“The other five objects were never meant to be as ostentatious as the headmistress’s. The vampire, the faerie, the shifter, the warlock, and the nephilim who created Academy of Six were all powerful in their own right, but they never wanted to be a target of retaliation after the Dark Genocide. After Etheria’s death, I believe it was smart of them to hide. It was smart ofmeto hide.” His dark eyes lift, and he meets my wide gaze head on.
Professor Thorne was one of the founding six…
He straightens to his full, spindly height. “I have to go,” the professor says suddenly.
He’s leaving. He’s going. He’s going to protect his magic.
My hand snatches his arm before he fully passes.
“Where are you going? Tell us where it is, and we’ll help.” Anxiety must be contagious. The hammering of my heart and the desperate breath caught in my lungs tells me it is.
Thorne hesitates. He peers out at the flames that bleed across the night and the blood that coats our academy grounds. If the wrong person knew where the source of the academy magic is kept, every building here could be a pile of dust by morning.
It’s a guarded secret.
One I don’t think a common teacher would have access to. And certainly not one that would be given away under regular circumstances.
I can see all of that just by the feel of the professor’s tense shoulders and his darting eyes.
“They’re hidden away in the channels,” he whispers on a quiet breath.
The channels.
A chill slithers over my skin.
I have no idea what that means. I’ve never once heard anyone say those words about Academy of Six. It seems there are many guarded secrets here, and I don’t know if we’ll ever know them all.
But we also don’t question the professor.
Even as he shrugs off my hold and stalks forward, shoves the doors open, strides out into the night, and fights his way across the academy grounds.
We simply follow.
Four
Izara
The last of hell shoves through the flaps of the portal. It doesn't seal back up but remains a bright, gaping hole in the air that whips back and forth as if tugged at by a phantom breeze.
So many creatures came through, so many of them a flashing blur. I did catch figures I recognized in small snatches. The gleam of black teeth, the wisps of ethereal bodies, snarling throats, and many limbs.
And the pixies in fucking jeans. Hell is a strange, strange place.
A swarm of them buzz around my head with their glittering motorcycles. The things are relentless in their mischief. They tug at my locks of dark hair before darting away as my hand comes up to swat at them.
Fucking annoying.
I can't help but wonder if Azazel has left them to watch after me. They are, after all, from his domain. Not that domains matter here anymore.
The space constricted within the academy bounds looks like a dozen worlds have exploded and this is the aftermath. Sand erodes with ice, caves merge toward palm trees and barren wastelands. The sky is black and red and blue, with vicious clouds that take the form of nightmares in the sky. Twin moons and a glaring sun hide behind clouds, while the silhouettes of demons circle the sky.
It's like one of those paintings divided into four equal parts, depicting spring, summer, fall, and winter. Except this is chaos, smidgens of seasons on all corners of the canvas that is now my world.
All the domains, all the seven circles of hell, clash together before me. Creatures war against each other with malicious glee. Ice creatures that can only be from the fifth circle face off against Azazel's leather-wearing lackeys, who string up ass-torturing demons by their dicks and beat them with sticks like a fucking child’s birthday party.
I can feel Azazel's demons and their eyes on me. Some of them approach daringly, but when they get too close, my half-brother unleashes the cruelty of his magic on them, and they scurry away in pain.
I slash a glare his way, and the Messenger of Chaos just meets the expression with a vicious sneer of his own.
