by Demi Dumond
Monster Unleashed
Blood Moon Academy Book Three
Demi Dumond
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Epilogue
About the Author
Copyright © 2020 by Demi Dumond
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Book cover by Melody Simmons
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1
Keira
“Welcome to Advising, Keira,” the Headmaster said as he carried my limp body through the doorway into what looked like a speakeasy-era waiting room.
Wait, did he just say Advising? What the hell was actually going on here? Literally the last thing on my mind right now was my academic progress. And the red trail leading out of the room looked a lot like blood. The sight and the smell of it made my stomach churn.
My eyes flicked around as the Headmaster carried me deeper into the room and set me down onto an old-fashioned looking fainting couch. Then he calmly walked back and locked the door. Like a psychopath.
The room had old black and white photos of smiling people in old timey suits and dresses. And there was a gorgeous rug on the floor that had an eye-catching red, floral pattern.
On the ceiling was an ornate chandelier that reminded me of the throwback opulence of an era I had only seen in black and white movies. I had to wonder if any of it was even real.
Once the door was locked, he turned to face me and clapped his hands together. He had an awful, triumphant, shit-eating grin on his horrible face.
I wondered if that was his real face or if I was hallucinating his other form that I had seen earlier in the hallway. Right now, I think a hallucination would be easier to believe than the events of the last few hours. And if true, now would be a great time to wake up.
I had gone from stuck in a cell with my mates, to battling the monsters downstairs, to abducted from my dorm room by the Headmaster. To think, all this time I was worried about dying alone in the dungeon. Who knew that for me it would all end in Advising? What were the odds?
The Headmaster pointed at me. I expected to be thrown across the room. Out of reflex I tried to at least blink in an effort to protect myself, but even that was impossible.
Instead of being thrown across the room, though, sensation returned to my body. All at once, in a burst of tingling, I could feel everything again. It was the last thing I expected. I sat up with a jolt, the movement jerky. I nearly toppled over onto the floor.
I moved my arms and legs, making sure that everything worked properly. Much to my surprise, I was fine. The next thing I did was fix my eyes on the Headmaster.
“What the hell?” I asked him. Sure, it was a lame response to the events of the last hour or so, but in my defense, I was freaked out and it seemed like as good a place as any to start.
A growing worry rose inside of me. Why kidnap me, lock me in a dungeon, and then free me if not for the purpose of doing something worse? Maybe I was jaded, but I had good reason to be.
Also, this room was much nicer than the office he seemed to spend most of his time in. It felt like a room for special occasions, and I hoped that the occasion was my survival.
Headmaster Crowe stood between me and the door for a moment before sitting on a comfy looking couch near an ornately carved wooden minibar. He sighed and his fingers adjusted the glasses that never quite fit his face right. Normally the fit of his glasses on his face, and his face in general, bothered me. Right now, they were way down the list of things I was concerned about.
“Keira, Keira, Keira. We need to talk.”
“We could have talked in my dorm room like civilized people. Or you could have called me to your regular office in the morning.”
“Not so. I warned you in my office the last time. You didn’t listen. Then I tried to have you killed in the dungeon and you didn’t comply with that either.”
“I’m a rebel that way,” I answered.
“I might have let you live a little longer, but I’ve got to hand it to you. That little bit of forbidden magic in the forest was beautiful. I didn’t think you had it in you. I felt it, you see. I knew what you had done. And you can feel it too now, can’t you? The dark magic, the forbidden magic, it’s a part of who you are. And of course, my suspicions were confirmed when I saw Tor again.”
I thought about Tor and wished he could have held out a little longer before confronting the Headmaster. No wait, scratch that, I wish Tor would have killed the Headmaster.
But I saw what he did to Tor and Ivy when he burst into the dorm room. That’s when I knew that none of us had a chance. Especially me.
“This is better, though.” He said. “Honestly I should have thought of this first. You will be so delicious, my dear. So much more than my last victim, Archie. He was good, don’t get me wrong. It had been too long since I fed. But you are something special. Who knows, if I’m lucky, you might even put up a fight.”
2
Rafe
My mind was swimming with the events of the night as I tossed and turned in bed. Sleep just wouldn’t come.
There was my new bond with Keira to think about. Over and over in my mind I replayed that night with the two of us in front of the bonfire. The memory of us together made me happy.
And then I thought about how she put herself in danger for Ivy before transforming Tor back into a human. She was something special.
That’s when I felt it. A tingling all over. It was an awful, skin-crawling feeling that washed across my soul.
I knew instantly that the awful feeling had something to do with Keira. She was in danger. My wolf snarled a response and tried to take over. I forced him back down for now so that I could figure out what to do.
My senses went into overdrive. I grabbed a shirt to go with my boxers and was out the door three seconds later.
I was at a full sprint now, and my footsteps echoed loudly through the empty hallways in the middle of the night.
When I got to her room, the door was partially open, and I slowed down. A feeling of dread washed over me. The hair on the back of my neck stood up and I knew something terrible had happened here.
And yet I knew that Keira was still alive. I knew it like I knew my own wolf. I could feel her. I breathed a small sigh of relief.
And yet one look at the door to her dorm, which
was still ajar, told me nothing was okay. I went in and found Ivy slumped against a wall.
“Keira!” I shouted as I ran into her room, but she wasn’t there. Where the hell could she be?
I ran to Ivy and checked her pulse. She was still alive and breathing, but she wasn’t conscious.
Tor was also unconscious on the other side of the room, and he was obviously injured. He was slumped over, lying in an unnatural position. But I had to help Ivy first. I shook her gently. “Ivy?”
Ivy stirred and gave me a confused look. Then she glanced around the room. “Oh shit, Rafe. It was the Headmaster. He came in. And me and Tor fought him. Keira too. I guess we lost.”
The snarling of my inner wolf threatened to overtake my human side. I pushed it down again. For now. But I could feel my inner beast pacing and prowling. “Where’s Keira, Ivy?”
“I don’t know,” Ivy said, shaking her head. “I just remember trying to keep the Headmaster from getting in. And then I blacked out. Ow, my head hurts. That guy is strong.”
She looked around. “Tor! Rafe, he was trying to help. Is he okay?”
Ivy looked alright, so I got up and went to check on Tor. He had a pulse and was breathing, but he did not look right. I whispered across the room to Ivy, so she’d know to be quiet too. “It looks like his leg is broken, Ivy. It’s bad. When he comes to, he’s going to be in a lot of pain.”
I made eye contact with Ivy, and she knew what I was asking. She was weak and shaken herself, but she was the closest thing we had to a healer in our pack. And she was the only one who had a shot at helping him.
“I don’t know,” Ivy said, looking across the room at Tor, her expression sad. “It looks pretty bad, Rafe.”
That’s when Ian and Malachai crashed in through the door, pushing and shoving each other wildly.
They looked around, the worry on their faces matching my own. Then they ran into her room like I had and came out confused. I understood. They were replaying the actions and emotions that went through my head just minutes ago.
“Where is she?” they asked in unison. Then they turned to give each other a dirty look.
“The Headmaster was here. Tor and I fought him and look what that got us,” Ivy answered.
“Keira’s not here, so he must have taken her,” I finished, saying what I knew we were all thinking. There was no other explanation.
Ian pounded on the wall. “She’s in danger, she’s afraid. I can feel it. We have to do something.”
The pounding on the wall was too much noise. I shushed Ian and gave he and Malachai a hand signal to keep their voices down by pointing my head at Tor. “If he wakes up, he’s going to be in mega pain, guys. And that’s not going to help Keira.”
They nodded at me, but the worry on their face remained.
“My wolf can track her,” I announced. Then I turned to Ivy. “Can you take care of Tor?”
Ivy nodded. She got up. “Go,” she said. “Just do it quietly. And get to her soon, Rafe. There was no question she was the one the Headmaster was after.”
She padded off toward her bathroom. I knew from experience that was where she stored all of her healing herbs. Tor was in good hands. Now we just had to find Keira.
I turned back to Malachai and Ian.
Ian bared his fangs. It wasn’t a threat, at least not to me, but I could tell he was ready to rip somebody’s throat out. Because I felt the same way. “Let’s go ger her, wolf.”
That was all the encouragement I needed. My wolf roared to the surface and I was on all fours before I was out the doorway and into the hall.
3
Keira
“What are you?” I asked, I couldn’t help it. This whole thing had taken such a strange turn. I mean, I always knew on some level he wanted me out of the way and possibly dead.
To know it for certain, and to see that he was perfectly fine killing me himself was a whole new level of fucked up.
I’m going to be murdered in the academic advising room of a magical academy. I did not see that one coming.
And after he paralyzed me with a gesture of his hand, I wasn’t even sure how I was supposed to fight back. I guess the only thing I knew for sure was that we had both used forbidden magic. I could feel his darkness and his power, as I guess he could feel mine. Otherwise I probably wouldn’t be here.
“Ah,” he said, perking up. “A relevant question. Good on you. To the common eye I look like your typical, run of the mill supernatural, but I’m really a Sobek.” He said it with a twinkle in his eyes and I could have sworn I saw a glistening of saliva on his lips. Ew.
I searched my memory of the books I had read in Professor Smythe’s class, but I couldn’t remember the name ever coming up before. “I don’t remember learning about that species,” I answered honestly. “Although in my defense, this is like my first year and there are apparently lots of things I don’t know.”
I was babbling out of sheer nervousness now. My body and brain were on red alert, already in fight or flight mode. But there was nowhere to go since he was sitting directly between me and the door. I knew I’d never make it. And he was keenly watching me like a hawk, or Sobek, or whatever the hell he was.
He just sat there on his chair near the minibar eyeing me, and I was on the fainting couch in front of the window staring at him. Now that my eyes had adjusted to the room, I realized it wasn’t me, the room was kinda dark.
“Well, you see, Keira. The reason you do not hear a lot about Sobeks is because they are very much frowned upon in the outside world. Which is a pity, really. As you can see by my appearance and from this room; I am every bit as civilized as everybody else on the outside.”
I fought the urge to roll my eyes at him. He had to be joking. “Sure, you’re very civilized. That’s why you kidnap students to this school, students that nobody will miss. That’s why you asked those idiot guards of yours if they had run the background check on me, right?”
The moment I said it I knew it was true. It was finally all starting to make sense. It was probably too late for me, but it was kind of satisfying all the same. “And then you prey on the the student body, one by one. Like a coward. That doesn’t sound civilized to me, it feels like a fucking murderous scam.”
That got a rise out of him. He stood and glared at me. “Sure, I do what we Sobeks do, that’s just nature. The strong eating the weak. And yet look at what I accomplished here. Look at the beautiful grounds and the excellent teachers. Look how fast you came into your power. I’d dare say your time here has been at least as good if not better than the rest of your miserable, ignored life would have been on the outside.”
“You’re nothing more than a carnivorous con artist,” I snapped.
He flashed me a cruel smile. “My dear, I do believe that you’re missing the point. Don’t you want to know what a Sobek can do to you? Aren’t you interested in how you’re going to die?”
4
Rafe
My wolf sprang out before I was even out of Keira’s door. Then I was out into the hallway running fast.
I could smell her scent, and her fear. Anger prickled down my neck and made my hair stand on end.
The Headmaster’s scent was also thick in the air. He had made no attempt at all to hide or mask what he did. Luckily, I didn’t smell blood. Hopefully she wasn’t injured.
The only other thing I knew for sure based on what I was sensing was that she hadn’t gone willingly. That made me wonder about the lack of blood. I couldn’t let my imagination get the better of me, though. I had one thing to focus on, and that was finding her.
If the Headmaster touched a hair on her body, I knew I would rip his head off, bleed him out, and drag his body from one end of the academy to the other. I snarled, rippling my tongue on my teeth. The bloodlust I felt was growing by the second. I no longer worried about holding my wolf back, this was what needed to happen.
My wolf was crazed with anger and bloodlust. Worry was for humans. Now I was in seek and destroy mo
de. Find Keira and destroy the Headmaster and anyone who got in my way.
I ran faster and faster down hallways, easily following the trail. Until I was in an unfamiliar part of the academy. I had no idea where I was, but the scent of Keira and the Headmaster was still fresh. And there was another scent, something awful, ahead of me in the distance. I picked up the pace.
There were confused shouts behind me. I had left Ian and Malachai behind. I howled without slowing down my gait so they could hear me and follow.
I didn’t need them to protect Keira, I didn’t need anybody. But I knew that they were as concerned about her as I was. I could smell it.
Then I turned down a new hallway. The scent was the strongest right here, and then it disappeared behind a door. Keira was still alive when she came down this hallway not long ago.
My nose recoiled at the thick, new scent. Blood. At least it wasn’t from Keira. It was dead, old, blood mixed with bone and tissue. I paced back and forth in the hallway. My wolf did not want to stop and hand control over to my human side, but the trail ended here.
Keira and the Headmaster went in that door. There was a trail of blood that led out of that door down the hallway and into another room. I howled for the others to catch up.