“Your father showed up?” Headmaster Mykene asked.
“Yes. Blue Matthews murdered him. He was passing a message from some of the reincarnations that we’re dealing with Apep and no one in the Veil knows how to kill him.”
“Yes, we were visited by the shade of Ra. It’s a little strange Apep is back and so many of the Egyptian pantheon and not Ra. He said they killed Apep several times and he never stayed dead. That was why they sent him to a different realm. They wanted to trap him there until his life cycle ended. None of them knew they’d be getting reincarnated and Apep would return.”
“Well, we can’t do any of that this time,” Lucian said.
“No, but nothing is unkillable. Every reincarnation of Baldur is deathly allergic to mistletoe. Thereisa way to kill a void creature in a way that they don’t come back the next day. We just have to figure out what it is, and we can only make our move when we are one hundred percent sure. A witch’s binding is powerful, especially when it’s coming from a reincarnation of Hecate and her coven. Morgana can make it stronger now that we know their true names, but they still aren’t meant for gods and can eventually be unbound,” Professor Gefn said.
“How does one do that?” Lucian asked.
“Well, it’s usually a highly kept witch secret. It’s how they protect themselves if a hex is going to make things worse. No one knows how to undo a binding except a witch. A god can brute force their way through, but these two reincarnations are new. Even awake and knowing the theory of how to do things doesn’t mean they can. Spells require intention, but a lot of the magic you haven’t learned yet needs muscle memory. They aren’t strong enough to blast through a binding yet, but they will be practicing.”
“Secrets are only as good as the people who keep them. Torture never works. My Da still hasn’t learned that. People will spill anything over pillow talk. IfIwere the reincarnation of an ancient evil void god and I needed a witch secret, I’d just shag it out of one,” Liam said.
“You’d better not!” I snarled.
“Well, I’mnotthe reincarnation of an evil void god and I don’t think my dick works for anyone else, love.”
“I think magic dick is a you thing,” Mazen said. “I know how to take care of a woman, and Lola was still using me.”
“It’s probably because your dick is ugly and unpierced. Should I make you an appointment? I was thinking of doing my nipples,” Liam nodded.
“What?”
“Anyway,” Professor Gefn said, rolling her eyes. “Itispossible to seduce secrets out of people, but it’s harder with certain supernaturals. Witches can see auras. That’s not to say some of them don’t like the bad boys. Apep and Hemlock might be connected differently in this life.”
“So, we’re pretty sure Hemlock is Lola. She tried to drug and rape Liam. We stopped her, and Lucian caught her lying about being bad at potions and not knowing who she was. Morgana said she used an illegal fairy potion. I don’t think she could have known that unless she was Hemlock and awake,” I said.
“That potion has been banned since long before bookbinding was a thing. She wouldn’t have found it in any book, and it’s illegal to even post the recipe online. I don’t even think she could have gotten a fairy to teach it to her, even if she used what happened to her,” Headmaster Mykene said.
“Sorry, but wouldn’t the fairies be able to sense Lola?” Lucian asked. “When the fairies attacked us during the trials, Saffron stole Sage away because she sensed she was kin and brought us food because she knew Sage had diabetes. The fairies haven’trallied behind her and seem pretty annoyed with her. Shouldn’t they be trying to help her if she’s kin?”
Good question. Because I felt like Saffron and I had gotten pretty close and she seemed to take the secrets she’d been entrusted by her great-grandmother very seriously. She didn’t like Lola, but she hadn’t mentioned her as kin. Did we get it wrong?
“It’s complicated because no one alive has met an original, just their reincarnations. Hemlock had the core of her being changed when she became an original. I’m not sure there was anything left the fairies would recognize as kin. Liam, do you need to talk to someone about what she tried to do to you?” Headmaster Mykene asked.
“Stabbing rapists with Doris isloadsbetter than therapy. We’ve also got some revenge plans against the man who raised Sage that should tide me over until we figure out how to kill her. Figuring out how to kill those two while snuggling with my woman is how I’m going to deal with it.”
Yeah, it was deeper than that, and Liam was going to have to deal with it. I just had to get him to open up. Lola could have just lied about what happened when they were alone in his dorm room. She didn’t know anything about us, so she had no way of knowing I’d burst in there to stop her.
So, why did she take it that far?
Iwas having serious regrets about not being a were corgi. Lucian’s bat kept taking over and flying him to Sage when he was sleeping. Khalid’s jackal was refusing to leave now that we’d walked her back to her dorm room. If I could shift into a corgi, I could just join the puppy pile and she could scratch my fabulous bubble butt.
Alas, all I had were horns growing out of my forehead and my legs were getting hairier. I wasnotgetting them waxed. No thank you. The Prince of Darkness could have all his body hair yanked out by a sadist, but I wasneverdoing that again. Maybe Sage would think it was sexy. I was pretty sure I could endure it again if hairy legs grossed her out.
Morgana was just watching us with her arms crossed. I liked that girl. She was spunky and a good friend to Sage. She also had pretty good taste in men. I could have gotten stuck rooming with complete dipshits, but Elliot and Petros were decent. Petros kept stealing my shit, but he did it with flair and gave it back, so I never stabbed him in his sleep.
“Listen, the dorm room assignments are fluid. If we mate up, we’re allowed to sleep in our mate’s dorms. No one is going to be pissed if the three of you sleep in here and I go sleep with Elliot and Petros. Iman comes and goes, and she hasn’t been here at night in weeks. If she decides to return to our dorm and sees you in a compromising position, she’ll either leave or watch you like a creep. She seems pretty taken with Ivar and the guys, so she might not come back. She’s a cat, so she might not even be with them at night.”
“I can hear her little cat brain,” I said. “She appreciates how Ivar, Ari, and Alexios properly worship cats like the Egyptians used to. Iman thinks the rest of us need to do better, even though most of us are also gods.”
Morgana just shrugged.
“She didn’t want to do her trials with anyone. She said she hated group projects because she ended up doing all the work anyway, and then someone else took the credit. She found all her crystals and was the first back, and literally none of the other students could say they saw her out there. I only got to talk to her for a few days when we ended up roommates before she shifted for the first time and got stuck.”
Iman wasn’t stuck like Khalid was. She could shift back at any time. She was right where she wanted to be and would turn human again when she was ready.
