Raze, unsurprisingly, chose a tooth. “It’s like a keepsake. It gets heavier every time I want to murder someone.”
“Useless.” Drecken sighed, snapping his fingers. “Pass.”
Hawk had created a collar that looked weird and kept breaking apart as he tried pushing his intent into it. Each time, it cut his hands.
“Fail.” Drecken walked past his desk.
Hawk let out a disappointed sigh.
Lorian had a journal. “The pages fill when anyone speaks near it. True feelings of their hearts will be written into it.”
“That’s really cool!” Eleanor gasped.
The journal flipped open, and words appeared. Lorian’s eyes widened before he closed them with reverent hands.
Drecken chuckled, pushing his magic into it. “Pass.”
“Systems Breach is in twenty,” Drecken announced. “Go do something elsewhere until then.”
“Hacking class!” Slater exclaimed, clearly thrilled. “Finally, something more my cup of tea.”
“I want tea,” Rune whined.
I slung an arm over her shoulder. “I’ll make you tea when we get back to the house.”
“I don’t even know how a demon managed to summon a weird snake from a mirror of his chaos manifestation,” Dimitri muttered.
“Dude, fuck if I know,” Slater sighed.
“It was an enchanted mirror, Slater.” Rune fell into step between Slater and me, dagger hidden somewhere on her. “Couldn’t you sense it?”
“Wasn’t paying attention, venom baby.” He pouted. “A kiss would make me feel better.”
She leaned up and kissed his cheek. “Better?”
“A thousand times better.” He grinned.
dimitri
. . .
Quarter two feltlike some kind of fever dream. New schedule, same study habits as a squad in our common area.
We had just crossed the bridge, heading toward the Apex Simulator 2.0 for Field Ops for a full twenty-four-hour assignment, when Rune’s brother came into view with one of the siren triplets on his arm.
He smiled down at her as she said something.
Rune’s stride didn’t break. She slid to a stop next to them, gaze flicking from Tobias’s smiling face to the hand the siren had glued to his sleeve. “Cora,” she said pleasantly, stepping in just close enough to make the other girl retreat half a step on instinct.
I snorted.Of courseRune would make a siren step back out of respect and fear.
Rune smiled wider and leaned in as if to kiss her cheek. Instead, she whispered in her ear. “If you and your sisters play at Tibby’s expense, I will do much worse than make you shit yourselves in public.”
Cora’s lips parted in shock. “Oh, you have us completely wrong,” she explained quickly. “We mean no harm. We actuallyare very…attractedto Tobias. We intend to pursue him for keeps.”
“Fantastic. Just know that I’m watching you.” Rune smiled sweetly, but it didn’t reach her eyes.
It was clear she suspected her.
