Metamorphosis—Day 37, hour 11
“And then John carried me from the arena back to the room,” I finished telling Luka about the punishment.
John’s twin narrowed his eyes but said nothing.
Our bare feet slapped loudly against water and rocks. The surf slammed in with a roar, then retreated reluctantly back to sea.
Compared to his easygoing, talkative brother, Mr. Hyde was a quiet man.
Intense.
Intimidating.
We were two hours into a long morning jog, and even though I was sore and tired, I was grateful Malum was making us train. The run gave me a distraction from everything that had gone down yesterday.
The revelations.
High above us in the sky, the angels once again fought with their ice swords. Far below them, hidden in the shadows behind the academy, the devil legion also trained with swords, but theirs were made of fire.
I shivered as I studied the two legions.
Fire and ice.
Angels and devils.
Sadie said they shared a realm, and I hadn’t understood until this moment what that meant.
Now I saw the similarities.
Strength and power radiated from both groups, and even their swords were mirror images of each other.
I squinted at the devil legion as we ran past. It wasn’t hard to picture them with wings.
BANG. Ice swords slammed together, and blue flames exploded.
BANG. Fire swords bounced off each other loudly.
It was the alchemy law of extremes: At its hottest temperature, fire mimics the properties of ice. At its coldest temperature, ice mimics the properties of fire.
Goose bumps shivered down my spine.
A shadow flashed in my periphery, and I looked over my shoulder. I scanned the surf, but there was nothing, just rocks and the sea. I must have imagined it.
Movement. I whipped my head to the right.
There.
A pale body dashed swiftly across the rocks, angling itself in the shadows of boulders so that it was almost impossible to follow its progression.
It was a member of the assassin legion.
I’d assumed the other legions were all resting inside between competitions, but now I wasn’t so sure. To the naked eyed, there was no one else outside training.
Has the assassin legion been training around us this entire time and I’ve never noticed?
Taking a deep breath of sulfur-stained air, I relaxed my arms and drove forward with my legs. I focused on each step.
I ignored the angels in the sky, devils on land, and assassins in the shadows.
Endorphins pumped through my blood.
They kept the haze at bay. Just barely.
I focused on my breathing and not the stranger who was matching pace beside me. Stride for stride, we ran together like we’d been doing so our entire lives.
Just like with John, Luka and I ran in perfect tandem. We’d done this same jog dozens of times.
But unlike with John, I didn’t know this man.
Yet, he knew me.
From the shitshow that had been yesterday, Luka had no interest in getting to know any of us further.
After Luka had revealed who he was, everyone in our legion had spiraled into a mini meltdown over the revelation.
For hours, we’d bombarded him with questions, which turned out to be a pointless and infuriating exercise because unlike his twin brother, Luka wasn’t a big talker.
He was more of a glowerer.
Sun god, he was even quieter than Orion, who at least mouthed responses most of the time.
Luka didn’t pretend to care that someone was talking to him. He was perfectly content ignoring everyone.
Even as he jogged beside me, his lips were pulled tight in a scowl, dark eyes stormy.
How had I ever thought he was John? They looked bizarrely identical, but their personalities were like night and day.
John shone with brightness.
Luka was shades of black.
A wave of melancholy hit me, and I staggered from the force of missing John. No wonder Mr. Hyde had always put me on edge.
He wasn’t my friend.
I rubbed at the bruises under my eyes as my legs pumped faster.
My skin pinched as my stitches pulled.
I wished Luka would open up so I could at least figure out if John was okay. Where did he go? How did they travel? Why did they conceal their identities? Why all the secrecy?
So many questions.
No answers.
I stretched my head to the side as we rounded the bend and tried to ignore the tightness in my neck muscles.
I’d slept on the floor in an awkward ball.
At least it hadn’t been cold.
I’d woken up with a pillow under my head and a cozy blanket tucked around me. I’d gone to bed with nothing but a sweatshirt under my head, so I assumed a servant had seen me on the floor and brought me stuff in the middle of the night.
I didn’t know how much I depended on John until he was gone.
Everything that had happened between us still couldn’t detract from what he was to me.
My rock.
I spent my days sleeping beside John and sitting next to him at every meal. He was my running partner and confidant and the person I turned to for a laugh or a hug.
John was everything that made the academy bearable.
Now I was painfully alone.
I glanced up at Luka under my lashes, and it hurt how much he looked like John. He was a sad substitute.
Luka hadn’t said a single word all run. Meanwhile I’d spent the first ten miles explaining in excruciating detail every second of the punishment. I’d told him everything that had gone down between John and me. I’d left nothing out.
I owed him that much.
I’d finished the story miles ago, and Luka still hadn’t responded.
Was he waiting for an apology?
After another three miles, I broke the silence and said, “I’m sorry.”
Luka furrowed his brows, and his dark eyes narrowed, but he didn’t respond. He didn’t care.
Whatever.
I turned my attention back to the shoreline.
Thirty-two miles later, we finished our run, and Luka walked beside me back to the academy.
I glanced over at him in confusion.
Yesterday, he’d made a point to avoid me and not stand anywhere near me. Now he was purposefully slowing his stride so we were side by side. Sweat covered both of us.
I opened my mouth to question him.
Luka glanced down at me, and his eyes crinkled as he frowned.
I closed my lips.
There was no point. He wouldn’t respond anyway.
I tried to remember what my usual interactions with Mr. Hyde were like. I was pretty sure he’d always been quiet. I was the one who talked and teased him.
But I thought I’d been cheering up John.
Now that Luka was a different person, it felt pointless to speak. Sun god, he probably thought I was annoying as hell.
As I trudged up the steep walkway, I couldn’t help but think about how John would have his arm thrown over my shoulder. He thought it was funny to touch me when we were both gross and sweaty, because I always freaked out.
No one touched me now.
My heart throbbed in my chest.
We entered the academy, and the hall buzzed with energy as students poured out of classrooms and headed to lunch. Malum sauntered forward, and people fell over themselves bowing and making a path for our legion.
Lightning streaked. The stench of ozone burned my nose. A gruesome battle raged in one of the stained-glass windows.
The black marble floors were polished like glass and chilled my aching feet.
As I walked down the hall with my legion, I pretended not to notice that most people were focused on me.
The energy in the academy had changed.
Men leered like pigs. Women made comments about my appearance as their high heels clacked against the marble.
If they’d always known I was a woman, I had a feeling they wouldn’t be so focused on me, but since I’d deceived them, I’d become enemy number one.
The other.
Society either vilified women for their faults or worshipped them for being different. The decision was usually made based on how attractive the woman was.
Mother had been cruel and insane, but she’d also been flawlessly stunning and elegant. She’d had silky blue hair, she’d been lean with no muscle definition, and her pale skin had never been blemished. Her clothes were always extravagant.
They’d worshipped her for her perfection.
Where she’d been polished, I was jagged.
My skin was covered in bruises, dark circles surrounded my bloodshot eyes, and unruly blue curls hung in a tangled mess down to my butt. The gash under my left eye throbbed.
The girl who’d fucked her friend as punishment.
A woman’s upper lip curled.
A man whispered something derogatory.
My worst sin of all—I’d lived and fought beside the men that every woman and man at the academy would kill to have associated with their name.
Everyone who attended the academy was powerful. Most had been sent with specific instructions to make allegiances that increased their families’ standing. An assassin recruit was the ultimate prize.
The kings were the crème de la crème of the academy.
I hadn’t realized how important they were until I’d started paying attention to the student gossip. How I’d managed to miss the millions of conversations about the “most powerful devils in all the realms” was a mystery to me.
It was probably the depression.
It always was.
I missed the days where I thought they were just fae men.
Ignorance was bliss; knowledge was suffering.
People sighed and fluttered their lashes at the kings, then turned to glare at me. Their stares had gotten noticeably colder after the punishment with John.
Just another slut.
Competition.
They didn’t know about my plans to die alone.
Students stuck their noses up at my shitty appearance. In their business casual wardrobes, breasts were pushed high and shirts were worn a size too small so they stretched tightly across male chests.
The students oozed sexuality.
My teammates oozed strength and power.
I oozed blood because I accidentally ripped the scab off my lips again.
They wanted the power, and my roommates wanted to fuck; it was a perfect symbiotic relationship.
And I wanted inner peace, hard drugs, and a ten-day vacation on a fae beach.
Yet I was in the middle of it all.
The students thought I was interfering with their prizes.
A royal woman in a stunning wrap dress bumped into me and staggered back with disgust, brow arched and nose wrinkled.
I grinned at her and flashed all my teeth.
She recoiled with horror.
A lifetime ago, shopping and dressing up had filled me with joy, but now I could barely remember what it was like to feel polished and proud of how I looked.
I wiped sticky curls off my forehead and shivered in my sweat-soaked skin. My fingers were covered in dirt from where I’d collapsed onto all fours after the run.
My nails were black with grime.
They matched my soul.
Pushing my pipe between my lips, I kept my eyes downcast and inhaled with all my might.
Smoke filled my lungs.
The drugs took effect.
I stopped caring.
A man spoke loudly to my right. “Ms. Gola confirmed in class that a storm is coming. She said this one is going to be a bad one.”
“Oh crap,” someone responded. “That’s not good.”
“Weather is a pseudo-science,” I mumbled under my breath.
The man glared at me.
I sighed.
Sure the air was chillier and the cloud cover darker, but there wasn’t that much of a change. For some reason, the weather was all anyone ever wanted to talk about. The rumor mill was convinced that something big was coming.
I hoped it killed us all. Violently.
It would be sensational.
Thrilling.
Pulling my hoodie up over my head, I tied the knots around my chin so I looked like a gnome. I lowered my shoulders while I rubbed at my arms to get warm.
Lately it felt like I was constantly cold.
Nothing I did alleviated the chill that had settled into my bones. Maybe it was because I was an ice fae? I was probably haunted.
In the dining hall, Sadie frowned when she saw me.
I shrugged back at her.
Blood gurgled out of the mangled face of the man who was still crucified to the sacred tree. Sari sat at the royal table, glaring at me as she clutched a steak knife. Students openly gawked at me.
Ever have an impact on people around you? Same.
I collapsed tiredly into my seat.
Blinked.
A pig’s head was the centerpiece of the table, and its body was spread out on various plates. The mouth was gaping and stuffed full of vegetables, and its dead eyes were wide open.
They looked directly at me.
I stared back.
Until it was my head on the plate and vegetables overflowed from my mouth. My limbs were scattered in pieces. Men leered at me and dug into my flesh, smacking their lips as they gnawed on my—
Fingers snapped in front of my face.
“Eat,” Luka ordered.
I slowly turned toward the man who had ignored my many attempts to converse for the last forty-eight hours.
He pointed at my empty plate.
Around me, the men dug into the pig, their jaws crunching through bone as they slurped on marrow.
A wave of nauseousness hit me.
I plugged my nose.
“Thank you! Finally, I’m not the only one saying it,” Scorpius said to Luka, eager to have someone else to talk shit about me with. “She needs to eat more and—” Blah, blah, blah.
Why did men talk so much?
I put my elbow on the table and leaned my cheek against my fist.
Scorpius’s upper lip was slightly crooked.
The black ink of the tattooed pupil on his neck dilated as it stared at me.
Was the tattoo sentient? Because its attention was fully on me while Scorpius was bitching to Luka.
I studied the art on Orion and Malum.
Was it all connected?
The sword on Malum wrapped around his neck like a choker, and the silver glinted like it was a sharpened edge. The pink flower petals on Orion’s neck shifted slightly as he moved his head.
I rubbed at the ink on my hip.
Surprisingly, being their slave wasn’t much of an imposition on my everyday life, since we were already forced to compete together as a legion.
I had nowhere to go and nothing to do.
No freedom.
I would laugh at the irony, but it wasn’t funny. It was horrifying.
Malum’s steel-colored eyes stared at me, and something close to pity flashed on his expression.
A servant appeared out of nowhere and bowed to Malum. “As requested, sir.” He offered a platter overflowing with yogurts, nut butters, and ripe fruit.
My mouth watered.
The plate was full of my favorite foods that were usually only served at breakfast.
Malum nodded and took the plate.
He put it in front of me, then turned back to his meal and resumed eating like nothing had happened.
I gaped at the bronze king.
His cheeks flushed red, and he gave no explanation.
It felt like a peace offering.
Like something monumental had shifted between us after I’d rescued Scorpius in the last competition.
Whatever, I wasn’t going to dwell on it.
Stomach growling, I hungrily dug into the feast. I piled on granola and drenched my creation in a mountain of nut butter.
Salty and sweet calories flooded my mouth.
My stomach cramped with relief.
I ate as fast as I could and replenished the energy I’d lost training. I was perpetually hungry after breakfast, since all the afternoon meals focused on serving meat.
“So good, thanks,” I said to Malum between a mouthful of honeyed, sliced mangoes.
Malum’s cheeks turned a brighter shade of crimson, and he grunted.
Good talk.
I turned back to inhaling my plate as quickly as I could.
Scorpius made a strangled noise, and Orion stared at me with a frown.
He didn’t blink.
Scraping my spoon across my cleaned plate, I slumped back in my seat contentedly.
The kings were laser focused on me, and I squirmed under the weight of their undivided attention.
Looking for a distraction, I turned to Zenith, who sat on my right.
“So how are ya doing?” I asked him.
Inky lines expanded under the demon’s eyes. “I told you to never talk to me.”
I chuckled at his joke. “You’re so funny.”
The lines expanded down Zenith’s neck, and veins bulged obscenely from his forehead.
Vegar made a caution motion behind Zenith’s back.
What was he going to do? Kill me?
Get in line.
I just wanted someone to talk to me. I didn’t want to be alone with my thoughts. Was that too much to ask for?
There was a reason John and Sadie were my best friends.
The academy legion ate in silence.
I leaned my chair back on its legs and stared at the vaulted stained-glass ceiling. Rolling my pipe between my lips, I squinted until everything was unfocused and blurry.
“Don’t tip your chair back like that,” Malum said as he furrowed his brow. “You’ll break your neck.”
I tipped back further.
He said something else. I didn’t listen.
The meal lasted an hour, but it felt like seconds.
Colors faded to gray, sounds became muted, thoughts fragmented and shattered. Reality obfuscated.
The only constant was enchanted smoke, and I inhaled like it could save me.
It didn’t.
Nothing could.
