Chapter Eight
“Hurry up. Fall in.”
Despite Erlik’s order to hurry, I was the only one to put some pep in my step. The rest of my class shuffled, trudged, or straight ignored him.
Erlik scoffed when I was the first to step up to the starting line. “Kiss-ass.”
I held back a gusty sigh. It seemed this guy was still determined to hold on to his irrational hatred of me—which wasn’t making my already hectic life any easier.
After Ronin threw me out of my room, I got as many of my things as I could and found my way to the key box. I had plenty of hideous, over-the-top gloves in the luggage Lucifer packed me, so my hands were nice and protected as I dug around and collected as many keys as I could hold.
Armed with them, I wandered through the demon wing—opening doors, sticking my head in, and perusing the selection until I found a dorm room that was empty, clean, nice, and modest. No fireplace, sitting area, or fancy décor, but there was a desk, drawers, a small bookshelf, an armchair for Sabrina to curl up on, a twin-sized bed, and an attached bathroom with nothing to say for itself except for a sink, toilet, a bucket, and a drain in the middle of the room.
Clearly I was supposed to fill the bucket with sink water and wash myself that way, but that was fine with me.
There was nothing about this room that would make any of my counterparts jealous enough to take it from me, and that was its appeal.
After putting away a few of my things, I hopped in bed with my clothes on and crashed. The next morning I woke to find Sabrina sleeping on the armchair. I tried waking her to find out what she learned, and got snapped at for my troubles. That left me to face all of my morning classes alone.
I thought it would be bad, but when Ronin showed up, he glared at me for all of two seconds before turning away and claiming a seat as far from me as possible. I knew that look of heavy shame. It was the heavy realization that someone knew what your anus felt like, and it wasn’t you.
I had to come to my own peace with that knowledge when one of my past boyfriends’ stuck a surprise finger up my bum.
But even with Ronin ignoring me, amazingly, no one looked at me —or that day’s humiliating outfit.
Everyone just pretended I didn’t exist, and I had a strong feeling it was because Ronin announced to everyone that I was his servant.
People really feared him so much, they wouldn’t come near me even when he wasn’t next to me.
I glanced up as Tristan fell in beside me.
“Hey,” Tristan mumbled in my direction, and then snapped his head around—blushing at the sky.
Almost everyone stayed away from me. Tristan had been sticking to me like glue since I walked out of my dorm room this morning. Which was saying something considering he could barely look me in the eye.
I wasn’t sure what to make of this, and since Sabrina found me in the mess hall an hour before and started filling me in on what she learned in the werewolf wing, I knew even less.
“The wolvesssss gather,” she told me. “They speak in the night of the great, and the cursed, Tristan No-Name. Many say he achieved a feat unlike any werewolf before him. Many more admire his courage, bravery, and ruthlessnessss, but all,” she whispered, “would rather die than follow him.”
“What?” I had hissed to her as I trailed my class out of the mess hall. “Why? How does that make any sense?”
“A vampire has tasted his blood. It is the greatest shame a wolf can bear,” she replied. “There is no doubt your Tristan came here to reclaim his spot in the pack.”
I heated up for no good reason. “He— He’s not mine!”
If Sabrina could roll her eyes, she’d be doing it. “But none of the wolves intend to follow him. Nor can he serve under them. Tristan No-Name is an alpha, and an alpha serves no one,” she went on. “Knowing this, his brethren intend to do one thing and one thing only—kill him.”
I tripped over my feet and cracked my knees on the floor. Everyone else streamed around me like I was invisible. Everyone... except for Tristan.
“Whoa, you okay?” Rushing back, Tristan knelt down and reached out his hand—his golden eyes soft even as dusky cheeks darkened.
“Why?” I whispered, my heart racing as I rested my soft server hands in his calloused and battle-torn ones.
He cocked his head. “Why what?”
“Because he is a walking legend,” replied the true recipient of that question. “Because he might possibly be the strongest wolf in this or any age. To walk off the battlefield with Tristan’s head would signal to all that his opponent is stronger still.”
I fought to keep the unease off my face as Tristan helped me up.
“Your wolf came here to show his people that he is still strong enough to lead, and instead, he’s given every budding young alpha here the ticket to becoming the lord alpha leader of all the packs of hell.”
Sabrina’s words rang in my ears as the rest of the class continued to fart around instead of falling in line as instructed.
I just couldn’t believe Tristan risked his life to save his people, and their thanks was to murder him.
It just doesn’t make sense. I know this is hell, but is there really no sense of camaraderie, loyalty, or even family down here? Does power and strength really outweigh sticking together and making it through side by side?
My thoughts didn’t have an answer for me, and that’s because I already knew it. The answer was yes. In a world with no love or friendship... survival of the fittest is all you have left.
My gaze traveled off Tristan to the group of bare-chested guys moving as one behind half a dozen bored-looking vampires. They obviously had no intention of letting a vampire see their backs.
Luckily there was plenty of room for them to maneuver behind them on the field.
Although calling it a field was being generous.
Our class, Stop Being Pussies, was being held on the dry, cracked, dusty ground behind the mansion.
There was nothing around but two chalk lines, dirt, dirt, dead trees, and dirt.
But checking the werewolves out, it was interesting how similar they were, even though their skin colors and facial features differed from person to person.
They were all crazy buff, they all had tempting golden eyes, and they were all scarred.
They also all had one eye on the vampires... and one eye on Tristan.
I tensed. “Did they say how they were going to do it?” I whispered to the reptile under my ugly red-and-blue Christmas vest.
She didn’t ask me what I meant. “They will each have their own plan, and no reason to share it with anyone else. There can only be one victor over the All But One.”
I accepted this, although I didn’t flipping like it. Tristan would have dozens of guys after him, possibly even from among the upperclassmen, and how would I stop them? Would it really be as simple as looking them in the eyes and telling them to go away?
“Your heart races, human, and your skin begins to moisten,” Sabrina said. “Now you begin to see that your wolf is your true enemy.”
I blinked. “Wait, what?” I cried, spinning away from the alpha male wolf pack. “What are you talking about?”
“A wolf without a pack is nothing more than a corpse looking for its grave,” she replied.
“His people will not take him back, and vampires will only continue to come for him until one of them succeeds in draining him dry. That is unless he is handsomely, and magically, rewarded by whoever is using him to have you framed and burned as a witch.”
My eyes popped.
“A demon powered by a mortal soul could easily make his skin like sssstone,” Sabrina said. “Vampire fangs would shatter on contact. Now, wouldn’t you trade some random wisp of a girl that you’ve only just met for power like that?”
“No! I wouldn’t!”
I breathed hard through my nose and turned away from all the nasty and confused looks that came my way when I shouted out.
Sabrina obviously thinks we’ve found the culprit, so she’s twisting every new thing we learn to fit her conclusions.
But a few people wanting Tristan dead doesn’t automatically mean he’s at the beck and call of whoever took Dora.
“What about my nestmate?” I asked, not wanting to say sister or Dora out loud. “Anything?”
“No one spoke of a captured human girl, and for the rooms I could accesssss, I saw no sign of one either,” she replied. “But I was unable to finish my search before I had to return.”
“That’s okay,” I said—because it was polite, not because I meant it.
I wanted to find Dora and get out of this place, but I also knew snakes needed a lot more sleep than Sabrina was getting these days.
She was really pushing herself to help me, so the least I could do was appreciate it.
“Hey, if you want to go back to the room and—”
“Listen up, you fools,” Erlik barked. “Classes were canceled yesterday to investigate the murder of those asswipes and determine if they were really killed by a witch.
“They were.” Erlik said the magic words, in the most uncaring way possible. Just like that, everyone who had been lazing around rushed to take their place on the line—crowding in to hear.
“What?” “Seriously?” “You’ve got to be fucking joking!”
The only one who wasn’t flipping out or on the line was Ronin. The demon heir had conjured up a chaise lounge and was kicking back—fast asleep.
“You’re not serious,” a demon with snake eyes and a scaly face hissed, drawing my attention back. “It’s not possible for a witch to have gotten in here.”
“Of course it’s possible,” Erlik drawled. “All one would have had to do is glamour themselves and then blend in with the new applicants. As long as they passed the trials, they would’ve received a patch that gave them free run of Abaddon.”
I fell very, very still.
And not just because I felt Tristan’s eyes on me.