The breaking period: Day 2, hour 1
The realm’s constant dark sky was disorienting.
It didn’t help that the assassin program didn’t have schedules like the royal and commoner students’.
From what I overheard the royals saying during class, their school day ended at midnight. Then they had breakfast in the great hall at 8:00 a.m. and class at 9:00 a.m.
They’d been complaining about how late their classes went. Spoiled brats.
Currently, the clock in the classroom said 8:00 a.m.
In the time that the royal students had ended class, gone to sleep, and woken up for breakfast, we hadn’t left the fucking classroom.
No food.
No sleep.
No shower.
No warmth.
Until now, I’d thought I knew suffering. I’d thought I understood what it meant to be miserable.
I’d been wrong.
Because no matter how hard my life was, I’d always had two things—sleep and warmth. Even in the shifter realm, we’d had heavy coats that repelled the cold.
In the grand scheme of the realms, those two things seemed small and inconsequential.
Now I knew better. They were everything.
As I shivered in the back of the black stone classroom, my teeth chattered as my eyelids slumped and my head tilted forward.
The other recruits fared slightly better.
The men had stopped seeming like they were cold hours ago, and the only signs they weren’t well were their heavy lids and growling stomachs.
In contrast, I shivered violently, bright-blue veins stark against my pale skin.
All this pain for no reason.
After class with Ms. Gola, which was at least salaciously entertaining, Lothaire had walked in and announced he was our teacher. And in the ungodly hours of early morning, class had gone from bad to worse.
Lothaire didn’t bother to explain when we were going to get to eat and sleep. If we ever were.
Instead, he’d launched into the driest lecture on battle tactics I’d ever heard.
If he explained one more time how to maximize torturing a captured opponent, I was going to punch myself in the face.
Lothaire spent hours drawing a detailed diagram of how to extract information from a person.
With war paint decorating his face, Lothaire said, “The common misconception that fingernail extraction is the most painful method is just that, a misconception. What is a smaller action that has bigger results?”
He looked around the room, single eye flashing, as he waited for an answer.
I ran through methods in my head: cut out their tongue, cut off their genitals, disembowelment.
The list was endless.
But I didn’t bother to answer, since I was freezing and pissed the fuck off. Instead, I glared at Lothaire and told him with my eyes how much I wanted to do all those things to him.
“Horace.” Lothaire pointed to the surly vampyre, who was raising his hand.
“Sir, I would cut off the tips of their fingers and toes. More blood. More pain. It’s more effective.” Horace grinned and flashed his fangs.
Lothaire smiled back as he tapped his finger to his mouth like he was considering it.
Just two vampyres having a homicidal moment. Not what anyone wanted or needed.
I slumped lower in my seat and fantasized about crawling into a hot tub and never leaving.
After a long pause, Lothaire said, “That would work, and points for creativity. However, there is another method that is more effective. Anyone know?”
Scorpius raised his hand, and Lothaire pointed to him.
“Sir, I’d make small, shallow incisions all over their body at key places. Then I’d slowly peel off their skin.”
I scrunched up my nose as I glared at the pale bastard. Sure, I had my own issues, but I didn’t revel in my unwellness.
At least, that was what I was telling myself.
Scorpius smirked over at me as he flexed his biceps and placed his hands behind the back of his head. He thought he was so hot.
He was extremely attractive in a pale, sarcastic, rude way.
I rubbed at my eyes and flipped him off with both my middle fingers. When he didn’t react, I remembered he was blind and whispered, “fuck you.”
Lothaire obliviously nodded. “Excellent. That is correct, Scorpius. The skin is the largest organ on a person’s body and is usually very thin. The perfect instrument to exact pain while still leaving your captive alive.”
When Lothaire turned back to the board, Scorpius smirked and whispered back, “You wish I’d fuck you, pretty boy.”
Was he hot? Yes.
But did I have standards? Probably not.
I wasn’t going to tell him that though. Instead, I pursed my lips and said, “I’d rather die. Also, you’re obsessed with me.”
Scorpius mimed hip thrusting into the air, his powerful thighs bulged with strength, and the lower part of his shirt pulled up, showing off a cut Adonis belt.
On his hip, he flashed a tattoo of a snake eating its own tail.
It was a stunning, intricate piece of artwork but seemed different from the eye tattoo on his neck. Like it had been done by a different artist.
I swallowed through a sudden lump in my throat as my stomach pinched weirdly, and I looked away from him.
Orion shook his head as he looked back and forth between us, and Malum glared at me like he was imagining my head catching on fire.
But two could play at this game.
With painful slowness, I ran my tongue over my lips and popped the side of my thumb against my cheek in a wanton manner.
Scorpius’s pale cheekbones burned pink at the sound and Orion delicately arched an eyebrow at me.
Malum adjusted in his seat. He was probably trying to shift closer so he could strangle me or something.
Lothaire turned around, and we all snapped our attention to the front. Which I immediately regretted because he proceeded to draw an extremely graphic rendition of a person getting all their skin peeled off.
Scorpius was lucky he was blind.
John leaned forward and whispered, “Whatever just happened between you and Scorpius was hot.” He fanned himself dramatically.
Was everyone in this palace a pervert?
Lothaire spent the next few hours naming all the different species in the realm and their abilities. It was all a review of things I’d learned as a princess in the fae realm.
I spent those hours crossing my eyes and doodling pictures of fire and skulls on my notebook. After drawing an extremely detailed bonfire, I started hallucinating that I could somehow conjure warmth.
Every few minutes, I dragged my chair closer toward Malum’s flaming arms.
The harsh planes of his face were taut as he sprawled casually in his chair and watched Lothaire. His eyelids weren’t fluttering like everyone else’s. In fact, he looked completely awake and unbothered. Like he wasn’t sleep-deprived and hungry.
He didn’t seem to notice my approach.
Malum snapped his head up, silver eyes glowing like the moon. “Are you fucking kidding me, Egan? Get the fuck away from me. Either get on your knees and suck my dick or go back to your table.”
Never mind.
He noticed.
Apparently sexual harassment was a problem at this academy.
I awkwardly scooted my chair away from Malum. The scraping noise uncomfortably loud in the small classroom.
Lothaire turned to glare at me. “Am I boring you, Aran? Please explain what I just described for the class, since you’ve taken the liberty of dragging your chair across the room.”
Gnawing on my lower lip, I narrowed my eyes like I was thinking. I had zero clue what he had been saying.
“Um, yes. S-S-Sir. You were t-t-alking about skinning a body.” My teeth chattered.
In the space of a blink, Lothaire flew across the room.
Crack.
My head snapped to the side as Lothaire slammed his black baton across my cheek. Warm blood dribbled down my face.
I straightened my head.
There was a long, tense moment as we stared at each other. I’d never wanted to kill anyone so badly.
The room was dead silent.
Lothaire snarled, “We talked about skinning hours ago, you fucking imbecile. I was explaining that we won’t need to learn about your individual abilities until later this year when you have more freedom in combat. For now, you are unimpressive soldiers whose only focus is to train and stay alive.”
I nodded and made sure to stare straight ahead at him.
My cheek throbbed.
Lothaire shook his head with disgust. “But since you clearly think you’re too good for my lesson plan, please explain to the room what type of creature you are that makes you so much fucking better than everyone else!”
I jumped in my seat when Lothaire suddenly started screaming. He paused with his massive chest heaving and slapped his baton across his palm like he was trying to control himself.
If hunger weren’t gnawing at my stomach, cold eating my bones, and sleep deprivation stabbing my brain, I might have been nervous.
I was dead inside.
“So what the fuck are you, Aran Egan?” Lothaire growled. “Answer me!”
A monster.
A girl.
A queen.
“I’m a w-w-water fae from the fae r-r-realm,” I gritted out.
Lothaire arched his brow. “How the fuck is that possible?” His lips curled up with disgust.
“I’ve never known a water fae to be powerful. The ruling monarch has always been a fire fae, and we haven’t had one in the academy for years. So what makes you so special?”
Oh, I bet you know all about the ruling monarch. Since you were sticking your dick inside her for years.
Lothaire was trying to trip me up in front of everyone. He’d voiced suspicions about my heritage back in the beast realm, and this was just a ploy to get answers out of me.
But I’d grown up mingling with vipers in the fae royal court.
Eyes dead.
Face relaxed.
I donned the mask of an unfeeling princess.
“I’m not special. I’m just powerful.” I infused my voice with strength and refused to let my teeth chatter as I studied my cuticles like I was bored.
“Explain,” Lothaire replied.
“Like all water fae, I manipulate water. But my ability is nuanced, and I have mastered transforming water into ice. My specialty is ice daggers.”
The key to selling a lie was getting comfortable in it. I was a master at sinking into the deceit until I didn’t know where the truth began and the falsehood ended.
That was how Aran the male beta shifter had been born.
That was how Aran the water fae would survive.
“So your only power is you create ice daggers?” Lothaire asked slowly with disbelief.
I smirked as I crossed my arms. “Yes. They’re very…effective daggers.”
Malum scoffed, and Scorpius said something under his breath that sounded like another unnecessary musing about my impending death.
Lothaire narrowed his eyes.
You’re tired, hungry, and sleep-deprived. He has you at your weakest, and he knows something’s up. He’s not going to stop prying.
Scorpius muttered something else under his breath.
I whipped my head to the left and went into full bitch princess mode.
“If you have something to say, Scorp, say it to my face. I get that you’re obsessed with me, but it’s frankly pathetic. What can you even do, Scorpius?”
Classic game theory strategy: deflect and redirect.
Scorpius’s nostrils flared as he dragged his hand through his perfectly slicked hair and looked off into the distance with his white eyes.
After a second of heavy breathing, he visibly calmed himself and sneered, “You’d like to know, wouldn’t you? But you spoiled brats are all the same. Don’t worry, Egan, I know just how to handle pretty boys like you.”
Scorpius slowly rolled his hips, and Malum smirked like he was imagining me on my knees.
My lower stomach pinched with a strange sensation.
Scorpius was probably a weak earth fae, and that was why he was so fucking rude all the time. He and Orion definitely depended on Malum’s flames for protection.
He was just another mediocre man overcompensating for his shortcomings. And his small penis.
I chuckled darkly. “That’s a lot of talk for someone who clearly gets by just riding Malum’s coattails.”
Scorpius snarled, and he clenched his cut jaw so tightly that it twitched.
“Enough!” Lothaire roared. “Aran, you aren’t in any position to make demands of the kings. Their abilities are on a need-to-know basis, and you aren’t need-to-know. They’ve also proven themselves, while you have done fuck all.”
My head hurt from the effort not to tell him to pull the stick out of his ass.
Double standards much? The kings were fae, and there was nothing secret-worthy about that. Just more garden variety wastes of space with dicks and balls.
I’d never been around people with larger egos than Malum and Scorpius. Which was saying something because I’d lived with Sadie’s Alpha mates.
Calling out Scorpius worked, though, because Lothaire stopped asking me questions about my heritage.
After another few hours of Lothaire saying “blah, blah, blah” while I doodled a three-dimensional image of Scorpius getting his head sawed off, I was ready to fall asleep at my desk and just take the beating.
When Lothaire glanced at the clock and said, “You have two hours to sleep in your barracks, then we will meet at the ocean,” I thought I had misheard him.
Two hours? I needed two fucking weeks of uninterrupted sleep, a bubble bath massage, a case of enchanted wine, and a few hours in a dark room with my pipe.
Devastation hurt my chest.
I slid lower in my chair.
“Was I clear?” Lothaire’s voice dropped threateningly.
“Yes, sir!” we chorused back in synchrony.
Lothaire sauntered out of the classroom and casually said over his shoulder, “Two hours starts now.”
Chairs scooted across marble as the men quickly stood up.
I half fell, half rolled out of my chair.
The loud clicking of my teeth chattering in my mouth was distracting and made it hard to whimper appropriately. My limbs seized with cramps as I dragged myself up into something that resembled a standing position.
With a smidgen of dignity left, I limped next to John as we walked toward the barracks.
“So we don’t get to eat and sleep?” My voice was small and unfamiliar.
John stretched gingerly. “No, we do, but…” He trailed off as we exited the fortress.
“But what?” The cold rocks burned the cut-up bottoms of my feet, and I hobbled.
John grimaced. “The first few weeks of the school year is what Lothaire likes to call the ‘breaking period.’ He says we all get weak from time off and we need to get reacclimated to the stakes.”
I stumbled over a rock. “So what does that mean?”
John sighed heavily as we entered the barracks. “It means he runs us into the ground for the first few weeks. He keeps us sleep-deprived and hungry so when we start the real fighting, we’re prepared.”
Sleep-deprived and hungry.
I face-planted dejectedly onto my cot. Too late, I remembered the kings had ripped it to shreds. My nose slammed into the ground, and I groaned in misery.
Turning around on the awkward netting, John pulled off his wet sweatshirt and showed off a lean, muscled torso. His shoulders weren’t as wide as a door like the kings’, and he was built leaner, but he was still impressively strong.
Then the unthinkable happened.
Admiration turned to horror as John pulled down his sweatpants and his boxers in one fell swoop.
I averted my eyes and fought back a gag reflex.
One thing I did not need to see was my new friend’s dick and balls. That was the final straw.
Unfortunately, when I turned away from John, I looked directly at Malum, who was also standing stark fucking naked. His darkly tanned skin was pulled tight across the most impressive male physique in all the realms.
The weird sensation pinched my lower stomach.
Sharp V lines framed what could only be described as an eight-pack of lean, rippling muscles that widened out to his impressive shoulders.
I swallowed a gasp.
His massive fucking dick hung purple and long against his leg. Even with it limp, veins popped across it.
An impossibly deep voice asked, “Like what you see, pretty boy? Keep challenging us and maybe I’ll reward you by letting you suck it.”
Holy shit.
Malum was definitely into men. I ignored the small mentally ill part of me that was disappointed.
Heat flamed across my cheeks as I realized Malum was watching me ogle his massive flaccid penis.
Fuck, what would a dude say?
I coughed and looked away. “Please. Nothing you have interests me.”
Everywhere I looked, large males were standing ass naked as they grabbed the dry sweat suits off the cots and pulled them on. Apparently a shower was out of the question.
Malum chuckled darkly, and I ignored him.
Grabbing my clothes, eyes turned downward, I shuffled behind the flimsy wall that jutted out in front of the toilet.
I ripped off my wet clothes and pulled on the dry ones.
It wasn’t as good as a shower, but the shivers calmed as fleece material enveloped my limbs.
I nearly cried with relief.
With my modesty protected, I relaxed my shoulders and emerged from my hiding spot.
You can do this. How hard can it be to pretend to be a dude? You’ve been doing it for years.
I jumped backward because Horace was standing as still as a statue outside the divider. His eyes were wide and manic. “Why did you hide, Aran?”
The hairs on my neck rose because he said my name like a predator identifying his prey. I didn’t want to have Horace’s attention.
“Had to piss,” I said casually as I walked by him, grateful that Scorpius had forced me to take the cot in the far corner. It was furthest from Horace.
“Please. I’m not surprised that the pampered pretty boy is insecure. He barely has any muscles,” Scorpius sneered.
All the gratitude left my body.
“Oh, please,” I snapped back tiredly and lifted my shirt to show off my ab muscles. “Keep calling me pretty, Scorp. We all know you just want some of this.”
I flinched as I said it. I was starting to channel toxic masculinity a little too accurately.
Oh my sun god? A horrible thought struck me. Was I becoming part of the patriarchy? Was I the problem?
Malum tilted his head back and laughed. “Were those supposed to be muscles?” He was still standing starkers, and I couldn’t help but admit defeat.
Compared to Sadie, I was a beast of a woman, but compared to these men, I was pathetic and weak. Especially since I was still enchanted to look wider and stronger.
They would die of laughter if they saw my true form.
Fuck them. If I was going to be stuck in this miserable place, I better get jacked as hell.
From my peripheral vision, Scorpius dragged his nails down Malum’s abs and asked, “Aw, is pretty boy blushing?”
Maybe they weren’t brothers? My stomach twisted into knots, and I patted my cot like I was getting ready for bed.
“Whatever,” I mumbled as I gingerly lowered myself onto the broken fabric. I rested my head on the corner piece still attached to the frame, while half my body pressed against rocks.
Pure comfort.
I would have killed for a soft blanket.
Across the barracks, Zenith and Vegar lay down on the same cot. Their combined weight strained the material, and it looked like it was one second away from ripping. But they cuddled close and looked content. Warm.
The three kings pressed their cots together. Malum spread out on the middle cot, and more flames erupted across his arms as he spread them wide.
Orion and Scorpius lay down on either side of him and used his biceps as pillows.
I shivered with jealousy.
Horace smiled big with his wide eyes open as he stared at me.
Nope. Absolutely not.
John scooted his cot closer and blocked my view of Horace. He didn’t stop until our arms were touching.
“Body heat, for warmth.” John flashed a grin and closed his eyes.
The ground was cold beneath me.
I scooted my cot as close as it would go to John and fully wrapped my arm around his. I stuck my fingers in his armpit and swallowed a moan at the delightful heat. “Body heat,” I whispered.
John nodded and didn’t move away.
My eyes fluttered shut as my aching body shut down.
A thought pierced through my hazy tiredness. “What did you mean when you said we’d begin ‘the real fighting’?” I whispered.
John’s mouth moved, and he spoke nonsense.
“What did you say? I misheard you.” My ears were deceiving me.
Wind shrieked as it slammed against the flimsy metal walls of the barracks.
John’s dark eyes opened, and intensity transformed his human features into something unexpected and deadly.
“War. We train for war,” John repeated.
It wasn’t cold that made my limbs tingle and my skin crawl.
John smiled and flashed his dimples. “Go to sleep, Aran. We only have two hours. If you use every break you get and are smart about it, you’ll survive.”
I closed my eyes.
Then hyperventilated until I fell asleep.
