The necromancer started clawing at the barrier. A shifter crouched low and was about to shift. Even Cheryl’s fangs were bared in defense as she looked around wildly. But we were trapped inside the barrier, unable to get out.
Stiles watched us alongside Headmaster Torne, his face impassive and his body still. My fangs grew, and I tried to flash away, but the air barrier was too strong, and I went flying backwards, falling into students behind me. Everyone was shouting to be let out, powers were flinging around the room, and just when total destructive pandemonium was about to break out, a voice halted us.
“Students, stop!”
I felt my body jerk to a stop, my muscles stiffening against my will. Everything about me was frozen, forced into a statue-like state that made me rage in panic.
What the fuck kind of magic was this?
A Spector guard waltzed forward and circled the room, his eyes blood red. He was tall and imposing, with a deadly energy about him that made me want to run—but I couldn’t. Every Thibault student in the room was on pause, not a single one of us was even able to blink.
The man sighed and shook his head at us. “I don’t know why you bother with the song and dance, Hafferty. It’s so much easier doing things my way,” he said while rolling his neck like he was bored.
“President Belvini prefers a sense of civility, Jones,” Hafferty replied with a sigh.
“Yes, but it’s better when they’re willing. The success rate nearly doubles,” the red-eyed man with the halting words replied. “But they’re hardly ever willing, unless I make them be.”
“Indeed.”
“Well? Make them be willing, then,” Headmaster Torne put in. “I don’t want my most prominent graduates killed tonight. That wouldn’t do well for my re-election as headmaster.”
Rage festered inside of me. These people were talking about taking away our free will as nothing more than an annoying hurdle to jump over so that they could perform whatever fucked up demon ritual they had planned. I always knew the headmaster was a jackass, but this was some next level bullshit.
With a curt nod from Hafferty, the red-eyed man—Jones—walked in front of us. His creepy gaze slid over our frozen forms. “When I release you, you all will remain calm. You will perform the ritual as instructed, and you will not fight it.”
His words dug into my brain like a maggot digging through rotted waste. I felt it niggling into my consciousness, spreading through me like a virus.
“You are released,” he said, his low voice like a murmur that travelled from my toes to my spine.
Instantly, my body let go, like a car suddenly kicking from neutral into drive. I faltered on my feet, my heel catching on the hardwood as I settled into a decisive stop.
Before I could decide to try to escape again, it was like my brain split in half. Part of me knew that I needed to run, to get the fuck out of there. But the other half of my brain refused to let me. Even my panicked heart had stuttered to a slow, calm beat.
This man’s power, however he was able to do this...it was like a vice around my entire being, controlling my every reaction and movement. It scared the fuck out of me.
I bared my fangs at him—or at least, I would’ve if the compulsion power had let me.
I tried to fight it. I tried so, so hard, but it didn’t work.
My body and my mind weren’t under my own control. A shifter settled beside me and was heaving in and out, likely trying to fight against this power like I was. A necromancer stood at my back and closed his eyes as if meditating.
Cheryl was shoved into me, her willowy body pressed at my side as she shook with fear and rage. I felt bad for her. We hated one another, but I didn’t want this for any of us. I still wasn’t exactly sure what this was.
My entire body tensed, my mind screaming at my body to flee so violently that I started shaking. Part of me wanted to run far, far away, but the other half soothed me, like everything was sunshine and daisies. Every bone in my body felt strangled with warring tension.
I met Stiles’s eyes from across the room. “Don’t fight it,” he mouthed.
My eyes blazed with fury, but he just burrowed his icy gaze straight into my soul as his expression slipped into resigned indifference.
Don’t fight it? Fuck him.
This was breaking every natural law we had. Supes weren’t allowed to mess with demon magic. It wasn’t our place. Demons were different from us. Powerful. Dark. And these students weren’t even willing. This was so wrong on so many levels. No wonder Spector was so fucking secretive. When the council found out about this, they’d all be executed.
Against my will, I felt my entire body relax. It felt unnatural, but my lips parted on a sigh. The tension around my eyes went away. My muscles stilled until they were unclenched, and I stood there with all defiance leaked out of me, just like the rest of my peers.
“That’s better,” Jones said with a smirk. His rustic voice grated against my skin.
The Spector elementals finally dropped their hands, eliminating the barrier since there was no need for it now. Then one by one, the rest of the Spector guards closed in around the ritual circle, stopping right outside of it. They clasped hands and then immediately started to chant. The words were foreign, spoken in a haunting, monotonous tone that made the hairs on the back of my neck raise up to attention.
Sarathess rythirite lamentous orelustimenum...and on it went.
My heart raced with each uttered syllable of their raised voices. I could feel the anxiety in the room from my classmates as they looked on in bland fear, like the expression couldn’t fully reach the surface thanks to our compulsion.
The voices grew louder and louder, and wind
