Chapter 37 Raven
Raven
Alight dusting of flakes fell from the leaden sky as Glynda and I dragged ourselves to our PT class. Zane had popped into the library and informed me Maverick’s mother was sick, so my bear needed to go home. He explained he was taking him to save time.
Then he’d kissed me hard for a few seconds and vanished. When I tried reaching out to Maverick via the bond, the door remained shut from his end.
Maverick rarely closed his side of the bond. He’d told me early on that monitoring my emotions helped calm his bear because he’d know if I was in danger. Zane liked to check in with me for an entirely different reason. The minute something or someone turned me on, he was there, in my head.
Kai was the only one of my mates who maintained a respectful distance.
Alaric did, but I didn’t count him as my mate.
“Is Maverick not teaching us this afternoon?” Glynda looked almost as miserable as I felt when we surveyed the slushy field.
“No.” We reached the assembly area where the rest of our class huddled in small groups, the shifters shirtless as per usual. Kai jogged over immediately.
“Lightfoot’s in charge again,” he told us in a low voice.
“Lovely.” Memories of doing circuits on the obstacle course while the wolf shifter professor scrolled a dating app on his phone made me want to smite him.
“At least we won’t be doing the obstacle course today. The forest is off-limits now,” Glynda reminded me.
I huffed out a sigh of relief. Running laps of the sports field was both tedious and hideous, but I’d still choose that activity over an obstacle course designed for burly shifters, not pathetically unfit witches.
“I’ll stick with you.” Kai laced his fingers through mine. “I don’t trust some of these wolves not to harass you with Lightfoot in charge.”
Glynda nodded. “He’s right, plus Demelza’s here, and she definitely has it in for you these days.”
“Gosh. I feel blessed to be so popular.” Stars above, Kenji’s sarcasm was rubbing off on me.
The storm mage stood with his friends on the far side of the group. He laughed at something before slanting a look in my direction. Was the asshole laughing at me? It wouldn’t surprise me.
Demelza obviously thought so because she smirked at him.
But to my surprise, Alaric looked right through her, as if she didn’t exist. The witch flushed and huffed before muttering to her friend and pretending she didn’t care that Alaric had snubbed her skanky ass.
Then they both turned and sneered at me.
I gave her a finger wave and smiled. Beat the bullies with saccharine sweetness was my motto for today. It had never worked in the past, but I was too cold to start a fight.
“Gather round, everyone!” We shuffled closer as the female wolves preened and flicked their hair at Lightfoot.
“I thought student-teacher relationships were banned?” I watched the professor flex his muscles and wink at a female wolf with shiny blonde hair and enormous tits.
“They are unless it’s between soul-bonded mates. But Lightfoot is related to the guy who’s in charge of the Shifter Council, so I guess he thinks he can get away with it.” Glynda rolled her eyes. “Nepotism rules.”
“Since Professor Wilder has taken unexpected leave, I’m in charge of today’s lesson.
That means we’re going to have some fun!
” The wolf shifter contingent all hollered and whistled with excitement while I silently prayed for a demon to attack so we could go back to our dorms and hide.
I’d rather deal with an ugly demon than run laps any day of the week.
“Instead of laps around the field, we’re going to play a game called Capture the Flag.
You’ll each have a flag to carry. The aim of the game is to capture as many flags as possible.
Anyone who loses their flag by the end of the lesson will do an hour of circuits each morning for the next seven days.
The student with the most flags wins the game. ”
“Can we use our shifter forms, sir?”
“Yes. If you can shift or you have magic, use those abilities. Anything goes in this game.” He paused for dramatic effect. “Apart from killing a fellow student…obviously.” He chuckled as if killing a student was the punchline to a joke. What a psycho.
“But accidents happen, sir,” Demelza piped up loudly while looking directly at me. “And if someone dies in an accident, that’s not our fault, right?”
“As long as nobody can prove you deliberately set out to harm a fellow student, then you should be exonerated.”
“What the actual fuck?” Glynda and I looked at each other in alarm. This did not sound like fun. Was Lightfoot really saying killing was fine as long as nobody saw it?! Surely not.
Even Alaric looked worried, and he had no reason to be alarmed with his magic abilities.
He glanced my way, all traces of amusement gone. Did he think Demelza would try to murder me and claim it was an accident? It sure looked like it.
“Fuck, this is insane.” Glynda said what we were all thinking.
“We stick together, no matter what.” I was more worried about Glynda than about myself. I knew I could handle the likes of Demelza, but Glynda didn’t have fire magic like me.
“Kenji, I need you.” My familiar could help me channel if I got into trouble.
“Sorry, kind of busy right now. Please leave a message after the tone, and I’ll get back to you later…beep…”
“I swear to the goddess, Kenji, if I die, I will haunt your ass from beyond the veil!”
Nothing but silence filled the ether between me and my loyal familiar.
“I know you’ve been told not to venture into the forest, but the headmaster has temporarily lifted the restrictions to allow this exercise to go ahead.
Mage magic will drop each of you at a different location within a marked zone.
Your task is to track down your fellow students and steal their flags by whatever means necessary.
At the end of the exercise, the charms will transport you all back to this field. ”
He handed out a bunch of crystals attached to lanyards, along with colored flags. I shoved my flag inside my bra, deciding I would have a legitimate reason to set someone on fire if they tried touching my boob.
I forced a smile as Kai clutched my hand and Glynda went into a meltdown.
“It’ll be fine,” I reassured her. “Find a hiding place and wait for the lesson to end. Doing circuits for the next seven days won’t be too bad. Besides, once Maverick comes back, he’ll let us off.”
Glynda did not look convinced.
“There is no hiding from a shifter!”
“Um, climb a tree?” I was reasonably sure wolves couldn’t climb trees.
“Do I look like I’m an expert at climbing trees?!”
Sadly, I didn’t get the chance to reply as my best friend vanished in a puff of lilac smoke, closely followed by Kai.
The last thing I saw before I, too, vanished was Alaric’s worried face.
The mage charm dropped me into a bog. I cursed under my breath as I hauled myself out of the sucking mud. The only silver lining was being plastered in mud might shield my scent from asshole shifters.
How had this day gone so badly wrong?
I wanted to whine and pout, but there was no time to feel sorry for myself. Maverick’s mom was sick, and I needed to stay alive so I could comfort him when he returned to campus.
Besides, I was a strong, independent witch who had successfully obliterated one demon and an ugly old sea hag.
“I radiate love and positivity,” I said out loud before a bird pooped on my head, adding to the mud facial I’d already acquired. Nope, today was not going well.
Rasmus reached out down the bond, but we were too far away from the campus to talk. Since the last thing I needed was for him to crash the game and out himself, I forced my negative emotions down.
Managing a few wolf shifters and a demented witch was well within my wheelhouse.
“You’ve got this,” I muttered. All I needed to do was stay clear of the shifters and Demelza and not die.
How hard could it be?
Twenty minutes of slogging through stinking mud had me questioning my life choices. The trees in this part of the forest were so thick I could barely see a path, let alone figure out where I was in relation to the campus.
An occasional shriek filtered through the dense foliage, but I saw no other creatures. Even the bird that had so kindly pooped on me was long gone.
The sky above turned darker as the temperature dropped. Thank the goddess for the flag keeping my left boob warm. It was the only thing standing between me and hypothermia.
Snowflakes drifted down.
A wolf howled.
I trudged on.
Time passed, and my mood plummeted further. Was my bear okay? Had my incubus returned yet?
Were Kai and Glynda safe?
A thick thorn tore a jagged wound across my shin. Marvelous. Now I’d probably contract a fatal mud-borne disease. What a perfect end to a perfect day. Death by flesh-eating bacteria.
Still, silver lining…that sounded more fun than death by drowning.
Or death by hellfire.
Or death by…
I shut that line of thought down. Picturing the means of my imminent demise was not helpful.
The trees thinned as the path grew steeper. I pushed through a thick copse and entered a small clearing, scanning it for signs of shifters or other aggressively inclined students hoping to murder me in cold blood.
The amulet resting between my breasts heated unexpectedly as a blast of magic slammed into me from behind. I stumbled forward, my arms flailing, before smacking my head on a rock.
“Oops,” a familiar voice cackled.