Spirited: A Reverse Harem Fantasy Romance (The Academy of Spirits and Shadows Book 1)

by C. M. Stunich

  AMERIN ROYAL COLLEGE: AN ACADEMY DEVOTED TO THE STUDY OF MAGICKS, SPIRITS AND SHADOWS

  The words filled the center of the decorative metal arch, stretching over the gate and beckoning with mysterious fingers. There were so many things inside these walls, inside the cluster of buildings that dotted the property and stretched all the way back into the waiting forest. Secrets that Jasinda would kill to get a hold of.

  Me, I wasn't sure what I wanted, so I was more than happy to follow my handler's dreams for now.

  “Do you think the queen will give us a reference?” Jas asked, eyes sparkling as she clutched the scroll underneath her arm and beamed. A reference from the queen was an automatic acceptance to the college. “Doesn't matter anyway,” she said, answering her own question as Elijah watched us with a curious smile on his face. “As soon as we write up our report on Grandberg Manor, we'll get an invitation.”

  “Still haven't gotten into the academy?” Elijah asked, looking me up and down with a smirk lingering on his lips. I ignored him as he ruffled up his dark hair, stopping outside the guardhouse and waiting for one of the soldiers to come out and look us over. It was a strange hour to be coming and going. That, and with Vaenn in strange turmoil, the guards weren't taking any chances. The Queen's entire harem had been killed a few years prior, her lovers cut down in the midst of a border war with the neighboring country of Scythia. Her daughters had been serving as generals in the army and they … hadn't come back either.

  Amerin now had one queen. And one prince.

  “What are you … twenty?” Elijah asked as he looked me over carefully, circling around both me and Jas as she moved up to the castle wall and rung the bell. “And you haven't gotten in yet?”

  I gritted my teeth as a pair of drowsy looking guards stepped out of the guardhouse and used a charm on both Jasinda and me, pausing when the clear stone turned black to indicate Elijah's presence.

  “We have an order of free passage from the queen,” Jas said, holding out the scroll and waiting for the two women to look it over. “And the spirit we have with us is the carrier, Elijah of Haversey.”

  She gestured in the complete wrong direction as the guards checked the scroll and looked up at me.

  “Can we see him, please?” one of them asked, and I sighed. I was exhausted and the last thing I wanted to do right now was expend the energy needed to let some Amerin human get a glance at the Otherside.

  “Of course,” I replied, because there was no other way we were being let into the castle with a ghost on our heels.

  Lifting my hand to the silver star at my throat, I pricked my finger hard enough to draw blood, wincing at the sharp sting of pain. My thumb smeared over the guard's closed eyelids before I drew the symbol of the Light Goddess on her forehead—a five-pointed star with a circle in the center, the point facing down instead of up. Hellim, the Dark God, had the same symbol, only his pointed up. That confused some people, but it made perfect sense to me: the Dark God was pointing up from the dark depths of the earth while the Light Goddess shone down from above.

  Drawing matching symbols on my own face, I clasped the guard's right hand in my own and grabbed my necklace with my left hand.

  “Haversey,” I whispered, light flaring around us, teasing my white braid into a frenzy, ruffling the dark feathers on my wings. My body sagged as the very last of my strength was drained out, sliding through our clasped hands and sending the power of my second sight into the guard.

  I just hoped there wasn't anything else around for her to see besides Elijah.

  I didn't feel anything, but some of the dark spirits that'd been haunting the city were tricky, slippery little things. Several powerful spirit whisperers had been killed inside the city walls.

  Shivering, I flicked my gaze over to the guard and found her with her mouth open wide, her distinctly Amerin-blue eyes locked on Elijah.

  “Holy ship,” she said, but well, you get the picture now right? She didn't actually say ship. Change that P out for a T and then … well, I'd already a few feathers that night and I wasn't about to give up another. Sure, they grew back but they itched like crazy and I already had to put with molting once a year. “Elijah of Haversey.”

  “At your service,” he said with a flourish and a bow. His court manners were impeccable. Not surprising considering he was a sixth-year student at the academy. Well, I mean, he had been a sixth-year student when he died. Since most graduates got employed either by high-ranking nobles or royals—either in Amerin or its allied countries—court manners were part of the curriculum. “I seek free passage to the queen.”

  The soldier nodded, stunned by the clear, crisp line of Elijah's spirit. This could very well be the first ghost she'd ever seen.

  “Right this way,” she whispered, letting go of my hand and blinking suddenly when, presumably, Elijah disappeared from sight. The woman shook her head, took out a heavy ring of keys and let us through a small metal door in the side of the wall.

  There was no way anyone was wasting time raising the portcullis for a spirit team as insignificant as Jas and me.

  “So why haven't you been accepted to the Royal College yet?” Elijah asked, slipping through the door ahead of me. I bet he'd have walked straight through it if the castle walls weren't so heavily warded.

  No ghost, spirit, or other baddie was getting through, under, or above these walls unless they were powerful as flub.

  “None of your business,” I replied curtly, wishing I were powerful enough to mind-speak with spirits. It would save me from getting a lot of strange looks. Glancing over, I found Elijah's ice-blue eyes watching me with interest. If he'd been alive, I'd have said he was interested in me. But dead men don't come back to life. Well, not with their souls intact. Death whisperers could animate corpses, but that wasn't really the same thing, not without a spirit inside of them.

  No, despite his good looks and his charm … Elijah of Haversey was dead, and there wasn't a single person in all of Amerin that could bring him back to life.

  The guards led us through a familiar set of side passages, cut out of the thick stone walls and known only to a very select few. The fact that Elijah had an order of free passage from the queen was a big flubbing deal. So whatever information he was supposed to get from Grandberg Manor, it must really have been important.

  As we slipped from the narrow passage into the main hallway, I saw the queen in her robes, waving goodbye to my father—her other lover. Only a queen could convince another strong-willed Amerin woman like my mother to join her in bed and share her man. It was an impressive thing.

  I wondered if the three of them were in love?

  My dad paused, handsome as Hell in full white plate armor, his wings at least a good half size larger than my own, filling his back and taking up the entire hallway behind him.

  “Brynn,” he said, the lilting notes of his voice something I hadn't inherited. I'd gotten wings, and magic, but I hadn't gotten grace, an angelic singing voice, or the air of haughty superiority that most angels had. “I'm glad to see you back in one piece.”

  “It was a close one,” I admitted as I bowed my chin to the queen, and Jasinda went all the way down to her knees. She was Amerin, through and through, and anything but pure deference was unacceptable. Although I'd been born here, I'd also spent a lot of time in Nalahari, my mother's desert homeland, as well as my father's birthplace of Saraph, so while the queen did strike awe into my heart, I didn't feel the need to prostrate myself to show respect.

  “My decree,” the queen said, her sea green eyes going wide as she rushed toward us, her voluminous robes streaming out behind her. A moment later, my mother appeared in the doorway to the queen's bedchamber and made me raise an eyebrow. Hmm. She wasn't dressed in armor, but was instead draped in a set of robes that were almost identical to the queen's—the purples, reds, and whites of the Amerin royal crest.

  “Hello Brynn,” my mother said, acknowledging me with a slight smile as the queen took the decree from my
fingers and unfurled it. Her Majesty's pastel green eyes lifted to mine, shining with an emotion that was too complex for me to read. “You found Elijah, I take it?” Mom asked, her voice soft and tinged with sadness.

  I nodded and held out a hand to indicate the man in question, his spirit leaning against the stone wall, his shoulder sunk several inches inside of it.

  “I've managed to bring him back, Your Majesty,” I said, which earned me a raised eyebrow in response. Surely, the queen was wondering how a mediocre … nay, lower level spirit whisperer such as myself was able to pull something like that off. “Elijah of Haversey.”

  “Welcome, Elijah of Haversey,” she said with a small nod of her head. Somehow, she managed to look right into his eyes, as if she could see him there. Hell's bells, maybe she could? I might be half-angel, but the queen was half-deity, a demigoddess born of Hekkett, God of Magicks, and an Amerin noblewoman.

  Nobody knew what powers demigods had exactly, considering there were less than a dozen scattered across the entire continent. The other eleven continents we were much less sure about. Maybe they had their own gods?

  “Come in, please,” the queen—Everess of Hekkett—said as she gestured for us to join her in her chambers. My mother preceded us in, making sure to close the doors to the back bedroom. Amerins weren't very modest or shy about sexuality, but the bedroom was considered a sacred and personal space. We wouldn't be permitted to even look at it.

  “Have dinner with me later this week,” my father said, nodding at me and Jas before moving down the hall with the clink of his heavy armor. My dad wasn't technically a part of the Amerin court. Instead, he was an ambassador on permanent loan from Saraph, the kingdom of angels. How my mother had managed to convince him to stay was a mystery to most; pure-blooded angels were not known for settling down nor were they often known for having actual relationships with their children.

  Guess Mom and I were the exception.

  “Have someone bring us breakfast,” the queen told the guard that'd brought us up here, gesturing for Jas and me to take a seat at the table in her foyer. Each personal chamber in the castle was like its own house, the floor plans modeled on the twelve basic designs that filled the entire city of Amerin. The repetitive nature of the buildings should've made them unoriginal and tiresome, but instead, it was like having such ordinary shells forced the people to be creative. Only in the desert had I ever seen such color, innovation, and design in a person's house.

  “I'll need to speak with Elijah,” Everess said, her blonde hair loose and wavy around her shoulders, her robes fluttering like the petals of a flower as she took a seat. My mother came and sat on her left, where a captain of the guard oughta sit. She might've been wearing robes and smiling at me, but I knew she could kill me and Jasinda both before I was finished blinking.

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” I said, lifting my hand to my necklace.

  The queen reached out and put one of her own hands, as pale as fresh cream, over my sun-kissed brown one. Her green eyes sparkled as she turned to Elijah, sitting half inside the chair on my left.

  The hairs on the back of my neck lifted as someone used magic—strange magic—and lifted our hair and clothing, letting them float in an ethereal breeze. I tasted apples and honey on my tongue, the bright flavor of Hekkett's blessings.

  As far as I knew, there were only two people in the entire country that were magick whisperers—the queen … and her son. The only reason I recognized the taste and smell of that energy was because I'd spent so much time playing with the crown prince as a child. But as far as what they could do with their powers, all I had were vague clues based on things I'd seen Air do in the past. And the K on the end of magic? That was just a fancy old-timey spelling that helped differentiate the magic that everyone else did … from the awe-inspiring powers of the god Hekkett and his descendants.

  “Elijah,” the queen said, and I knew I was witnessing something that few ever learned about. And I had to wonder why, of all people, I was being allowed to witness it. The queen could've thanked Jas and me, sent us back to our chambers, and dealt with Elijah herself.

  Flicking my eyes to my mom, she gave me a secret smile that I couldn't quite interpret.

  “Your Majesty,” he said as he flickered to life in brilliant color—not just the blues and grays and whites of a spirit form. I could see Elijah's dark hair, cool blue eyes, the gold of his buttons, the leather shoulders of his Royal College jacket, as if he was sitting right there with us.

  Glancing over at both Jas and my mom … I could tell that they saw him, too.

  Wow.

  The queen was doing what I could … with a fraction of the effort and twice the result.

  No wonder demigods were the only Amerins permitted to take the throne.

  “Tell us what you found,” the queen whispered as her skin began to glow and her eyes took on a scintillating shimmer that definitely wasn't human.

  “I found the book,” Elijah said, and the queen's eyes brightened even further. “It was exactly where you said it would be, in the Grandberg Manor. Unfortunately, I was murdered before I was able to leave the grounds with it. But …” Elijah paused and exhaled, closing his eyes and ruffling up his dark hair with his fingers.

  Standing up from the chair, he bowed once to the queen and then flicked his eyes over to mine with a slight raise of brows.

  “Permission to disrobe,” he said and I gaped as the queen nodded and Elijah's clothing … simply disappeared. His body was distracting to say the least, even with both the queen and my mother in the room with us. My eyes couldn't stop tracing the firm hills and valleys of Elijah's abs, the strong muscles in his back as he flexed his wings, and turned around.

  Whatever the queen's magic was doing to him, he looked … alive.

  I knew it was just a trick, but it was impossible to glance away.

  My heart thundered in my chest, and my throat went dry.

  Elijah's skin lit up with an inner fire, silver runes etching across the muscles in his back, flickering to life one by one across his shoulders, down his spine, over the firm curve of his ass. I didn't even have to feel guilty for looking—everyone else was.

  “The book itself was destroyed,” Elijah began, and I had to wonder what book, exactly, he was talking about, “but before that happened, I managed to copy down the information you wanted. Every last word.”

  “This is all of it?” Everess asked, her voice heady and thick with power as her sea green eyes took in Elijah's naked form. She stood up as he spun, slowly, to face us, runes glimmering from every surface of his body, even his eyelids, even his eyes. I could see a single rune etched into each one of his irises. Not even his cock was spared, half-hard and pointing toward the row of shuttered windows that lined the back of the room.

  I wondered if he'd have to get it up all the way so we could read them?

  With a quick flick of his eyes in my direction, Elijah grinned, runes shining from his teeth and tongue, and then he winked at me. I quickly dragged my attention off of his manhood, but it was too late.

  He saw me looking.

  And he wasn't exactly … half-hard anymore.

  “The whole spell,” the queen repeated, putting her white hands on Elijah's flat chest. I shifted slightly in my chair and tried to ignore the bee that had just sprung to life inside my tummy, stinging me with sharp pricks of … something I couldn't name. It was an emotion I didn't like and wasn't comfortable with, not at all. It was as green as … envy. “Layna,” Everess said, turning to her part-time lover, my full-time mother. “Start writing it down.”

  But Layna Rebane—who was entirely human and without a god's blessing—was already way ahead of her queen, fingers clutching a quill pen, a sheet of vellum laid out in front of her. As I watched, she poised herself to write.

  “Which one is first?” she asked and Elijah lifted a single finger to his face.

  “My right eye,” he said, and then my mother began to write. While Jasinda and I sat there
in silent shock, the golden skinned Nomaid woman who'd beaten out hundreds of Amerin natives for her position through hand-to-hand flubbing combat, wrote down a spell that made my throat tight and my blood sing—and for different reasons than I'd felt earlier.

  This wasn't lust, this was a calling of power, like to like.

  My heart lurched and my fingertips felt suddenly like they were ablaze with magic. Shifting my wings, I extended them fully and let them rest on the floor, taking some of the strain off of my back.

  “Are you alright, Brynn of Haversey?” the queen asked, looking down at me with a bemused smile on her face that said … she didn't think I was and that was okay. No, that was good. Not to say the queen couldn't be a real blitz at times, but she wasn't exactly known for being cruel either. If she was looking at me like that, there was a reason for it.

  “There's something strange …” I started, lifting a hand up to my necklace. It was forged of Haversey steel, another gift from the Light Goddess to all her children. It couldn't be stolen, borrowed, or bought. If I lost it, it'd come back to me. If it were destroyed, it'd reappear within hours, hanging there around my neck for the whole world to see, an announcement of who I was and what I could do.

  As soon as my fingers curled fully around it, I felt something shift inside of me, some lurching jolt of recognition as my eyes took in the runes of the spell, runes I shouldn't rightfully be able to read … but which started to make sense to me. The longer I looked, the clearer they became.

  “A resurrection spell,” I whispered, beads of sweat dotting my forehead as the Light Goddess took over my eyes and translated the ancient language for me. I hadn't even asked for the second sight. No, it was being forced on me and I didn't know quite what to do. Hell's bells, I didn't even think I could move.

  Elijah finished his slow spin and my mother scribbled down a few last runes, pausing expectantly and looking back up. The beautiful silver etchings twisted and turned dark, oozing blood down Elijah's perfect skin.