Chapter Seven
SEVEN
After I agreed that I was ready to face the students of Valmora Academy, I swung my legs over the edge of the bed where the cold floor bit into the soles of my feet, reminding me that I had no idea where all my belongings went.
Tilly told me to wait where I was and left, returning a little while later with a pile of folded clothes in her arms along with a set of black lace-up boots.
Apparently, each Malachite student gets given a uniform for training purposes.
The items are plain, simple. Black pants with enough stretch that if I were to run or jump, they’d move with my body, not restrict me. The t-shirt is dark green, lightweight and fits against my body like a second skin. The boots and black socks are my exact size, too.
As I look in the small mirror within the narrow bathroom inside the infirmary, I realise that I look like one of them – the Malachite students that surrounded me as Harley attacked me. I’m dressed in their clothes but with a special addition: bruises spread around my throat like a collar.
Part of me just wants to walk back to the bed and lay down to hide.
Wouldn’t that be easier? But then I realise Tilly is right.
I don’t want them to think they won. I don’t want them to have the satisfaction of knowing they scared me.
I want them to see the bruises around my throat and know that Harley didn’t break me.
I want them to know that I didn’t run the other way.
I’m no fucking coward. Malachite’s values are courage and resilience, and if I am anything, I am resilient.
Tilly and I walk out of the infirmary, and I discover it’s a separate building, not actually inside Opal’s tower like I assumed. Instead, the infirmary is attached by a long corridor, giving the Opal students easy access to it while also making it accessible to students from other units.
Tilly walks with me down the corridor and gestures to a set of double doors off to the side. ‘Are you sure you don’t want me to go with you?’ she asks, looking through the windows across the manicured grass to the furthest building from the main structure.
The Training Centre.
From what Lukas told me, it’s mainly occupied with students from Malachite for Combat class, but Opal students utilise it as well.
I know from my mother’s stories that healers need to learn basic combat skills in case they are ever required to step foot on a battlefield.
They can’t look after the lives of others without ensuring they know how to look after themselves first.
While I was changing, Tilly read me my schedule, which consists of five different classes: History, Elemental Magic, Sympathetic Magic, Basic Healing, and Combat No Magic, which changes to Combat With Magic once students progress.
The latter is where I’m supposed to be right now.
According to the piece of paper folded in my back pocket, the class started twenty minutes ago.
I inhale deeply, filling my lungs with the fresh salty air that blows in through a few of the open windows, then nod at Tilly. ‘I’m sure. I need to do this part on my own.’
I walk along the soft grass toward the Training Centre, listening to the sound of waves crashing against rocks in the distance and using every step to place a metaphorical slab of armour over my skin.
I’d be lying if I said I’m not nervous about walking in there, because I fucking am.
But I use this time to remind myself that I deserve to be here.
Before everything that happened, I was a legacy student; magic or not, my blood runs through these halls just like the rest of them.
If I have any hope of proving my father wrong about me – about Lukas – I need to make sure everyone else sees that I belong here too.
If I get kicked out, I’ll accomplish nothing, and I haven’t gone and put myself into the starsdamn Warrior Unit to walk out of here empty-handed.
I lift my gaze to the overcast sky, then back down to the two-storey academic building off to my left and finally, behind me, to the colossal building looming at my back, and try to imagine Lukas here.
I try to envision him walking across this very grass to get to his Combat classes.
I try to picture him lying in a bed like I was, with healers fussing about his wounds or bruises from fighting.
Because no doubt he had them all wrapped around his fingers with his charm and easy smile.
A smile that seemed a lot less bright the last time he visited. A smile that seemed forced, and that had wavered at the corners of his mouth when he’d said goodbye, heading back to the academy after we only got a few days with him.
I knew something was wrong the second he left.
Usually, he was brimming with energy to return to the academy and get back into his classes and training, an energy that I imagine came with being the best at everything he did.
I remember the way he wrapped his strong arms around me and tugged me tight against his chest, resting his chin atop my head – like he knew.
He knew it might be the last time he did it.
A painful throbbing settles behind my ribs at the thought that he still decided to go back even when he knew there was something coming.
Only one month later he died.
The bruises around my neck, the cut across my palm, now sealed and resembling a dark purple line thanks to the healers, are nothing compared to the pain of losing Lukas … nothing.
I tell myself, that this too will be nothing. I can walk into a damn building and face the Malachite students because I’ve already felt more pain than I thought imaginable. If I can handle that, I can handle a bunch of assholes who hate me and don’t want me here.
The Training Centre, like the rest of the academy, is made from limestone, this time just one level and in the shape of a long rectangle.
I push my way through the double doors at the entrance, letting them close behind me with a thud as I step into the open area teeming with students dressed in clothes like mine.
There are black fall mats strewn about the room with handfuls of students circled around them.
The circle closest to me has two students locked in a stand-off.
They skirt around the mat, neither of them making a move, instead locked in some sort of dance where when one of them inches forward, the other moves back.
I notice what I assume to be older students, or trainers, giving instructions as they pace along the mats, speaking to the younger audiences in front of them.
Others are engaged in combat, some being pinned to the mat by their opponent s, some holding wooden staves and using them to advance on their rivals.
Lukas had a pair of staves at home that he’d had custom made for his height and build.
They were heavy, though that didn’t stop him from dragging me outside to practise with him.
Seeing similar staves here gives me a modicum of relief.
I spent countless hours training with my brother, enough to know I’m decent with them.
I can hold my own. According to Lukas, I was a natural.
‘Nocthare!’ A voice yells my name from the far end of the room.
My head snaps up. The shout was loud enough that several students pause what they’re doing and watch as Sebastian Zain stalks toward me with quick powerful strides.
‘What do you think you’re doing here?’ he snaps, coming to stand in front of me.
Stars, he’s huge. Taller than Harley. Where Harley was wide and bulky as he towered over me, Sebastian is leaner and more defined, with a tapered waist – a waist that looks perfectly sculpted, from the way his black shirt, damp with sweat, sticks to his skin.
‘I’m here for Combat class,’ I state flatly, glad to find my voice sounds clear as I pretend his presence does not affect me.
If he wants to play the ‘I don’t know who you are’ game, then so will I.
I push away every memory of him seated across from me at our family dining table, the silent moments he offered me comfort when my father rained insults on me, the curious glances he’d send my way when he caught me watching him as he trained with Lukas outside.
I picture an open steel box and then I shove, with both hands, all those memories inside the box and close it.
He is not the Sebastian I thought I knew.
Sebastian shakes his head. ‘No, you’re not. You’re late and you already missed orientation, so get out.’ He points over my head at the doors I just came in.
‘No!’ I protest. ‘I’m not leaving.’ I look past him, spotting a familiar snarky redhead standing with what I presume are the other first years.
She’s whispering into the ear of another student, when her eyes find mine and narrow viciously.
Great! I move to pass Sebastian, but he blocks me, his large frame crowding mine.
He starts to walk forward, forcing me back several steps until I hear the sniggers around me and dig my heels in.
I will not let him push me out. His chest brushes mine as he looks down his nose at me.
‘You’ll leave or I’ll put you out myself. Look around. No one wants you here.’
His words sting, though I don’t let it show. I keep my face neutral.
‘Tell that to your grandfather. He’s the one who signed my acceptance letter. Not you.’ Bringing his grandfather into this is a low blow; I know it, he knows it. But I won’t be walked on like a rug. I’ll play dirty too if I have to.
His nostrils flare and a dangerous glint appears in his eyes.
‘All right, fine. You win,’ he spits, then grabs my upper arm tightly in one of his large hands and, suddenly, I’m being pulled alongside him as his muscled legs eat up the space between us and the first years at the back of the room.
‘What are you doing?’ I gasp, attempting to yank myself free from his hold. ‘Let me go!’ My feet struggle to keep up with his long strides. Hell, he’s almost lifting me off the ground as he drags me through the crowd.
‘You want to train so bad? Then have at it.’ He releases me harshly. I stumble before I manage to catch myself, only to find I’m standing in the middle of a circular mat that looks similar to a fighting ring.
‘What are you doing?’ I hiss and turn to him. I feel eyes on me, heads turning our way from all over the room, causing my stomach to twist.
Sebastian ignores me. He drops himself into a fighting stance right in front of me, then calls out to the crowd.
‘First years, listen up!’ he shouts. ‘Nocthare has kindly volunteered to show you all what not to do when faced with a threat.’ The emphasis he places on the last word isn’t lost on me.
He wants me to know I’m not safe with him.
That he’s not the person I thought I knew.
Well, the message is loud and fucking clear.
An excited holler roars up from somewhere in the room, followed by someone yelling, ‘Teach that bitch what it means to be Malachite, Zain!’ There’s an onslaught of clapping and more insults. Sebastian’s lips curve upward. Prick.
‘Get into a fighting position, Nocthare,’ he orders. ‘It’ll hurt less if you do.’ The dangerous smile that lights up his eyes makes me think that hurting me is exactly what he’d like.
Well, I won’t give him the satisfaction.
I drop into a defensive stance, planting my feet wide and bringing my hands up like Lukas taught me to.
I’m not delusional; there’s no way I’m about to beat Sebastian Zain in hand-to-hand combat.
He’s three times my size and has years of training on me.
But he’s pissed me off, and I told myself that I wouldn’t show weakness around these people again.
So even if he lays me flat on the ground in under a minute, at least I can walk away knowing I didn’t back down.
‘What’s the criteria for becoming a unit leader?’ I taunt. ‘Picking fights with first years?’
‘No, but putting them in their place sure is one hell of a perk,’ he retorts a second before he lunges forward, so fast that I barely have time to react.
I leap backward in an attempt to get out of his way, but I’m too slow, or maybe he’s too quick.
Either way, his forearm thuds against my chest, shoving me backward right as one of his legs wraps around the back of mine and sweeps my feet from under me.
I fall to the mat, hard, landing right on my back.
The force of the fall knocks the air from my lungs and causes my teeth to clack together.
I blink several times as I gasp for air to return to my body, just to find Sebastian looming over me with a self-satisfied cock of his brow.
‘See? Perfectly in your place,’ he sneers. ‘On the ground with the rest of the dirt.’
‘F-fuck you,’ I seethe, pushing myself up to face him once more but he’s already given me his back, effectively dismissing me as he turns to address the other students.
‘All right, listen up,’ he calls out. ‘Nocthare thinks she can walk in here and expect to train with us.’ He gestures to me as I get to my feet.
‘She thinks she is one of us, but she’s not.
So let this be a warning. If I catch any of you trying to help her train in this room, in my domain, you’ll be answering to me. Got it?’
A uniform chorus of ‘Yes, Unit Leader’ rings out, echoing off the walls.
Fury licks up my skin. He can’t do this!
I have as much right to learn and train as anyone else here.
My teeth grind together as I glare daggers at him, wondering what I ever saw in him.
He just smirks, his corded arms folded over his chest. I don’t think I’ve ever been so blindsided as I feel right now.
I want to scream, but instead I clench my jaw and fists as I skirt to the side to watch Moira Davis waltz into the fighting ring with a wooden stave over her shoulder.
Her cold blue eyes narrow as she looks me up and down like I’m something gross she stepped in.
‘Get out of the ring, scum. Didn’t you hear? You don’t get to train.’