“It’s...well, it’s about me punching Professor Iasan in the face during ability training.”
Nei’s lips curved slightly upward, her kind eyes waiting for more of an explanation but Roque stormed in front of Brokk, snapping, “An assault against a teacher can result in expulsion!”
Gnashing his teeth together, Brokk volleyed, “And pushing students to react in violence doesn’t need consequences? Sir, I beg you to listen to what I’m saying. Iasan isn’t teaching us. He is forcing us to always be on the defense, to always act with vengeance. To be weapons without compassion. To barely be human.”
Roque ran a hand through his tousled hair. “Iasan has his methods as we all do. He pushes you because he believes that you can achieve great things. He is brusque, stern, and disciplined, but he knows no other way. The tides of this world have been pushed into change with great effort from all of us. Without challenge, there is no growth. It is the younger generation that will dictate whether the dream and purpose of the Academy lives on. For it to live on, it must encompass your soul, your beliefs, and your dreams. It once did, did it not?”
Brokk stood awkwardly, the weight of Roque’s words falling on his shoulders. He did once, as a young boy. Now, being seventeen and on the brink of entering his manhood, he had let go of his dreams of a full life pinned on childish whims. The last twelve years had ensured that. Brokk sought out one thing above all else. The truth. The truth of his past, the truth of the Academy. The truth of the hearts of the Faes and Strattons and how they upheld their students.
A flash of sympathy crossed their leader’s eyes, and he rested a strong hand on Brokk’s shoulder. “You will understand fully one day. With all dreams come sacrifice. With all freedom comes some form of a cage. It is the lesser of two evils that we all must learn to live with.”
Brokk cast his eyes toward the floor, unable to find his words.
He saw Nei’s sharp gaze flickered between them before Roque murmured, “You are dismissed with a warning. But if I hear of this sort of behavior again, or you are brought to me, then there will be consequences.”
Heat flushed his cheeks, and Brokk dipped his head. “Thank you.”
With that, he flew from the room. Clicking the door shut, fast low voices danced at him from behind it, and that strong sense of warning pulled at his gut again. Ripping himself away, he sauntered down the hallway. He needed to find Memphis. Something wild and dark was churning for them all in the shadows. He could feel it.
Brokk tried to cage his galloping pulse, but every step, every thought brought him closer to his conclusion. The Faes and Strattons were hiding something at the very heart of the Academy, and he had every intention of finding out exactly what it was.
Chapter Two
Adair
He was transfixed by the way she moved. Locks of her black hair trickled forward. Her slender body was animated as Emory was lost in what she was saying. The words were a distant hum, never truly reaching him, but wrapping his mind with their warmth. It felt so good to be talked to without the condescension from his parents or from the withering looks of fellow students.
The afternoon air brushed his cheek, bringing him back to his pressing thoughts. As usual, he was completely and utterly at Emory Fae’s mercy. She radiated with life, and Adair clung to it like a lifeline, desperately and all at once. Chewing his inner lip, he tried to slow his hammering heart, his clammy palms. To suffocate the urge to lean over and run his thumb over her lower lip, to cup her face, to lower his lips on hers and just feel what it would be like, to know the possibilities they held together.
Like every other day of his life, he pushed his roaring emotions down deep, chaining them in the restraints of his very core. The afternoon had passed with their parents going over maps and possible borders his father would go to next with his brainless group.
Roque and his father constantly butting heads.
Nei and his mother, Bresslin, talking quietly to themselves.
Him and Emory had sat in the back, watching and ever dutiful.
But as always, he was watching her. Glimpses of her full lips quirking to the side in her crooked smile. How she tucked her long ebony hair behind her ear. How her eyes reminded him of the forest at night, deep and full of secrets. How when she was excited or mad, her high cheekbones flushed deeply. Her laugh. Her scowl. Her stubbornness. Her, entirely.
Breathing in the deep scent of summer, he tried to relax as they sat on the ledge of the grey boulder they had scaled. He knew, with every passing day, the ownership of his heart was being whittled away. A slow warmth spread through him at the thought, because when it came to him and Emory, there was no other way he wanted his story to be written. The first time they had met, he had known - they were destined. Her light had always complimented his darkness, and he was, in every sense, entranced by her.
“Adair?”
Snapping out of his thoughts, he stole a glance at her and faltered, looking ahead.
The sun sat lazily in the sky, and time seemed to stop, each stolen brush of fingers and sly smile tucked away for them both. Emory sought out the comfort of her longest friend. He was her confidant. Who else could relate to what it felt like to uphold their family’s reputations? The pressure, the constant scrutiny. He cringed internally, echoes of his father’s criticisms filling him.
You are the best and the strongest, Adair. We are elite. Better than these fools who occupy
