Zodiac Academy: Fated Throne

by Caroline Peckham

  "Do you guys want a sandwich?" Xavier offered, holding out a bag of carrots and I opened my mouth to reply, but a pain-filled scream met my ears before I could, making me freeze where I was standing.

  "Did either if you hear that?" I asked in a sharp whisper.

  "Hear what?" Xavier asked, looking back at me around the fridge door with his cheeks a little less red.

  "Someone screamed," I murmured, training my gifted hearing on everything all around us as I frowned in concentration.

  "When I was on the moon," Seth began. "There was sometimes this sound kinda like a scream when-"

  I shushed him aggressively as I heard it again, but this time there was a man begging for someone to stop what they were doing alongside the scream.

  "Come on," I commanded, running from the room and hurrying along the corridor outside before taking a sharp turn onto a servants’ staircase that led to the underground portion of the palace.

  "Where are we going?" Seth growled, seeming kinda pissed at me and I shot him a frown.

  "Someone down there is screaming for help."

  That wiped the irritable expression from his face and he hurried his pace as I led them down to the foot of the stairs before pausing to listen again.

  "Are you sure there's someone here?" Xavier asked, looking a little concerned but determined to stick with us all the same. He still had half a carrot and mayo sandwich in his hand which he quickly ate as I glanced at it.

  "Yeah," I said, waiting for the screams to come again and frowning when they did. "It's still coming from beneath us."

  "I've explored the palace a fair bit and I haven't seen a level beneath this one," Xavier said in a low voice as he swallowed down his snack.

  I frowned as I looked around us, placing my hand on the stone wall at the foot of the stairs and ignoring the impulse to shoot off and take a piss as it crept over me.

  "There's a repulsion spell here," I grunted, focusing hard on trying to pull it apart as the need to pee made me feel like I was about to piss myself. "Someone strong created it."

  "Father?" Xavier asked in alarm.

  "No," I said as I forced my magic into the spell and broke it with a shove of power. "It would have been harder to bypass than that if it was him. I can feel a space beyond the wall now."

  Seth moved to my side, his arm brushing mine as he ran a hand over the wall too, feeling it out with his earth magic and I nudged him slightly in the way he normally did when he could tell something was up. He glanced at me for a moment, a smile catching the corner of his lips as he nudged me in return. It turned into a grin as he found the catch holding the door in place and pressed the brick into the wall.

  There was a sound of grinding stone as a doorway was revealed and flickering orange light from somewhere below lit up a curving staircase.

  I threw a silencing bubble over the three of us then looked at the others. "Whatever is down here isn't good. Last chance to turn back."

  Seth scoffed dismissively, but we both knew my offer had really been for Xavier who raised his chin defiantly.

  "I'm coming," he said, stamping his foot like it was a hoof and I was gifted a vivid memory of him doing that exact thing when we'd all been playing together as kids. How no one realised he was a Pegasus before he Emerged was a mystery to me in hindsight.

  "Alright then, let's see what you've got, pony boy," Seth joked and I smirked as I led the way into the dark stairwell.

  We jogged down the stone steps, the cold air seeping into my skin and making me use fire magic to warm myself. I reached out for Seth's arm behind me and gifted him some fire too as he was the only one amongst us without it, and he leaned forward to lick my cheek in thanks.

  I batted him off with a snort of laughter but quickly forgot our playful crap as another scream came to us from much closer this time and the two of them sucked in gasps of alarm.

  We broke into a run, heading down to the foot of the stairs where the firelight burned brighter and a huge room opened up before us.

  Seth threw a concealment over us as we stayed hidden in the shadows at the foot of the stairs and we looked out over the stone chamber where several medical tables were laid out with surgical equipment beside them.

  A short man in long red robes stood over a guy who was strapped to the table in the centre of the room, his white hair almost shining in the firelight as I looked at the back of his head.

  "I know him," Xavier hissed, horror lacing his tone. "He's the Order Conversion Therapist Father got for me after I Emerged as a Pegasus. His name is Gravebone."

  "What the fuck is that when it's at home?" Seth asked.

  "A sick motherfucker who tried to make me believe I was a Dragon and not a Pegasus. I never could work out what the point of it was, but his methods were scarily effective. For a while, I almost began to believe the shit he was feeding me." The rage and disgust in his voice was clear and I laid a reassuring hand on his arm as I gritted my teeth in anger at the way he'd been treated just as Gravebone started to speak.

  "Rats are such dirty creatures," he purred, his voice as slick as oil and his attention fully on the man who was struggling against his bonds beneath him. I spied a pair of magic restricting cuffs around the man's wrists which were clearly being used to stop him from fighting back. "Such little, pointless, scheming vermin. No one would wish to be such a lowly Order. You certainly don't."

  "There's no shame in being a Tiberian Rat!" the man on the table hissed. "You won't convince me I'm a fucking Medusa so stop trying."

  "The procedure will go much more smoothly if your mind is in alignment with it," Gravebone said, sounding resigned. "But if you won't even try to adapt to your new reality then there is much less chance of success-"

  "Fuck you!" the Rat snarled before spitting right in Gravebone's face.

  The creep flinched back, growling loudly as he swiped a red sleeve over his cheek to remove the spittle. "Let's try this again." He lifted a scalpel from a small table beside him, but Seth threw a hand out before he could use it, casting a thick web of vines into existence which snapped tight around his hands and immobilised his magic.

  I shot forward in the next breath, earth magic pulsing in my veins as I sped around Gravebone several times while he cried out in panic, binding him in vines of my own. He yelled out for help before falling to the ground with a hard thump but with my silencing bubble surrounding him there was no chance of that coming.

  "Oh my stars, are you here to rescue us?" the guy on the table gasped, his pasty blonde hair sticking to his forehead as he looked at me like I was some kind of hero.

  And I guessed maybe that was exactly what we were here for, even though I hadn't given it much thought until this exact moment.

  "Us?" Xavier asked as he rushed over, heading straight towards the Rat dude like he intended to unstrap him, and I held an arm out to slow him down.

  "Hang on a second," I said, my palm hitting Xavier's chest as he looked at me in alarm. "We can't make it obvious we were here."

  "Fat chance of that!" Gravebone shrieked from his position on his back on the floor. "I've seen your faces - your father will hear of this Xavier!"

  Xavier snorted in fury, kicking out at Gravebone's head and making him shriek in pain as his nose shattered. I caught Xavier’s shoulder to stop him before he could do any more, still unsure of the best way to proceed.

  I filled Gravebone’s mouth with dirt to stop him from speaking again and smiled cruelly down at the terror in his eyes as he fought to breathe around the obstruction.

  "Untie me!" the Rat begged. "Please - I know who you are. You're Caleb Altair-"

  "Everyone knows who he is, buddy," Seth said, moving to stand beside me with a contemplative frown on his face.

  "Yes, but, I went to Aurora Academy with Elise. Please, my name is Eugene. Eugene Dipper. I swear I didn't do any of the things they said I did. I didn't steal the midnight amethyst stones from anyone. I was just a collector, I never hid that, I swear!"

  I e
xchanged a look with Seth, the guy having even more of my attention now as I wondered if I should try to call bullshit on his claims by finding out if there was any truth to them. If he'd known Elise then I guessed that gave me even more reason to help him out, but I didn't have any intentions of leaving him here anyway.

  "Calm down, man," I said. "No one is leaving you here. We just need to figure out how to cover up our involvement in this little incident. I need it to look like you got yourself free somehow."

  "H-he - Gravebone has the cuff key in his pocket," Eugene gasped. "Perhaps if it looked like I got a hand free then maybe it could seem like I'd gotten hold of it and freed myself and my magic without help."

  "Doesn't help us with the witness issue though," Seth mused, giving Gravebone a casual kick which drew a muffled grunt of pain from him.

  "That's why we need to kill him," Eugene growled and I was surprised to hear such savagery from the little dude, but he was more than clear in his thirst for blood here. And I guessed if I’d been strapped to a table and tortured while some freaky asshole tried to convince me I was a Medusa, I would be out for blood too.

  "What the fuck is the point of all this anyway?" Xavier asked indignantly. "Even if you believed you were a Medusa, you wouldn't suddenly become one so-"

  "Gravebone and V-Vard have been doing experiments," Eugene said, a sob catching in the back of his throat. "C-cutting Fae open and trying to steal their Order forms before re-replacing it with another. I've been down here for weeks and watched them kill countless Fae of my kind with their twisted experiments. It’s never even come close to working but they just start again as soon as they fail. They’re sick."

  "There are more of you here?" Seth asked sharply and Eugene bobbed his chin towards a door on the far side of the open space.

  "M-more than I can count. Tiberian Rats, Sphinxes, Minotaurs - all of the Orders the Dragon King has deemed lesser than whatever he requires for supremacy. You have to help us. You have to!"

  "We're getting to it," Seth said, glancing at me and I gritted my teeth as I tried to think about the best way to do this.

  "We need to cover our faces so they don't all see us, in case any of them are caught," I said, glancing at Eugene and wishing I'd thought of this sooner. "Then we let them out and give them a chance to run for it. They can punish Gravebone however they see fit."

  Gravebone started to thrash and kick on the floor at my feet, knowing full well the victims of his torture wouldn't be merciful if we let them decide his fate. But that really wasn't my problem. If they wanted to get revenge on him for what he’d done then they had the right to.

  "If we just let them make a run for it they'll be caught again," Xavier protested angrily and I ran a hand over my jaw, knowing that there was a fair chance he was right about that.

  "I don't see what else we can do," Seth said. "I mean, the Rats could shift and maybe sneak out, but the Sphinxes and Minotaurs..." He shrugged. "At least this way they'll have a shot."

  "That's not good enough," Xavier demanded, stamping his foot angrily again and I opened my mouth to argue just as the sound of stone grinding on stone announced another secret door opening behind us.

  I whirled around, fire blossoming in my fists as I felt Seth's air shield lock into place around us and my heart nearly fell out of the pit of my stomach as a door slid open in the wall and Gabriel stepped through it.

  "I saw that you needed my help in getting some people out of here," he said with a cocky grin which he totally deserved to be sporting.

  "Fuck yes," Seth whooped and Xavier sagged with relief as I set my focus on setting these Fae free.

  I bent down and hunted Gravebone's pockets while he bucked and fought beneath me, but he was so well tied that there was no chance of him getting away. I pinned him down with an irritated grunt, finding the key to the magic restricting cuffs in his pocket followed by a thick metal key which I was guessing would set the Fae beyond that door loose.

  I swiped a hand over my face as I cast the concealment to hide my identity and Seth quickly did the same for him and Xavier. Gabriel followed our lead and once I was certain no one would recognise us, I grabbed hold of the leather cuff tying Eugene's wrist to the table and tugged on it with a surge of my Vampire strength. The damn thing almost didn't give but with a grunt of effort, I broke it, leaving Eugene to unbuckle the rest of his limbs as I raced towards the door on the other side of the room.

  The key I'd stolen from Gravebone opened it and I found a row of cells full of Fae who all shrieked and cringed away from the bars at the sight of the door opening.

  "I'm here to get you out," I called, my voice disguised by the concealment spell as I moved to the closest cell and quickly unlocked it.

  I decided that them knowing I was a Vampire wouldn't really risk my identity and quickly shot around using my gifts to unlock the rest of the cells as fast as possible. The Fae inside all poured out, calling their thanks, some of them sobbing as they ran for the exit and a freedom I was guessing they hadn’t expected to ever see again.

  By the time I returned to the main room, Seth had unlocked most of their cuffs and Gravebone was well and truly dead. His blood was seeping over the floor and his mangled body so pulverised I was willing to bet they'd beaten him to death instead of wasting magic on him.

  I dispersed the vines I'd created to hold him and Gabriel ushered the escapees towards the dark tunnel he'd emerged from.

  "Go now," he barked at us. "Caleb needs to run you back to the party within the next thirty seconds or you'll be missed. I can get everyone away from here safely. Hamish will help them hide from there."

  I didn't need telling twice so I gave Gabriel a firm nod before shooting forward and hooking an arm each around Xavier and Seth before speeding out of the hidden chamber.

  I only paused to close the concealed door again then hoisted the two of them into my grasp and carried them back to the party, skidding to a halt at the side exit we'd used to escape it.

  Xavier looked half inclined to puke from the speed we'd just travelled at and Seth shook his head like he was trying to stave off some dizziness. I dispelled the illusions over us and we pushed the door open, slipping back inside.

  My heart was thundering as I led the way towards the buffet and my mom's voice drew my attention to her as she called my name.

  "I've been looking for you!" she chastised half-heartedly. “Come on - I want you to speak with the leader of the Falhurst company. He's doing some really impressive things with predictive charts that I just know you'd love to hear about."

  I smiled politely at the Falhurst dude who Mom was clearly trying to impress for some deal and painted on my Heir face as I moved over to join them.

  Had we just gotten away with freeing a bunch of prisoners right out from under Lionel's scaly nose without anyone even realising we'd ducked out on the party?

  Hell yeah we had. And it felt really fucking good.

  I stood in a huge shower which seemed big enough for eight people as I washed the blood from my skin, examining the places on my stomach where the knife had cut me open. There was no sign it had ever happened, yet I could still feel the icy lick of it imprinted in my memory.

  I shuddered, turning the water off and stepping out into the large bathroom onto a fluffy white mat, using my air magic to dry myself off before wrapping myself in a towel. Gabriel’s family were away at a cabin for Christmas in their usual tradition and Gabriel would be joining them there too after tonight. He’d given me access to his house a while ago and had given me permission to come here if I was ever in trouble. I guessed he’d done the same for Orion.

  My bloody clothes were bagged up in the garbage and Diego’s hat rested by the his and hers sinks with my Atlas. I picked them up, finding a text from Tory in reply to the message I’d sent her to say we had the hat and we were okay, but we’d had to run after Stella and Clara had shown up. I’d tell her the rest when I saw her next. At least for now, we were safe.

  Tory:


  Lay low. Lionel will send the FIB looking for Orion as soon as he realises he’s escaped. xx

  My throat thickened as I let that knowledge settle over me. On the one hand, I was glad he was away from Lionel but on the other, the idea of the FIB coming for him was terrifying. What would they do to a convict on the run? How many more years would they add to his sentence if he was caught? There was only one plan we could make. They could never, ever catch him.

  I dressed in a pair of soft lilac sweatpants and a white crop top I’d borrowed from Gabriel’s wife then opened the door, putting Diego’s hat and my Atlas in my pocket. Orion immediately pushed off of the wall opposite me, his eyes full of anxiety. He’d washed and changed, wearing what I guessed were a pair of Gabriel’s navy sweatpants. He didn’t stop coming, dropping to his knees in front of me and pressing his mouth to my bare stomach. I gasped in surprise, fisting my hands in his hair as desire spilled through my flesh.

  He hugged me against him and looked up at me with his brows drawn low.

  “I’m sorry,” he rasped, a haunted look in his eyes that made my heart squeeze painfully.

  I knelt down too, leaning into his touch as he cupped my cheek. “It wasn’t you.”

  His upper lip peeled back, his fangs glinting as hatred shone in his eyes. But I wasn’t sure who it was aimed at, only certain it wasn’t me. His fingers pushed through my hair like he was trying to reassure himself I was still here, and I let myself bathe in his touches despite knowing it would only make it harder to pull away.

  “I’m okay,” I promised and his Adam’s apple rose and fell.

  “I’m not,” he replied in a deep growl.

  “I’m sorry too,” I breathed, pain caving in my chest.

  “Don’t you dare be.” He looked at me with an intensity in his gaze that made my breath catch. “You freed me from the shadows. You saved us. I was the one who…” He laid his mouth on my throat where the knife had kissed my flesh and a shiver darted down my spine.