Chapter 17 Sylas #2
Velra shifted on her seat to face him. “I know you’re stressed with news of this unknown threat, and not knowing what’s going on with your mom’s sudden return to supernatural politics, but Kelsana isn’t the threat you’re making her out to be.
You know that. You and I have both lacked help with our hybrid natures, and although she’s pure Dark Fae, she needs that kind of guidance with her power.
She feels out of control, lost. She came to me just now and swallowed down her pride and displayed a lot of vulnerability.
Do you think that was easy for her to do?
She’s obviously trying to change, to better herself.
How can we begrudge her that? How can we begrudge anyone that, Lazriel? ”
He ground his jaw.
Then he looked out at me, a mixture of restrained frustration and adoration for her sweet and compassionate words flickering in his eyes.
He sighed, then told her, “Well, if you’re gonna be all mature and reasonable about it, what leg do I have to stand on, huh?”
She smiled and laid her hand on his thigh.
“You’re not all wrong. You have strong instincts.
And I love how much you care about me and Sylas, how this reaction is coming from a safeguarding place.
But it can prevent you from seeing the good sometimes too.
” She winced. “Just like me with not bringing the fun very often and getting bogged down in the negative and the fear.”
“Wow, when you put it like that, we’ve got a whole lot of messiness between us, don’t we?”
“Anyone who’s learning to grow and better themselves, make connections, does,” I assured him.
“Yeah, I guess. But thank goodness we found each other. Really fucking lucky there, weren’t we?”
I chuckled.
Velra laughed too and patted his thigh, before eyeing the clock high up on the wall over the food service stations. “We better get to our classes.”
As Lazriel rose to his feet, I grasped his hand, my red magic flaming briefly. He jolted from the sudden warmth it would have caused him.
“What was that?”
“A scent-muting spell.” I gestured at his now empty whiskey glass. “To mask that before we get to class.”
“This professor is meant to be a chill, down-to-earth guy. I doubt he’d care.”
“He’s a Guest Lecturer from the Unity Council.”
Dropping your guard around anybody connected to the higher echelons of supernatural governance was never a good idea. Case in point being yours truly.
“All right, yeah. Well, thanks.”
“You’re welcome,” I responded, letting the clipped way he’d said that slide.
For now.
Velra and I cleared away our dishes with our magic, returning our trays to the service station area, and then the three of us made our way out, Velra and Lazriel slinging their messenger bags over their shoulders as they went.
Lazriel was back in his full black-on-black tactical gear look, his bag his favorite forest-green.
But Velra wasn’t in her normal black leather corset and pants.
She looked much more relaxed, open, and even approachable through forgoing her usual armor in a midnight-black top that clung to her shoulders in a sculpted off-the-shoulder cut, paired with fitted violet jeans and a thick leather belt.
Her bag was a checkered purple and black edgy design.
Things were shifting for her.
She even leaned into me, then Lazriel, and gave us each a kiss on the cheek, before she made a left down the corridor toward her class, wherein Lazriel and I took a right toward ours.
“Want to tell me what’s going on with you?
What’s had you resorting to drinking spelled whiskey in order to take the edge off?
Something you told me previously that you used to do in the past during times of stress and extreme upset in order to mute your bloodlust and the wrath of the wolf when emotional stress threatened to destabilize you? ”
He didn’t answer at first.
His boots struck the polished floor with heavy, deliberate thuds, his jaw set like he was grinding thoughts between his molars.
“I’m fine,” he finally muttered. “I’ll be fine. Just adjusting to this threat situation. Another fucking one coming my way.”
“You’re not in it alone. You don’t just have your mom now either. Velra is here. I’m here. It will be resolved. Of that I have absolutely no doubt. So, it has me wondering whether that’s actually all that’s causing this reaction in you?”
When he said nothing, I went to reach for him, but he batted my hand away.
I rounded him, forcing him to pull up short. “Tonight. Before I go to see Velra regarding the Death Sense spell, you’ll come to my dorm room.”
“What? That’s not—”
“It’s been days of this from you. I’m done with it.
Tonight we have it out. Whatever it is, we’ll discuss it.
” I stepped closer, our chests brushing, making his breath hitch at the contact.
I wasn’t above it either. Like I said, it had been days with him in this piss-poor mood, so fucking had been off the table.
I was all for an angry fuck here and there, but he didn’t like the concept.
As much as I doubted he’d admit it, except when in the throes of pleasure, the connection was important to Lazriel.
He needed that, pure and untainted, during sex.
“Am I clear?” I ground out, my breath fanning over the side of his neck.
“Yes,” he breathed. “Fine.”
Fine. I hated when he said that.
“Good.”
I stepped back, then we turned off into our designated classroom for Inter-Realm Relations: Treaties and Cooperation.
Students were already arriving and taking their seats.
I led the way to a two-person desk in the far left corner of the room at the back, and Lazriel followed me over.
As I sank into my seat, I gritted my teeth when he dropped his bag on the table with an unnecessarily heavy thud.
“Are you looking forward to this class?” I asked him as he sank into his chair, then brought out his laptop with a brief burst of vampire speed, opening the lid, then even setting up and titling a new document for this class in split-seconds.
“Not really. It’s all theory. Nothing practical or physical to do.”
“Working the mind is still an act of physicality.”
He snorted, despite his moody state. “That’s so you.”
“That it is, wolfie.”
He laughed, fighting to stop himself and hide his smiling face, but failing beautifully.
Relief filled me that I’d managed to cut through the nasty tension and his awful mood.
Although, it would clearly only be temporary until we had it out properly later.
Fortunately, before it had chance to take root again, the professor walked in, kicking the door shut behind him as he went.
He swaggered down the gangway toward the front of the class, sipping from a large coffee cup.
He was wearing dark jeans rolled at the cuffs with a pair of scuffed boots.
A plain white T-shirt was layered with a gray button-down, the sleeves shoved up to his elbows.
His ears were more metal than skin with all the earrings hanging from them.
His black, shoulder-length hair was mussed up like he’d just rushed out of bed.
He leaned his hip against the desk at the front, and looked out at us as he sipped from his coffee, taking his sweet time before releasing a satisfied sigh, then putting the cup down on the edge of the desk.
Then he pushed his ass onto the surface.
“Lenos Caldrith. Sorcerer. Unity Council member. Been practicing for ninety-years, so despite the mid-20’s youthful exterior you’re all seeing, I’ve got some experience under my belt.
So, rest assured, you’re in excellent hands.
” He executed a hand flourish. “Call me Lenos. Formalities aren’t my thing.
” He smiled. “Works out well that I’m coming in with that attitude considering the dry material we’ll be covering in this class.
What are they calling it….” He snapped his fingers and a document levitated before him.
The class syllabus. “Ah, right, dry title too. Inter-Realm Relations: Treaties and Cooperation.”
Hmm. He was certainly an interesting character.
More than that. He was perhaps somebody I could actually work with.
When the time was right.
I wasn’t quite ready yet. Things weren’t in place.
Suffice to say, I wasn’t just continuing on with my vigilante activities on the down low for the sake of it, or for some adrenaline high, or to play judge, jury, and punisher like Ryker had believed.
I wasn’t that short-sighted.
I always had a plan.
And this was no exception.
It had just been a long time in the making due to the nature of it.
“This class isn’t about history. It’s about fallout,” Lenos went on. “Power vacuums. Backroom deals. People who smile while rewriting your rights. We’re talking about how inter-realm cooperation has been used to broker peace, rewrite oppression—and the darker and more complex side to all of this.”
He shifted on the desk until he was sitting cross-legged on top of it.
“The Dracoryn Realm just suffered through a civil war, the results of which extend beyond the confines of that realm. There are draconic expatriates being assisted by the Shifter Stabilization Unit, territorial alterations. There has been fallout from the Severance, issues with the Dark Fae Realm with their refusal to outlaw free-will-violating magic. A whole lot. And all of that is in the here and now. That is what you need to be aware of, not some look back at history, but the current state of things and the complications that come along with managing it. The processes, the high-level decision-making and policy development.” He winked.
“We’ll have no fools here. Be informed. Be aware. Be prepared.”