Chapter 9

Icursed for the hundredth time as I stomped along the back streets of Celestia. The muck from the sewers where I'd chased Lionel's war General, Irvine McReedy, clung to my boots, back, and side where the fucker had managed to knock me off my feet with a well-timed strike of his poisonous tail.

The stench was never going to wear off. Worse, it had taken all of my fucking magic to heal the sting from his scorpion tail and save my damn life. I'd almost lost him then, and I'd been forced to speed back and forth in the underground cesspit for over an hour hunting him down again.

I should have just given up. Should have taken the moment that sewage splashed me in the star damned eye as a sign from the stars that it was over, but of course I hadn't done that.

Lucky for me, the motherfucker had been tapped out too, but the fight against him in his Order form had resulted in a bloody chunk torn out of my side, four gaping claw slashes down my spine, and had left a slit running along the entire left side of my face for good measure.

So now, I was coated in blood as well as the sewage, limping, wearing mostly shredded clothes, magicless, feral with thirst, and dragging an enormous, half-dead Manticore along the back alleys of a city which was empty of my friends and the army I'd arrived with.

Apparently, not one of those assholes had noticed I was missing before stardusting back to the academy, and I hadn't been carrying a speck of stardust with me to be able to follow them.

My fist was latched tightly around the scaly, scorpion tail of Irvine McReedy, his leathery, bat-like wings dragging across the concrete, catching on trashcans, streetlamps, and to my amusement, a pile of dog shit which someone hadn't bothered to clean up.

Most Fae shifted back into Fae form if they were rendered unconscious, but apparently this big bastard was going to stay in his enormous Manticore form despite the blow I'd dealt to his temple.

Now I was trudging through Celestia, looking like death warmed up, dragging a half-dead Manticore and wondering what the fuck I was supposed to do.

I cursed as I hauled the unconscious beast out of a small side street in the financial district where not a single soul was around to help me.

A piercing scream split the air apart, and I whirled around in anticipation of an attack, my fangs snapping out before I found myself face to face with a bucktoothed woman wielding a rolling pin, pointing at me with a trembling finger.

"Bog beast!" she hissed, fire magic sparking between her fingers. A pang of memory brought me back to the night the other Heirs and I had coated Darcy in mud, compacting it so thickly onto her skin that she couldn't break free. Cries of ‘bog beast' had been heard all across campus when she'd gone running away from us, and FaeBook had blown up with photos of her looking like she'd just crawled out of the nearest swamp. I guessed karma really was a bitch.

"I'm not a bog beast," I snapped. "I'm a Celestial…" I trailed off because that might not really be true anymore. We'd bowed to the Vegas. In a perfect world, they would choose to keep the Celestial Council and continue the way things had been for hundreds of years, but what if they didn't want us to serve them in that role? My mind snagged on that question, but the woman obviously thought I was done with what I'd been saying.

"Celestial beast of the bog!" she cried, turning away and sprinting off down the street with a scream.

I was tapped out and seeing her run set the non-bog beast in me salivating for magic.

I gave chase, my muscles bunching with effort as I dragged the unconscious Manticore along at my back, my Order gifts seriously depleted and exhaustion laying siege to my flesh.

But even at my lowest, I was still one of the most powerful Vampires in the whole of Solaria.

I caught the woman by her frizzy hair, yanking her back against me and ignoring the sting of her flickering flames as she tried to throw them at me. She wasn't even powerful enough to set my blood-drenched clothes alight, and I shuddered with revulsion as the disgustingly powerless taste of her blood washed over my tongue. One mouthful and she was drained, my own reserves not even replenished enough to heal myself.

I shoved her away from me and slapped a hand to the throbbing wound on my side all the same, managing to stem a little of the blood before my magic was gone again.

"I'm Caleb Altair," I snarled at the woman who was backing away, brandishing her rolling pin at me. "And I need a fucking car."

"Bog beast," she hissed, backing up further, and I was forced to stalk her all the way back to her grubby apartment before Coercing her to offer up the keys to what turned out to be a near-dead rusted pickup truck. I might have felt bad about stealing from her if it hadn't been for the photograph of Lionel Acrux she had sitting proudly on her mantlepiece with a little crocheted green Dragon beside it.

"This is almost as bad as the sewage," I groused as I hauled the manticore into the truck bed, then stomped around to get into the cab.

The truck spluttered and whined before the engine finally turned over, and I proceeded to curse my way back to Zodiac Academy for the next three hours, all the while inhaling the stench of the sewer and wincing at the pain from my still-bleeding wounds.

Night was close to falling again by the time the golden gates of the academy finally came into view through the windshield, and I was forced to halt beyond the magical boundary which had been erected to keep out anyone aside from the rebel army.

No less than ten Fae approached my car, magic stunning guns held at the ready, various Elemental power flickering in their free hands.

"Announce yourself," Milton Hubert barked.

I slapped my hand against the door of the truck several times, trying to locate the damn window button before finding a fucking roller thing to do it with instead. I really should have taken more notice of my Horoscope this morning and realised the stars had plans to fuck with me. Your misfortunes may lead you to discover the humble ways of the simple life today.

The window squealed loudly as it was lowered, and I scowled out at Milton from beneath a lock of hair which was stained with whatever had been festering in that sewer and no longer resembled my usual golden blonde.

Milton gasped. "Bog beast!" He raised his magic stunning gun and I had hardly even shouted to tell him that I wasn't a fucking bog beast before the full force of the weapon smacked me in the chest and threw me into the footwell of the truck so hard that I blacked out.

I came to as I was hauled from the cab and thrown unceremoniously at the feet of the Fae who were all playing guard. I shoved myself upright, baring my fangs at them furiously and committing each of their faces to memory.

"It's me, you asshole," I snarled. "Caleb."

Milton squinted at me in the dim light, a Faelight illuminating to better show them my face.

"Shit, it is you," he said with a nervous moo. "Sorry, man, I didn't recognise you under all of that…" He waved a hand, clearly uncertain what to call the mess of blood and excrement that covered me.

I lunged at him before he could put a name to it, my fangs sinking deep into his throat, and a startled moo escaped him. I wasn't gentle, fisting my hand in his dark hair and bending his head back at an awkward angle in payment for that shit with the stun gun.

I was vaguely aware of one of the other guards rushing off to spread the news of my return, and several of the others inspecting the unconscious Manticore in the back of the truck, but mostly I just lost myself to the rich and powerful taste of Milton's blood.

Sure, he was no Seth or Vega, but he was practically a five-star meal in comparison to that rolling pin wench back in Celestia.

A baying howl snapped my attention away from Milton and I shoved him aside roughly, barking a command at the guards to secure the prisoner before shooting away from them into the academy grounds. A flare of my magic allowed me access through the barrier, and I rushed inside at full speed.

I hadn't been letting myself think about it too much, but I'd been deep within the city when the battle had been won, and fear for my friends had been eating its way through me for every moment their fates hung in the unknown.

I raced through campus at speed, ignoring the aching weight in my limbs as my Order gifts were stretched to their limits, exhaustion tugging at me on a bone-deep level.

I reached The Orb and slammed into Seth, who was bounding towards me in his white Wolf form. He shifted instantly, the wolfy lick he'd aimed at my face turning fully Fae halfway through.

My blood lit at the feeling of his mouth against mine, and I shoved him into the shadows beside The Orb, kissing him hard and groaning at the relief of finding him alive and unharmed.

But instead of kissing me back, he pushed me away with a cry of disgust.

"Argh, Cal, what the fuck is that smell?" Seth gasped, and I realised in a moment of mortifying clarity just how fucking gross I was right now.

"Don't look at me," I snarled, whirling away from him as fast as I'd collided with him and shooting away again.

I intended to head back to my room in Terra House and douse myself in scalding water until the sewage and blood was finally burned from my flesh.

Unfortunately for me, five steps into my sprint of shame, my utter exhaustion caught up with me and my Order gifts gave out entirely. I found myself sprawling in the fucking mud, agony piercing through the wounds which I hadn't even paused to heal in my desperation to reunite with Seth.

Seth whimpered as if my pain was his own, and the next thing I knew, he was leaning over me, pressing his hands under the rip in my shirt and forcing healing magic into my body with a rush of power so intense it stole my breath away.

"I was so fucking scared," he breathed, not looking at me while he worked.

I realised my anger over being left behind in the rush to escape the scene of the battle paled to nothing in the face of what he and the others must have gone through while trying to figure out where I'd gone.

"I'm fine," I told him despite the blood staining his hands as he healed the wounds I'd been suffering with for hours. "Is everyone else okay?"

"Yeah. I mean, the dream team are all doing good. But while we were gone, the twins flew off somewhere and no one knows where or why, so that's caused a whole shit storm of confusion. Did you…fall in a big pile of shit or something?" He tried not to wrinkle his nose at the smell coming off of me, and I recoiled in shame.

"I caught that Irvine fucker, but he tried to hide in the fucking sewers so…"

Seth nodded sympathetically while not so subtly shifting his hand off of my filthy skin.

"Darius and Orion just got back from hunting down another Guild Stone," he explained. "He found a shit ton of treasure and has gone all Dragon over it in his room in Ignis. I was just with him and Max, and we were going to force Geraldine to let us leave to come search for you – the magical barrier won't let anyone out without permission from her or the Vegas, and as the twins still haven't come back from wherever the fuck they flew off to, it was left to her."

"Geraldine wouldn't let you leave?" I asked, a little bit pissed she'd stopped him from coming to look for me.

"No," Seth huffed. "She's bossing everyone about and making a load of statements about the world all falling into line and everything in the universe being right at last – honestly, if I'd realised bowing to the Vegas would make her go this batshit, I might have reconsidered. She said that no true warrior of the queens could fall on such a night and that ‘his chompiness will be back' in a weird, creepy voice, and then she went off to bake a cake or some shit for when the Vegas return. I've been out of my damn mind."

"I'm good," I promised him. "Or at least I will be when I get a shower."

"You want help?" Seth asked, offering me a hand up, and I arched a brow at him curiously as I let him pull me to my feet.

"In the shower?"

Silence hung between us for several seconds during which I remembered he was naked.

"Oh right," he muttered. "I forgot, our moms said-"

"Fuck our moms," I replied, and his brows rose at that statement, which was a little less than ideal taken out of context. "Not literally, but, you know, fuck what they said."

"Really?"

Seth looked at me in a way which was hard to put words to, and I shrugged under the scrutiny of that look.

"I mean, we're adults, right? We don't have to listen to them, and I don't want to stop this…"

"This?" he asked, giving me that puppy head tilt thing which always forced me to say more than I meant to.

"Us. Whatever it is. I…like it. I like being with you, so…"

Seth bit his lip, glancing over his shoulder like we might be about to get caught.

"Okay."

"What's okay?"

"We can just keep being secret…this." Seth shrugged and I breathed a laugh, my gaze falling to his mouth. "But first, you really do need a shower."

I shuddered, agreeing with that wholeheartedly, but as I turned toward Terra House once more, an alarm started blaring overhead, causing a prickle to tear up my spine.

"All members of the Queens' inner circle are to gather in The Orb faster than a sprout on a tumble table!" Geraldine's voice boomed out across campus, magically amplified loud enough to shake the damn trees.

Seth headed around the curving wall of the golden building and I stumbled after him, fighting against the exhaustion in my limbs as we made our way to the main entrance.

A flash of Vampire speed drew my focus down the path, and a booming roar split the air overhead, announcing Darius's arrival too.

I tilted my head back to watch the enormous golden beast as he banked hard, tucking his wings and coming in to land in the small space between The Orb and the crescent moon-shaped building which housed Lunar Leisure. A smile drew my lips up as I watched him, gripped by the urge to thank every star in the sky for his return.

Something had been missing from my heart while he'd been dead, a piece which had been jagged and raw and never could have healed without him in my life. If his return to this battle wasn't an omen of victory, then I didn't know what was.

"What the hell happened to you, Caleb?" Orion asked, skidding to a halt before me. "You look like shit."

I scowled at the assessment, and Darius shifted back into his Fae form, striding towards us butt naked, his tattoos coating his flesh like a second skin.

"He smells like shit too," Darius commented, catching the pair of sweatpants Orion tossed his way and stepping into them.

"Nice to know you were worried about me," I muttered, wiping at a smear of blood on my arm pointlessly. "The Starfall Legion fucking forgot me out there. I had no stardust, was tapped out, and have burned through all of my Order gifts too, so excuse me if I haven't had time to shower yet, but I was just heading back to my House now to-"

A jet of water slammed into me so hard that I was knocked from my feet and sent rolling away across the ground.

"Nice to see you back, soldier," Geraldine called, marching past me where I laid dripping on the ground as a victim of her water magic. "I didn't doubt you for a second. That'll do for a scrub up for now. We have dealings to discuss."

Darius burst out laughing like the asshole he was and strode away into The Orb, barely even flinching when I whipped him across the back with a vine.

I called on my fire magic and steam rose from me in a cloud, engulfing me entirely. By the time it faded away, I found myself standing alone in the dimming light in my torn and ruined clothes, my hair a complete shit show - even if the actual shit had been mostly washed out of it.

I glanced up at the stars which were just beginning to appear in the sky and scowled. Bastards.

I headed inside, finding Seth rustling about the place in a pair of pants he'd made himself out of leaves and the rest of our group gathering around the red couch which had once been so familiar to me.

I sighed, heading for my usual spot and stepping through a silencing bubble someone had erected to keep this meeting private.

"What's going on?" I asked, dropping into my seat, and Max reached out to rest a hand on my arm. I gave him a brief smile as he pressed his gifts over me, offering me up some extra energy and stealing a measure of exhaustion from me too.

"Good to have you back, brother," he murmured, his relief washing over me in a wave.

"Reports are coming in of an attack," Geraldine said gravely, holding up an Atlas which showed shaky footage of someone running in the dark, fire blazing behind them and screams filling the air.

"What has my father done now?" Darius snarled, and Geraldine sucked in a rattling breath.

"This took place at a Nebula Inquisition Centre," she replied, letting Darius claim the Atlas from her, and he scrolled onto a similar video, this one taken from further away, showing the camp in flames, quiet sobbing emitting from the person filming it.

"It makes no sense," Geraldine swallowed thickly, and I reached for the Atlas next, a stone seeming to weigh in my gut as I took in the devastation, my eyes roaming over image after image, trying to understand it.

"How many survived?" Seth asked, his shoulder brushing against mine while he leaned in to look.

"There were around a thousand Fae being held there," Geraldine breathed. "It was the next on our list to try and take down. Our army was on their way…"

I didn't need to push her for more, understanding dawning on me. The survivors were few to none.

"But why-" Max began.

"Because Lionel knew we were coming," Xavier snarled. "He knew and he killed those prisoners out of spite."

"Wait," I interrupted, pausing the new video which had just begun to play and rewinding it a few frames before pausing it again. "What are the twins doing there?"

Darius snatched the Atlas from my hands, the shot of the twins flying over the devastation still burned into the backs of my eyes, the fire which bloomed from their hands a damning sight. They were burning it down, killing all those people.

"What the fuck?" Seth breathed, but his words were drowned out by Darius's deep growl.

"That's not my fucking wife."