My heart breaks for the child version of Kane, for the loss he suffered and the pain he felt. I’m horrified that I caused such tragedy. “I would never have done that on purpose. I don’t remember doing it, but I must have been scared, and I’m so sorry. So sorry,” I whisper, my voice cracking.
He looks back out at the forest. “I hated you for it, because I could never understand why you did that. I thought maybe you were just that bad of a person. In my memory, I had no idea what happened next. Only that your parents were dead. The entire town was dead. I was picked up like cattle and thrown in here along with any other shifters in the forest with us. Just the children. All the adults were killed by witches in cloaks. When I was in the transport, the witches just talked about you. How important it was that Juniper was fine. How Juniper was the key to it all. How all this death was to protect Juniper. I just lost everything, and you were the reason. I was so mad at you.”
“I’m sorry, Kane. I really am.” We both know it wasn’t all my fault. The witches must have been from the Umbral Authority.
He leans forward, wiping the tears away from my cheeks. “It’s in the past, okay? I don’t blame you, and I know you’re not this evil witch I made you out to be in my head to cope with the loss of everything. We will build our own future, and we are honoring our parents by doing what they couldn’t. They would have loved our rebellion, don’t you think? They would have loved that we found each other again in all this madness and fell in love.” My breath hitches. “I think the Umbral Authority killedthem all and probably anybody that had anything to do with the rebellion. They took you because you were always the prize, weren’t you? They saw it. And now I see it too.” He kisses me softly for a long time. Not a claiming kiss, but something softer and deeper. I melt into his arms, and he holds me against his chest.
I look up into his eyes. “They will pay for all their deaths. We won’t let it be for nothing, Kane. We will fight. We will borrow the light from our memories and burn the darkness to the ground.”
Chapter 17
WINIFRED
Extra tutorial lessons with the headteacher are not great. For one reason, his bonded fox is utterly terrifying and glaring at me the entire time with her big brown eyes. I’ve never seen her shift into human form, and I’m certain it’s because she doesn’t like me. I’m not sure what I’ve done to upset her, but maybe it’s just because I’m a witch and bothering her bonded. It’s unfair to call her a fox when she literally is the size of a horse. Two, Luke is grumpy for a teacher, and he has no patience. He asks a lot of personal questions, and he is meticulous about me passing these exams and getting them right. If I get things wrong, he makes me do it over and over until it’s right.
Our tutor lessons take hours, and I miss being able to spend time with Aster on my evenings. I’d like to bite his head off about it, but the truth is, I am getting better in class. He is a good teacher, and that’s what I keep reminding myself as I glance over at him, as I run my eyes over his body, as I see him bend over a desk and notice how much of a nice ass he has. These are all things I tell myself repeatedly to stop noticing, because they’re a real problem.
Luke looks back at me, like he knows I’m staring at his ass. “Are you done?”
“Yes.” I clear my throat, and I pick up the test that he gave me and walk over, stopping at his desk to hand him the test paper. He pulls out his dreaded red pen and begins going through my work while I lean on the side of his desk. Luke’s bonded walks out the door, letting it shut behind her with a flick of her fox tail that shakes the wall. Luke barely notices as he goes through my work, and I clear my throat again. “Your bonded doesn’t like me, does she?”
“Well, isn’t that how most shifters are described when it comes to witches?” he absently answers.
He has a point. “I’m surprised they bond with us at all, to be honest.”
The red pen clatters as Luke fumbles it and puts it down. He looks at me. “Most people don’t have much choice in this world. Tell me how your bond with Aster is going?”
I break eye contact, looking around the room. “My self-defense is coming along better, and we are high up the board. Our bond is going well.” I won’t mention that Aster sleeps in my bed and that things are much more than “just friends” between us. It’s complicated, but I don’t care. I don’t want to stop.
Something flashes across Luke’s face…shock or jealousy? I’m not sure; I don’t know him well enough to read his emotions. I just don’t know what caused that reaction. Does he not have a good bond with his bonded? “Show me.”
“What?” I stumble over the word.
“Show me how good your self-defense is. Come on.” He stands, the tight shirt he is wearing flexing against his muscles.
He jerks his hand towards the back of the room behind him. There’s a bit of a clearing between the thick bookcases, which I was told on day one not to touch.
“You want me to fight you?” I ask, still stuttering over my words. He can’t be serious.
Something about him makes me nervous as he looks at me dead in the eye. It’s more than the fact that he’s a teacher; it’s just that he’s intimidating. Gorgeous. Bothersome. Infuriating. “Yes, but you will not win. Aster is not training you well enough for my standards, Winifred.” He unclips his cloak and begins to roll the sleeves up on his shirt and undoes his tie, leaving it on the counter. That just made the whole scenario a lot worse in my head.
“I’m not really dressed for training.” I wave a hand at my outfit I chose for today. For the extra lessons, I usually come in my own casual clothes and not the academy clothes. Today, I’ve got a skirt that falls to my knees, a checkered one with cute pink bows, and tucked into it is a white blouse.
“Well, you could be attacked in any scenario, in any clothing. If Aster hasn’t taught you that, then perhaps it’s time that I intervened.” His tone tells me not to argue. This isn’t a discussion. I bite down on my cheek and follow him over.
“Then what do you want me to?—”
“Stop me,” he interrupts, and he moves like a shifter himself. Trained, fast and unstoppable. His hand wraps around my throat, and I freeze for a second. His eyebrow raises and his lips twitch with humor. No, he is not being a smug bastard right now. I grab his arm and spin underneath it. His eyes flash wickedly before he comes at me again. This time he’s quicker, faster. He grabs my arm, easily pinning my back to his front, his forearm pressed against my throat. His other hand splays against my hip, holding me to him. “Close,” he murmurs, breathing into my ear. “Next time, move faster.”
He twirls me around, leaving my head spinning. I frown, anger burning in my chest. I lunge at him. He smiles like this is a game, making me angrier as we fly around each other. I carefullyavoid all of his attacks until he swings his leg out, knocking me straight to the ground, and he’s on top of me in a second, pinning me to the floor. His hands grab mine, holding them above my head. His weight pins my body down, and he’s huge, well over six feet and very dominating. “Headmaster, I think this is?—”
“Luke,” he growls. “You call me Luke.”
“Don’t you think that’s a bit personal?” I breathe out, well aware of how close we are.
“And don’t you think this academy’s a ruse? If we both can’t be personal, then what are we?” He leans down. “Wini, don’t you remember?—”
The door is knocked twice and slowly. He climbs off me, grabbing my hand and pulling me to my feet. He walks back to his desk as Aster walks in, followed by my mother. All questions about what just happened fly out of my mind as I freeze at the sight of my mother. “There you are. I’m glad to see you’re doing extra tutorial lessons, just like we discussed.”
