“I know, baby,” he said, resting his head against mine. The heat pouring off him had eased; his eyes were mostly green again. “I’m not worried about your feelings. But Jesse is going to be a problem until he gets this shit out of his system.”
Musical notes rang out through the air, and since this room was no doubt supposed to have another class in it now, we hurried out—only to find a teacher and an entire class on the other side, waiting patiently for us to fuck off.
“Oh, I am so sorry,” I said. “Minor power issue.”
I had no idea how long they’d been there, but I was too upset to be embarrassed.
The teacher met Asher’s eyes, and he must have read the lingering anger there. “No worries.” His voice had a forced upbeat sound to it. “We’re only a few minutes late…” He ushered his class inside.
It would have been amusing, but Jesse was occupying most of my emotions. And none of that was remotely funny.
Since the rest of us had lunch now, we wandered toward the commons. I wondered if Jesse would be at our table, and I quickened my steps, wanting to see him. Only the table was empty, mocking me with that fact. Mocking us all.
Asher’s face darkened. He’d gotten himself mostly under control, but I could feel what was happening deep inside. The tumult of anger and pain still raged there.
We couldn’t stay at odds like this. It wasn’t good for anyone.
Ifstronger togetherwas our motto, this current state was leaving us extremely vulnerable to the gods.
We had to fix it. Right the fuck now.
Chapter 6
Unfortunately, none of the Atlanteans equipped with testicles made my job of “family togetherness” easy over the next few days. I was literally the only one trying, and it was starting to creep under my skin like an itch I just couldn’t scratch.
We fell into a normal routine for school life, and even though I saw Jesse in class a few times, he was acting the part of the most dedicated student ever, not even looking our way.
By the time Wednesday rolled around it was the first official sports morning, an initiative that had been started last year by Princeps Jones. It hadn’t gotten any further than day one last year because I’d accidentally used my power that day to bring half the ocean to the Academy.
Whoops. My bad.
This was a take two, and Larissa told me her dad had high hopes it would unite the supernatural races in ways that were probably impossible to achieve. I loved him for trying though. Especially since I was going to use this mandatory event to force Jesse to deal with me. We were going to find our family dynamics again.
If it was the last godsdamned thing we did.
It was killing me to have this tension in the group, and not just me ... Axl was not handling it well. Poor dude was basically living in the library now. Not that he hadn’t always spent a lot of time there, but it was pretty obvious at this stage that he was avoiding home. I’d wanted to force us closer together and all I’d done was tear it further apart.
Today all of us were on the field. The weather was mild, and outside of a swift breeze, nothing at all to concern anyone. It was almost warm, and considering it was technically winter in this part of the world…
Bottom line: there was nothing that would result in me causing a huge scene by dragging half the ocean to the Academy and getting this bonding event canceled for another year.
“You wouldn’t do that again,” Asher said, doing our new fun mind reading thing. “You have control now. Frankly. I’m afraid of what you might be able to do once you’ve reached your full potential as an Atlantean demi-god.”
I laughed, shaking my head.
The smallest of smirks tilted his lips. “You didn’t say anything about canceling the event, did you?”
“Nope. That was you picking up on my thoughts.”
Most of the time I got emotions from him, and some vague images, whereas he seemed to be getting actual detailed thoughts from me.
“Royal Atlanteans could hear the thoughts of their true mates,” Axl said.
Asher and I both turned to him. “Are you serious?” I hadn't had a chance to properly research it yet.
Axl nodded. “Yep, I’ve just finished reading the second-to-last section in the library, and I found a book about the royals. It appears that those bonded in true mate relationships could communicate mentally.”
“Holy shit,” I murmured.
