Phoenix Academy: Forged (Phoenix Academy First Years Book 3)

by Lucy Auburn

  “Absolutely a relief to know,” she responds dryly.

  Well, I tried.

  We come to the edge of the east side of campus and stop ten feet in front of the wall. Frowning, I glance left and right. “There’s nothing here. We passed all the classrooms and dorms, too. What exactly are we supposed to do, go flying?”

  A twinkle in her eyes, the headmaster pulls a key on a long chain out of her pocket. “Something like that. The entrance can’t exactly be easy to find, after all—we’d have too many students traipsing into it at all hours of the days. It’s too great a risk. So it’s hidden.”

  Can’t have the students breaking into their prison full of murderous psychos, I suppose.

  Instead of just telling us exactly what’s going on and letting us into the school’s creepy Riker’s Island knock-off, the headmaster decides to show us. Key in hand, she approaches the wide trunk of a nearby tree, motioning for us to stay back.

  Then she puts the key in the bark.

  No, I’m not kidding. I wish I was. All the magic in the world, and parlor tricks is what it gets used for. I shouldn’t complain but fuck it, I’m complaining: they could’ve given us unicorns, and instead it’s just prison doors in the middle of trees.

  But that's not it apparently. Nothing happens.

  "Well?"

  "Be patient," she says. "The physical key just unlocks the physical door. There's magic keeping the lock closed too."

  Stepping back, she pulls a knife out of her jacket and plunges it into her hand.

  Well, it's less of a plunge and more of an aggressive nick. But I still find myself looking at her askance.

  "Portal spell," she explains, because apparently she thinks I'm well-educated in this whole magic thing despite clearly being a C student. "They tend to require sacrifice. This one wants blood. It helps keep the lock closed and prevents people from just barging in."

  At least now I know Grim spells aren't the only ones with a thirst for AB negative.

  She smears the blood across the trunk, and that apparently completes the creepy blood-drinking spell. As her blood sinks into the bark, a glowing line shoots up and travels around the tree in the shape of, obviously, a door. The bark-encrusted door separates out slowly and creaks open.

  Her hand already healed, the headmaster grabs a rough handle-shaped chunk of bark on one side of the door and yanks it the rest of the way wide. She then pulls the key out of the tree and motions towards the darkness beyond the doorway with a flourish.

  The darkness that’s pitch black, endless, and completely mysterious. You know, like in a horror movie where all the non-virgins die first. And I’m most definitely not a virgin anymore.

  “Go on, then. I’ll meet you on the other side.”

  She seems incredibly fucking certain that I’m going to do what she says, but while I may have started to think of this place as home, there’s still a little sliver of street rat inside me. Since laying aside my homeless girl instincts and trusting people got me betrayed by Meyer, I’m more inclined to follow those no-fucking-way paranoid feelings than ever before. Like hell I’m going in first.

  Thankfully, Mateo doesn’t have much in the way of self-preservation instincts, between all the grenade pin pulling and experimenting with gunpowder. With a white-toothed grin on his face, he takes a step forward towards the black emptiness, and pulls his sidearm to hold it loosely at his side.

  “Imprisoned Grims without their powers? Can’t wait.”

  With a hoot and not a single bit of paranoia, he walks straight into the darkness, disappearing completely in a single step.

  You can’t tell me that’s safe.

  I eye Petra. “You next.”

  She raises one of those perky blonde brows at me. “Scared, Carpenter?”

  “Scared, smart, attached to having my skin stay un-flayed and on my body. You pick. Also,” I point out, “you’re my Shield. And from what I remember in my history classes, soldiers usually hold those in front of their bodies. So go on.” I put my hands on her shoulders and steer her in front of me. “Shield me.”

  She makes a sound that, if I didn’t feel her human body underneath me, I would swear is a straight-up wolf growl. I’m pretty sure she’s even got her lips back to show all her teeth. And based on the way she’s digging her heels in, she’s not going to let me push her in first.

  Some Shield she is.

  “I’ll go.” Pulling one of his poison-tipped knives and casually spinning it on his finger, Sebastian strolls past us towards the darkness. “If my head doesn’t get severed from my body—or worse, my dick—I’ll pop back out again.”

  Headmaster Towers frowns in my general direction. “It’s safe as sin, you two.”

  “Sin isn’t safe,” Sebastian says as he steps towards the door, “just ask Richard.”

  A perplexed look pushes the headmaster’s brows together just as Sebastian disappears. Petra snorts indelicately; I guess she and the others didn’t tell Headmaster Towers about my whole seeing demons sever a dick thing, which I shared with them the first night I came here. Maybe she thought it would make me look like a violent lunatic.

  Too late to undo that impression.

  A moment after my favorite poisonous dick-severing bastard disappears into the black beyond, he pokes his head back through and gives us a thumbs up. “I’m still alive. Or dead, really, depending on your point of view. Unfortunately so is Mateo.”

  Then he disappears back into the blackness.

  “So.” I push lightly on Petra’s shoulders, mostly because I’m afraid she’ll chew my fingers off if I push her harder. “Let’s go in together?”

  “If you’re expecting me to hold your hand, it’s a no on that.” She raises her chin. “But I’ll go first, since you’re such a pansy.”

  “It’s not that I’m afraid,” I object. “I just think we should get a headstart on our beautiful partnership.”

  “Suck it.”

  With Lynx and Ezra at my back, both of them in various states of boredom, and a pissed-off little Petra in front of me, I head towards the not-at-all frightening great yawning pit of blackness past the tree bark door Headmaster Towers made appear out of nowhere.

  At least I’ve got eleven more lives waiting for me in case this one doesn’t pan out. Something that would be more of a comfort if dying didn’t feel like getting my skin flayed off and eyeballs scooped out of my soul.

  Walking through a door that leads to a prison island off the coast of the northeast is, it turns out, nothing like dying. It’s a lot like how it felt to walk through the gates to Phoenix Academy for the very first time, which makes sense.

  One moment I’m here. The next I’m there.

  There being a very depressing, dimly-lit hallway made of concrete painted a dark grey on either side. Sebastian and Mateo are already here, checking and double-checking their respective weapons, and a good hundred feet in front of us there’s a floor-to-ceiling gate that must lead towards the cells.

  Though the headmaster said our powers wouldn’t work in here, I don’t feel any different. But based on the way Petra is listing to the side, breathing through her nose and propping herself up against the wall, she does.

  “You okay?” I raise a brow in her general direction. “As my Shield, I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to be prepared to protect me at all times.”

  “Oh, fuck off,” she says without heat, leaning back against the wall and pinching the bridge of her nose. “I’ll have you know it’s very disorienting losing my wolf all at once.”

  “That sucks,” I tell her, trying not to find any glee in the fact that strong, ever-snippy Petra is currently faring worse than me. “I don’t feel any different. Shouldn’t the Grim side of me be like, vomiting on the ground or something?”

  Mateo shrugs. “Fuck if I know.”

  Sebastian, of course, doesn’t even answer. He appears to be trimming his nails with the sharp tip of one of his poison knives. You know, like a serial killer. It’s cute. />
  Lynx and Ezra walk in behind us, forcing Petra to move a few feet over and lean on a different stretch of the wall. Frowning, Ezra glances down at his watch. “We’ve got maybe two hours to scout this place and figure out if the plan is going to work. You sure the headmaster knows what she’s doing?”

  I know she’s the only one who’s come anywhere close to making a plan that might work, and I’m glad I saved her life. “She’s got like a hundred Grims in here. I’m sure she can figure it out.”

  Petra corrects me, “Fifty-two, actually. And a good half of them were captured by her mother. But yes, she knows what she’s doing. When she’s not being hypnotized against her will by a demon.”

  Mateo shrugs nonchalantly. “Wasn’t me in charge of what I did.” He slides the safety on his well-polished, fully loaded gun and puts it back in the shoulder holster that hangs beneath his armpit. “As for the plan, I’m hoping it all goes sideways. I’ve got the perfect bomb if it does.”

  “It won’t.” Headmaster Towers steps into the hallway in one smooth motion, her hand behind her—no doubt to close the weird ass magical door. “Everything is going to go smoothly, and if you do need to use a bomb, it’ll be because part of the plan is to have backup tactical support, since I won’t be able to do anything in here—which is why I’ll be on campus, prepared to protect the students in case Meyer somehow escapes, which is also part of the plan.

  “Always prepare for the worst,” she says, for some reason looking at me. “Leaders have a plan B for their plan Z. The only way to make sure everything goes according to plan is to plan as if it won’t.”

  I don’t know why she’s aiming this advice at me, when I’m the furthest thing from a leader. It doesn’t matter, though; this is her plan, because she’s in charge now, so no matter what happens it’s all up to her.

  There’s no way I should ever be in charge of anything ever again.

  I’m just not cut out for this shit.

  Chapter 9

  I don’t know what exactly I was expecting, but this wasn’t it.

  The cell area past the gate is a contrast to the grey, dimly-lit hallway we walked into. For one thing, there are floor-to-ceiling windows looking outside all along the opposite wall, and even this late into the evening there’s quite a bit of natural light streaming through the glass.

  Each of the individual cells has bars on it, sure—bars that are set at least a foot in front of what appears to be unbreakable plexiglass that keeps each individual Grim contained. But the rooms on the other side of the plexiglass are surprisingly spacious, with a real bed and mattress in each, and a half-wall for privacy in the toilet and shower stall area.

  Not that any of the heart-stealers on the other side look particularly pleased about the accommodations. They’re all rather, well, long-faced and grim-looking. Though most of the ones we pass by don’t look up at us even a little, the ones who do have exactly the murderous stares you’d expect from a Grim.

  Ezra notices the same thing I do. “Quite a bit of space they’re all getting. And did that one have a minibar next to his bed? Seems... generous.”

  “We’ve always hoped that we might be able to use our Grim prisoners as a bargaining chip one day if a war were to break out again.” Headmaster Towers sounds pragmatic about it all; she leads us past the first row of cells and to a wider, open room without even blinking at the prisoners shooting her death glares. “If we mistreat them, they won’t survive as long. Also, we’ve discovered that treating them well—and some of them better than others—has its advantages. You wouldn’t believe how much information that minbar alone got us. People will sell their own family out for a sip of Patron.”

  “I find torture works better for that sort of thing,” Sebastian says casually. “Of course, for me it’s easy to give someone incredible pain without leaving even a permanent scar on their body. Not that maiming isn’t fun too.”

  The headmaster ignores him, thankfully. She seems to be getting that they want a rise out of her more than anything.

  Petra, for her part, just quips, “Maim away all you want as far as I’m concerned. These Grims have all done things to get them here.”

  “We’re not here for that,” Towers reminds her. “Dani, if you could have them test their powers somehow.”

  I shrug off the weird tang of wrongness that comes from her speaking to me about the demons, instead of just to them. I get it; they’re my demons, and she’s not exactly used to them, even though she’s managing to stand in the same room as them without losing her head.

  Glancing between all of the guys, I consider them each: Ezra’s ability to see people’s powers will be useless here, with the dampener active. Sebastian shouldn’t be giving anyone pleasure or pain right about now. None of us want Mateo to make us forget anything. So it’s Lynx’s ability to see souls that we're left with.

  “Any black spots on the headmaster or Petra’s ledger right now?”

  Lynx shakes his head. “They’re still the same, but that tells us nothing. Once I see a soul I don’t need to use my powers to see it again.”

  I grumble. “I don’t want to cut myself just to test Sebastian’s powers.”

  “There may be another way.” Lynx gets his nerdy thinking-really-hard face on. “If the power dampeners in here really do inactivate Grim abilities, then I may be able to see into one of their souls.”

  Mateo twirls around. “Eenie, meenie, miney...”

  Absent-mindedly, Lynx tells us, “Did you know the origins of that are incredibly racist? It’s basically the most racist children’s song ever.”

  “Mo.”

  His finger is pointing right at me. I frown at him unhappily. “I’m not technically a Grim, you know.”

  “No, but I want to know what your soul looks like. Lynx never did see it that night on the cliffs. But maybe in here...”

  Well, great. “Okay. Lynx, try looking into my soul. If it doesn’t work we’ll try out Sebastian’s powers.”

  Narrowing his eyes in my direction, Lynx takes a single, long step towards me. He’s looking at me so intently that it feels like he’s a predator and I’m the prey. It takes me back to that night on the cliffs, the night that I died and everything changed.

  This time, as he steps forward and cups his hand gently over the back of my head, his eyes widen. He makes a little surprised sound. And he says, “I can see it. I can see Dani’s soul.”

  “What can you see?” I lick my lips nervously, fear suddenly shooting through me, followed closely by the urge to tell a joke. “If it’s puke green, don’t tell me.”

  “It’s not.”

  “If it looks like Meyer’s...”

  “I never did see his soul,” he reminds me gently. “Grim souls in general are cloudy because of how their powers work, by tapping into the ether of the Great Beyond. But your soul... Dani, your soul is magnificent.”

  I blush, which is absurd, because it’s not like he’s telling me that I’m beautiful or something. “Thanks. I mean... thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.” Lynx’s mouth crooks up on one side. “And there are no dark marks on your soul. Not that I’d expect anything different, of course. You’ve never killed or hurt anyone with cruel intentions.”

  My heart twists, because that’s not quite true. I killed Kayla by not stepping into the fight and defeating the White Phoenix before she could gut her. I killed Laena by going after Meyer in the woods without a clue what I was doing or the bravery to pull it off.

  And now I could get one of them killed, too. My four absurdly wonderful and violent demons, who would apparently come back in another body without even knowing who I am. The thought makes me sick inside.

  Oblivious to the nausea growing in my stomach, the headmaster claps her hands together and smiles in triumph. “Marvelous! With the four of you on this side of the door, your powers at hand, there’s no way Meyer will be able to escape even if the worst happens. And if he does—if he makes it to the secondary door out onto the
campus—I’ll be there waiting for him.”

  Mateo grins wolfishly. “Let’s hope he doesn’t suspect anything so we can have a little fun with him before he’s put away.”

  My mind is on things other than revenge. “Are we sure the power dampeners will work on him at all? What if he comes through and he’s full strength? And where’s this door I’m supposed to bring him through?”

  Petra is eyeing me oddly, but I ignore her expression. Headmaster Towers says, “I’ll answer the last question first. The door is a backup we created in case we ever needed to use Darkness Island as an escape route out of the academy’s grounds. It leads out into the back of a cafe in a busy part of Santa Cruz. All you have to do, Dani, is get your father to follow you through the door in that cafe and onto Darkness Island.”

  “Oh, well, if that’s all...”

  Her mouth thins. “I realize it may be difficult. While we’ll have one of our off-campus associates manning the cafe, and Petra will be there to keep you safe, it’s still dangerous. I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t think that despite all his shortcomings, your father is loathe to hurt you.”

  “Don’t call him that.” The word is like a slap across the face. “Fathers show up. He’s just some asshole who didn’t want me until after I died and came back special. Call him Meyer. Or better yet, rat bastard. Either works.”

  Pity flickers across Headmaster Towers’ face. “Very well. Meyer it is.”

  “Hey.” Ezra’s voice draws my attention to the other side of the room. He’s peering into one of the cells, eyes narrowed. “I recognize this guy, I think. You guys recognize him?”

  “He does look familiar.” Sebastian approaches the cell. “Pretty sure he tried to enslave us once in Madrid.”

  That makes me wonder. “Is the guy who tried to kill me that night we met here?” I ask Petra. “It’d be nice to clock him one.”

  Headmaster Towers is the one who answers my question. “He got transferred out.”

  I frown. “To where?”