8. Scythe
Chapter 8
Scythe
A s the morning sun rises over Animus Academy, Marduk and I stare at the bodies of the five dead guards, lying sprawled on the grass before us.
“It could’ve been worse,” Marduk says, exhaling a puff of smoke from his joint into the blood-stained air, before offering it to me.
I decline it with a shake of my head.
Even with the protections made from my regina’s tears that keep the hallucinations away, I might have been driven mad by the knowledge that my regina has stolen away from me. Of her commanding my brothers and me not to follow her.
I had no choice but to sink into my psychopathic shark.
Ice cold, calculating, and in no need for the calming effect of an alpha-grade joint.
“Marduk?” Minnie’s voice shrieks across the school grounds like a javelin. “ Marduk! ”
The Caspian tiger is already striding towards the little tigress, suddenly protective and alert. “Regina,” he says attentively.
I turn to watch a furious Minnie jogging towards us, in a purple tracksuit, pink curls wild from a sleepless night. Yeti strides behind her, his pale face tight and unhappy.
“Where is Lia?” Minnie demands, pointing angrily at us both, one at a time. “And where is Savage? Raquel is saying he killed school guards last night! Someone better tell me what the Goddess-damned plan is before I lose my shit completely!” Minnie’s aura pulses a faint red-tinged orange as she plants her tiny fists on her hips.
Marduk reaches for his regina, but Minnie slaps his hand away before looking to me. The tiger makes an affronted sound in his throat, but Minnie isn’t giving him the time of day. She tries not to look at the mangled bodies behind me, blinking sudden tears away as she does what many beasts cannot: stares me dead in the eye. “Scythe?” she swallows. “Where is she?”
“Minnie.” I say flatly. “Did my regina ever give you any indication of her plans?”
She blinks, the question unexpected. Her eyes search the air in thought, but then her face becomes stormy, and she raises a finger at me. “ You left.”
Behind the cold, a faint pain threatens to pierce my heart. I deserve that. Deserve to feel the full brunt of that agony. But not now.
“I know,” I say. “But I have returned for her. And she surrendered to the enemy. She has been taken.”
Minnie appraises me and seems to understand that human Scythe has been put away.
She nods carefully before pinching her nose. “I had no bloody idea. She never let anything on. After you left, she, well…” She crosses her arms. “She was in a state. Understandably. But none of us could have guessed she’d give herself up.” For the first time, I hear Minnie growl in her throat. “And with Xander’s help, no less. Goddess, I want to kill that dragon! He saw what it did to me when Titus—” Infinite pain flashes across her face. “He fucking saw!”
Yeti places a hand on her shoulder as tears stream down Minnie’s face and she angrily wipes them away with her sleeve.
All I can do is watch the three mates huddle together as that fresh wound within me burns like hellfire. My shark thrashes and I crack my neck to relieve the tension. Marduk turns from comforting his mate to glance at me warily.
What Marduk has with his regina is denied to me. I am unable to comfort Aurelia, unable to serve her and kiss her tears away. No doubt she is shaken from the severing. No doubt she is raging from the betrayal.
And I am forbidden to go to her.
Ice cold thoughts filter through my mind. Plans. Projections. Deaths that are needed. Blows that need to be made.
“And where is Savage?” Minnie sniffs. “She wouldn’t want him to be acting like this.” She jerks her chin to the bodies behind me.
“It’s time for a meeting.” Even to me, my voice sounds like death.
We hear Savage well before we enter the underground rocky cavern. It’s the same one Lyle had previously used to cage us, what seems like a lifetime ago now. My wolf brother rages within the central electrified cage, the sizzle of electricity and scent of burnt wolf’s flesh saturating the air.
Minnie rushes into the cavern after me, before a gasp stops her dead. “He’s half-shifted?”
Marduk and Yeti protectively flank their regina as she wanders forward in horrified awe.
I, too, survey my brother, except a sadistic smile twitches at my lips. It pleases me that his love for our regina is on full display in this maddened form.
Savage remains in his half-wolf form from last night, a rare and terrible state I’ve never seen in an animalia. His head is entirely wolf, black tufts extending down his neck and stopping at the bloody skin of his human chest. His upper arms are human, but more fur starts at his forearms before ending in his large, human hands. The same for his calves and feet. He’s torn off his formal evening clothes, leaving him unrestricted to blast powerful punches to the rock wall at the back of the cage. His growls and snarls fill the cavern, echoing around us in a cacophony of rage. He’s been going all night.
It’s a joy to see.
“Where is Mr Pardalia?” Minnie asks quietly.
“With the headmistress,” Marduk says quickly, passing me a look. “Meditating, perhaps.”
I’m doubtful of that. Once she’d seen the regina order written in phoenix flame, Celeste had advised Lyle, Savage and me to separate ourselves. As mates of the same pack with our regina taken, we are likely to descend into a feral hunt, urging each other on in the most animalistic way.
Savage had not taken kindly to any of it.
Minnie tentatively says his name.
My brother whirls around, baring his canines. “They have my regina!” he roars in a nightmarish primitive voice. Goosebumps erupt all over me.
Minnie flinches, but bravely steps forward and says in that gentle voice women use on pups. “I know.” Yeti and Marduk shadow her every movement. I step up next to Yeti, watching closely.
“They have my regina!” Savage roars again.
Minnie’s patience is apparently short-lived because she shouts back, “Yeah, and all of this—” She angrily waves her arms to indicate Savage’s body. “Is. Not. Helping !”
Savage’s jaws snap shut for a moment as he considers her. His hazel eyes are wild and feral.
“Pull yourself together, Savage!” Minnie continues shouting. “Because you’re not going to get her back acting the fool!”
Savage claws at his face, howling into the cavern ceiling. He falls to his knees, a whine escaping through sharp, sharp teeth. “I miss her,” he says softly, dropping to lie on his side in the fetal position. “I need her.”
“So do I,” Minnie huffs, stepping forward to crouch a safe distance from the steel bars. “But we can’t be feral and half-shifting and all that nonsense when we’ve got to use our thinking human brains, right?”
“She left me,” Savage whines. “Left us, Min. Why would she do that?”
A growl rumbles in my own chest. We have enemies to kill, torture, maim. We have allies to build. Bridges to burn.
Savage reflexively raises his wolf’s head to growl back at me. Minnie snaps her fingers to get his attention. “Less of that.”
A regina-command truly only works on a regina’s pack, but it does make the rest of us pay attention. Marduk and Yeti suddenly straighten.
“Can you shift back?” Minnie urges. “You’re going to scare people like this.”
“Good,” Savage says, dragging himself off the floor and to his feet. With what appears to be great effort, he sighs, before his wolf head shrinks and loses its fur. My brother’s handsome human face appears, hazel eyes glimmering with rage and malice. He finds my gaze and holds it. “Let them be scared.”
“Are you ready to work, brother?” I ask.
Savage snarls viciously in reply.