Rebel Academy: Curse

Chapter Seventeen MAGENTA

I’d never considered that the hardest test I’d face in my second chance at life after death would be loving a fae prince.

The risk of allowing Lysander into my heart in the same way as my other Immortals wasn’t only of being hurt or opening my lovers to the same hurt.

It was far more dangerous.

It was allowing myself to give up the hurt of the past.

Yet how could I?

The ghost of my death and Robin’s had haunted me throughout my long imprisonment in Hecate’s Tree but it’d also warmed me because I could admit now that it’d been all I had left of the first man who I’d loved: my best friend.

It was my truth.

What did I have if I finally let that heartache go? And how could I, now that Robin had returned to me?

I knelt before Hecate's Tree in the Dead Wood, ghosting my gloved hand across the trunk that pulsed with magic. This was back to where it had all begun. I'd once knelt in the same place and prayed to Hecate for freedom from my marriage to Titus. I'd been selfish. Perhaps, Hecate had granted me the freedom of death in order to teach me the lesson that you should never pray for yourself alone.

The only thing that’d mattered had been the freedom of all the Rebels. And that included the entire academy, down to its roots, and even Hecate herself who was trapped by my own magic, which had created the wards.

I understood that now.

Some would say that I was a rather slow learner.

The air thinned, darkening with the shadows of twilight. The sky was low and oppressive.

My hand clenched into a fist against the blackened trunk. Once, this glade had been wrapped in the intoxicating scent of lily of the valley, while butterflies had fluttered between violets. Now, the glade was transformed to bones. It was a black ring in the white of the wood. My mother had murdered it, when she'd murdered me. The only sound was the fizzing of ancient magic along the withered branches.

Yet delicate snowdrops tentatively pushed their heads up around the base of the trunk. They'd sprung to life, just as I'd been resurrected. My Immortals had brought them to life with their love. I brushed the tips of my fingers along their half-closed petals. How easy it'd be to crush them.

And how easy to tend them to life.

I glanced down at the Your Heart’s Desire Book on my lap. It'd been agonizing to leave it behind, during Bacchus' lesson. After being reunited with Paper Robin, it'd felt like abandoning him all over again. Yet I couldn't risk Bacchus sensing him. She was a bitch with an unhealthy obsession with her wand (Sleipnir had explained that she no doubt fantasized about using it as a strap-on, before he'd shuddered, but why would she want to strap something on?), but she was exceptionally powerful. I couldn't risk her sensing Paper Robin. Plus, my bosom might be large, but there wasn't enough room to hide an entire book down my cleavage, and it was a distinct flaw of my dress not to have pockets.

I traced my hand over the red feathers. When a silvery song rang out, I shivered.

I need you Robin; I've always needed you.

Flair and Echo swooped down from the branches of Hecate’s Tree, landing next to me.

"Are you OK, boss?" Flair cocked his head. Why did he sound panicked? "Why don't you just back away from the tree. Right. The. Fuck. Now."

I blinked.

"The last time we found you like this," Echo explained, fluffing his feathers in distress, "you ended up dead, dead, dead..."

I scooped Echo into my arms, and he wrapped his wings around my neck. "I beg your pardon. I would never pray to a goddess again. It's been tattooed on my heart. I'd never do anything to separate us."

Yet would I achieve that by breaking the wards and attempting to leave the academy? What would happen to my familiars?

I stroked over Echo's head. For over a century the twins had been all I'd had. We'd been each other's family.

Flair hopped closer. "By my fangs, stop kicking yourself up the beautiful arse. We've been...innocently...investigating every part of this academy and we know how rotten it is. You have to escape." He exchanged a glance with his brother. "We've talked about it, and if that means that even our fuckable behinds fade, die, or whatever happens to ghost familiars when the witch they're bonded to leaves...then shit happens, right?"

My eyes smarted with tears. "Then I stay."

When Echo poked me with his sharp beak, I yelped.

"You don't trap yourself again for us," Echo insisted with steelier resolve than I'd ever heard. "You're our kind, beautiful, witch, and we'd do anything to free you, even from us." Then he added, more softly, "Perhaps, we’ll be able to fly away with you. I'd never free myself from you."

"Then you'll escape by my side because a bond like that doesn't break. I shan't let you leave me. You don't have my permission to die, do you hear?"

Echo sighed happily like that was the most romantic wooing he'd heard. For freaky vampires like him and his brother, it probably was.

Sweet Hecate, let it be true that they'd be tied to me, if I escaped the academy.

"So, if you're not here to make the second biggest mistake of your witchy life by praying to Hecate, what's with the angst?" Flare demanded. "Echo could be getting in his nightly fix of elf prick in the Princes’ showers." Surely, I couldn't be blamed for how much I wished that I could accompany him…? But I wouldn't be satisfied as a voyeur. Elf prick had many uses, I'd discovered, and many more that I was dying to try out. "And I could be getting a quick roll in the Omega's bed, you know, just to get me through the night."

"You're still insisting that it's not stalking?" I asked.

"You call it stalking, I call it romance from a distance." Flair sniffed. "And don't change the subject, boss."

I played with the edges of the Your Heart’s Desire Book. Paper Robin was inside here, waiting for me, but guilt coiled inside me because I was thinking of Lysander, who was the nephew of the fae who'd kept Robin and me apart, leading to both our deaths.

In Bacchus' lesson, I'd been thrumming with desire for Lysander. My magic had vibrated with it from the tips of my toes to the ends of my hair. I'd felt like I'd burst on fire, hotter than poor Fox's punishment for swearing. The way that Lysander had curled his tongue into my lover's mouth to cool it, had made me want to catch him in my arms and make certain that he understood that I saw him: the kindness and nobility, which he had to hide from Titus.

Yet it'd also been like I could feel the phantom touch of Lysander’s lips on mine, and I'd craved it.

As soon as the lesson had ended, I'd dematerialized in confusion and distress, reappearing in this glade that'd been my murder scene, prison, but also sanctuary.

I shook at the memory of Lysander's plush lips. They'd been so close. One breath away. In that moment, he'd been all I’d wanted. Needed.

Sweet Hecate, was he who I'd always been waiting for? My true fae prince?

But this was no fairy tale. I was the wicked witch, and if I craved this, then it'd be on my own terms.

I wrapped my fingers tightly around the book on my lap. "Is wanting Lysander as an Immortal a betrayal of Robin?"

There. Cauldrons and candles, I'd voiced it.

Flair snapped his beak together with a clack. "You want to fuck him. No judgment because I'd fuck that tight behind."

"No, I mean, yes..."

"You want to nest in all those golden feathers because I would," Echo tried.

"Also, no but yes."

Flair shuffled closer. "You want to spank his tight behind because it'd make me come so hard that I saw stars to see it bouncing and cherry red. Don't you think he'd look delicious, sobbing and ruined?"

What a startling and surprisingly hot image. Perhaps, I did want that. Lysander had certainly earned it by bringing up his uncle, during class.

"I never realized that the English language is woefully inadequate because it hasn't developed a word that means no but yes."

"You love him," Echo said, softly.

A slow smile spread across my face and it felt like life. "Ah, now that's simpler." My smile faltered, and for a moment, I could sense how caught I was still between the veils, tremblingly close to death. "Or it should be." I glanced down at the book in my lap. "Should love be a betrayal?"

Flair's gaze became knowing. "Is this about squirrel boy's gift?"

I flushed.

Echo tapped my cheek with his wing. "Who said love's easy?"

Flair rested his beak on the book. "Do you reckon that you're the only one with a past, boss?" I startled. My familiars never told me about the time before they'd been turned from vampires (which were Fallen Angels) into familiars on my twenty-first birthday, and I'd never forced them. "To move on, you're always leaving somebody or something behind. On the heart of pain, the only betrayal that matters is if you betray yourself."

"We were both owned by a warrior Glory, and we fought in the ranks, under a fellow Wing called Commander Drake. By my feathers, he was dazzling, brave, and he looked out for the kids in the army." Wait, there was an angelic children’s army? The Glories were the female angels, and I knew that they dominated the male angels, the Wings. Echo refused to meet my eye like any moment he'd say something that would make me reject him. Witching heavens, why was he so scared of that? "Plus, the Commander was a secret rebel because he'd secretly warn any Wings he could, if he knew their Glories were going to Mark them."

When Echo flapped off my lap into the protective embrace of his brother, I stiffened. Both crows shook. How had the angel who should've loved and protected them (like I did) hurt them so badly that even now, they were frightened?

"What in the name of Hecate is being Marked?"

"It's like having your balls on a leash." Flair wrapped his wings closer around Echo. "You’re no longer part of the harem; you’re nothing but your Glory’s bitch. So, that night we rebelled and Fell. On my blood, we betrayed Angel World, our pasts, and families, by becoming vampires. Were we wrong to do that, boss?"

"Of course not,” I replied. “I only wish that I could hex your Glory's lady bits to woof every time that a Wing strolled past her, so that there was no doubt who the true bitch was." Echo snickered. "What happened after you Fell?"

"Oxford's vampire Duke accepted us into his Court. He's gorgeous, and has all these pretty beads in his hair." Flair's expression was dreamy. Somebody had a crush. "It became our home."

"Until the witches caught us," Echo added, darkly.

"I'm sorry," I whispered.

How could they bear to be with me? To comfort me? I'd always known that they'd been stolen from their home, but now it felt real.

Flair did the crow equivalent of shrugging. "Don't get your panties bunched, boss, no one's ever treated us as well as you."

Echo rubbed his head against a snowdrop. "And no one's loved us, loved us, loved..."

My chest tightened. No one had loved me the way that the Immortals had, since I'd been rebirthed. Apart from Robin, and our love had been as new and delicate as these snow drops. Perhaps, it would’ve blossomed into something more, but we hadn't been given the time.

I'd never get over Robin but I didn't have to. I just had to allow myself to love all the men who met my different needs, as well as to meet their needs too.

I placed the Your Heart’s Desire Book onto the ground next to me. "If you don't awfully mind, I’d appreciate a quiet moment."

Flair nodded. "Got you."

I stared at both my familiars, who hadn't moved. "Ehm, traditionally, that means by oneself."

To my surprise, Flair cawed with raucous laughter, before flapping into the air. "Next time you want some privacy to finger your quim, until you’re gasping out Lysander, Lysander, Lysander, just ask."

I took great insult at that: my breathy moans sounded far more civilized.

Echo flew after his brother. "Don't forget to chalk it up to the Wank Count and to tell us about it."

Ah, this modern age.

"I shall in great detail."

I simply shan't admit that it's imaginary, since I'm not doing anything to my quim, thank you very much.

But I didn't want to spoil their fantasy.

I watched them swoop away into the twilight like two dark specters. Then I turned, resting my back against Hecate's Tree. I could feel her magic pulsing through me; I crossed my legs because right now, Flair's idea was tempting.

Then I opened the Your Heart’s Desire Book.

A gust of icy wind blasted through the glade.

Ghost Robin circled the glade once, before tickling down my neck (which had been his weak spot as a child) and then ghosting waves of icy air all the way down to my hips like he was rediscovering the feel of me.

I shivered, smiling at the sight of Paper Robin. Only, he was in Mr Tailsy’s red squirrel form, scampering from one side of the page to the other. This small, he was even more adorable and just like one of my toys from the Bird Turret. I longed to pet him, while his tail would wrap around my arm like ivy, and he’d rub his tufted ears against my hand.

Mr Tailsy paused, staring up at me with a delighted tuk tuk. Then in a burst of glitter, he transformed back into a man, who stuffed his hands in his pockets in an attempt to look casual.

Like he hadn’t merely been waiting in here for me to visit him again.

“Good evening, wife,” Robin said like he was testing it out.

Had he been desperate since last night to say those words? Did he not truly believe that I wished to marry him, no matter that our marriage could be solemnized by secret vows?

I arched my brow. “How are you, husband?”

His expression relaxed into a grin, before he yawned. “Bored. Merlin’s breath, could you draw some trees for me? I’m aching to leap from the branches and take all those furry risks that I know you hate. The dead need their exercise too, you know.”

My chest tightened. “You’re not dead.”

“Quite right. I’m more like an echo. I’m not delusional, after all, I’m a magical enchantment, who’s trapped inside a book. Mama would’ve understood what it all meant or possibly, she only pretended to because it seems to me that there are any number of different kinds of ghosts. Yet I never thought I’d have a second chance with you, and that’s all that truly matters. I count myself lucky.” He peered at the blackened trunk behind me. “Where are we?”

“Our glade.”

“Then the years have been far kinder to you than Hecate’s Tree.”

Laughter bubbled out of me, in the same easy way that it always had around Robin. “To be fair to her, she was burned by mother. Oh, so was I, but when I was reborn, I was restored with what my lovers have assured me is enviably flawless skin.”

Paper Robin strolled closer to the front of the page like he could step right through it, and all of a sudden, I realized that he was shaking.

“Burned you?” He demanded.

“Did I not mention that part?” I caressed over the book’s spine.

“Well, at least we now know who’d win the Traumatizing Your Child to Death Award between our mothers.” But he didn’t stop shaking. “Funny how you didn’t mention your lovers either.”

“Ehm, my what now?” I tried for innocent but I was far too wicked to pull it off.

He cocked an unimpressed eyebrow at me. “Don’t lie to me.”

So, was the shaking distress, anger, or both?

Ghost Robin cocooned me, and my magic sparked to meet the cold. Was his phantom touch stronger tonight or was it simply because we were once more together in the glade that connected us?

I took a steadying breath. “This modern age is different than I’d ever imagined. I’m different. Cauldrons and broomsticks, I loved you so much back when we were first alive that it was like a bruise that I couldn’t stop touching. I never thought that you’d see me as more than a friend, and if you never had, then that would’ve had to be enough. You were my best friend and… I can’t take back what happened to you because of me. On my Wickedly Charmed magic, I swear that when I knew you loved me too, I’d have chosen to marry you alone. But I had no choice.” I swallowed; his eyes gleamed, as he studied me. “Titus took it away. But now, I love other Rebels too. To them, loving each other is as natural as breathing. Would you be able to share our marriage bed?”

Paper Robin’s gaze softened. “Other Rebels like the one you almost pulled down the Academy to save…?”

Ah yes, he’d witnessed my magic bonding to Bask. He’d calmed me, controlling my powers.

I nodded.

“Pan’s balls, by asking you to wait for me, I didn’t expect you not to cherish and protect other Rebels. It’s what you did for me. Why wouldn’t they love you, like I do? I’ve always only wanted you to be happy. I’m not possessive like a fae.” Why did he have to mention fae? Golden wings, silky emerald hair, and blazing eyes that were the same color as Robin’s and yet so different flooded me. I craved them both. How could that be wrong, when it made joy that I’d never experienced before flow through me, lighting the glade with pink fireflies? “I was wicked for craving a single moment with you before, but now every moment that I’m granted with you is a blessing.”

I gasped, as Ghost Robin feathered frozen kisses down my jaw. I arched my neck to grant him access, and he slid lower, taking advantage.

How delicious would his cold feel next to Sleipnir’s heat?

“I’ve recently discovered,” I murmured, “how wonderful it is to awake in a warm tangle of your lovers’ arms. The Immortals call it knifing…or possibly it was forking…”

“They have an obsession with cutlery?”

I furrowed my brow. “Spooning, that’s it. I rather think that they should rename it squirrel tailing because being cuddled in bed with so many, feels like being wrapped tight and safe in your tail.” I blushed. “I adored that as Mr Tailsy you could love me, and I could love you, even when we were only friends.”

By Paper Robin’s answering blush, I knew that he felt the same.

“You always treated me as a man, despite the fact that I was a shimage.” His blush darkened.

My eyes glittered. “I treated you like a man and a shimage. It was never despite anything. Mages aren’t my enemy, and witching heavens, my husband shall forever be my equal.”

Paper Robin’s radiant smile was worth everything.

Then a blast of wind tumbled the book to the side, slamming it shut.

My eyes widened as Ghost Robin’s outline appeared in front of me like a charcoal sketch with a flash of blurred oils — emerald eyes and burnished red hair. I reached forward, and the outline hovered backward. I scrambled desperate to touch — touch — touch. A cheeky smile hovered on his lips.

So, like that was it?

I laughed, chasing after Ghost Robin around the glade. His powers were stronger. I’d never been able to manifest, and I’d been attempting that trick for over a hundred years. Where was he gaining the energy from to appear to me?

When Ghost Robin twisted behind me, I turned too quickly and tumbled onto my back. He caged me beneath him within the cool band of his arms. The scent of sweet blackberries enveloped me like a coming home. I could taste their tartness on the back of my tongue. I longed to hear Robin’s voice, feel the tickle of his hair against my skin, and the heat of his warm hands. Instead, his lips blew icy gusts across my lips.

Closer, sweet Hecate, just a little closer, please…

His lips grazed mine.

All of a sudden, there was a golden flash in the branches above me. Through the charcoal outline of Ghost Robin, it was as if he’d been painted in by gold paint. I squinted in confusion.

I reached out, as if I could wrap my arms around his neck and drag him closer, but my hands only broke through cool air. I couldn’t touch him.

Ghost Robin’s eye’s gleamed with anguish, before he faded.

“No, please…” I clawed at the air, desperately.

Nothing.

Then Lysander swooped down from the branches, caging me with his arms, just like Ghost Robin had been. His wings stretched out, beating majestically. His heart thud, thud, thudded too rapidly; I could feel it through his shirt, matched by my own. His breath was warm against my cheek, when Ghost Robin’s had been cold.

Lysander had been watching me?

I could feel Ghost Robin’s loss beneath my skin, in the prickling of my magic, and in the aching of my gums.

Now a fae was in my glade, which had once been Robin’s and mine alone.

Yet why didn’t it feel wrong or a betrayal?

Lysander studied me, even as he shook like he was the one in distress. “So, you can even love a ghost…a memory…but it’s only my noble self, with whom you can’t bear to bond?”

“Perhaps courting rituals have changed, but stalking isn’t appealing to me.”

“Please, your incubus did nothing but stalk you. In fact, your Immortals literally brought you back from the dead because of their obsessive desires. How is my royal personage any different?”

I’d have been offended, if there hadn’t been such genuine insecurity threading underneath that question. Lysander’s wings curled around me, stroking over my shoulders. I shivered at their softness and the scent of cherry blossoms.

He was spring, hope, and predatory danger all at once.

He was a sweet tasting trap.

Why was it wrong to wish to love this fae prince, even while I hated another?

Lysander pressed a kiss to my forehead with as much reverence as Bask ever had. “In his training sessions with me since the tournament, my guardian has made one thing brutally clear. My royal personage is forbidden to touch you, love you, or…” When his tongue darted out to wet his plush lips, I longed to catch it with my own. My skin was too tight, and my magic sparked. My nerves were on fire. “…kiss you.”

“Are you so afraid that Titus will hurt you?”

Lysander snorted. “He’s already hurt me in more ways that you can conceive.” His wingtip stroked down my cheek, and he rested his forehead against mine. His hair veiled us both. Had we ever been this close before? His eyes were beautiful and so like Robin’s. “One fears only that he’ll hurt you.”

My eyes became frosty, and my fingers curled into the hard muscles of his shoulders. “Hecate’s tit, he’s already hurt me as well, and I shan’t ever allow him to do so again. You seem to be confused, so let me make it clear. If you choose it, you’re one of my Immortals, as much as Willoughby or Midnight. I won’t allow Titus to destroy our new love like he did my old.”

Lysander shuddered, as he closed his eyes, feathering kisses across my forehead.

Then he drew back and the depth of the love in his eyes made my breath hitch. “My uncle hates you, and he taught me to hate you as well, but damn my feathers, I love you.”

Lysander’s lips hovered over mine, just like Ghost Robin’s had.

Warmth pooled in my stomach. I’d go crazy…crazier…if he didn’t lower his mouth to mine and…

Yet he drew back, and his gaze was once more shuttered; disappointment crashed through me. “Are you truly naïve enough to believe that my guardian can’t still hurt you? There were courageous fae who thought like you. Their tribe were known as Rebel, and their young Lords were taken as hostages to our Fae Court to force the rest of the tribe to obey. To my childish mind, the bravery of those young Lords was admirable because they stood up to the Court Fae, when I couldn’t. Yet even so, when their tribe rebelled, they were sent to the Wicked Reform School. My guardian demanded that I…”

When he turned his head away from me, I nibbled along his jaw, and he reluctantly looked back at me. I was shocked by the glint of tears in his eyes.

“A Court Fae must obey,” he whispered, “and kill without hesitation. Yet my royal personage is weak.”

It was my turn to snort. “I’ve seen you face off with Juni.” I grimaced. “That takes a fae with…”

“Large wings?” Lysander smirked.

He rocked his crotch against mine. Witching heavens, his hard cock and balls definitely matched his large wings.

Were all fae so blessed, and did the size of wings always match with size of their manly parts?

I’d be careful not to mention my thesis around Bacchus, or she’d set it as coursework. Although, Fox with his not so secret Fae Kink would no doubt achieve a top grade and be exceptionally thorough at testing out the theory.

“Strength,” I replied.

Lysander’s expression once more became open and vulnerable. “Titus ordered me to execute the ringleaders.” I gritted my teeth. This was it. I’d never known why Lysander had been sentenced to the Rebel Academy but I’d known that it had to be something bad enough to depose him and for an entire kingdom to turn their back on a prince. After all, Willoughby was a killer and a traitor, even if only because of his inability to control his powers. Why had I expected that Lysander wouldn’t be? “My noble self refused.” I startled, staring at him with wide eyes. His lips turned up at one side in a lopsided smile. “To lay down your scimitar and refuse to kill in the name of your Court is a crime, but I wouldn’t become a murderer. That’s why I was sent here to be reformed into a true Court Fae.”

What in the name of Hecate…?

Lysander was as innocent as Sleipnir.

My guts clenched. Sleipnir would possibly punch a wall. Bask would curse Titus’ wings to malt, whenever he wore dark clothes. And Fox would cuddle Lysander and never let go.

Was this why Lysander resisted rebelling? After all, he’d witnessed a failed rebellion where fae had been punished and slaughtered.

Lysander drew back. “Did you expect me to be a killer, rather than one who failed to become a killer?”

I huffed. “Well, obviously. You have excellent predator vibes.”

Lysander inclined his head; his sharp teeth glinted in the light. “My noble self is all predator, witch, but I’m no fool. Were you not listening to my little tale? The Rebels were discovered, executed, and I lost…” He took a shuddering breath. Who had he lost? Wait, who had he loved…? “With deluded faith, one believes that it’s possible to reach a place where one can no longer be hurt, but it’s not true. There’s always something or someone else to take. One knows that you’re scheming to bring down the academy. You don’t need to tell me your plan because I trust you.” My magic sparked against Lysander’s in shock, but he lay his cheek against mine. His words gusted against my skin with a hollow fear that bled through me. “You’ve been dragging all us Princes into your plot, and we go willingly because we’re enthralled by you. Titus forbids me from loving you, but I can’t stop it any more than Willoughby can melt the ice flowing through him, or Midnight can fight his need for blood. Yet you’re leading us to our ruin; my royal personage knows because the past horror of the massacre still haunts me. If you continue to rebel, we’ll all become ghosts.”