3

鈥淢e.鈥?

Asher huffed out an impatient, eager breath. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not about what it smells like, Xem. It鈥檚 what it means . As ridiculous as it may sound, you and I are apparently soulmates, and if you鈥檙e as clever as you think you are, you know that-鈥?

The other mage glanced away. 鈥淲hat I know, Asher, is that we鈥檙e now even. Don鈥檛 expect another free show.鈥?

鈥淴em, soulmates !鈥?

鈥淚 heard you the first time. Leave.鈥?

鈥淒on鈥檛 you realise what this means?鈥?Asher pleaded as Xem fixed his clothes with curt tugs and began to forcibly usher him towards the bedroom door. 鈥淲e can鈥檛 be apart! It hurts whenever I鈥檓 away from you, Xem. Surely you feel it too?鈥?

鈥淣o,鈥?he said, the lie making him grimace.

鈥淛ust...just let me stay with you?鈥?

鈥淭here鈥檚 no room.鈥?

鈥淚 need to be around you, Xem!鈥?

鈥淗ow nice for you. Get out.鈥?

鈥淚t鈥檚 not about sex,鈥?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. 鈥淚 could sleep in the other bed? Please?鈥?

Violet eyes followed Asher鈥檚 vague arm wave towards the other side of the room, and narrowed in disdain. 鈥淚n the bed reserved for my closest competition? You think you deserve that, recruit?鈥?

鈥淧lease,鈥?Asher said again. He鈥檇 lost all eloquence, reduced to begging.

Then Xem unexpectedly smiled, all teeth and lustful daring. 鈥淵ou want that bed, Asher?鈥?He leaned in until cinnamon became all Asher could smell, taste, feel, somehow see . 鈥淭hen earn it .鈥?

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鈥檚 room for the rest of the year.

Twelve weeks to bring himself up to a standard far beyond what he鈥檇 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鈥檚 end of the corridor. It seemed easier than Asher somehow topping the rest of their year. But Xem wouldn鈥檛 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鈥檛 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鈥檚 ability to cast magic from him than he could stop himself obsessively dwelling on the man.

How enthralled he鈥檇 been when discovering Asher had come for him untouched. The defenceless, serene expression on his face when Asher鈥檚 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鈥檚 rank 鈥?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鈥檇 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鈥攅ver so fucking slowly鈥攂ut surely, Asher began to improve. Not just in skill, but also in confidence, something he hadn鈥檛 realised he鈥檇 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鈥檚 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鈥檇 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鈥檚. He just hadn鈥檛 accepted that yet.

T he day before the ranking duels, Bonnie burst into Asher鈥檚 bedroom with her frizzy auburn hair flying loose of its ties.

鈥淎sher!鈥?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鈥檛 fair considering that in the previous trimester Dawson had ranked at the bottom of the year鈥攁lthough 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鈥攁nd 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.

鈥淎sher!鈥?

鈥淗mm?鈥?

鈥淭hey鈥檝e just posted the lists for...the first round...of the ranking duels!鈥?Bonnie told them between heavy pants, doubled over with her hands on her knees. 鈥淵ou...have...a good match.鈥?

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

鈥淔ara.鈥?

That was a good match. Good meaning 鈥榣ucky鈥? for Fara was one of the poorer performing students in their year who still couldn鈥檛 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鈥檛 been him who had come up with the cut-throat method of graduation. If it wasn鈥檛 her, it would be him.

鈥淟ucky,鈥?said Dawson mournfully. 鈥淚鈥檝e probably got Xem or something.鈥?

Bonnie assured him that he didn鈥檛, chatting away about Dawson鈥檚 opponent and who had the misfortune to face Xem鈥攈ow had she memorised so many names on the list?鈥攂ut cold trepidation slid down Asher鈥檚 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鈥檇 never have a chance to place second.

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

鈥淗ah!鈥?crowed Dawson, and cold water cascaded over Asher鈥檚 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鈥檚 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鈥檛 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鈥檇 once been, but if he was to be afforded the honour of sharing a room with Xem鈥攁nd the other perks granted to the top performers in the year鈥攈e 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鈥檚 hands wouldn鈥檛 be too brutal or quick.

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

Perhaps being an obsessive stalker like Asher wasn鈥檛 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鈥檚 clutches last month allowed Asher to look past his arrogance.

Pippah just wanted her place at Xem鈥檚 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鈥檚 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鈥檚 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.

鈥淵ou鈥檙e done for, Larsen,鈥?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鈥檛 see the need to waste breath on it. Some called him quiet, others, the crueller of his peers, slow, but talking wasn鈥檛 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鈥攄ual elemental spells only, nothing lethal or permanently damaging, no collateral damage to the spectators鈥攁nd 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鈥檚 face.

He ducked the magic. Perhaps Xem could have blocked it and sent a counterattack her way, but they couldn鈥檛 all be infuriating little progenies like him. It left Asher鈥檚 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鈥檛 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鈥檚 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鈥檇 learned with Xem鈥檚 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鈥檇 lost.

Pippah had knocked him out of the fight鈥攍iterally鈥攁nd Asher had lost .