by Jayme Morse
So, needless to say, I asked Aiden to let me swap partners with someone, but he wouldn’t let me. He felt that I was the best one to deliver this presentation, considering I had the most personal experience with it.
That was the problem.
Fortunately, the presentation ended up going just fine. I didn’t slip up about the fact that I was Princess Fallyn, so there was that, at least.
Time just seemed like it was moving faster after that. The days faded into weeks and the weeks into months. Before I knew it, November was already upon us.
We still hadn’t come up with a plan, but only because we couldn’t come up with one. After all of the research I’d done about the Triangle, we knew that if I tried to kill the Triangle right now, I would end up dying, too.
So, basically, my entire autumn was a waiting game. We were constantly waiting for the ball to drop, and it didn’t.
A part of me secretly wished that the fires would just start already, that the war would be close to beginning so I could get rid of them. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen from here on out, but the one thing I did know was that our lives were a whole lot scarier knowing that Milos and Iris were still walking this earth.
One Thursday in late November, Iris didn’t show up for our homeroom class. A part of me secretly hoped that she had decided to finally give up on whatever game she’d been trying to play all semester, but I had a feeling that there was no way I could have been that lucky.
No, I was pretty sure she had probably just taken a sick day or something.
Later that afternoon, I was almost at the Darken house when I saw Vince walking behind me.
Crap.
I started to quicken my pace. He was the last thing I wanted to deal with right about now.
Somehow, telling Vince about everything that had happened now was even worse than telling him about what had happened at the beginning of the school year. Because now, I needed to explain to him why I hadn’t told him everything then, too. I had dug myself into a hole, and I wasn’t really sure how to unbury myself.
“Raven, stop. Please!” Vince called out. “I need to talk to you. My mom died.”
I stopped in my tracks and then turned around slowly. “Are you okay?”
“I will be, but right now, what I need more than anything else in this world is my best friend.” His eyes met mine. “I don’t really understand why you haven’t talked to me all semester, but we can’t go on this way. Please just talk to me and tell me why you seem like you’re mad at me.”
“I’m not mad at you, Vince. I get why it must look that way to you, but I’ve never been mad at you. I promise.”
“I know this has to do with you and Iris more than it does with you and me. But it still feels like you’re mad at me, considering you’ve been dodging you all semester,” he said with a sigh.
“I’m not dodging you. I’ve just been running from the problem.”
“Well, I need you to stop running. Can we please just go somewhere so we can talk in private? And in case you’re wondering, Iris went back to the human world to visit her mom in Savannah today, so we don’t have to worry about her interrupting us.”
Bullshit. Ever since I had found out the truth about Iris, that she was an ancient, I was pretty sure that she didn’t even have any family in Savannah. Considering the virus had killed most of the ancients, it seemed highly unlikely that any of her family had survived. In fact, I was willing to bet that Iris had probably gone to visit Milos during every summer and winter break.
But I knew he wasn’t making up the fact that Iris was gone, considering she hadn’t shown up to any of our classes today. It really seemed like she had left. I was sure that she had probably gone off with Milos to devise a plan to kill me, but at least she was out of my hair for now… and I would take any Iris-free moment I could get.
As we approached the house, I glanced over at Vince. “Do you want to come inside?”
“Hell yeah, I want to come inside. Because you have a lot of explaining to do.” As I unlocked the door to the house, Vince continued. “There’s something I need to tell you, by the way.”
“What is it?” I glanced over at him.
“My mom didn’t really die.”
“What? You lied to me?” I just stared back at him, dumbfounded that he would lie about something so big.
“I wasn’t sure how else to get you talk to me, considering you’ve been dodging me all year, Raven. So sorry, but not sorry.” He shrugged. “I just want to know the truth. I deserve to hear the truth.”
He was right. He did deserve to know why I had been avoiding talking to him like the plague. But now that it was finally time to tell him, nervousness was beginning to take over and a million questions of doubt were flooding my mind.
What if he hated me for pushing him away all year? What if he didn’t think he would ever be able to forgive me?
What if he didn’t even believe me?
What if he took Iris’s side?
These were all questions that had kept me up more nights than I cared to admit this past year.
Once we had gone inside the house, I closed the door behind us. “So, before I tell you everything, I just have to ask one thing. What, exactly, has Iris told you?”
“She told me that she kissed Theo the day before classes began, and you’ve hated her ever since. And I get it, Raven. He’s your mate. Iris should have kept her dirty paws off your mate. It’s like she doesn’t understand Girl Code. It was really fucked up of her, and I’ve told her that a million times. I’ve told her that she should apologize to you, but she insists that you’d never forgive her. Is that true? Would you really never forgive her?” Vince asked.
“Well, it is true that I would never forgive her,” I replied, “but that’s not what she did.”
“It’s not?” His eyes widened.
“No. What Iris did was far worse than kissing my mate.” I paused. “Don’t get me wrong. I probably would have snapped her neck off if she had kissed Theo or any of my other mates, but that would have been way more forgivable than what she actually did.”
“What could even be worse than kissing your best friend’s mate?” Vince just looked dumbfounded by this news, and it made me feel sort of bad. He had believed for months that this was all Iris had done to hurt me.
Now I was about to tell him the truth. And the truth was that his best friend, my ex-best friend… was a monster.
“So, Iris helped Milos Santorini kidnap me. She helped him keep me as a prisoner in his dungeon for three months, and then she tried to murder me.” I swallowed hard, glancing over at him nervously. I was afraid that there would be doubt in his eyes or written all over his face, but there wasn’t.
“Iris did… what?” He just stared back at me wide-eyed, but he didn’t seem in disbelief.
And so, I told him everything, beginning with the way Milos had managed to get inside my mind and convinced me that he was actually Theo to make me go with him, and ending with the day I was rescued and how I got back home. I told him everything. Every. Single. Thing.
Once I was done, Vince was crying. And I don’t mean just teary eyed. No, there were actual tears streaming down his face.
“I’m so sorry, Raven. I’m so sorry that you went through all of this, and I had no idea. I’m sorry I let that psychopath let me believe that she didn’t do anything hurtful to you. I should have known that you wouldn’t have cut me off unless something huge had happened. But most of all, I’m sorry that I couldn’t be there for you during your darkest hour,” Vince said, shaking his head. “I feel so guilty. I could have prevented all of this from happening in the first place, too.”
“How?” I asked.
“I was going to come to your dorm suite the day Milos lured you. I was going to give you this painting I made for you last year, but then I figured I would just give it to you when you came to visit Chicago over the summer.” He paused. “I’m also sorry that I didn’t realize that you didn’t call
me this summer because something was wrong.”
“Vince, it’s okay,” I told him. “I lost touch last summer, too. And nothing anyone could have done would have prevented Milos from getting to me. He was determined, and he was going to find way to convince me to go with him, no matter what.”
“Makes sense.” Vince sighed. “What are you going to do now?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” Vince said. “I’m cutting off Iris.”
“Is that really a good idea? I don’t want to piss her off or make her think I’m turning people against her,” I admitted.
“Well, maybe she shouldn’t kidnap people, hold them prisoner, and try to murder them.” He shrugged. “I’ll make up some excuse as to why I no longer want to be friends, or I’ll just slow fade her. I won’t let her think it has to do with you. But I just want you to know that I’ll always have your back, no matter what.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it.” I paused for a moment. “Going to school with Iris has been really hard. I’m always worried about what her next move may be. But she hasn’t done anything to bother me yet, and I’m not really sure why that is.”
“Honestly, I’m not sure why she’s even here. She’s an ancient. You can’t tell me she hasn’t already gone to a werewolf boarding school before now. The reason is clearly just because of you.” Vince paused. “What’s even more peculiar is the fact that Eric is here, too. He’s her twin, so if Iris is an ancient, then he obviously is an ancient, too.”
“That’s a good point,” I murmured. I hadn’t really given any thought to that before now. Of course, I had already figured out that Iris was only at Werewolf Academy because I was a student here, but I hadn’t really given any thought as to why Eric was here.
An idea hit me then, just as Vince said, “You know what I think you should do?”
“What?”
“I think you should talk to Eric.”
Vince had completely read my mind.
I had a feeling that Eric held the answer to something; I just wasn’t sure what.
Chapter 10
I never bumped into Eric on campus, but it didn’t take me long to find him. I thought about the first—and only—time I had run into him and headed back there the following afternoon after classes had ended for the day.
Sure enough, I spotted a wave of strawberry blonde hair towards the back of the library.
He was hunched over a tall pile of books, slowly flipping through one as I sat down next to him.
His light blue eyes flitted over to meet mine, and he looked surprised to see me. “Raven. Hi.”
“Hey. Listen, I was wondering if I could talk to you.”
“You want to talk to me?” Eric just stared back at me with wide eyes.
It took me a moment to realize that he thought of me as some sort of celebrity. After all, he was one of the only people on this campus who actually knew that I was Princess Fallyn.
“Yeah, it’s about your sister.”
“Well, I don’t know how I can help you there,” Eric said, quickly shaking his head. “Iris doesn’t even speak to me. She’s pissed at me.”
“Is it because you followed her here?” I asked.
He glanced around the library. “She’s here? I don’t see her.”
“I didn’t mean to the library.”
His eyebrows shot up. “Then where did you mean?”
“Werewolf Academy.”
Eric spun a ring, which had a large ruby gemstone set in a thick gold band, around his finger nervously. “We’re both werewolves, Raven. I didn’t follow her here. We both needed to our education.”
But he didn’t meet my eyes as he spoke, which confirmed for me that I was right. Eric really had followed Iris here.
“You can cut the shit, Eric. I know you’re both ancients. You both would have received your education long before now,” I said as quietly as possible, not wanting anyone else in the library to overhear what I was saying. Even though I knew they were ancients, everyone didn’t need to know that.
“How did you know we’re ancients? Iris told me you didn’t remember your past life,” Eric whispered to me.
“I’ve figured some things out—” I started to say. But at that moment, my cell phone began to ring from my purse.
Shit. It would be just my luck that my phone would start going off in the middle of a library.
I pulled my phone out and then glanced down at the caller ID.
It was him.
My heart pounded against my chest as I sent the call to voicemail.
“Listen, I can’t talk to you here,” Eric said, glancing around nervously.
“Why?” I asked.
“It’s not safe. Iris has people watching me. If she knew I was talking to you about this… Well, let’s just say that it wouldn’t be good for either of us.” He paused for a long moment. “Let’s meet somewhere off campus later tonight. There’s this bar.” He wrote an address down on a piece of paper and then tore it off for me. “Meet me there around nine, okay?”
“Okay,” I agreed with a nod.
Eric scooped up the pile of books then and gathered his things.
As he headed out of the library, I wondered what I would learn later.
“There’s no reason you can’t just come with me,” I told Aiden as we headed out of the house to meet Eric that night.
Well, I was meeting Eric. Aiden felt that he needed to use an invisibility spell before we met up with him.
“I just think he’ll give you more info without me around,” Aiden explained as we climbed into the car. “Trust me, Raven. He’s been my student now for two and a half years. He’s always been sort of nervous and jumpy around me. I don’t want to make him even more uncomfortable.”
“He probably just thinks you’ll figure out that he’s an ancient,” I replied with a shrug. “That or he’s just naturally nervous and jumpy, which makes sense. If my sister was a monster, I would be nervous and jumpy, too.”
“Whatever the case is, I just think it would be better for me to be invisible.”
“Suit yourself.” I shrugged. “Just make sure you don’t park close enough for him to see you there before you go invisible.”
“Oh, I’m not even worried about that.” As he came to a stop sign, he whispered, in the witch language, “Invisbla.”
He quickly went transparent.
“Can you make yourself visible again, please? People are going to think that this car is just driving itself.”
“Self-driving cars are the future,” Aiden joked, even though I still couldn’t see him.
I sank down in my seat, hoping that no one would end up noticing that there was an invisible driver.
“Relax, Raven. This happens all the time in the paranormal world. Everyone knows you don’t have to be visible to be driving safely,” Aiden insisted.
I still didn’t like it, but I tried not to complain too much as we made it across town.
Aiden parked the car across the street from the bar where I was meeting Eric, and we both climbed out.
We began to walk in the direction of the bar when I spotted him.
Headmaster Black.
He was heading into a business called Psychic Investigations. It read: Serving your investigative needs using our intuition.
“Okay, isn’t that weird?” I whispered out loud so that Aiden could hear me.
“It’s really weird,” his voice filled my mind. “I’m not sure what he would be going in there for.”
“I’m really curious,” I admitted. I was probably biased since I didn’t like or trust Headmaster Black, but I just couldn’t help but think that he was up to no good.
“I have an idea,” Aiden said. “I’m already invisible. What if I follow him?”
“Do it.”
“You’ll be okay here with Eric?”
“Eric is harmless. If someone else”—I knew I didn’t need to specify that I was referring to Iris or M
ilos— “happens to make an appearance, I’ll let you know.”
“Okay. Let me know when you’re done, but I’m guessing that I’ll be done before you.”
“Alright. Love you.”
“Love you, too,” he replied as I opened to the door to the bar.
When I stepped inside, I glanced around for Eric. I saw him sitting at a back corner of the room.
I headed to the bar and ordered a pumpkin spice margarita before heading over to his table.
“Hey, Raven.” He shot me a small, albeit nervous, smile.
“Hey.” I gripped my glass nervously. I wasn’t entirely sure how to begin this conversation.
“So, I know you have questions.”
“A lot of questions,” I admitted with a nod.
“I’ll answer them as honestly as I can, but I need you to agree to something first.”
“Okay, what?”
His blue eyes met mine. “You can never tell Iris I told you any of this. If she ever knew… Well, I’m pretty sure she’d kill me.”
“I promise that everything you tell me will stay between us.”
“Can I see your phone?” he asked.
I shot him a funny look and then pulled my phone out of my bag. I handed it to Eric, and he laid it on the table.
“I just wanted to make sure you’re not recording me.”
Even though I semi-thought he was being paranoid, I also understood. With a twin as batshit crazy as Iris, I’d have been paranoid, too.
“We can leave it out if it makes you feel more comfortable,” I suggested.
“That would be great.” His eyes met mine again. “So, you want to know why Iris and I are both going to Werewolf Academy?”
I nodded. “Yeah, that seems like a good place to start.”
“Milos and Iris have known each other since ancient times. She’s in love with him,” Eric explained, glancing over at me. “Actually, ‘in love’ might not even be the best way to put it. She has an unhealthy obsession with wanting to be with him. But, as I’m sure you already know by now, Milos isn’t interested in her because he’s in love with you.”