient again, his magic and focus now fully on his work.
Right. I swallow. I’ve waited months to feel Shade’s arms around me, so I can wait a bit more—especially when River’s survival hangs in the balance.
Tye clears his throat. “Well, it does appear we now know why Shade’s wolf was more annoying than usual. The wee fleabag must have smelled the pups and decided to take guarding Lera into his own paws.” Crossing the room toward me, Tye grips my hips and lifts me easily to sit on a tall writing table. The new setup doesn’t quite put our eyes level, but it comes close, the male’s pine-and-citrus scent caressing me gently. His sharp, beautiful face is tantalizingly close. In spite of his casual ease, his silver earring glinting jauntily in the sunlight, I can see his freckles in higher relief. The pulse pounding in his throat. “I think this is the Star’s greatest gift, Lilac Girl. Or their grandest jest. Probably both—but I’m happy with either.”
His words reach me through a fog. Pups. Heartbeats. Inside me.
Panic finally rises up my throat, spurring my breath. I’m pregnant. Stars. I’m pregnant and River is unconscious, and the Night Guard hold the mortal world’s kings hostage. Magic is loose in the human realm.
“You said it was impossible, Shade,” Coal’s voice is as full of panic as my own thoughts, the words growing louder with each syllable. Now on his feet, the black-clad warrior has a knife in his hand, his breaths coming faster than I’ve seen even in battle. Blue eyes blazing, he squares off toward the healer. “That her body wasn’t ready. You said—”
“Apparently I was wrong,” Shade snaps. His golden eyes flash at Coal for a moment before returning to River, a complex weave of silver healing magic now spidering over the commander’s skin.
“Who’s the pups fa—” Coal starts to ask.
“There isn’t a way to know.” Shade growls softly. “This would be a good time to revert to your signature silence, Coal.”
As he spins away from Shade with a disgusted snort, Coal’s hard gaze darts around the library before coming to rest on me—on my stomach. He sheathes his blade and nudges Tye aside to stand between my legs, running his hands over my shoulders, my rib cage, my perfectly flat belly, as if he could feel something in there already. I watch him, his sculpted face narrowed in concentration, his broad shoulders tightened with anxiety. Warmth trails in his touch’s wake, his heavily callused palms strangely soothing—though the frantic cast to his sky-blue eyes is anything but. “We need a midwife.”
“I’m fairly certain pregnancy doesn’t work the way you think it does, Coal,” Tye drawls from the chair he’s plopped into. “That part doesn’t usually come for a wee while. And w
hen it does, well, in my experience, midwives are not the kind of creatures one captures in the shadows at knifepoint.”
I’m shocked to feel a laugh bubbling up in my throat and pull Coal’s tense mouth down toward mine to squelch it—
“Ahem…” Gavriel’s quiet cough is my first reminder that we aren’t alone—though how I managed to overlook the librarian’s bright red face, I can’t begin to imagine. “Allow me to express my congratulations,” he says, stuttering through the words. “And oh, do be careful. Things like that can make you lose your wits completely.”
It takes me a moment to realize that Gavriel is speaking not about my pregnancy but the broken amulet I don’t remember having picked up. Dangling from a leather cord, the two pieces of rune-inscribed stone look dull and harmless, but I can feel confused magic rippling inside.
“Maybe… I’ll get Arisha.” Without waiting for a response, Gavriel flees his own library, moving more quickly than I’d have thought a limping man could. My mouth is still half-open to call to him—not that I’d know what to say—when the door shuts, the merry bells jingling.
Right. I tuck the broken necklace into my pocket lest one of the humans picks it up.
Pulling away from me with an impatient growl, Coal stalks over to Shade and grabs his shoulder. “She… I mean them… They… Stars take you, do something.”
“Enough!” With a roar of command, Shade uncoils from his patient, twists and clamps his hand to the front of Coal’s neck. The two males lock gazes, Shade’s tan skin covered with a thin sheen of sweat, Coal’s pale face darkening with fury. With his hand still on Coal’s neck, Shade shoves the other warrior against the library wall with enough force to send the nearby books cascading to the floor in a thump-clatter-thump cascade that would have Gavriel whimpering if he were here.
“I don’t have time to deal with your meltdown, Coal.” Shade leans in close enough to Coal’s face that there is barely an inch of space between them. Shade is the second-in-command of the quint, but he pulls his authority out so rarely that even Coal flinches from the shifter’s low, powerful voice. “Not now, not for a damn good while. So shut up. Go kill something. I don’t care what you do, so long as you are not doing it here. Understood?”
The entire library seems to hold its breath as Coal pulls back his lips to flash his canines before looking away. When Coal brushes away Shade’s hold, the healer’s eyes flash one last time before he lets go.
“I’ll go check the area.” Coal says, heading toward the library’s back entrance as my own mind finally snaps back to function.
Yes, I’m pregnant—but so early in the process that only Shade’s wolf could sense the growing lives. The cubs are safe inside me for now, and before I drown in the shock of what this all means for the future, I have the present to deal with. A quint mate to help and a realm to liberate. I have things to do to ensure the pups enter the kind of world I want them to live in.
Seeming to have read the swirling thoughts on my face, Tye has returned to my side now, smoothing my hair back from my temples. Reaching up, I squeeze his shoulder and nod toward Coal’s retreating back. “I think he needs company more than I do just now. Or at least a minder.”
“Hmmm…” Tye rests his cheek on the top of my head, his breath tickling my hair. “Perhaps I could go after the wee kitten. But only if you give me something first.”
“Give?” I turn in Tye’s arms to find a breathtaking smile growing over his face. Before I can say another word, he leans down to cover my mouth with his own, the slow leisurely kiss turning my bones to molten lead. When he scrapes his teeth on my bottom lip before pulling out, the tiny sting shoots straight to my sex, making my thighs clench together.
With a grin that says he knows exactly the kind of effect he just had on me, Tye saunters after Coal, his shoulders shaking when I mutter, “Bastard” under my breath.
With Coal and Tye gone, I turn back to Shade, who’s still fully occupied with River. While he’s still unconscious, the warrior’s color is returning, his powerful chest expanding with greater ease. My heart pinches painfully at seeing my beautiful, powerful male so still. I need him to wake up so badly it aches under my skin.
But what if he still doesn’t remember you? The tiny voice whispering in the back of my mind is like a shard of ice. We still don’t have any proof that what happened to Shade when we joined also happened to River. And I can’t imagine how we’ll defeat Owalin if it didn’t.
“How is he?” I ask Shade through a tight throat.
“He’ll be fine once—” Shade cuts off as the silver weave of magic slips along River’s skin, muttering curses about working without his instruments.
“I’ll fetch them from the infirmary,” I say, the ability to contribute something—no matter how small—a comfort in itself.
“No.” Shade’s attention stays on River.
I frown midway through straightening my dress—for all the good it does to improve the tattered red silk. “I know where they are.”
“You aren’t going anywhere by yourself, Leralynn.” Looking up from River’s body, Shade jerks his chin at my midsection. “Not while you are with pups.”
“That’s ridic—”
“This isn’t up for debate.”
I stare at him, my pulse beginning to speed. “I was stating a fact, not asking permission,” I say with more control than I expected as I start toward the exit.
Pushing away from River, Shade interposes himself between me and the door, his broad, chiseled chest rising before me. He uses every inch of his towering height to his advantage, his fresh earthy scent tinged with anger, his legs tense like a wolf standing his ground.
Beyond the door, raised voices in the courtyard prove that the crisis unfurling there is alive and well. Children cry over missing parents, families and mates calling on their kings, and guards, and stars for help.
I gaze up at Shade, my chest aching. This isn’t how the return of our quint was supposed to go. This isn’t the way Shade—always the one I could turn to for gentle, steady support—should have returned.
I shake my head, my gaze falling on the book Gavriel was reading before he left to find Arisha. The old pages lie open to a too-familiar drawing of a young fae holding up a sword. Gavriel’s prophetic protection. I may not be that, but I am a warrior, for better or worse. And I will fight while I can for the future I want.
“Shade.” I put a soft hand on his ridged stomach, the first time I’ve touched his male form in months—but my voice is anything but gentle. “I’ve been on my own from the moment we arrived here, surviving—no, more than surviving, protecting your bloody hides. I deserve more respect than this.”
Shade’s eyes flicker for a moment, but then he pulls away from my touch, steel in his gaze. “You’re not on your own now.” The hardness of his words matches his eyes. “You deserve protection. You and the pups both.”
The tap tap tap of my pulse spreads indignation through my body until I can barely think over the roaring in my ears. My jaw tightens, the proverbial line in the sand suddenly forming before my feet. “I’m not a relic or prize broodmare to be protected, Shade. With pups or not, I think and act and make decisions for myself. So stop impersonating a doorjamb and step aside.”
Shade’s yellow eyes flash. “Try to get past me, and I’ll truss you up like a calf.”
My hand curls into a fist, my lips pulling back in a snarl. “Magic is loose in the mortal world. The Night Guard are holding hostages in the Great Hall. River is wounded. And you want to argue with me over—”
“I don’t want to argue with you about anything!” Shade’s nostrils flare as he steps toward me. “And I don’t give a bloody damn about what’s loose in the mortal world or who is holding who at sword point. And you shouldn’t either. Your sole concern now should be—”
I’m as surprised as Shade when I bury my knuckles in his jaw and stalk out of the library into the cool chaos beyond.
2
Lera
Under a sky quickly filling with thick, angry clouds, the smoke still rising from the ruined stadium takes on a queer orange-gray cast. The vast cobblestone yard is covered in white ash and black soot, its hundreds of occupants faring no better—the colorful ceremonial fashions from every corner of the continent have been rendered nearly indistinguishable. The late-afternoon sun has just passed below the rim of stone buildings, deepening the sense of foreboding.
For all that happened in the library since I dragged River there, this milling, frantic mass is a harsh reminder that only moments have passed since Owalin took the Great Hall hostage. A quarter hour at most.
As I skirt the courtyard toward the infirmary, I see that, save for the orders River issued—which account for the well-placed perimeter of guards keeping a large semicircle of clear space in front of the Great Hall entrance—the rest of the courtyard swarms with cadets, competitors, and guests. Family members with loved ones trapped inside shout over each other with demands, sobs, and recommendations of how the situation should be handled.
Standing in the middle of the open semicircle, Headmaster Sage holds a speaking trumpet, sweat running down his pale bald head despite the cool air. If River’s presence, even while he’s injured, instilled a sense of calm and hope, Sage’s has the opposite effect on the crowd, his wheedling, fear-tinged tones only seeming to fuel people’s desperation.
Suddenly, a low chuckle booms over the courtyard, seemingly from the roiling gray clouds themselves. It takes me only a moment to spot the tall figure standing on the edge of the mezzanine balcony, looking down upon the mass of people before him as if surveying an unruly garden in need of weeding. His bloodred cloak whips in the growing wind, the raised hood keeping his face in deep shadow.
