Chapter 26
Terra
Acold breeze draws in from the headmaster’s study.
I shiver and make a face at Raine. He smirks at me and nudges my shoulder with his. “No backing out now, babe. We need to see what he’s hiding in here,” he murmurs softly as he lets his Shadow slowly seep from his fingertips and unlocks the third door we’ve had to get through in order to get this far.
This is why I shouldn’t have told him about the headmaster stealing hearts. Raine is too curious and reckless just to ignore these sorts of things.
“I didn’t think we’d actually go looking for the hearts. It’s probably more metaphorical, anyway. I doubt there are literal hearts in jars in there,” I whisper as I glance uneasily over my shoulder for the hundredth time.
The lock clicks and Raine shoves the door open. I glare at him for being so loud but all that earns me is a silent laugh from him. I do appreciate him trying to cheer me up though; Edgar has been weighing heavily on my mind since he attacked me a few days ago. Arthur pushed our private lesson to today so I had time to recollect my mind.
“Let’s see,” Raine murmurs as he steps through. I follow behind him and shut the door quietly behind us.
The headmaster’s study is dimly lit with black candles that have almost completely burned out. A long desk takes up the space in the center of the room. Old papers, candles, pens, and books lie scattered. He and Elias share that habit.
Raine searches the wall of books while I take to searching Emerai’s desk, pulling out the heavy drawers, not entirely sure what we’re looking for when it comes to the hearts. I find a few notes to compare to the one we found in the library and quickly cross him off the list.
“Hey, come here,” Raine whispers after several minutes have passed.
I close the last drawer and walk to his side. “What’d you find?”
The shelves are dusty and the oak is warped from moisture. The books are arranged neatly in comparison to the mess on the headmaster’s desk. Raine points to a gap between the tops of the books and the shelf above where an inch of space is visible.
“What?” I ask again.
“Look closely.” Raine moves over so I can stand where he is. I narrow my eyes at the space. It’s dark, but there’s a glint of something in the next room. “A secret room behind a shelf? That seems too obvious,” I say hesitantly.
Raine smiles and shrugs. “Tacky or not, we should check it out.”
We each take up a side of the bookshelf and move it out far enough so we can slip inside. The room is cold, the kind that feels drafty and ominous.
It’s too dark to see anything besides glinting from glass or something reflective across the room.
“I don’t like this,” I whisper.
Raine ignores me. He leans down and inspects something close. I watch him so intently that when hands softly land on my shoulders, I yelp.
“Terra, it’s only me,” Arthur says lightly.
Raine stands quickly, his eyes wide with fear.
“It’s okay, it’s Arthur,” I tell him and he settles a bit, keeping his stern glare on his face. My beautiful Raine is so untrusting.
Arthur flicks his fingers and lights turn on above us. It’s still rather dim; they only illuminate the center of the room, leaving the shelves and walls in the dark.
“What are you two doing here, might I ask?” Arthur says in his calm, level voice. My eyes linger over his sharp jaw and I look away when amusement flashes across his gaze.
Raine answers, “You’ll have to torture it out of me, Fernestian.”
Arthur chuckles, which only fuels Raine’s hate fire more. I intervene. “Elias said something curious about the headmaster collecting hea?—”
The light around us darkens in the blink of an eye and Arthur presses his warm palm softly against my lips.
“Don’t say it here,” Arthur says with dread permeating his expression. His dark hair falls over his forehead and touches my nose. My heartrate rises; his lips are mere inches from mine.
“Why?” I ask with bated breath.
Arthur smooths his hand gently over my throat and down to my collarbone. His gray eyes linger on my lips as he slowly shakes his head. “Many ears in Alkrose lend themselves to the headmaster.”
Raine’s face sullens and he uncrosses his arms. “Where does the headmaster keep them?”
The air is heavy and thick as Arthur regards us in silence. “The headmaster consumes them. There is nothing to find,” he says matter-of-factly and lowers his chin. “Now, let us leave before Emerai returns.”
I stare at Arthur’s empty expression. I don’t quite believe him, but we follow him as he guides us quietly out of the headmasters study. We stop at the bottom of the stairs on the second floor and I look at Raine.
“You go ahead. I have a tutoring session with Arthur,” I say with a weak smile.
Raine furrows his brows and looks from me to the instructor before dipping his head. “Fine. Don’t forget to meet us in the courtyard after supper though. Finn, Aervin, and Kai will be expecting us.”
I follow Arthur as he saunters to one of the classrooms down the hall. He waves me in first and shuts the door behind us, then selects one of the window seats that line the south wall of the class and pats the space next to him with a bleak grin. Warm orange sunlight drips over him, welcoming all the hollow parts of his cheeks. I yearn to touch his handsome face, to draw lines with my fingers over every valley where his flesh meets bone.
I curl myself into the arched space and pull my legs close to my chest. He watches me and cocks his head to the side. His soft lips draw up into a smile. Being this close to him beckons a desire from so deep within that I’m not sure if it is mine or my Shadow’s.
“What is it that runs rampant through your mind, Terra?”
I study his gaze and all I find is kind endearment. I hesitate, but say slowly, “Edgar… He’s never been a violent person, but I don’t know how we can ever face one another again.”
Arthur’s expression remains blank. “He has certainly created a rift between you, hasn’t he?”
I grit my teeth and bury my face in my knees. “I don’t know what to do.”
He leans forward, pulling his knees up to his chest as well and resting his head on his forearms. “I’m remorseful to say I’m at a loss as well. I would tell you if I knew how to stop Sully. I promise you that.” He speaks properly but his gaze is anything but.
I stare down at the academy towers beneath us. The courtyard is out of view from here, but the lake stretches almost out of eyesight along with the fog that lingers around the grounds today.
“Terra.”
I break my thoughts and look up at Arthur. “Hm?”
“The technique I plan on teaching you today might get a bit… involved. I’ve heard you aren’t foreign to it since you’ve been in Kallos’s class.”
A light laugh rolls easily from my lips. “I won’t lie and say I didn’t expect something of the sort. Close contact with other strong Shadows makes Amser… intense.”
He laughs with me, a joyous and simple sound that could easily live in my head forever.
Arthur is in his mid-twenties. Looking at him, sitting with his knees up and so lax, he looks nothing more than a young man who wishes to study, read, and be at peace. I’ve always thought he looked tired, but staring at him now, eyes dreary with maroon blush that paints his lower eyelids, I’d say he’s been tired since long before we met. I wish I could take that away from him.
“What?” he asks with a warm smile that breaks my heart. He looks at me like he can wait centuries and longer if need be. Patience and understanding flicker across his old soul.
“I was just admiring your devotion to whatever it is that keeps you awake at night—do you not sleep well?” I ask with a sympathetic grin.
He perks his head up a little as if he’s surprised I noticed. Then he looks away, staring longingly into the dim room, at ghosts perhaps. He doesn’t respond as he shifts and stands. I watch him curiously as he walks to the center of the room, turns, straightens into a polite posture with one hand behind his back, and offers me the other. His black hair falls beautifully around his shoulders and my heart aches to run my fingers through it.
I oblige and meet him in the middle of the classroom, slipping my hand over his. “What are we doing?” For a moment, a rather silly one, I let myself think he’s going to dance with me.
Arthur grins and closes his hand around mine. “I’m going to teach you a useful technique for the exam, remember?” A dark flicker flashes across his eyes and I swallow hard as his Shadow tugs viciously at mine. I sink my teeth into my lower lip to keep from moaning at the divinity of it. Stronger than Kallos’s, softer than Elias’s. Arthur’s lips twitch at the sensation, but he remains expressionless. “This is called Shadow leeching. It is the act of borrowing another’s strength by leeching parts of their Shadow.”
A dizzy spell falls over me as his Shadow siphons mine like a glass of water and I fall forward. It feels as if his Shadow has sucked the life from my veins. Arthur catches me, his hand still clasped tightly over mine. He lowers us to the floor in one fluid motion.
“I just leeched some of your time magic,” he says in a low tone. My blood chills. I feel so helpless like this. Amser doesn’t answer my call, as if it’s muted inside me. “Now, I want you to take some of mine. Draw it in, and once you can feel it building inside you, cut it off from the rest of me.”
I stare at him incredulously. “I have no idea how to even begin to do that.”
He chuckles and helps me stand back up. “Just think of it like sucking in water from a straw.”
My brows crease and I can’t help but smile. “A straw, huh?”
Arthur looks confused for a second before his eyes narrow at me. “You’ve been spending too much time with Elias, I see,” he says with an eye roll. “Go on, then, give it a try.”
I shut my eyes and focus on the sensation of our Shadows, trying to draw his into me but finding no luck. Letting out a sigh, I release his hand. “It’s not working.”
He stares at me in thought and then steps closer, pressing our chests together and leaning me back over a desk until I’m lying flat over the surface. The wood groans against the tile as he lets his weight burden me. Every fiber of my being lights up and I’m hyper aware of every inch where his body is against mine.
I study his beautiful face gazing down at mine. He tries to mask it with indifference, but a well of kindness and warmth he’ll never allow anyone to know peeks through.
“Try again. Focus, Terra. There will be worse things to distract you in the exam than me,” he murmurs against my neck. His lips are warm and a shudder spreads throughout my body.
Somehow I fucking doubt that.What is more distracting than your professor pushing you back on top of a desk in an empty classroom? My Shadow’s presence grows stronger with my increased heartrate and I take shallow breaths as Arthur’s warm ones heat my skin.
I try again, focusing on his Shadow and where it dallies around mine. It slowly draws closer and when I feel it entering my bones, I gasp, losing my hold on it.
Arthur straightens himself, quirking his mouth in disappointment. “I was sure that would work.” He presses his hand to his mouth in thought.
I lie back on the desk, staring at the ceiling as I relish in that sensation. It wasn’t like anything I’ve felt with Elias or Raine, nor Kallos or Finn.
How can something hurt yet contain so much subtle pleasure? All-consuming and not all simultaneously.
“Arthur, what was that feeling? Did you feel it too when you took my Shadow?” I lift my head when he doesn’t respond.
His eyes flick to me like he’s only now hearing me. “Hm? Oh, yes, I did.”
That’s not enough. I press him. “What was it? You’re not my mate and yet, every time you touch me, I feel… lonely.”
His eyes drift to the floor. “Lonely, huh? That’s not how I would?—”
“Not lonely in the moment we’re together, but all those that follow. In the seconds you touch me, I’m filled with longing and so much sorrow… but after we part, I’m utterly lonely. Is that how you feel too?” I ask, desperate to know I’m not the only one.
His weary eyes meet mine again and he nods.
“I told you, time and memory are old friends. Never together, never apart. Always lonely,” he mutters sorrowfully.
I sit up and take his hand. “That’s dreadfully sad. Who says that’s how they have to be? Why can’t they be in harmony?”
His eyes turn cold and distant, his lips paler than they were a moment ago. He mutters softly, “I say so.”
“That’s quite cruel, don’t you think? Who are you to force this tragic feeling upon us?” My voice is husky with the emotions building inside me. I can’t stand to be this close to him for this long. The desire to consume him claws at my soul. His presence alone is familiar.
Every inch of this man cries out to be touched—felt and kissed. It’s unbearable to breathe the same air as he does. I turn, needing to put distance between us before I do something stupid.
As I turn my head he catches my neck, hand sprawled out over my jaw as he pulls my attention back to him. His fingers dig into my skin and splay across my throat in a tight hold.
My heart skips a beat and I hold my breath, eyes widening. Before I can make much sense of what’s happening, Arthur’s lips are against mine. His scent of old pages and comforting tea spills into me. I whimper as he pulls me in closer, loosening his grip around my neck and sliding his hand into my hair. He kisses me as if he’s been thinking of my lips for a very long time—kisses me as if he has before.
Such a starved, carnal man. Lovely and lonesome.
He’s made my heart realize what loneliness is too. And I consume his demanding kisses just as viciously.
His other hand wraps around my waist and he lifts me up, carrying me toward the front of the classroom. I pull away from his lips as he sets me down on top of the long desk. My lips part to say how insane this is but his mouth is back on mine and he lowers his frame over me.
Elias might have to make room for another man in my life.
Our Shadows tangle hopelessly and my heart yearns for Arthur.
He deepens the kiss, parting my lips with his tongue. I wrap my arms around his chest and let my fingers explore his toned back, every curve where his muscles dip into the bones beneath and sculpt his perfect form. He lets out a low moan as my hands come back around his waist and I trace his hip bones with my fingertips.
Arthur breaks our kiss and inhales deeply. “We should stop.”
“You started it,” I murmur against his lips and he sets his forehead against the desk with a groan. “Best we don’t get caught though. I’m not sure what Elias will think.”
Arthur lifts his head back up and looks at me. This close, his eyes don’t look quite gray. They almost have an ashy-green hue to them. “Elias doesn’t own you. Don’t let him be delusional enough to think that he does. You’re more than all of us, Terra.” He pauses, looking down at my lips, swollen from our brutal kisses. “Now, do you want to learn the technique or not? Take part of my Shadow.” Arthur lowers his lips back to mine and I try to focus on the Shadows inside us and not the hard bulge in his pants pressing against my core.
I thread my fingers through his hair and focus on how wispy and dark it is. Slowly, I draw his Shadow within me once more. This time I’m ready for the odd sensation that assaults my marrow and blends into my body. Amser circles around it, leaving a wide berth for it to fill.
Abruptly, all the focus I have vanishes. Arthur’s lips are trailing down my neck. He slowly unzips my jacket, pulling my shirt up and revealing my breasts. He looks up at me momentarily and murmurs against my nipple, “You’re going to lose it again if you don’t focus.”
His Shadow slips away from my hold and I’m honestly finding it hard to care right now. Arthur’s tongue is hot and wet as he strokes my tender skin over and over. I squirm beneath him and fist his hair.
He stops and I’m tempted to let him know I’ve bitten Elias’s dick for playing this very same game.
“I won’t continue unless you can learn this, Terra. It’s important that you know it for the exam,” he says in a perfectly annoying professor’s tone.
Somehow that turns me on more.
I manage to messily sever a part of his Shadow that I still have a hold on, and the moment I do, his tongue resumes and my back arches up into him. A breath that is not my own coils inside my lungs.
“Good, now your reward,” Arthur mumbles, lips gliding down my stomach. His fingers are warm and he easily unbuttons my pants, sliding them down and pulling my underwear with them.
I swallow hard. Is this really happening?
His gray eyes lift to mine before he dips down and starts stroking my core with his tongue. My head instantly drops back and I curl my fingers into the desk as I stifle an urgent moan.
Students are in the hallway walking past the door as Arthur devours me, lapping at my center like an impoverished soul. He yearns for me; I can feel it in the way he grips my hips greedily, demanding more. His strokes slow and he pushes two fingers inside me, pumping into me over and over until my eyes are rolling to the back of my skull and I’m squeezing his head between my knees.
“A-Arthur,” I cry softly.
He lifts his eyes and watches me as I moan his name and whimper beneath his hand and tongue. He nips lightly on my clit and this time I can’t keep quiet. I cry out and moan as I ride out the orgasm, grinding into his face as the last waves of the high settle and come crashing down.
Arthur presses a kiss on my inner thigh and stands, looking satisfied with the mess he’s made of me. He licks his lips and smooths out his hair while I pull my pants back up.
My cheeks are warm. There’s a blush across his too.
I think we just crossed a line that we can’t come back from.
“Shall we go practice in the forest now?” he says academically, completely dismissing the relations we just shared. I quirk a brow. “You took some of my Shadow, and I ought to show you how to use it, shouldn’t I?” He grins and offers me his hand like a gentleman. I take it and he helps me off the desk. Before letting my hand go he presses a kiss to the back of it. “You truly are a delight, Terra.”
I chuckle and look into his eyes. This close, I’m certain there’s a bit of green to them. Does he still have some sliver of his heart? “Arthur, what color were your eyes before they turned gray?”
He seems taken aback, pausing to think for a moment as if he’s forgotten.
“Green. Not emerald like your own, but a sage green. Dull but pleasant.” Arthur grins nostalgically.
“I have no doubt they were lovely. Your gray eyes are beautiful too, you know,” I say as I nudge him. He laughs and I find I’m taken with that as well.
“Let’s hurry. You still have to meet Raine and the others this evening.”
I find myself staring at the back of his head the entire way to the blight grounds, wondering what Arthur would be like if not for Alkrose.