by A. K. Koonce
I take a step forward, but I take it right back when he lifts his hand, pushes his bloody palm over his lips, and swallows the iron tablet.
“Professor,” I gasp, hands held up as if I might comfort him, but I don’t go to him at all.
I keep the space between us.
It’s like I’m terrified if I come closer, the sinister thoughts slashing through his eyes will infect me.
And then I too will do something irreversibly fatal.
A stuttering cough chokes from his throat, and his gaze slides through the room before landing on me. It’s as if he forgot I was here entirely. With his gaze still holding mine, his long legs give out, and he falls to the rocky floor on his knees.
“Good luck, Mr. Rutherford,” he gurgles, blood sliding from his lips and down his chin. It bleeds across his white collared shirt, and the fae man seems confused by the turn of events. He stares down at the mess he’s making as if he isn’t quite sure whose blood this is or how it got there.
And then he falls face forward.
“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” My hands shake at my sides, and I force harsh breaths from my lungs, but it isn’t enough.
Too many emotions and strengths rip through my body, and I don’t know what to do with it all. My fist flies forward and collides with hard marble. My hand lingers there in the middle of the carved wings of the nephilim. Dust billows up around my knuckles. Pieces of debris scatter to the floor from the divot I’ve made in the statue.
It’s that easy.
One careless fucking punch and the statue’s damaged. A few more reckless blows and it could be taken down completely.
This entire room could be destroyed with little hellacious effort.
And then all of New York City and the world would be fucked.
I slow my breathing and back out of the room. I stumble through the dark channels with rushed steps. I slam into every twist and turn that makes up this maze of a fucking tunnel, but I never stop.
I have to get the others. We have to protect this tomb of memorabilia. We have to handle this. Now!
My palms slide over smooth marble. It isn’t hard rock like the rest of this place. It’s cold beneath my touch, carved down into a perfectly flawless design. I just know it’s the statue of the headmistress. I can hear screams and fighting just on the other side.
But the entrance is closed off.
I shove against it. I whisper a string of words that I think the professor might have said. I do it over and over again.
But the opening never shifts.
Only darkness surrounds me.
And I’m fucking trapped in the unknown channels of Academy of Six.
Six
Izara
A scream crawls from Syko’s throat as the Messenger tears through his wings. He rips them straight from his back with a spray of blood, and I know the sound of cracking bone will haunt me forever.
Tufts of feathers fly around them. Feathers threaded through with gold and light, and now… blood. He shreds them until his wings are nothing but stumps against his back and hanging, marred flesh wet with blood.
Syko screams until his eyes roll to the back of his head, and it feels like it all happens in a single moment. I don’t have time to speed up. I don’t have time to process my shock before the Messenger drops him and he plunges to the earth.
“No!” I shriek. I steer my body after Syko’s falling form, the Messenger’s echoing laughter following after my beating wings. I screech with rage, both my Prod and I, as we’re forced to witness our best friend hurtling toward the ground.
I am all powerful, and yet I feel like I don’t have enough strength to reach him in time. My arm extends to his prone form and latches on to the front of his shirt. His heavy body nearly pulls me down with him, but I splay my wings out at my sides, pulling him to my chest and smoothing out my landing.
We drop to the ground, and I roll Syko onto his stomach to stare at his back in horror. His wings, those beautiful angel wings, are gone. Marred scraps of skin and feather with little stumps between his shoulder blades are all that’s left.
It’s so horrifying to look at that I have to fight back a gag.
“Syko…” His name breaks on my lips as I turn his face. He’s too pale, his pulse too faint. “Syko, baby…” My fingers brush across his skin, but he doesn’t stir. Not even in pain.
Malek kneels beside us. He’s in human form now and naked. His warm body seems to envelop Syko, and finally, my nephilim moves, but a sound of heart-wrenching agony rips from his lips.
I can’t fucking stand it.
“Get him to safety, Malek,” I plead desperately. Those wounds are bleeding so much, too much, and my destructive magic isn’t enough to heal them.
Malek shoots a glare in my direction. I know just how unnerved he is by the trembling of Syko’s body, but his voice is as hard as steel. “What will you be doing?”
My fists tighten, and a lump catches in my throat. “I have to go back.”
“Fuck, Izara. You’re going back to them? After what they did to him?” His expression is full of hurt. “You’re still going to take their side after this?”
Impatience tugs at me. “I’m on your side, Malek. Can’t you understand that?” I plead for him to understand. He has to, because I can’t survive the next few moments if he doesn’t. “I’m on your side. So fucking take Syko to safety. Help him. Heal him.”
Malek doesn’t seem to understand my words, but he gets up, pulling Syko with him gently. He throws him over his shoulders as easily as he would a child, with barely more than a grunt. His cheeks are flushed, and he’s staring at me like I’m a stranger.
Maybe I am.
All I know is that I’m not the same scared girl that first stepped foot into this academy two years ago. I’m different, I’m changed, and I won’t apologize for doing what’s right.
But I can offer him one slip of truth.
I lean forward, lips brushing along his ear, and whisper the words softly in Spanish, so no one else can hear or understand.
When I pull away, understanding dawns on his features, and hope shines in the depths of his eyes. I hate that he’s leaving me, but he has to.
Right now.
“Go,” I scream. “Help Syko.”
He nods and turns, running away in a blur of movement.
I watch him go until he disappears, and only then do I bend to pick up my discarded crown before I turn. The back of my hand hurts; the spot where my father, Lucian Morningstar, kissed his burning promise onto my knuckles flares in pain at a broken deal.
I’ve held back my magic for so long, for too fucking long, and it’s time I unleash the full extent of my rage.
The words I whispered to Malek rise with my power, my magic merging with the fury of my Prod and me.
I am going to kill them all.
Seven
Malek
Violent shivers tear through the nephilim’s body so hard I nearly drop him several times as I speed through the halls and stairwells of the main building. My foot collides with a solid door, and it flies open to greet me with the cold whipping winds of the rooftop.
At the first sound of Syko’s agonized screams, Saint’s there in a flash of movement.
“What the fuck happened? Who did this to him? Did Izzy do this?” The questions hurtle, one after the other, in my direction with brittle anger and worry.
“No. The Messenger did,” I whisper breathlessly.
Saint’s arms shove at mine until he’s holding Syko against him, falling to his knees and covering himself in the nephilim’s blood just to be near him. “You’re going to be okay. You’re going to be fine,” the vampire says over and over again.
But there’s so much blood. Matted crimson-stained feathers hang from crumpled wings. Torment pulls at the man’s features in a way I could never imagine. It’s a brutal, torturous death that the Messenger intended for him.
And he will die. Supernaturals have rapid healing powers when it c
omes to small wounds. But this—this is too much for anyone.
“Where—where’s Phoenix? Syko was with Phoenix.” Saint’s blue eyes are enormous as he looks to me like I might confirm all the terrible scenarios that are clearly slamming through his mind.
“He was following after a professor. He probably wanted to keep going after the magic that’s warding this place. Syko flew to Izara the moment he saw her, though.”
“And her Prod didn’t hurt him?” Heaven’s eyes are narrowed on me, and Sasha gives her girlfriend a look, clearly thinking the woman’s voice should be lowered just slightly.
I agree.
“No. Izzy… she’s in control of her Prod. She’s—she’s on our side. We have to keep faith in her,” I say with a firm nod.
Heaven’s laughter is a cutting slice right to the jugular. More disbelief.
And her amusement is accompanied by Saint’s glare and Syko’s sudden wail of pain.
All of us tense as his cries carry into the cold night.
“Heaven, get our father. Get our mother.” Saint doesn’t look back at the woman standing with wide eyes behind him. “Go! Now!” he screams in a shaking tone.
Heaven is simply a blur of dark colors as she rushes into the building. Seconds later, I faintly hear the rattle of a gate in the distance.
The thing is, no vampire will be able to help this. Not even the leader of the Citadel. Saint’s father can’t heal this mess.
But Saint wants him anyway. I think he just wants someone to tell him what he’s been whispering to Syko for the last several minutes.
That everything is going to be okay.
I want desperately to believe it.
Eight
Izara
The Messenger acts like nothing ever happened in those woods. Like he hadn’t just ripped Syko’s beautiful wings from his back and destroyed his chances of ever flying again. Like he didn’t just break a deal I made with my father.
He’s laughing with his gargoyle creatures and weird demons that look like a cross between geese and blobs of slime. Their eyes bulge from their small faces, and when they open their mouths, their tongues have teeth.
Fucking. Teeth.
What the fuck kind of demon hybrids is he breeding in hell? I’ll never look at a goose the same way again, I swear.
That inky gaze flicks to me with nothing but malice as I storm up to the thrones. My hand burns the whole way, and my heart beats incredibly fast. There are tears burning the backs of my eyelids, but I refuse to shed them at all. Not when the force of my anger is stronger than my sorrow and begging to be unleashed. My men were threatened. My best friend and lover was harmed.
My father sits up straighter on his throne as I storm before him. By now, I know everyone is looking, watching to see what’s wrong, what I will do. It’s probably the ephemeral glow of my power, surrounding me. I’ve unleashed it in its full capacity, and a burning golden light surrounds my body, the static destruction of what lives inside me causing my hair to stand on end. Flickering tendrils of shadow rise around me, and I know I must look formidable. I know because I feel it.
My Prod is a force to be fucking reckoned with.
I stop in front of my father’s throne. He sits up straighter, his eyes flickering with surprise as he takes in my angry stance and the violence emanating from me. He leans back ever so slightly on the throne, resting one arm across the armrest, crossing one leg over the other.
He looks elegant and in charge, as always.
The backs of my knuckles burn as hotly as the rage inside.
A pixie buzzes near my ear and angrily, I slap it away with my palm, sending it hurtling in circles through the air in a buzz of angry chattering.
“You promised!” My chest heaves as I hurl the accusation at him. “You fucking promised me!”
His eyes narrow, and he drops both feet to the floor as he sits up straighter. “What are you on about?” His voice has none of the gentleness it should.
“You promised me my men would be safe!” I throw my crown right at him.
It hits him in the face and bounces off. He doesn’t even flinch, but I can feel the rippling of darkness and demonic power swirling around him. It brings a hush among the crowd.
Slowly, he unfurls himself from his dark, shadowy throne and stands to his full height to face me. I should fear his wrath, I know I should fear the wrath of the one man who has the power to destroy me entirely.
But I don’t.
“What has happened?” The question cuts through the air and sends an icy chill over the explosion of hell around us.
“Ask your precious Messenger.”
His glare spans out across the demons who have gathered and are watching us with fearful, gleeful eyes until they stop on the Messenger. He growls out a command, calling his son forth.
In hulking strides, the Messenger appears at my side. It hurts to stand next to the fucker that hurt Syko, and I grit my teeth through it.
He bows arrogantly in our father’s direction and asks, “Yes?”
“What have you done?”
“I took care of a threat to your life.”
I can’t hold back any longer. I turn and shove against his body. It’s like touching stone, and it abrades my palms as I use my power to shove him. He staggers backwards with a growl.
“You hurt my nephilim! After Father forbade it!” I turn away from him and with gritted teeth demand, “Punish him.”
My father’s eyes flicker between the two of us as if he’s weighing the wisdom of his decision to have two children instead of sticking to just one.
“Apologize to your sister for what you did and let bygones be bygones.” He practically sighs the words out. Like this whole ordeal is beneath him.
“Fuck your apology. We had a fucking deal. You said my men would be spared!”
He shrugs and sits back down on his throne. “Your brother will be castigated for his actions. What more do you wish of me?”
I take a breath, my power humming through my blood, my Prod purring in my ear. I know what she wants; I know the violence and vengeance she craves because it is my own. We are one now, she and I.
I am her, and she is me.
We are one.
“Blood for blood.”
The Messenger laughs at my bold words, but it’s not to him I look. It’s to our father and the response I know he will give me. Because he’d never meant to protect those I care about in the first place.
“Your loyalty lies with this family now,” he says dismissively. “I promised at your behest, I gave in to your whims and fancies, but the Messenger is your brother. You cannot expect blood for blood. He is family. One does not betray family.”
Azazel’s words come back to me, and I repeat them with a smile on my lips, loud enough for everyone to hear. “What kind of world would we live in if we can’t even trust our own family?”
It was like he’d seen into my heart, into my soul at that moment and had known what I’d done and why.
And what the inevitable outcome would be all along.
Azazel had known precisely what I’d hidden behind the gleam of manic violence and my bicolored gaze, and he’d smiled.
“Forgive me, Father,” I say slowly. “For this is the only way.”
And I turn and fly toward the Messenger of Chaos, unleashing my magic, shoving it down his throat until it’s choking him.
My father gave me this power. I took it, knowing what would happen. I knew he wouldn’t fully trust me until I gave myself over to the violence of my Prod completely. I knew the power it would give me. How much stronger it would make me and what I would lose in my acceptance of it. I knew what I would have to do.
I knew, the moment I’d taken my father’s hand and let the power of my Prod consume me, that I would use it to destroy them all.
My magic is a punishing force of fire and energy. It shoots down the Messenger’s throat, cutting off his growls of rage and consuming him. The fire spreads inside his b
ody like the very rivers of golden fire that thread through the veins in my wings. Black spots spread along his gray skin like embers burning in a fire. His mouth drops open and meaty hands reach up to clutch at his throat.
He dies all too quickly.
His arms splay out at his sides, and the screams of rage explode along with his body in a shower of rocky chunks. I stand firm, even as the flying rock abrades my skin and pounds my flesh.
The force of the explosion sends creatures flying back, but not my father. I watch, grains of dirt raining over me, the remnants of my half-brother, as my father stands and absorbs what just happened. His expression changes in an instant. Those strict, collected features snap into a mask of rage and betrayal.
But it is nothing compared to what I’m feeling inside.
“What have you done?” my father grinds out. I can hear the underlying tone of hurt in his voice and that violent thirst for vengeance.
“You took my mother from me.” I can still see her weeping face in the Forest of Woe. I can still see her expression as she sees me and cries because I’m an abomination not meant to exist. “You manipulated me, tricked me—”
“I gave you your power.”
I smile then. “You gave me life. But this power is mine.” Fire flares to my fingertips and spreads, swirling around my body. “And I always planned to use it against you.”
I lift my hands up and blast him with my power, but it bounces off his body and doesn’t even harm him. It’s then that I fear for myself. Not for what I’ve done, but for the retaliation gleaming in his eyes. For the fact that I might die without having set out to do what I meant to do.
Destroy the King of Hell.
Tears seem to glisten in his eyes, but beneath that is a well of rage so profound, I could never hope to see the bottom. I am acutely aware of this moment. Of the snarls at my back as the demons try to herd me toward my father. I know I’m cornered. I know I likely have no way to escape.