Chapter 28 #2
“Well, for one, you just confirmed it with your reaction. Two, you would have just said Julian, because that was your tried and true answer before.”
Fuck. She had her there.
A rumble came from Felix’s throat. “Really? You went back multiple times to Julian and his punchable face?”
“Shut it, it was a mistake.”
“Mistake-ssss,” he said.
Avery ignored him and turned her attention back to Maya. Her cheeks burned. This conversation had veered into dangerous territory, and she needed to steer it somewhere, anywhere, else. “Okay, yes, fine, I’m seeing someone. But I can’t say who yet.”
“No need.” Maya held up her hand. “I already know who it is.”
Oh goddess. She knew. Panic ripped through her, every muscle locking up.
This was a trap. She was wearing some sort of recording device and was trying to call her out.
The theater in her mind played it all out.
Enforcers dragging Avery to the council chamber in chains or publicly burning her at the stake like her ancestors. Felix turned to ash.
“It’s that transfer student, isn’t it?” Maya said, raising her eyebrows over and over.
Avery blew out a breath, the panic draining so fast she felt dizzy. She got it half correct. More than half. Just missing a slight, tiny, crucial detail that she hooked up with a shifter. “Guilty,” she said through her teeth, an awkward smile plastered on her face.
“I knew it!” Maya said, getting up like a wobbly doe and pointing a long finger at her. “Why didn’t you tell me?” she said with a twinge of hurt in her voice.
Because I can’t! She wanted to scream. Instead, all she said was, “I’m sorry.”
Maya’s eyes softened. “You know you can always tell me anything, right? I’m not going to judge you.”
If only she knew. Bile rose in her throat, whether that was from the alcohol or the guilt; her stomach was churning.
“Do not tell her,” Felix said into her mind.
“I know,” Avery smiled, answering them both, but she didn’t meet either of their eyes.
She wanted to tell Maya everything; she wanted someone other than Felix to talk to about this insane week she had lived through.
To set her head straight. Or at least be able to just talk about it.
It would just be so nice to say: hey, I summoned a shifter with blood magic, bound him, and now I’m dreaming about fucking him into tomorrow.
Oh! And mother is keeping hundreds of trapped shifters underground. Pass the whiskey?
Avery was never good at keeping secrets. And the whiskey was absolutely not helping. She was the type who it physically hurt not to tell someone something. But even if she did tell Maya, and by the grace of the goddess, she didn’t turn her in or run screaming, Maya would be in danger.
“He’s sooo hot though,” Maya said drunkenly. “I just knew by the way he eye-fucked you in class that he had the hots for you.”
“Yeah, he’s pretty cute.”
“Cute? Later, I’ll show you fucking cute,” Felix said low, earning a shiver down her spine.
Her stomach fluttered at the promise, heat pooling low in her core.
The memory of his mouth, his shadows. The way he had touched her was divine, like he was truly worshipping her.
She had come so hard she had seen fucking stars.
It seemed hard to imagine it could get better than that, but something told her that they had barely started.
Avery needed to change the subject. “Okay, my turn. Weirdest thing you’ve ever done?”
Maya put her hands on her face and tilted her head in embarrassment. “Nooo, you’re gonna judge me.”
Avery choked on her whiskey as she drank it, laughing, some of it coming out of her nose. “Trust me, I will be the last person to judge you for anything.” Not when Avery’s secrets had secrets.
“Ugh, fine, just because I do not want to get more drunk than I am already,” Maya said.
Surely it couldn’t be that bad? It was Maya. Apart from the drinking, she was practically a saint.
“I…” she stumbled, “I read a lot of erotica.”
Avery shook her head. “You…you whore!” she screamed jokingly. “Burn the witch.” Avery pretended to flick water on her to cleanse her of her sins while Maya giggled.
“Come on,” Avery said. “It’s not that weird; I read it all the time.”
“Do you now?” Felix said into her mind.
“Oh my goddess? Really? How have we never talked about this?”
“Okay, but what do you read?” Avery asked her.
It definitely wasn’t shifter porn; not everyone was as much of a degenerate as she was.
“I would never ever do this in real life, and obviously they’re, like, super bad.”
Oh my fucking goddess.
“But I read a basilisk shifter novel recently, and I have never been so turned on in my life.”
Avery squealed so loud that Maya had to tackle her and put a hand over her mouth lest they be found by the wicked housemother.
Once Maya released her face, Avery also confirmed that she, too, read shifter porn.
They ended up lying on the ground, laughing so much together that tears streamed down their face, and every time they stopped giggling, one of them would start up again.
Maya raised the bottle in a mock toast. “To reading monster porn and making questionable life choices.”
Avery clinked her bottle against Maya’s. “To questionable life choices.”
United in shifter smut. Could they ever be better friends?
They drank, and for a moment, everything felt almost normal.
Like they were just two friends, drunk in a dorm room, talking about ridiculous things that didn’t matter.
She had a familiar, a best friend who cared about her more than her own family did, and she was finally getting the hang of magic.
For a minute, she just let herself bask in the normalcy—a false dream that everything worked out the way it should have.
It was a nice dream. But like any dream, reality doused her in its cold waters.
“You have a cute laugh,” Felix said into her mind.
Maybe reality wasn’t so bad. But it would never be this.
Her heart ached when she thought about her future, and really, there wasn’t one.
Not after what Felix had told her. She and Felix would break the bond, he would leave back to wherever den he came from, and Avery would once again be magicless and alone.
Maya would probably grow distant, and witches hardly ever left the university, let alone the island.
She would try, fail, and while Maya would succeed at something, eventually they would lose contact, and her family would disown her for daring to try.
They probably already should. Her mother trapped shifters in statues, and Avery was lying on the floor, drunk, in love with one.
The Alarch family legacy in full fucking bloom.
Suddenly, the tears of laughter turned sour. Luckily, Maya didn’t notice, too lost in her own world of her drunken dreams. Avery blinked back the tears that had carved their way down her face so many times; if they were cuts, they would have scarred.
“Little witch, are you okay?” Felix asked gently.
She shook her head against the floor. Next thing she knew, she heard the sound of paws hitting the ground and the sound of nails coming across the wood.
For a moment, Felix only looked into her eyes, his mismatched gaze staring into hers as she turned her head to face him.
Felix headbutted her, rubbing his feline face against hers, and a sad softness swept through her.
Maya’s breathing evened out; she always seemed to fall asleep in Avery’s room.
Felix didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. Somehow, he knew. Maybe he felt the same. No matter how entangled they became, they would always be cleaved apart in the end. So instead, they just pretended. Pretended that day wouldn’t come.
Felix stepped his paw on her and positioned himself on her chest. As he lay down, he made some biscuits on her skin. Avery scooped him in close and cried into his fur. He didn’t make a move, didn’t say a thing, and as much as she knew he despised water, he let Avery cry onto his coat.