Chapter 54 Slater
slater
. . .
I was still glaring at Hawk’s crumpled body and heart. My girl had just been grabbed, pawed at, and then I wasn’t even the one to rip his heart out.
“Shit,” I muttered.
My throat felt tight.
Beside me, Zuko’s scales faintly flared over his face. “That’s not fair. I wanted to at least torture him first.”
Rune was doing great in that gas-soaked torture simulation they called the placement exam, but she was contained in a chair.
“What the fuck is that, Lake?” Professor Bloodwyne hissed. “No other student was strapped down to a chair!”
“I didn’t do that!” He screamed at his brother-mate.
“Get her out,” Sabine hissed.
“I’m trying.” Headmaster Bloodwyne sounded frantic as he fucked with the controls.
I turned back to the monitor.
The feed flickered, static crawling over the image before it cut completely just as Rune’s eyes snapped toward the side like she saw someone in there with her.
“Fuck!” My demon form rippled out as I took off running to the simulator. “No, no, no!”
Zuko, Koa, Dimitri, and Jesper were behind me.
Drecken flew out of thin air and landed on the ground in a huff. “I can’t teleport inside.”
Sabine’s color drained from her face. “Lake, do something.”
The simulator door stayed shut, and the feed stayed blacked out.
“Open it!” I roared. “She’s in there—”
Drecken moved again, faster than I’d ever seen him move, his hand pressed flat to the wards around it.
His magic shimmered, white light spider-webbing across the building itself.
The wards hissed.
I really thought he’d tear it down, because if anyone could, it was him.
Nothing happened.
He frowned. “It’s human poison mixed with tourmalyke. I think someone coated the entire simulator with it.”
“What?” Headmaster Bloodwyne snarled.
“Tourmalyke essence is already gassed inside,” Drecken said grimly. “It numbs our magical essence and magic. It makes supernaturals collapse. The seals are feeding off magic, but when there is none to feed off of—”
“This didn’t happen to anyone else.” Professor Bloodwyne slammed a flaming fist into the door.
Five minutes stretched like an eternity. All of us shouted, clawed, burned, pushed, and hit the simulator.
My chest felt like it would cave in with every second that passed.
Then, the door cracked ajar with a burst of bright light.
The simulator finally gave out under Jesper’s strike, and a searing light blasted through the crack, blinding us before we could get a glimpse of what waited inside.