Chapter Thirty-Four - Hooded Figures
“ALL THAT MATTERS now is that we focus on keeping them from getting closer,” Nick shouted back to Trevor.
Trevor looked back at me and reached to the ground. He was using magic within the ground to increase his earth magic while hidden under the cover of trees. There was so much more I learned about combining elements with magic, but my mind completely blanked while the hooded figures surrounded us.
Trevor switched from blocking magic falling on us to lifting vines from the ground. I pushed myself, desperately trying to match Trevor’s magic, despite him being a second-year. I had made it under the gazebo, trying to stop magic from falling down on me, hidden in the dark. I let myself feel all the fear I felt before. I now knew how to connect with my magic better than in the graveyard.
My power flared like it never had as I allowed it to fully flow through me. They took the prisoners magic, my uncle’s, but they wouldn’t take mine.
Holding up my walls wasn’t letting me access my full power. I had to let them down to stop it from draining my energy. The fear still pounded through my body, increasing every time the attacks could be felt hitting the shield Nick kept throwing up to block their magic from getting close. My fear wanted to drag me down, make me feel helpless and closed off. I felt it, but didn’t let it stop what I’d do next.
Three more portals opened beside them. More figures stepped out, joining together to burn through the vines while throwing constant attacks.
The bolts of light were powerful, crackling against the shields Nick kept having to recreate against it. While I focused on creating walls of vines they had to break through with Trevor, my eyes kept flicking to Nick. He was pouring everything into keeping them from advancing to us, to the academy, by distracting them.
I’d never seen magic like it, not this much from one person. He didn’t use light magic against them—they had too much. He wielded shadows like I did, with comfort, a part of him. Nick used so much magic that Trevor looked back at me confused and back at him. I watched him fight harder than I saw anyone else in my life. A part of me knew exactly where he was pulling all of this from.
Trevor started to slow down. His magic kept getting weaker, falling apart against their attacks .
I stopped casting when light came straight for me in the cover of the gazebo. A blast of light, larger than I’d seen one person cast before, came barreling through the sky like a comet toward me.
It narrowly missed the gazebo’s pillars as it tore past, I darted backwards trying to dodge it. My ankles hit the cold stone as I fell back. My hands flew up to block the bolt from hitting my face.
The light hit a shield that was in place only inches in front of me. It rippled off in a wave.
He had an air shield around me, it held strong.
That magic was going to hit. It was aimed directly at me, slipping through the defense he put up, yet it didn’t pierce the protective shield he placed in front of me. My magic pooled within me, fueled by fear and anger at the close call.
I felt something else too, something crashed through my body with such intensity that I knew it was true. I knew it like I knew how to breathe, like knowing my own name.
I stared at Nick in the field while he kept them at bay. He hadn’t looked back when the comet of light came at me, he knew I was protected.
Everything that happened became too hard to focus on while clarity had me zeroing in on one fact. All of the information I had heard or listened to in passing, information I barely paid attention to, it was alarmingly obvious in my mind.
Nickolas Ares was my mate.
I had a mate. Me. I actually had a mate that had been there since the first day in the Realm. He protected me .
My lips pressed tight. Did he hate me, but couldn’t resist? Was this the answer to the hot and cold?
My eyes welled with tears. I knew the truth was written in my features as plain as day.
He turned to me, a furrow on his brows. Was it anger flaring within those eyes at my presence here? How did he even find me? He had to have known what I had just learned. It was written clearly across his face, yet his lips remained soft, slightly parted as his intense gaze burned into me.
Even more portals showed up within seconds.
Walking forward, I zeroed in on only him in shock.
Clarity rose, and I pushed down everything that threatened to consume me. I needed to help stop the hooded figures from coming forward, long enough for him to make a portal. Even then, the academy was close by, I didn’t want them to start attacking students. We had to stop them. I didn’t know how, but I would give my all at the front beside him.
To access all of my magic, I stopped holding anything back.
I felt my walls fall down completely with no reservation. The mate bond felt even stronger, like it was flowing through my body, a river that gave and took, too powerful to stop.
He looked down at me when I made it to his side. Did he feel it like I did now? That look he gave me in the dining hall, when he scanned the class, the look of fear and of desire—that look in his hotel.
“You knew?” I asked.
He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. He didn’t want me to know this whole time. He rejected the mate bond. He rejected me. I could never forget that.
Before he fully glanced back to our attackers, they linked together. The chancellor in the center unleashed something toward us. Light rained down like arrows falling from the sky in every direction. It pelted the ground around us, coming close and weakening the air shields. Nick cast shadows, while Trevor used wind to push against the light magic, but it was too heavy, too fast—too devastating.
Nick’s shadows wrapped around specific members, twisting around their necks and bodies. Trevor joined him with the move, creating binds with earth magic.
The council fought it easily, but it created enough of a distraction for whatever Nick was planning to do next when he knelt down on the damp ground.
Instead of taking from the earth, magic poured from him, straight from him into the ground. I could feel it like I could feel my own. There was so much anger, so much hurt and emotion. The magic poured from him and started lifting from the ground in a shield between us and the council. It was visible, an electric spark with shadows, looking dangerous as the ground shook to allow the magic to come forth.
Nick was left so vulnerable,barely able to block incoming attacks with his other hand.
His face turned to me, and in it was something broken that he’d let me see before, no anger this time. A plea. It reminded me of the look of someone left all alone, asking for help from anyone. Then his hand rose up to me, leaving him unable to block anything at all as the wall lifted higher and higher, thin at first but gaining strength.
In my gut I knew I wanted to take his hand, I placed mine in his. It might have been the call of my mate, him asking me for help.
Magic was nearly overflowing out of me with the contact. I needed an outlet or I was going to explode.
Looking at the chancellor, I raised a hand to block incoming bursts of hot magic at us, burning my arm from the intensity. It felt like my power had almost no end, my rage kept it overflowing. The connection to Nick and the feelings of him being my mate nearly overwhelmed me.
“Let go,” he encouraged.
With those two words, I unleashed it down our connected hands and into the earth. We were taking something deeper, tapping into the ground together, and borrowing something ancient. He stared at me wide-eyed as he could feel the amount of magic boiling up inside me and I could feel his. It was like an incoming storm, nothing able to hold it back. It was anger, raw and ready to let go. The rush of dark storm clouds and the feeling of knowing there was no hesitation or desire to do anything but welcome it. I had no idea what my magic felt like to him, but the shock on his face seemed to match mine.
The dome grew high, filled with shadows, lifting and lifting so their magic could no longer reach us. The attacks only threatened the strength of the barrier but were unable to pierce it.
Nick drank me in with a look of pure awe, pure admiration, pride.
The feeling between the mate bond and the earth, feeling the shadows pour from me. I wondered about the stories of people falling into the power .
Nick spoke like he read my mind, “Stay focused on right here and what you’re doing.”
“Am I going to lose myself?” I asked, worried about losing myself to the shadows completely. “Is it going to be too much? Will I lose control?”
“Not while I’ve got you.”
I looked over at the cloaks and focused only on the magic protecting us from them.
I unleashed everything I had learned since being here, all the buried truths, all my hurt. Every inch was felt through me as it created a barrier bigger than I thought possible, encasing as a dome all around the academy grounds and Deimos. It was all around us and those we cared about, growing thicker and thicker. The incoming attacks could no longer be felt anymore.
Through the shadows, the figures started backing up. Some watched, the cloaks waved in a blur as they started retreating through portals. They escaped quickly, not wanting to be spotted after their attack was failing.
We were blocking off anyone from hurting us, fueled by our combined hurt and past, fueled by our bond. I felt the top of the dome seal and we strengthened the wall even tighter.
“Just a little more, Harper—you got this. You’re incredible.” His voice was gasps, amazed breaths.
The first genuine smile I saw break his composure, the first real smile was like seeing sunlight for the first time, reminding me of warm days before anything had ever hurt me. I couldn’t even smile back. I was too stunned.
It was just for me, but I didn’t understand. He didn’t tell me. He didn’t give me the chance to understand why he rejected me or to even know I was mated.
“Harper, what are you doing?” Blythe’s voice called out.
My head turned to her standing there in the dark. Did she come looking for me? It was past curfew. Blythe stood up on the hill toward the academy, too far to see her face. Her voice made it clear enough. Her trust in me broke.
“Levi.” Trevor’s shoulders dropped as he looked back. He panted breathlessly. “We did it.”
“Did what, exactly?” Levi shouted to him from beside Blythe. Distrust leaked from his voice just the same.
Trevor stumbled into the grass from exhaustion, and Levi came sprinting.
Looking back, only Lastrada and two others standing beside her remained. They were too far for anyone to have seen from the hill Blythe was on.
I didn’t stop though, taking energy from the ground, from my mate bond and poured it into the shield. I was able to protect myself and those I cared about, so that was what I had to do. The magic turned transparent once I was sure the hooded figures couldn’t get to us, at least for now.
“What did I just do?” This wasn’t a part of my plan coming here, not a plan to go against the rulers of the Realm.I just locked in the whole academy with someone set on revenge, so set that they would go against the council on their own, set on a path to kill those who hurt him, and take an entire academy. I helped him .
Looking up to the man who didn’t want a mate so bad that he wouldn’t trust me with the knowledge, my fingers were the first to go numb. My breaths slowed, vision blurred, and my weight seemed to fall. It was too much magic, too much energy. My vision blackened and thoughts waned.
The sensation of falling chased me until arms wrapped around my body. I was buried into a chest.
“Don’t worry. I’ve got you, I’m never going to let you go.”