by Jayme Morse
“Sounds like a plan,” Tristan said in a monotone voice.
I knew he wasn’t thrilled with the idea. I didn’t really like the idea, myself.
I’d had zero freedom at all for the past year. I didn’t need a bunch of babysitters watching my every move. I needed to just be free.
I had… other urges… that I needed to satisfy. The kinds of urges that I didn’t want my friends to watch. Urges that I wouldn’t have minded exploring with Riley. And it sucked that I’d been told to stay away from her, even though I’d heard everything she’d thought about me. She’d thought that I was sexy as hell. For a moment, no matter how brief it was, she had been just as into me as I was into her.
Not one of my friends acknowledged anything I was thinking about. None of them cared about what I had to say about any of this.
I wasn’t dangerous. I wasn’t going to be a threat to Riley, or anyone else, for that matter. I just needed to get used to living again.
I needed to live life, for once.
Tristan sighed as he glanced from Julius to Slade. “There’s only three of us, not counting Noah. We’re going to be outnumbered. We have more vampires to babysit than we can handle. And we have to do it all while going to classes. I’m going to need a drink after all this is over with.”
“We’re just going to have to make it work. If we make it work, I’ll buy you that drink,” Slade replied as he leaned against the Headmaster’s desk.
“On the bright side, school is going to be pretty easy since we can just compel all of our teachers to give us good grades. We might not even have to attend our classes,” Julius said hopefully.
“We’re not going to do that,” Slade said, shaking his head. “We’re laying low this year. Whatever grades you earn are going to be the grades you keep.”
“I don’t think a little breaking and entering is exactly what you’d call laying low,” I said as I gestured around the office we were in.
“But is it breaking and entering if you have a key?” Slade asked, pretending to look thoughtful for a moment. “Hmm. I don’t think so. I think we’re in the clear.”
I let out a laugh.
Even though they were still mad at me, even though they would be mad at me for who knew how long, it felt like we were getting back to our old selves.
The four of us together had been so fun. We’d gotten into and out of so much mischief over the years.
It was no wonder why Slade knew exactly what to do to get into Headmaster McCullough’s office. He’d had a lot of practice over the years.
“It feels so good to be back. Even if there is a lot of shit going on—”
“That you caused,” Slade cut me off.
“That I caused,” I admitted. “It’s still better than laying in that crypt.”
“Yeah. Enjoy it while it lasts,” Tristan said with a tight smile.
I planned to.
Because any day now, one of us would be going back into that crypt.
Chapter 10
Riley
I stopped the car in front of the stone pillars that sat on either side of the road. They were the largest decorative pillars I’d ever seen in person. The plain gray matching brick bases were taller than the SUV. On top of the bases sat two identical gargoyle statues. The gargoyle’s wings extended up high above their backs.
On the brick arch above them, a sign read Nightshade Vampire Academy, which confirmed everything that I had overheard the guys talking about in my thoughts.
They wanted me to go to school here.
I glanced at Jordan in the rearview mirror. “Are you a werewolf?”
Her eyes went wide.
After a long pause, she asked, “How did you know that?”
“I heard the vampire guys talking about it in my head. This place we’re at? It’s a school for vampires. They wanted me, you, and Drew to go to school here until they found out that you’re a werewolf. Now they’re only letting me and Drew go here, since he used to be a human,” I explained, filling her in on what I’d overheard.
I wished I could have heard everything the guys were talking about. I only got bits and pieces of it. What I wanted to know was what made me overhear some of their thoughts, but not everything?
“Drew was human?” Jordan asked, looking taken aback. “He seemed so… witchy. If you told me he was a witch, I wouldn’t have been surprised at all. It’s so much more surprising that he was human.”
“Now they want to send you to the Nightshade Vampire Penitentiary, because you’re not allowed to go to school here and you’ll be safe there.”
They had another thing coming. None of us were going to this school or to jail.
We were going home. We were going back to Crescent Bay High School.
Jordan shook her head frantically. “Riley, they’re wrong. I can’t go to that prison! Vampires hate werewolves.”
“Obviously you’re not going to prison! I’m not letting my best friend go to jail,” I replied.
Jordan let out a sigh of relief. “Thanks for being on my side.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” I asked, raising my eyebrows at her.
“Because all vampires are supposed to hate werewolves. And werewolves are supposed to hate vampires.”
“You hate me?”
Riley shook her head, her long brown locks of hair swaying around. “No. But I hate the rest of the vampires in the whole world. They’re the enemy.”
“You’re a vampire, too,” I reminded her.
“Yeah, and I’m scared,” she replied, a look of worry filling her eyes.
“Of what?” I asked, even though I was afraid, too.
“I’m starting to feel sick,” she admitted tearfully. “Werewolves aren’t meant to become vampires. Werewolves go to war with vampires. And it feels like my body is going to war with itself. It started with that headache, and now I have a fever.”
I wanted to calm her down, to tell her that she was being dramatic, but the truth was, I didn’t know that for sure. She knew a lot more about all of this than I did.
“Maybe you’re being paranoid,” I said, choosing my words carefully. “I don’t doubt that you feel sick, but it could be for any other reason. What happens to other werewolves when they become vampires?”
“I don’t know. All I know is that they get banished from both the vampires and the werewolves. They’re not welcome in a lot of places in the paranormal world. The safest place for them would be in the human world,” she replied.
“Well, that’s perfect, then. Nothing has to change, since our home is in the human world,” I said, trying to sound optimistic.
She wrinkled her nose. “Yea, nothing has to change, aside from the fact that I keep wondering what your blood and Drew’s blood tastes like.”
“Same,” I admitted with a laugh. “But I think we’ll find a way to manage. We’re all in this together.”
Everything is going to be fine, I told myself, hoping that it was true.
I lifted my foot off of the brake and started to drive through the pillars.
The sooner we got back to our lives, the better.
Sirens started to blare around us. They were so loud.
Flames shot out from the pillars on either side of the car.
Jordan let out a shriek. “What’s going on?!”
I felt frozen in fear. All I could do was keep driving.
In the mirrors, I could see the statues begin to move behind us.
As both of the gargoyles leapt down from the pillars they had been sitting on, their bodies changed. They went from having a gray stony appearance to having black scaly, lizard-like skin.
They flew faster than the car. Within seconds, they had landed in front of us.
There was nowhere to go. There was no way to get around them. The road leading away from the school was surrounded by water.
“No, no, no. This can’t be happening!” I thought to myself.
“Riley, put the car in reverse!” Jordan shouted over the
noise.
As I drove backwards, back through the pillars, the alarms went silent.
The gargoyles remained where they were. Their beady green stared menacingly into the car. One of them scraped the pavement with its clawed foot.
It looked like the gargoyle was trying to sharpen its claws.
It wanted its claws to be sharp for us.
“Looks like I’m going to Nightshade Vampire Penitentiary, after all,” Jordan said, her voice cracking as the tears came.
Chapter 11
Tristan
I’d been letting Riley listen to our thoughts.
Some of them, anyway. Not everything.
I hadn’t wanted her to know every little detail of what we’d been planning for her, but I’d wanted to start breaking the news to her that she was now part vampire and that her new future was going to start at Nightshade Vampire Academy.
I’d let her listen for two reasons:
So that she could be prepared for what was to come next.
So that if she didn’t like the idea of what was coming next, she could escape.
Honestly? I was hoping she’d choose the second option.
I didn’t like what she was doing to us. It wasn’t her fault, but she’d woken something within us that was entirely new. It was a part of us that was crazy competitive and jealous. And I had a feeling it would make us become downright ruthless in time.
Every single one of us wanted Riley to belong to him.
I wanted her to be mine.
Slade was already acting like she was his—which was rare. He had always been the one who was the least likely to ever catch feelings.
Noah seemed obsessed with her. Pretty ironic for the guy who had nearly killed her.
And Julius had gotten feelings for her, too. He was quieter about them, which was just how he was. He was the quiet one, the one who got lost inside his computers and tech stuff. He rarely got interested in girls at all, so this was a pretty big deal.
All that, and we had only been around her for such a short period of time. What was going to happen after we were around her for a lot longer than that?
Would our feelings for her lessen once the newness of her wore off, or would we all fall even harder for her?
It felt like she was going to be dangerous for us as it was. I was pretty sure she could have any single one of us wrapped around her little finger if she wanted us.
It would just be better for all of us if none of us had her.
I would have tried to escape if I had woken up in a cage in a stranger’s car. I’d told Slade that the cage was excessive—that it would make all of this so much scarier for Riley and her friends—but the cage had already been in there because it was Slade’s weredog’s cage.
So I wasn’t surprised at all when I heard Riley freaking out inside my head.
“No, no, no. This can’t be happening!” she shouted in her mind.
I closed my eyes as I tuned in to her thoughts, listening closer to what was going on. When I opened my eyes again, it was like I was there in the car with her. I was seeing what she was seeing, feeling what she was feeling.
That’s my girl, I thought to myself. She’s a fighter.
I really needed to stop calling her my girl. I supposed that our girl would have worked better.
“Riley’s driving your car,” I told Slade.
I wouldn’t have meddled. I wouldn’t have told him if it weren’t for the fact that those gargoyles had been trained to attack to the death. Riley’s life—and her friends lives—were in danger if they kept provoking those gargoyles.
“How?” Slade asked, his jaw dropping. “We took the key to the cage with us.”
“I don’t know, but it doesn’t matter how,” I told him as I headed for the Headmaster’s office door and opened it. “The gargoyles are out,” I told the others.
“Fuck!” Noah shouted.
He was the first to react. He pushed past me, running as fast as he could to get to her.
Maybe we could trust him around her, after all.
Chapter 12
Noah
I fled from the building and raced down the steps.
When I saw Slade’s car, I saw that the trunk door was open and she was trying to pry the cage open as Jordan pushed on it.
They were new vampires. They didn’t have the strength to force the cage door open yet. Their strength would grow in time, but for now, they were useless.
Especially when they were up against a pair of gargoyles.
Damn it, Riley.
She should have just stayed in the car. Why would she get out of it? That was such a dumb move.
Didn’t she see that the gargoyles were inching their way towards her?
I watched as Jordan shifted in the cage. Her small body turned into a massive wolf.
Riley took a step back and to the side as Jordan rammed her body, full force, into the cage.
The door swung open and she hopped out onto the ground. She stood next to Riley, watching her.
I wasn’t sure what they were planning to do next.
I held up my hand.
“I need you guys,” I told my friends, knowing that they’d know what I meant.
“No. Don’t you do that. You can’t let them see our powers,” Slade protested.
“There has to be another way,” Julius agreed with Slade as the gargoyles blew fire onto the ground beside the car. It almost reached Riley.
It was so close to touching her, and she didn’t even flinch.
Whatever. I didn’t need my friends’ powers.
I had my own powers.
I just hoped it would be enough.
Deciding that I probably really did need a little help, I ran over to Riley and grabbed her arm, maybe a little too roughly.
Startled, she yelped and fell away from me, onto her knees.
“I’m not trying to run away,” she said, even though we both knew that was exactly what she had been trying to do.
Her voice sounded so afraid. She cowered back from me as much as she could, considering she was still in my grasp.
It made me sad that I’d scared her so badly.
“Don’t hurt me,” she pleaded with me.
“Never,” I told her quickly.
I’d never used someone’s magic without their help before. I didn’t have enough time to talk her through it, to teach her how to help me. I didn’t even know if she would have cooperated willingly.
So instead, with my hand wrapped around her arm, I willed my body to suck some of her magic away from her and into me—but not too much. Not enough to hurt her.
With my hand held in the direction of the gargoyles, I released my magic onto them.
It shot towards them in the shape of a fiery orange ball and swirled around their massive bodies, before it carried them up and over to the pillars, where they belonged.
As they froze back into place, I helped Riley up.
“I don’t know what you just did, exactly. But thank you,” she said, glancing up into my eyes with a small, timid smile. “You made the gargoyles turn back to stone.”
“You’re welcome. And I didn’t do it. We did it,” I replied, smiling back at her.
“How?” she asked, her eyebrows raising.
“With these,” I said.
I held my ring up for her to see. It looked so similar to hers, except mine had an orange gemstone, and hers was green.
Each one of our gemstones were a different color. It had been a long time since I’d seen my friend’s rings, but I remembered that they were all different.
It might have been selfish of me, but I hoped that saving her life—even if she didn’t know just how dangerous those gargoyles actually were—made up for killing her.
I didn’t think it would, though, and I shouldn’t have expected it to be so easy.
“Why did you get out of the car?” Tristan asked as he reached us.
“I was trying to drive backwards, but then the car stopped m
oving all of a sudden. I couldn’t get it to move again, so I got out,” Riley explained.
“That’s weird,” Tristan said, shooting me a look.
I had no idea why the car would have stopped working. The only thing I could think of was that it had either been a car problem, or, more likely, it had been because of magic.
I just wasn’t sure whose magic.
It sure as hell wasn’t any of ours. I would have felt it if one of the guys had used my magic.
That meant that it would have had to have been a witch or someone else who had magic.
I didn’t want to even consider that possibility, so I instead chose to believe that it had just been a car problem.
As more of the guys came over to us, I noticed that Riley was becoming more and more afraid. She was visibly shaking.
I wanted to pull her into my arms. I wanted to comfort her. But I knew that would have just had the opposite effect on her.
Instead, I stood between her and the rest of them, allowing her to keep some distance between her and the other guys.
As wrong as it was—as much as I knew it would go against everything—I knew, without a doubt, that I would always put her first. I would always choose her.
Man, I was already in too deep.
I glanced up to see Slade and the way that his eyes were on us.
He looked angry with me. And maybe a little jealous, too.
I had a feeling he was jealous I got to Riley first. He’d probably wanted to be the one to save her, to play the hero… even though I still didn’t think that she truly understood that she’d been saved. She had no idea just how deadly the gargoyles really were.
“Don’t ever tell anyone about that,” Slade spoke, his voice harsh, as he stared Riley down. The expression on his face was hard and angry as he warned her. “No one can know that those rings are magical,” he said, too loudly.
He was practically yelling at her.
Riley nodded and shrank back to get even further away from him.
His eyes softened. It looked like he wanted to apologize to her.
Then the look turned back to anger as he directed his gaze onto me.