Nine Lives: The Caelum Academy Trilogy: Part THREE

by Akeroyd, Serena

It was a theory worthy of merit.

  Two opposite magnets would attract one another, but two positives? No.

  Eve and I were now definitely on the same pole, but she and Samuel weren’t.

  Because that made sense, even my Lorelei settled down. I disliked the childish outburst from it, but understood because, at its heart, the soul always felt what I did. It just turbocharged everything. Made everything seem a thousand times more powerful or, on the other end of the scale, weaker.

  Settling back into the sofa, I watched as my woman, and one of our Pack finally got some rest after a job well done. I hadn’t anticipated guarding two people this night, but it was a task I’d embrace with both hands.

  2

  Samuel

  There are some sleeps you just never want to wake up from. When the sheets and duvet are warm and cozy, when your body is in the most comfortable position, where even your temperature is just perfect. Those sleeps make stirring into wakefulness a huge inconvenience.

  That was my current status.

  I knew where I was.

  The second I’d formed some semblance of consciousness; I knew I was with Eve. I also knew I’d taken a huge liberty because nothing between us had indicated that she’d be okay with me sleeping with her. It wasn’t like I was a predator—not the sexual kind, anyway—and I had no intention of hurting her, but she didn’t know that, did she?

  Even as the thought crossed my mind and I knew I should climb out of bed, I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. Instead, I lost myself in my musings, nestled warmly in the haven we’d made.

  It wasn’t the first time I’d awoken with a woman in my arms, but Eve’s warm softness just seemed to merge into me. It was strange, but it was the reason I’d slept so well. I wasn’t as bad as Eren, whose reputation for not sleeping was rife in Caelum, but I did struggle to sleep most nights.

  I wasn’t like Eren who had a legitimate reason for not being able to sleep. Me? Not so much. Too much screen time, too much shit to do, and my brain never seemed to shut up.

  Though I never failed in my duty to Caelum, my duty to my Pack was more important to me. I spent a good few hours a day listening in on my parents, then I had the stocks I invested to handle. It was a peculiar talent of mine; one my father had harvested when I was a child.

  I could easily remember waking up on a Saturday morning and seeing him hiding behind the pink sheets of the Financial Times. He’d teasingly ask me which stocks I’d run if I had a hundred pounds and, using the various tidbits he’d taught me over the years, I’d make my selection.

  Only when, to him, I’d died, had I heard him tell my mother that my stock picks had been better than his. Every Saturday, with my hundred-pound ‘teaser’ investments, he’d place the money where I’d told him and had usually doubled or tripled his money.

  I thought it was the Vampire who was in control of that talent, if I was being honest. The hunter in the creature knew what to track, and because I was at ease with my instincts, together, we made a nice team.

  Due to that, when I was handed Frazer’s portfolio, it was a pleasure. Like playing Monopoly but for real. I had invested in real estate, some of it in Paris and Berlin, but most of it was in London because that was my home turf and I knew it better than anywhere else. Frazer couldn’t say the same about home turf, which was why I hadn’t purchased much in the States. He’d been secured in one of his family’s mansions as a child, protected against kidnappers, shielded from his own shadow, before being locked up in a mental health facility that made Alcatraz in its heyday look like the tourist hotspot it was now.

  However, because of these investments, when we arrived in the capital we’d be staying at one of our Pack’s many properties, and with the journey ahead of us, I was truly grateful for my gifts because it meant we had unlimited funds to play with, to facilitate the treasure hunt that had staked a claim on Eve.

  Eve… she was my version of the forbidden fruit.

  She was Pack, meaning she was mine, but there was more to it. More to her. It scared me and enticed me equally.

  My arm was around her waist, and I squeezed slightly in a farewell before I decided it was truly time to get up. When I did, though, she murmured in her sleep, “Samuel?”

  Eyes widening, I jerked upright. Eren was there in a flash, and I wasn’t even uncomfortable with the idea of him having seen me sleep. Instead, I was just focused on the first word Eve had spoken in far too long.

  A word that just happened to be my name.

  “Eve?” Eren almost barked, his tone harsh with his concern.

  I understood, truly I did. Eve was scaring the shit out of us all with this extended nap.

  A mumble escaped her, and she began thrashing under the covers. Her legs kicked out at mine, but it wasn’t like the fit from before. It was more like she was in the throes of a bad dream.

  I grabbed a hold of her and tried to tuck her back into my body. The second I did, she calmed down.

  Eren noticed it too and, with a frown, stated, “Why is she doing that?”

  “How the bloody hell would I know?” I grumbled. “I’m as in the dark as you.” Still, it made me feel good that some part of her was connected to me.

  Not having received a mark from her, not having been Chosen, made me feel quite shitty.

  The second Reed had told me about his mark, I’d known I needed to keep her away from us and maintain some distance, otherwise it would be impossible for them to ever talk. I’d intimidated her at first in the hopes of turning the faculty’s big nose out of our business, and it had worked when she’d started beating the shit out of me in the gym.

  No one, until the final two weeks or so, would have thought there was any love lost between her and my Pack.

  “Do you think if we ducked her under cold water in the shower then you let go of her, she’d wake up?”

  “Sounds like something from Takeshi’s Castle,” I mumbled, but the idea held some merit.

  “What’s that?”

  “A Japanese game show where they did weird shit to the contestants.” I squinted at him. “She might just fall instead.”

  “You can catch her,” he retorted. “I’m not saying we need her to break a leg for her to wake up.”

  I had to hide a smile at his huffed reply. “No. Sorry. You’re right.”

  He nodded firmly, then mumbled, “Well, go on then. You’ll have to carry her out or she’ll start thrashing again.”

  Getting the feeling he wasn’t happy about that, I had to admit I understood. It was as hard for me not being Chosen as it was for him being Chosen but not Claimed. Most of the Pack were in a similar state, and we really needed Eve to start Claiming us and forcing our souls to settle upon the dominant creature in our beings.

  We didn’t have time for her to remain unconscious, not when we had a plan in place I was ninety-five percent certain would work, and when we could purposefully use the time spent traveling toward said plan by helping her with her souls, training her to be more at ease with them and to understanding the minutiae that came with each creature.

  It was awkward climbing out of bed with her held close to me. Harder still to haul her upright and into my arms when she was lax and not responding. In the end, Eren had to help. I could maintain her weight with little to no issue but getting her to stay in my grasp without her tumbling out of my arms was nigh impossible.

  With great difficulty, we headed for the bathroom.

  The yacht was technically a super-yacht, and the fixtures and fittings meant nothing to me, but to the others, I knew they were the height of luxury. Frazer and I had been raised with money, but Reed hadn’t. Nor had most of Eren’s Pack, although I thought Eren came from a monied background, if I was being honest. He hadn’t really been taken aback by the yacht at all, and I’d seen the necklace he’d gifted Eve for her birthday.

  As a jeweler’s son, I recognized expensive hardware when I saw it. That gold had been of the highest quality, and deep in the hand, where the All-Seei
ng Eye was set, there was a diamond with perfect clarity. Flawless—free from inclusions. Clear as glass, with nary a hint of yellow to spoil those pristine facets. All those things added up and meant it cost a sweet bundle of cash.

  Pressing her into the wall to hold her up, I set her so that her feet were dangling close to the floor and stared down at her sleeping features as Eren rushed over to the showerhead and turned it on. He came back, and together, we moved under the rainfall and drenched her to the bone. She began to shiver, her body shuddering within seconds. Though I felt the cold, my creature protected me—Eren too. Hers should have protected her, but it didn’t, and when Eren stepped back, I was hesitant to do the same, even though I knew his logic made sense.

  I gritted my teeth and let go of her.

  The second I did, her eyes flashed open and her knees crumbled.

  Snapping forward, I grabbed her and kept her upright. She moaned in my tight hold and her head fell back so the water pounded her square in the face.

  Concerned, I shot Eren a look, but his mouth was grim as he stated, “Let her go again. She has to wake up.”

  He was right. Sooner rather than later. But I still felt like a complete bastard.

  I let her go, and her breath gurgled as she let out a yelp that sounded horrendously like a garbled, “Samuel.” Once more, her knees buckled, but this time, her hands shot out. They slipped against the tile and she couldn’t gain purchase. Leaving it to the last second to catch her, I waited until her body almost connected with the ground before I hauled her against my chest once more.

  This time, her eyes were open, and she looked up at me in a daze. Her arms and legs were like overcooked spaghetti, but she was awake.

  “You’re mean,” she rasped, and the words sounded dull like her tongue was too thick to form the words.

  “And you stink,” I told her instead, my lips curving in a gentle smile that had her squinting at me. “Five days in bed will do that to you.”

  She blinked, her eyes slowly drifting open and closed—but fuck, she was awake and that was something to celebrate. “Five?”

  “Yes. You’ve scared us to death, Eve,” Eren grated out from beside me.

  She slowly turned her head and whispered, “Eren.”

  “Yes. Me.” His lips twitched. “At least you don’t have amnesia.”

  I snorted. “Let’s be thankful for small mercies.”

  “I feel…” A long pause. “Funny.” She moved her hand slowly, and it looked as though it might have weighed a good forty pounds for how hard it was for her to raise it. When she finally managed it and cupped my cheek, she narrowed her eyes at me. “Hate me?”

  Jerking in surprise, I asked, “Hate you? Why would I hate you?”

  “Like Dre. Grumpy. With… me.” That last word was a slur.

  I cut Eren a look. “One more round under the water?”

  He nodded, his brow again taut with concern—she sounded and looked as though she were drifting back to sleep.

  I hated myself for it, but I moved us back under the water and then as she began struggling against the intense cold, I let go. This time, she did fall to the ground. Like a sack of potatoes. I almost caught her, but her limbs were flailing, and it made it so I couldn’t grab a firm hold of her.

  Squatting down in front of her, I maintained a distance, even though her hands sought me out and her eyes pleaded with me to touch her.

  Her reaction scared me because I wanted her touch as much as she wanted to give it to me, but for whatever reason, when we were touching, she could sleep, but awoke when we weren’t.

  Fighting my inclinations, I whispered, “I don’t hate you. I just need you to wake up, Eve. We need you awake and aware.”

  Her head bowed and her hands dropped as she lay there in a splattered heap on the shower floor. The water bounced off the sparkling silver drain and around her, it puddled, making the patterned mosaic floor tiles easier to behold.

  “What do we do now?” I questioned Eren, unsure why I was asking at all because he knew as little as me.

  He squatted next to me. “Pray she gets herself together?”

  “Stopped praying a long time ago,” I told him, my voice hoarse.

  “Me too,” he admitted grimly.

  I raked a hand through my wet hair. “Should we set her in a bath of cold water? That way she wouldn’t be like…” Well, the splat on the shower floor.

  “No,” Eve moaned, startling us both. “Just. Gimme. Minute.”

  We shot each other a look and waited a minute. When she began to move again, this time with more purpose, I really was close to praying she was awake.

  Slowly, so fucking slowly that I wanted to wind up the clock, she managed to roll onto her knees. When the joints connected with the tiles, both Eren and I winced, then we watched as she pushed her hands onto the ground in front of her and shoved herself into a straighter position, where her butt was resting on her ankles.

  She was shaking, and I knew it was from a combination of the intense cold of the water and exertion. Whatever the tattoo had done to her, it had drained her reserves to a ridiculous extent, and considering how much electrical power it would require to make those damn leaves glow the way they did, it was no wonder her brain was going haywire. There were synapses in the brain that functioned with a form of electricity, but nothing like this light. Her body wasn’t made for such a feat and until this moment, I’d thought that was why she was weak.

  Now, I was wondering if the fact she needed to Choose me was one of the major parts of the problem.

  She needed my touch, needed the connection with me to stay awake, that told me she needed a deeper bond with me.

  Trouble was, how did we help her Choose me?

  “What did she do to you, Eren? How did she bring your Lorelei out?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. Why?”

  “Maybe she should do that to me. Maybe that would help stabilize her somewhere. With all eight of us united, maybe that will help her? As it stands, I’m the weak link and it leaves a gap in her defenses if she’s supposed to have the seven of us backing her.”

  “She looked into my eyes and did something. Drew the Lorelei forward.” Another shrug. “I don’t really know how to explain it.”

  Licking my lips, I nodded and ducked down so that her lowered eyelids weren’t able to avoid mine. “Eve, I think it’s time for you to Choose me.”

  For a second, she stared at me blankly. Then, she nodded, as though I was right, as though she’d been waiting for me to come to that conclusion on my own. Leaning forward, I cupped her chin, then forced her to look at me. “Help me, Eve. Help me to help you.”

  Her eyes were a strange mixture of chestnut and amber. They were dark and glinted like a horse’s, but the amber brought gold to the irises that made them sparkle in the overhead light.

  When the daze cleared from her vision, I felt her stare at me, felt it deep in my bones. In my very soul, she was there. Waiting for me. Wondering why I’d taken a lifetime to reach her. Christ, the feelings she was drawing from me had me wondering why I’d taken so damn long as well. But then, when the pressure deepened, I realized I’d felt her inside me before.

  Back at Caelum.

  When she’d drawn me and the others from our drug-induced slumber and had forced us awake.

  Why, when she’d been inside me, hadn’t she Chosen me then?

  Why had she let me suffer without her mark?

  Before I could rail at her, she became a heavy weight inside me, on my soul, drawing the Vampire out into the light, letting the others pull back into the darkness. I felt them fade as though they’d never existed until the Vampire was the only creature inside me, until he was dominant, the king of my being as he’d been born to be.

  I shuddered, feeling red raw and wounded. Like the other souls had left their mark on me as they’d faded into nothingness, but there was a triumph too. A glory in knowing I was whole. At. Fucking. Last.

  Not having realized I’d
closed my eyes, I let them flutter open and saw her staring at me, those golden glints in her eyes sparkling and the light on her body flickering into being as different leaves glowed in response to my attention. Her hands were outstretched, reaching for me, and I let my fingers grab a tight hold on them. I clung to her, felt her cling in response, and I could do nothing less than haul her into me.

  The second our bodies connected was the second I realized the shower was off. I knew Eren had left us alone after turning off the water, and I felt inordinately grateful for the moment alone with Eve. She was a woman I’d never known I’d been waiting for, a woman I’d never dared dream I’d have, but here she was.

  Mine, just as much as I was hers.

  My throat was tight as our mouths collided. A need surged through me, which outweighed every other ounce of lust I’d felt for any other woman in the past. My body hardened where hers softened, and the minute she nipped at my bottom lip, my head fell back as an acute agony swarmed through me. It was need and want and hunger wrapped up into one voracious, swirling tornado, and it was focused on one thing—her blood.

  I staggered back from her, dragging myself away. The need to taste her was a soul-deep ache, and I shook as I stared at her, so ravenous for a drop of her essence that I must have looked stark raving mad.

  “Samuel?” she rasped, her voice low, her eyes losing the stark cast as whatever she’d drawn upon to drag my Vampire to the fore, to consume the other creatures inside me, began to drift away.

  Shaking my head, I bit off, “Need you.”

  “You can have me.”

  My nose twitched as I scented her Hell Hound sniffing around the scenario. Hell Hounds weren’t subtle like Weres. If I tried, I could hear their thudding weight in every beat of a Hound’s heart. As Eve’s was racing, I could discern the heavy presence of the beast that lived on anger, that thrived on lust. Every and any high emotion was the Hound’s to glory in, to exploit.

  That didn’t bode well for my control.

  “Blood,” I stated, spelling it out as much as I could with a voice that didn’t seem capable of working.