He shook his head. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Well, she told me she’d killed my parents for their magic and then she tried to kill me.”
Dr. Green’s hands balled into fists and his jaw tensed. If I weren’t so tired, I might have been concerned about his body language. But there wasn’t enough energy left for me to move, let alone worry about what was going to happen from here. Maybe he’d ship me away to that prison they threatened me with. Maybe they’d just kill me on the spot. Who knows, maybe he’d even called this crazy bitch here to kill me.
The dean turned to Ben. “You should shift. You’ll heal faster.”
Ben’s throat bobbed. “I can’t.”
“What do you mean, you can’t?” Dr. Green asked.
He shook his head. “I tried that already. Whatever she did to me, it must have done something to my wolf. I can’t shift.”
Dr. Green turned to look at me. “What did she do?”
“Me? I stopped time again. I didn’t have a choice. And I’d do it again,” I said.
“Wait, you can control time?” Ben asked. “That was you?”
I nodded.
“No, not that. What did this,” Dr. Green tapped his toe on her side, “mage do?”
“She had lightning of some kind. It was blue,” I said. “Hurt like hell.”
“She got me with it too,” Ben said.
Dr. Green let out a heavy sigh. “She’s a thief.”
“Please tell me you mean she’s here to steal a painting,” Ben said.
Dr. Green shook his head. “No.”
“What’s a thief doing here? And how did she get in?” Ben asked.
“Someone clue me in here,” I said.
Ben turned to me. “It’s a creature we don’t like to talk about.”
“Half mage, half demon. It has the ability to siphon off and build complex magic from other creatures,” Dr. Green added.
“She said she killed my parents.” I looked up at the Dean, fresh anger growing in the pit of my stomach. “Did she take their magic?”
A vein in Dr. Green’s forehead throbbed. “I’m guessing she did. And it’s probably how she was able to trace you here.”
“So that’s it, though, right? She’s caught and she’ll be executed,” Ben said. “Then we get our magic back?”
“What do you mean back?” I asked. “I used magic.”
“Shadow magic,” Ben said. “I saw it. It’s broken, unstable.”
I scrubbed my face with my hand. Just when I thought I was starting to figure this all out, it got even more complicated.
“So now what?” I asked.
“Now we begin the healing process,” Dr. Green said. “And we train you on your time magic without you getting caught. You’re going to attract a whole lot of thieves if word is out about you. You’ll need to be able to defend yourself.”
Several men dressed in black ran down the corridor. I flinched, recognizing those uniforms. The people who arrested me and dragged me here wore those uniforms.
“I’m not going to magic jail,” I said, forcing myself to standing with a groan.
“You’re not leaving here,” Dr. Green said. “You were sent as my charge by someone with more clearance than I have. That means, there’s someone else out there who knows you’re here and is looking out for you.”
“My scholarship?” I asked. “Where was this mysterious benefactor when I was struggling to survive?”
The magic cops stopped in front of Dr. Green and saluted. That was new. Who the hell was this headmaster to get them to treat him like that?
“Sir, we await your orders,” one of them called.
Dr. Green pointed to my attacker. “We’ve got ourselves a thief. A powerful one as far as I can tell. She’ll need questioned. Find out everything she knows. How she got in here, who her contacts are. Get everything you can from her by any means necessary.”
I shivered at the tone in his voice. It reminded me never to cross Dr. Green again. There was a lot more to him than I originally thought.
“You two, back to your rooms. I’ll deal with both of you later,” Dr. Green said.
“I’ll walk you back,” Ben said, offering his hand.
Still feeling uneasy on my feet, I accepted it. As soon as our fingers touched, heat surged through me and tingles spread up my thighs. My breath hitched and I turned to him in surprise. Despite my exhaustion, I was half tempted to take his clothes off right here.
Startled, I let go of his hand.
Ben smirked. “Now you know how I’ve been feeling around you.”
“Why did you come for me?” I asked.
“Because you were in trouble,” he said.
“How did you know?” I asked.
“We have a bond,” he said. “A connection.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” I asked.
“It means that one day soon, I’m going to claim you as mine.”
My cheeks heated and I could almost feel what it would be like to have his hot breath on my skin.
“All that’s going to have to wait,” Dr. Green said. “We have bigger problems.”
In front of us, the room flickered as if it weren’t real. As if it were on a bad television screen.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“This is what happens when an entire building is held in a time stop and they didn’t know it had a basement.”
The flickering stopped abruptly and the three of us darted down the hall. Ahead, the magic police were on the ground.
The thief was gone.
Thank You!
Book one is over but don’t worry, book two will be out soon!
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XO, Alexis
About the Author
Alexis Calder writes sassy heroines and sexy heroes with a sprinkle of sarcasm. She lives in the Rockies and drinks far too much coffee and just the right amount of wine.
Academy of the Elites: Untamed Magic Page 12