Their Shifter Academy 3: Undone

by May Dawson

He headed for the door, but Winter glanced over his shoulder at us. His gaze seemed to seek Maddie, just for a moment.

  “I wish you’d take me—”Alice began.

  “I need you here,” he cut her off, as if this was a familiar argument. “And you wouldn’t enjoy the work, with your tender heart. There’s killing to be done.”

  Indy held the door for them. The three of them went out, still talking. Then the door swung shut on their conversation.

  Something about that had unsettled me even further, and today was definitely not my favorite day.

  Maddie said softly, “They’re probably watching us with cameras, like they were in Joan’s house.”

  “Probably.” It made sense, even though I despised the idea.

  She held her arms out to me, and I drew her into my lap, the two of us curling up intimately close. I knew that it made sense to be so close, to speak so softly that only our enhanced hearing could pick up what we said, our faces close enough to make it difficult for anyone to read our lips from any likely camera vantage point.

  But having Maddie this close to me still made my heart lift. The smells of acrid smoke and coppery blood still clung to us, but as I breathed in her faint scent beneath that—the one that always reminded me of sunshine heating the grass after a summer rain—it became easier to push the last of the wolf away, deep down.

  “They think they have something to cure us,” she whispered. “To take away our wolf.”

  “And they’re going to attack the academy. But maybe not with their ‘cure’… not yet.”

  Instead, they must intend to kill our fellow students. We’d known for a long time that the witches would attack the academy one day. It was their chance to wipe out an entire generation of our warriors.

  Maddie’s face was resigned as she nodded. “We have to get back there. We have to warn them.”

  “Leaving aside any logistical issues with that plan,” I said, my gaze flickering to the monotonous row of bars, not broken by any door or hinge, “I thought it could be our death warrants to go back.”

  She shrugged. “That’s what Rafe said. But you know what a worrier he is.”

  “Hm.” There was being a worrier, and there were facts. Facts such as, the packs will kill any witch they find hiding in their ranks.

  “I have to go back,” she said. “I’m not leaving them to die. But you…”

  “Oh, shut up,” I said, and her lips tugged in a faint smile. “We’ve had this conversation too many times. I’m not smart enough to abandon you and you’re not smart enough to abandon me.”

  When we’d left on this trip, maybe we’d both been running from something. Maddie hoped she’d outrun the accusation she was a witch. I hoped I’d outrun the role I was locked into, as Penn’s beta, Penn’s brother, Maddie’s other lover.

  But we couldn’t outrun who we were or who we loved.

  Now we were running home.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Rafe

  Maddie and Ty weren’t back Sunday afternoon. Penn drove home on his own, arriving reeking of weed, his attitude even more sour than his scent. I told him to head upstairs and shower, that I would deal with him later. He flashed me a look that said he didn’t give a damn about anything but Maddie right now, even though he muttered a lifeless yes sir.

  I called her and I called Tyson. The first few times their phones rang until voicemail picked up. Then my calls went straight to voicemail, as if their phones were turned off.

  I couldn’t pick a favorite emotion between terrified they were hurt and fucking furious. It was a toss-up when I didn’t know what was going on.

  Even if the worst came true and Maddie took my advice and ran, they still owed the rest of us an explanation. If all she sent was a text goodbye, then at least that would have been something.

  The thought of never seeing that maddening girl again made something twist through my gut.

  But it was better than the thought that she was hurt somewhere, that she needed us—needed me—and we weren’t there.

  My nerves were stretched taut to begin with when I stopped by Jensen’s room. He answered the door as soon as I knocked, dressed in his blazer, shirt and tie, all pristine and pressed. His face was tense.

  “Still nothing?” he asked.

  “Still nothing,” I answered. I tilted my head in the general direction of the dean’s office.

  Jensen fell in alongside me. The two of us walked in silence across campus; I could tell he was lost in his own worries about Maddie and Ty. He finally glanced at me, his golden eyes bright in the darkness.

  “How do we find out where they are?” he asked.

  I’d never heard Jensen ask a question he didn’t know the answer to. He was usually such a smartass.

  I wished I had a better answer to give him.

  “We’ve got to trust them, McCauley,” I said. “Northsea still has her necklace. She’ll call us if she needs us.”

  I’d bitched at her enough about that magic pendant she wore—in defiance of the school’s simple rules—but I was glad for it now.

  “And we’ll go?” he asked, gesturing vaguely around campus. Things were changing—fast—since Clearborn took over.

  His tone left no doubt that he would go. He just wasn’t sure about the rest of the team. About me.

  I pushed down the fear of what going would cost us. “Yeah, we’ll go. If they need us. Of course we’ll go.”

  The halls of the academic building were quiet at this time of night. When they were full of students, this felt like any other school—despite the strange curriculum. But on a night like this, when it was just Jensen’s footsteps and mine echoing down the hall, I remembered the ghosts who owned this place first.

  “I can understand having to set a standard that no one leaves campus without permission,” Jensen said abruptly. “Whatever the other circumstances.”

  I nodded. I had the feeling he was trying to justify what was about to happen, that he was trying to make it easier for me. There was no way around what I had to do. If I didn’t beat Jensen, Clearborn would have someone else do it. I’d lose my position, and the chance to protect Maddie and the rest of the team as much as I could.

  Still, Jensen’s attempt to be a good friend made me dread the situation we were walking into even more.

  “Besides,” he said easily, “I’m pretty sure I’ve done something over the last two years to earn this. Starting fights, bullying Maddie, general assholery.”

  I hesitated. I didn’t want to be soft now, right before we walked into the dean’s office, and yet Jensen had to hear what I really thought about him. “You’re a good kid, Jensen.”

  His eyes widened as they met mine, just for a second before his lips turned up on one side. “That wouldn’t be my takeaway, but all right.”

  Before his mask went back up, what I’d said had meant something to him.

  When I pushed open the door to the anteroom and walked in, the room was empty, but the door to the dean’s office stood open.

  “Sir?” I called. “May we come in?”

  “Please do.” Clearborn appeared at the door. He glanced behind me to Jensen and his gaze sharpened, but he didn’t look surprised. “Where’s Northsea?”

  “She’s late,” I said reluctantly. “We hope. She left in a car with Tyson heading back toward the academy, but now no one can contact her.”

  “Do you think she’s coming back?” As he walked ahead of us into his office, Jensen and I followed.

  “The academy is important to Northsea,” I said. “I’m worried she was…unavoidably detained. I’d like to go out and look for her.”

  The faintest smile played over Clearborn’s lips, then was gone. “I need you here, Raphael. For as long as you’re cadre.”

  Well, there was a threat.

  When he perched on the edge of the desk, his movement drew my attention to the long leather tawse that lay across the dark wood surface.

  The look on Jensen’s face was stoi
c, and unease rippled through my gut.

  “I meant it when I said it’s ridiculous that we ground you all. This is for the best,” Clearborn said to Jensen. “It’s clean, efficient. You’ll be punished for your disobedience and you can leave it in the past.”

  “I see.” Jensen’s voice was flat.

  “When your Ms. Northsea does arrive,” Clearborn said to me, “please make sure you bring her to me directly.”

  Jensen shifted subtly. His face was blank in that way that had often exasperated me when I tried to talk to him; he looked like a sphinx, as if nothing penetrated his rocky exterior. But his mind was always whirring along behind those narrowed golden eyes.

  “Let me take her punishment too,” Jensen said abruptly.

  Clearborn’s brows arched in surprise.

  He’d rejected that offer when I made it. As the image of Maddie’s slender frame under the belt flashed through my mind, rage tightened my chest. Neither Jensen nor I could protect her no matter how much we wanted to.

  “How gallant of you,” Clearborn said.

  Before he could go on, Jensen interrupted.

  “It’s not gallant,” Jensen said. “You can ask anyone. I made her life a living hell here. I don’t want girls at the academy. Knowing that I took her beating for her—because she’s too delicate—will eat her alive.”

  Curiosity flashed across Clearborn’s face. He seemed too sharp to buy Jensen’s story. But he’d implied before that Jensen was self-centered and bratty, and this was a different side of Jensen.

  Clearborn looked to me. I said reluctantly, “He’s not wrong. It would kill her that anyone took her punishment for her. She wants to be seen as their equal.”

  Even though she’s more than the equal of most of the men here.

  “Interesting,” Clearborn said. “Well, hold that thought for now, Jensen. We’ll see how you feel at the end of your own punishment. You might be a little less chivalrous.”

  “You wouldn’t make that deal with me,” I said.

  As Clearborn glanced at me, disappointment wrote itself across his face, as if he was annoyed that I’d complained in front of Jensen. “You were trying to weasel out of your punishment. You’d rather take a physical blow than a blow to your ego, which is all wrapped up in leading that team. Jensen is a different story.”

  Thanks for that amateur psychoanalysis. I wasn’t sure he was wrong, though, which just made me feel unnerved.

  Clearborn fell back into his chair, watching us both curiously. “Have him remove his shirt.”

  “Jensen,” I said, my voice tight.

  He was already unbuttoning his school jacket.

  Jensen stripped off his blazer, loosened his tie so he could draw it over his head, then pulled off his shirt. He laid them all over the arm of the wingback chair by the window. His muscles rippled under his skin as he turned to the wall, spreading his hands out to brace himself against the wall.

  “Twenty,” Clearborn said.

  I wrapped my hand around the wooden handle and picked up the strap, the ends sliding across the desk until they fell off, dangling just above the elaborate Persian rug.

  When I looked up at Jensen’s naked back and shoulders as he waited, his jaw gritted, dread settled low into my gut.

  I carried the strap across the room until I stood behind and to one side of Jensen. It was heavier than it looked.

  “You know, the more you hesitate, the worse it is,” Clearborn said, his voice amused. “You’re drawing out his anticipation.”

  Jensen glanced at me over his shoulder. His jaw was tense, his teeth gritted.

  I wasn’t the one who had the worst of this moment. It was time to stop deliberating. I pulled back my arm.

  I focused on placing the blow across his shoulders, where it would be easiest for him to take it. His body rocked forward faintly under the blow, and then his fingers dug into the wall, holding himself tighter, more tense, for the second blow. That one that didn’t rock him at all. He took it silent, unmoving.

  As each stroke landed across his back, a red welt bloomed in its place as the strap fell away. It wasn’t until the tenth blow fell that I heard the faint hiss of his breath in pain. Goddamn it. Only halfway through. Steady, Jensen.

  The eleventh blow landed with a fierce crack. I winced myself, but Jensen didn’t react, his head bowed and his face so tense I could see a tic flutter in his jaw.

  Better to get it over with as fast as possible. I rained the next blows down on his shoulders as fast as I could draw the strap back, hardening myself to the sight of his flesh turning white, then darkening as a welt bloomed, each time.

  If Clearborn intended to bring back the traditional ways of the packs, I was free to lay the stokes anywhere between his shoulders and his thighs, but I didn’t want to humiliate him any worse. Better to lay the strokes in close proximity, from his broad shoulders to the bottom of his shoulder blades. Already, the welts were blooming into fresh red bruises.

  “Twenty,” I muttered, the crack of the last blow lingering in the air. I lowered the strap, which was heavy enough that my shoulder tingled from the force. “It’s over.”

  Jensen jerked his head in a nod. He started to come off the wall, then seemed to sway, catching himself with one hand. For a second, I caught the sheen in his eyes. Tears of pain. Then he blinked them away. His face was still hard, but the tic in his cheek kept fluttering.

  Fury at myself—for not finding a way out of this, for not protecting him—tore through my chest.

  “Is it indeed over, Mr. McCauley?” Clearborn asked, the edge of curiosity back in his voice. “Your decision will never leave this room if you’ve changed your mind and leave Northsea to face her punishment herself. A second round now will be far worse across the bruises you earned yourself.”

  Jensen stared at him with hatred flaring in his eyes. He looked as if he might dive across the desk and give Clearborn a taste of his own medicine.

  But all Jensen said was, “Oh, let’s do it again. Please.”

  The edge of sarcasm in his voice broke through clearly, but instead of being offended, Clearborn’s eyes crinkled at the corners, as if he was holding back a smile.

  “Very well,” Clearborn said. “Raphael, if you would, please.”

  Jensen spread his arms, gripping the wall again. No matter how much he tried to stuff all his emotions, as he always did, the tic fluttering in his cheek gave him away.

  We’d come this far already.

  Cain help me.

  I pulled back the strap.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Silas

  I stepped into the woods, deep in my own thoughts, then froze at the sight of the hulking, shadowy figure ahead of me.

  My heart beat faster at the possibility someone had seen me walk through the magical door I’d created between worlds. If they raised the alarm before I could alter their memory, my mission would be compromised. I couldn’t let that happen. My hand tightened into a fist at my side, magic sparking in my palm, just in case.

  Then the moonlight caught the rough-hued features of his face. Chase.

  “What are you doing out there so late?” I moved past him to my clothes, still hanging on a branch. They felt faintly damp to the touch, and it was unpleasant to pull my t-shirt over my head.

  “Best defense is a good offense, huh?” Chase asked, tilting his head to one side.

  “I came out for a run,” I said; it was common enough for shifters to strip down and wolf out in the woods that surrounded the academy. “But you look like you’re just lurking.”

  “You weren’t out for a run.” Chase crossed his arms. “Who are you really, Silas?”

  I stared back at him, my feelings warring. I shouldn’t tell any of them who I was or why I was in their world. At the same time, my emotions were a raw nerve after learning Fred and Isabelle were in prison.

  I desperately wanted to tell a friend what was on my mind.

  Even if I’d have to erase his mind after.
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  I buckled my belt, then tucked my hands into my pockets. “Aren’t you afraid? You know I’m…”

  I trailed off meaningfully, gesturing for him to finish the thought.

  “Not a wolf,” Chase said. “Maybe a witch. I don’t know, Silas. Should I be afraid?”

  “I wouldn’t personally confront someone deep in the woods with no backup.” I glanced around. “Did you bring Jensen or Penn along? Are they around here somewhere?”

  “Now I feel like I shouldn’t tell you the answer to that,” he said slowly.

  So, no. He’d trusted me.

  “What tipped you off?” I asked.

  “You were so weird about the money. A better person than any…normal person would be.”

  “To be fair, I am pretty odd.”

  “Are you, though?” Chase fixed me with an inscrutable look. “You’re the one who gave me the lottery ticket. You enchanted it somehow, didn’t you?”

  I shook my head. I didn’t want Chase to feel like he owed me. “Do you want to know what I’m doing here, Chase?”

  “Desperately.”

  “I do use magic. But I’m not a witch like from the covens. I come from a pocket world, a split-off from the reality you know. In my world, there’s a lot of magic.”

  Chase nodded, as if any of that made sense, and I realized I needed to back up. “All the worlds are in danger right now. There are these rips through the fabric of the universe, and until they’re sealed, the worlds will keep bleeding into each other. We’re coming up on an apocalypse.”

  He blinked at me, then asked levelly, “What’s the time frame on this apocalypse?”

  “It’s really kind of freaking me out how well you’re taking this situation.” I was worried that Chase was quietly having a nervous breakdown under his still surface. “We don’t know how long we have until the apocalypse. Years, for sure. But eventually, we’ll reach a tipping point where we can’t fix it anymore, where the fabric is so shredded that it can’t be patched.”

  “And what are you doing here? Saving the world?”

  “That’s the plan,” I said.