Jesper turned to Rune immediately. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” she said, breath a little tight. “Thanks.”
Jesper’s jaw worked. “Your body is yours. No one dictates what you do with it. Even if he’s my cousin, I’ll kill him if he hurts you. Just tell me.”
“I’ll tell you,” she assured him.
Zuko was still smiling, but there was nothing nice in it. “If he comes at her again, I’ll do worse than kill him.”
“Same,” Slater said.
“And me,” I added. Heat licked my palms.
Dimitri didn’t bother adding his words. He just glared holes in Darian’s passed out form.
Jesper nodded once before glancing at me. “Koa, Sabine’s in the headmaster’s office. She asked for you.”
My stomach dropped. “Now?”
“Now.”
“My mom is?” Rune’s brows furrowed as she looked over at me. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah,” Jesper answered for me. “She has a question about his family’s past is all.”
“See you later?” she asked.
I nodded and followed Jesper to Lake Bloodwyne’s office.
“Do you knock that asshole out often?” I asked, pointing my thumb behind us.
“Never.” His jaw tightened. “But when he said that about Rune, I?—”
“Lost it?” I finished, shrugging. “If you hadn’t done it, I was going to.”
We walked into the office, and the sun knifed through the high windows; dust motes looked like floating constellations.
Sabine stood at the table with a folder open. “Supernaturals are going missing faster,” she told us. “We recovered one. He’s a centaur. He says humans grabbed him, took his blood, ran tests, and dumped him at the edge of Fate Hollow.”
I blinked. “Alive?”
“Barely.” She slid a photo across the table. He was bruised, riddled with needle marks, and a powder substance crusted at the hairline. “Blood extraction,” Sabine went on, her voice tight. “The same procedure described on your father’s system fifty-one years ago.”
The room blurred. “He didn’t have anything to do with that,” I mumbled. “Humans planted it. They were in our house; they knocked us out with tourmalyke. Theyframedhim. You bought it.”
Her mouth thinned. She’d heard me say it before. “I’m giving you a chance to clear his name. You in?”
There wasn’t air for a second, but then I sucked in a lungful of it.
“Yes,” I said quickly. “I’m in.”
“Good.” She tapped the folder. “Jesper, you and Koa will work together on this. I trust you to monitor him. Koa, you’re going to go undercover soon. Jesper will be your contact if anything ever goes wrong.”
My heart slammed against my ribs, and I couldn’t remember how to fucking breathe.
This was the chance I’d been waiting for ever since the council had fallen for the humans’ evidence.
rune
