Relentless

Relentless

Adelaide Blaike

Content warnings: non-consensual interaction involving magic | implication of animal cruelty (not shown on page)

F rom the moment Asher Larsen stepped across the ancient, boot-worn threshold of Gannon Academy for the Elemental Arts, the powerful scent of another mage’s aura became his entire world.

The cinnamon-infused trail was thick in the Academy’s courtyard, lingered faintly in Principal Everett’s office as Asher dutifully endured his induction lecture on academic integrity and mage honour, and weaved through the various classrooms and training areas he was shown on the ground floor.

“So that’s the serious stuff out of the way,” chirped Bonnie, the sprightly, auburn-haired student who had been assigned to show Asher around. “We don’t get much free time, and I expect you’ll have even less with being a trimester behind, but when you do , everyone hangs out in the Attic.”

The Attic turned out to be a low ceilinged room on the top floor of the old building. It was an informal space, softly lit, with mismatched lounges and low tables dotted across the floor. Asher couldn’t see any professors amid the thick crowd of gathered Academy students.

The mage cohort groups were indicated by the number of pips on the uncomfortably high, starched collars of their black uniforms. Three for the senior year. Two for the junior. And one for the first-year recruits to which Asher now belonged: raw with magical potential but no formal training.

Although, as Bonnie had reminded him with inexplicable cheer, at least the rest of them had spent their first trimester studying at the Academy. Asher’s attendance had been delayed by the rains coming early to his family’s farm, and judging by the lengthy admonition he’d just received from Principal Everett, helping to plant the crops that would keep his kin alive through the next winter wasn’t an adequate reason for turning up to Gannon late.

Asher, despite the scowl he’d worn throughout the lecture, couldn’t find it in himself to argue. He was dreadfully, hopelessly behind the rest of his cohort, and already despairing at how he’d possibly manage to catch up. He had spent the two-day journey to the Academy wet, miserable, and wondering if it was even worth the attempt.

What if he spent most of a year buried in books and gruelling exams, only to wash out?

Only half of the first-years graduated to the second, and half of them wouldn’t make it to the third. Gannon Academy didn’t give second chances, and a failed, uncertified mage was as good as no mage at all.

He should direct his efforts into woodworking or tanning instead, Asher had been telling himself as he stumbled wearily up the stone steps to the school. Spend the time earning a trade instead of wasting it on a fool’s dream.

But that was when he’d smelled the cinnamon. It was more than a pleasant scent: it was an energy , utterly intoxicating and mesmerisingly magnetic. It overwhelmed his senses even now, making it difficult to concentrate on Bonnie’s chatter and impossible to smell the mug of mead she was waving under his nose.

“Asher. Asher, are you listening?”

The aura was actually stronger here than it had been downstairs. Rich and exhilarating, and making Asher’s mouth water with need. He felt himself being pulled deeper into the room, drifting through the crowd of students and sensing Bonnie’s bemusement as he left her behind.

The cinnamon-tasting aura wrapped itself fondly around him and offered gentle nudges towards the back of the Attic with an insistent compulsion that was impossible to ignore. Eyes watched him pass: the second and third-years with curiosity, and the first-year mages with a wary assessment as they sized up their new competition.

Asher was no competition. He was tired from his journey, overwhelmed and weary, and already feeling woefully inadequate against the confident, competent students who surrounded him.

A man near the far end of the hall glanced up with an irritated expression as he passed, his hand lifting as though to touch Asher, and then aborting the movement just as abruptly. Asher swayed like he’d been hit, the invisible force locking down each of his muscles to prevent him from walking past.

This was the source of all that delicious energy.

He was a first-year around Asher’s own age, with thick dark hair that framed a pale, scowling face. His eyes were piercing and violet, his nose thin, and he was the type of handsome often termed brooding or tortured. His was an aloof beauty, the kind that would be ruined by a smile, but he certainly wasn’t doing anything as soft or human as smiling now.

The man—Asher’s soulmate, the energy in the air between them could be nothing else—looked Asher up and down where he stood frozen in front of him.

Asher waited for the mage to acknowledge him. To greet him, to embrace him, to...kiss him. This stranger had stirred a desperate need within him, one that eclipsed even the necessity of air. And that inexplicable force that had drawn him in, overriding all of his senses and sensibilities and making him yearn for someone he’d never even met… surely he had to feel the same?

But the dark-haired man’s mouth twisted in distaste and he tossed a handful of red sparks in Asher’s direction, making him flinch.

“Fuck off, recruit,” he said disdainfully.

Then he nodded farewell to his companions, pushed past Asher with an unnecessarily vicious shoulder check, and disappeared into the crowds of the Attic.

“Oh,” Bonnie said with a long sigh, appearing at Asher’s side. “Oh, dear.”

H is name was Xem Whitlock, Bonnie told him. She pronounced it ‘Zem’, and it was only much later that Asher realised it was spelt with a X in the exotic way of the other mage’s native icelands. But Asher was more bespelled by the sound of it, and how it wrapped around his tongue in the same way Xem’s aura tangled itself around him in tones of cinnamon spice, heat, and need.

Bonnie also told him Xem was out of his league, by a thousand times, honey . Asher would have been offended, except she’d multiplied the number when cataloguing her own chances with him and pulled a disappointed face when explaining that Xem favoured men. “But even as adorable as you are,” Bonnie had added, eyeing Asher’s pale curls and the biceps that were more pudgy than toned, “neither one of us should expect to warm that particular mage’s bed anytime soon.”

“Why?”

“He barely tolerates anyone but the highest ranked third-year mages. The prick is insanely powerful.”

Asher wasn’t surprised. The sheer strength of the aura that continued to draw him into its thrall was akin to the tornados that would sweep through his family’s farm every couple of years. Capable of rattling doors and hurling livestock and tearing Asher limb from limb.

Disappointingly, there wasn’t a trace of it in the cramped, draughty room he’d been assigned to share with Dawson, another first-year. Clearly Xem had never been in there, and while his scent drifted faintly through a couple of the other student bedrooms, it was strongest behind the door at the furthest end of the corridor to Asher’s own.

“Swap with me,” Asher begged Bonnie at the end of his first week at Gannon, unable to take the desolation any longer. He’d been tossing and turning for hours each night, feeling like a man dying of thirst and knowing all the water he could ever want was sleeping a handful of beds down the corridor. Bonnie might not have been the lucky student who shared Xem’s room but at least she was closer, and getting closer was all Asher could think about.

The addiction had weaved its way into his soul. It gnawed at him, eroding his interest and attention in anything else until his whole world had become Xem .

What time the mage woke each morning. That he shared a room with Pippah Shae, another first-year student. What he liked to eat for breakfast down in the main dining hall and how he always finished his eggs prior to starting on his bacon, each type of food neatly polished off before he began on another. Xem’s impressive mastery over the four elements: not just the fire he’d thrown at Asher that first day in the form of sparks, but also the rich strength of earth, the deceptively gentle caress of air, and the hungry demand of water.

And how his presence made everything…better . Being near Xem was soothing and satisfying and the only time Asher felt he could breathe freely. The distress he suffered whenever they were separated wasn’t painful, exactly, but it was like an itch that couldn’t be scratched. A cough that wouldn’t leave. An urge that wouldn’t ease.

A distracting, agitating need.

“Swap rooms with you?” Bonnie repeated, confused. “Why?”

“I just...”

Asher trailed off. He had no good reason to give her: identifying any objective merit of her room over his would hardly give her the incentive to agree. And while his friend was unhappily aware of his obsession with Xem—she could hardly fail to be, considering how mindless it made him—telling her that being a few yards closer to the other man each night would make him feel better seemed...pathetic.

It was pathetic. He was pathetic.

Yet from the pitying look she was giving him, Bonnie had already figured it out.

“I can’t,” she said. “You know the beds are ranked.”

“What?”

An exasperated sigh was breathed his way. “Asher, have you been paying any attention at all?”

No .

“Yes?” But it came out hesitant, a question he hadn’t meant to ask, and he winced as he said it.

“Our rank within our student cohort grants us proportional entitlements at Gannon,” Bonnie explained with a patience Asher didn’t deserve. “The higher your rank, the fewer shifts you’re assigned to work in the laundry. You’re permitted longer bookings in the training rooms. You get the better bedrooms.”

She waved a hand up the corridor towards the window that overlooked the Academy grounds, where the door to the room Xem shared with Pippah was firmly shut. “Top of the year reside down there: larger rooms, comfier beds, fewer rats trying to gnaw on your toes.”

Then Bonnie rapped her knuckles on Asher’s open door. “Bottom of the year—and new recruits who haven’t yet been ranked,” she added hastily, catching the crestfallen look on his face, “sleep all the way over here. I hope you took my advice about the vermin?”

He’d completely forgotten what she might have told him to do, but coming from a farm, rats didn’t bother Asher.

No, what was concerning was the number of beds between him and the mage who had quickly become his entire focus. The one who hadn’t even bothered to speak to him since that first day, perpetually haughty and unapproachable, and sending Asher into a confusing state of miserable delight. Or delightful misery. The two made an impossible combination: the mere taste of Xem in the air could invigorate Asher in a way he’d never felt before, but not being able to get closer was absolute agony .

T he blood on its whiskers and claws suggested that the huge black rat was the same one Asher had spotted in his room last night when he’d woken to use the privy. A vicious, ugly beast, as were its two companions, but that didn’t mean any of them deserved the fate their professor had just described.

“You’re making the second-years practice their air magic by suffocating innocent creatures?” Asher repeated in disbelief, straightening up from where he’d been inspecting the cage on the desk. The three murine occupants scurried frantically within the confined space. “That’s fucking barbaric!”

“Language, Mr. Larsen,” Professor Allarie chided, as though swearing was worse than the literal torture she’d so casually tossed out as explanation for the captive rats. “What would you have the students do, practice on each other ?”

“At least mages can consent!” he argued stubbornly, feeling hot fury spark up his spine. The rest of the first-year class watched on silently with wide eyes and gleeful intrigue.

“Does that mean you’re volunteering as my next class’ test subject?” The professor’s voice was laced with dark threat.

Asher set his jaw and folded his arms. He tried not to imagine what being deprived of his air might feel like. “Yes.”

But she dismissed him with a contemptuous glance, turning to face the rest of the class. “As I said before that pointless interruption, you’ll be doing single element casts with your partners today. Use the techniques we went through yesterday to disable-”

“They’re terrified ,” Asher pointed out, still bristling with horror. “You have no right to do this!”

“Speak again on the subject, Mr. Larsen,” Professor Allarie said irritably, “and you’ll be paired with Mr. Whitlock for the rest of the trimester.”

Asher looked at Xem, irrationally pleased to find him already glaring back. His violet eyes shone with murderous intent and his knuckles hissed dangerously with sparks as he casually rolled his wrists where they rested on his desk. No one in their right mind would risk Xem Whitlock being assigned as their permanent duelling partner, unless they planned on spending life bruised and beaten.

“Very good,” their professor said. She smirked, satisfied her threat had landed. “Now we’ll-”

“I would have thought mages were above animal cruelty,” Asher said loudly. “Clearly, we’re not as advanced and progressive as this Academy likes to claim.”

The room descended into stunned murmurs, and those students closest to Asher suddenly found themselves other places to stand.

“Mr. Whitlock,” hissed Allarie, her lips drawn into a tight line. “It seems Mr. Larsen needs to learn a thing or two about when to hold his tongue.”

“It would be my pleasure to teach him, professor,” Xem responded with a cool cadence, rising gracefully from his chair and gliding over to stand before Asher. Ever the teacher’s pet with his advanced skill and smug diligence, he received a level of respectful reverence from the professors that was rarely shown to other students.

His uniform—the pretentious black Gannon coat, tan breeches, and shiny boots—was as immaculate as always: neatly buttoned, starched and polished, and a clear contrast to Asher’s inability to even keep his shirt tucked in or his suspenders untangled.

Asher squirmed under the intensity of Xem’s gaze. Being this close to the other mage was doing unexpected things to Asher: sending heat through his cheeks and down his neck, hitching his breath, and weakening his legs. He could also feel his cock thickening uncomfortably beneath his breeches. It seemed Xem could breathe life into it with his mere proximity, and Asher desperately hoped it would go unnoticed by the rest of the class.

“The rest of you, pair up,” the professor was saying, although her voice sounded muted like he was hearing it from underwater. In contrast, the small sigh that escaped Xem’s lips as he shifted his weight between his feet was a roar in Asher’s ears.

“I did not realise standing still would pose such difficulty for you,” Xem said dryly.

Asher gave a delighted smile. He didn’t care that the words were drenched in sarcasm, or that he was apparently wriggling so much the mage would bother commenting on it. Because Xem was talking to him.

He had not been so blessed since the contemptuous dismissal that first day when he’d approached Xem in the Attic.

“And I didn’t realise you’d be so…” Asher trailed off, having enthusiastically begun the retort without an idea of where it was going. “I mean, you…”

Xem snorted. “So is talking in full sentences, it seems.”

That time, Asher flushed with humiliation and ducked his head. Apparently his body had decided what it should do when faced with dauntingly powerful men, and that was to shiver and harden.

“Asher,” Xem said.

Trying but failing to suppress the full body shudder that rippled over him at the sound of his name in Xem’s mouth—and the thought of what else of Asher’s he would enjoy having Xem take between his lips—Asher forced himself to lift his chin and meet the intense violet gaze staring back at him.

There was open amusement on the other mage’s face. “You know I’m going to beat you in this duel,” he said. Not as a bluff or a boast, but as an unequivocal statement as emotionless as conveying the time of day.

“Yes,” agreed Asher, equally as certain.

“Then why the fuck are you smiling?”

He was saved from having to reply by Professor Allarie giving them a clipped command to begin. Magic immediately blasted out from the hands of each student in the classroom, from jets of water to waves of fire, but Xem hadn’t moved an inch.

Neither had Asher.

“By all means, recruit,” Xem murmured. “Take the first shot. It’s the only one you’ll get.”

Asher heaved in a breath, raised both hands, and began the somatic movements required to perform elemental magic. Left palm facing down and tipping to an angle towards his right wrist as it rotated anti-clockwise, and then thumb out, tucked in, out again. He was proud of himself when he brought his hands together and his forefingers touched perfectly, fingertip to fingertip, because he’d never achieved such an adept casting before. A flawless icicle flew from his outstretched index finger, three inches long and with a point sharper than an arrow.

It hurtled towards Xem’s unprotected chest. Asher watched in horror, predicting the way it would split his uniform beneath the Academy’s crest, pierce his heart, and blossom blood. How Xem would fall to his knees, eyes wide and accusing, and how Asher would feel in killing his soulmate.

He leapt forward and swept his right hand through the air to dispel the magic. But the hand movement hadn’t been correctly executed, and now there wasn’t time to stop the projectile as it…

…as it dissipated into steam a foot away from Xem.

The mage raised an incredulous eyebrow at him.

“I said you could take a shot,” he drawled. “Not that I’d let it land.” A frown formed on his flawless forehead. “Although why you chose something so dangerous if you truly believed I wouldn’t defend myself is an interesting question.”

Because Asher hadn’t believed he could do it. He’d never cast magic that well before, and had aimed for an ice shard with the expectation of getting a puff of snow.

Had it been Xem’s presence…his soulmate’s presence, that had allowed his magic to flourish?

“I-” was all Asher got out before Xem’s delicate, pale hands flashed in movement and something struck out at Asher with impossible speed.

He had just enough time to recognise it as a vine—thick and gnarly, like the roots he used to hack through to prepare new soil back on his family’s farm—before it lashed across his stomach, sending him staggering backwards. Winded, Asher raised his hands to defend himself, only for the vine to split in two and lunge at his wrists. They looped around his hands and forced them apart.

Xem moved closer with slow, deliberate steps, using his mastery over earth to thread smaller vines between each of Asher’s fingers and render his magic helpless. It showed impressive control over the element, skill that Asher could appreciate even as he struggled against the restraints that now held his arms outstretched.

He was also incredibly turned on.

He’d thought the magical traces Xem left in his wake were addictive, but being touched by his magic itself was a whole other high: an erotic combination of pain and pleasure, as though Asher had been edged for hours and was only now being promised release. His skin tingled where it was wrapped in the vines, hot and achy. He fought the urge to moan.

Xem, violet eyes glittering, touched his thumb to the little finger of his other hand and Asher found himself dragged backwards by the vines around his wrists. His back slammed hard into the classroom wall and he grunted, trying to flex his fingers but discovering them entirely immobilised.

Fuck.

He was now so hard beneath his breeches, it was painful. He was grateful for the duel as an excuse for why his breathing was so ragged, but being pinned to the wall like a butterfly in a collector’s case was not helping to hide his obvious erection. All attention in the classroom had been drawn their way, the other duels quickly discarded in favour of watching someone else’s suffering, and Asher saw more than one person glance down between his legs. Their snickers made his blushing return in full force, and this time he couldn’t even hide his face, for another vine slithered across his neck to hold his head firmly in place against the wall.

Xem, entirely predictably, had annihilated him.

And the price of Asher getting to feel the mage’s magic directly on his skin would be his very imminent, very public, humiliation.

“You surpassed all my expectations, Asher. That was even more pathetic than I could have imagined.” Xem offered him a dangerous smirk. He didn’t need to raise his voice to be heard; all activity in the classroom had ceased but for the eager way the other students’ heads were flickering between the pair of them.

Professor Allarie made no attempt to intervene, showing sudden and undivided interest in wiping her glasses.

“What was it, two seconds? Maybe a grand total of three?” taunted Xem. “Tell me you at least last longer than that in bed.”

Asher choked on a breath. Hearing the word bed in Xem’s enticing accent, the consonants morphed to make it sound like there was an r in there, had stolen all thoughts from his head. He tucked it safely into the back of his mind so he could examine it later, play with it and caress it and bring himself to release to the sound of it, and instead tried to match Xem’s casual attitude.

“Why? You looking for tips on how to keep it up?”

Someone laughed. It was abruptly cut off when they realised who they were laughing at, but it was enough to make Xem’s pale face flash with fury.

“Says the mage sporting a hard-on from having his arse kicked,” Xem shot back, because really, it had been too much to hope that he hadn’t noticed. There were braver chuckles from the crowd this time, and he bared his teeth at Asher. “Although that contemptible performance makes me question if you deserve the title of mage at all. Perhaps you should just trot on home to daddy’s farm, hmm?”

Wait. How did Xem know Asher had grown up on a farm? A lucky guess? Or…had he been asking around about him? Had he not been as disinterested in Asher as he’d pretended?

Asher swallowed. “I’m not going anywhere.”

His body—and his mind—would never let him leave, not while Xem remained at Gannon Academy. Asher had already figured out that no one else could sense the intoxicating magnetism of the other mage, or they’d have been plastered to Xem’s side all hours of the day and night. It seemed it was just him who lived in torment.

The world had a strange sense of humour, assigning Xem Whitlock to be his soulmate.

Not that Asher resented it. Xem was clever and quick, ridiculously talented, and had a body that made even the school uniform look attractive. He was just…not fond of Asher. At all.

“Then if you think you deserve your place at this Academy,” the other mage said cuttingly, “prove it to us, recruit. Get yourself free.”

Xem waved a hand and the vines around Asher’s left wrist disintegrated, releasing his arm and allowing his fingers to move freely. But his right hand remained trapped, bound to the wall with the strength of mortar.

Prick. They all knew students weren’t taught one-handed magic until their third year, so no one could seriously expect Asher to pull it off. And maybe if he’d had a knife he could have tried sawing through the vines, but blunt fingernails weren’t going to do shit against the strength of the elemental magic that Xem wielded.

The man just wanted everyone to see him fail.

Summoning up a smirk of his own, Asher shook out his left wrist and then manoeuvred his hand. It formed a one-handed gesture, but one Asher was far more familiar with than advanced third-year magic, and it made Xem’s expression drop into a stony glare while the other students tried to hide their appreciative snorts.

The mage formed a somatic spell with careless annoyance. Vines instantly materialised back around Asher’s left hand, encasing the rude gesture it had sent Xem’s way, and more sprang into existence to wrap around his legs and chest.

“How about you take that middle finger, Asher,” Xem said in a low, dangerous voice, “and put it to better use?”

Asher hissed in surprise as he was unceremoniously peeled off the wall and manoeuvred by the vines around his limbs down onto all fours. And then Xem used his earth magic to drag his offending left hand behind his back, forcing it under his breeches and down the crack of his arse.

Someone whistled. Asher felt his cheeks flush again, but this time with rage. The fucker better not-

“Alright, that’s enough,” their professor said in a rather half-hearted way. “Get back to your seats.”

Xem cocked his head, holding Asher’s furious gaze.

And for a moment Asher thought he might do it anyway, might actually make him finger himself in front of the whole class, and the expressions on the other students’ faces said they thought so too.

And then Xem shrugged and turned away as if it meant nothing to him either way, vanishing the vines without warning so Asher collapsed to the floor. He heaved in a breath, glaring at the tiles beneath his face.

“ What ?” Professor Allarie shrieked a moment later, and the alarmed tone forced Asher to lift his head.

She was staring at the cage that was still resting on her desk, yet its metal door was scuffed and twisted as if something had blasted through it. The resulting gap was more than large enough for a rat to escape, and now the cage sat empty.

“Mr. Larsen, I’ll have you in detention every night for the rest of the year!” Her voice had gone shrill, her eyes bulging as she rounded on him with an accusing finger, and Asher’s heart sank. That was as good as expelling him. Without the time to practice, he’d never be able to catch up to the other students and then-

“I’m afraid I had Asher’s feeble magic all tied up, just like the rest of him,” Xem drawled from the other end of the classroom where he had his booted feet insolently propped up on his desk, and there were a few tittering laughs in response.“Regrettably, it couldn’t have been him, professor.”

Allarie threw Asher a disgusted look but didn’t accuse him further.

No, the rats’ rescue hadn’t been Asher’s doing.

Because as he took his seat at the front of the classroom and stared at the mangled cage door a couple of feet away, the scent of cinnamon wafted from the bent metal in Xem’s unique magical signature.

A sher was seated on the floor in a dim corner of the Academy library, trying and failing to cast the vine magic that Xem had used on him earlier that day. After he’d found the relevant textbook, he’d retreated further into the stacks to hide from the other students. He didn’t want them to see how he’d tried it fifty...sixty times now, each attempt resulting in miserable failure.

He frowned down at the open book in his lap and tried again. Little fingers bent and held tightly to the palm by the thumbs. The three middle fingers turned to face first the caster, and then the victim—in this case, an innocent oil lamp that had, so far, avoided all of Asher’s efforts to wrap it in restraining vines. And then a final push was meant to finalise the casting and make the earth magic materialise.

It did not.

“Here.”

Asher startled as cool hands folded around his from behind, the cinnamony aura of Xem settling itself over him like a warm blanket and his chest brushing against Asher’s back. Xem’s pale, angular face appeared in his peripheral vision, and Asher imagined for a stupid moment that the other mage might rest his chin on his shoulder.

“Did it occur to you that you’re doing it wrong?” Xem asked bluntly, and Asher rolled his eyes. He probably had a pointy, uncomfortable chin anyway. Who needed that digging into them?

“No shit. How do I do it right?”

He expected to be told to fuck off again.

“Like this,” the mage murmured, and used his hands to guide Asher’s.

Asher forgot how to breathe, so acutely aware of everywhere they touched and the way Xem’s chest rose and fell against his back.

Xem manoeuvred him into the first movement, and then the second, then the third-

Vines sprang into existence and wrapped around the lamp, throttling it so tightly that its flame was instantly extinguished.

“But...!” Asher said in wonder, pleased to know he’d done that. Albeit with help from a prickly rival-almost-enemy. He glanced down at the textbook again. “It says to push, like you’re shoving something heavy off a table. But you just-”

“Slid,” Xem corrected. “Think of it as moving that heavy something across the table without letting it fall. The difference is in the wrist movement.”

He backed up, releasing Asher’s hands in a bittersweet sensation of loss and freedom. Banishing the pitiful urge to beg to be touched again, Asher ran back through the somatic movements and cast a further set of vines to twist around the lamp.

“Good,” praised Xem, sounding...well, almost sincere . “I’ll leave you to your studies.”

Asher twisted around before he could move away, catching Xem’s slender wrist and revelling in the thrill of his skin beneath his fingertips. “You helped the rats to escape. Why?”

“And you deliberately let yourself be paired with me,” Xem shot back. “Why would you do that?”

“I asked first.”

For a moment, Asher didn’t think he would respond. And then Xem gave a long, weary sigh and ran his free hand through his dark hair.

“You were right,” he said. “What they were going to do to those animals was cruel.”

The words filled Asher’s heart. He’d felt so alone in his defiance, as though only he cared about how the rats would suffer. And he might have been the only student to speak up, but Xem had been the one to do something about it.

And then Asher remembered everything else that had happened in the classroom, and reclaimed his scowl. “If I was right ,” he demanded indignantly, “then why the fuck did you have to be so cruel to me?”

“To buy you an alibi,” Xem explained with a quirked, incredulous eyebrow like it should have been obvious. And with hindsight...

“Oh,” Asher said, realising what Xem had said to Professor Allarie had been more than a brag. “You wanted everyone to see my magic had been immobilised, so I wouldn’t be blamed.”

Xem was silent, clearly not bothering to respond to Asher’s incredibly slow appreciation that the mage had a hidden depth to him. Kindness to animals? Thoughtfulness?

Damn it, that shit was like catnip to Asher. He now didn’t need a magical soulmate bond to want to jump the man’s bones.

“And the rest of it?” asked Asher, trying to strum up some of the resentment he’d felt earlier. His cheeks heated as he thought of the way he’d been spread and pinned to the wall, how Xem had effortlessly toyed with his body and almost made him...

“The rest of it?” Xem repeated, leaning in closer until their breaths merged. A grin spread across his face, wicked and delighted, and Asher realised he’d been wrong about him. A smile didn’t diminish his beauty at all. “What are you talking about?”

“You know,” he offered awkwardly. “The unnecessary shit you did. Are you going to explain that away, too?”

“But of course,” Xem said smoothly, eyes dancing with violet amusement. “I did it because I could. And because it was fun .”

Asher exhaled. The world had been set to rights: Xem Whitlock was still a prick.

“I…”

“You blush so prettily,” Xem murmured, twisting his wrist so that his long fingers could stroke along Asher’s. “And I could feel how you fought against my magic even as you surrendered to it. Did you like being at my mercy?”

Asher could only stare at him.

Fuck me. No seriously, do.

He nodded once, dipping his chin low and certain.

“Good.” Xem softly chuckled, slipped his hand from Asher’s, and disappeared back into the shadows of the library.

“ A ttic?” Bonnie offered when the day’s final bell had finished tolling around Gannon Academy, rocking carelessly back on her chair and stretching. The rain pounded relentlessly against the Academy’s windows with a thunderous roar that had lasted most of the day. “Apparently a second-year smuggled in some rum, and is offering swigs to anyone with a gold coin or willing to flash their tits.” She shot Asher a mischievous smile. “I’ll show him something else too if you want some.”

He shook his head. “I’m going to get some rest.”

Still unsettled from his recent encounters with Xem, Asher needed space to work through the complex array of emotions they had sparked in him. Indignation, of course. Humiliation. But as with all things Xem, it was entwined with intrigue and pleasure and a deep-seated satisfaction akin to sinking into a cool lake after a day of sweaty farm work.

If only the mage would stop making things so fucking confusing for him, perhaps Asher would be able to enjoy his evenings like the rest of the student cohort. Or better yet, pay enough attention to his studies to finally catch up to them.

Yet when Asher wandered up to the floor that housed the first-year bedrooms, it wasn’t his books or his bed that snagged his attention. It was the door at the far end of the hallway, normally closed but now slightly ajar, as though the latch hadn’t engaged properly.

Xem was in there. Asher knew it like he’d known he had magic: not by any tangible reason, but through an inexplicable certainty that went beyond the mundane.

He crept closer, footsteps muffled by the worn rug that lined the corridor, until he was three bedrooms away, and then two. It became easier to breathe with each step, the proximity to Xem and his spicily sweet aura making the air seem lighter and less suffocating. What would it be like to place high enough in the student rankings to get to sleep in one of these beds, knowing only a couple of walls separated them instead of over a dozen?

He probably wouldn’t be reduced to sneaking around like this in the hope of getting his next fix. Wouldn’t be so addicted to the man that he’d only manage to sleep tonight if he was able to catch a glimpse of Xem sitting at his desk or perusing his bookshelf...

...or getting changed out of his uniform.

Asher really should turn back. Shamelessly stalking the man from a distance was one thing, but this probably crossed a line in both Academy rules and moral etiquette.

And then he heard it.

A soft, breathy moan. The sound of flesh on flesh, fast and eager.

Asher was at the door in an instant, pressing an eye to the crack formed between it and the frame and trying to uncurl his fingers from the fists they had found themselves in.

At the sight of Xem alone, his back to the door as he stood fully dressed before a full-length mirror, Asher’s irrational fear abated. Xem wasn’t fucking anyone. Not that it was Asher’s business, of course, or that he could have done anything about it even if it was...but still.

Xem groaned again, his elbow bobbing as he pumped his arm in front of himself, and Asher’s relief gave way to sharp arousal as he realised what he was seeing.

“Fuck,” he breathed, excitement strumming through him as he watched the mage pleasure himself. Xem shifted his weight between his feet and accidentally gifted Asher with a better view, the sliver of unobstructed mirror revealing how he was jerking himself to completion with a tight, angry grip, and how his breeches were undone just enough to allow access. That slight concession of necessity was hotter than if Xem had been completely naked.

Asher stood frozen; entranced by the movement of Xem’s hand, the tension in his shoulders, the delicate line of his neck as he threw his head back with a faint cry. He watched as the mage spilled over his fist with thick, ropey spurts of cum that made Asher’s mouth water with need. Licorice suddenly laced Xem’s cinnamon aura, infusing it into a darker and more provocative scent. And then Asher felt himself unexpectedly dragged over the edge as well, releasing untouched merely from the erotic sight before him and the heightened intoxication of Xem’s aura as he came.

Asher staggered, his hand slamming into the doorframe to catch himself from falling. The resounding slap echoed down the hallway.

Shit.

Asher lifted his head.

Caught Xem’s enraged, violet gaze in the mirror.

Ran for it.

Only he’d barely gained two steps down the corridor before he collided with an invisible, yet solid barrier. That same immense force buffeted him backwards and threw him against the bedroom door, forcing it open under his weight. Asher fell to the floor with a squeak.

A loud slam told him that the door had been shut with more air magic, sealing him in Xem’s room with the cantankerous mage himself. But when Asher raised his head from the floor, heart pounding wildly, all he could see was two neatly made beds, one on each side of the room. The thick rug he was lying on, and a collection of books on the shelves. There was no sign of-

“It seems you enjoy courting danger, recruit,” Xem hissed into his ear from behind.

Asher found himself shoved roughly back down to the floor before he could push up onto his elbows. He snarled, fighting, but was securely held with no movement left to him.

Firm and uncompromising, it was impossible to tell whether the cool grip around the back of his neck was Xem’s own hand, or another of his impressive castings of air magic.

“What were you doing outside my door?” the other mage demanded, giving him a little shake.

Just passing by , the coward in Asher wanted to claim, but that would be an obvious lie for a hallway with a dead end.

You left the door open , his braver side thought, but there was no way he’d dare voice that out loud.

“I’m sorry,” Asher yelled into the rug instead, the fibres tickling his lips as he threw himself on Xem’s mercy like he’d previously seemed to enjoy. “I didn’t mean to, I’m sorry!”

The pressure instantly eased from his neck.

“I don’t want you to be sorry, Asher,” Xem said in a low voice, his tone icily provocative.

Swallowing, Asher dared to peer back over his shoulder. Xem was standing two feet behind him, between Asher and the door, and did not look like he’d just jerked himself to completion. His uniform was neatly back in place but for the sleeves folded up past his elbows, his dark hair effortlessly styled, and he raised a single contemptuous brow at the sight of Asher sprawled across his floor.

Asher wet his lips. “What...what do you want?”

Surely Xem wasn’t fool enough to demand money from him? It wasn’t difficult to deduce from Asher’s worn clothes and meagre possessions that they were worlds apart when it came to coin, with Asher being the fourth son of a farmer and a seamstress. Xem, on the other hand, radiated wealth, from his stiff-backed posture to his tailored uniform jacket, and the snobbery he overtly engaged in.

Would he tell Asher to leave the Academy again? Would Asher have a choice, if he was going to be reported for misconduct and expelled anyway?

“What do I want?” Xem repeated, eyeing Asher like a cat that had cornered his prey. With unrestrained delight and a conniving, vicious hunger. “I want the same from you as you had from me.”

Before he could ask what that meant, Xem moved his hands in a complex and delicate cast that was too quick for Asher’s eyes to follow. Fingers flickered and twisted and bent.

The air around him seemed to shudder, and then Asher was plucked from the floor and pressed to the full-length mirror like he weighed nothing. Pinned against the glass with air magic immobilising his wrists and ankles in an unsettling reminder of what had happened in the classroom earlier with the vines, Asher was far from amused.

“Powerful mage, my arse,” he hissed. “It seems you only have one trick.”

He spluttered as Xem waved a hand and an invisible gag formed across Asher’s mouth.

“Oh, not at all,” he assured. He wore a wicked smirk that Asher knew better than to trust, and yet there was a part of him that preened at earning so much of the mage’s attention. Being wrapped up in his magic, those violet eyes staring at him unblinkingly, made Asher feel like he’d won a game he hadn’t known he was playing.

“I’m just picking up from where we left off last time,” taunted Xem, heat lining his gaze at the way Asher strained against his bonds. “And seeing as you got to see me spill, I’m certainly going to be watching you get yourself off in turn.”

Tendrils of air plucked nimbly at Asher’s breeches, undoing the laces. He roared ineffectually against the gag, shaking his head in violent objection. No, if Xem saw what he’d done, how he’d come untouched just from...

“Are you right-handed or left?” Xem asked in an almost conversational tone. He chuckled when Asher merely glared at him. “I’ll free one hand for you to stroke yourself. The rest of you remains pinned to my mirror so I can see your face when you come-”

His air magic finally peeled back Asher’s clothes to reveal his cock.

Xem paused, eyes widening as he stared at the mess in Asher’s breeches.

His face burned with humiliation. He waited for the mage to deliver his usual scathing mockery, but when the man finally spoke, it wasn’t anything of the sort.

“What a beautiful fucking sight you make,” Xem murmured, closing the distance between them. He dipped his hand to trail two long, pale fingers through the cooling cum. Then, seeming mesmerised, he raised them to Asher’s mouth and slid between his lips.

Asher, initially recoiling at the unexpected taste of himself, lunged forward as far as the magic allowed to take more of Xem’s fingers into his mouth. He slurped and licked, hurriedly swallowing down his own cum so that he could better enjoy the taste of Xem’s skin, his cinnamony aura, and the way the mage groaned obscenely as he sucked on his fingers.

Being near Xem was amazing. Feeling his magic had been glorious. But this, the sensation of his skin on Asher’s tongue, was exquisite .

Hands were precious in most trades, but for mages, were a necessity. Magic could only be cast by hand movement and so this, having Xem’s fingers in his mouth and getting to graze his teeth against his knuckles in playful threat, made Asher’s own physical vulnerability seem lesser. And watching how Xem’s eyes closed with sensual flutters of his long, dark eyelashes, knowing that Asher was doing that to him...

His bonds wavered and then failed as Xem lost his concentration over the casting. Yet Asher didn’t move.

“I...stop that,” Xem muttered as though it hadn’t been his idea, stumbling backwards and regretfully stealing from Asher the fingers he immediately needed back between his lips.

The other mage was always so composed that it was thrilling to see him like this, wrecked and helpless. Asher smiled, taking a pace forward for each one that Xem took back so the distance between them remained the same.

Maybe the smile had been a mistake.

“You smell like cinnamon,” Xem snapped, his mouth drawing back into a disapproving line.

Asher’s heart raced. So he did feel the soulmate bond between them? Was he as hopelessly drawn to Asher as Asher was to him?

But Xem’s top lip had curled in disgust. “I hate the smell of cinnamon.”

“Who the fuck hates cinnamon ?”

“Me.”

Asher huffed out an impatient, eager breath. “It’s not about what it smells like, Xem. It’s what it means . As ridiculous as it may sound, you and I are apparently soulmates, and if you’re as clever as you think you are, you know that-”

The other mage glanced away. “What I know, Asher, is that we’re now even. Don’t expect another free show.”

“Xem, soulmates !”

“I heard you the first time. Leave.”

“Don’t you realise what this means?” Asher pleaded as Xem fixed his clothes with curt tugs and began to forcibly usher him towards the bedroom door. “We can’t be apart! It hurts whenever I’m away from you, Xem. Surely you feel it too?”

“No,” he said, the lie making him grimace.

“Just...just let me stay with you?”

“There’s no room.”

“I need to be around you, Xem!”

“How nice for you. Get out.”

“It’s not about sex,” Asher said desperately, even though it kind of was. After getting that brief taste of him, Asher wanted him so badly it hurt.

But he wanted Xem near him even more. “I could sleep in the other bed? Please?”

Violet eyes followed Asher’s vague arm wave towards the other side of the room, and narrowed in disdain. “In the bed reserved for my closest competition? You think you deserve that, recruit?”

“Please,” Asher said again. He’d lost all eloquence, reduced to begging.

Then Xem unexpectedly smiled, all teeth and lustful daring. “You want that bed, Asher?” He leaned in until cinnamon became all Asher could smell, taste, feel, somehow see . “Then earn it .”

The door slammed in his face, shutting him out in the corridor once more.

I f Asher was going to take the place of Pippah Shae, the second highest ranked student in their first-year cohort, then he had a lot of work to do. The rankings were determined each trimester and coursework counted for only a quarter of their grade, with the outcome of an elemental duel determining the remainder. The duel was held on the final day of each trimester, which meant Asher had twelve weeks to win himself the bed in Xem’s room for the rest of the year.

Twelve weeks to bring himself up to a standard far beyond what he’d even dreamed, until he was good enough to beat whoever was pitted against him.

For one idiotic second, he considered asking Xem to throw his own duel so they could bunk together in the worst room at Asher’s end of the corridor. It seemed easier than Asher somehow topping the rest of their year. But Xem wouldn’t agree to it in a thousand years, and besides, a student had to finish in the top half of the cohort to graduate to the second year. Asher wouldn’t dare risk either of their futures like that.

Not when Xem was the embodiment of magic. Graceful, quick, and competent: the mage barely seemed to need the lessons drummed into them by impatient professors and was clearly only here to achieve his certification. Asher could no sooner take Xem’s ability to cast magic from him than he could stop himself obsessively dwelling on the man.

How enthralled he’d been when discovering Asher had come for him untouched. The defenceless, serene expression on his face when Asher’s tongue worshipped his fingers. The challenge in his violet eyes that made Asher instantly want to be better and work harder, so that he could win Pippah’s rank – and her bed in the room she currently shared with Xem.

Whereas for the first month at Gannon Academy his fixation on Xem had caused his grades to slip, now it propelled them. Asher skimmed by on five hours of sleep a night, casting an ice spell on himself to stay awake, and eschewed all non-essential pastimes for study. He could be found in the basement library more often than not, gritting his teeth against the distance it put between him and Xem up in the Attic or the bedrooms, and obsessively comparing his skill to that of the other students in the year.

When he got the hang of casting air shields, he gave a single nod of acknowledgement and then trained even harder. When his test results in the mid-term theory exam turned out to be higher than half of the year, he spent that night memorising the answers to the questions he’d gotten wrong. When he soundly thrashed Bonnie in a practice duel that pitted fire against fire, he helped her back to her feet and immediately insisted on a second round.

Slowly—ever so fucking slowly—but surely, Asher began to improve. Not just in skill, but also in confidence, something he hadn’t realised he’d been lacking until he earned it.

And instead of staring mindlessly at Xem in class and drooling over his delicate wrists and the way his breeches framed his slender legs, Asher trained himself to watch how the other mage moved . There were three or four occasions where the instructions of the professor and the descriptions in the textbooks completely failed him, and he was only able to learn the casting by mimicking Xem’s movements.

A flick instead of a jerk. A finger that needed to be crooked instead of bent.

Miniscule differences that meant the difference between a jet of water and a cloud of steam...or worse still, an embarrassing anticipation when nothing happened at all.

Because even when performing a cast he’d clearly never learned before, Xem seemed to instinctively understand how his hands should move. He was a fucking natural, and one day the world would cower before the might of Xem Whitlock.

But until that day, he was all Asher’s. He just hadn’t accepted that yet.

T he day before the ranking duels, Bonnie burst into Asher’s bedroom with her frizzy auburn hair flying loose of its ties.

“Asher!” she called delightedly, and he looked up from where he was sitting cross-legged on the floor facing his roommate Dawson. The pair were batting a globe of water between them, its outer film so thin that applying too much force might break it. Too little, and your opponent would gain the upper hand.

The contest wasn’t fair considering that in the previous trimester Dawson had ranked at the bottom of the year—although Asher was pleased to discover that his own renewed interest in study had rubbed off on his roommate and he was no longer the pushover he had been—and Asher had been forced to handicap himself before Dawson would even practice with him. So his attention was split between Bonnie, the threatening ball of water above their heads, and the three ropes of vine he was also weaving around the legs of their beds.

“Asher!”

“Hmm?”

“They’ve just posted the lists for...the first round...of the ranking duels!” Bonnie told them between heavy pants, doubled over with her hands on her knees. “You...have...a good match.”

“Who am I going up against?” he asked, pushing back the globe of water as Dawson tried to use the distraction to win. The other mage’s hands fluttered frantically to try to stop it colliding with his face.

“Fara.”

That was a good match. Good meaning ‘lucky’, for Fara was one of the poorer performing students in their year who still couldn’t cast an air shield properly, and Asher had an excellent chance of beating her. He felt a vague pang of guilt that his victory would mean her loss, but it hadn’t been him who had come up with the cut-throat method of graduation. If it wasn’t her, it would be him.

“Lucky,” said Dawson mournfully. “I’ve probably got Xem or something.”

Bonnie assured him that he didn’t, chatting away about Dawson’s opponent and who had the misfortune to face Xem—how had she memorised so many names on the list?—but cold trepidation slid down Asher’s spine. He was capable of beating Fara in the first round...but who would he face in the second? Or the third?

In order for the rankings to be determined, multiple rounds of duels would be held where the winners of the previous bouts were pitted against each other as they steadily fought towards first place. What if Asher was matched to Xem in an early round? His inevitable loss would mean he’d never have a chance to place second.

He faltered, the vines unravelling and then fading into nothingness.

“Hah!” crowed Dawson, and cold water cascaded over Asher’s head in an ominous sign of what was to come.

T he tang of elemental magic lay heavy in the dusk air: the petrichor scent of rich soil just after a rainfall, and the stomach-turning stench of charred hair and flesh. Students were scattered around the Academy’s courtyard in varying degrees of exhaustion and disarray, with scorched or soaking uniforms, or twigs tangled in their hair.

Those who had been eliminated over the course of the afternoon were forced to sit on their hands, Fara among them. She looked more resigned than resentful, but the two opponents Asher had faced after her were glaring at him and throwing him rude gestures when the professors weren’t looking.

It was a vicious test, with student pitted against fellow student, friend against friend. There was no allying, no assisting. Just each mage attempting to withstand cast after cast until through either skill or luck, a victor emerged.

Asher had just won his third duel, which put him in the top eighth of his cohort. A feat to be proud of, especially considering how behind in his studies he’d once been, but if he was to be afforded the honour of sharing a room with Xem—and the other perks granted to the top performers in the year—he had one more mage to best. Well, two, but Asher held out no hope of beating Xem himself, and he only prayed his decimation at the talented mage’s hands wouldn’t be too brutal or quick.

Yet between him and Xem was Pippah Shae. The current incumbent of what should be Asher’s bed, if the soulmate bond had anything to say about it, and a crawling sycophant.

Perhaps being an obsessive stalker like Asher wasn’t any better, but at least he appreciated Xem for who he was. Clever. Skilful. Gorgeous. Also insufferably smug, but his heroism in rescuing another batch of rats from Professor Allarie’s clutches last month allowed Asher to look past his arrogance.

Pippah just wanted her place at Xem’s side for the prestige it granted her, loudly declaring to anyone who would listen how power attracted power and that the Shae and Whitlock families had a long and mutually beneficial history. Asher had had the pleasure of watching Xem’s face when Pippah announced to the dining hall that perhaps it was not only history the two of them might have in common, but a potential future ; a combination of dark eyebrows raised in incredulousness and his lips pinched together to stop himself from gagging. It had taken all of Asher’s restraint not to march over and steal a kiss from that tempting mouth, no matter how much punishment it might have earned him next time he faced the mage in class.

“You’re done for, Larsen,” Pippah sneered disdainfully to Asher now, orange sparks crackling around her fingers as she faced off against him. The courtyard had been set up for twelve simultaneous duels but now, with only three of them left standing, all of the defeated students were spectators to their solo fight. Keeping their hands tucked beneath them to prevent interference or accusations of such, tired eyes stared unblinkingly their way. Some out of mere curiosity, others knowing their own rankings would be impacted by the outcome of this penultimate duel.

Asher had noticed that boasts and taunts were commonly thrown at opponents, but he didn’t see the need to waste breath on it. Some called him quiet, others, the crueller of his peers, slow, but talking wasn’t what would win him his prize.

So he waited in patient silence while the rules were once again read out by one of the professors—dual elemental spells only, nothing lethal or permanently damaging, no collateral damage to the spectators—and Pippah tossed more threats his way. Then a flash of lightning cast overhead announced the commencement of the duel and Pippah immediately leapt forward, bared teeth and a rope of fiery thorns aimed at Asher’s face.

He ducked the magic. Perhaps Xem could have blocked it and sent a counterattack her way, but they couldn’t all be infuriating little progenies like him. It left Asher’s hands free to knot themselves into a complex cast of water and air, swirling up an unnatural maelstrom that wrapped around Pippah and knocked her off balance.

But while the mage had lost her footing, she hadn’t lost her hold on her magic, and she heaved it back towards her with a grunt. Asher gasped as forceful heat tore across his back. He twisted, bringing up an air shield reinforced with earthen strength, but it was too late: the thorns had already inflicted their damage in burning and scoring his skin. He gritted his teeth and did his best to ignore the pain.

The two mages glared at each other and let their respective magics fade out of existence, bringing their hands together to begin anew. Now back to an even playing field but for Asher’s injury, it was obvious from their aggressive stances that victory would be secured by whichever of them could get their next casting off first.

Asher had prepared for this. Hours of research and obsessive practice had told him which somatic movement he was capable of performing the fastest, and it was instinct that guided his wrists and fingers through the casting for the simple vines he’d learned with Xem’s assistance all those months ago. Then he clenched his right hand to add fire, and-

A blast of water hit him square in the chest, stealing his breath and leaving stunned surprise in its stead. Asher was thrown clear out of the dedicated duelling zone marked by low, flickering candles, and then it was all over.

He’d lost.

Pippah had knocked him out of the fight—literally—and Asher had lost .

He growled into the cold mud beneath his face, caring less about the inevitable bruises to his body than the ones to his soul.

He hadn’t been quick enough, good enough. He’d given it his all, and it hadn’t been enough .

Fuck, the last several weeks had been torture. Feeling the soulmate bond agonisingly stretched and pummelled whenever he and Xem were more than a room or two apart, Asher had only been able to withstand it with the knowledge that it was just for a little while longer, and then he’d be only a bed away from the other half of himself.

One room away for the next four months would have to be enough. He’d survive.

He’d have to.

He couldn’t.

“Congratulations, Ms. Shae,” Professor Allarie said warmly, although her eyes were on Asher as he picked himself up out of the mud. “Mr. Larsen, you’ve placed third, and Ms. Shae will now duel Mr. Whitlock to determ-”

“Actually, professor,” Xem cut in, not bothering to excuse his interruption with an apology. His intense gaze found Asher and pierced through him, giving nothing away. “I think you’ll find that Pippah’s last casting only contained one element, not two.”

That was how she’d been able to attack so quickly?

Professor Allarie glanced at Principal Everett, who nodded. Asher doubted he’d been paying much attention to the duel—he’d spent the day sliding up to the younger professors and older students and murmuring things in their ears that made them either blush or blanch—but it was unsurprising that he’d take the side of a Whitlock mage, even if it meant pissing off the much less influential Shae family. And Xem, the self-righteous prick, was far too respectable to lie.

Allarie gave a distasteful sniff.

“Very well,” she conceded in a curt, clipped tone. “Ms. Shae is disqualified. I don’t want to hear it,” the professor added as Pippah began to hiss out complaints. “The rules clearly specified dual castings only. Mr. Larsen, Mr. Whitlock?”

Asher limped back over the line of candles, shaking out his wrists and coming to a stop before Xem. Who, of course, looked his usual infuriatingly neat self, as if he’d passed the afternoon partaking in a late lunch instead of having all four elements thrown at him in combinations just short of fatal.

“You’re going to be granted second rank regardless of what happens now, Asher,” Xem remarked, inspecting his fingernails. “So instead of being thoroughly beaten—again—you may concede the duel verbally. No one would think less of you.”

A round of excitable ooooooohs echoed around the courtyard from the watching students.

Asher shook his head, a small smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. As if he’d miss even one opportunity to face off against Xem. He’d relished every loss at the mage’s hands over the last several months, Professor Allarie being as good as her word to pair them up for the entire trimester, not only for the way his soulmate’s magic felt against his skin but also for how Asher had learned and improved from each encounter.

“Very well,” said Xem. “A painful defeat for you it is.”

No one would think less of you . A blatant lie, for the mage’s eyes had lit up in delighted pride when Asher had refused his offer of surrender.

Lightning flashed. Xem’s hands formed a pattern Asher didn’t even recognise—magic certainly beyond that of the average first-year—but he didn’t need to understand the exact casting to know what Xem intended. He’d fought him enough times now to have picked up his habits.

And sure enough, when the casting loosed from Xem’s fingers it went for Asher’s legs: powerful but narrowly focused, designed to knock down his opponent in a strong opening move that would then be followed by something broader and more restrictive.

Asher’s half-smile flourished into a rare grin when he blocked the rush of air that had been aimed at his knees. Xem returned the expression, his natural arrogance giving it the quality of a fond smirk, and renewed his assaults.

Defensive magic was quicker to cast than offensive, and Asher was thrilled to find himself parrying the second strike, and then the third—but a fourth, an unexpected disruption of the soil under his feet that knocked him on his arse, saw him swiftly incapacitated when Xem reformed the earth over and around his hands.

He’d buried him?! Gods, this man was something else. As a fully trained and certified mage, he’d be unstoppable.

Asher barely heard Allarie calling out their final ranks. Bonnie’s cheering drowned her out, and he glanced over to find Dawson giving him an excitable thumbs up.

Hard earth turned to soft mud around him and Asher yanked his hands free, surprised when Xem extended one arm down to help him to his feet.

And then the mage ruined the gesture by wrinkling his nose in horrified distaste and casting a gentle flood of water to sluice the dirt away from his own hands.

“You’re filthy,” Xem declared.

He leaned in until his lips were brushing Asher’s ear, murmuring his next words too quiet for anyone else to hear.

“Don’t even think of setting foot in our room until you’ve bathed.”

Our room.

Asher was bruised, sore, bleeding in three places and beyond exhausted, but he’d never moved quicker in his life.

S hould he knock?

A freshly scrubbed-clean Asher hesitated, his knuckles poised up against the door of the bedroom occupied by the first and second ranked students.

Him and Xem. It was still dizzyingly new in Asher’s mind, not having properly sunk in, yet thrilling in all forms.

But.

Should he knock?

It was his room now, but the door had been closed when he dragged his small valise up the corridor of wet, resettling students, and he felt like an intruder.

Plus, it was Xem. He’d probably appreciate Asher showing the courtesy, especially considering what had happened last time Asher had been up this end of the hallway.

Compromising by giving a quick rap on the wood and then pushing the door open without waiting for an answer, Asher stopped short after taking a single step into the room. His breath left him in a quick, startled huff, as though he’d been hit.

Where his bed should have been—the bed he’d spent the trimester fighting for, had earned from Pippah with his literal blood—there was only empty space, a dusty floor, and a slightly scuffed wall.

Asher felt like falling to his knees and crying. Which was stupid , and Xem wouldn’t hesitate to verbally lacerate him for it, but…

“It occurred to me that there were too many beds in here, Asher.”

His name, spoken so softly and with a tenderness Asher had rarely spied through Xem’s prickliness, didn’t do anything to help his breathless state.

He turned slowly on his heel. His bed had been pushed up against Xem’s over on the other side of the room, turning the two narrow cots into a more spacious sleeping space. The dark-haired mage himself was tucked up under the covers, the shape of his long legs beneath the blankets showing that he was shamelessly sprawled across both beds.

“You should see your face.” Xem chuckled and rolled onto his back, stretching insolently. “I’m almost tempted to let you continue to believe I’m trying to screw you over, for I’d love to end that argument with you rendered helpless by my magic again. But no, Asher, I’m not stealing your bed. I’m offering to share it.”

He shuffled sideways to free up a couple of inches of space, and lifted the corner of the blanket invitingly.

Asher’s mouth went dry.

Barely remembering to close the door, he dropped everything he was holding and moved towards the bed with an eagerness that had him tripping over his own feet. His mumbling apologies earned him wry amusement from the watching mage.

Yet when Asher began to slide beneath the covers, Xem scowled and dropped his hand, blocking his way. Asher faltered.

“I said you could come in,” Xem said in that silkily dangerous voice of his, violet eyes flashing. “I said nothing about your clothes.”

Oh.

Oh.

Asher stripped out of his uniform, sending boots, suspenders, and breeches flying. He flushed when he caught Xem staring at his body with open appreciation, and climbed hastily into the bed. Searching hands slid under the blankets to grasp his hips and yank him close, and at the slide of bare skin against his own, he realised Xem was also unclothed.

The other mage rolled on top of him with an elegant twist of his hips and Asher groaned when their bare cocks brushed against each other, heavy and leaking. Xem was all at once light and weighty, warm and cool, over-intense and not enough, and it was overwhelming in its sheer perfection .

Pouncing on Asher, Xem devoured his mouth. The kiss was brutally possessive, delivered the same way that he cast: ruthless, uncompromising, and with enviable skill. His tongue searched Asher’s mouth as though he owned it—and he did, there was no question—and cinnamon spice flooded Asher’s tongue with floaty, desperate need.

When Xem finally drew back for air, his eyes were wild and his lips abused and red. It was the most unkempt Asher had ever seen him.

“Fuck, how I’ve wanted this,” Xem breathed from above him, tightening his hold on his arms.

Asher smiled hazily, his mind pleasantly emptied.

“Me too. You know we could have had it the day I arrived.”

“No we could not,” Xem said coldly, and Asher blinked at the abrupt change of tone. “Because I do not dance to the whims of fate.” Fingers reverently traced Asher’s jaw before coming to rest over his lips. “Why should anyone but us control our own destinies?”

So that was why he hadn’t believed they were soulmates—or he had, but he’d refused to let it bind him to Asher other than by his own decision. Stubborn prick.

As if he could tell what he was thinking, Xem smirked and slid his fingers into Asher’s mouth, pressing down on his tongue and driving them to the back of his throat. Asher gagged. Xem held him down with his weight and waited patiently, evidently enjoying his suffering.

“You are in this bed only through your own hard work, Asher,” he said conversationally, as if he wasn’t making Asher more turned on than he’d ever been in his life. “Because you wanted something and made it happen, and fought like the damn Devil today to win, even against me. Because I corrected Allarie’s fuckup when I could have said nothing.” Arousal danced in his violet eyes as he watched Asher choke on his fingers. His cock twitched against his thigh, hard and needy. “You are my soulmate, Asher Larsen, not because fate said so. But because I said so.”

Xem withdrew his fingers and granted Asher the air he’d been struggling for, but which he now only wanted for the way it let him taste Xem’s heady aura once more.

“Now,” Xem purred, rocking back to sit up on his heels and expose Asher’s shivering body to his hungry gaze. “Shall we consummate our soulmate bond?”

There was only one way of doing that, and consummate was the right word for it.

Thankfully, as soulmates, they didn’t have to worry about protection.

And Asher thought he was prepared for anything the wickedly demanding mage might want. But when Xem eased his weight away and rolled onto his elbows and knees in one smooth move, Asher stared in stunned silence at the flawless arse peeking up at him.

Without turning around, Xem stretched out one elegant leg and kicked Asher on the shin.

“Ow.”

“I know you’ve got it in you, recruit,” Xem taunted, his voice muffled from the way his face was pressed into the mattress. “You always demonstrate so much... enthusiasm in class.” He shifted impatiently on all fours. “Show me the same.”

Those last words were delivered as an order, icy dominance dripping from each syllable. If anyone could be so unquestionably in charge while face down with their arse in the air, it was Xem fucking Whitlock.

Asher moved to his knees, fingers reaching out to lightly trace the enticing lines of Xem’s body. The mage shivered beneath his touch, equally delicate and vicious. When Asher reached the pale globes of his arse and withdrew his hands, Xem jabbed a careless thumb to the right.

“The oil is in the drawer...fuck, Asher!”

Asher grinned, working his finger deeper inside him as Xem twitched and yelped in surprise. The oily liquid he’d silently cast from water and earth gushed over his hand, slicking up Xem’s entrance and dripping down to the bedsheets beneath.

“Don’t make a mess,” Xem growled, obviously noticing the same thing. “There’s now only one bed, and I refuse to sleep on soiled sheets-”

The complaint was gratifyingly cut off when Asher added a second finger, making the mage howl.

“You’re courting danger again, Asher Larsen!”

Oh, Asher planned on doing a lot more than courting him.

He scissored his fingers to patiently work Xem open and then gave careful attention to that place inside him that he himself loved being touched. It made Xem’s head whip around, a crazed look in his exotic eyes and his hair mussed from where he’d been writhing against the bed. He’d never looked so dishevelled, even after a duel, and Asher adored it.

“Fuck me,” he demanded, still so fierce.

Asher obeyed. Quickly slicking up his cock, he lined it up with the mage’s glistening hole and thrust his hips forward. Xem’s body welcomed him with ease, drawing his cock into its hot, silky heat.

They both exhaled as one.

The scent of cinnamon was thick in the air, mixing with their sweat and shared desire as Xem began to move. Asher attempted to hold him still—he was the one topping, damn it—but it was like trying to keep waves from lapping at the sand. Slippery and determined, Xem continued to rock backwards onto Asher with a series of satisfied grunts, and it was all Asher could do to hold on so he wouldn’t fall backwards off the bed.

Sensation crested. Xem was clenched tight around his cock, greedily taking more of him with each roll of his hips, and Asher was lost amid a sea of desire and delight.

“Now,” Xem murmured in a voice thick with pleasure. He grabbed Asher’s right hand and brought it beneath him with a slight tilt of his head that dared Asher to object.

He didn’t.

He curled his fingers around the heavy cock that danced between Xem’s legs, revelling in the warmth of it against his skin, and began to stroke it in time with the man’s aggressive movements. Feeling daring, Asher let his thumb explore the shape of the head. He grinned into Xem’s hair when he ran it over the sensitive slit and the mage bucked beneath him with a cry.

And when their shared climax overtook them a few moments later, bliss cascading down Asher’s spine and warmth blossoming over his hand, the soulmate bond solidified between them with a resounding thwack that felt like a physical blow to the chest. Exhilarating yet soothing, it stole all thoughts but the feel of Xem’s body wrapped around his throbbing cock, and how he shuddered and shivered in Asher’s arms.

As mages, the pair of them already had access to earth and water, fire and air. But with their consummated connection the fifth element had snapped into place, denied to all but those who were lucky enough to find their bonded mate.

Soul.

Now Asher could feel the other mage as part of himself, sense the beat of his heart and the hitch in his breath. If one died then they would both die, but that was no burden at all, for how could Asher live without this clever, impossible man?

“Xem!” he cried into his mage’s shoulder, acutely aware of Xem calling out his name in turn, and then they were twisting, grabbing, kissing, crying, laughing, and no longer caring about the mess they’d made of their shared bed.

Xem sighed long and loud against Asher’s mouth.

“Fucking magic,” he murmured happily. “Take me again.”