“This is pointless.”
I huffed a sigh and looked at the other paired-up students in Advanced Coercion. This was yet another change, thanks to Adira, as the typically lecture-style class never did hands-on study. Why would we? There were two main reasons to coerce. The need for food and the need to keep our presence unknown. That meant there was no point in trying to coerce each other. So, the instructors lectured about techniques, and the students were then given assignments to try those techniques on Uttira’s minuscule human population.
The bell rang and saved all of us from wasting more time. I moved to stand, but Fenris stopped me with a hand on my arm. He waited until the room cleared before speaking.
“Talk to me. You’re really not acting like yourself today. The changes haven’t been that bad, have they?”
“It’s not just the changes. It’s Piepen.” Fenris gave me a confused look. “His bitter aftertaste isn’t going away. It just crawls under my skin until I’m angry without understanding why.”
“Okay. We’ll figure this out.”
“No.Wewon’t. I’m going home. I just need some time alone.” I turned but paused to look back. “I know I wasn’t easy to be around today. I’m sorry.”
I left him in the coercion room and hurried for the exit before anything else could happen.
My phone buzzed before I reached my car, and I looked at the number. For a moment, I hesitated to pick up, then desperation won out.
“Mom?” I said instead of a greeting.
“Baby, what’s wrong?”
“So much,” I admitted. “I really wish you wouldn’t have told Adira about Fenris.”
“What did she do?” Mom asked sharply.
“She rearranged his schedule so he would be in every class with me.”
Mom was silent for a moment. I closed myself in the car and waited.
“That doesn’t sound awful. Unless the wolf boy is becoming annoying?”
“He’s not annoying. Adira is. It’s like she’s still trying to force-feed me.”
“I understand. I’ll talk to—”
“No, Mom. That’s part of the problem. Just stop talking to her. You’re both driving me crazy.” I realized I was yelling at her and forced myself to take another calming breath. It caught on a partial sob.
“What aren’t you telling me, Eliana?” Mom asked softly. “Does it have something to do with all the cake you ate this morning?”
I groaned.
“Now you’re talking to Mrs. Quill about me, too?”
“She cares about you and wanted me to know you were behaving strangely. You know I don’t care if you eat cake. It’s the reason you’re eating it that worries me. Fenris seemed very willing. Did something happen?”
Setting my head against the steering wheel, I stared at the intricate pattern of woven fibers that made up my jeans.
“I’d rather not talk about Fenris.”
“Okay. If this isn’t about him, then what?”
“I want to tell you, but I don’t want you to freak out and think I’m eating wrong again.”
“I won’t freak out,” she promised.
A wobbly breath escaped me.
“It’s Piepen. He was next to me on the pillow, touching himself again. I opened my mouth to yell at him, and he erupted. It got in my mouth, Mom. And my eye.”
