by Jayme Morse
I allowed myself to absorb this information. “And once we’re done at Demon Blood Academy, then what?”
“Then we go back home.”
“We can go back home?” I was surprised but relieved.
I’d been afraid that I would need to stay in this other realm forever.
Kassidy nodded. “Yes, as long as we complete our education, we can usually live alongside humans without causing any damage.”
Usually?
What if I was one of those Demons who couldn’t? What if the Demon half of me wanted to destroy things?
“I see.” I swallowed hard. “So, basically what you’re saying is that, like it or not, I have to stay at Demon Blood Academy if I want to go back to the real world without hurting anyone.”
“Correct.” Kassidy studied my face. “Don’t worry, Lux. I know this might all seem like a lot to take in, but Demon Blood Academy is only here to help us. My parents are the ones who founded this place. That’s why my brother is currently the Headmaster. The program may be pretty vigorous, but you’ll get through it. We both will.”
“How long have you been here?” I asked her.
“Just for three weeks. New Demons are brought here right around our sixteenth birthday,” she explained. “So, I’m guessing you must have just turned sixteen, too.”
“I did.” I paused. “Is it… scary… here?”
“Scary?” Kassidy just stared back at me with a look of confusion.
“Yeah. I just mean being around all of the other… Demons.” Just thinking about the fact that I was at a school for Demons sent chills down my spine.
Kassidy let out a little laugh. “You say the word ‘Demons’ like we’re bad or something.” When I didn’t respond right away, Kassidy shot me a look. “Has anyone who you’ve met here really been that bad so far? With the exception of Sienna, I mean.”
“Well, no…”
“That’s because we’re not all bad. We’re just like people. You’ve been a Demon—”
“Cambion,” I corrected her. I wasn’t willing to let Kassidy or anyone else call me a Demon when I wasn’t. Not fully.
“Right. Sorry. You’ve been a Cambion, AKA half-Demon, your entire life. And you didn’t even know it before now, did you?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Do you think you’ve been evil your entire life?”
“No.” But even as I responded, I wondered if it was possible that my being half-Demon might have explained everything.
For over a year, I had been living with the guilt of the one horrible thing I had done, the secret that I had planned to keep buried within me forever.
The Evan Thing.
Was it possible that the entire reason The Evan Thing had even happened was because I was half-Demon?
Chapter 6
Lux
After I had changed into my uniform, Kassidy led me in the direction of the cafeteria. I wasn’t the least bit hungry, even though it was dinnertime. Although I wondered if it may have been because it felt like I was in some sort of weird time warp, I was pretty certain that everything I had learned had left me with no appetite.
I glanced over at Kassidy. “I have a weird question.”
“Okay, hit me,” she replied.
“What do Demons even eat?” I asked, suddenly feeling even more nervous.
What if the so-called “cafeteria” was actually some weird sort of sacrificial ceremony hall that all of the students at Demon Blood Academy had to participate in? I hadn’t even been able to stomach the pig roast that one of my foster families had once in the human world.
Kassidy laughed and opened her mouth to speak, but Zay approached us before she had a chance to say anything.
As I glanced over at him in his uniform, it was hard for me to ignore how attractive he was. I wasn’t sure what it was, but there was just something about him that made it hard for me not to stare.
When his amber eyes locked on mine, my heart skipped a beat.
As Kassidy threw her arms around his neck and stood on her tiptoes to kiss him, I quickly darted my eyes away from them.
I didn’t want to watch that.
I hadn’t even realized that the two of them were a… thing.
Now that I knew, I couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable. It made me feel sort of guilty to know that I found my roommate’s boyfriend insanely attractive.
“Not here,” Zay said, breaking away from her.
“You’re such a chicken,” Kassidy replied with an eye roll.
“Kassidy, please. You know the rules.”
“Rules are meant to be broken,” she muttered under her breath. Then she stomped away from him, joining a group of girls across the cafeteria from us.
Zay looked about as uncomfortable as I felt as his eyes shifted over to meet mine. “So, did Kassidy show you to your dorm room?”
“Yeah,” I replied.
“How did you like it?”
I shrugged. “It looks just like any other dorm room to me.” Except maybe more pink than other dorm rooms.
I paused and glanced at the cafeteria line ahead of us nervously. I never did get my answer. “So, um, I was just asking Kassidy if Demons have a special… diet. She never got the chance to answer me.”
“Yes, actually,” Zay replied with a nod. “We eat all of the same things that humans eat, but there is one difference that’s key to our survival.”
“What is it?” I was too afraid to even imagine what the worst-case scenarios could be.
“We need to drink blood.”
“Blood? But we’re not vampires!” I just stared at him like he was a four-headed alien. “No. No way. Nobody’s blood is going into my mouth.” I touched my lips.
I had so many questions and I didn’t even know if I wanted the answers to all of them. Whose blood? Where did it come from? Was it animal… or human?
I shook my head. No. Why would it be animal blood? Of course it’s human.
The thought of drinking human blood made me want to vomit.
“Relax, Lux. You can barely taste it,” Zay assured me. “It will only be a few drops of blood that’s already mixed into any bottled drink you have when you’re here. You just need to drink one of them a day or…” He trailed off.
“Or what?” I narrowed my eyes at him.
“Or you’ll die.”
“I thought the whole point of being here is that we’re supposed to be good Demons,” I insisted.
He nodded. “Yes, it is.”
“Well, drinking blood doesn’t sound too ‘good’ if you ask me,” I said as we fell into the cafeteria line.
“It’s just a part of our biological makeup,” he explained. “Historically, Demons have been known to drink far more than just a few drops of blood a day, believe me. Entire human villages have been completely drained of their blood at the hands of Demons.” He grabbed a bottle of iced tea as we reached the fridge.
I hesitated. I was too afraid to grab a bottle of water, in case I might have been able to actually see the blood. So, instead, I grabbed a bottle of Cherry Coke.
“But thanks to Demon Blood Academy, we have been conditioned to require only minimal amounts of blood,” Zay went on, running a hand through his dark hair. “It took some time to figure out the minimum amount of blood that we could survive on, but they eventually figured out that three to four drops of blood a day is enough to sustain most Demons.”
“So, would a Cambion need less blood than a Demon?” I questioned.
“Possibly, but I’m not sure that anyone’s tested it.” He shrugged. “You need to drink the same amount as the rest of us.”
“Ugh,” I replied with a frown.
“Lux, you need to drink it.”
“I will, but can we please not talk about this right now? Blood kind of grosses me out.”
“Why don’t you taste it right now?” Zay pointed his chin at the Cherry Coke I was holding.
I glanced over at him with a wrinkled nose. “No.
”
“Oh, come on. You’re going to have to drink it eventually. You might as well get it over with.”
I sighed and unscrewed the lid. Then I lifted the Cherry Coke to my lips, careful not to smell it. I wasn’t even sure if blood had a smell or not, but I wasn’t about to find out right before it was about to go down my throat.
I took a quick sip of the soda, surprised to find that it tasted just like regular Cherry Coke.
“Well?” Zay asked.
“I can’t taste anything,” I admitted.
“Told you,” he replied with a grin as we moved further down the cafeteria line. “So, what do you think of Kassidy?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. I was alone with her for, like, ten minutes. She seems nice enough, from what I can tell.”
“I can think of a lot of adjectives to describe her, but ‘nice’ wouldn’t necessarily be one of them,” he replied as he grabbed a foil-wrapped hamburger and a carton of French fries.
“Well, that seems a little cruel to say about your girlfriend, doesn’t it?”
Zay’s eyes flicked over to meet mine then, a look of surprise swirling around inside his gaze. “Is that what you honestly think? That Kassidy is my… girlfriend?”
“Yes.”
“That seems like a pretty big assumption.”
“Well, would you blame me for assuming that? It did kind of look that way,” I pointed out as I grabbed a ham and cheese sandwich from a cart.
“Well, looks can be pretty deceiving. She’s not my girlfriend.”
“Yeah, okay,” I replied with a snort.
“No, I’m being honest.”
I eyed him curiously. There was a look of sincerity in his eyes. “Does she know that?”
“Good question.” He hesitated for a moment. “And the truth is that I’m really not sure about the answer.”
“So, she does think you’re her boyfriend then,” I said with wide eyes.
“Yeah, pretty much,” he replied as he grabbed about twenty packets of ketchup.
“When are you going to tell her the truth?” I asked as he led me to a cafeteria table that was located in the center of the room, facing the windows that overlooked the courtyard outside.
Zay shot me an uncomfortable look. “I haven’t exactly figured that out yet.”
“I see.” As I slid into a chair, I smiled at him. “Maybe you’re just lying to me. Maybe she really is your girlfriend, and you have every intention of keeping her that way.”
His eyes flitted over to meet mine. “Why would I lie to you about that?”
“I don’t know,” I replied with a shrug. “Maybe you like me.”
As soon as the words had slipped out of my mouth, I wished I could shove them back in. I had never been so bold with a guy before. What had gotten into me?
Glancing over at me, the amusement swirled around in Zay’s eyes. “So, what if I do?”
“It doesn’t matter.” And I meant it. Even though Zay was undeniably attractive, I was at Demon Blood Academy for one reason and one reason only: to become a good Demon. Well, half-Demon. Cambion. Whatever. I wasn’t there to get my heart broken by a Demon in the process.
“You don’t sound too confident about that to me,” Zay replied. There was a hint of challenge brewing in his eyes.
“Oh, I am confident about it, believe me. In fact, the truth is that I prefer not to associate with your type.”
“My type?” His dark eyebrows knitted together at the center of his forehead.
“Yeah. Guys like you. The type of guy who I don’t even care to talk to, if we’re being completely honest.”
“Well, I hate to break it to you, but you’re going to be doing a lot of talking to me,” Zay replied.
I snorted. “That’s what you think. Just watch me.”
“Actually, it’s what I know.” Zay leaned in closer to me, his amber eyes locking on mine. “I’ve been assigned as your Guardian.”
“Guardian?”
“Your Guardian Demon,” he explained. “You know what that means, right?”
I shook my head. “No, why don’t you enlighten me?”
“It means I’m your personal bodyguard. It’s my duty to follow you around like your shadow and make sure nothing bad happens to you. We’ll have the same schedule now. I will escort you to and from your dorm room every day. We will eat every meal together.” His eyes locked on mine as a smile touched his lips. “Basically, it means that you’re stuck with me, whether you like it or not.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Zay’s lips formed a flat line. “Do I look like I’m joking to you?”
“Great. This is just great. How long do I have to stay at Demon Blood Academy, anyway?”
“It depends on the individual Demon,” Zay explained. “Some of us are only here for about three months. Some of us take a while longer.”
“So, basically however long it takes to make us ‘good’ Demons,” I pieced together.
“Pretty much,” he agreed with a nod.
“How long have you been here?” I asked.
“About a month now,” he replied as he took a bite of his burger. “But I have a lot of experience with Demon Blood Academy.”
My eyebrows lifted. “Experience?”
Zay nodded, but he didn’t elaborate.
“What if I don’t want a Guardian?” I asked, nibbling on a pickle. “If I turn it down, does that mean you’ll leave me alone?”
“Nope. That’s not for you to decide,” he replied, shaking his head and popping a French fry in his mouth. “Kieran was very firm on this. You need a Guardian and he wants it to be me.”
“Does everyone get a Guardian?” I glanced around the room at the other students.
There were a few tables full of girls. Kassidy was sitting at one of them, laughing away with the other girls, who looked like they could have been cheerleaders in the human world.
There were a few tables of guys. They looked like they were probably jocks back in the human world. Most of them appeared strong and muscular, like football players or wrestlers.
And then there were groups of miscellaneous people. I supposed that they were the misfits who didn’t fit in with anyone else at Demon Blood Academy.
The thing was, I wasn’t sure if anyone else in the room had a Guardian Demon besides me.
“No, not everyone,” Zay answered. “Kieran only assigns Guardians to the students he feels need the extra protection.”
“Why does he think I need extra protection?” I asked.
“I’m not sure.” He darted his eyes away from me and down at his cafeteria tray, clearly avoiding my gaze.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “I think you do know and you just aren’t telling me.”
I waited for him to deny it or confirm it or give me some sort of answer, but he didn’t. Instead, he said nothing at all.
“Who do I need protection from?” I pressed.
“Anyone who might want to hurt you,” Zay replied.
“Like who?”
“Could be anyone.” His eyes darted away from mine, again proving that he was trying to avoid my questions.
Why was Zay keeping secrets from me?
It was obvious that someone wanted to hurt me. I just wondered if it was that girl Alice or if it was someone else entirely.
Chapter 7
Lux
When I woke up the next morning, Kassidy had already left our dorm room. I quickly changed into my school uniform and ran a brush through my hair.
As I slid into my shoes, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I couldn’t help but find it hard to believe that I was a Demon. I would have assumed that a Demon would look dark and scary—like something out of a horror film. Maybe a Demon would have looked like one of those girls who played in the movie The Craft or Johnny Depp in Edward Scissorhands. Or maybe it would have looked really scary, like one of the Demons in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Or like the girl in The Ring.
But with the exception of my eyes changing colors, I still looked like myself. Like an average teenage girl—maybe even a little plain, if anything. My wings hadn’t even appeared yet. Who was to say that they would even appear? The only reason I had been led to believe they would was because Kieran had told me they would, but what if he was wrong?
What if I didn’t get my wings at all? Would that have meant that I wasn’t actually a Cambion? Would the Academy realize that maybe they had made a mistake—that they had the wrong Lux? Would they let me leave, knowing about their secret—that Demons really existed?
At that moment, there was a knock at the door. Grabbing my schedule from the nightstand, I flung the door open and found Zay staring back at me.
“You missed breakfast,” he informed me.
“I never eat breakfast.” I paused for a moment and then pointed out, “But even if I did eat breakfast, wasn’t it supposed to be your job to escort me to the cafeteria?”
“I actually came to escort you, but you were still sleeping.”
I frowned. “How do you know that?”
“I could hear you snoring through the door,” Zay explained.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “That sounds borderline stalkerish, if you ask me.”
His amber eyes filled with a look of amusement. “You’re really not much of a morning person, are you?”
“What makes you think that?” I asked with an eye roll. He was right, of course. I wasn’t a morning person—not in the least. In fact, I was the absolute furthest thing from a morning person. If I was being honest with myself, mornings were the one time when I actually might have resembled a Demon.
“You just don’t look too happy right now,” Zay replied with a shrug.
“Is anyone happy when they first get here?” I asked as I followed him out into the hallway, closing the door to the dorm room.
“That… is a very good point,” he agreed with a nod.
“I’m really not a morning person, though,” I admitted.
“I know.”
As we began to walk down different hallways, Zay glanced over at me. “Where are you going? Flight Lessons class is this way.”