“Well can I suggest you start going for walks? A few times a week, head off campus or down to Tempest Lake or into The Iron Wood, anywhere you fancy really. But it’s important for you not to neglect your Order needs. And you need some time alone.”
“That actually sounds really fucking good,” I admitted with a heavy breath. The more I thought about it, the more I wanted to do it. If I took myself away from everyone then I could focus on my grief for a while, remember my brother being happy rather than just obsessing over avenging him.
“Great.” Titan smiled widely. “And my other suggestion is that you find yourself a permanent blood Source. There’s a lot of research into the value of a Vampire feeding from the same Source repeatedly. It gives you a chance to grow used to that Fae’s power living in you and for you to wield it to the best of your ability. Of course, I’m sure you’ll want to choose someone powerful what with your own exceptional level of power but even if you went for someone a little easier to subdue I think it would be worthwhile. Do you have anyone in mind?”
I ran my tongue over my teeth as my fangs snapped out at the mere suggestion of who I might like to bite. The answer was pretty straightforward but it was also impossible. I’d had a taste of both Dante and Ryder’s blood and I wanted more of it. More and more. The problem was, they were both more powerful than me and better trained too. I wouldn’t be able to maintain control over them to keep either as my Source. But every other Fae I’d drunk from since coming to this academy had just been a poor substitution for my true desires and I didn’t want to commit to drinking bland blood. Not now I’d had a taste of thunder and pain.
“I’ll give it some thought,” I said simply, not wanting to worry Titan with my crazy ideas.
He smiled widely. “Perfect. Then I guess I’ll see you in class tomorrow. And maybe you can work on claiming a Source before our session next week?”
“Will do.” I stood and offered him a salute as I headed out of the room.
I’d give it some thought alright. No doubt I’d daydream about it every time I found my power running low for the rest of the week. But unless I figured out a way to make miracles happen, I guessed we’d both be disappointed with my progress by the time our next session rolled around.
It always started the same way. My Clan were gathered on the picnic benches at the base of Devil’s Hill after school. Across no man’s land was the Lunar Brotherhood pooled together on the bleachers. They kept standing up, cracking necks, pounding chests, never looking our way but the threat was clear. They were out for blood today. I could almost smell it before it was spilled, that’s how certain the coming fight was.
I rapped my knuckles on the table in warning, the gold rings on my fingers making the sound carry. The other members of my Clan echoed the tap until everyone was alert, glancing my way, waiting for orders.
The unallied students who ambled through Acrux Courtyard grew quiet at the sound of the tapping. Those who’d noticed the change in both gangs had already made a quick exit, but now it was a mass exodus toward The Vega Dormitories as they realised what was about to go down.
I turned my head to look up at Devil’s Hill. Some of the braver students would stay there to watch from a safe distance. But in my experience, nothing was a safe distance.
The Kipling brothers did their job and cast magic over the entranceways to the school. Anyone not inside now was here for the duration. Devil’s Hill was the safest bet but it wasn’t a guarantee. My gaze snagged on Elise up the hill. She folded her arms, watching the two gangs with curiosity. I wasn’t surprised. That girl didn’t seem capable of bowing to fear.
You should have left, carina. Now I’ll have to keep my eye on you.
Ryder stood at the heart of the bleachers and everyone in his gang banged their chests and made an endless sssssss noise through their teeth.
“Dante,” my cousin and Beta wolf, Tabitha, moved next to me, her crimson hair falling into her soft blue eyes. She was Felix’s daughter but nothing of his cold-blooded nature was in her. She was a great fighter, but not a callous one. “Word is Ryder’s out for your blood in payment for you attacking him the other day.”
“I know. I’ve been waiting, cugino,” I said calmly, flexing my fingers and drawing air between them. “Let him come for my blood, I’ll take his first.” The hatred between Ryder and I was more personal than most other gang feuds. In Oscura Clan, we called his father Wolfsbane for how many of my family he’d killed. And not just killed, butchered, left in ten pieces. My father had been his last victim before Oscura Clan had finally cornered the bastard and gutted him.
Tabitha nuzzled into my arm in her wolfish way and I felt more of my cousins drawing closer, the urge to lead them as their Alpha rising in me. Those not of the Werewolf Order closed ranks, magic skittering under the tables, between palms. Weapons crossed hands. Weapons we shouldn’t have had. If the faculty found them, they’d call in the FIB to have us all arrested. But they never looked too closely. Professor Mars was the only one who’d try and stop this fight but the Kipling brothers would keep that from happening for as long as possible. They knew the drill. Blood would be shed before the bell rang.
Ryder whistled and his ranks rose up on the bleachers, pounding their chests in time with each thump of their leader’s fist.
My own Clan were banging on the tables again, the noise growing in urgency.
“Stay on my right flank, Tabitha,” I murmured before passing out instructions to the other wolves. They needed a formation to attack efficiently. As far as I knew, I was the only Dragon in Solaria who was Alpha to a Werewolf pack. But I’d grown up surrounded by their kind and I knew their laws, spoke their language. I could lead a pack better than anyone.
“Are you going to shift, Alpha?” Tabitha asked me, her shoulder rubbing mine.
“I want to feel his skin split under my knuckles first,” I growled.
Ryder shedded his blazer, lifting a razor blade into the air to the whooping cheers of the Brotherhood. It was his way of making sure he always drew first blood in battle, by drawing it from himself. He slit his thumb, painting two lines up his cheeks. And that was it. The signal for this to begin.
I stood, lifting my head to the sky and howling to the clouds. Werewolf or otherwise, my entire Clan echoed it. The Wolves tore their clothes from their bodies, leaping forward and shifting into their enormous six foot forms. Twenty in total, creating a triangle out behind me as I headed the line. Beyond them, the rest of my Clan locked into a wall. Some would shift, others would cast, the rest would shield.
Ryder’s gang was unpredictable. He changed tactics like the wind so we could never guess their moves.
They spilled towards us like ants from a nest and we charged to meet them, hands raised.
Adrenaline surged as I cast a hurricane from my palms. My comrades cast their own attacks too.
Air, fire, earth, water. It all clashed together in the air at once with a sound like the sky was falling.
I set my eyes on Ryder and his eyes were locked on me. We tore up the tarmac parting us as I knocked his gang members to the ground with blasts of air. My feet dug into soft bodies. Yelps and screams filled my ears. I never slowed. I was made to fight. And I loved every second.
When Ryder and I collided, electricity rolled off of my skin. He hissed but didn’t let go. He had three razor blades squeezed between his fingers, throwing a punch which slit open my arm. I growled and he drank in my pain as I delivered a blow to his head that knocked him back a step.
He cast vines in his palm, latching them around my legs, but I severed them with a whip of air, diving forward and locking my hands around his throat. I captured the air in his lungs with magic, holding it prisoner. He choked and I squeezed his throat to drive the point home with a twisted satisfaction in my gut.
He smiled all the while, punching my gut again and again. My skin tore and searing pain bloomed, but the clinking of razor blades said he’d dropped them after the first or second hit. I n
ever let go. I gritted my teeth and went to the darkest place inside my mind.
His gaze collided with mine and with my focus entirely on withholding air from him, I couldn’t keep my mental block in place. He sent me a vision of my mother bent over a chair, Ryder fucking her from behind while she cried out in delight.
“FUCK YOU!” I spat, head-butting him and knocking the vision away. My shirt was bloody and soaked. I didn’t realise how woozy I was until I staggered sideways.
Have to heal.
I turned, falling back, determined to return the moment I could. I tore away the bloody material sticking to my skin, the wolves closing ranks behind me to hold Ryder off. I clasped the gaping slits in my side with one hand and released healing magic into the wounds. The sounds of battle filled the air as I waited, desperate to jump back into the fray.
I am the Dragon born of Wolves, and I will do my family proud.
A morte e ritorno.
When my wounds were healed I turned to re-join the battle, shirtless and howling to the sky. My Wolves thundered around me, pouncing on Centaurs, Manticores, Pegasuses and Minotaurs who rushed to meet them from the Lunar ranks.
Ryder had his muscular arm locked around a sandy brown wolf’s neck and panic seized me. My cousin Helios whimpered as Ryder twisted, ready to break, to kill. But that was against the rules. We couldn’t kill. Not in school, not here. But that hungry look in his eyes said he wasn’t playing ball today. He was out for blood, pain, death. And I couldn’t let him have it.
Helios barked as I leapt over him, using air to propel myself and taking Ryder to the ground. We rolled in a tangle of fists, claws, teeth. He ripped at my flesh like paper and I cracked his head against the ground with a roar. Electricity coiled around my spine as I pinned him in place with my knee to his stomach.
“We don’t kill on academy grounds,” I spat at him and his mouth twisted into a cruel smile.
“How sure are you of that vow today, Inferno?” Vines caught my throat, wrenching me off of him and slamming me into the concrete on my back. I battled them, but he had two wrapped tightly around my hands so my magic was contained. I jerked and thrashed as Ryder rose to his feet, pulling his shirt over his head and revealing an interweaving pattern of scars all over his body. I’d seen them before. I knew what they meant. And he wanted revenge on me for them.
“You have it all wrong, stronzo,” I growled, but he slammed his foot into my side.
“Don’t lie to me you piece of filth.” He kicked me again and I felt my Werewolves closing in, but Ryder’s gang held them off in their Order forms. There was a clamour above as Griffins and Pegasuses clashed in the sky.
Ryder reached into his pants pocket and took out a switch blade, flipping it open. Death didn’t scare me, but Ryder didn’t want me dead. He wanted me maimed and bloody.
He dropped down over me, eyeing my bare chest like it was a fresh canvas ready for him to paint. “She started here, so I’ll do the same. She used essence of Wolfsbane to stop my wounds from healing so when I’m done, I’ll pour it all over you,” he breathed into my face as he pressed the tip of the knife to my heart.
I yanked against the vines, but I was immobilised, my arms tethered firmly to either side of me. Ryder’s gaze locked with mine and he forced a vision into my mind. He was no longer him. A woman with raven hair, blood red lips and eyes full of hate leaned over me in his place. Her voice was a soft purr I knew well. Mariella. “If you embrace the pain, you’ll eventually start to want it.” She scored the knife across my chest then dragged it down and back up.
Electricity hummed in my veins and I battled the hold Ryder had over my mind with his hypnosis. With a bellow of effort, I forced him out of my head and the shift happened just as I saw the oozing red R he’d carved right into my chest.
I ripped free of the vines and he lurched backwards as the Dragon burst free of my skin. I rose up to my immense height, gazing down at Ryder and drawing a storm of electricity into my throat.
He cast a shield and the Brotherhood helped him, throwing a huge dome of magic around him so the electricity ricocheted off of it.
Claws dug into my spine and I roared, turning my head to find a Vampire on my back. It was Bryce, Ryder’s second in command. He tried to get his fangs in me to immobilise my magic, but I caught his leg between my teeth, flinging him from me. With powerful wingbeats I launched myself into the sky, setting Ryder in my sights again. The air pulsed around him with the powerful shield he hid within, but he wouldn’t hide for long. He never did.
A rogue fireball, billowed across the courtyard and Devil’s Hill, taking out a line of trees climbing its side. A scream tugged my heart apart as burning branches tore through the air and my eyes zeroed in on a figure caught in the blast. Elise was on the ground and all I could see was blood. I tucked my wings, diving toward her with urgency.
I landed beside her with an almighty thud, nudging her with my nose. She whimpered, reaching for me, her hand trailing across my scales for a moment before she passed out. I roared wildly, panic seizing me as I scooped her up between my talons and took off toward the dormitory tower. This fight would have to wait for another day. A force of pure pain was guiding my actions. The need to protect her was so visceral it made me sick to think I’d let her remain on that hill at all.
I landed atop The Vega Dormitories, carefully setting her down before shifting into my Fae form and lifting her into my arms. I descended the metal staircase which clung to the side of the tower, pushing open the window to our dorm and carrying her inside. I lay her on my bunk, pressing a hand to the bloody welt on her head where a branch had knocked her out. My chest crushed like a tin can at the sight.
When her head wound was healed, I moved my hands to the burns up her legs which climbed beneath her singed skirt. I shut my eyes, giving her every ounce of magic I had to give as the soft green glow enveloped her wounds. Her lungs expanded and she breathed in deeply as she came to.
Her eyelashes fluttered as I leaned over her, my eyes darting between hers as relief tumbled through my chest. “You’re okay, carina. You’re safe.”
“You saved me,” she gasped, a frown tugging at her features like she couldn’t understand why.
“Of course I did,” I growled, the strength in my voice surprising me.
She brushed her fingers along my jaw and I leaned into her touch, electricity skittering across my flesh.
“What about the fight?” she breathed.
“It doesn’t matter,” I said firmly. “When I saw you on that hill, bella…” I tried to come up with the right words to express the pain that had caused me. Her hand circled around my neck and her eyes shifted lower.
The moment shattered as she realised I was butt naked and I swallowed the crazy thoughts I’d been about to let loose on her. I gave her a slanted smile then leaned sideways to grab some sweatpants from under the bunk. I lay down beside her, tugging them on and she rolled toward me.
“Thank you.” Her fingers fell to the bloody R on my chest and her eyes rounded. “Ryder,” she gasped and I said nothing, my jaw ticking.
Her hand pressed to the wound and healing magic tingled beneath it. When the mark was gone, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to where the letter had been carved into me and I felt that kiss in every corner of my body.
A shrill whistle told me Professor Mars had finally made it to the fight and it wouldn’t be long before the battle was under control.
The sunset burned through the window, blood red and spilling across the room. Elise slid her arm around my waist as she rested her head against my shoulder.
“Do you want to stay here for a while?” I asked softly, surprised by how affectionate she was suddenly being.
Her eyes sparkled for a moment, then she nodded and I sensed there was some deep hurt in her that had nothing to do with the gang war. Something she would probably never tell me about. But I could be here for her all the same.
I leaned up, pulling down the sheet so it fell acr
oss the bunk and cocooned us in my own little world.
She brushed her fingers along my bicep and heat built beneath my skin from her touch.
“I thought I knew what hatred was,” she said quietly. “But I’ve never seen two people despise each other like you and Ryder do.”
“We have our reasons, carina,” I sighed. “Though they aren’t cut and dry. Our families’ feud runs deeper than the gangs. Our fathers were enemies. Now they lie in graves and we continue to fight for the blood we’re both owed. But Ryder’s mind is so twisted, he can’t even see the truth anymore.”
“What truth?” she breathed.
I almost told her, then shook my head at the last moment. I couldn’t spill my family’s secrets even if my heart did want to trust Elise. “La verità non è mia da dare.”
Her fingers circled right where Ryder had cut me and a small frown pulled at her features. “What does that mean?”
“It means, bella, that the truth is not mine to give.”
“Ryder’s truth?” she guessed and I nodded. “You have some loyalty to him then?”
I clucked my tongue. “No loyalty, Elise. It is a question of honour. What my family did to his, and what his did to mine is between us. Terrible things went down in the name of avenging our kin. We don’t speak of them. In the Oscura Clan, we have a saying. A morte e ritorno: to death and back. We embody it in every sense of the word. We fight to the death without fear, and our secrets go with us.” I thought of my medallion which would be lying somewhere outside on the battlefield. After I’d shifted, it must have broken off, but one of my wolves would no doubt find it for me.
“I understand,” she whispered and for some reason I was sure she truly did.
I blinked lazily at the grey wall beside me as I came to, trying to figure out why it didn’t look right.
A moment later, I noticed the arm wrapped firmly around my waist, the chest in line with my back, the crotch right up against my ass and the really hard bulge that came with it.
Dark Fae (Ruthless Boys of the Zodiac Book 1) Page 23