Bloodline Alchemy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 6)

by Lan Chan

  I blinked. “Sophie?” Sandra shook my shoulder.

  “Huh?” I pinched myself and realised my mind was playing tricks on me.

  “You zoned out for a second there. Is this too much?”

  Steeling my spine, I took a long breath. “No, I’m fine.”

  She glanced over my shoulder at Noah. “More than I can say for your shadow.” She rounded on him. “If you’re going to just lurk, you can at least make yourself useful.”

  “My role is to guard Sophie.”

  The way her jaw locked said that she wasn’t impressed by the answer. By the time late afternoon arrived, I was covered in all manner of blood that wasn’t mine as well. And imprinted in my head was the stoic grunt of every supernatural species as they took to being knitted together without any sort of painkiller. More than once I was on the verge of fainting. The only way I managed to hold on to consciousness was to remind myself that they were hurt because of me.

  Sandra finally pushed me out the door when evening arrived. “But you’re not done.”

  She gave me an arched look. “We will never be done. But you’re not going to be any use to anyone if you drop dead.”

  As Noah took me back to the Reserve, her words bounced around in my head. Right now, I was no good to anybody. For so long, I’d painted myself as a fugitive and a blood witch. Somehow, in all this mess, I had allowed myself to forget that I was more than just the great-granddaughter of a criminal. Before I was any of those things, I had been a kitchen witch. It was time to remind myself of who I was.

  19

  Noah’s face twisted into a scowl. “Are you allowed to be in here?”

  “Can you carry this?” I asked, ignoring his reticence. We were inside the Academy’s stock room where all of the potions paraphernalia was kept.

  Noah held up his hands. “Relax!” I hissed. “It’s not stealing.”

  “I beg to differ.”

  “Well, do it while you’re helping me carry things.”

  “Do you really have to take this from the Academy?”

  I gave him a pointed look. “Would you like to take me to Rivia instead?”

  His arm whipped out and he took the paper bags from me.

  There really was a lot of stuff. “On second thought,” I said, “maybe we should borrow a trolley instead.”

  “No way. This is bad enough. What are you going to do with all this stuff?”

  “I’m going to make a potion that will burn you alive.”

  I did a double take when he rolled it eyes. It was the most expressive thing I’d seen pass over his face. As I watched him, his eyes kept darting to my neck.

  “What?”

  His nose flattened. “You’ve got troll blood all over your collar.”

  Oh, that. The troll had been absolutely still when I’d removed the hook from the rough skin on his underarm. But the tip of the hook had hit an artery. Blood haemorrhaged everywhere.

  Shrugging, I finished getting what I needed, and we headed back. On the way out, I spotted the rare-ingredients trolley that Professor McKenna loved to wheel out on special occasions. Stacked on all of the glass shelves were ingredients that made my mouth water. Without supervision, it was so tempting to just swipe all of it. The contents of the trolley were worth a fortune.

  “I never figured you for the thief,” Noah said.

  “I never figured you for a snitch,” I shot back. He let out a soft growl, and I knew he’d keep his mouth shut even if it killed him now. Placing my palm over the painted rune on the top of the glass, I whispered my name and the word of light to open the cabinet. Noah groaned.

  “You have the opening spell.”

  I grinned at him. “Professor McKenna gave it to me in third year when I started becoming a nuisance asking for stuff all the time.”

  Thinking of her made it harder to swallow. Instead, I busied myself taking only the ingredients I needed to make my health elixir. At the last minute, I decided to pocket all of the winterflowers as well. It wouldn’t hurt to see if I could transmute them into some kind of sedative. On the way out, my eyes landed on the glass cabinet stocked with sealed beakers of blood. Shuddering, I increased my steps.

  We arrived back at the mansion to three cheerful faces. Noah unloaded the potions ingredients onto Charles and Luther before saying, “I will supervise when you mix the potions.”

  I scowled. “Okay, well then you better start camping here too.”

  Neither of us was particularly happy with that prospect. “He’s so weird,” Charles commented.

  “At least he’s not jumping like I’m about to stab him in the back to harvest his essence anymore,” I said.

  “Do you mind if I sleep on the floor of your room?” Cassie asked while we stashed all the ingredients inside.

  “There’s more than one spare room,” I noted. She rubbed the back of her neck. “But if that’s what you want, be my guest.”

  I was halfway through cooking dinner when there was a knock on the door. Eyes narrowed, I stuck my head out of the kitchen and craned my neck around the corner in time to see a statuesque brunette with hair down to her butt handing Charles a paper bag. She smiled slyly, looking him and up and down too before Cassie slammed the door in her face. Cassie grabbed the paper bag without looking at the contents, marched into the kitchen where I was suddenly preoccupied with the soup in the cauldron, and tried to toss it into the fire.

  Charles leaped out in front of her, grabbing for the bag. “Hey!” he said. “Whatcha doing?”

  “What does it look like I’m doing? This is garbage.”

  Luther came into the room, his eyes ringed in red capillaries. “You don’t even know what’s inside,” he said. “It smells good.”

  “It’s garbage.” She shoved Charles in the shoulder and tried to get past him.

  “Cass,” he said, voice suddenly amused. “You can’t do this.”

  “Do what? Since when is it a crime to throw out trash?”

  She kept pushing at his chest. He wouldn’t budge. When her skin began to emit that strange glow again, I had to intervene.

  “It’s okay,” I told her. “Just put it into the cooler.”

  “But–”

  “I said, it’s okay.” That it was pushed out through ground teeth wasn’t lost on anybody.

  It was unfortunate that the doorbell rang again while I was chopping up salad ingredients. This time it was an ebony-skinned girl with thin braids in her hair. She was almost as tall as Charles. A sweep of metallic silver dots were painted across her brow and cheekbones. Luther swallowed as she handed him a single golden apple. “For Max,” she purred. I felt the warm sensuality in her voice like a slap in the face.

  As soon as Luther closed the door, Cassie swiped the apple from his hand, dropped it on the floor, and stomped on it.

  “Cass!” he shouted. Charles grabbed her and pushed her behind him at the same time Luther and I threw up circles. The detonation of magic crawled over my circle like an intimate caress. It kissed the skin of my wrist and sank into a low heat in my gut. Luther scrunched his face and tapped at his temple as the amorous spell dissipated.

  My face must have been like a storm because Charles didn’t say a word as he cleaned up the remains of the spelled apple. “What did she think was going to happen?” Cassie hissed. “That he’d eat it and suddenly fall for her?”

  Luther snorted. “Did you get a look at her? She didn’t need the–” My knife bashed the hell out of the tomatoes. I couldn’t even bring myself to look up when the doorbell rang the third time. Inside me, the mating link had turned into a pool of simmering red fire. Somebody was going to get burned soon. When Charles came into the kitchen with yet another stash of food, I’d had enough.

  “Help me pack this up,” I ordered. “We’re not eating here anymore.”

  Somehow, we found ourselves in the open clearing where all of the ascension ceremonies were held. After Jacob Buchanan’s attack, the field had been stitched together by mages and the Fae
, but it had been left untouched. Over in the distance, I could see lights on in the houses that butted up against the edge of the clearing. There was smoke coming from their chimneys. I heard little high-pitched voices on the breeze.

  Charles watched the houses in the same greedy way I did. “I’m sure Dani is fine, wherever she is,” I assured him.

  For a second, his eyes cleared, but then he shook his head. “Yeah, I guess.”

  Logically, their decision made sense. Their parents were unable to care for her, and both boys were too busy. That didn’t change the fact that she would probably prefer to be with her brothers. Thinking about my own parents, I knew if I were given the choice, I would trade safety to be reunited with them.

  Clearing my throat, I helped Cassie set out the food. Luther cleaned the fire pit that had been allowed to get untidy. When night drew its cloak around us, he pointed a finger at the pile of enchanted wood, and it went up in flames.

  He rubbed at his eyes while spooning stew into his mouth. “Here,” I said, “I’ll top you up.” Glancing up into the sky, I said, “The stars are so bright tonight.”

  All three heads lifted skyward. They didn’t notice when I slipped something into Luther’s bowl. After dinner, we spread out on the lush grass, our arms tucked under our heads. Charles wiggled around.

  “Why don’t you just take the blade off?” Luther grumbled.

  “Why don’t you just shut up?” Charles shot back.

  Luther lay on the grass on my right. He turned his head in my direction. In the soft light of the bonfire, his eyes blinked very slowly. I suppressed a smile. “I don’t even know why I bother,” he said. “His head is thicker than a brick wall.”

  Charles tried to kick him, but they were too far apart. “Then why don’t you just stop trying?” Charles said.

  “Lu has a point,” Cassie said from my left.

  “Don’t you start too.”

  She pulled on the blades of grass. “We’re allowed to have an opinion, you know. Just because Lex left you the blade doesn’t mean it’s off limits.”

  He growled but we were all in too much of a food coma for there to be any real bite to it. “When she leaves you the blade, then you can have an opinion.”

  Luther grunted. “Like you even know what to do with it. You can barely touch it.”

  Silence descended on them. I could tell they’d had this conversation many times, the weight of the responsibility weighing heavy on each of them in different ways. As the silence stretched, I could practically feel the strain in Charles’s voice when he said, “Maybe she made a mistake. She probably wasn’t thinking straight towards the end.”

  I gave a soft laugh. “If you’d seen her at the end, you’d know how silly that is. I’ve never seen her more focused. She might have been dying, but there was no mistake in anything she did. Whether or not you can use the blade, she wanted you to have it. She could have left it to anyone, Chuck. She didn’t. She left it with you.”

  He beat a fist against the grass. “Why?” It was a painful cry.

  I didn’t pretend to know her thoughts. All I knew was that Lex trusted Charles in the same way he had always trusted her. “Maybe to keep it in safe hands until she comes back. Maybe because she believed you would know when to use it.”

  After a few beats, he said, “Okay.”

  It was more than I had hoped to get. Beside me, Luther’s half-closed eyes flicked open. “Incoming,” he said. Judging by the way he smiled, I wasn’t concerned. Not until we were sitting up and something furry rammed into my chest.

  Falling back, I shrieked as Edward in his leopard form sliced up the front of my shirt in an effort to help me back up again. His mother, Cheyenne, pinched her lips together. I gaped at the state of my blouse. “My mama bought me this shirt for my birthday!”

  She cackled. “I’m sorry.” Her tone said anything but. “He saw the fire and scented you. He hasn’t stopped whining about seeing you since the other night.”

  An adorable little growl emitted from Edward’s throat as Charles tried to make him heel with a palm on his neck. Edward nipped at Charles’s hand, trying to get to me. When Charles went for his tail, Edward shifted back into human form, completely unabashed by his nakedness. He leaped back into my lap, not realising that he was a big boy.

  “Ugh!” I grunted.

  “Sophie!” he wrapped chubby fingers around my neck. Cheyenne placed a hand over her mouth.

  “Are you just going to stand there while I get mauled?” I asked her.

  “Better you than me.”

  It occurred to me that I might actually prefer it when the shifters treated me with cautious indifference. I was being suffocated by affection.

  From behind Cheyenne’s back, somebody sniffed. “You’re such a dork,” Kate said. “Get off her. You’re not a baby.”

  Edward didn’t seem to care. He’d made himself a comfortable little spot on my lap and shifted back into a leopard. His hair was so sleek and soft, I’d sunk my hand into it and was inadvertently petting him.

  Even though her voice was laced with derision, I could see the envy in her balled fists. Reaching out a hand, I opened my fist. Without even thinking, she took it, her fingers trembling. “I’m perfectly fine,” I told her, sensing through practice in the Zambian compound the deep shame in her.

  “We shouldn’t have been out there,” she said. Cheyenne clutched at her shoulder, but Kate’s attention was only for me. “I didn’t even know where I was running until it was too late.”

  “The malachim got into your head?”

  She gulped. “I woke up because I heard Rowena walking past my house.” Rowena was her friend. She was also half-human. “I called out to her, but she wouldn’t acknowledge me. Before I knew it, we were out of range and Ed and the boys were with us. That’s when they came.”

  Her fingers constricted. I could feel the vein in my neck spasming, but I didn’t let go. “If you hadn’t shown up–”

  “Hey,” I said. “I did show up. We’re all okay.”

  She took in the bonfire and the kids around me. “You’re trapped here. That’s my fault.”

  “Kate,” I said. “It’s my own fault I got caught. It’s my fault I did things that warrant my captivity. None of that is your fault.”

  “But...” She trailed off. I saw her glance in the direction of the pack circle conference room which was only just up the slope of the hill. “They’re saying you did bad things and that’s why you can’t leave.”

  I grinned at her. “Yep. That’s also why you shouldn’t worry. I can take care of myself.” Edward snuggled in deeper. She swallowed hard, trying to determine whether the lie I had told her was acceptable.

  The quiet was punctured by the sound of snoring. “For goodness’ sake,” Charles said.

  “Don’t wake him!” Cassie and I hissed at the same time. Luther was dead to the world. His mouth hung open and his snores spoke of exhaustion. Sniffing, Charles eyed me.

  “You drugged him.”

  I wasn’t sorry. “That’s right. A reminder of what happens when you displease me.”

  Kate and Edward stayed with us until Cheyenne declared it was past their bedtime. As she dragged him reluctantly from me, she bent down and whispered in my ear, “Thank you.” Her arms were suddenly shackled around her son, holding him for dear life. “I don’t care what anyone says, Mark and I will never forget what you’ve done for us. They’re just afraid. They’ll come around eventually.”

  Charles grumbled as he slung Luther’s limp body over his shoulder. “Oh, shush,” Cassie said as she shouldered our packs. “He weighs nothing.”

  “It’s not that he’s heavy! It’s that he’s shooting fire while he’s asleep.”

  I burst out laughing when, at that very moment, Luther snored and a small blaze ignited in the grass. Cassie and I spent the whole way back dousing flames while Charles yelped and complained about getting his hair singed.

  There was hardly any space inside the room, but Cas
sie managed to squeeze herself between the ingredients chest and the base of the bed. “Are you sure you don’t want to come up here?” I asked.

  “No thanks. I don’t want to risk Max mistaking me for somebody else and murdering me in my sleep.”

  “That’s not funny.”

  “I’m not joking. I’m really tall for a girl.” She had shot up even more in the past six months. She could rest her head comfortably on Charles’s collar and he would only need to bend his neck to hold her in place. I couldn’t help wondering what Kai would think of that if he were here. Her thoughts were on him too it seemed.

  “Do you think you’d be able to explain to me what happened?” she asked. “I was all the way on the other side of Terran when it happened.”

  The unmasked pain in her voice was the only thing that convinced me. I would sooner never think about the final battle ever again. If I didn’t know how badly she needed this, I would have refused. We were both sobbing by the time I was done. Cassie from grief and fear and me from the lie I maintained to hold on to the illusion that I wasn’t the cause of at least half of that grief. Once she closed her eyes, her breath evened out quickly. Like Luther, she was wrung out emotionally. I only wished that I could believe my own crap so I could forget for a second that it was all my fault.

  20

  Kai agreed with my assessment. When I finally fell asleep, it was to be dragged into a swirl of darkness that ended with me standing beside him on the precipice of a cliff. His wings were unfurled but they were no longer a beautiful white. Instead, they were stained with a silver sludge that dripped from him in waves of despair.

  “Kai?”

  My breath caught in my lungs when he turned and pitiless black eyes bore into me. I tried to take a step back, but my legs were cemented to the ground. In front of us, the swirl of darkness was punctured by a ravenous keening sound, along with an agonising scream that dragged out until I thought I was going to go crazy, only for it to start all over again.