Chapter 12

Aelia

Blood iced my veins as I watched Belmore saunter down the pathway, each footfall like a nail in my coffin. The bastard couldn't touch me according to the code of conduct, but that didn't mean he couldn't sic his friends on me. My hand lifted to my chest, unbidden, finding the gold necklace hidden beneath my tunic. Somehow, Aidan's gift provided a measure of comfort.

"Come here, little Kin." Kian's sing-song prickled the hair on the back of my neck.

"Why do you get the first taste?" said the other male. "If you ruin her, there will be nothing left for me."

"Quit your whining, Lucian." Kian stepped closer, and my heart kicked at my ribcage.

Come on, Aelia. You've trained for this your whole life. Make Aidan proud. Closing my eyes for an instant, I pictured the quiet meadow behind my home, my adoptive father's patient face as he rearranged the targets for the third time, the melodic chirping of insects, the warm sun on my shoulders, and I willed the familiar calm to emerge.

"Do you see that, Lucian?" Kian's smirk kicked up. "Her aura is darkening. We've upset the little Kin."

"Or maybe you're turning her on," he countered. "An aura can darken with lust."

The two males chuckled and bile oozed up my throat. I would rather die a thousand times over than allow either of these Fae to touch me. The two large males blocked the pathway toward the Hall of Rais. I could try to dart past, but I doubted I could outrun them both. Though I had to try. Jumping off the steps, I made a run for it. Kian reached out a long arm, but I dropped to a crouch and unsheathed the knife from my boot. I slashed my blade across his chest, but he moved like a wraith. He leapt back and the rip of fine material whooshed between us.

"You bitch," he hissed as he glanced down at his torn tunic. "This was new."

"Just leave me alone," I shouted. "Let me by so I can go to class and we can forget about all of this." Frantically, I scanned the lawn for other students, anyone. Raysa, where was everyone? Surely, there had to be someone else late for class!

"I don't think so, Kin," said Lucian, inching closer. He ran his hand through his shorn, pale blonde hair and licked his lips. "You embarrassed our friend and now, it's your turn to pay the price." He flashed his hand across my face, brilliant light streaking from his palm, blinding me.

As I blinked rapidly to clear the stars from my vision, a body pummeled into me, and we crashed to the ground. My knife came loose and the clatter of metal across stone sent all hope squeezing from my lungs.

"No!" I shrieked as one of the males pinned me to the roughhewn path. "Get off me!" The coarse stone sank into my shoulder blades as I squirmed beneath his weight. My vision was still hazy, his face a blur of muted colors.

"Stop wiggling, you worthless Kin." A palm cracked across my cheek, and the sharp sting rushed through every nerve-ending. The back of my head bounced against the unyielding stone and darkness etched into the corners of my vision.

"Son of Noxus!" I gritted out.

"Don't knock her out, you fool." A muffled voice echoed from above, but I couldn't tell if it was Kian or Lucian. My thoughts were scrambled, the bright blue and cottony clouds overhead spinning. "Let's have some fun with her first. Bring her back to the dorms."

Panic lanced through my chest, pushing back the darkness. No. I would never let them take me. If I could only reach my boot… Blinking again, the form hovering over me finally coalesced into a discernible figure. It was Kian leering down at me, strands of silver hair coming loose from the neat tie at his nape. He held both my wrists in one big hand. I struggled and kicked, attempting to buck him off, but the Fae was an immoveable force.

A whisper of heat kindled deep in my core, and I grasped onto the flicker with all I had. It swirled around my gut, like gauzy strands of energy I couldn't quite hold onto. It was a sensation I'd never felt before. Raysa, help me.

"Blazes, look at that aura," Lucian gasped. "I've never seen anything like it."

With my last ounce of energy, I planted my boots against the stone floor and vaulted my hips up. Kian bounced up allowing me to free one of my hands from his grip. I reached for my second blade and jabbed it into his thigh.

"Noxus's nuts!" Kian roared as he rolled off me. "She stabbed me!"

I leapt up, and my head spun, a slight throb at the back of my skull. My knees gave, and I dropped to the ground once again. I lifted my hand to my nape and my fingers came back sticky with blood. Oh, no. The Hall of Ether tilted, the blue of the sky flipped upside down, and my cheek hit the rough stone again. Lucian loomed over me, a satisfied grin twisting his mouth into something truly wicked.

Icy tendrils licked up my spine and I turned my head, slowly, trying to keep my world from whirling. A dark presence raised the hair on every inch of my body. Inky shadows zipped by, a tornado of umbral power thickening the air.

"Step. Away. From. Her. Now." The ominous growl cut through the manic pounding of my pulse. Where everything else was muffled, Reign's voice rang out as clear as the blinding light streaming from the gods' celestial abode.

That piercing gaze found mine, where a storm brewed below the sleek obsidian surface. Tendrils of darkness curled around his form in a midnight cloud of sheer power. I might not have been able to read auras, but even I could see his.

Lucian twirled around, offering our professor a slick smile as Kian pushed himself off the floor, leaning on his good leg. Blood dripped from the wound in his thigh and despite the endless spinning, a faint smile pursed my lips.

Reign, too, noticed it, his murderous gaze dropping for an instant to my attacker's leg.

"Professor…" Lucian dipped his head.

"You're late for my class." Reign bared his teeth, and another chill skittered up my spine.

"We were detained with more pressing matters." Kian limped closer and leaned against his friend.

"Nothing is more pressing than my class." Reign's tone was calm, collected, and altogether lethal. His hand jutted out and a shadow streaked off his form, darting toward the male first-year.

Kian's eyes bulged, two saucers of icy blue widening to impossible widths as the shadow curled around him.

"Are you proficient in umbrakinesis?" Reign twisted his fingers and the dark shadow snaked around Kian's throat. He twisted again and the darkness coiled like a rope, tightening around the male's neck. "What about fear induction? Umbral blades?" Another shadow shot from his splayed fingers and blades made of pure night whizzed across the few yards between them. One hummed by, millimeters from his stuck-up nose, while a second sliced across the tie at the back of his neck, and a clump of silver hair hit the ground.

"Blessed Raysa," Lucian rasped.

"Only Noxus can help you now, boy," Reign hissed as he released another onslaught of murky shadows. They surrounded Lucian, and a scream tore from his curled lips.

"Get them off! Get them off!" He jumped up and down, scratching and tearing at his clothes.

I watched, horrified, as the chaos unfolded.

"There's nothing on you," Kian shouted, but Lucian's eyes were vacant and wide, blind terror etched into his features.

"Fear induction," Reign snarled, as he closed in on both males. "Another important ability you would be learning if you were currently in my class instead of torturing a weak, fellow first-year."

My head snapped up at the insult. I wasn't that weak… I'd managed to land a few hits, at least.

Reign's arms opened wide and, like dogs returning to their master, the storm of darkness retreated, curling around the Shadow Fae's muscular form. He towered over the cowering males, his lethal glare fixed to the pair. "Get out of my sight," he growled. "Do not show your face in my class until I say so."

Lucian and Kian stood frozen, eyes wide and jaws unhinged.

"Go, now," he shouted.

"But…" Kian whimpered.

"Now!"

Both males scrambled toward the lawn, Kian limping behind Lucian's speeding form. I drew in a breath as relief loosened the tense set of my shoulders, and I attempted to sit up. Until that ominous power slithered over me and shards of ice danced across my skin.

I swallowed hard and glanced up to meet those fathomless midnight orbs. Technically, I was also late to Reign's class. Would it matter that an assault prevented me from arriving on time? Probably not, knowing how things worked in this academy. Forcing my shoulders back, I faced the dark beast.

"Are you hurt?" he gritted out.

Well… that hadn't been what I'd expected at all. "Does my pride count?" I forced a smile, despite the pounding ache at the back of my head.

The ghost of a smile twitched at his lips. "I'm afraid pride does not count for much at the Conservatory unless it is well earned."

"Fair enough."

Reign crouched in front of me and offered a hand. Those shadows swirled around his palm, writhing like possessed wraiths. Again, my gaze drifted to the silver bangle hanging from his wrist, the metal gleaming beneath the sun's brilliant rays. What secrets do they unlock?

"I'm not going to bite, princess."

"I don't know if I believe you after what you just did to Kian and Lucian."

"That was different. They were late to my class."

"So am I." Goddess, shut your mouth! Why couldn't I stop myself from blurting out stupidities in front of this male?

He dropped lower so his eyes were level to mine. "You're my acquisition. I have an inherent stake in your survival. We've already gone over this. Do your rounded ears prevent you from hearing well?" An actual smile lifted the corners of his lips and Raysa, it was gorgeous. Shadow Fae or not, that grin was more radiant than the gods' blessed sun.

"Was that a joke?" I sputtered. "Is the dark and broody professor of Shadow Arts actually capable of humor?"

"There are many things I'm capable of, princess. Maybe one day, I'll grant you the honor of witnessing my numerous talents." A devious grin lit up his onyx irises, bathing them in pure starlight.

Goddess, and was that flirting? Thank the realms I kept that thought to myself.

Reign wrapped his hand around mine and hauled me off the stone walkway. All the blood rushed from my head at the sudden jolt and I crashed face-first into his firm chest, his arm encircling my waist as he held me up. I inhaled a mouthful of musky, frosty male, like the air after a thunderstorm, and another type of heat rushed low in my belly.

"You are hurt," he snarled, nostrils flaring. His hand moved from my back, up my neck until his fingers tangled in my hair. "Fuck, Aelia, you're bleeding."

"Right. I think I hit my head before?—"

"Who did this to you?" he snapped. "Was it Kian or Lucian?"

My thoughts were still fuzzy from the attack, but I was ninety-nine percent certain… "Kian," I muttered.

"Hmm." His lips pursed, and the shadows darkened around him. That power expanded, pressing into me like a tidal wave. "Can you walk?" he all but growled.

"Of course, I can." I peeled my body away from his and attempted a step. Thankfully, I didn't fall on my rump and embarrass myself further.

"You're going the wrong way, princess."

I spun around, clearly too quickly given my head wound, and flopped into Reign's open arms. "Oh, Raysa, strike me down," I growled against his dark tunic, breathing in another lungful of his intoxicating scent.

"Be careful what you wish for." With a dark chuckle, Reign swept me into his arms before I could get a word out. His hard planes yielded to my soft ones, and despite the unearthly chill that clung to his shadows, his body felt warm against mine. Honestly, with my form pressed so close to his, my tongue was hopelessly tied. A completely new phenomenon for me.

Those omnipresent wisps of darkness wrapped tighter around me, cool and crisp like a dead lover's embrace. Another chill skittered up my spine, unbidden.

Reign dropped his gaze to mine. "Are you aware of what shadowtraveling is?"

My dark brows furrowed as I regarded my professor. "Excuse me?"

"Oh, Noxus, princess, did they not teach you anything at all in that Kin educational system?"

"Apparently not."

"Shadowtraveling is an advanced Shadow Fae ability to traverse space through shadows, allowing us to move swiftly from one shadow to another."

I gawked at my professor. He may as well have said he had the power to travel through time. "You can move through shadows?" I finally blurted.

"Correct."

The epically long journey aboard the phoenix tumbled to the forefront of my mind. "Wait a second, then why didn't we just do that when you found me in Feywood?"

His lips flipped into a scowl; clearly, I'd hit a nerve of some sort. "So many questions…" he muttered.

"That's a sign of intelligence," I countered.

"And extreme vexation."

I couldn't stop my eyes from rolling.

"If you must know, traveling such lengths takes an inordinate amount of power. So that is why we flew instead."

I shrugged. "Why was that so hard to admit? You wish for me not to know that even your impressive abilities have limits?"

A rueful smile flashed across his face, and I wanted to smack myself for noticing the perfect bow of his soft, pillowy lips. "Something like that, princess." His arms wrapped tighter around me—no, not his arms, his shadows. "Get ready."

Endless black coiled around me, and a chill seeped into the depths of my bones. The bright sunny campus blurred, then disappeared altogether. A rush of air whipped dark and light strands of hair across my face as the void swallowed us whole.