A Demonic Year Two: A Reverse Harem Paranormal Bully Romance (Academy of the Devil Book 2)

by Eva Brandt

  Did he? Maybe. But were his limits as harsh as he claimed, or was he lying to me?

  I was so tired of all these word games, of pretending things were all right when they weren’t. “Sir, do you know why Lucifer would’ve wanted to bring me my admission letter himself?”

  Mephistopheles went very still. “He did what? Impossible.”

  “No, it’s true,” I insisted. “I mean… I’m not one hundred percent certain. But I did see a vision of him during Professor Grim’s class and he was very similar to the cherub who came to tell me I needed to join The Academy of the Devil.”

  “That doesn’t make sense, Alyssa. You know very well that a lot of angels don’t have strictly humanoid forms. Lucifer does, I’ll give you that, but he’d never use that shape in battle.”

  “And yet, I saw him. Twice. At first, he introduced himself as Lenoir, but that must’ve been a false name.”

  In hindsight, I should’ve guessed that sooner, if only because Lenoir was such an unusual name. Lenoir. The black one. It was almost hilarious that Lucifer, the Brightest Star, would use that name in a conversation with me.

  “Lenoir, huh? That does sound like something he’d say. We used to joke about it, you know, about the reasons why he’d fallen into darkness.” Mephistopheles shook his head as if physically pushing away a thought. “I’m afraid I don’t know what he’s thinking, Alyssa. I can tell you that he showed some interest in your presence at the school, but it was never enough to warrant excessive concern.”

  “You can’t actually believe that, Sir,” I shot back. “I feel like if Lucifer is interested in anyone, it is always a matter of concern.”

  “Well, yes, but contrary to popular belief, Lucifer tends to be pretty straightforward. He’s too proud to play games for too long. I don’t know if this helps, but if he wanted to hurt you and the others, he’d have done so by now.”

  “No, Sir, it really doesn’t help,” I grumbled. Adolf had said something similar, but it just wasn’t enough. “I’d prefer to not have to rely on guesses. Or on incomplete truths.”

  Mephistopheles looked away at my sharp words. “You should remember where you are, Ms. Michaelis. Demons are never truthful, not even to those they love.”

  “I haven’t forgotten,” I replied. “I can deal with that. I just have one issue. I can’t stay in a school that perpetually hurts the people I care about. First Shiro and now Mikael. Something has to be done. And if I have to leave to accomplish that, I’ll do it.”

  “We’ve been over this, Ms. Michaelis. You can’t leave. Your ancestor’s contract makes it impossible for you to do so.”

  I found it odd that he oscillated between using my first name and my last name when addressing me, but I didn’t let it show. “Yes, about that. I never did see that contract. I took Lenoir’s word that it existed, and I believed him, because I knew my father had had issues when he was younger. But those aren’t real guarantees, are they? How do I know that whole thing wasn’t a huge lie?”

  “You don’t.” He hesitated. “But Alyssa, I knew your ancestor. My word might not mean much to you, but I wouldn’t lie to your face, not about this, at least.”

  “But you’d lie about everything else.” I sighed. This was getting me nowhere. No matter how hard I tried, the damn demons insisted on being cryptic as fuck.

  “You know what? Fine. Don’t tell me anything. I’ll figure everything out on my own. But don’t complain about the results when I blow up the school because of it.”

  “You wouldn’t do that, Ms. Michaelis,” he said with a small, knowing smile.

  “Why are you so sure? I thought I wouldn’t be capable of attacking someone like I did Professor Jones. People are capable of anything if they’re pushed into a corner, and I’m no different.”

  Mephistopheles’s smile faded, but he didn’t agree with me, at least not verbally. He really should’ve known better than to tempt fate.

  * * *

  Battle Magic was the sole class I shared with Stefan and Callum. It didn’t take place on a weekly basis, like a regular class. Morrigan was here as a guest teacher, more or less, and she had other responsibilities elsewhere. She also taught every student, not just one specific year. Instead of teaching boring things like theory, she naturally went straight into practical magic—which apparently translated into the class turning into a battle royale of epic proportions.

  I didn’t learn this until the end of September, when it was time for me and my lovers to join the chaos. “You have got to be kidding me,” I told Callum, who’d been the one to deliver the news. “What could possibly make her think this is a good idea? This is a demon school. I thought the teachers were making at least a token effort to keep the students alive.”

  “Why do you think I was so wary when she first arrived?” Mikael asked. “I respect Morrigan, but she has no sense.”

  He was right. In the context of our current situation, the whole thing was a recipe for disaster.

  But the decision wasn’t mine to make, and so it was that I had no choice but to participate in the insanity.

  This was what brought me to Morrigan’s sanctum, in late September, watching the whole school gathering there with no small amount of anxiety. There had been no real incidents of bullying since the upperclassmen’s attempt to force Mikael into his angelic form, but I knew better than to think the respite would last. I’d yet to find out real answers to all my questions, which left us all in a weird, awkward limbo. The battle magic class would be a perfect opportunity for our fellow students to enact revenge upon us.

  Still, once we were actually there, I did my best to not show this uncertainty. I stood flanked by my lovers, with Shiro and TB as always by our side. As Morrigan entered the circle of standing stones, I focused on her and hoped like hell she knew what she was doing.

  “As most of you already know, this is more than a lesson,” she said without preamble. “It is a fight. As such, no one will be compelled to participate. Step back now if you don’t feel ready.”

  Stefan snorted. I couldn’t blame him for his dismissive attitude. No one would back out, because if they did, they would be mercilessly mocked and maybe even bullied later. The school was very tense right now, with Mikael walking among the students unchallenged. Anyone could lash out at a fellow student, using any pretext.

  Just like I’d expected, nobody left. Morrigan nodded, not looking very surprised either. She moved on quickly. “We will begin with a series of individual exercises to demonstrate what will be expected of you. Ms. Grimm, Mr. Oleander, why don’t you give us a little glimpse of battle magic?”

  Gemma and a student I didn’t know both stepped forward. “Of course, Great Lady,” Gemma replied. “It would be my absolute honor.”

  “The honor will be all mine,” her opponent said. “And I mean that in every way.”

  Gemma flashed her fangs at him. “We’ll see. Great Lady, I haven’t fed in some time. Is it permissible in your sanctum?”

  “Of course, Ms. Grimm,” Morrigan answered. “You can do whatever you please.”

  She didn’t tell Gemma to not kill the other student. Maybe the rule Callum had mentioned didn’t apply here. Wonderful.

  Morrigan stepped out of the circle and clapped her hands. The megaliths lit up, just like they had during my battle with her monsters. “Begin!”

  Instantly, the Oleander guy rushed toward Gemma. Instead of meeting him half-way, Gemma launched herself in the air.

  She didn’t have wings like Mikael did, but she didn’t need them. Her dark magic helped her stay aloft, just like it had once carried my trolley, the day I’d arrived here.

  Truth be told, I’d never actually seen Gemma fight. Shiro had attacked her on more than one occasion, but she’d never retaliated with her full strength. This was probably a good thing, because I didn’t know what would’ve happened to my familiar had she chosen to harm him. It likely wouldn’t have ended well, for any of us.

  The moment Oleander was within her re
ach, Gemma shot into action. When he threw a blast of fire magic at her, she easily dodged and responded with one of her own. A few students let out gasps of admiration. “That’s amazing.”

  “I didn’t realize she was so good at it.”

  “Yeah, me neither.”

  I didn’t understand their shock, since she was among the most powerful students at the school. Callum leaned a little closer to me and provided me with the explanation. “Vampires are usually pretty terrible at fire magic. That’s why you won’t see a lot of them at The Academy of the Devil. As far as I know, right now, there’s only Gemma and the Byte heir. So the fact that Gemma can wield fire magic of such power is a bit of an anomaly. She’s very skilled at it.”

  “Yes, I can see that.”

  In fact, I couldn’t help but be jealous of the effortless way she moved and wielded her magic. Would I ever be capable of gaining such mastery over my strange skills? Right now, it didn’t seem like it.

  Naturally, Oleander didn’t give up. Wrapping himself in a shield of shadow, he vanished from Gemma’s view. There must’ve been something dangerous about that shield, because she didn’t try to break through it, instead flying back and eyeing her opponent with care.

  When the fog disappeared, the humanoid student was gone and a massive reptilian creature had appeared where he’d been standing before. Oleander was a shape-shifter.

  I couldn’t identify his exact species. It wasn’t something I recognized. It didn’t look that scary, reminding me a little of a cross between a big dog and an iguana. Even so, Gemma didn’t attack Oleander at once. Every student in the grove seemed to be holding his or her breath as we waited for the confrontation to continue.

  “What’s going on?” I asked my lovers. “Why is she afraid?”

  “She’s not afraid,” Mikael corrected me. “She’s wary, and rightly so. Dragons aren’t shape-shifters, but some families carry dragon blessings because of contracts they’ve made with dragon bloodlines. I didn’t realize Oleander was one of them. It might be something new.”

  Interesting. That was yet another thing I needed to look into—assuming, of course, that I survived this class unscathed.

  In the end, it was Oleander who lost his patience first. He opened his snout and a blast of fire emerged from his throat. It wasn’t as powerful as the stream of molten lava Redrum had once thrown at Mephistopheles, but I could hardly expect it to be.

  It was also different from a simple spell, since even if Gemma tried to dodge it like the first time, she failed. The fire curled mid-air, as if it was alive, chasing her. Gemma hissed in displeasure and quickly threw up some kind of shield around herself, but the blaze still grazed her.

  After that, all bets were off. Gemma lashed out at Oleander with an enormous accumulation of telekinetic energy. It clashed against Oleander’s following spell and did some damage to him, but not as much as I’d expected. It soon became obvious that it wasn’t easy for her to use spells of this magnitude while she was in flight, which left her at a disadvantage. Oleander’s skin seemed to have a degree of immunity to magic, which again, made it tough for her to deliver a decisive attack.

  But Gemma was nothing if not determined. She abandoned all subtlety and dropped down from the sky, straight on top of him.

  “Oh, this is going to be nasty,” Callum commented. “She’s pissed.”

  Before I could ask him what he meant, Gemma pressed her hands to the reptile’s head and a glow of dark magic manifested underneath her palms. Oleander screeched, a sound of agonizing pain that echoed all the way into my soul. He started flailing, his body overheating as he tried to throw her off. The flesh of Gemma’s hands and knees was completely scorched off, to the point that I could see bone. But even so, she didn’t let go, not for a moment.

  The whole thing lasted for a minute, if that, and then, Oleander collapsed and shifted back into his humanoid form. He was still twitching and moaning in pain, and the sight made a memory flash through my mind. I’d done something similar to those upperclassmen who’d attacked Mikael, hadn’t I?

  My restlessness and confusion must’ve been obvious, because Callum provided me with an explanation without me having to ask. “She used Psyche Manipulation. It’s an advanced form of Mind Magic, an elective only certain species can take. Vampires are very good at it, and so are incubi.”

  “I take it humans can’t do it.”

  “Not really, no, and even if they could, it would be unadvisable for you to try. You already have enough on your plate without adding electives.”

  Mikael stayed silent. He’d undoubtedly realized what had unsettled me and didn’t want to point out the troublesome situation in such problematic company.

  In the end, it all turned out to be a moot point, since after Gemma defeated Oleander, it was time for the rest of us to join the fight. The megaliths pulsed with light, and the space around us expanded, engulfing every single student in the school.

  “All right,” Morrigan said. “Now that you’ve seen the demonstration, fight.”

  She had to be joking. Oh, who was I fooling? This was The Academy of the Devil. Of course she wasn’t joking.

  My lovers clustered around me, with Stefan shielding me with his own, larger body while the others faced the rest of the students.

  I wanted to point out I could defend myself, as I’d already done, countless times in the past. But it would’ve been stupid, since powerful or not, I was no warrior and I still didn’t understand my magic. I’d take whatever help I could get.

  “Just stay behind us, all right, princess?” Callum told me. “You’re safe with us.”

  The irony was that it was perfectly true. They hadn’t been called the princes of the school for nothing. Several groups of students tried to come at us, but after the first two were almost eviscerated and turned to ash, they quickly backtracked and decided it wasn’t such a great plan after all.

  I was beginning to think the class would end without any incident of significance when it happened. Something slid under my gown, and a sharp sting erupted through my thigh. I cried out in pain, tripping and clutching my wounded leg. As I fell, a snake emerged from beneath my dress, its fangs dripping with venom.

  It wasn’t TB. This snake was different, white, with crimson eyes that reminded me a little of Mephistopheles. It was also far more hostile than Mikael’s familiar and the dean, as I was already going into shock.

  I collapsed against Callum and he caught me. He cursed viciously under his breath when he noticed the intruder. “What the fuck is that?”

  The others had already taken note of the problem. TB hissed and lunged at the second snake. Shiro got to it first and within seconds, he brutally tore it apart. It was too late.

  I couldn’t feel my leg. Spots started to dance in front of my eyes. The world was spinning, and I couldn’t feel Callum’s warmth anymore.

  In the background, I could hear Shiro furiously barking, the way he always did when he sensed a seizure. “Callum!” Stefan shouted. “Do something!”

  “I can’t! I’m no healer! I can only stop her seizures.”

  “Fuck. Move over.”

  Mikael pressed his hand to my forehead, his magic already flowing over me, bright, warm, and familiar. “He’s using divine powers!” another student snarled in the background.

  Stefan and Callum didn’t take it well. “Fuck off.”

  “If you have a problem with that, you’re going to have to go through us.”

  That would’ve been very comforting, except for the fact that I could suddenly no longer feel Mikael at all. Instead, distant phantoms floated around me, reaching for me with transparent fingers.

  It was just like the time I’d gone to the Scholomance ruins with my lovers, only now, it was much worse. I could distinguish their faces, their voices, and more than that, their desperation. “Give it to us.”

  “Come to us.”

  “We fought for it.”

  “You belong to us.”

  I had no
idea what they were talking about, but whatever it was, they wanted it very badly. They seemed to think I belonged to them and they were much too close for my comfort. “No!” I tried to say. “Leave me alone!”

  The ghosts didn’t listen and floated above my head like malevolent shadows. “You’re ours,” they insisted. “Come to us. Give it to us.”

  They seemed seconds away from going straight through Mikael to reach me.

  Fortunately, the staff at the school wasn’t useless, and this time, someone intervened before disaster could strike again. A crow flew toward us and landed on Mikael’s shoulder. The ghosts scattered with terrified screeches.

  The crow shifted back into her regular form, that of my Battle Magic teacher. “This was an admirable effort, but it won’t heal her.” Morrigan’s soft hand landed in my hair, and some of the pain and wooziness vanished. “She’s stable now, but that might change soon. We need to get her to the academy, at once.

  “Mr. Schwarz, Mr. Adamson, Mr. Lost, keep an eye on the class while I do this.”

  “W-What?” Mikael stammered. “But we’re supposed to be with her.”

  “Not right now, you aren’t. Right now I’ll need to focus on Ms. Michaelis, and not on you. You will stay here and you will like it.”

  Shiro growled and draped himself over my stomach, refusing to be turned away as well. “Okay, fine,” Morrigan said, “but just you. Now, step back.”

  Even with my eyes closed and my consciousness drifting away, I could still sense my lovers’ agitation and dread. But for whatever reason, they decided to not oppose the goddess. They moved away from me, and I immediately felt the loss of their presence, their magic, and their touches.

  Morrigan took my hand and squeezed it. “Don’t worry, Ms. Michaelis. You’re going to be just fine. You’re too important to die.”