“Focus. We need to find Professor Bowen first, then his replacement.”
“Replacement?” Thierry asked in surprise.
“He should know where the other missing students are being held. Maybe even Ryker’s brother,” Nix said, watching her dragon mate closely. She wanted to bring his brother back to him. It had been one year since his brother went missing.
Ryker’s mouth opened as a spark of hope lit his golden eyes.
I will not let that spark be extinguished.
“I was warned that going back in time could cause worse things to happen to me, but I chose to do it anyway because we will need the advantage,” she said.
Nix just had to fix the day—find out where the other captive students were being held, kill her mad scientist nightmare “Lemmuns” again, and somehow destroy the shifter council president.
“Advantage to do what?” Thierry asked.
“To take down Kellan Oadess.”
CHAPTER 33
“So, while you were under the enchantment, did Adar Oadess… I don’t know… Try anything?”
“I told you that nothing happened. Focus,” Nix told Bael after she guzzled down the vial of protection potion that Professor Bowen provided her.
The professor had needed little convincing or time to produce the potion. He had gallon jugs of it sitting by his door.
After Bowen poured a dose and handed it to Nix, he told her cryptically, “I think many at the academy are not thinking with clear heads,” as if he thought more than just Nix were under an enchantment.
Nix and her still-working-to-be-forgiven mates walked from the faculty residential building to where the dean’s office resided in the main academy. Nix had questions for Dean Felling, including where the future potions professor “replacement,” Dr. Lemmuns, was.
Bael clucked his tongue. “See, I will be unable to focus until you tell me yes or no and what he did in great detail.”
Nix rolled her eyes. “Either answer I give you, you still plan to hurt him, yes?”
“Yes, but how long I make it last depends on your answer.”
Nix paused in her walking and blinked. “Wait, I do actually remember something I wanted to ask about.” She turned to her gargoyle shifter, who always had all the answers. “Adar mentioned offhandedly—”
“Wherewere his hands?” Bael asked. “Because if they were on you—”
Ignoring the incubus, Nix finished, “—that winged prey shifters don’t naturally go into heat. He mentioned some type of drug or elixir or something that the Oadess family uses to trigger a heat cycle in female cygnus shifters.”
Thierry rubbed his palm over his jaw as he said thoughtfully, “There is not much documented history on female prey shifters. History tends to be written by the victors and prey…”
Persius offered, “Have never won anything.”
“Until Kellan Oadess won shifter council president,” Nix reminded them.
“Still doesn’t make any sense,” Bael remarked.
“It makes perfect sense, actually,” Thierry commented, surprising them all. “He rose to power by convincing everyone that he was their ally in a sea of enemies. Even as a prey himself, he convinced predators to listen to him after he told them that they had a common enemy.”
He said, “Tell a predator that they are prey to someone, and you appeal to their fear. Create division, and you build an angry army ready to fight. History proves it again and again. People are more willing to fight against someone than fight for someone.”
“And the common enemy was phoenix shifters?” Nix asked.
“Amongst others. His newest fixation has been on dragons.”
Ryker grunted in aggravated agreement.
