The door opened and I came face to face with a rather angry looking Orion.
“I was just getting this,” I explained, holding his jacket out to him.
He frowned at it for a moment before clearly remembering draping it around me after he’d pulled me from the pool the other night.
“So... thanks, I guess,” I added as I stepped into the corridor and closed my door again.
Orion took the jacket from me, raising an eyebrow at my tone. “You guess?”
“Well, you dragged me out of the water and all so I’m grateful for that. But you did only give those assholes a few weeks detention for attempted murder... so I’m not exactly falling all over myself with gratitude to you. It’s kinda obvious where your loyalties lie.” I shrugged as I turned away from him but he moved with his Vampire speed and caught my wrist to stop me.
“You and your sister don’t have a lot of friends around here. Maybe you should think a little bit about your attitude if you’re wondering why that might be,” he warned.
I stepped closer to him, smiling sweetly. “Thanks for the advice, Professor, but we’ve never needed anybody else to look out for us before so I’m not going to start expecting it now.”
I pulled out of his grip then turned away. He let me go but I could tell he was half tempted to say something else. I kept going until I made it back to the common room, concentrating on breathing normally and slowing my heart rate. The last thing I needed was Professor Grouchy Vampire catching onto me before I could retrieve that stash.
The other agents returned from their latest inspection of Darius’s destroyed room and the whole group of them including Orion headed upstairs to start searching rooms.
Sofia began working on a Cardinal Magic assignment and I feigned interest in it as I let the seconds tick by. I scrolled through my FaeBook feed, smirking as I noticed a few posts mentioning Caleb Altair’s secret Pegasus fetish. Our plans against him were starting to take shape. Sofia had started spreading that little rumour amongst the Pegasus herd and we’d been stoking the flames of it through the A.S.S. whenever the opportunity arose.
Once fifteen minutes had passed, I got to my feet.
“I just realised I have a parcel waiting for me in the Pluto Offices,” I said casually. “I might as well go and grab it while I think of it.”
“You want me to walk with you?” Sofia offered and I could tell she was a little worried about me wandering around campus alone after what the Heirs had done the other night.
“I’ll be fine,” I said, waving her back down into her seat. “What’s the worst they can do to me anyway?”
Sofia looked at me like she was about to start a list and I shrugged as I headed for the exit.
As soon as I was out of sight I practically sprinted for the door that led out to the Fire Territory, forcing myself to slow my pace once I was outside again. I skirted Ignis House as casually as I could, wandering off of the path to the area of land around the back of the building that my window overlooked.
I hesitated, leaning my back against the cool, glass wall of Ignis House as I looked towards the spot where my stolen goods were hidden. Every nerve in my body was begging for me to race forward and snatch it but I refused to obey.
I’d been in too many tight situations to let my nerves get the better of me. I needed to be sure I hadn’t been followed. I needed to know no one was watching me.
I pulled my Atlas out of my satchel and started scrolling through FaeBook posts like I didn’t have a care in the world.
I gave it a few minutes and was about to give it up and move to retrieve my loot when a prickle travelled down my spine. I suddenly had the very real belief that someone was watching me.
I resisted the urge to look around for the source of my discomfort and continued to scroll through the FaeBook feed. There wasn’t much to catch my interest today, a few bits of gossip about an earth student who had been cheating on her girlfriend. Some conspiracy theories about Astrum’s death. I noticed a group dedicated to finding a way to cheer Darius up after the fire in his room. It looked like they were going to throw him a party... and quite possibly offer him an orgy too by the looks of it.
I scoffed in disgust. I guessed I couldn’t have expected to have ruined his fun for long but at least I could look back at that photo of him literally bursting with anger any time I wanted to.
A harsh wind gusted down on me and I flinched in surprise as my hair was blown back and the light of the moon blotted out for a moment.
My heart leapt in panic as I spotted the golden Dragon diving from the sky towards me and I pressed my back against the wall of Ignis House, almost dropping my Atlas in fright.
I fought to keep my features as neutral as possible as Darius landed in front of me, the ground juddering beneath his weight.
A deep growl emanated from his throat and he swivelled his reptilian head so that one, huge, golden eye could survey me.
I swallowed thickly, looking over his enormous body in awe. He towered above me, forcing me to tilt my head right back to look up at him. I couldn’t help but appreciate the beauty of this beast, the way the moonlight glimmered on his scales and his eyes flashed with untamed power.
He spat something from his mouth and I glanced at the wad of material just as his body retreated back into his Fae form.
“Oh for the love of crap,” I swore as he stood before me butt naked. Again. “You could have landed anywhere you liked, why did you choose to flash your goods at me?”
Darius smirked at me as he prowled forward, apparently not the least bit embarrassed by his body being on show. Not that he should have been, he had sculpted muscles and shoulders that just screamed touch me. His skin was tanned and kissed by his tattoos and just looking at him had heat rising across my body.
Bad Tory. Don’t look at the jackass like that. He might look good enough to eat but he’d sure as shit give you indigestion.
“Why are you hanging around out here?” he asked as he stooped to gather the clothes he’d dropped. He stepped into his pants while keeping his gaze fixed on me.
“Well, I was enjoying some time away from assholes, but we can officially count that as being over.”
Darius shrugged his t-shirt on, covering up that beautiful body and allowing me the clarity of mind to look away from him.
“It kinda looks like you were reading about me,” he countered, pointing at my Atlas which was hanging loose in my hand.
I glanced at the screen and spotted a picture of him which had been posted by the girls organising his party. It looked like a posed shot for a photo shoot and he was gazing wistfully off of a bridge without his shirt on.
“Oh yeah, you caught me. Secret fangirl right here. I just love to stand about staring at photos of you, daydreaming about your oh so dreamy body and imagining what it would be like if you had a halfway decent personality.”
Zero truth to any of those comments.
Darius actually quirked a smile in response to that remark and my bottom jaw practically hit my sneakers. Or at least it would have if I hadn’t perfected the art of resting bitch face and stuck it into place with superglue at the start of this interaction.
He glanced up at the sky and held a hand out like he was checking for rain.
“Well, don’t hang around out here too long, Roxy,” he said, using that irritating as hell nickname for me. “We wouldn’t want you to come close to drowning again.”
I scowled at him as he strode away from me towards the House, my heart skipping a beat as he moved past the clump of scraggy grass which concealed the sock of stolen goods from his bedroom.
Darius didn’t so much as hesitate as he passed right by it and I waited for him to disappear inside before finally moving forward to claim it. I shoved the lot deep into the bottom of my satchel and took off across the grounds towards Aer House.
It was getting late but that was alright; we’d need the cover of night to move the stash of stolen goods from Darcy’s room.
As I hiked up the hill, that prickling sensation ran along my spine again and I paused, certain that someone was behind me.
I dropped down, pretending to re-tie my sneaker and looked through a curtain of my hair back towards Ignis House.
It didn’t take me long to spot Darius lurking on the track. He was vaguely trying to blend into the shadows but beneath the light of the full moon his broad frame was pretty impossible to hide in the open, rocky landscape of Fire Territory.
My heart started pounding a little as I wondered what the hell he was doing. He’d only just arrived at Ignis House and he’d seemed intent on heading inside a few moments ago. It was like he’d waited for me to walk away and was now following me.
A shiver of unease ran down my spine at that thought. I was confident he hadn’t seen me reclaiming the treasure outside because he would have confronted me already if he’d figured out I’d stolen from him. So he must have had some other reason to follow me. While I walked alone. In the dark. At night.
I’m not going to let him spring another goddamn attack on me.
Just ahead of me, the path split in two directions, one towards The Orb and the other to Aer House. I wasn’t going to lead him to my real destination and the open meadows of Air Territory weren’t going to help me lose him so as I straightened, I turned towards The Orb.
I pulled my headphones out of my satchel and placed them over my ears but I didn’t actually turn any music on before I started jogging. I was tempted to sprint, wondering if the Dragon asshole could keep up with my top speed but I decided that would look suspicious.
I didn’t look back again as I ran but I could feel him following me, his gaze on my body feeling almost like a physical sensation.
The Orb loomed ahead and I darted straight inside. It was fairly empty, but several students were around having a late dinner or enjoying a coffee and slice of cake with friends.
I snagged a bottle of water from the frozen ice cooler as I passed it so that I had an excuse for coming in here then crossed to the exit on the far side of the room. I glanced over my shoulder before I stepped outside and saw Darius striding through the room. I caught his gaze for a fleeting moment then slipped out into the dark again.
I sprinted to the right of the exit and into the shadows surrounding Mars Laboratories, pressing my back to the wall as soon as I reached it and ducking behind an arch in the brickwork.
I looked back at The Orb just as Darius stepped out and he fell still, looking all around with a frown on his face. I smirked to myself as I waited silently in the shadows. I’d given the cops and several security guards the slip more than once and I was sure Darius Acrux wouldn’t be much of a challenge.
He looked left and right, swearing beneath his breath as he tried to figure out where I’d gone.
“Have you seen Roxy Vega?” he snapped at a group of girls as they appeared from the direction of Jupiter Hall.
“No,” they replied, lingering in case he wanted anything else from them.
Darius snarled irritably and headed the other way, moving closer to me as he searched the shadows.
As he stalked past me and on towards Earth Observatory, I slipped along the wall and kept going until I reached the far end of the building. The Wailing Wood spread out beyond me but I’d have to make it across another path and a long stretch of grass before I would reach the trees.
I glanced around to see if Darius or anyone else was close enough to see me then made a run for it. My heart pounded as I sprinted for the trees and I passed between two huge trunks before making it into the darkness beneath them.
There wasn’t an official path here but I kept running until I came to one deeper into the trees. I pulled up short on the dirt track and caught my breath as I listened for the sounds of pursuit. Silence greeted me and I grinned to myself as I turned in the direction of Aer House. Whatever Darius had had planned for me, he was going to be disappointed.
I started running again and didn’t slow until I reached Aer Tower. I threw a gust of air magic at the lock to let me in and jogged up the curving stairwell to Darcy’s room.
I hammered on the door and she opened it with wide eyes. I stepped inside without waiting for her to ask why I was here.
“Has something happened?” she asked nervously, looking me over like she expected to find something had been done to me.
“Not yet,” I said. “But Orion just turned up in Ignis House with a bunch of FIB agents and started searching every room for evidence to do with Astrum’s death. They’re bound to start on the rest of the Houses once they’re done there so we need to move Darius’s gold, like yesterday.”
“Oh crap. Okay,” Darcy agreed. “But what the hell are we going to do with it?”
“Bury it I guess?” I offered, having no other ideas.
I dropped down onto my knees and started dragging the gold out from under her bed, checking inside the huge sports bag and making doubly sure that I hadn’t missed so much as a single coin. Darcy checked it all too and once we were sure that we had every piece, we moved towards the door again.
“I’ll go ahead and check that no one’s lurking outside,” she said. “I’ll send a message to your Atlas if there is. If not then follow two minutes behind me.”
“Okay.” I heaved the heavy bag over my shoulders and waited as she disappeared into the hall.
I counted two minutes and no message came through so I slipped out after her. I tiptoed down the stairwell, careful not to jostle the bag and make a sound. When I finally reached the bottom, I found Darcy waiting for me in the shadows by the door.
We headed outside and moved north into The Wailing Wood. The trees were thick and ominous around us, their branches whispering in a soft breeze overhead that set my skin crawling with anxiety.
“I vote we bury it in here,” I said. “We can set some kind of marker to find it again if we need to but at least this way no one will be able to prove it had anything to do with us if it’s found.”
“Good plan,” Darcy agreed. “Look, there’s a few animal tracks that lead through the trees away from the path. If we follow them they’ll probably lead us to the heart of the forest.”
I followed her as she led the way further into the trees and took the route off of the path. When she was sure we’d gone far enough, she stopped and I dropped the heavy bag of treasure between us.
“Now what?” I breathed. Our Earth Elemental lessons had all been about the power of growth so far. We’d created flowers and vines, even encouraged trees to grow new limbs, but we’d done nothing with the actual earth yet. I imagined we had the power to dig a hole in the soil by our feet with magic but I wasn’t really sure where to begin.
“Let’s just try and create a hole and see what happens,” Darcy suggested.
I didn’t have any better ideas so I followed her lead and aimed my hands at the soil by our feet. I imagined a hole in my mind, the soil parting to create the perfect hiding place for our treasure...
Nothing.
Darcy was clenching her teeth so hard in concentration that it looked like she might burst a blood vessel.
I dropped to my knees and pressed my palms flat to the ground to see if that might work better instead.
A faint tremor marked the path of magic flowing into the dirt around me but no hole appeared and without a shovel we were going to really struggle to get this done.
“Crap,” Darcy cursed. “We could just throw it in the lake?”
I balked at the idea of all this pretty treasure sinking to the bottom of the lake. “The Sirens might find it again,” I reasoned, though part of me refusing was just because I couldn’t bear to part with this hard won prize so easily.
“Well I guess we’d better start digging then,” Darcy said, sounding resigned.
I nodded my agreement and began to claw at the dirt around me.
Darcy joined in and I continued to try and throw my earth magic at the task. Sometimes it seemed like the clump of soil I broke away was big
ger than I’d expect and I wondered if my magic was aiding me a little even though it clearly wasn’t doing everything I wanted from it.
Darcy was breathing heavily beside me and sweat was lining my brow alongside the smears of mud from the countless times I’d swiped my hair away from my face. Heaven only knew what the hell I’d look like when we were done here but I’d have to worry about that once our job was complete. The hole was still only half dug and we needed to get the treasure into it yet.
I was so engrossed in our task that I didn’t even notice the footsteps approaching until it was too late to hide what we were doing.
“Holy guacamole, your majesties!” Geraldine exclaimed and Darcy squealed in fright.
“Shit Geraldine! Don’t sneak up on people, like that!” I barked as my heartbeat thundered in response to her arrival.
“What in the name of Santa sunbathing in a thong are you up to?” she asked, her eyes wide and wild.
I couldn’t help but laugh in response to that. She’d caught us red-handed anyway. We had no choice but to come clean and hope for the best.
“Well, I didn’t want to drag you into this, Geraldine,” I said slowly. “But I think I’m going to have to trust you with our secret.”
Darcy shot me a look to say ‘are you sure about this?’ but I could only shrug hopefully.
“The honour of keeping your secrets would be the single greatest accolade I have ever achieved,” Geraldine gushed. “I will take it to the grave. I would hold your confidence even if I was tortured on the rack, fed alive to starving rats, boiled in a vat of week-old gravy, beaten by the fists of-”
“We get it Geraldine, we can trust you,” Darcy said to stop her. “What are you doing out here in the middle of the night anyway?”
“I was just replenishing my magic,” she explained, brandishing a basket of purple flowers at us while still peering at our half-dug hole curiously. “I’m of the Cerberus Order. We have to eat aconite, which you might know better as wolfsbane, to replenish our magic. I was just gathering fresh supplies of it which is easier to do at night. It’s deadly poisonous to all other Orders though, so no snacking! What are you doing?”
Zodiac Academy 2: Ruthless Fae: An Academy Bully Romance (Supernatural Bullies and Beasts) Page 15