Professor fucking Shade. Of fucking course.
“You’ve been spending a lot of time with him.” The words rip out of me on a growl without me meaning them to.
She stills, cocking her head to the side. The gesture is too fucking cute, I almost forget why I’m suddenly pissed.
“Are you jealous?” she asks.
“Jealous? What the fuck? No. I wouldn’t know what jealousy feels like. Just because I have feelings now doesn’t mean you can throw them at me like fucking labels. Jealous? Of fucking what?”
Saint smirks at Syko on their bunk but it only pisses me off more.
“Aww, you sound so defensive,” she whispers.
“I’m not.”
Shit, I think I sound jealous. This must be what Iz’s obsession is with that pop song. This is what Nick Jonas was singing about and I never understood a single lyric until now...
A sarcastic, eat-shit, smirk tilts her lush mouth. “Oh, I think you are.”
She just makes me so fucking crazy.
I growl and take a step forward so we’re pressed close together. “So what if I am?” I loom over her, invading her space, feeling the desire that surrounded her only moments ago turn into something else. Not fear. “Don’t I have a fucking right to be?”
I hate admitting this shit. It’s new, it’s sensations I never knew could exist inside of me coming out in nasty slashing colors. This is the uglier parts of emotions I never understood, that no one ever warned me about.
“Ever since you got back you’ve been keeping secrets. You’ve been spending all your time withShade,” I sneer the name, “and haven’t been honest with us aboutanything.Why won’t you let us help you?” My hands grip her hips, and the next words I say, I speak them softly. “Let us help you, baby.”
Her eyes gloss over with tears, her throat working as she swallows. “You want to know what happened?” she whispers, and the words sound dangerous, filled with spite and venom. But I take them like they’re my own elixir. “My father, the Messenger of Chaos, had a demon steal me from the Academy. He took me to his palace in hell where he shoved me onto a throne and kept calling megroemmel,hisdaughter,and I can’t close my eyes without hearing that voice in my mind; or seeing Osmodeus again while he shoves visions of my Prod killing the people I love, over and over again down my throat. So forgive me if I go to the only person at this Academy who can help me get my shit together. Even if it’ll take months of learning and staying away from you, to protect you.” Her breath hitches.
Malek steps closer and goes to reach for her, but she pulls away in a jerking, scared move.
“Don’t,” she commands tightly. “Just give me a bit of space. I—I’m sorry. I have things I need to sort through.” A strong breath comes out her nose and a tight smile curls at her mouth that I know is fake. “Professor Shade is helping me work through it. He says my powers are easier to control in hell because that’s where my Prod is from and this dimension messes with my magic and makes it uncontrollable. He thinks there might be a way to either train me, or find someone who can help bring a tiny piece of hell to me; like an amulet I can wear or something that’ll help me control my powers better.”
“What?” Malek demands.
She slashes a cutting glare his way. “Don’t judge me. I’m doing this for all of us. I’ll see you later, alright? I’m running late.”
I don’t get another chance to say a word, because she flaps her powerful wings and soars away from us out into the hall, and I know there’s no way I can follow her now.
So I watch her go, a bad feeling twisting in my mind and my gut.
Though I can’t quite place what it is.
Twenty-Six
Malek
Something about her words gives me pause.
An amulet from hell to help control her powers? Bringing a piece of hell to her? There’s… there’s no way to do that, is there?
And even if there is, it can’t be safe.
As far as I know, and from what we’ve learned at the Academy, hell is warded by the angels and they are the only ones who can open the doorways. Sometimes there are rips in the fabric of dimensions. That rip is how the demon Osmodeus was set free in the first place. It’s how demons can find themselves in this dimension to procreate with humans and create the Prods.
It’s one thing to visit hell in interdimensional travels and bring back a useless souvenir for class. That’s what the traveler partner is for. They guide with magic, towards the rip in the fabric of dimensions and into wherever we need to go. They don’t actually create doorways.
The rules of traveling through dimensions are complicated, but what Izara says shouldn’t be possible unless Shade plans to be her traveler. How could he be? When we went to ask him to help us find Izara, he said he couldn’t.
