“And you’ll burn yourself to make a point. Consider me equally impressed.” Juni calmly took Magenta’s palms between hers, and her seared palms healed.
Magenta raised her eyebrow. “Does your mother know how much magic rests within you?”
“It’s much safer if she doesn’t.” Juni’s voice became sharper. “I can make things much harder for your Immortals if you tell. Now, doesn’t afternoon tea usually come with…?”
“Scones,” Magenta gasped, “buttered toast, cucumber sandwiches…oh, little Victorian sponge cakes!”
The food appeared, spreading out across the royal blue.
“Hey, don’t imply that we can’t feed our Prefect,” Sleipnir grumbled.
“She’s not a pet, Slippy.” Bask bounced on his tiptoes. “And if it pleases you, aye it does. We crave all the afternoon tea goodness.”
Bask dived on the feast of tiny sandwiches and cakes like only a starving incubus could who still made every move look both sexy and elegant. The way that he popped a cake into his mouth and then sucked the cream from his finger was sinful.
When my stomach grumbled, hungry for lunch, I groaned. Then I realized that Midnight had as well. His breath ghosted my neck
Okay, that’s what I got for being a clever foxy pants about my tasty blood.
Lysander’s voice shook with anger. “My uncle sent those treats for me, and on my wings, he’d never wish them to reward her.”
“Your guardian is our patron, and what he sends becomes mine,” Juni replied. “I’ll share it with whoever I please. Right now, it displeases me to share it with you. Your Food Privileges are revoked for twenty-four hours.”
Lysander’s face fell. “Professor…”
“Would you like to try for forty-eight?”
Magenta dropped the cucumber sandwich in her hand like it’d become infested by slugs. Was that an apologetic look that she was shooting Lysander?
Juni’s expression darkened. “Start the divination spell.”
“Shall I be mother?” Magenta poured two cups of steaming tea. Then she sniffed the herbal aroma with a sigh. “What a delightful blend.”
“Concentrate on the liquid and the power that you wish to infuse it with,” Juni instructed.
Magenta nodded. Slowly, her sparkles lit up the surface of the tea like a flaming cocktail, before sinking beneath the surface.
Lysander tilted up his chin, marching around the table to drop his strand of hair into one of the cups.
I stiffened. What happened next? A puff of smoke? The undead howling out Lysander’s sins? Lysander’s hair falling out?
Nothing.
Well, that was anticlimactic. Until, Lysander snatched the cup and turned to crouch in front of Midnight. Instantly, Midnight pulled away from me, folding his wings behind him like a soldier smartening himself up into parade position, even if he was strung up.
Lysander’s expression was disturbingly gentle, as his fingers clenched around the cup. “Your duty is to help us win today by drinking this. I assure you that it won’t harm you, but it will let me read the future through you. What you see is private between us two alone.”
“You don’t ask a whipping boy’s permission,” Juni snapped.
“Such wasn’t my intention.” Lysander’s hard gaze didn’t leave Midnight’s. “One sought merely to make sure that he understood.”
When Midnight nodded, Lysander held up the cup.
After Lysander had poisoned Bask last night in the café, would Midnight trust him today? And I hadn’t had a great experience with Co-Co and its never-ending coming power either.
Just say no to potions. It could catch on as a slogan.
Yet did either of us have any choice? I mean, I had my neck on the line and Midnight had his wings.
Midnight darted out his tongue, licking with difficulty at the tea in an act of submission that was greater than anything Lysander had shown last night. When Midnight gasped in pain, Lysander laid the cup to the side with shaky hands.
Pan’s hairy balls, I knew it…
Midnight thrashed wildly, and I understood at last why they bound us. His wing accidentally caught my nose, and I howled.
“You deserve this. You’re a disgrace of a fae. Whoever heard of a prince who was too weak to obey or kill?” Midnight growled in a voice that terrifyingly was not his own.
Chills ran down my arms at such a commanding and cruel voice snarling from Midnight’s sweet mouth at Lysander, who’d stumbled back onto his ass and looked pinned to the floor in fright at the blazing contempt in Midnight’s eyes.
“Touch your whipping boy’s forehead,” Juni ordered.
Lysander shook his head. Who terrified him so much that he looked nothing but a pair of gleaming emerald eyes, as he tried to cover himself in his wings?
“Do you wish to lose today on cowardice? I’ll cast a Shame Hex on you if I even suspect such a thing possible.” Juni prowled closer.
Lysander’s trembling hand rose to press against Midnight’s forehead. Then he screamed, arching against the floor. Willoughby vaulted across the table to his side, dropping to his knees. His hair had frozen to ice, and his eyes flashed. Juni raised her hand, however, and Willoughby flew backward, crashing against the table.
“What have you done?” Magenta demanded.
“Granted Crown the power to see the future. He has enough pain in his past for me to guess that it lies ahead of him as well.” Like a crow, Juni settled next to Lysander, where he lay shaking on the floor, before cradling his head on her lap. “Are you back with us?”
Lysander nodded, weakly.
“Do not fear to divine the future because we see only one path based on our past.” When Juni stroked Lysander’s hair away from his face, I had the sudden urge to bite off her fingers.
I blinked. Why was I so desperate to show her what it felt like to be the prey? As she continued to pet Lysander like reducing him into a shuddering wreck was a personal victory, I realized that it was because she pretended to be better than the other witches and that made her worse. She was a predator who loved the hunt. If the Princes didn’t break for her, then she brought their predators alive for them.
“Can what I saw be changed?” Lysander asked.
Say yes, yes, yes…
Juni cocked her head as if in thought. “Fate is woven every day by many hands. We merely catch glimpses, which help us to see our path.”
“She means of course it can.” Magenta’s gaze became flinty.
Lysander’s relief was like a living thing. “Thank you.”
Take that Miss Fate: your prince is thanking an Immortal.
Juni’s expression hardened. “Time for my dear sister in the House of Crows to face her future.”
I shook my head. “Sorry, this oracle attraction has been shut down for health and safety reasons.” I cradled my bruised nose. “Look, it’s damaged and not worth seeing. Come back next month, year, or how about not at all?”
“How about I close it permanently,” Juni demanded silkily, before muttering, “at least it’d be quieter.”
I eeped, but before Juni could move towards me, Lysander had tugged on her sleeve. “Please, don’t ask the witch to go through that. She made the potion, and it was demonstrated on me. Could that not be enough?”
Was that the first time I’d heard Lysander say please?
Juni eyed him dispassionately. “Why, if that isn’t what I call teamwork. Yet I still have to decide the Punish and Reward Game. Any thoughts?”
“It could please you to make it a draw?” Bask said, hopefully.
Juni huffed. “Nonsense, who’s been putting such thoughts into your head? Crush earned a Privilege Point for the Princes, which swings the lesson to them.”
“What about Lysander losing Food Privileges?” Sleipnir demanded, and Mist snorted his agreement from his pocket.
“That’s his own personal punishment, unless you wish to join him?” Juni said, frostily.
Sleipnir shoved a scone int
o his mouth just in case she followed through with the threat, then he did a thumbs up. “I’m good.”
I shrank back, as Juni’s dark gaze met mine. I scowled because when I was both one step closer to punishment at the Princes’ hands and being killed (I was so haunting her with visions of my crooked tailed self getting funky to “Super Bad”), how much worse could things get?
“After the rudeness, refusals, and in the witching heavens does he never hold his tongue, of Confess this lesson, I select him as the worst behaved student.” Juni’s eyes blazed with spiteful smugness. “He’ll suffer in the Memory Theater. Why finally, nothing to say?”
Oww, how many times did I need to mentally slap myself before I learned?
“Now you’ll wish that you’d disciplined your whipping boy,” Lysander said, wearily. “At least, you shall after tonight.”
I swallowed, paling. My pulse pounded. The way that Midnight twisted closer to me, cocooning me once again in the darkness of his wings only made me shake worse.
I knew what was in my past. I didn’t want to face it again. What if the Memory Theater was worse than any horror?
Chapter Eighteen
Rebel Academy, Tuesday September 3rd
Fox
I shook, abandoned on the stage in the center of the Memory Theater. A spotlight rooted me in place like all my faults were lit up. I wrapped my arms around my middle. They’d need a brighter light. Then I squinted up at the tiered seats that were hidden in shadow.
The Princes sat on black seats and the Immortals on pink like it was a chessboard. I smirked. It’d be epic if the truth of this theater was that I’d been chosen to play real life Wizard’s Chess with a twist: I’d love to see Lysander’s expression when Magenta’s magic mist swept him off the board because no way would he ever get to be King in my game.
Why did I have the feeling that witches wouldn’t put a mage in charge of picking up litter, let alone their precious Princes?
I sighed because okay, that’d been a pleasant way to stop the terror from reducing me to as much of a pooping Rebel as Mr Fierce in front of the rest of the students. The theater was thick with the scent of burning sage. My magic prickled with the power held within this room: it was oppressive, suffocating, and dark.
It wanted to swallow me whole.
I shivered with unease, tipping back my head. Words swirled in and out of focus on the ceiling like they were rising to the surface of a rippling pool:
Share our pasts in order to move forward as one together.
I grimaced, closing my eyes.
More of Damelza’s motivational mottoes — brilliant.
I’d already shared enough to feel like the tips of my ears would never stop burning after the Punish and Reward Game in Divination class. I’d expected something dastardly from Lysander like the Itching Powder Pants Hex.
My ass had already been squirming in anticipation.
Instead, Lysander had scrutinized me in a way that’d made my dick and balls join in the squirming. “I choose Punish.”
“Shocker,” Sleipnir had muttered.
“So, what’s it to be?” Swinging upside down, I’d grinned crookedly. “Public execution of our social media accounts? Goodbye Instagram, farewell sweet Facebook, and so long Tinder…”
Bask had snickered.
“You possess those?” Lysander had blinked.
“If you define possess as in…do I have access to a computer, Internet, or any social media…then that’d be a nope. Oh look, then the punishment’s already carried out. Good job.”
Lysander had snorted. “Excellent try.” His gaze had slid to Magenta, who’d boldly met it. “Do you not think that we should get to know each other? My order is simple: each answer the same question.”
Magenta had nodded.
Lysander’s smile had been sharp. “Are you a virgin?”
“Why? Are you looking for a virgin sacrifice?” Magenta had snapped.
Perhaps, he’d expected to shame us. The first answer on my tongue had been: Of course not, I’m the legendary mage lover of the House of Jewels: The Wizard Lothario, surely you’ve heard of me? But then, the spell had kicked in, and I’d been forced to tell the truth.
Lysander’s eyes had widened at my shy nod. The tips of my ears had reddened.
Yet Sleipnir had stretched his arms behind his head with a cocky grin. “I’m the son of Loki. Hel’s tits, no.”
Bask had winked, sliding his hand down to circle his dick through his pants. His eyes had been half-lidded. “You think this much sexiness hasn’t been petted?” His grin had been sly. “Don’t you want to see if you could keep up?”
Lysander had flushed. Hadn’t he learned yet that sometimes you lost, when you thought that you’d won?
“What an impertinent question.” Magenta had tossed her hair. “My virtue is intact as befits my unmarried station, but worry not, I intend to change that soon. I have lovers now who I wish to ravish.” She’d caught Lysander’s gaze, and he’d shivered. I’d already been lost on the whole ravishing part of that. After all, I was the legendary mage lover, why wouldn’t she want to ravish my curly-haired cuteness? See, I could still lie to myself within the spell. “I’m intrigued by your interest. Were you hoping to deflower us and add us to your list of conquests? Or perhaps, you lie awake at night, fretting that you’re the lone virgin in this academy?”
Lysander had stormed out with his haughty nose in the air.
I’d bet my prickles and whiffling nose that despite the bluster, Lysander was as innocent as me.
Yet now, caught in the spotlight, I would have to share a part of myself again and this time, I wouldn’t have the other Immortals backing me up. It’d been brilliant to turn the tables with them at my side, but alone on the stage, I didn’t know if I had the strength to pull off the same trick.
In a flurry of feathers, Damelza appeared, and my eyes snapped open. Her silver blonde hair reflected the light, and her dress swept across the floor, as she prowled towards me.
I shuffled my feet, unable to move.
Do not poop, do not poop, do not…
With a flick of her hand, feathered straps bound each of the Rebels into their seats like the theater was a fairground ride. Wow, it’d be brilliant if it was because I’d never been to the fair. Except, I had the feeling that I was the ride.
“What a surprise that the criminally inclined mage is the first to visit my theater.” Damelza’s lips pinched, and my dick shriveled. “I tried to help your mother with your discipline as a child. I always knew that you’d turn out to need a firm hand, although I never guessed that my poor friend would have two sons with magic. I wonder if she was cursed.”
My hands clenched into fists. “I missed you and your inspiring speeches. Where’s the suggestion box? I have a few complaints…well, suggestions for improvement…about my induction.”
Someone snickered from the theater seats. I’d bet that it was Bask.
“I’m so sorry.” Damelza’s eyes glittered. “Write down your complaints and hand them to Professor Bacchus.”
“Really?”
“If you want to be transfigured into a footstool.”
I bit my lip. “Tempting because she wears epic boots, and I have this kinky thing for them, but Pan knows that enough witches have already trodden on me in my life, so I’ll pass.”
Damelza fiddled with the feather at her ear, and I couldn’t help the flinch because the last time that she’d touched the feather, she’d thrown it at me. I had that effect on witches. “Why don’t you share your trauma with the rest of the class but not the kinky part because do you know what witches hate listening to the most?”
I cocked my head. “The Wizard of Oz soundtrack?”
Damelza’s cheek twitched. “Boastful mages.” Damn my prickles, that was me screwed. “The most delightful thing about my Memory Theater is that the Rebel doesn’t need to speak. The spell will show the truth, and every student here will relive the memory alongside you.”
I bit my tongue so hard that I yelped. When did I let others see the truth? It’d taken years of dedication to build up my walls of lies and I liked it that way, cheers.
Okay, Sleipnir and Bask had glimpsed some of the truth because of the Blood Amulet, but the secrets of their own dark pasts blasted through me in angsty rock, and they didn’t pry. A guy appreciated that. But Magenta was my first kiss; she was the woman who’d brought me to life. She also didn’t act like it but she was a witch. Would she truly want me when she saw that I was the monster of the House of Jewels?
“Shall we?” Damelza said like she was inviting me to a dance, rather than the violation of my mind. “I’ve never explored a mage’s head before, so I’m hoping for the best but expecting the depraved worst.”
All of a sudden, Louis Armstrong’s gravelly voice boomed through the theater backed by the joyful flute and trumpet of “It’s a Wonderful World.”
My eyes widened. Damelza couldn’t have picked this on purpose, right? She had a sick sense of humor because it drove me back to a spring day that I was desperate not to remember, when I’d lost all hope that I’d ever be rescued from the attic.
Damelza gripped my shoulders, spinning me to face the back wall of the theater. A kaleidoscope of images was projected onto it. They flashed like a thousand home movies that’d been ripped apart and then jaggedly sewn together from fae, vampires, and gods.
Paws save me, they must be the memories of every student who’d faced this trial.
That was it, stop this ride, I wanted to get off, and probably hurl as well. It turned out that I hated the fair.
My stomach roiled. I clutched my sweating palms tightly under my armpits. I recoiled, but Damelza held me in place.
No escape, no escape, no…
The jazz played on loop. There was no way out. There never had been. From the moment that I’d been locked away in the warded attic because my magic had come in, I’d been trapped forever.
Rebel Academy: Crave: A Paranormal Academy Romance Series (Wickedly Charmed Book 1) Page 25
