34. Savage

Chapter 34

Savage

T wo days later, we drive through the black and gold coiling gates of Animus Academy. Sabrina grips Aurelia's hand tightly in her own, her other hand perched on the open window of the SUV. I watch them carefully from where I sit shotgun up the front with Yeti driving. My regina offers Sabrina another corn chip, and the little leopard opens her mouth for her to pop it in. She already looks better. A little colour returned to her cheeks this morning before they all did their make up together.

"I have to look good for my comeback," Sabrina said softly, brushing on mascara in our big motel room. "I have to let everyone know those bastards couldn't break me."

My regina cried herself to sleep last night. She and Minnie slept in Sabrina's bed so she wouldn't be alone, and when she eventually came to mine and Lyle's bed at 2 a.m., I stroked her hair and kissed her tears away.

Marduk insisted on keeping watch by sitting on the doorstep of the motel room, while Yeti slept by the door and my regina put shields all around the entire motel. I think it was only all of these things put together that got Sabrina to eventually fall asleep.

We drive up right into the medical centre drop-off where we came in for enrolment, and there's an entire welcoming party that Aurelia and Minnie organised via telepathy with Raquel.

Connor and Raquel stand with a giant hand-painted banner stretched out between them that says ‘Welcome home our favourite Hoe'. Stacey holds Eugene, who holds a single balloon in his beak while Theresa, the animas' counsellor, holds a whole bunch of rainbow-coloured balloons. I can sense Scythe and Xander further in the medical centre. They arrived two days ago on dragon-back and have been sorting things out with the new boss bird of the school.

I hop out of the car to see Sabrina's face lighting up, and I see a tiny bit of her old self come through as she sashays up to Stacey with her arms out. My regina lets out a sigh of relief at the leopard's reaction.

"She thrives being around people, regina," I say to her, mind-to-mind. "Sort of like a wolf, I think. She'll heal being around her friends."

My regina looks at me with shining eyes and takes my hand as we follow our party into a private room where an eagle-eyed nurse takes Sabrina's vital signs.

"I'd like her to have a bag of fluid and IV paracetamol and ondansetron," Lyle says bossily to the doctor. "She's not been eating very well and has a number of bruises."

Sabrina bites her lip. "I feel kind of vomit-y."

Connor brings out a bag of buffet pastries from nowhere, plonking it on the table. "I'll feed you myself, babe, and we'll have you dancing in no time."

"But you can take all the time you need," Stacey says hurriedly. "You don't have to do anything you don't want to."

We let the nurses do their job for a bit, and once Sabrina is settled on the bed, she demands to hear the gossip from the school.

"That giant b-bin chicken has been on the w-warpath since you guys left," Raquel mutters.

"It's a disaster!" Connor cries. "Dolores has taken the nimpins hostage!"

"Hostage!" Minnie and Aurelia exclaim at the same time.

"C-Confiscated them," Raquel clarifies. "Said we d-didn't need them. Said they were a h-hazard"

"He's got them starving in a dungeon somewhere, I just know it," Stacey says, sniffing.

"That bastard!" Minnie says stomping her foot. "Gertie must be so confused!"

The animas relied on their nimpins more than I realised until I saw how much Henry comforted Aurelia during her time stuck in lioness form in the cavern under the school. He'd helped me feed her, even after I'd threatened to eat him whole, bones and all. The nimpins are important.

"Zookeeper Rick would never put them in a dungeon," I say calmly, "but we'll send Lyle to check. What else?"

"The place has gone to the dogs," Stacey says. "No offense," she adds, glancing at me. I shrug. "He works us like convicts in the yard!"

"But the school h-has b-been protesting," Raquel says, brown eyes excited.

"Like when it wouldn't let Dolores back in his office?" Connor says. "Except better. There's been pipes exploding, a classroom collapsed on itself, and the entire computer network wouldn't work for a full day. A bit annoying, but it's had Dolores running around like a headless chook." We all glance at Eugene. "No offense."

My regina is smirking.

"Sharing is caring," I say into the group chat.

"I had a word with Christine and Bastien before I left," she replies. "Looks like they kept up their promise. "

I'd once tried to behead Christine the gargoyle from her spot on top of the anima's dorm entrance. Looks like she was more useful than we thought.

The animas chat with Sabrina for a while before an academy guard knocks on the door. Sabrina stiffens. We see the red envelope right away, and Yeti takes it from the guard before commanding him out.

With raised eyebrows, the white tiger hands me the envelope. "It's for you, Sav."

I take it, professionally opening it up like I'm going to read it. Luckily, my regina rescues me, leaning over my arm to read the fancy letters.

"It's a notice to see Dolores," Aurelia says, her mouth twisting in distaste. "He wants to see you for a meeting immediately."

"He's not going to try and put you back in jail, is he?" Minnie asks nervously.

I cackle, and it sounds kind of mad, which I like. "Are you worried about me, Minnie?"

The tigress turns her face away from me and makes a ‘harrumph' sound. "Of course not."

I turn to my regina. "I think she is."

My little chompy grins. "I think she is too. You'd better go see what it's about."

I don't want to leave, but I've been commanded by my regina, so I sigh, kiss her loudly on the mouth, and go to meet my fate.

Damien Dolores Dicky Doo Agnis definitely looks like an overgrown bird. One of the spindly ones that are all wobbly on their legs. Except I think he's a bit wobbly in the mind.

I know all about that.

"So, you are Savage Fengari," the phoenix chirps from behind the desk in one of the classrooms he's been forced to make his office since the school won't let him into Lyle's.

I clasp my hands behind my back and nod like the good little student I am. "It is I."

He sniffs through his slightly red nose. "You left a significant amount of mayhem in your wake at Blackwater Prison. Property damage is in the millions, let alone injury to the employees. A number of inmates are missing. And there is the matter of the murder charge for Ruben Lunaris and three prison guards."

I shrug and smile sweetly. "Sometimes these things happen." He narrows his goldy eyes. His vision can't be good even though he wears those big white glasses. He has no regina to make sure he has the right sort of frames, and I think that's a bit sad. "Xander says you may be inbred. Is that true?"

Blood floods his pale cheeks, turning them pink, and his carotid artery bulges nicely. "Excuse me? My blood line is pure, though I can't say the same for yours. I believe you are still illiterate despite your advanced age."

It's not that I don't want to learn how to read and write properly, it's just that I'm so shit at learning it. But the way he's saying it is not very nice. I clench my fists behind my back as I imagine breaking the bird's beak. But, unfortunately I've promised Scythe I won't hurt this cockatoo.

He continues with his beak in the air. "It is time you grew up and became an adult. This childishness must stop."

"Adulthood is where the soul goes to die," I say smoothly. It's one of my favourite sayings.

Damien rudely ignores my words of wisdom and just continues on. That gets on my nerves. "While the inmates at Blackwater Prison are being redistributed, the council has agreed you may be incarcerated for your crimes here."

Translation: we know it's useless to try and lock you up, so we're letting you do what you want.

"How lovely and generous," I say.

"But listen to me now." Damien points a finger at my chest. He thinks I haven't noticed that he won't move out from behind his desk. Does he think a bit of wood will save him?

I reach up to my ear and turn an invisible dial. "Listening is on."

"I won't tolerate any fighting. Any backchat. Any general lack of respect. You will follow my rules or suffer the consequences."

"But consequences don't work on me," I splay my hands out, genuinely worried. "What are you gonna do about that?"

"Well," he says, lowering his finger, which is a good thing, because it was about to be removed from his body. But then he smirks. "You have a regina now."

There is only a beat of silence before I grab his entire desk with both hands and fling it out the window.

Wood crashes into glass, sending shards and splinters everywhere. The phoenix squawks loudly in shock and plasters himself to the whiteboard, clutching his chest, eyes wide. Outside comes a few screams followed by a loud crash.

It's my turn to point at him and my voice emerges feral deep. "Threaten my regina again, and that'll be your severed head crashing through the window."

The phoenix peels himself off the whiteboard and straightens his shoulders. "You are insane and deserve what's going to happen to you."

A chill runs down my spine, raising my hackles. Scythe would never let this bin chicken do anything to us. I make a promise to myself then. That whatever happens while this dodo is head of the school, that one day, I'll pluck his feathers one by one and fry his breasts, thighs and tenderloins in a vat of oil.

Those golden eyes I'll leave for last. Maybe if Xander eats them, his own eyes will grow back. It's worth the try.

I clap my hands once and grin at him, suddenly in a good mood. "Yes, yes! So what's the plan now?"

He shakes his head like I'm the mad one and brushes the shoulder of his white suit for no reason. He says tightly, "The entire faculty has been discussing the best solution. Lyle has made some suggestions. You may go to see him now to begin. And you will make me a new desk."

"Sure," I say, wiggling my fingers at him before I saunter out the door. "It'll be the best desk ever."

I sniff out Lyle at the back of the academy where zookeeper Rick runs his animal rescue shelter.

"G'day, Savage!" Rick says excitedly. He's an excitable red-head in a safari outfit and very good with animals, which means he's good with me. Right now, he's weighing a tiny, pink squirming thing on an electronic scale.

"Is that for eating?" I ask, pointing at the tiny creature. It looks like a jellybean.

Rick writes down the thing's weight on a notepad before bundling it up into a cloth sack. I'm trying to push away what Lyle calls intrusive thoughts, honest.

"Nah, mate. It's a koala joey. His mother was brought in this morning, but she didn't make it."

I frown because suddenly it feels cold in here. Like a cloud's covered the afternoon sun. "How's it gonna survive without its mummy?"

"We'll look after him. Feed him, clean him up, make sure he's happy."

My regina's beautiful face suddenly swims into my brain. "But it's so small."

"Sure is, but old mate's got plenty of fight in him."

"Yeah," I say more confidently. "I reckon he does."

Rick grins at me, his eyes crinkling. "Lyle's waiting for you in the back. Nice little surprise for you there."

When I get into the back room, Xander is also already in there, arms crossed and frowning at Lyle, who's sitting on a stool in front of a table with two cloth bundles like the one Rick had, only bigger. One is purple with a banana pattern, and the other is pink with brown teddy bears.

"Your job is to keep them alive," Lyle says. "And all will be forgiven."

"There are pups in there?" I exclaim, gesturing to the bags.

"Marsupial babies are called joeys," Lyle says. "And congratulations, they are your responsibility now."

He hangs the cloth sack around Xander's neck and then mine. When I look down into it, the joey—which is a furless, brown thing—is sleeping soundly, curled up on itself. Sometimes I sleep like that too.

"We're dads now, Xander!" I say, patting my bag. "I bet I'll do it better than you."

Xander takes a booklet of information and flips through it, sighing dramatically. "So that's it?" he asks. "I have to keep this thing alive for the next few months and they won't class me a fugitive?"

"The council's approved it. And Sav has to pass a writing and reading test in three months."

"What?" I choke. The joey wriggles against me and I whisper instead. "That's fucked up, Lyle, and you know it. Three months to learn something I couldn't learn in twenty-three years?"

"You're tried for murder, Sav. These are pretty good terms," he says firmly. "Aurelia said she will help you. So there's your incentive. You get…private time with her."

I perk up then, because why didn't he say so before? I imagine bending her over a desk and finally living out my fantasy of fucking her in a classroom.

Xander scoffs and collects a handful of bottles, teats, and joey milk. He stalks out the door with one hand cupped around the bulge that's the joey and leaving only a singed scent behind him.