“You didn’t think I’d leave, did you, Lyle? After all you’ve done for me?”
“Your mates?—”
“Understand completely,” she reassures us. “You gave me my life back when you gave me a job here. I wouldn’t abandonyourpack or this academy and what it stands for when beasts come to take it from us. Some of the other faculty feel the same. We will stand with you.”
The backs of my eyes burn as they converse quietly, and I take my food to the table and eat next to Savage, who only has a glass of water before him. “You’re not going to eat?” I murmur.
He turns in the seat to give me his full attention. “I fight best if I’m hungry, regina.”
Xander pulls out the seat next to me, sitting down heavily. “Regina, I want to give you something.”
I turn around with interest and see he has a small blue velvet box in one hand. He opens it to reveal a gold necklace with a jewelled pendant. It’s a deep blue sapphire with five stones set around it in a circle: green, yellow, blue, red, and grey.
“One for each of us,” Xander says as I run my fingers over the precious stones. The fact that he included the grey stone means everything to me. His big fingers are gentle as he carefully takes the necklace out of its place. I turn around, my skin prickling as the pendant settles above my cleavage, and he clasps it securely. I can immediately tell that it’s been dragon-spelled to change its length when I shift.
“Thank you,” I say, turning back to show him how it looks. There’s something in those glowing eyes as he looks upon me, like he wants to say something. I’m just about to probe for an answer when Sabrina, Stacey, and the assassin twins stride through the outside door. Minnie, Marduk, and Yeti on crutches arrive through the inside door. They grab their food and sit down next to us.
“So what’s the plan?” Sabrina says, looking at me and toying with a piece of lettuce.
“The avians have checked out the convoy coming for us,” I say. “And what I suspected has been confirmed. My father is going to be difficult to kill. He’s in a military truck protected by armed guards, shifted serpents,andserpent runes. Out of the three, the runes will be the most difficult to get past.”
Stacey’s eyes go wide, and the nimpins on her shoulder, including Henry, hover with nerves. “Will they work like the one you used on The Collector?”
“Likely, just more…instant.”
“So how do we counter them?” Sabrina asks, twisting her lettuce in her hands. “How can we get to him?”
I take a deep breath and nod to Lyle, who levitates a small, frosted glass ball out of his pocket. “I made this after consulting with Hyacinth.” I pick it out of the air and show it to everyone. There are runes painted all over it in a special mixture of my blood and venom. “Normally, these are nullification runes. But they won’t work on something as powerful as my father’s work,especially with the sheer number he’s using. So we’ve mixed my usual blood and venom with the powder they made from my old femur bone.”
Minnie’s face turns ashen, and Sabrina tears her lettuce in half. No one says anything, so I continue. “I just have to get it past his runes and activate it by smashing it open. With this, any serpent rune he’s using will lose power. It’s a dark type of magic to use body parts, but it’s my own, so I don’t feel bad.”
“It’s like a bomb!” Savage says proudly, smiling at me.
“A Boneweaver bomb,” Stacey says softly.
Scythe’s voice floats into my head, only for me.“I’m proud of you, regina. For using your enemy’s weapon against them.”
“I need this to work,” I tell him and everyone. “It’s the only way we’ll be able to get to my father to kill him. It’s the only way all of this stops.”
“There are other obstacles,” Lyle says. “There will be the militia and the venom bullets to deal with, for one.”
“Which is why we’re working in teams.” Xander nods. “You all have your assignments.”
Stacey raises her hand, but there’s a shout from outside and Beak walks in, fully naked, sweat glistening on his chest. He nods purposefully at Scythe. “They’re almost here.”
My stomach plummets, the muscles of my body clenching. A low growl sounds in my head. Silently, we split up into our groups. My pack and I head out to the top of the Animus dorm where we’ll get a better view of the road beyond the academy. A dust cloud forms on the horizon, and it takes a minute, but the rumble of heavy military trucks reaches our ears. Another rumble, higher up and higher-pitched fills the air. Two dots rise into the sky. Then another two.
He had come for my mother.
Then he came for me.
And now he wants to take everything.
A violent rage, one like I’ve never known even when I burned down the Naga family home, funnels through me. I place my hand on the stone wall. “Protect us. Do what you can to protect this place.”Something pulses out under my hand, and the blue dome that surrounds the school brightens, an energy shimmering down from its centre point high above us.
Savage comes up to stand next to me. Strapped to his chest is a carrier like the one they use for front-facing babies, but Eugene is in it, his goggles pulled taut around his head as he sits comfortably, legs hanging on either side. Savage has a matching pair of goggles on his forehead.
“He’s going to help me with the hatchling soldiers,” Savage says softly. “If we can see how they’re going to move seconds ahead, we can take them out without killing them.”
