Page 31 of Fae Trials

I ground my teeth. Would I even survive this bloody trial long enough to find Sicily? Judging from the way Lady Gala had tried to freeze my heart in the dining room, it was looking like I might die if I participated and would certainly die if I refused.

“Fine,” I said. “But you’ll have to do something for me.”

He suppressed a smirk. “Very well. When Gala dies, I will bend you on your hands and knees and grant you one good, hard fuck.”

“Ew!” I flinched out of his grasp.

His smug expression faded. “What do you want, then?”

“Help me find someone I’ve lost.”

He shot me a dirty look and walked across the courtyard, leaving me staring at his broad back. What a spoiled brat.

A small crowd of whispering students gathered around me. Someone tapped my shoulder. It was a girl with chestnut brown eyes and burnt orange hair. “Is it true you’re going to fight Lady Gala to the death to win Prince Rory?”

“Not if I can help it,” I muttered.

She gave me a smile as bright as the sun, and a pang of sadness struck my heart. Something about her reminded me of my sister.

The double doors opened, and an older man with hair the same golden shade as mine poked his head out of the door. “Classes started a minute ago.”

“Sorry, Mr. Whittaker,” said the girl.

A breath caught in the back of my throat. Josiah Whittaker? That was the half-blood Gladiolus had told us had been implanted with false memories of a human life. At some point during the day, I needed to get him on his own and ask if he had been cursed by dark faeries.

The other girls rushed ahead of me and hurried through the door. I followed after them, glancing over my shoulder for signs of Prince Rory, but he’d already disappeared around a tower.

Behind me, a gust of wind brushed against my wings, making me turn around. Something rushed toward me, a rapid blur. I jumped back, and it whizzed past my face and embedded into the stone.

My jaw dropped. “An arrow?”

“Get away from that,” shouted a male voice.

I scrambled back toward the wooden door, but the tip of the arrow exploded in a cloud of black vapor. Panic spiked through my heart. This could be anything—including iron salt. Staying low, I dashed to the building’s entrance, flung open the door, and staggered inside.

Mr. Whittaker stood in the hallway, his face as pale as sour milk. “Did you inhale any of that?”

Coughing up a lungful of air, I choked out, “No.”

“Follow me.” He strode through the entrance hall and pushed open a door, where about four dozen students of all ages sat around wooden tables arranged in a U-shape.

All the chatter stopped, and everyone turned to stare at me, their eyes wide.

“It’s started already.” The girl with the burned orange hair wrapped an arm around my shoulders and guided me to the nearest seat.

“What?”

“Everyone was talking about it in the dining hall. The Fated are going to group together and have you murdered.”

Chapter 10

I could barely concentrate on Mr. Whittaker’s lesson, knowing that Lady Gala and the other Fated were out there, wanting me dead. Slumping on my wooden seat, I stared blankly at the front of the room as the remedial class teacher demonstrated to the room another way to express their magic.

He wore the same style of robes as Gladiolus and the headmistress, except his seemed to be made from unbleached linen compared to their silk. Maybe it was a way for the academy to indicate that he was a half-blood. His wings were retracted, as were those of two-thirds of the remedial class, but none were as vivid as mine.

“You should ask Mistress Ellyllon for help,” whispered the orange-haired girl sitting next to me. “It’s forbidden to attack half-bloods.”

A sob caught in the back of my throat. The headmistress was the person who had authorized this unofficial hunting season. I had no doubt that she anticipated that the Fated would gang together to stick a dagger in my back. My death would restore the girls’ perfect lives.