“I can find my own way,” I answer, trying to hold a fake smile on my face as he opens the door. My shoulders drop in relief when we both see Maz is leaning against the banister, wearing a cocky smile along with his uniform. His glasses reflect the light from above, but they do little to hide his brilliant deep blue eyes.
“Good morning. I was waiting for you to come out, Juniper.” His eyes flicker over me like he’s checking that I’m okay. He turns to Lock. “I have the same lesson as Juniper. Why don’t I take her to breakfast and then class? Your lesson’s in the opposite direction, right? You are a year older and not in her classes after all.”
“We’re skipping breakfast. I brought food to our room for us to share in private.” Lock looks at me. “But Juniper barely ate anything because she isn’t hungry. No need to go to breakfast.”
“Maybe Juni-bug here wants something different to look at over the breakfast table.” He smirks at Lock. “Some sights can put you off your food.”
My heart flutters as I think about what he said to me just last night. How I reacted to everything he said to me last night. I wanted him to do it, which is insane, isn’t it?
Lock clenches his fists. “I really feel shifters should be muzzled like the animals they are.” He touches my arm. “Don’t you agree, darling?”
“No, that would be cruel.” I tug my arm from his touch. “We should get going. I don’t want to be late to class.”
Lock mutters about something, but I’m already moving, walking down the stairs. Maz is quickly at my side, and we both pretend to ignore Lock shouting for us as we speed up and disappear into the corridors. When we are alone, Maz reaches into his cloak and pulls out a breakfast bar, one covered in chocolate, my favorite from last year. “Thank you. How did you know I’d be hungry?”
“I got the feeling he’s the type to feed his women salads and judge them for eating chocolate. Basically, he identifies as a stupid fucking asshole. I know his type.” He nudges me with his arm. “Eat up.”
He’s not wrong. Lock gave me a breakfast that consisted of just fruit, and all the fruit just did not look appetizing. Don’t get me wrong, I love fruit, but I don’t like apples, and that made up most of the fruit salad, and the zero-calorie yogurt didn’t fill me up at all. The yogurt was also apple-flavored. I know I’m curvier than I was at Melody’s because I’ve had three meals a day and snacks for the last year at the academy. Most of my curves are from my food choices, but I couldn’t care less. Chocolate is worth it, and life would be miserable on a diet of zero-calorie yogurts and apples.
I gratefully chew on the cereal bar as we walk down the corridors, and I shove the wrapper in my pocket when I’m done as stroke Minnie’s soft fur. We get around the corner, a few steps away from the classroom, and Maz pulls me to him and hugs me tightly, his head buried in my neck. I wrap my arms tightly around him and just relax for a second in his arms. Being with them is the only time I feel safe. “Can I kill him yet?” he asks.
“Nope, not yet, even if I want you to.” I sigh, snuggling closer. “I needed this. I miss sleeping in our room with you all. Even Kane’s slight snoring that he says he doesn’t do. At least I have my father’s shirt to sleep in.”
“I need you too.” He grins at me, his eyes dropping down to my lips and back up. “I’m glad we’re back together, even if it’s for a moment. Fuck, I want to kiss you.”
I lift myself up, brushing my lips against his for a heartbeat before tugging away. “We have class, and anyone could see.”
Maz groans, rubbing his face before adjusting himself. “Fuck, yeah, you’re right.” He clears his throat. “I’ve never felt this way about anyone but you, Juni. You drive my thoughts to insanity,and I know I will never get enough of going crazy like this. I just want more.”
My cheeks burn, and I nearly jump when Kane walks past us. “Ready for class, you two?”
“Yes,” I blurt out, hearing Maz’s low laugh chasing me.
Kane looks at me strangely. “I remember something. Just a flashback of our class now.” My heart pounds. If he is getting memories back, even short ones, he might remember everything soon. “Don’t do the usual Juniper thing in class and compete with Vale. The two of you give me a headache.”
I frown. Of all the things he could remember, it’s Vale and me arguing in class. “Hey,hewinds me up. Not the other way around!” He looks down at me as we walk into class. “Fine, maybe I do a little. I just don’t like being beaten.”
“That competitive streak is awfully good for both of you. Might help with his memory issue. Plus, it turns me on,” Maz whispers as he walks past. Both Kane and I heard him. Kane calls him a fucker and hits the back of his head, and I laugh. I go sit at the desk next to Maz, and Vale walks in like a god who owns this room, his eyes flickering to me once before taking the seat behind me. Kane and Black sit at the back of the room, almost hidden by the shadows.
I glance over my shoulder at Vale, and he smiles at me. A wicked smile. A challenging smile.
I smile back. Game on.
The teacher comes in. Tutor Sona with her vibrant clothes and warm smile. “Welcome, everybody, to your first class at Bloodstone Academy. It is an honor for you to be sitting here today, and I am proud to be a part of your personal development. Today we’re going to go over a bit of an unusual lesson. I don’t usually teach this to first-years, but they have gone ahead to say that perhaps our people need more lessons on our own personal history and less on dangerous spells. Now, alldangerous spells will only be taught to the last years. Knowing them before that may not be required or useful, but history? History and knowledge is power, and in our world, you need both brains and strength to have a chance of winning the war.”
So they’re banning me from learning spells this year. Too bad for them that I don’t need to learn their idea of dangerous spells. “Let’s begin with something simple. In our history, what creatures are known to us?”
Vale answers immediately before I can. “Witches, of course. They trace back for centuries. Our oldest and most powerful race, but there were other creatures that once lived in this world, but they are long gone now. They were called Nexus beings and Vian beings.”
I cut him off when he pauses, taking any chance I can. “It was said that Nexus had creatures inside them that attacked and gave them powers. Vian was the opposite. They drained and took life and powers from Nexus and witches. The Nexus race was not too far off what witches and shifters are. I imagined them as a sort of mix of the two. But they’ve not been seen for centuries in our world. Long extinct, and no one knows what happened to them.”
“That is correct. No one does know what happened, but many suspect they simply fought and died, destroying each other. Any other races? We’ve gone over witches, shifters, Nexus and Vian. What other races lived once in our world or still do?” Tutor Sona asks, clicking her fingernails on the desk as she leans on it. Behind her, an enchanted dry erase marker writes the names we have listed on the board.
No one answers until Vale does, and I wish I’d thought of it. “The Mindless, small creatures, normal animals,” he answers. “And of course, humans.”
“This is correct. Well done, Vale.” I glare at him over my shoulder. “We really should have begun with humans. As muchas witches and all our other supernatural beings have existed for ages, the truth of it is that humans were here before all of us. They had far more people than we ever did, and they successfully colonized this entire world. They are not to be forgotten. One human can change everything.”
The pen writes down the names of all the creatures we listed on the board behind her in neat, perfect writing.
