Chapter 14
By the end of my first week at Harker, the summer’s heat has finally faded.
When our little group steps out of Elkfore, my nose fills with the scent of moss and still-fresh morning dew.
It’s always colder at this hour, especially on a soupy-gray early September day such as this one, but even still, I wonder if the shiver down my spine can really be chalked up to the shift in seasons.
The lengthy walk to the coliseum on Friday morning takes us past that smiling photo of my dad and his teammates outside the gateway.
It’s like the locket around my neck—a reminder that he’s always with me.
Not only his memory but all I still don’t know about him.
I stare at the photo and try to reconcile the cheering twentysomething with the man who raised me.
Who died to protect me. Who changed his name and was on the run and never told me why.
As we stalk past Harker’s stonework bell tower—haunted and alluring, with horned gargoyles and spires atop it—I try to put thoughts of last night’s discovery from my mind.
I’m going to need every ounce of focus for the week’s final class.
Combat Training taught by Reid. Irritation tightens my chest.
Outside the walls of Old Campus, we stride away from the wide, silent lacrosse field and sudden, sprawling cemetery wrapped in wrought-iron gates. When we cross the low stone bridge over Hellebore Lake, there’s an early-autumn mist crawling over the dark, glassy water.
“Whoa,” Sophia murmurs. She’s bundled in some guy’s oversized hoodie.
“Fucking. Awesome,” Elliot breathes.
Kitty and I can’t help but grin at each other. Peter gulps.
In the distance, the crumbling arena rises into the morning fog. Like the ancient Roman Colosseum, with sunlight slanting through columns and arches. A feat of human architecture, history, and bloodshed.
We tramp through wildflowers and over slopes of matted grass until the meadow becomes a footpath again.
Wide, craggy planes of stone lead to the soaring coliseum and I crane my neck up as we walk in.
The giant oval reminds me of Harker’s ancient amphitheater.
Now I see what Peter was saying: The gothic elements of the school—all the collegiate red brick and iron candelabras—are layered like a collage on top of a far older canvas.
Looming columns surround the space, with victory banners of navy and gold lining the edges of the wide-open ceiling.
Sparring championships, hard-won team battles.
There are no tools or training pads or equipment in here like there are in the gymnasium.
Just the clouds high above and the chalky arena at my feet.
At first I think it’s sand, but upon closer inspection I realize I’m walking on fine pebbles.
Stone that’s been pulverized over many years.
No doubt coated in hunter blood, sweat, and tears.
We file onto the lowest steps of the steep stone seating that wraps around the arena floor alongside the other students. There are only about thirty of us in this class by my quick count.
“Morning, students,” a deep voice echoes through the vast stadium.
My heart pounds in answer. I’ve come to recognize Reid’s masculine growl—a more-than-aggravating realization.
He’s wearing loose athletic sweats and a sleeveless black shirt.
With his charming brown curls and muscled biceps, he looks like a nineties heartthrob.
I can’t reconcile the way his sharp jaw and defined forearms make me feel with the brand on his neck.
I try to imagine Reid in his demonized form—with barbed wings and claws and a tail. It doesn’t really compute.
“In your other classes, you’ll learn how and when and why to fight deviants,” Reid says. “Here, you’ll actually fight one.”
Some students shift around me. I hear a few intakes of breath. Not everyone here is taking Crowley’s Monster Identification class this semester. Some of them didn’t know that Reid was a demon. It’s not like his eyes are flashing red at the scent of hunter souls. He’s better trained than that.
“Find a partner and come down to the arena floor.”
Sophia quirks a brow at me. “Partners?”
“Sure.” I turn to Peter, who’s begun to sweat a little at his temples. Kitty’s already paired off with a girl behind us. “Why don’t you partner with Elliot?”
“Yeah.” Elliot grins, biceps flexing. “I promise not to crush your glasses.”
“I don’t wear glasses,” Peter mutters.
“Are you sure?” Elliot asks. “I feel like you should.”
“He’ll go easy on you,” I say, remembering how we sparred.
Elliot grasps Peter by the shoulders and leads him down to the arena floor. “I’m a gentle giant. Scout’s honor.”
We stomp down after them and pair off. Reid strolls past the groups to give each a slip of black fabric. When he gets to Sophia and me, he hands one to her without looking in my direction.
“As hunters,” he says to the class, “you’re gifted with heightened hearing, sense of smell, agility, and one hell of a gut instinct.
To hone those senses, you can’t rely only on what you see.
We’ll start with one member of each pairing blindfolded at a time.
For those without the blindfold, remember this is sparring.
Don’t go straight for the tap out. Give your partner a chance to adjust to their new senses. ”
I raise a pitying brow at Sophia. I’ll go easy on you, pookie. She shakes her head like Don’t you dare.
“All right, blindfolds on,” Reid commands. “Get to it. And no weapons.”
Sophia groans beside me. “This is so fucking dumb. When am I going to fight a demon blindfolded?”
“I’ll do it,” I tell her with a laugh, taking the fabric from her hands. I bend over to stretch my back before tying the strip over my eyes. The chilly morning winks out into pitch-darkness.
“You ready?” she asks. Without my sight, her voice takes on a more sultry, feminine rasp. I’m picking up on the pitch of her breathing, the shuffle of footsteps beside me, the sound of Peter’s pained grunt, Reid’s low chuckle…
“Gimme a sec,” I breathe.
This is actually harder than I thought it would be. I try to focus. My meditation app mocks me from my phone. Maybe my dad was onto something with that.
“Any day now, huntress,” Reid drawls. The low register of his voice slides up the nape of my neck. I shake my shoulders out until I’ve cleared him from my senses, and then I leap at Sophia, fists raised.
The sound of her exhale guides me left. I listen closely as her feet slide over the arena’s pebbled floor. Dust kicks up in her wake and filters into my nose, the scent of chalk masking dried blood. Demon blood, maybe. Like Elliot’s brothers said. Just flecks of iron now, after all these years.
My instincts send me ducking low as Sophia’s fist flies overhead. I can hear her grunt when she misses me like it’s being broadcast into my ear canal. I can taste her sweat in the air.
Somewhere, I can hear a student asking Reid a question.
When he doesn’t answer, the kid asks again.
“Sure,” he says. He sounds distracted, his voice pointed in my direction. He’s watching me.
I dodge Sophia’s next blow and swing my fist where I sense her hair rippling in the wind. I only make contact with the strands.
She laughs behind me. “You look like you’re going after a pinata without the stick.”
But when I drive my fist toward the sound of her voice, I catch her in the solar plexus. I remember her shirt barely covers her navel when my knuckles smack toned abs and the edge of a belly ring. “How does it feel to be my pinata?”
“Not excellent,” she groans.
Somewhere behind us, Reid growls to a student, “You think this is funny?” The low, rumbling fury in his voice renders both Sophia and me still.
“I’m a hunter,” some kid responds to him. “I’m taking any advantage I can get, right?”
I lift the blindfold from my eyes and the unfiltered sun blinds me. I squint and blink until I feel less like an ant under a magnifying glass, and the coliseum comes back into view.
Only then do I see Reid towering over Matt. In Reid’s iron grip is the handle of a switchblade, and on the ground, Matt’s sparring partner is clutching her bloody, dripping fingers.
“You knifed your blinded classmate through the hand.”
“She should’ve seen me coming.”
Sophia and I sigh in tandem. Hunters.
Reid nods to himself, taking in Matt’s words. Then he hands him back the knife as well as the blindfold. “So you should have no issue seeing me coming.”
Matt lifts his hands in defense. “Well—”
“No,” Reid cuts him off. “Not a question.”
When Matt takes his time standing up, Reid barks, “Hurry up.”
No one resumes their sparring. In fact, a bit of a circle has formed around Matt and Reid, as if they’re about to have a schoolyard tussle.
“Put the blindfold on and take me down,” Reid instructs Matt.
“Can’t really without my silver.”
Matt’s a prick, but I don’t totally disagree with the sentiment. My aeon blood has begun to pump and whirl. I want in on this fight.
Reid doesn’t smirk. His cheeks don’t redden in fury. He takes another blindfold from his back pocket and ties it across his own forehead. Before he slides it down over his eyes, he orders, “Take me down.”
Once they’re both blindfolded, Matt sniffs the air like a dog, nostrils flaring as he tries to pick up Reid’s scent.
He flexes his fingers and then coils them into fists, adjusts his stance, and charges.
But it’s all wrong. He’s barreling too fast toward his moving target.
He’s doing the opposite of the lesson—he isn’t using any of his senses.
It happens so fast I could cough and miss it: Reid moves out of his way with ease, catches Matt by the scruff of his neck like a newborn puppy, lifts him up, and slams him down to the arena floor with a bone-crunching smack.
Sophia physically jolts at the sound. Kitty’s and her sparring partner’s eyes both widen in awe. Peter and Elliot behind us make twin sounds of sympathetic agony. Ouch.