by Everly Frost
His hand tugs, nearly imperceptible, but I sense it, urging me toward him. I open my eyes to find his gaze shifting from my cheek to my lips. Every harsh line of his face has softened, but the amber of his eyes is more crimson… as if the moon were suddenly firelit. Mesmerizing. Confusing.
Dangerous.
The last time he cupped my head so gently, I ended up in severe pain.
He starts to speak, but my survival instincts kick in and I jolt away from him, breaking the connection. “You’re done?”
He nods, his expression hardening again, suddenly unreadable. “Don’t wash your face in the morning. The wounds should be healed by tomorrow evening, but you’re better off protecting your face for the next two days.”
“From you,” I say.
He nods. “I won’t hit your face.”
“Thanks, Draven.” Sarcasm drips from my tongue. “It’s really kind of you to make that concession.”
He doesn’t miss a beat. “Why do you want to learn how to fight?”
“Because I refuse to die here.”
He opens his mouth but seems to rethink it. He leans around me to pick up the scratchy blanket from the floor, rolling it up and pitching it onto the bed. “You need to increase your fitness first. I go for a run every morning and evening. If you want to learn, meet me outside at 5 A.M.”
“I’ll be there. Lucinda will too.”
He pauses in the act of stepping toward the door. “Why Lucinda?”
“She needs to figure something out. Don’t worry. She won’t get in your way.”
He continues to the door, opens it, but pauses. “If I stop pushing you around, the compliance officers will notice and they’ll beat on you themselves. You don’t want that.”
“So you’re going to do me a favor and keep hating on me then?”
He doesn’t acknowledge my retort. “Be prepared for me to treat you like rubbish, but I won’t touch you again. It’s safer for both of us if we engage in as little physical contact as possible.”
I frown as he disappears into the corridor. His final statement is confusing. Safer for him? I’m not sure what he could possibly be afraid of.
18. Peyton Price
The morning sunlight wakes me well before five o’clock. I hurry to dress in gym clothes, running to the bathroom to brush my teeth, but I avoid splashing water on my face. I dash out of the bathroom just in time before Striker emerges from his bedroom looking half awake.
He scowls at me as I pass by.
“You should try leaving your curtains open,” I say. “You’ll wake up earlier.”
Yeah, I’m poking that beast again.
He grunts an unintelligible response that sounds like a string of curse words before he closes the bathroom door.
I’m early, but I head downstairs anyway, startling Collin and Colby, who wait at the bottom of the attic stairs. They follow me all the way to the first floor.
Along the way, we pass two groups of compliance officers—those waiting for the guys to wake up and those waiting for the girls. I think I’ve caught them in the middle of a shift change because some are arriving and others are leaving. Nobody has clarified this for me, but even though every student has two compliance officers, there appears to one present in the day and another at night. I’m the only student with two officers during the day but I think that’s because they assume Striker is my guard at night—a role he’s obviously willing to play.
I head out the back exit into the fresh morning air to wait for Lucinda. I attempt to stretch my legs, but I’m not really sure what I’m doing. Collin and Colby don’t seem to know either, giving each other quizzical glances as they watch me awkwardly attempting to lunge. Yeah, that’s not working.
I give up and wait beside the nearest practicing post instead.
When Striker bursts through the back door dressed in workout gear, water dripping from his hair, his eyes bright again, Collin and Colby raise eyebrows at each other before taking up position against the back wall to observe us closely.
Ignoring them, Striker points to the grassy area at the side of the combat ring and starts a series of warm-up exercises that I attempt to follow before he sets off at a slow jog around the perimeter.
I try to keep up before I decide it’s impossible and set an even slower pace for myself, ignoring the smug smile he throws my way when he laps me. Rounding the corner of the building again, I find Lucinda dressed in gym clothes and waiting at the combat ring. Her gaze fixes on Striker as he jogs ahead of me.
I wave her over to me and she falls in with my slow jog, keeping pace beside me.
“Your wounds look much better today,” she says as she runs. “I was getting worried.”
“Thanks,” I manage. “I don’t suppose you have a mirror?”
“Not a hope. Mirrors can be smashed and turned into weapons.”
I snort. “How do you manage to look so good, then?”
“We do each other’s hair.”
I miss a stride. “Wait… really?”
“Yes, really. Now look, don’t get the wrong idea. It’s not all girly sleepovers on our floor. We don’t always get along and there’s no hope that we can protect each other from anything. But we have some basic rules that we never break: we do each other’s hair and we never stab each other in the back.”
“That sounds nice.” I try to ignore the odd pain in my chest over the fact that I’m not part of it. I cover my emotions with a scornful smile. “Maybe I could ask Striker to braid my hair for me.”
She gives me a smile. “I can fix your hair if you’d like. After our run. Braiding really helps with the tangles.” She points to her own.
“Yeah,” I say, trying not to make a big deal out of it. My ponytail is hiding one hell of a bird’s nest and I haven’t been able to untangle it. “I’d appreciate that.”
I sense Striker’s approach behind us, not sure what to expect now that Lucinda has joined us.
“Morning, Adams,” Striker says as he laps us.
Lucinda startles. I suspect it’s his cordial tone that surprised her.
“Morning, Draven,” she manages, but he’s already too far ahead to hear her.
She changes the subject. “I mentioned I’m not a runner, right?”
“Me, neither,” I respond, with a genuine wheeze. “But I’m determined to give it a shot.”
A glance back tells me that Lucinda’s compliance officer has joined Collin and Colby at the side of the building.
“That’s Cameron,” Lucinda says, not yet out of breath. “My night guard is Christopher.”
“What’s with the ‘C’ names?”
She shrugs. “They all have them: Curtis, Chad, Craig. One of Ashley’s officers is called ‘Charleston.’ They’re all aliases. It’s the same with the teacher’s names. Bird types to match the Academy name.”
“Yeah, I figured that was… deliberate.” My breath is failing me now. Talking and running is going to kill me. “Let’s not talk… just do what you need.”
I wave my hand around, hoping she knows I mean the trees. My legs are already wobbly and my breath is wheezing audibly now. I’m pretty sure I might be dying. It’s one thing to throw myself around the combat ring for a few minutes. It’s another to sustain a run.
Lucinda quiets beside me. She relaxes into the jog. Her gaze flicks to the trees every now and then. Despite her assertion that she isn’t a runner, it doesn’t take her long to fall into a steady rhythm.
“It’s nice out here in the morning,” she says, her breathing annoyingly even. “I should come out here more often.”
I focus on not falling over. “Yeah. Sure.”
We run on. Five minutes later, I’m ready to drop and I have no idea whether being out here has helped Lucinda even the slightest. She does seem at peace, though, her features relaxed and her breathing even. Her random glances at the trees have stopped and instead she focuses on the curve of the fence.
Striker laps us for the thousandth time, but thi
s time, he falls in beside Lucinda. In stark contrast to his polite demeanor before, now he resembles an impending storm, his eyebrows drawn down, his glare at a thousand percent.
She glances up in alarm. “Draven?”
His response is low and dangerous. “You’d better stop, Adams. Or they’re going to notice.”
She gives him a confused look. “What are you talking about?”
“The trees, Lucinda. If you haven’t stopped whatever the hell it is you’re doing by the time I lap you again, I’m going to throw you against the fucking fence. Do you understand me?”
“Y-Yeah. I got it.”
He tears away from us. Judging by his sudden speed, Lucinda’s only got thirty seconds before he carries out this threat.
She picks up her pace. “What was he talking about?”
“I don’t know, but let’s get away from the fence. Striker doesn’t make idle threats.” I grab her arm, pulling her away from the perimeter.
Just as she takes a step back, she gasps, jolts out of my hold, and then stumbles on nothing, falling hard onto her bottom.
I drop to my knees beside her, taking wary glances at the guards. “Lucinda?”
“I just realized what he’s talking about. Don’t look. I mean… Do look. Don’t make it obvious.”
I stand and turn, not sure what I’m supposed to be looking for. Rose bushes, combat ring, practicing posts, compliance officers, ugly building, stretch of grass, fence… trees…
Trees! They’re bending in a way that trees shouldn’t bend. Each tree outside the perimeter sways inward, straining toward Lucinda’s location, branches reaching toward the fence like she’s some sort of magnet. The effect must have been behind us so we couldn’t see it, but Striker could because he ran up on us.
Now that we’ve stopped moving, I give the officers five seconds before they focus beyond the fence and realize that the trees aren’t simply moving in the spring breeze.
“I can’t stop it!” she whispers, panic filling her face as she fists the grass, fixated on the tree line. “I don’t know how.”
What’s worse… her skin is transforming before my eyes, a hazel sheen forming across it, her fingers shifting on the grass, all visible skin taking on a luminescent mottled appearance of…
Bark. Just like a tree.
The sound of Striker’s pounding feet meets my ears.
He knows how to make it stop. The same way he stops a flicker fit.
I spin to him, stepping in front of her. “No!”
He darts around me and scoops her up as if she weighs nothing, throwing her over his shoulder. She screams, flails, and kicks her legs. I lurch for him but he’s too agile, skimming my reach by an inch. Despite his threat to throw her against the fence, he runs her to the combat ring instead. If I weren’t so mad at him, I’d appreciate that he drew the officer’s attention away from the tree line.
I race after him, a shot of adrenaline overcoming my lame jogging fatigue. I sprint as fast as I can. There has to be a better way for her to control her power than a punch to the face.
He drops her against a practicing post, making her yelp and wince when her shoulder hits it first. He pulls his fist back, preparing to thump her beautiful, transforming face, but I ram into him and grab his elbow to annihilate his aim.
I barely make an impact, but it gives Lucinda a precious split second to lean left.
Striker’s fist hits the post where her head used to be.
His knuckles crunch. Blood splatters the wood.
Lucinda loses her balance and falls to the side and back onto her hands, staring at the bloody smear Striker left on the post.
He raises his fist over her again, blood spraying across her face with the suddenness of his movement. I prepare to jump on his back, anything to make him leave her alone, but she gives a sudden inhale and a wide-eyed smile before he can let fly.
The growing texture disappears from her face, instantly transforming back into her usual skin.
“I stopped, Draven,” she says.
His aim wavers, his hand clenched above her face, his other hand fisting the front of her shirt, half-lifting her off the ground.
She whispers, “I just needed to connect with the wood.” She pats the post beside her. “I controlled it. I know what I am now.”
A quick glance at the trees confirms it. They’re back to normal, leaves blowing in the breeze in all directions like ordinary trees do.
Striker doesn’t move, but his chest rises and falls rapidly. I’m standing behind him and can’t see his expression. I want to know what he’s thinking, but I don’t want to trigger an aggressive response. I hold my breath, waiting for his next move.
Finally, his fingers unfurl from her shirt. “They won’t hear about it from me.”
He gives her a little shove away from him before letting her go. Turning to me, his jaw clenches as if he’s grinding away at his thoughts and everything he wants to say to me. “She needed to figure something out, huh?”
I raise my chin at him. “That’s what I said. That’s what she did.”
Without a backward glance, he takes off toward the building, jogging past the officers who relax against the wall again. I guess as far as they can see, Striker’s back to his normal hateful self. It’s probably more expected than the possibility that we were all out for a happy jog together.
I help Lucinda stand. She presses her palm against the practicing post. “Now that I know… I’ll find ways to practice without giving it away.”
“You could leave,” I say. “Reveal your power, control it, and you can leave. That’s what they said.”
She shakes her head, searching my face. “Peyton, no. Nobody ever leaves. We’ve seen what goes on in this place. The only way they’re letting us go is in a coffin. Even then, they’ll dig a hole in the forest and throw us in. There’s no walking out of Bloodwing alive.”
“But you’re not a threat anymore. You won’t flicker.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“How do you know?” I sound desperate and I know it. I still had hope that there was another way to get out of here other than escape.
She pries my fingers from her arm, squeezing my hand tightly in hers. Her casual glance beyond me tells me she’s checking that the officers are still standing at a distance. “After being here for a while, you get to hear things. Snatches of conversations, whispers behind closed doors, things you aren’t meant to hear. The woman who runs this place… she didn’t start Bloodwing out of the goodness of her heart. She wants to use us. I’ve even heard the teachers talk about us as if… we’re supposed to be her soldiers.”
“What?” My response is too sharp. I try to calm down. “There’s no freaking way I would ever willingly do anything for the person who controls this place.”
“We might not have a choice. But we have to be smart. For now… I plan on learning everything I can about myself until I’m strong enough to fight back.”
I manage a smile. “Now you’re talking my language. If she wants soldiers, I’m happy to be one. I just won’t fight for her.”
Lucinda gives me a sudden grin. “We’ll figure your power out next.”
“We’ll see.”
Lucinda’s reluctance to reveal her power explains why Striker is so determined to keep his a secret. He and Lucinda are the first two students I’m aware of who control their magically repressed abilities—whatever Striker’s actually is.
I don’t hold out much hope that I’ll discover mine, but it doesn’t matter. Lucinda’s plan aligns with mine now: grow stronger, no matter what it takes, and escape.
19. Peyton Price
I survive my first week at Bloodwing Academy and it feels like a small miracle. Striker delivers on his promise not to touch me again. He picks random fights with the other guys before gym class and ends up on the combat mat with them. Another time, he shoves one of the girls, who stumbles into me, pitching me into a practicing post, where I start working out before the chaos
clears and Ms. Hawk can order me onto the mat.
Every morning, I drag myself around the perimeter, eating Striker’s dust and resisting the urge to stick out my foot and trip him when he laps me. I’m smart enough to know that I shouldn’t willingly break the no-touching rule. As the days pass, I find I can run farther without wheezing and my fitness is improving each day.
Every afternoon, I leave him alone on his run. There’s no way I want to watch him electrocute himself. It was bad enough the first time I saw it. I’m certain it has something to do with his power, but I can’t figure out what.
Ms. Sparrow doesn’t try to make me use Kaitlyn’s wand again, giving me a plain white wand instead. I can’t do any magic with it and she likes to give me paper cuts on my arms every time I fail. They sting, but they always heal.
I make it through my first Magical Biology lesson taught by a sweet-looking old witch named Ms. Vulture, who blinks rapidly every time she looks at us over her glasses. I find myself studying her carefully—the faded blonde color of her hair and her pale, blue eyes. When she steps into the sunlight streaming through the side window, she looks younger than her wrinkles would imply. I quickly abandon my close study when she begins describing in great detail all the stages of shift that a shifter goes through. Except that her point is to describe all the gory ways in which a shifter can be killed at those various points of shift—when the eyes are vulnerable as opposed to the throat or the stomach. My own stomach turns while her sweet little old lady voice croons on about how easily the skin can be pierced at different points of the body.
Finally dismissed, I stumble from the classroom, whispering to Lucinda. “What was that?”
She looks as green as I feel. “I have several theories: currently, psychological trauma is winning over desensitization to violence.”
“Oh, good.” I laugh. “I was worried she was trying to turn us into killers.”