Rogue Reformatory: Broken (Supernatural Misfits Academy Book 2)

by Amber Lynn Natusch

  “I’m ready,” I said, trying to sound brave, but my voice shook. “For whatever you want to do.” The Council members, edging around a pack of wolverine shifters snapping and snarling at anyone who came near, would reach us in seconds. Our time was nearly up.

  “Blast them, Aidan,” Rhys said as he rushed over to stand in front of me. “We need a distraction.” While Aidan’s fire shot toward the Council, Rhys held onto my arms. “I need to awaken your sentinel.”

  I reeled back, but his grip tightened. “Do I need to bite you and take your blood?” As a half-vamp and my boyfriend, his blood-taking thing had been something I’d wondered about, though I wasn’t sure if I was excited or squeamish at the thought of him nibbling for fun. “When Wolfy bit me, he became my sentinel, but guardians can’t host. What are we doing, exactly?”

  “That book in the library—”

  Magic shot over my head, making me duck. “What?”

  A councilman swung a blue sword of power at the wolverines, and they leaped up and snapped at it in a feral frenzy.

  “If there are more winged shifters, they’re hidden.” His glance cut to the Council. “Because—”

  “If anyone binds with us, they can control us.”

  He nodded and yanked me away from a vamp leaping in our direction, fangs bared. A flick of his hand, and the vamp’s eyes widened. His mouth gaped in horror, and he stumbled backward. “The winged ones are the most powerful.”

  “Time’s running out. Tell me what to do!”

  The Council member added three more swords, swinging them at the wolverines. Hit, they yelped and scattered.

  Aidan cast a glamour across the floor, and a big pool full of crocodiles appeared between us and the Council. When they stomped through them, ignoring their magical, snapping jaws, Aidan shot bolts of power, knocking them back.

  “I want you to pull your power up, but trap it in your throat,” Rhys said, frantic.

  I yanked on my hair. “What if I can’t contain it? I could’ve killed my sister last time. I could hurt you!”

  “You can do this. I know it. You’re not doing it alone.” His hand took mine and squeezed. “Remember, I’m a guardian. I’ll be right here beside you, holding your hand.”

  “They took the guardian ability from you.”

  “They weren’t able to strip it from us. That’s what the book said, in an indirect way. Don’t you understand? It’s still with us. It’s trapped in our minds. But I’ve broken through, and I think I can use it to help you.”

  “Okay,” I gulped. “Bring up my power, but hold it back. Do I shift?”

  “If you want to.” The smile he sent me made my pulse sing, despite the dangerous situation. “Damn, but you’re the most gorgeous dragon I’ve seen in my life.”

  “I bet I’m the only dragon you’ve seen in your life.”

  “And that just makes you even more special.” He cupped my face with his warm palms and gave me a quick kiss. “Trust me?”

  I nodded. “Always.”

  “Then let’s do this.”

  He released me and turned to stand by my side, taking my hand again. “Bring it up slowly. Let it build until you can’t stand it, until you feel like it’s going to rip its way through.”

  Closing my eyes, I shut out the fury surrounding me. Distractions would pull me in too many directions. At my subtle touch, my beast cracked an eyelid and looked at me. My spirit stirred. I tugged it up, but kept it restrained, even when it gnashed its teeth, tipped its head back, and roared, determined to burst free.

  You are mine. No, you are me. And I’m the one in control.

  My beast paused and peered up at me. It bucked and writhed, trying to break loose, but I smacked it with a bolt of magic. It whimpered and hung its head, a chastised pup.

  Rhys was onto something here...

  I tugged it up further, all of it at once, and it burned across my lungs like acid. My fingers snapped out, and my claws burst through the tips. With a moan of agony, I hunched forward, my hand wrenched from Rhys’s. My neck snapped back, the movement nearly driving my spine through my brain. My arms shot out at my sides. My legs snapped and curled and grew longer.

  I opened my jaws and roared. Fire erupted from deep inside me, hitting the ceiling high overhead, but the flames only licked across the surface, as if the building had been built to withstand anything, even the rage of a dragon.

  “Yes,” Rhys said with complete confidence, “that’s it. You’re still in control.”

  I am.

  “We’re one,” I said, my voice coming out gravelly and deep. And scary, even to my own ears.

  My power ached to be unleashed, to be sent around the room in an incinerating blaze. If I wanted to, I could end this. End everything. The insatiable lure called out, telling me that if I gave in, I’d finally belong.

  No. I am in control. Back, beast! I only need your—my—power.

  “Channel it,” Rhys said softly. “Think of a funnel. You dump the liquid into the top, and as it moves down, it narrows, coming out in a fine stream at the bottom. Do that with your power, Maddy. Only picture the head of the Council at the end of the funnel. Hit him with everything you’ve got.”

  I shrieked, barely able to control the urge to give in. I couldn’t contain it. Couldn’t contain me. But I refused to let this part of me rampage. While I’d gladly rip off endless councilmen’s heads, I couldn’t bear it if I hurt anyone else.

  “Funnel, Maddy!” Rhys said, his hand connecting with my thigh.

  I poured my power into the channel and, opening my eyes, drove it forward with a blast of my will, like flinging a dagger with a whip of lightning behind it. The fiery stream hit the councilman between the eyes. He staggered backward, writhing, his arms cupping his head.

  Too late.

  Like a nuclear explosion had detonated, a shockwave burned across the room, sending kids flying like cards in a stiff wind.

  Then the magic was sucked back into me, channeled back into my beast’s gaping maw. The beast licked its lips, then settled down, curling into a sleeping mass once again.

  I deflated, returning to a me who was not quite me any longer. When I staggered, Rhys grabbed onto me and held me upright. He kept me grounded.

  He hadn’t tamed me, but he’d helped me tame myself.

  “Perfect,” he whispered. His head ducked, and he kissed from my chin to my earlobe. “You were amazing.”

  “What the fuck?” a shifter cried. He peered around in horror as others did the same. Their power dropped to the floor in a thick, inky cloud.

  En masse, we all turned to the Council. The remaining guys clustered in the corner, flint hardening their eyes. Power licked across the fingers of their raised arms. Their furious gazes fell on me with a promise of retribution.

  They lifted their arms together and released their magic.

  As the surge of power knocked us backward, the councilmen disappeared from the room.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Cece

  I stared down at the councilman scrambling away from my feet. The power I felt connected to roared through my body, begging to be released.

  “How...?” he asked, his expression full of the fear and confusion he emanated. He reeked of both, and for a moment, it permeated the high I was on—the heady feeling of magic that swam through my veins.

  A malicious smile spread slowly across my face. “I think it likes me...not you.”

  “You don’t know what you’re messing with,” he said, clambering to his feet. “Give it to me before it’s too late—”

  “Too late for what?” I asked, my saccharin tone camouflaging growing rage—rage not entirely my own. “Weren’t you just about to kill me?” I took a step closer, and his whip appeared again, but this time, a bright shield accompanied it, as though I were finally a threat worth defending against. “Why the concern for my well-being now?”

  “It’s not yours I’m worried about.” He sneered in disgust. “If you destroy that t
hing,” he said, pointing at the power source, “you’ll unleash a force that not even the Council can contain—not after you killed Frank. It took all five of us last time—”

  “Yeah,” I replied, the ball in my hands crackling with magic. Tiny sparks ignited with every step I took closer to him—to the source. “I’ll unleash all the malums you put here to feed that thing. All the kids you killed!”

  “That was a necessary evil,” he said, no apology in his tone.

  “Yeah, well, my sister won’t be the next one—not if I can help it.”

  “Sacrifices need to be made for the greater good sometimes,” he snarled, whip raised to strike.

  “I couldn’t agree more.”

  His arm moved like lightning, and once again, his whip careened toward me, but I ducked and rolled under it toward the gyrating orb of light. And for the first time since I'd encountered it, I didn’t feel its draw. Instead, I felt pushed toward it, as though an unseen force were guiding me—showing me what I had to do next.

  The empath knows…she has everything she needs...

  I stood and ran toward the source, the mini-wolf shouting a warning at my back. The crack of the whip rent the air, and I awaited the sting of its hit. Instead, a bolt of lightning erupted from the crystal ball. I heard the cries of the Council leader as I ran, never looking back.

  Standing inches from the source—the final obstacle keeping us prisoner in Wadsworth—I lifted the ball toward it like an offering. The eerie glow of the source moved nearer, extending a tendril toward it, as though curious.

  You know what to do, I thought, and I cocked my arm back. Before I fully understood my actions, I hurled the crystal ball at the source. It broke through the outer barrier—the shell that my sister, in all her malum glory, had barely been able to tear open—like a knife through butter.

  When nothing happened, a sudden feeling of terror swept over me.

  Then the sharp bite of the whip bit into my back, and I cried out in pain.

  “Stupid girl,” he said as his arm wrapped around my throat, cutting off my air. “You just gave away your ticket to a merciful death.”

  His evil laughter rumbled through his chest into my back as he hauled my feet off the floor. The wolfling attacked his legs, and I kicked and struggled, to no avail. The councilman’s grip was like iron, and it was slowly choking my life away.

  Then I saw it—the black crystal ball in the center of the power source. I felt like its non-existent eyes were on me, watching my life fade away. A blast of anger shot from it into me, and in my oxygen-deprived state, I could have sworn I heard my name whisper through my mind.

  “Your sister is next,” the Council leader growled in my ear. “Then the fey boy…”

  No…

  I focused my eyes on the crystal ball, and that word gurgled from my throat.

  “No…”

  Violent wind erupted in the room, creating a swirling vortex that threatened to suck everything into it. Including me.

  I felt his feet sliding along the stone floor, unable to secure his stance against the storm—the crystal ball buried deep in the source. His arm was wrenched away from my throat, and I fell to the ground as Wolfy dove into my arms. My hair that had whipped around my face fell limp around my shoulders. My dress lay still. It was as though the storm couldn't reach me.

  My attacker flew through the air, sucked into the whirlpool of debris circling the room. I looked on as he fought against it, his whip casting out for anything it could grab onto, but each attempt failed, and he was sucked closer to the ball that seemed to be swallowing the room and everything in it.

  Everything but me and the wolfling.

  Silent with awe, I stood and tried to grasp what I was seeing. The source began to disappear, imploding into the orb of black within. A horrific scream escaped the Council member as he, too, was sucked inside the relic. I cringed as he exploded, creating a tornado of blood droplets. But it didn’t last long. With a final ‘pop’, the winds stopped, the dust settled, and the black crystal ball dropped to the floor.

  Then it disappeared altogether, leaving the mini-wolf and me staring at where it had just been, totally dumbfounded.

  “Holy shit,” I whispered. “We did it…”

  The mini-wolf smiled up at me in approval. “You did it, Cece.”

  “Yeah, but I still don’t fully understand how—”

  “We can figure out the fine points of that later,” he said, jumping from my arms. “Now we need to get back and help the others.”

  He ran toward the entrance, and I quickly followed. As we darted through the halls, a morbid giddiness welled up inside of me. I’d done it. I’d destroyed the source. All we had to do was walk out the door, and we’d be free.

  Our stint at Wadsworth would be over.

  With Wolfy at my side, I broke through the cafeteria doors, ready to join the fight. But one look at the stunned crowd spread throughout the room and I knew it was done.

  I wasn’t the only one who’d succeeded.

  Maddy’s eyes met mine from across the room, and a wary smile stretched across her face. Rhys was at her side, battered but still standing. I searched the crowd for the missing member of our foursome.

  The marking on my hand flared, and my eyes darted to the far corner and the being shrouded in shadows looming there. His dark stare met mine, and he took a step forward. The room fell silent as he stalked toward me, students parting to let him pass.

  “Aidan?” I said softly, wondering just how bad things had been for them in my absence; if my injury had hampered his strength because of our bond. If my success had somehow made things worse for them. But with every step he took, the post-battle aura of anger and adrenaline that enveloped him like the tendrils of his inky black magic faded, leaving only concern and awe in its wake.

  Every eye in the room tracked him as he closed the distance between us. Then he stopped before me, those icy blue eyes raking over my body, fixating on the shortened hem of my dress and the blood coating my leg.

  “I’m okay,” I whispered, uncertain what else to say. What else to do.

  His gaze shot to mine, and his brow furrowed. His head dipped low as his hands cupped my face, and my breath caught in my throat.

  “You are more than okay,” he said.

  Then his soft lips crashed against mine, desperate and claiming. I threw my arms around his neck and pulled him closer. The feel of his body pressed into mine was everything I’d thought it could be and more. Even though we were exhausted and covered in blood, the stench of spent magic filling the air around us, it didn’t matter. Nothing else existed in that moment—just his hands on my body and his lips against mine and the knowledge that the feelings I had for him, he had for me in return.

  After what seemed like only a second, he pulled away and smiled down at me. I looked over at the staring crowd and quickly realized that Aidan hadn’t bothered to glamour us.

  “No need for pretense anymore,” he said, as though reading my thoughts. “So tell me, little witch, are we free now?”

  At that, I smiled. “Only one way to find out.”

  The distinct swish of taffeta grew louder, and I peeked around Aidan to find Maddy rushing over with Rhys right behind her.

  “Wolfy told me you did it!” she said before she threw her arms around my neck and hugged me tightly.

  “I couldn’t have without him,” I replied, shooting a wry smile to the mini-wolf at her feet. “He’s a feisty little bastard.”

  “I’m not a bastard,” he snapped, and the rest of us laughed. His furry brow furrowed. “I know who my father is!”

  “I’m sure you do,” Maddy said, scooping him up. “It’s just a saying.”

  He grumbled something unrepeatable under his breath and licked her chin.

  “So, what did I miss?” I asked, looking at the destroyed cafeteria. The trio I’d left behind shared a look, and Aidan wrapped his arm around my shoulders.

  “I’ll tell you later…like on the
long walk to the nearest town.”

  Something in my stomach fluttered. Maybe I’d been wrong before. Maybe Aidan wasn’t going to bail the second we escaped.

  “Now, kids,” the headmaster called as he walked into the center of the room, looking every bit as frazzled as he should, given the circumstances. “I’m not really sure what happened here tonight, but let’s just take a moment to make sure we’re all okay.” The heads in the room slowly swiveled, taking in the students nearest to them. Then the headmaster looked at the clock on the wall—the only thing left intact in the room—and smiled. “We still have an hour left scheduled for the dance, if any of you are still interested.”

  Nervous laughter broke out through the room.

  I leaned into Aidan. “I guess destroying the source didn’t snap him out of it.”

  “I think that’s for the best,” he replied, dragging the tip of his nose along my ear.

  “Let’s see if this thing still works,” the headmaster said, heading toward the sound system.

  As he neared it, a rumble shook the building, a deep reverberation knocking everyone off balance for a moment. There was something familiar about the tenor of it—like a low, evil laugh.

  Before I could analyze it, a sharp snap of wood cut through the noise and echoed through the room. One second, the headmaster was leaning over to inspect the speakers; the next, he was impaled by a floorboard that had shot up through him like a stake.

  The crowd stared for a moment before screams filled the room and chaos broke out.

  Students ran for both sets of doors—the ones to the hall, as well as the outdoors—but any that got close enough found themselves in the same predicament as the headmaster.

  “Come on,” Aidan shouted, grabbing my hand. I reached back and took Maddy’s just as he hauled me forward through the mob. Rhys threw a protective shield around us, but I couldn't help but wonder if it would be enough.

  As we neared the door to the hall, I watched as the kids in front of us shot into the air one by one, as though they’d been plucked by the heavens. Then I looked up and found I wasn't far off. They hung limp from the pendant lamps above.