“Ayaz.” Bile rose in my throat as I realized why she had pursued him, why she was prepared to use her position of power to sleep with him. She was trying to have his child.
It’s sick. She’s sick. And mad. In this whole fucking wackadoodle school, she’s the craziest of them all.
“Mr. Demir did his duty with enthusiasm.” She laughed again, and the sound turned my stomach. “Alas, it was in vain. And then, Hazel Waite appeared and affected our god, and I started to wonder if perhaps the god sensed something in her that would be perfect. And once again, you boys did your duty without prompting from me. All three of you! The god inside you must be attracted to her cruelty.”
No.
My heart plunged to my toes.
That can’t be true. Everything I feel for the Kings – it means something. It can’t simply boil down to me being a vessel for a fucking god-baby.
It can’t it can’t it can’t.
Trey looked ready to explode. “You can’t force us to breed.”
“I don’t have to. All these years you’ve carried off our plan perfectly without my prompting, excited to do your parents’ bidding and torture the sacrifices in a state fit to be fed to the god and fuck like rabbits as the teenage hormones continued to rush through your veins. Don’t act as though you’re a victim here, Trey. You’ve had free will to resist at any time. But the god is inside you. He is part of you and you of him. You wanted to hurt and torture and bully, just as you now want Hazel. At least with her, you get to have your fun at the same time.”
“Only because we were lied to!” Trey cried. “If we knew the truth, we never—”
“You never would have tortured those who had less than you to raise your status? You never would have lashed out because you were afraid of something different? You never would have done his bidding if you knew your father’s empire was built on the god’s brutality?” Ms. West silenced Trey with her penetrating stare. “Is that true? I think Hazel would tell a different story.”
I bit back my answer. I didn’t want to admit it in front of the guys, but Ms. West was right. The Kings of Miskatonic Prep didn’t need their parents’ encouragement or the knowledge of the god to bully the scholarship students. They’d been raised to believe that was their right. The choices they made belonged to them.
Just as my choices – my terrible choices – belonged to me.
Ms. West steepled her fingers together, studying me with that hard, cold face. “The god very much wants you, Ms. Waite, but not as fuel. He reads your crime on your soul as easily as you might read words on a page. Long before I figured out what you and Ms. Putnam were hiding, the god had set his sights on you as his consort.”
“Yeah, well, he can keep on dreaming. He’s so not my type.” I wanted to steer her away from that line of thought, in case the guys started to suspect the relationship I had with the god. “If the god has his children, why raise the pillar?”
The Deadmistress’ mouth tugged up at a corner. “As I said, the pillar is a mystery. Perhaps it is part of a fertility rite from the god’s own culture, meant to inflame the loins. Tell me, Trey, does staring into its blackened depths bring the stirrings of lust?”
“You’re sick,” Trey spat. “Why are you telling us this now, when you’ve gone to such great lengths to hide the truth?”
“If we are to work together, I demand complete transparency. That is the only way our efforts will be a success. It is why I have told you everything tonight.”
Complete transparency? Was she serious? After everything she’d done, how could she expect us to trust her? And yet, our best chance at surviving this was to make her believe it. She gave us her secrets, and we owed her something in return.
“If you want transparency, you should probably know we overheard Vincent and the others talking before the performance,” I said.
Ms. West raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow. “How did you manage that?”
“There’s a secret passage Quinn knew about – it leads from the forest cabins into the faculty wing. We hid inside during their meeting.”
“You are resourceful. What did they talk about? No doubt they’re all deeply concerned about their imminent aging.” She let out a dry laugh, touching her alabaster cheek. “The god is now too weak to give them the power that keeps them young. You have injured many of them with your fire. They will need to lick their wounds for a while. Perhaps some of them will even die. But they will want to regain control.”
I nodded. “They do want to regain control. They’re planning to release the Great Old God from his cage.”
“A bold plan, if a foolish one.” Ms. West’s lips pursed. “Such arrogance to assume the god cares for their petty power squabbles. Our god cannot be controlled – even from within his cage he exerts his own will and works his schemes. We saw this with the presence of his pillar. If he is free, he will not waste a moment helping the Eldritch Club. He will be with his children, teaching them the wonders of the universe. He will destroy the human race to make the planet ready for his children.”
“Yeah, that’s not good.”
“Agreed.” She waggled a finger. “No destroying the human race until we’ve perfected breeding. We need at least ten generations of evolution before we can be certain of the viability of the god’s progeny. But if he is freed, I cannot promise he won’t be overcome by the deliciousness of our feeble race. But not to worry, the Eldritch Club won’t attempt anything so stupid after that fire. Especially not when they see what we have.”
She drew a mobile phone from the folds in her coat, tapped her fingers on the screen, then passed the phone across the table. I picked it up and hit play on a queued video.
Gloria Haynes was tied to a chair, her mouth gagged, her eyes wide with fear as robed figures flocked around her, leering over her with menace on their minds. She cried incomprehensible words, her voice muffled by the gag and the large room.
I recognize it. She’s in the weight room. But are Greg and Zehra still there with her?
Ms. West hasn’t said anything about the god’s silence, or about his refusal to devour Zehra. She wants me to believe she’s still in control.
Ms. West replaced the phone in her robe. “I’ll be sending that to Vincent within the hour along with our demands. We cannot allow them to free the god.”
“How do you… I mean, we plan to stop them?”
“First, Hazel will return as a student.”
I snorted. “Even with the other problems he’s dealing with, Vincent Bloomberg will have something to say about that.”
She smiled. “Thanks to you, after tonight the Eldritch Club will no longer exert any power over what happens at this school. Think about your future, Hazel. If you return as a student, you can graduate with a diploma. When this is all over, you will be able to leave and continue your life elsewhere, with all the clout a Derleth education could offer. And perhaps, a celestial baby in your belly.”
I snorted with laughter, thinking of the absurdity of what she just said. Never have I been so fucking grateful to my mother for the bad example she set. Thanks, Mom, for making me gun-shy. All those times with the guys and we used condoms even when we didn’t have to… “What clout? There have literally been no graduates of Derleth Academy. Ever. I’d be the first. But fine, I’d get a diploma. You try to use my uterus for your own ends. Good luck with that, but whatever. Say I agree to come back. What’s after that?”
“We need you and your boyfriends—” she let the word dangle on her tongue like a bungee jumper “—to take back the school. You must regain control. We will host a formal dance on the anniversary of the first ritual. It’s the only time the sigils can be broken. The Eldritch Club will return for that if I have Gloria, and I will make them break the sigils that bind us to this school. I need every student to attend and to fight with the faculty if the club tries any tricks, which they no doubt will. We may be immortal, but they are the descendants of great witches and occultists. Vincent will throw his fu
ll weight at us, and I need every student on our side. If we are triumphant, every Miskatonic Prep student will be free. Immortal and free.”
I glanced between Trey and Quinn. Neither of them moved a muscle, nor gave any indication of what they were thinking. They didn’t have to – I knew their hearts well enough by now to know what they thought of Ms. West’s offer. But it was important to keep her on our side… for now. “And you’ll return Greg and Zehra?”
“They are safe. You do not need them, but I do.” Her smile chilled my bones.
“I don’t care. We want them back. After tonight, you don’t need to pretend that Greg went to the god. Release Greg and Zehra. Otherwise, there’s no deal.”
“Very well. If you get me what I want, I will return them to you. Show me you can be trusted, Hazel Waite.” Ms. West stood, towering over me in that sweeping black dress. A hand with nails like talons crept toward me.
I shook on it, sealing my new deal with the Deadmistress.
A deal written in blood and lies.
A deal that gave me a ticket back into the school, and the chance to study the pillar and the god, to find the solution that would restore the lives of all the students.
What Ms. West didn’t know was that while her cold fingers gripped mine, I’d already made a deal of my own – that I would end her reign of terror, and the god would help me do it.
Chapter Eight
Our business concluded, we rose. My legs shook, but I held out my hands to steady the guys. Trey leaned against me, his features pale and drawn. Quinn shrunk away, not wanting to be touched.
As soon as the Deadmistress’ door slammed behind us, Trey sank to his knees, burying his face in his hands. I stopped in my tracks, frozen by his pain.
This was Trey Bloomberg, undisputed King of the Kings of Miskatonic Prep. This was a guy who’d known cruelty his entire life, who’d taken those lessons he’d learned from his father and internalized them until he became the very person he hated and feared.
Yet he’d still clung to one sliver of hope – that deep inside, he was someone different than his father. That his dreams and his soul were his own to command. And Ms. West had just shattered that hope.
Trey’s shoulders rocked, and my chest ripped open as I felt his heart shatter like it was my own. I staggered toward Quinn, desperate to hold him. But Quinn flinched away.
He wouldn’t break like Trey. No, Quinn had been broken long ago. His father had beaten the soul out of him and then I’d gone and set his world on fire. Now, Quinn looked over at me with cold, calculating eyes.
“You should run,” Quinn whispered. “Take Greg and Andre, take Zehra. Run as far as you can, as fast as you can away from this hellhole.”
“You know I’m not doing that,” I said. “We’re going to fix this.”
“Don’t you understand? There is no fixing this. Our souls have been severed. They can’t be put back together again. I’m not Quinn Delacorte any more. I’m a demon spawn, a fucking monster.”
“So what? We’re all monsters. But you’re right about one thing,” I whispered, my nails digging into the burn on my wrist. “You can’t go back. But after twenty fucking years, you get to move forward.”
“What she’s offering isn’t a life.” Quinn turned his head away. “I couldn’t walk out with my head held high, not with a piece of that… that thing rattling around inside me.”
“I agree, but it is a start. It’s the chance to stand outside the grounds of Miskatonic Prep without carrying a giant-ass stone around your neck. It’s being able to have ice cream with Trey and me, pat some dogs, drive a motorcycle really fast. It’s the ability to experience new things, new people, new ideas. Don’t you deserve that?”
Quinn didn’t reply.
“You’re right about another thing, too. You’re no longer Quinn Delacorte. The Quinn I met when I first arrived at Derleth believed the world owed him a good time just because he existed. That was the Quinn who gave in to his base urges, who took pleasure in torturing new students because it made him feel good about his own life. But the guy I fell in love with…” I choked back a sob. “He’s brave and loyal and he makes me laugh and he can’t stand injustice. So don’t you—”
“You’d know a lot about base urges,” Quinn’s face twisted into an ugly scowl.
I tried to fight down the pain that threatened to overwhelm me. Right now, I’m the physical embodiment of Quinn’s greatest fear. Cut him some slack. “You know what? Yeah, I fucking do. Because I’ve spent my entire life trying to hide who I am, and maybe if I’d embraced the fire instead, I might’ve been able to control it and I never would have hurt the people I loved most. I know I scare you right now, and that’s okay. Being scared at Miskatonic Prep is so mundane, it’s ridiculous. But don’t let that fear make you forget who you are. Besides, if you think we’re going to blindly do whatever Ms. West wants, then you don’t know me as well as you think. I want her to believe we’re on her side – that buys us time to find a real solution. And there is a real solution, I know there is. There’s a fucking giant-ass obelisk in the middle of the auditorium – so we know there’s more going on here. But being able to leave Miskatonic Prep without having to sneak around would help a lot. Deborah could do more tests and—”
“No.” Quinn’s voice was pure ice. “No, no, and no.”
“It’s not for us to decide,” Trey whispered, his chin rocking against his chest.
“You don’t know,” Quinn snapped.
Trey jerked his head up. His eyes swam with a pain so intense I staggered back in shock. Yet when he spoke, his voice carried a calm authority. “Exactly. I don’t know. We can’t make this decision for everyone. This isn’t about us anymore, Quinn. It’s about every Miskatonic student.”
There he was – Trey Bloomberg, class president, future world leader, squaring his shoulders and stepping into his true power. My chest swelled with pride for how he was able to pull himself through this haze of pain. Dicksome rich boys could be an asset, after all.
Quinn gaped at him. “What’s your fucking game, mate?”
“This isn’t a game,” Trey growled. “Ms. West wants to make an army out of the students. Fine. We’ll show her an army. It’s time we take back this fucking school.”
Chapter Nine
Trey’s jaw had set into that hard line, his eyes glaciers – immovable, remote. He’d shut away the parts of him that felt the sting of Ms. West’s revelations. His focus became his armor. He knew he needed nerves of steel for what would come next.
I knew that look all too well, for it was what I did – I shoved all the feelings down deep so they wouldn’t cripple me under the weight of my guilt. We had shit to do – a student body to win over, a creepy pillar to decode, and only the final quarter of the school year to make it happen. Trey took Quinn’s arms and dragged him into the atrium. I followed, my eyes locked with Trey’s. Wordlessly, we formed a plan.
First, Ayaz. Then, sleep. Then, taking back the school.
As we approached the infirmary, Quinn clawed his way out of his stupor and was able to walk under his own weight. As we rounded the corner a cry echoed down the hall, so filled with pain it rent my heart.
“Ayaz!” I broke into a run. Trey grabbed my arm and yanked me back.
“Don’t go in there guns blazing or you might… start blazing,” he hissed. “At least he’s conscious.”
I nodded. Trey was right. I needed to be calm, or the guilt and the pain would make me boil over. I hated that Ayaz was hurt because of my fire.
He’s a child of the god. His wounds will heal.
Courtney appeared at the door, her skin pale, her usually-perfect hair matted and dull. Her eyes narrowed as they landed on me.
“Get out.” She backed up and slammed the door.
Quinn shoved his foot into the door, catching it just in time. His nose hovered inches from hers. “We’re seeing him, Courts.”
“She’s not coming in here. She burned him.” Courtney slammed th
e door against Quinn’s boot. “Get. Your. Foot. Out.”
Trey added his foot to Quinn’s, using his shoulder to muscle the door open wider. “I get that you’re scared, but Hazel isn’t the enemy here. We’ve got bigger problems than her fire. Like that black-ass pillar in the auditorium and the fact our parents are going to try to finish the job they started twenty years ago.”
And discovering we’re the children of the god, I finished for him inside my head. I guessed now wasn’t the time to spring that one on Courtney.
“I don’t care! Ayaz is my boyfriend and she’s not coming in.”
“Forget about Hazel for a moment. Look at me, Courts.” While Trey maneuvered the door open with his shoulders, Quinn slipped behind him and reached for Courtney, his fingers trailing under her chin. “It’s really important that we see Ayaz. You know I’m not one to exaggerate and be overdramatic, but our very future could depend on it. Do you think I’m lying?”
After a moment staring at his serious, freaked-out eyes, she shook her head.
“Okay then. Let us in.”
“Not her.” Courtney spat. “She burned him. No way is she going to finish the job.”
I’m done with this.
“Get the fuck away from my boyfriend,” I snarled, slamming my body into the door and thrusting my palm into her face. I wasn’t going to burn her, but she didn’t know that. Courtney screamed and dropped her grip on the door. Trey shoved. CRACK. The door slammed against the wall.
“He’s not your boyfriend. He hates you.” Courtney careened across the room, toppling over the back of Ayaz’s bed and landing in a heap on the floor. I stepped over her and plonked down in the chair beside the bed. Behind me, I was dimly aware of Courtney yelling while Trey hauled her away. I heard her yell in anguish. I didn’t care. The world narrowed into a dark tunnel – at the end of which was Ayaz, broken and burned and maimed beyond belief.
Because of me.
I refused to see my mother and Dante’s bodies after the fire. I needed that last image of my mother’s halo of flames to be the one burned into my memory, to be the flag of my guilt and anger. Anything more and I’d have come apart completely. And so I was unprepared for the trauma of Ayaz’s injuries.
Ignited: a reverse harem bully romance (Kings of Miskatonic Prep Book 4) Page 5