by Eva Brandt
“Grim is appealing enough in his own way, but I do admit that on occasion, I find myself craving something less bony,” Morrigan replied. “I haven’t had a real tongue up my cunt in over a decade.”
The imagery of Grim having sex with anyone was headache-inducing. Thinking about him with Morrigan was even weirder. Fortunately, Stefan was nothing if not efficient, and it didn’t take us long to leave the courtyard with the two enthusiastic, aroused teachers behind.
It soon became obvious that we were heading toward the dorms of The House of Envy. Mikael and Callum met us when we were halfway there. They both looked pale, but determined. “That was close,” Callum said. “You okay, Lyssa?”
“I’m fine. You, on the other hand, look like you’re taking lessons from Professor Jones’s makeup artist.”
Callum grimaced. “It’s not easy to inflict a lust aura on Lilith and to avoid discovery at the same time. I think we managed, but it took a lot out of us.”
“Worth it, though,” Mikael added. “Better for us to take the chance than you.”
“I was just coming from the library. I don’t think it would’ve been that big of a deal if they had found me.”
“You’re too smart to think that,” Callum replied. “There are only so many concessions the school is willing to give to any student, even one as remarkable as you. Why did you leave the dorms without one of us?”
I was beginning to get a headache, and not because of my epilepsy. “Contrary to what you seem to think, I’m not a child,” I answered bitingly. “Most of the time, I can protect myself perfectly fine.”
“Yes, we know, but you shouldn’t have to,” Stefan pointed out. “In the end, you are only a human.”
I glared at him, and he quickly backtracked. “That came out wrong. I just mean that you haven’t mastered your powers yet, and there are plenty of people at the academy who still want to hurt you. We just want to keep you safe, Lyssa.”
I buried my face in my hands and sighed. I believed him, but at the same time, I had to wonder if that was just because I wanted to.
It was becoming clearer and clearer that I was very biased when it came to my lovers. I couldn’t judge them as harshly as I did everyone else. It just didn’t seem in my ability. But there were still so many things about this situation that I didn’t understand, and I couldn’t let them go, no matter how much I cared about the men who’d brought so much fire and passion into my life.
“Let’s just go back to the dorm. Not is really not the time and place to discuss this.”
“I agree,” Callum said. “We have other, more interesting things to do.”
It was easy enough to understand what that meant. The small smirk on his lips said more than his words ever could. I tried very hard to not think about everything I knew that mouth could do, but utterly failed.
I might have abandoned all caution and kissed him right then and there, but at that exact moment, through the corner of my eye, I caught sight of a white shadow. I turned, just in time to see the clear figure of a person disappear through the wall.
“What the hell?” I asked, a shiver coursing down my spine. “Is this place haunted on top of everything else?”
It wouldn’t have been surprising, considering how many students lost their lives here on a regular basis. And maybe something so simple shouldn’t have freaked me out after experiencing life at The Academy of the Devil for over a year. But maybe a part of me still had human sensibilities, because I was very concerned about what I’d just seen.
My inquiry seemed to confuse Mikael. “Not as far as I know. Usually, when people die here, Ammit consumes their souls or Professor Grim sends them on their way, so it’s impossible for a ghost to stay behind. Why?”
I stared at him in disbelief. “It was right there!” I hissed, pointing at the spot where I’d seen the apparition. “The ghost! Didn’t you see it?”
Stefan shook his head. “We didn’t see anything, Lyssa.”
Callum frowned, seeming deep in thought. “We’re pretty close to the entrance to the passage of The Scholomance. It’s not out of the question something might be down there that the teachers never bothered to hunt. And to be fair, we do know the corridors are dangerous at night. The school might indeed hold vengeful spirits.”
“Which brings us back to what we were talking about earlier, returning to the dorm ASAP,” Mikael pointed out. “Come on. We’ll be safe there, under Leviathan’s protection.”
He didn’t wait for me to reply. Instead, he took me in his arms and started to run toward the dorm. He might have claimed he hadn’t heard anything about potential apparitions present in the school, but he was clearly freaked out enough that he wasn’t willing to take any chances with my safety.
I appreciated that. I liked to believe I could fight my own battles, but at the same time, I knew I still had a lot to learn. I wasn’t proud enough to refuse my lovers’ help, especially when it meant I could get away from the creepy ghost.
We reached the dorm without incident and entered the building. Callum and Mikael didn’t bother returning to their own houses. Instead, we made our way to the room I shared with Mikael. We bypassed the common room as we walked. Leviathan waved at us with a fin from his painting and Shiro woofed at him.
“Good night, Your Highness,” I told my patron.
He couldn’t reply, but I could’ve sworn I heard a whisper of ‘Good night, little darkling’ in my head anyway.
Not for the first time, I wished things were a little more straightforward at the academy. I wished I could just ask Leviathan about all the questions I had, especially the mystery of Lucifer’s interest in me. But that wasn’t in my ability, so I decided to set my apprehension aside, at least for now.
I was too tired and quite frankly, too cranky for sex, but my lovers didn’t push me. When I collapsed in bed, fed up with life, Mikael pulled off my shoes. Stefan helped me out of my gown and into my pajamas, without allowing his hands to wander. Callum lay on the bed and pulled me against his chest. “You’ve had such a tough time lately, princess. You need to sleep and relax more.”
“Now you’re starting to sound like my doctors,” I rumbled. “That was what they always used to tell me.”
“Well, then, they must’ve known what they were talking about,” Mikael offered. “Don’t question it. Sleep.”
In a way, following his advice seemed like a waste. Because of all my classes, we couldn’t always be together as much as I would’ve liked, and a four-way relationship, while enjoyable, came with some challenges. Sleeping might be important, but like Callum had said earlier, we had better things to do.
But not everything was about sex, and there was a different type of comfort in being like this, in experiencing their warmth and affection in a platonic way. This kind of connection was rare in the demon world. It was nice to just lie there and be, to enjoy the knowledge that they genuinely cared about me.
Maybe I was worrying about nothing, I thought as Callum started massaging my temples. After all, who cared if Lucifer wanted to play strange games with me? As long as I had my lovers by my side, nothing else mattered.
The world was our oyster. All we had to do was to reach out and take it. And anyone who didn’t like that would pay the price for their defiance.
Revelatio
“Ms. Michaelis! Ms. Michaelis! Are you paying attention?”
“Err… Yes, Sir.” I blinked at Professor Jones, who was frowning at me with an almost concerned expression. I wanted to punch him in the face for daring to pretend he cared. “Of course. Apologies.”
“Did you need help with your assignment?”
“No, thank you, Sir,” I replied, gritting my teeth in irritation. “I can handle it.”
He didn’t seem convinced, but he let it go and drifted to the work table of another student. Meanwhile, I poked the leaf of the plant in front of me. It was a variety of ivy, but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember what it was called. The black vines had wrapped th
emselves around my work counter as soon as Professor Jones had let them out of containment. Our task for the day was to harvest some cuttings without disturbing the plant or getting ourselves killed. I’d managed the latter part, but only because I hadn’t attempted to harvest anything.
Today was just one of those days when nothing seemed to be going right. Professor Jones had refused to let Mikael into the greenhouses on some bullshit excuse that his angelic background would disturb the ecosystem. I hadn’t reacted well to this, but Mikael had told me to go along with it, so now, here we were.
Frustrated with myself, I tried to focus on my task. I tended to be good at Herbalism, but today, I didn’t have my usual patience. Even so, the plant accepted my touch with ease, donating its thorns for the potions we’d have to create eventually.
In a way, the act was calming, and the ivy caressed my hand as if sensing I needed the comfort. I appreciated the help, but my problems couldn’t be so easily fixed.
It had been a little over three days since I’d overheard the argument between Morrigan and Lilith. I’d yet to figure out the meaning of Leviathan’s cryptic message or find any information on Lucifer. I was beginning to think Adolf was right and I was worrying about stupid unnecessary things. Finding a way to keep Mikael safe was more urgent. But I didn’t know how to do that either and my helplessness made me want to scream.
By the time the Herbalism lesson was over, I’d finished my task, but I was also even antsier than before. I fled the greenhouse like the hounds of hell were after me, and not with the intention to fuck me until I was dead, as Stefan had so eloquently put it. Much to my surprise, Mikael wasn’t waiting for me outside like he had promised.
Had he gone to the Demonology building instead? I had another class there, and Ammit wouldn’t have minded if he hung around until my arrival.
It was a possibility, but his absence still gave me a bad feeling. He always preferred to stay with me and watch my back, and he wouldn’t have left without letting me know.
As I rushed through the corridors, heading toward Ammit’s classroom, a strange wave of wrongness struck me. I suddenly felt like I couldn’t breathe. A clawed fist seemed to be squeezing my lungs, choking me.
All thoughts of going to class forgotten, I turned on my heel, allowing the feeling to guide me. The castle’s corridors twisted around me, granting me easier passage, as if encouraging me and telling me I was doing the right thing.
I ran into the group of students on the path that led to beach. I had no idea what Mikael was doing here. I was no longer attending PE, so for all I knew all of them might have been headed to Polyphemus’s class. The reasons weren’t really what mattered to me. What mattered was that five other people had surrounded Mikael and TB, and they weren’t happy.
I didn’t recognize them. Most of them were upperclassmen with whom I’d never spoken before. The sole exception was, surprisingly, one of my former housemates, the Voldemort girl. It wasn’t clear what she had against Mikael, but for the most part, she was staying out of it and watching the others do the dirty work.
The upperclassmen didn’t disappoint. “Your little mistress isn’t here to protect you now,” one of them said. “Isn’t that funny? What are you going to do, angel?”
Mikael was vibrating with tension, but he didn’t react to the provocation.
“Are you really that stupid?” he asked. “I don’t need Lyssa to protect me. I can protect myself just fine.”
“Divine magic is forbidden on campus,” the other student replied. “You are an angel, and as such, any magic you perform is automatically divine.”
“I am a nephilim. I can cast both types of magic, in case you’ve somehow missed it during the years I’ve been here at the school. Who are you trying to fool? You can’t beat me.”
“That would probably be true, but we don’t have to beat you,” another student, this time female, replied. “I’m sick and tired of you parading around the school like you belong here. You don’t. You’re not one of us. You never were. You need to stop pretending. And if the teachers aren’t going to make you do it, we will.”
Demons weren’t creatures that made idle threats. Whenever they said they’d do something, they usually kept their word. As such, I wasn’t surprised when one of the students retrieved a glowing vial and tossed the substance inside at Mikael.
Mikael must’ve expected something like this. At the last moment, TB leaped forward, and the substance hit her instead.
I assumed that Mikael had believed whatever was inside specifically targeted angels and so, couldn’t harm TB. In this, he was proven correct. In every other way, he was wrong.
When the potion struck TB, it dissipated into thick, dark fumes that reminded me an awful lot of the fateful exam where I’d had my first seizure at the academy. That day, Professor Jones had asked us to make the Angel Shield potion, and it was something very basic, which most demons learned about since they were very young.
But Mikael had been at the school for years and would’ve been exposed to that potion plenty of times. That sort of thing couldn’t hurt him, because like he had said, he was a nephilim and could use both celestial and infernal magic.
As it turned out, the goal wasn’t to harm Mikael, at least not physically. When the fumes spread and surrounded Mikael, the air around him blurred. The enchantment that had been keeping his wings incorporeal faded. I was still too far to do anything about it, and even if I’d been closer, I wouldn’t have had time to intervene.
Before I knew it, Mikael’s wings showed up in all their glory. Maybe they’d never been truly gone at all, because at first, he didn’t even seem to realize what had happened. It was TB who caught a glimpse of the feathery appendages first and she hissed in alarm.
Mikael twitched, turning to look over his shoulder. He paled, and his reaction drew a chuckle of satisfaction out of the upperclassman who had thrown the substance. “You can’t hide behind your familiar and your mistress now, angel. Let’s see what everyone else thinks and feels when the truth is out in the open.”
There was no more time for doubt and hesitation now. Shiro let out a loud howl and lunged forward at the group. Alerted by my familiar’s outburst, the other students turned toward me. “Well, look who it is. The human who took a nephilim as her familiar. I wonder—”
He never got the chance to finish the sentence. The ground beneath our feet started to shake, and the upperclassmen collapsed, screaming and writhing in agony. “You might have missed the memo, because you and I don’t share classes, but I won’t let anything happen to Mikael,” I said calmly.
A part of me was freaking out, because I hadn’t done anything that could’ve made them act like that. But that part was very small, and as far as I was concerned, they needed to be taught a harsh lesson.
My arrival snapped Mikael out of his shocked trance. “Lyssa, what are you doing here? It’s not safe.”
“Oh, and I take it it’s safe for you to be alone around these fuckers. Give me a break.” I didn’t ask him why he’d left the greenhouses. That wasn’t important right now. “Are you and TB okay?”
Mikael pursed his lips, obviously still uncomfortable, but trying to hide it.“We’re fine. It’s just a Revelatio potion. It didn’t occur to me that any of them would know how to make something like this, since Revelatio potions aren’t supposed to be able to affect divine beings. Anyway, I’m stuck like this, for now, but it’ll wear off.”
I scanned him from head to toe for any further signs of injury, but there were none. “You sure?”
He arched a brow at me. “You’d realize it if I were hurt elsewhere. I’m telling you the truth.”
I believed him, and the moment that happened, his attackers stopped screaming and writhing in agony. They didn’t get up, though. Instead, they curled into tight balls, clutching their heads and shaking. On occasion, they’d even let out tiny, fearful whimpers.
“What did you do to them?” Mikael asked.
“No idea,”
I admitted.
“Should we get someone to see to them? Or better yet, to you?”
In all honesty, I didn’t particularly care about providing Mikael’s attackers with first aid. They were demons, and they must’ve witnessed and been hit by magic far worse than mine. Granted, I wasn’t crazy about using magic I didn’t understand on people, but I was still more concerned about Mikael and TB. The upperclassmen made the choice in my stead. “That’s fine,” one of them said. “We’re fine. We’re… just going to go.”
“Oh, you’re cognizant.” Mikael walked up to the man and pressed him down with his foot. “Let this be a warning to you. I don’t care what you think you’ve accomplished here today. If you try this kind of scheme again, you’ll regret it, and not just because of Lyssa.”
His wings glowed slightly, and the other student nodded, lines of strain appearing on his face. Mikael smiled, an unpleasant twist of lips that made me wonder how anyone could mistake him for anything else except a very powerful demon. “Excellent. Happy to hear it.”
He pulled away and returned to my side. “Come on, Lyssa. This trash isn’t worth wasting our time. Let’s get back to the dorms.”
I still had another class to go to right now, and Mikael knew that very well. If he was asking to go to the dorms, it must be because he wasn’t as unharmed as he claimed. I didn’t say anything about this realization, acknowledging the fact that he likely didn’t want to have his weakness pointed out in front of his foes.
I took his hand and willed him to understand that I was there for him. It must’ve worked, because Mikael’s shoulders relaxed slightly and he showed no distress or fatigue as we made our way back to our refuge.
His strength ran out as soon as we were inside the dorm. We got as far as the common room before Mikael went down like a rock.
I knelt by his side, wrapped my arms around him, and held him close. “I’m so sorry, Mikael,” I said, petting his hair.