Loki chuckles, “He definitely seems to. Give him time. He’ll get used to us.”
I burst out laughing, and Aldrastos shoots me a warning look. I would be pissed if it weren’t for the genuine concern I see lurking in his gaze, and admittedly how hot I find that look.
For fuck sake, now is not the time.
“You may know this creature, but there are things that are far more dangerous lurking in the darkness, and it would be wise to be quiet,” he warns. He then adds, speaking directly to Laikynn this time, “You are mistaken, there is no way that Farren has been able to travel here. It took me . . .” he hesitates before changing what he was going to say and saying instead, “. . .changing, and several extremely strong supernaturals to send me over, and they weren’t sure that I would make it. Farren simply can’t have been travelling through the realm with such ease for so long.”
Laikynn studies Aldrastos for long enough that Aldrastos starts to glare, clearly uncomfortable as a growl builds in his chest. He must be some sort of shifter then?
Although Khaos and Kill growl, they aren’t shifters, so maybe a demon of some kind?
Before Laikynn can say anything, I decide to prove to Aldrastos, and if I’m being truthful to myself as well, that this is what I’ve been calling the Void. If it is, then I should be able to leave like I have always been able to do.
“Name something that’s in your office at the academy,” I challenge Aldrastos.
“What?” He asks, my sudden question surprising him.
I repeat myself, “Name something that is in your office at the academy, something that can only be in the office at the academy.”
Aldrastos smirks, clearly seeing where I’m going with this and expecting me to fail, “Okay. In my desk drawer, the top one, is an engraved bone. It’s one of a kind. I engraved it myself, and it’s from a creature that doesn’t exist in your realm. In the highly unlikely case that you can bring that back to me, then I will believe that you are not using the Void to travel but instead can somehow use this realm that has been locked down for thousands of years and is on the verge of dying.”
“Oh, the snark is strong with this one,” Kill smirks.
Hades shakes his head, looking equal parts amused and sorry for Aldrastos as he warns, “You really shouldn’t have challenged her, mate.”
Aldrastos shrugs as his gaze meets mine, and he smirks again, challenge in his eyes as he says, “Prove me wrong.”
I smirk.
You would think that his blatant disbelief in me would piss me off, but rather, it just makes me want to prove him wrong. I’ve been underestimated pretty much my whole life. In fact, it has been my whole life until I met the guys, and even then, they underestimated me at first.
Well, Kill and Hades didn’t.
They never have actually, and I love them for that.
Occasionally, being underestimated has pissed me off, but most of the time, I have used it to my advantage. It came in particularly handy when I was doing the jobs for my father and going against his wishes and relocating people to the Shadowlands.
He was always underestimating me.
I also have to admit that I love proving people wrong.
Admittedly, there is a small part of me that is worried that I may not be able to use the Void to go back to the academy and that Laikynn is wrong and that this place isn’t what I’ve been calling the Void.
If he is wrong and this isn’t the Void though, then how is he here? He’s from where I travel to, which is the Void.
This is going to get confusing really fucking fast.
Unless, of course, Aldrastos is wrong about this being his realm. If he were, that would beg the question of why the portal brought us here, and what went wrong with the spell that was given to him in order to call the portal.
Either way, one of them is wrong, and I’m curious to see which.
I grin, and salute Aldrastos making his eyebrows raise as the guys chuckle, and then I call what I’ve always assumed to be the Void, and instead of calling a door to me like I usually would when I’m in the Void, because something is telling me that I shouldn’t, I simply step to the side, and I find myself in Aldrastos office back at the academy.
Well, I’ll be damned.
I really am using an ancient realm to travel and not the Void.
“I have to admit,” I say to Poca, who of course stepped through with me, “I didn’t really expect that to work.”
