Chapter 6
Ilisten to the whispers of the other novices for what feels like an eternity before the final door closes and everyone is tucked into their rooms. The lights in the corridor are dim—perfect for slinking into the shadows when I ease from my chamber. I stride down the hall, heading toward one of the bathrooms stationed throughout the dorms, just in case I run into anyone.
It only takes me a few moments to reach the containment hall. At first, I was surprised when I noticed Ziv leading her this way, but after thinking about it, I’m actually relieved. Not only is the hall mostly vacant of other novices, but the walls and doors are reinforced. Typically, it’s to keep those confined inside from getting out, but it will also help make sure no one can get to her either, except me of course. A tiny crack is all I require. It never once dawned on me that there may be a reason he put her into that room, other than her own protection, but when I see the iron cages over the windows in the door and the heavy bolt holding it closed, I start to wonder if there’s more to my creature than I first imagined.
I slip into a corner and watch the hall for any signs that someone—namely Ziv—could still be around. When I’m met with only silence, I dematerialize, becoming a full shade. Clinging to the ceiling, I make my way down the corridor until I find her curled up on the bed, shivering.
It takes no effort to roll across the floor and ease myself under the very bed she’s lying on. The cool stone under my back tells me I’m once again corporeal, but it’s not the only sign. The sudden ache in my groin nearly has me letting out a groan, but I bite my lip to keep the sound from escaping.
My creature’s soft, even breaths tell me she’s sleeping. I think about slipping back into my shade form so I can watch her, but my fingers are already inching down my stomach and into my pants to fist my cock. My teeth sink even deeper into my lip, and the metallic tang of blood touches my tongue.
Knowing she’s within inches of me and having her scent surround me make it impossible to ignore the demands of my body. All it takes is one tight squeeze for a warm drip of liquid to trail down my cock, allowing my fingers to glide even better as I pump my fist hard and fast. My hips jerk off the floor, causing the tip of my cock to brush against the rough material of the mattress she’s on, and the sensation is enough to have me coming in thick ropes. I don’t stop until my skin is almost too sensitive, blurring the lines between pleasure and pain.
When my ass touches the ground again, I realize the fingers of my free hand are curled around the side of her mattress. As I snap my arm back, fearing I could have gotten too close to her, I hit my elbow on the floor, and it makes a loud thud. My curse that follows is silent, but my breathing is choppy. I just had the best orgasm of my life, but in doing so, I might have unintentionally touched my mate. My mate… The word echoes in my head with a certain finality, forcing me to accept the truth. No matter how much I would like to think otherwise, there is no other explanation for the pull my creature has over me.
Bitter anger fills my gut, making me feel even more hollow than I did before entering this room. How cruel must the Fates be to curse us with such a destiny? Mates are not exactly rare, but they aren’t common either. They are, however, to be treasured, cherished, and protected. Protection won’t be a problem, since I have the ability to end anyone who dares to threaten her, but forcing us to feel this connection without the ability to ever sate it is worse than brutal. How will I protect her from me and the pain she will be forced to endure because I won’t be able to care for her the way a mate should?
In that moment, I decide to keep our interactions to a minimum in an effort to shield her from knowing what we should be, so that only I will bear the certain knowledge and the torment fated for us.
I will be her silent protector, her personal shadow.
I sit straight up when a loud noise rouses me from a deep sleep. It takes a heartbeat for my blurry eyes to adjust to my unfamiliar surroundings. The events of yesterday come flooding back to me—walking up the mountain, eventually losing consciousness, waking up in the school, Ziv, food, and sleep. Just as I’m trying to skip over everything that happened once he showed me to my room, the loud noise comes again, and I hop off the bed and back toward the wall. I now know where the sound came from—the door. Someone is trying to break it down, or at the very least make me think they are.
I’m tempted to ignore it and pretend I can’t hear the loud rapping, but I have little doubt whoever it is will just give up and go away. I ease closer, grab the chair positioned under the desk, and move it silently over to the door, then I climb up to look out the little window.
The face staring back at me startles me so much, I let out a yelp and scramble off the chair, nearly falling on my butt in the process. Ziv doesn’t look happy. I jerk the chair away, then twist the knob holding the lock in place. The door swings open in the next second, but this time, I’m smart enough to jump back and avoid being clobbered.
“Sorry,” I say the moment he ducks through the door.
He lifts his head and sniffs a few times, as if scenting the air, then his shrewd gaze lands on me. “You had company,” he states, tossing a bundle of things onto the bed. I watch as he does a double take of the mattress, and his lips thin into hard lines.
“No,” I answer truthfully, even though I know it won’t matter much. My father never believed me when I told him the truth. I back up until my shoulders hit the wall behind me, preparing for Ziv to scream in my face the way my father always did. His silvery eyes miss nothing as he turns his head to assess me. The furrowing of his brow now matches the tightness of his pinched mouth. My heart thunders in my chest. Ziv is easily twice the size of my father and much more intimidating. Try as I might, I don’t think I’m hiding the fact that he’s scaring me. The back of my throat is dry from my quickened breathing, and I’m sure it would only take one glance to see the thud of my heart against my ribs.
“Why did you take so long to open the door, little flower?” His words are spoken softly, yet I don’t feel comforted by that fact.
“I was sleeping. I’m sorry.”
Ziv’s eyes roam over me, and the stiff set of his shoulders eases just the tiniest bit. I don’t trust the response to be genuine. My father often tried to put me at ease right before he lost his shit. The male turns his back to me and flips up the bare mattress, causing it to sail across the room and crash into the wall.
All I can think is thank the gods that wasn’t me. The bundle he tossed on the bed is now strewn about the floor as well. My fingers twitch to clean up the mess, but I can’t force the rest of me to move. I’m too frightened to get closer to him. Hell, I have to remind myself just to breathe because that feels almost dangerous in the moment.
Ziv isn’t even breathing hard, it’s as if the action cost him nothing. I glance at the door, wondering if there’s any chance I could beat him to it and run. I know the answer before the question fully forms. Even if I could get out of the room before him, there’s no way I could outrun him, not even if my life depended on it, and it may. It’s hard to imagine I thought I had a crush on him last night, when today, I’m worried about him crushing me.
Just as I’m about to look away from my one chance at reprieve, I notice black smoke uncurling along the floor and easing into the room like a poisonous gas. I open my mouth to speak, to warn Ziv, but before I can utter a syllable, he’s standing in front of me, blocking my view and rearranging my thoughts again. It’s sad that I notice he smells good.
“Demon,” Ziv grates out slowly. I’m not certain, but I think he’s addressing the smoke. When the inky black tendrils reach his feet, Ziv snaps down to grab the smoke but comes up empty.
I inch along the wall, trying to get away from both entities, just as Ziv produces a black blade and slices through the smoky shadow like butter as it attempts to coil around his leg. The sound the creature makes has me ducking my head and covering my ears to hide from the strangled wail.
“Try that again, and I’ll kill you, novice or not,” Ziv threatens.
The smoke starts to retreat but changes course quickly and heads straight for me. I don’t even get the chance to release a scream before someone stands in front of me again, only this time, it’s not Ziv. This is going from bad to worse really quickly.
“We need to talk.” The male in front of me nearly snarls at Ziv. I’m more than happy to let this play out between them and get the hell out of this room, the only problem is, I don’t want to draw attention to myself by trying to escape or asking them to take their issues somewhere else. I start inching along the wall again, but my heel hits something on the floor, causing a pain filled gasp to escape me. I slam both of my hands over my mouth, like that could somehow erase the sound, but it doesn’t. The male in front of me turns his head to look over his shoulder at the same time Ziv leans to the side to get a better view of me. Neither of them looks happy, but both of their eyes are trained on my foot—the source of the pain. I don’t dare look down, even though I can feel blood dripping from my foot. I should have kept my boots on, but I wanted to let the blisters breathe and dry up.
“Sorry,” I say again, because I have no idea what else to say.
“Your foot is bleeding,” the male with the blue skin states distractedly. I don’t think quickly enough to assess his teeth, but I happen to know Ziv’s teeth are very sharp—perfect for blood drinking. I probably just made things worse. Let’s hope neither of them go into a frenzy.
Without looking away from them, I bring my knee up and cup my hand over the cut on my heel. I wince a little from the pressure, but I need to stop the bleeding. “Sorry.” I sound like a parrot.
“Stop apologizing.” Ziv angles closer, barely paying the other male any attention now. Great, they stopped acting like they are going to kill each other, but now the focus is on me again. I really suck at getting myself out of danger. “Sit down…on the bed.” He adds the second part quickly, as if he knew I was planning on lowering myself to the floor.
I’m not comfortable taking my eyes off either of them, but I really need to watch where I’m walking if I don’t want to get cut again. I dart my eyes down and see the plate I left on the bed next to me last night. It must have broken when Ziv flipped the mattress, and I just happened to be lucky enough to step on a thick shard. Glancing up again, I note neither of the males have moved. They seem to be waiting for me. I’m going to have to drop my foot if I want to get to the bed frame, but I’m reluctant. What if that’s all it takes for one of them to pounce? I don’t think I would like Ziv taking a bite out of me the way he bit the meat last night, but there was something intriguing about…
I shake my head to get rid of those useless thoughts and release my foot at the same time. My hand is smeared with bright red blood, but neither of them attack, so I take it as a good sign. With measured movements, I shuffle sideways, not picking up my feet so if there’s still glass, I’m less likely to actually step on it.
Once I reach the bed, I lower myself gingerly to balance on the side rail. The throb in my foot intensifies, but it’s nothing I can’t manage.
“Are you going to check her foot?” the blue-skinned male asks.
Ziv spares him a quick glance, then kneels before me. “It’s fine,” I tell him before he can get a look at my foot. His silvery eyes meet mine, swirling fast enough that I feel a little dizzy after staring for a heartbeat. When I break the connection, I agree, “Okay,” without him needing to say a word.
“Why don’t you make yourself useful and get a binding?” Ziv barks over his shoulder.
“If you didn’t toss her room like a prison guard, it never would have happened in the first place. Why don’t you fetch a healer?”
“That won’t work, you know…” Ziv trails off, then makes a point of looking at the male he called a demon.
“Why not?” the demon questions suspiciously.
“Never mind, grab me that.” Ziv nods toward some of the fabric he brought with him when he came into the room. It’s hard to believe that was only a few minutes ago.
The other male snaps his arm out to do as instructed, then he tosses it toward us. Ziv reaches out and snags it out of the air without even having to look. Using his teeth to hold the fabric, he rips it into a long strip before I even have a chance to see what it was.
He looks up at me with what could be sympathy and offers, “Make sure to tell me if I get it too tight.”
I nod, and he very carefully begins wrapping my foot, covering my heel, and looping the material around my ankle several times in the same pattern. The pressure is uncomfortable but not unbearable, so I keep my mouth shut while he works, tucking the end of the fabric into the binding when he’s finally done. I watch as he plants his hands on the tops of his thighs, then looks around the ruined room. His lips twist in a strange way I can’t quite read before he lets out a huff and rises to his full height.
“Kage and I have some business. I’ll return with some salve to make sure your foot doesn’t get infected, and then…I’ll clean up this mess.” The last part is spoken softly, as if he is reluctant to say it out loud.
I suspected the demon was the male from my memory and the hall, but hearing his name confirms it. It’s on the tip of my tongue to say something to him, maybe thank him for taking me to the school when I wasn’t able to get there on my own, but I flounder for words. It feels weird to make this more about me when they clearly have a history, or at the very least business between them, like Ziv said.
Both of them are out the door before I muster up the courage to utter a word, and I sag in relief.