Awakened

slammed into him: sadness, worry, and hurt foremost among them. Then, arms filled with a big wheat-colored cat, Stevie Rae rushed up to the mourning trio. It was so good to see her that Rephaim almost forgot to breathe.

“Duchess, you gotta stop this now.” Her distinctly accented voice washed over him like a spring rain in the desert. He watched her crouch beside the big dog, depositing the cat between her legs. The feline instantly started rubbing against the dog, as if he were trying to wipe away her pain. Rephaim blinked in surprise when the dog actually quieted and began licking the cat. “There’s a good girl. Let Cameron help you.” Stevie Rae looked up at the Sword Master. Rephaim saw him nod almost imperceptibly. She turned her attention to the sobbing boy. Digging into the pocket of her jeans, she pulled out a wad of tissues, and handed it to him. “Damien, sweetie, you gotta stop this now, too. You’re gonna make yourself sick.”

Damien took the tissue and wiped quickly across his face. In a shaking voice he said, “I d-don’t care.”

Stevie Rae touched his cheek. “I know you don’t, but your cat needs you, and so does Duchess. Plus, honey, Jack would be real upset if he saw you like this.”

“Jack won’t ever see me again.” Damien had stopped crying, but his voice sounded terrible. It seemed to Rephaim that he could hear the boy’s heart breaking within it.

“I do not believe that for one hot second,” Stevie Rae said firmly. “And if you really think about it, neither do you.”

Damien looked at her with haunted eyes. “I can’t think right now, Stevie Rae. All I can do is feel.”

“Some of the sadness will pass,” Dragon said in a voice that sounded as heartbroken as Damien’s. “Enough so that you will be able to think again.”

“That’s right. Listen to Dragon. When you can think again, you can find a thread of the Goddess inside you. Follow that thread. Remember there is an Otherworld we can all share. Jack’s there now. Someday you’ll see him again there.”

Damien looked from Stevie Rae to the Sword Master. “Have you been able to do that? Does it make losing Anastasia any easier?”

“Nothing makes her loss easier. Right now I am still searching for the thread to our Goddess.”

Rephaim felt a horribly sick jolt within him as he realized he had caused the pain the Sword Master was feeling. He had killed the spells and rituals professor, Anastasia Lankford. She had been Dragon’s mate. He had done it so coldly, with an absolute lack of any feeling except, perhaps, annoyance at being detained for the short time it had taken him to overpower and destroy her.

I killed her with no thought for anything or anyone except my need to follow Father, to do his bidding. I am a monster.

Rephaim couldn’t stop looking at the Sword Master. He carried his pain like a cloak around him. He could almost literally see the empty hole his mate’s absence had left in his life. And Rephaim, for the first time in his centuries-long life, felt remorse for his actions.

He didn’t think he’d made any sound, any movement, but he knew when Stevie Rae’s gaze found him. Slowly, he looked from Dragon to the vampyre with whom he was Imprinted. Their eyes met; their gazes locked. Her emotions engulfed him as if she’d purposely directed them to him. First, he felt her shock at seeing him. It left him flushed and almost embarrassed. Then he felt sadness—deep, jagged, painful. He tried to telegraph his own sorrow to her, hoping that somehow she would be able to understand how much he missed her and how sorry he was for having any part in the grief she was experiencing. Anger hit him then with such a force Rephaim almost lost his grip on the stone wall. He shook his head back and forth, back and forth, not sure whether it was in denial of her anger, or the reason for it.

“I want you and Duchess to come with me, Damien. Y’all need to get away from this place. Bad things have happened here. Bad things are still lurkin’ ’round here. I can feel it. Let’s go. Now.” She spoke to the kneeling boy, but her gaze never left Rephaim’s.

The Sword Master’s response was swift. His eyes swept the area and Rephaim froze, willing the shadows and the night to cloak him.

“What is it? What’s here?” Dragon asked.

“Darkness.” Stevie Rae was still staring at him when she spoke that single word as if throwing a dagger into his heart. “Tainted, unredeemable Darkness.” Then she turned her back on him dismissively. “My gut says it’s not anything worth raisin’ your sword against, but let’s get outta here just the same.”

“Agreed,” Dragon said, though Rephaim heard reluctance in his voice.

He will be a force to be reckoned with in the future, Rephaim acknowledged to himself. And what about Stevie Rae? His Stevie Rae. What will she be? Could she really hate me? Could she utterly reject me? He sifted through her feelings as he watched her take Damien’s hand and help him to his feet, and then lead him, the dog, cat, and Dragon away toward the dormitories. He certainly felt her anger and her sorrow, and he understood those feelings. But hatred? Did she really hate him? He didn’t know for sure, but Rephaim believed, deep in his heart, that he deserved her hatred. No, he hadn’t killed Jack, but he was allied with the forces that had.

I am my father’s son. It’s all I know how to be. It is my only choice.

After Stevie Rae was gone Rephaim pulled himself up to the top of the wall. He took a running start and leaped into the sky. Beating against the night with his massive wings, he circled around the watchful campus and headed back to the roof of the Mayo building.

I deserve her hatred … I deserve her hatred … I deserve her hatred …

The litany pounded through his mind in time with his wing strokes. His own despair and grief joined with the echo of Stevie Rae’s sadness and anger. The dampness of the cool night sky mixed with his tears as Rephaim’s face was bathed in moonlight and loss.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Stevie Rae

“Oh, for shit’s sake! Are you telling me no one has called Zoey?” Aphrodite said.

Stevie Rae took Aphrodite by the elbow and, with a grip that was maybe firmer than technically necessary, guided her to the door in Damien’s dorm room. At the doorway she paused and both girls looked back at the bed, where Damien was curled up with Duchess and his cat, Cameron. Boy, dog, and cat had finally, just minutes before, fallen into a sleep induced by grief and exhaustion.

Silently, Stevie Rae pointed her finger from Aphrodite to the hallway. Aphrodite sneered. Stevie Rae crossed her arms and planted herself. “Outside,” she mouthed, “now.” Then she followed her out of the room and closed the door softly behind them. “And keep your dang voice down out here, too,” Stevie Rae whispered fiercely.

“Fine. I’ll keep it down. Jack is dead and no one has called Z?” she repeated her question, much less loudly.

“No. I haven’t exactly had time. Damien has been hysterical. Duchess has been hysterical. The school’s in a dang uproar. I’m the only effing High Priestess who isn’t, supposedly, locked away in her room praying or whatever, so I’ve been busy handling the shit storm out here and the fact that a really nice boy just died.”

“Yeah, I understand that and I’m sad, too, and all, but Zoey needs to get here and get here now. If you were too busy to do it, then you should have let one of the professors call her. The sooner she knows the sooner she’ll be on her way here.”

Darius hurried up to them and took Aphrodite’s hand.

“It was Neferet, right? That bitch killed Jack,” Aphrodite asked him.

“Not possible,” Darius and Stevie Rae said together. Stevie Rae flashed Aphrodite an annoyed I told you so look as Darius went on to explain. “Neferet was, indeed, in the school Council Meeting when Jack fell from the ladder. Not only did Damien see Jack fall, but another witness corroborates the time. Drew Partain was crossing the grounds when he heard the music Jack was singing to. He said he only heard part of the song because the bell clock on Nyx’s Temple began chiming midnight, or at least that was why he thought he didn’t hear any more of Jack’s voice.”