by Sadie Moss
I raise a challenging eyebrow at him. What, he’s got a problem with this or something?
The guy sighs. “I’m not the official to be—I mean, I’ll have to check in with my superiors. But I don’t see any reason why they would say no. You have, as you said, proven that Unpredictables in general are not the threat and you’ve neutralized the person who was putting all of us in danger. I imagine you’ll be allowed to open the school whenever you’re ready.”
I have no idea when that’ll be, given all the damage, but hey, I will fucking take it. I turn to see if the others are paying attention, to make sure someone else heard this in case the Circuit tries to go back on their word later, and I catch Hardwick wiping tears away from his eyes.
My heart squeezes in my chest as a wave of acute fondness washes over me. This school was his whole life. He fought like hell for it, and now he’s getting it back.
Kendal, Tandy, Erin, and several others have been milling about nearby, not eavesdropping but clearly waiting to see what’s going to happen. The guys and I walk back over to them, and I’m grinning ear to ear as we approach.
“We got permission,” I tell them, watching their eyes light up. “Griffin is going to reopen.”
“What? What was that?”
A voice rises from the back of the crowd, and I look over at Hardwick, lifting a brow. He gives me a slight nod and then activates a charm around his neck that will amplify his voice.
I could be the one to announce it, but… I’ve had enough of the spotlight for a while. And Hardwick is still our dean. This is his school.
“Griffin is going to reopen!” he announces, the words booming across the quad, across the entire campus.
The cheer that rises up is deafening.
Chapter 26
Holy shit, I’m exhausted.
I want to collapse onto a bed with my four men and sleep for a week.
There’s a lot of cleanup to do—the school is even more destroyed than it was last time we fought here, but at least no buildings have collapsed, thank fuck—but that can all wait until tomorrow. The battle only lasted a couple of hours, but they were the longest, most intense hours of my life, and before that, we were up almost all night preparing, so I think we’ve earned a fucking nap.
But first, we have to get everyone patched up.
Anyone with any sort of medical knowledge or healing ability is asked to help out, and soon I’m bandaging knees, wrapping up cuts, applying antiseptic and all the rest. The adults all know first aid, and the school’s medical staff handle the more serious injuries like broken limbs and deep gashes and burns. Cam’s broken arm is set, and he’s given a potion that will speed up the healing process. Maddy’s leg is treated so that the burns fade to fresh, pink scars.
After we tend to the living, the next order of business is to take care of the dead. We have to go through and identify everyone we lost, marking down their names so that we can contact relatives. Roman uses some technique related to his necromancy magic to preserve the bodies so that their families can come collect them.
Oh, except the demon bodies. Those we just burn, even though Cam points out that some of them might turn out to make a pretty good steak, and I think he was only half-joking.
Liam helps us deal with the bodies before getting ready to head out, back to his compound in the woods. Before he goes, he says goodbye to Roman. I don’t know what’s said between them since they’re standing off to the side, a bit apart from the group, but I see them embrace, and when Roman walks back to us, he looks a bit lighter, like a weight has lifted from his shoulders.
“You all good?” I tilt my head, searching his face.
Roman nods. “He was just saying he’s proud of the people I have around me.” He pauses, hooking his thumbs into the front pockets of his pants. “When we parted, it wasn’t on the best terms. We had fundamentally different views on how to handle things and it felt… irreconcilable.” He grins slightly. “Something that Tamlin has informed me is typical between fathers and sons—the arguing, the parent driving you nuts, the rebelliousness.”
He shakes his head, a pained look crossing his features like a cloud drifting in front of the sun.
“But my father, my parents… they were gone, so all I ever remembered was the idealized version of them, how much I loved them, how perfect they seemed. I was just a child when they died, so I never got to that older stage with them where things become complicated and we might fight or struggle to maintain a connection. I didn’t realize that was what I had with Liam. So now that we’ve had time to cool off, to really… think about things, we can approach each other with more understanding. More appreciation for each other.”
“I’m glad,” I say honestly, taking a step toward him.
“Me too. I had no one besides him in my life growing up, not really, and I was a loner for a long time afterward. I thought Liam was a hypocrite, not having anyone in his life but telling me that I had to go out and find friends and more people besides just him. But he was right. I needed people. I needed you and the others. My life is so much better with you in it.” He gives me a small smile. “Liam also wanted me to know that he thought I’d made an excellent choice in a partner and that he was proud of me.”
I smile back, a wave of feelings expanding to fill my chest. “I’m glad that you could have that.”
Roman shrugs, stepping forward to meet me and erasing the small distance between us. “It’s thanks to you, honestly.”
“No, it’s thanks to you too.” I swallow as I wrap my arms around his waist, tipping my head back to look into his eyes. “Look, I never would’ve… given us a chance if you hadn’t encouraged it. If you had walked away at the beginning, then I would have too. I was so bad at opening up and actually being a part of a relationship, and you were so patient with me, letting me take my time but making it clear what you wanted, and… I’m so fucking grateful for that.”
“I think it was more fifty-fifty,” Roman tells me, his cobalt eyes shining as he runs the backs of his knuckles lightly down the line of my jaw. “You have so much love in you, Reckless. I could always see that.”
He dips his head and brushes his lips over mine, and my fingers dig into the back of his shirt as I rise up onto my tiptoes, pressing my body against his to properly meet his kiss.
“Oh, thank God, it worked!”
A loud voice behind us draws our attention, and I reluctantly break away from Roman to see what the commotion is about. I turn just in time to see Tamlin launch herself at Brodie, flinging her arms around him and jumping up and down in excitement.
“Uh… Did I miss something?” Cam looks up from fiddling with his sling.
“You miss a lot of things,” Asher jokes.
Tamlin seems to realize what she’s done and steps back quickly, running a hand over her disheveled, beat-up clothes and clearing her throat. Brodie’s face turns bright red, but he can’t hide the pleased little smile tugging at the corners of his lips.
“Oh. Um. This.”
Still looking flustered, Tamlin takes something out of her pocket and holds it out to us. It’s a small camera, I realize. When I look up at her in confusion, she shoots a glance at the man beside her and then curls her fingers around the camera.
“Brodie and I were hoping… well, while you all were running around getting ready, Brodie had a brilliant idea. Media has played a large role in this fight, influencing things for either good or ill. Agustin’s used it, we’ve used it, everybody’s used it. It’s how we stayed in touch with what was going on in our society as things went to hell.”
Her gaze cuts to Brodie again, and a beaming smile spreads across her face. She honestly looks like she might start jumping up and down again.
“Brodie made the point that, however things went down, it needed to be known. People needed to see what happened here. They needed to know that no matter what the outcome, Unpredictables risked everything to help them, and we’re not the bad guys here. We wanted to prove that
once and for all.”
“So we set up cameras everywhere,” Brodie adds. “We didn’t know if maybe some of the videos would get distorted with all the magic flying around, or if they would even survive the fight intact, and I think a couple of ’em did get crushed… but most of them seem to have made it out all right, with the footage preserved.”
“Footage of all of us kicking ass,” Tamlin says. She’s more energized than I’ve ever seen her, practically bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Especially you, Elliot.”
“This proves that we were really the only shot that the magical world had at defeating Agustin.” Brodie shrugs. “Not to toot our own horns too much or anything. But it all looks pretty badass.”
“We had it livestreaming onto the net.” Tamlin’s dark brown eyes gleam. “It seemed like the safest bet, because if we lost, no one would be left to upload the footage. I was worried that maybe it got cut off or something, but no, it’s been working!”
“The comments are astounding,” Brodie says. “Everyone is being so supportive.”
Tamlin nods, a little piece of hair slipping out of her messy ponytail. “They’re thanking us. They’re applauding. They’re realizing just how wrong they were and how close Agustin came to ruling us all.”
“He would have if it wasn’t for Elliot,” Dmitri grumbles.
Everyone looks at him.
He shrugs. “What? It’s true. Sure, we might have killed him. Might have. But Elliot’s been the one stopping him every time. She’s the one with the mirroring powers. She’s the one who woke up the government, and she was the one who got the deal to allow Griffin to reopen. It’s thanks to her.”
He pauses, as if realizing that he might be making it sound like the rest of them are chopped liver. “Not that everyone else didn’t help.”
I roll my eyes and kiss him on the cheek. “I appreciate you defending me.”
“We need to see about getting the other cameras,” Tamlin says, slipping her hand into Brodie’s. He jerks slightly and glances down at the connection between them, a blush tinting his cheeks, but she doesn’t even seem to have noticed what she unconsciously did. “We’ll see you guys later?”
“Yup.” I grin. Much later.
With no battles looming on the horizon, and the dead and wounded taken care of, there’s no reason for everyone to remain on campus. A lot of the admins and staff stay behind to start planning the cleanup efforts, but everyone else begins to clear out.
Maddy, Justin, the guys, and I go home. Well, to Roman’s.
It’s funny how I just think of it that way in my head now. Home. A place that’s for us.
Our family.
My sister sleeps in bed with me the first night. We used to share a big bed in our one-bedroom apartment, and after the day we just had, where she nearly saw her sister die after being kidnapped and held hostage herself… I can understand that she might need a little reassurance.
I fall asleep almost the instant my head hits the pillow, and I wake up a long time later with the oddest feeling.
It takes me a minute to realize what it is.
I don’t have to do anything.
I don’t have to get up and fight a bad guy. I don’t have to get up and train. I don’t have to save the world.
Thank fuck.
The next few days feel like a vacation. We barely leave the house, just relaxing and recovering together—soaking up this strange new peace. Justin stays with us too, getting to know all of us properly, which his parents seem to be fine with.
“I mean, you’re the hero of the hour,” he jokes. “What are they going to do, tell me I can’t hang out with you for a week?”
On the fifth day, we’re all hanging out in the living room, and I’m half asleep on Dmitri’s lap when Cam comes bursting in.
“Guys, look at this!”
I nearly fall off the couch in surprise. I do not appreciate being woken up from my nap, but Cam sounds so excited that I decide I’ll let him live. This time.
The blond mage holds out his phone, where a clip from a talk show called “Magic Today” is playing. It’s the same program he showed us a video of last year—the one where those assholes were dissing on Unpredictables and calling us weapons.
Not that I’m bitter or anything. Of course not.
In this clip, the panel is made up of half the same people and half new ones.
“The fact is that if there are a few… well, bad apples, let’s call them, in the bunch, we clearly need some good apples to stop them,” one panelist is saying. “Someone of Agustin’s power and mindset could rise up again, and we’ll need Unpredictables to stop them. Our magical level simply can’t compare.”
Everyone is nodding in agreement as the guy continues. “Unpredictables were the ones who had power to go up against him, and obviously they’re not all awful. They’re just like the rest of us, some good, some bad, some average, and it was a clear mistake that our society had alienated them so much and given into bigotry, even on this very panel.”
“Absolutely right,” a woman with sleek red hair says. “If there’s a possibility of these powerful Unpredictables coming along who have evil intentions, then we need to also have the well-intentioned Unpredictables who can oppose them. Oppressing Unpredictables only hurts people and makes room for the ‘bad guys’, so to speak, to waltz in unopposed.”
“I mean, whether Unpredictables can stop them or not, they’re people,” another panelist says. “We should be treating them fairly on that basis alone, not based on how valuable they are to us. Otherwise we’re still not looking at them as fully human.”
I have to agree with this last panelist.
“Um. I have issues.” Dmitri’s glowering at the screen, probably wishing he was on that panel right now so he could give a few of those people a piece of his mind.
“Of course you have issues,” Cam shoots back, grinning. “Isn’t that your middle name? Dmitri Issues Mikhailov?”
They devolve into good-natured arguing. Honestly… yeah. I don’t think things are going to be perfect yet. Probably not for a long time. But public opinion is definitely swinging our way.
I think we’re out of the woods.
Chapter 27
Maddy and Justin aren’t able to stay nearly as long as I’d like—they have to go back to their school, especially since Neptune didn’t officially close down while the whole Agustin thing was going on. The administration decided to “soldier on” and keep teaching their students.
The two of them aren’t in trouble for leaving though, which is what I feared at first. Apparently, soon after Maddy and Justin headed out to find us, the admins announced that anyone who wanted to leave to be with their families was welcome to do so.
I thought that was generous of them when Mads first told me about it, but apparently a quarter of the students left, so the school didn’t really have a choice. It was either support their students or have a quarter of them expelled or suspended, and the administration probably felt that would reflect too poorly on them.
Besides—Maddy and Justin are heroes now. Footage of them kicking a demon’s ass was captured by the cameras Brodie and Tamlin set up, and as more and more people watch the videos, both of them have gotten offers of dates from various people.
They’re not the only ones either.
We’re all sort of celebrities, in a minor way, for a little while. I’m looking forward to a time when people no longer stop me on the streets. I’m sure there will always be a few people who recognize me when I’m out and about, but as nice as it is to hear people thank me and as amusing as it is to get all this attention, I’m ready for it to be over. These people don’t know me, and I like my anonymity. I like my quiet life.
I hug Maddy tightly before she leaves. My heart breaks every time we have to be separated, and I’m still a little extra clingy in the wake of her kidnapping.
At least now it’s not just the two of us against the world. If my little sister was still all that I ha
d, I’d be taking this a lot harder. But she has Justin and all of her friends back at Neptune. I have my men, and my friends, and oh shit, graduation in a semester.
I’m glad Mads has a guy who loves her—it’s what she deserves. Someone who appreciates how wonderful she is and will treat her right and look out for her. If I can’t be with her all the time, I’m glad someone else is watching her back. Maddy would probably say the same about me, actually, although she jokes that of course it takes four people instead of one to make sure I stay out of trouble.
To which I say, hey, I don’t go looking for trouble. It just finds me.
It doesn’t happen overnight, but Griffin does reopen. Perhaps sooner than it should, but who cares about a bit of construction if it means we get to go back to school? Everyone’s education has been set back half a semester, and I know I’m not the only one who’s eager to hurry up and get their life back on track. Hardwick’s apparently bursting with ideas, now that public support and government funding are actually both behind Griffin, and we’re not struggling for attention and funds.
Good for the school and for Hardwick, if you ask me. It’s what both of them deserve.
Dmitri, Cam, and Asher are going to be staying at Roman’s house while Roman and I head back to Griffin to finish out the semester. Cam and Dmitri definitely see it as their home now, and that warms my heart. Asher will always have a place at his parents’ home, but he’s talked with them about officially moving into Roman’s—we’re all going to go up over the summer holidays to spend time with Asher’s family, and we’ll sort through his stuff and figure out what he wants to bring back with him while we’re there.
Unsurprisingly, his whole family has been very supportive, and they say they can’t wait for Dmitri, Roman, and me to meet the entire family, nephews and sisters-in-law and all of it, over the holidays.
I’m a little intimidated, I’ll be honest. Dmitri is too though, so we two introverts can cling to each other in crisis.