Chapter 26 Rune #2
I hadn’t even thought about everyone hearing me and Slater, but I had gotten loud again. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t have the ability to muffle my noises when pleasure overtook me. And I’d never felt pleasure like Zuko and Slater could give me.
“Don’t be jealous, Dimitri,” Slater scolded him.
“Jealous?” Dimitri let in a sharp breath of air before his gaze collided with mine.
“Seriously,” Zuko muttered. “It’s obvious why her noises are getting to you.”
Lorian, Eleanor, and Aura giggled while Hawk just looked confused.
“I—”
“Step inside, and we’ll get started,” Professor Hunting interrupted Dimitri, pulling our attention away from each other.
We filed into the simulator behind her, and she programmed it to Tactical Debrief Reconstruction: Destroyed Bat Shifter Village.
Bat shifters had been extinct for well over two hundred years.
That fact alone made me wonder how exactly this simulation was supposed to work.
History didn’t leave room for much advancement in investigations, but they would probably modernize the simulation to further test our abilities, I was sure.
Professor Hunting faced us with a stern expression. “You will be reconstructing a tactical debrief for the destroyed Bat Shifter village. Think tactically. You are the assigned squad sent to determine what happened here. Best of luck.”
The simulator beeped, and Hunting dissolved in a rush of magic and tech.
Around us was indisputable devastation.
Ash drifted through the air in heavy flakes, clinging to my hair and lashes like gray snow. I rubbed my burning eyes, but it did little to help.
The village lay gutted as the smoldering ruins billowed heat. Timber beams jutted out of collapsed houses, glowing faintly red at the edges where fire had kissed them. Those reminded me of Koa’s eyes, but this scene wasn’t nearly as beautiful.
The acrid stink of burned wood and charred flesh bit at the back of my throat.
The silence pressed in, thick and unnatural, broken only by the faint crackle of something still burning beneath the rubble.
The surrounding forest was now a barren wasteland.
Trees were warped, burnt by the fire, and stripped of branches. Their bark flaked into ash.
The soil underneath my feet glowed faintly, seared into hardened glassy ridges by the heat. Charred skeletons were littered underneath the smoking rubble, and it made my stomach churn at the sheer brutality.
“This is insane,” Koa breathed, his voice tight with disbelief. His brown eyes swept over the destruction, wide and unblinking. “The amount of firepower it would take to do this…”
He wasn’t wrong.
The scene reeked of immorality. Sparks of red and orange clung to stone walls like fireflies, but it was just residual magical essence from whatever—whoever—did this.
I had zero knowledge of any bat shifter village being burned to the ground, and I didn’t think it had anything to do with their extinction. But maybe it had. There must’ve been a reason it was a classified mission.
The fire’s burn pattern was too clean, too deliberate. So were the talon marks. They embedded deep into the ground, gouged out of the dirt as though something as massive as a firedrake had torn its way through the village.
In the center of it all was a child.
The only survivor we could see, crouched in the fetal position among the ruins, his thin frame trembling. His clothes were scorched. He was streaked with soot, and his small shoulders quaked with sobs.
Beside him, half-buried in ash, lay a single feather. It was bright, fiery red and gold, gleaming as though untouched by the flames.
It was a phoenix feather.
A loud pop cracked through the simulator before words popped up in front of all of us:
Koa Ashbourne’s magical signature is detected all over the village.
The words burned brighter than the embers of the ruined village.
“What?” Koa’s voice cracked. He stumbled back a step, eyes widening in a way that looked like raw fear. “No. No, no, no, that’s not—” His expression crumpled, panic replacing confusion. “I’m being…framed?”
I stepped forward until his gaze swung to mine. “No way. There’s no way you did this.”
Dimitri nodded immediately. “We know it wasn’t you.”
“Obviously,” Lorian agreed. “This is a simulation. You wouldn’t have had time.”
Aura folded her arms, frowning. “Tech doesn’t lie. If it’s his signature…”
“It’s not,” Eleanor emphasized.
“It’s fucked with,” Zuko growled, studying how freaked out Koa seemed to be. “Koa’s been with us.”
“Obviously,” Slater agreed, cheerfully. “Tech can be easily tampered with.”
“Perhaps,” Aura murmured, her eyes sliding over the devastation. “But maybe it was a phoenix, and that’s why it’s confusing magical signatures.”
“Or a firedrake,” Hawk muttered. “That would make sense, too.”
“Magical signatures aren’t easily mistaken,” I muttered. “This was intentional, and Koa isn’t involved in this.”
The child’s sobbing turned from silent to loud.
Eleanor moved before anyone else, crouching next to him. “Hey, it’s okay. We’re not going to hurt you.”
“We’re here to help.” Lorian joined her, his hand softly pressing against the kid’s shoulder.
A wave of calm overtook the child.
“How did you do that?” the boy asked, his voice raspy from all the smoke inhalation. “I can think straight again…I don’t feel sad or even hurt anymore. How?”
“My touch,” Lorian explained kindly. “I have a power that calms even the strongest emotions if I make physical contact with someone. As long as their soul is intact.”
“That’s incredible,” Eleanor murmured.
“Thanks.” A blush crept onto Lorian’s cheeks. “Can you settle the matter of who did this?”
“It wasn’t any supernatural,” the kid said before his eyes fluttered shut and fell asleep.
“It’s my ability,” Lorian explained. “Once I touch someone long enough, the calmness eventually makes them fall asleep. If only I could use it on myself…”
Zuko crouched beside the feather, tracing its glow with narrowed eyes. “If it wasn’t a supernatural, then why is this here?”
“Or this?” I kicked at the talon marks etched into the ground.
Slater grinned faintly and let his chaos magic seep out of him. Snakey formed and slithered through the ruins, sliding into cracks.
“Is the child a reliable witness?” Aura asked, worry creasing the lines on her forehead. “He’s been through a traumatic event. Surely, he may be confused.”
“My power helps calm the trauma. He should’ve remembered correctly,” Lorian told her as Eleanor put the boy’s head in her lap and stroked his hair.
“Even if he did misremember, we need to figure out what happened,” she said.
“It wasn’t me,” Koa muttered, rubbing his face with both hands.
I reached out and rested a hand on his shoulder. “We know.”
His hand came up and covered mine, squeezing. “Thank you, Rune.”
“I’ve got your back,” I promised.
“We just need to find out why the simulator is framing him,” Dimitri said.
“There you are,” Slater murmured as Snakey hissed up around a broken security camera half-buried in the dirt and brought it back to Slater. “Let’s see who the real culprit is. Snakey?”
Chaos magic flickered around us before Snakey dove into the device, coaxing lost footage to life.
Slater’s red eyes turned bright red, covering the whites.
“I can see what he sees,” he murmured as he saw through Snakey’s eyes.
I hadn’t known chaos demons were capable of that.
“Shit. The device was burned before the culprits were shown. All that’s on it is fire and screaming shifters being burned. ”
Snakey jumped out of the camera as Slater’s eyes went back to normal.
Snakey slithered off toward the rubble again.
“I didn’t know you and Snakey could do that,” I said in awe as Koa let go of my hand. “That’s really fucking cool.”
“There’s a few things you don’t know, venom baby. I’ll tell you everything you want to know.” He winked at me.
Hawk scratched his head, bewildered. “Wait…if bat shifters are extinct, why’s there still a bat shifter kid?”
“This happened in the past,” Aura reminded him, rolling her blue eyes. “The extinction of their species doesn’t apply to what happened here. Keep up. Besides, if this happened that far back, how are there even cameras?”
“Maybe they just modernized it a bit?” Eleanor suggested. “It would make sense that they wanted to gauge our abilities with some tech.”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking,” I murmured, scanning the evidence again.
“Let’s focus on what really matters,” Lorian stated clearly. “We need to figure out what caused this.”
“Dragon cult?” Aura suggested. “Talon marks and a phoenix feather. Evidence suggests the dragons and drakes could be framing the phoenixes.”
“But why?” Koa asked. “The dragons and drakes don’t usually have an issue with phoenixes.”
“These talon marks are too uniform.” Dimitri crouched down next to one.
“I thought the same. Even the phoenix feather looked perfectly placed,” I said. “Right next to the kid that, without Lorian’s power, would’ve been too traumatized to say anything.”
“It seems that someone wants us to think that this was done by the phoenixes or dragons.” Hawk scratched his head, and he couldn’t be more right.
“Snakey found another camera.” Slater tilted his head as his eyes went red again. “There’s a cloaked figure, blurred by smoke, and they’re…dropping that feather next to the kid deliberately.”
I felt a chill crawl down my spine. “False evidence planted.”
Dimitri’s eyes met mine, and I knew we both thought the same thing.
“Humans,” we said.
“Humans?” Aura scoffed. “How could humans do this kind of damage? Let alone frame any supernatural.”
“The surveillance supports that theory,” Slater said as he blinked until the whites came back into his eyes. Snakey slithered around his neck to rest before fading into him.
The feather was real, but it was collected and planted, not shed. The claw marks had to be manufactured.
“Look at the spacing.” I pointed. “The talon marks are identical.”
The child sniffled as he woke with a sob before Lorian placed his hand back on his shoulder.
“A hand,” the boy whispered. “A gloved hand. I couldn’t sense any magical essence from them. It was a large group.”
That was it.
The missing piece.
Hawk blinked, mouth half-open. “So…they used, like…fake talons?”
“Exactly.” Dimitri’s tone was grim. “Humans using forged talon marks and a phoenix feather to pit the supernaturals against each other. Phoenixes are blamed for wiping out a shifter village. The perfect spark for another war.”
Slater’s grin vanished. “Which means someone wants this village to burn twice. First in fire. Then, in memory as a catalyst for more violence. A political threat.”
“Always humans.” Eleanor’s voice broke.
The simulator flickered, then collapsed back into blank steel walls. The ruined bat shifter village vanished, taking the kid with it.
Professor Hunting clapped her hands once.
“Excellent. That was…very well reconstructed, honestly. I’m surprised your team managed it so well.
You thought critically, you worked together, and you resisted being manipulated by the evidence.
” Her gaze slid pointedly toward Aura. “Well, most of you did.”
Aura’s shoulders hunched. Her lips pressed tight, shame tugging her expression down. She knew she believed the false evidence without questioning it first. “I learned a lot from my squadmates.”
Hunting softened her gaze just slightly. “Quick judgment is dangerous. You must question even what seems like solid evidence with logical reasoning. Remember that.” She led us toward the exit with a smile. “But you all did well as a squad. Pass. Go study.”
We spilled out of the simulator and headed toward our house.
Aura walked with her head bowed, arms wrapped tightly around herself. Her steps dragged, and it was clear she didn’t handle scolding well, not that anyone really did.
Eleanor slipped an arm around her shoulders. “Hey,” she murmured, voice low and gentle. “It’s okay. We’re all learning what to do. That’s the point.”
Aura’s lashes trembled, her red-rimmed eyes brimming with tears that refused to spill. “I should’ve known better than to jump to conclusions,” she whispered. “Of course, it was the humans.”
“You’re being too hard on yourself,” I said, fishing my water bottle out of my bag. The condensation chilled my palm as I held it toward her, trying to coax a smile. “Here. Venom blend. Euphoric boost. You’ll forget you were ever sad.”
She wrinkled her nose, but she forced a smile. “That’s…really sweet of you, but no thanks.”
I shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
“Bet.” Slater plucked the bottle right out of my hand. He tipped it back, gulping down a long drink.
“Slater!”
His eyes flew open before narrowing to heavy-lidded bliss. “Venom baby,” he crooned, a grin spreading slowly across his face.
“As if I needed you any more euphoric.” I huffed but couldn’t stop myself from smiling.
“Holy. Fates.” He staggered closer, his warmth crowding me as his hands settled on my shoulders.
“You are like…a venomous flower. Are those real? I don’t even care.
You’re mine. I want to sniff you and immediately fall into your petals.
” He bent forward to inhale my hair, nuzzling his cheek against it. “Worth it,” he sighed, dazed.
Snakey, clearly curious, slipped from Slater’s shoulders down his arm, flicking his tongue across the bottle rim with a pleased little hiss before moving up and coiling around my neck, almost cuddling into me.
I smirked, reclaiming my bottle from Slater and taking a drink. “See? Slater and Snakey get it.”
“So do I,” Zuko purred, leaning in with deliberate slowness before brushing his lips against mine. He moaned. “Mmm. That is good.”
Koa groaned, exasperated. “If Tobias finds out, you’re never going to hear the end of this. He told me to stop you two from throwing yourselves at her!”
“You’ve successfully failed,” I giggled. “They’ve thrown themselves at me in many ways.”
Slater and Zuko chuckled.
“You like it,” Zuko teased.
Behind us, Hawk lingered close to Aura, fumbling with his bag strap. “Uh, you…did good in there. Really good.”
Aura gave him a polite, uneasy smile, stepping slightly away.
Eleanor caught my eye and nearly lost it laughing; I bit my lip hard to keep from joining her.
Lorian nudged her, and she turned to him with a smile as they delved into their own conversation.
Up ahead, Dimitri ran a hand through his hair, muttering, “Can you all ever focus on our studies?”