Supernatural Academy: Year Three

by Eve, Jaymin

  “What about you?” Jessa asked, her concern for the dragon queen obvious. “Will you have to go through the same test?”

  The golden woman nodded. “Yes. I will be at your side, as always.”

  “You are more than worthy,” Jessa agreed. “You are right not to be worried.”

  Josephina shook her head. “I’m not worried, but it’s not because of what you think. I’m no more worthy than you three. I don’t worry because I am with you. There’s no others I would be with, even if this is my time to end this life.”

  I’d never seen anyone lose color as fast as Jessa did; there were already tears tracking down her cheeks. “I will never accept that,” she choked out. “I don’t fucking care. Let’s turn around now, because I won’t accept losing any of you. Not Josephina, or Mischa, or Maddison. No one.”

  I felt the same. Fuck knows why, because these people had been in my life for all of five minutes in the grand scheme, and yet I knew I would mourn them greatly if they were not around. Sometimes it takes one second to click and know that these are your people, deserving of your love and loyalty.

  The dragon queen smiled, a beautiful display of womanly strength and grace. There was no way to tell she was a dragon, outside of the ancient eyes, and powerful energy. “We will do this together. We are strong and worthy,” she murmured, and the words seemed to resonate across the rocky patch we stood upon.

  In a second, the ground cracked open, like Josephine had whispered the magic password to break the rocks. As we all dropped, I heard Jessa mutter, “Fuck. Not again…”

  Then darkness closed around us, and I reached for my power to slow the fall, but it was wispy, slipping through my grasp.

  Looked like there was no cheating here or circumventing the next step on this “path.”

  We all just had to hope we were worthy.

  Chapter 22

  We didn’t fall for long, and when we landed, it was in a squishy substance. The darkness was the sort where it felt like no light would ever penetrate it, and since my magic was still beyond my reach, I remained in that dark hole, wondering what the fuck was around me.

  I ran my hands over the ground, noting it was both soft and firm, with a velvety coating, like you’d find on the outside of a peach. “Jessa?” I called softly, not wanting to alert anyone to our presence, but also not hearing any sound of life around me.

  No reply.

  “Mischa? Josephina?” I’d reached a whisper yell.

  No reply again.

  True unease slithered through my body. It was strong and fast, and it almost crippled me with the need to get out of here, to run and run and run until I was no longer in this place that had creepy tendrils chasing down my spine.

  I fought against my panic, refusing to let hormones and instincts scare me. I was stronger than this reaction.

  Like I’d just issued a challenge to the universe, whatever was affecting my central nervous system kicked up some more fear. With it came the brief thought that I was being controlled.

  It was too unnatural to be anything else, but what was I supposed to do to counter it? Should I wait until something happened and react from that? Or was it a better use of my time to move through the darkness and find my way out of here?

  With my mind moving in frantic, jagged thoughts, it was so hard to think rationally.

  Getting out of here was appealing, but I wouldn’t leave without my friends.

  Sucking up some bravery, fighting through the falsely induced panic, I shouted: “Jessa Lebron!” I was standing now, ready for the enemy to attack in the dark.

  “Jess! Mischa! Josephina!” I called their names loudly, and then, like that’s all the darkness had been waiting for, everything lit up.

  Bright. Blinding. Scorching my eyes until they adjusted.

  Blinking, I found myself standing on a path of pure gold. It glinted without a visible flaw, so shiny that I felt like I’d slide right off it if I took a step. The darkness still lingered on the edges, leaving the path clearly defined, but I’d never been one to just blindly follow the obvious route.

  I took a second to really think about what I wanted to do. All of this was a test. Now that I was out of that dark, squishy-floored room, I sensed that part was designed to see how I’d react when my fear and anxiety were ramped up while alone and vulnerable. Apparently screaming loudly for my friends had been step one.

  This golden path was another test, and for the life of me I couldn’t figure out what I was supposed to do.

  I took a step, bracing myself for the slide, but my foot landed firmly on the surface. Glancing down, a distorted view of my face reflected back at me, and even with the abstract nature of my reflection, I could see the tension lining my forehead.

  Get it together, Maddison. I had to get it together or it’d be over before it began.

  I took another step. And then another. The next step I moved right of the path, pushing the sphere of light across. The darkness receded further as I stepped to the right. Soon the lit path was so wide that it was closer to a field of gold. Joy lit up inside me, and with it came a push to take that beauty for myself. So much gold. I would be rich. Richer than anyone.

  The gold is everything. The gold is strength. The gold is power.

  It took me a minute to realise that was not my inner voice chanting those words at me. It felt so much like my own thoughts, and even when I shook my head to dislodge the voice, it would not abate.

  No! I bit back, the same way I would have talked to Asher. Gold is not everything. It’s not even in the top ten things I love. STOP!

  The chanting continued, and my hands itched to reach down and touch the beautiful path. A path I now realized was no longer smooth but littered with gold bars. Large and small, up and down the surface, piled high in some places and almost flat in others.

  No! I repeated, and I jerked my hands higher. No one controls me. I don’t need gold. I need answers. I need a way to save the world.

  The chanting stopped. The gold faded. The path turned to a dark gray rock and the gold bars became nothing more than stone.

  All that glitters is not gold.

  One final whisper of words and then the voice was gone.

  The stone under my feet turned bright red, like it was filled with fire. I couldn’t feel the heat but I knew it was hot. I also knew that if I moved from the one spot I stood on, I would burn.

  Fucking hell.

  Literal Hell, apparently.

  I was already over these tests. My patience had faded to a mere sliver inside, and when I reached this point I was pretty much all “screw it.” Without another worry about my death, I started to run. My brain winced at the first step, but I didn’t let it deter me. It hurt though, and when a sizzling hit my ears, I actually cried out. I was wearing shoes, but it burned from the sole of my feet right up to my knees, like the bottom half of my legs were on fire.

  Picking up the pace, I moved faster than ever, my entire focus on finding my friends and getting through this shit. The pain got worse and worse, each step more agonizing than the last, but I didn’t stop. I’d been through pain before. And if I was honest, physical pain was much easier to handle than emotional pain. Heptashia would not best me. I would not let anyone best me again.

  I had no way to measure the time that I ran for, but after what felt like hours, tears streaming down my face at the agony, I slowed. Was this how it would all end? Was this the test I couldn’t pass?

  My heart ached as a deep-seated disappointment pressed against my previous hope and determination. The pain was wearing me down.

  The moment I stopped moving, the agony burning my body faded. The ground was still red, but there was no pain. And my feet and legs looked whole and healthy.

  What in the actual…?

  What did this even mean? Was I supposed to keep running? Or was this a test of intelligence and I was failing miserably by aimlessly moving and causing myself unnecessary pain. Standing here for the rest of my life didn’
t seem any smarter though.

  Red land spread out as far as I could see, holding me hostage until I figured out how to pass its test.

  My energy swirled inside of me, but it fizzled into nothing when I tried to use it.

  I had to move again.

  It was harder than I expected to take that first step. Knowing how bad the pain was going to be had my brain rebelling hard. But there was no other choice.

  My foot lifted, and I closed my eyes, bracing myself, before I sprinted, hard and fast.

  I’d never been burned alive of course, but in my head I imagined this was a similar feeling. My second attempt lasted less time than my first, as cries and sobs spilled from my lips.

  Doubts followed soon after…

  What if I was running in the wrong direction? Maybe I was supposed to run into the darkness behind us. I couldn’t seem to get my head straight and make a decision.

  The pain was breaking me down to a point where I wasn’t even sure who I was anymore.

  I stopped again.

  My breaths wheezed in and out, harsh and almost deafening in this silent land. My face was cool as the tears streaked across it. I remained standing, though, with my shoulders back, and a core of steel.

  “You won’t break me!” I screamed. Fuck knows where that came from, because I was almost certain that whoever controlled this had already broken me. The force of those words came from deep inside, where they could not reach, where my bond with Asher lived, where my power and my ability to keep fighting to save the world existed.

  Their fires would never touch that.

  Chapter 23

  I had just closed my eyes, searching for the mental fortitude to move again, when a lilting song filled the air. At first it was just the melody, low and powerful, sending a shiver across my skin. Words followed, and I recognized the lyrics … I knew this song. The Sound of Silence. What an ironic choice, since there had been nothing but silence until the music started. Not to mention they were singing about darkness and how it was their friend.

  As the voice got louder, I realized who it was.

  “Jessa!” I yelled.

  I took off, following the sound of her voice. Before I could think twice about it, I was singing too, the familiar lyrics giving me a sense of home. A sense of purpose. Something to focus on through the pain…

  Wait.

  The pain was gone.

  A quick glance down had me blinking at brilliantly green grass, in shades of khaki and gold.

  Whoever the goddess controlling this path was, she was clearly a little insane.

  But hey, weren’t we all.

  The singing grew louder, and it was definitely Jessa’s voice. She had this beautiful rasp at the end of her words that was sexy and sassy at the same time. I’d recognize it anywhere.

  I couldn’t see her, but as the singing grew louder, I figured I was heading in the right direction. When the singer hit a particularly high note, a smile split across my face as I sang along. When the song ended, it didn’t start again. The silence bothered me, and since Jessa might be looking for me too, I continued to sing.

  I grew weak and tired as time went on—it had been hours—days?—since I’d rested or eaten. My mouth dry and parched, I’d have killed for some water, but I didn’t stop running and singing. I couldn’t stop until I got to the end of the path, until I made it into the underworld.

  I had to be strong enough.

  Out of nowhere, Jessa appeared in the distance, her face filled with terror as she sprinted toward me. My boots skidded to a halt, heart thundering in my chest. Where had she come from? And what was chasing her?

  Jessa didn’t strike me as the kind to fear anything, so this was most unnerving.

  Not Jessa.

  I blinked, mulling that idea over in my mind.

  Maybe this wasn’t her…?

  The Jessa running toward me was close now, arms out like she was gonna throw them around me. I prepared myself to fight.

  “Maddison!” fake Jessa trilled, voice trembling and ... empty. “I finally found you.”

  Yes, you did, pod person.

  “Where have you been?” she asked, launching herself at me.

  I didn’t let my guard down for a second, even when she hugged me tightly and smelled exactly like Jessa. Not her.

  “What were you running from?” I asked.

  “Follow me,” she said quickly, not answering my question.

  I shook my head. “No, I think we should continue moving forward on this path.”

  Jessa tilted her head, examining me with those blue eyes that matched the real Jessa but were vacant in a way hers weren’t. I sensed I wasn’t supposed to know this about her—that her imitation usually fooled everyone.

  I knew my friends better than that.

  “Don’t you trust me,” Jessa said suddenly, her moods as variable as the landscape here.

  As I opened my mouth to answer, a shimmer of light flashed across “Jessa’s” body, and for a split-second I saw another being superimposed over her.

  It was gone in the same heartbeat, but I’d definitely seen another female, unnatural in both her beauty and appearance. She’d had hair down past her feet, whiter than the purest snow I’d ever seen, spread out on the ground behind her. Her eyes had been huge and white too, cold and empty.

  Was that … Heptashia?

  “What are you?” I snarled, reaching out and wrapping my hands around her wrists. I was at a disadvantage here, not having any powers to access, but I was pissed off enough not to care. “And where is Jessa? If you’ve hurt her…”

  There was a moment where our eyes remained locked—she was examining me on a deeper level. I knew it. I could feel her probing beneath the surface, searching…

  I couldn’t return the favor, but as uncomfortable as it made me, I didn’t let go.

  The Jessa facade flashed again, one more time, and then it melted away.

  A luminescent woman, silvery white, stood before me. She smiled, teeth strangely more ivory than the rest of her body. “Follow me,” she said, and she turned and walked away.

  Another hard choice.

  Was it a trap?

  At this stage, it almost didn’t matter. I was just ready for something else to happen, even if it meant I would end up fighting for my life.

  So I followed.

  Her hair trailed out in a long river of white, cutting through the green, like a train following behind her. It seemed to grow further as she walked and, eventually, I had to move to the side or I would have stepped on it.

  She never looked back once.

  I was tempted to reach out and yank on all of that glorious hair, mostly because she was irritating me. Bitch better start talking or we were gonna be straight-up playground style brawling.

  “Hey!” I finally said when the walking had gone on longer than I could handle. “Where are you taking me?”

  She didn’t turn back, but she spoke: “You lasted far longer when you were burning.”

  My fingers itched, and I was reaching for her hair when she chuckled. I stumbled to a halt, blinking at the crazy chick.

  “I can read your mind,” she mused. “It’s intriguing. You’re full of thoughts and strengths.”

  At this point, I was almost certain she was the crazy goddess running this shit show. “You’re Heptashia, aren’t you?”

  “I am,” she said simply.

  “Did I pass your tests?”

  She stopped, finally turning back to face me. I hadn’t moved since her laugh, and I wouldn’t until she explained herself. I felt no power from her, just a cold emptiness.

  The coldness scared me more than anything else I’d experienced so far.

  “You have proven many things to me. That you care more for others than your own safety. You have a strong sense of right and wrong. You are determined. You are strong. You persisted through the pain.” The slightest of pauses again. “Did you know that when you’ve experienced a debilitating pain, and then you
have to experience it again, it’s worse the second time. See, your brain already understands what will happen if you choose that pain again, and it’s trying to save you from the agony. To do this, it will make you feel the pain even stronger, as a deterrent.”

  Her lips twitched. “Your brain did that, and still, you chose to step forward. You chose that pain again, no matter how strong it was. Very few make it past that part of the test. Even more important, you saw through the mask to the truth beneath. You knew your true friend and was never fooled by my ghosting her essence. Only those strong of mind can do this. In all ways, you passed my test…”

  But…

  I knew there was a but coming.

  “But there is one final step on this path, and none can circumvent it. You must move through to be part of the whole.”

  What? No, seriously. What?

  She started walking, and the green grass morphed to snow, her white hair no longer contrasting but blending in perfectly.

  “Where are my friends?” I asked with a sigh, moving again, my boots crunching against the snow. “Are they okay?”

  No reply.

  “Does this world change at your whim, or at its own?”

  This gave her a moment’s pause.

  Her eyes flickered to mine, the light depths almost translucent. There was actually a violet hue to them. “What an interesting question.”

  I could feel my face scrunching up. She was that irritating. “What an interesting answer,” I replied.

  Her tinkling laughter filled the air, and I felt a stupidly uncontrollable urge to join her in laughing. Maybe this bitch was part centaur.

  Her laughter cut off, and for the first time she was looking at me like she really saw me. No vapid, cold, empty shell, instead a fire burned deep in her soul, and the color of her eyes morphed to a bright, almost blinding, purple.

  “We could be friends,” she stated. “I didn’t think it was possible. But maybe many of the impossible things have just yet to meet you.”