Chapter 30

30

They cancelled the rest of the Trials. It was the first time in over five hundred years where the final two rounds would not be completed due to extenuating circumstances.

Headmaster Cyrus wanted to honor the memory of the student who’d died at Onyx’s hands, as well as the other unfortunate female victims. Coral was on the mend, since help had arrived in the nick of time. Selene, with the rest of the cavalry and Bronwen in tow, had quickly taken charge of everything, including securing my hostage.

My hostage, they’d called him. Like I’d somehow done something wonderful in crippling my friend and mentor. I felt terrible about it.

Onyx was not a bad guy, unlike his father. He wasn’t the kind of man or wolf to hurt innocent people for no reason. There had to be another explanation for why he’d attacked those women. He’d said he was having black-outs, couldn’t remember. Hadn’t the same thing happened to me?

Except he wasn’t taking the brain boost powder, as far as I knew.

Which meant someone else was controlling him.

Who?

I gritted my teeth, enduring the capture process and the questioning that followed, trying my best not to look at Selene though she stood close to me. To keep up the deception, she wasn’t there as a leader of the Claw & Fang. She was there as a reporter, and on her heels came the very familiar faces of the Faerie Bureau of Investigation, including Rooker, to take Onyx into custody.

He was still in custody, with Coral in critical condition but stable at the healing center. I’d somehow managed to slip away before anyone forced me to go to the center. Selene found me, under the guise of wanting an interview, and calmly escorted me out of the area.

I walked on numb legs with Selene at my side keeping me upright. Everything hurt. “Just a few more steps and then we’ll be there.” Urgency filled her voice.

“Fine.” At least, I thought I spoke. I still wasn’t sure. My eyes were closed and when I opened them a crack, I glimpsed the bright bronze knob of the tree door.

I hadn’t been able to fly on my own either. Selene had to force me to change form into a mouse and she carried me in her talons toward the half-shifter hospital.

There were broken ribs to mend, a dislocated shoulder and some torn muscles in my hip and left thigh. Onyx had really done some damage. But I was alive. He was alive.

“Try not to move. The healers are going to do what they can but you might have a scar on your side from Onyx’s attack.”

My eyes snapped open at the name and I instantly wanted to defend him. He hadn’t meant to hurt me, or kill those women. I didn’t know what had happened to him, but part of me almost wished he hadn’t made it through our final fight, because the consequences he faced now might be worse than death.

I worried about him. Whatever had happened to make him kill hadn’t been his fault, I was sure of it.

I sat up on the cot and the dark bloody stain on the sheet beneath me had my vision blurring.

“Tavi!” Selene hissed. “Don’t move. How come you never listen?”

Sighing, I allowed her to press me back into the mattress, waiting for the healers to arrive. Why didn’t I listen? Because I obviously had a severe death wish. Now it extended to those around me.

Of all the magic I had, all the power of my messed-up bloodline, all of it was useless when it came to keeping the people I cared about safe. Sure, Coral was alive, barely. But what had happened to Onyx to push him to such extremes?

Did his father have anything to do with whoever or whatever was controlling him in halfling form? I felt like things were slipping farther and farther out of my control with each passing second, and I wondered if I’d ever know the whole story.

I spent the night with the healers hovering over me to speed the process. Knitting me back together until Selene came to escort me home when the sun rose, her hand on my shoulder.

“I want to let you know,” she began with her voice soft, “to be prepared.”

I sighed and leaned heavily against her. I hadn’t gotten any sleep. “Prepared for what?”

“We all must brace ourselves for the fallout. It will soon go public that Onyx Grimaldi is a half-shifter.” Selene paused. “There is no way around it. There is no way to spin his bloodline after what he’s done.”

“It wasn’t his fault. It was mine.”

“No,” she was quick to say, clenching her hand on my shoulder. Pain exploded from the area but I didn’t cry out. “You did what you had to do. You stopped a murderer.”

“He’s not a murderer,” I insisted. “He’s a good man. He’s nothing but kind. Someone did this to him.”

“He might be all those things, but he is also guilty. There is blood on his hands and no way for us to keep the authorities from doing their jobs.” The door to the healing center closed behind us and melted seamlessly back into tree bark. “Not once this case became high profile. With the bureau involved, it will soon be public knowledge. Speaking of which, you have a meeting tomorrow with Rooker to discuss the events of the last Trial.”

I didn’t have the energy to be upset about the meeting. I’d known it was coming once I sent out the call for help. Even so, the world broke into a thousand tiny pieces. “Fine. It’s not like he and I haven’t had our one on one time before,” I said. “It will be like talking to an old friend.”

“You’re lucky.”

“How so?” My eyes grew hot.

“Well, your little girlfriend is awake, for one.”

That got my neurons firing again. “Coral?”

Selene was nodding as we walked. And luckily not trying to push me away when I clung to her. “Yes.”

“How is she? Is she—” I broke off. Oh God, what if she was jabbering on about seeing two wolves fighting?

“She’s awake and talking. Not about you and your little, you know, secret, but apparently she remembers everything about the attack. At least you should not become some kind of halfling scapegoat.” Her gaze cast down on me. “Well, not this time.”

“I’ll take what I can get.”

Selene stopped, forcing me to slow with her. “She’s defending your honor, Tavi.”

I almost scoffed, but I was still too exhausted so it only came out as a sort of grimace. “That would be a first for her.”

“I need you to be up and running so you can hold your head high and protect yourself. Keep the people from panicking. You’re off the hook as the culprit, and hopefully this will take the focus off of you for the murder of Madam Muerte too.”

I cocked my head to the side. “You think?”

“If we can spin it properly, yes. I’ll do what I can to get the story out in a way I can control but the other news stations and reporters may not be as eager to pick it up the way we want. We’ll have to wait and see what happens.”

“I’m not going anywhere. I’ll do what I have to do.”

“I know it’s too much for me to ask you to stay out of trouble.”

“Trouble?” I let out a short barking laugh. “You don’t think I try?”

“You try, yes. Try harder. Any more of this and we’re going to be digging a hole in the ground for you.”

I thought about her words later, sitting on the edge of my bed with each new breath a fresh agony. Dawn came and went hours ago but I knew there would be no sleep for me. Not today. Part of me wondered if Onyx hadn’t attacked, would Coral and I still be trying to fight our way through the tournament in the third Trial?

I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

A knock sounded at my door. “Come on in,” I called out.

A familiar blond head peeked inside. The fire inside of me burst into life at the sight of him. I should have known he’d come.

“Are you decent?” Mike asked.

I was too exhausted even to attempt humor so I just nodded.

He closed the door behind him before fixing me with a serious look. Then he dropped my backpack to the floor and stood in front of me. “You’re home.”

“I am,” I said with a small smile.

“What happened to you?”

“My mentor found a private healer for me. My wounds were…extensive,” I told him, parroting the statement Selene had given to me. Short, believable. Private healers for hire were legal in Faerie, allowed to work outside the confines of the healing center for more extensive needs. Specialized needs, like mine. “I needed more than the healing center could provide.”

Mike nodded. Did he accept the explanation?

“You should have let me know where you were. I was worried about you. I heard the half-shifter attacked you trying to get to Coral. What were the two of you even doing together out there?”

I wanted to throw myself at him for a big hug and a good long cry—the cry because I knew I would never be able to tell him the truth. And that sucked.

“We randomly crossed paths out there during the Trial. Then the beast had us cornered. I’m sorry I didn’t let you know we were okay. Did you have to hear about it from the news?”

Mike nodded again. “I didn’t know what was going on. I went to visit Coral at the healing center. She didn’t know where you were, either.”

“I’m sorry,” I repeated. “I hate that I made you worry. It took all of my magic to get through the attack and call for help once I had him down.”

“You’re going to have to tell me the story sometime.”

I could tell there was more he wanted to say. “Of course. You know I will. Maybe after I get a little sleep.”

“At least you won’t have to go through the rest of the Trials.” Mike fidgeted but he didn’t come any closer. “I know you really wanted to sit them out altogether.”

“Look where it got me.” I offered him a grim smile.

“I brought this.” He indicated the backpack on the floor. The bag was covered in blood. Probably a mixture of mine and Onyx’s and Coral’s. A melting pot of blood. “After the Trial ended, I went to look for you. I found your bag instead.”

“Thank you.”

Mike reached into his pocket and pulled something out. Keeping eye contact, he laid it gently on the nightstand beside me. “I found this, too.”

My skin turned to ice. It was my wolf amulet.

The red-hot shaft of fear tearing through me made the rest of my wounds seem like nothing. I went hot and cold at the same time, clenching the bed covering beneath me. “Where did you get that?”

Mike leveled a serious gaze on me. “This is your necklace, isn’t it?” he said softly. “I recognize the chain. I’ve seen you wearing it a few times and didn’t think anything of it until I found it with the rest of your things last night.”

Did I bother denying what he already apparently knew? Was it worth a try?

Before I could say anything, he said, “And I know it’s the symbol of the Claw & Fang, a secret society made up of shifters that isn’t supposed to exist but does.”

I couldn’t breathe.

Mike knew.

“Is there something you want to tell me, Tavi?” he went on. “About why you have this? What…what you are?”

But I didn’t have the answers he clearly wanted. I shivered, the cold seeping through my skin all the way down to the bone. I thought I’d known fear before? Nothing compared to seeing the betrayal on Mike’s face. The betrayal, and worse—the sheer fear of what answer I’d give him.

“What are you?” he repeated.

I swallowed and felt sick. My secret was out.

The End

Continue the Fae Academy for Halflings novels with Faerie Oath (coming soon).

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