"Stop!" Magenta hollered.
"My patience is officially worn out." Damelza snatched Midnight's wing by the wingtip, dragging it up towards her palm.
I wished that I could see Midnight's face, but tremors ran through his shoulders.
Dizzy, my heartbeat raced.
Don't, don't, don't...
Suddenly, Lysander thrust his arm towards Damelza. "Break my arm, instead."
Midnight's head shot up in shock. "You mustn’t, my prince."
"Silence." Lysander's arm was steady.
Respect.
"Mother," Juni begged, "he's obviously under that Wickedly Charmed witch's spell. He doesn't know what he's saying."
Damelza ignored her daughter. She raised her palm with the spitting hex towards Lysander’s bare elbow. He didn't lower his arm. I stiffened, dreading the crack...
When Damelza pulled away her hand, Lysander's breathing sped up.
She stared at Lysander in shock. "You'd really do it." Then she gave a sly grin. "But you don't own a dog and bark yourself, and you don't own a whipping boy and take his punishment. You're meant to care about them, which is why it'll hurt you so much when I do this..."
She snatched Midnight by the wingtips, before running her palms...and the hex...down both his wings at the same time.
I clutched my hands over my ears, but it still didn't block out the cracking of bones or Midnight's howls.
When Damelza let go of Midnight, and he curled into a ball with his broken wings quivering to cover himself like a blanket of feathers, Lysander hovered over him, unsure how he could even touch Midnight without causing him more pain.
Would she allow Bask to heal Midnight, after the tournament?
"Good luck on your mission this afternoon, Immortals," Damelza said like she'd just delivered a detention and not a hexing. "If you refuse to complete it, then I won't break your bones, I'll break your necks."
Hexing Midnight and sending us on the deadly mission wasn’t enough for Damelza, she also had to threaten us with execution.
So, it looked like I was right: Life’s a witch and then you die.
Chapter Twenty
MAGENTA
When I reached out with my magic, it curled through the academy's wintry grounds. Its roots burrowed beneath the academy and up into the trees of the Dead Wood. Out here, as I marched towards the dragon stables and the mission, I could sense my Wickedly Charmed powers in every crunching step, the snowflakes tearing from the leaden sky, and in the trembling of the breezes.
I was wicked, but now, I wasn't merely an explosion of primal rage, grief, and pleasure.
The curse was melting along with the snow, and the wards that trapped us all in the Membership were breaking down. If my dangerous Ice Prince could control himself, then so could I.
I clasped both Fox and Bask's hands, unwilling to let go. Fox shivered in only his whipping boy uniform, since Damelza hadn’t considered him deserving of a coat, even though she could be sending him to his death.
Sweet Hecate, never let me lose my Rebels.
Yet was it worse to hold onto them eternally or free them forever?
Sleipnir stormed ahead of me towards the huge stables with barred stalls, which looked more like a prison than the castle. His shoulders were stiff, and his hair was bristled to cinnamon red.
Music tinkled from around the corner. My brow furrowed. It was the same melancholy song about building snowmen (in my first life, I’d never have guessed that it was so hard for people to find play partners in the future), which my crow familiars had told me Willoughby sang with haunting beauty in the shower.
Was this where he’d learned it?
Ah, that made more sense than it being an elven ballad.
Yet I couldn’t shake the sound of Midnight’s howling, the crack as his wings snapped, or Lysander’s desperate Juni, please…
I hated with a witchy passion the sound of another woman’s name on Lysander’s lips.
One of the things about being burned alive and then trapped as a ghost, who was unable to escape Hecate’s Tree, was that it made me rather possessive of what was mine. Strangely, that now included Lysander.
One of the other things about being burned alive and so on, was that it clearly had driven me a little crazy because how could I care like my heart was in flames about two Princes and their whipping boy?
Had I captured them to our side or had they captured me?
I followed Slepnir around the corner and into the yard, which was in front of the stables. I wrinkled my nose against the stinging smoke. Then I narrowed my eyes at Professor Ambrose. He hummed along to the music, crouching over ranks of bridles, saddles, and spurs. I’d never ridden a dragon before, and I’d never been ridden before. Well, only the once. But losing my virginity to Fox wasn’t something that I’d forget.
Inexperienced as I might be, however, I knew that I’d prefer it not to include anything that controlled, hurt, or whipped me.
My gaze fell onto the leather whip, which was coiled at Ambrose’s waist.
Ambrose was a delicate, beautiful Seelie fae with emerald eyes that were bright against his alabaster skin and a matching steampunk uniform. His wings were golden like his hair. It didn’t look like he’d have had the strength to have survived as a Rebel and then to have been offered the role of professor.
Yet appearances were frequently deceptive.
Most people, for example, couldn’t even see my familiars, but Flair and Echo were loyal, brave, and possibly psychopathic.
They were perfect.
But then, nobody’s perfect, and what’s a ghost if not nobody?
“You know that I won’t touch any of those torture devices,” Sleipnir growled, “or are you getting ready for a seriously kinky party?”
Ambrose twirled around, startled. His wings spread out like he was trying to hide something…or someone.
Hecate’s tit, did he have a lover saddled up behind him?
Snap my broomstick, let it be Ezekiel.
Then I gagged as I imagined Bacchus being ridden, instead. Although, I rather thought that it’d be karma for her treatment of Pocus.
“You’re early, boy.” Ambrose snarled in a Scottish accent that thrummed with such dominance that my knees almost buckled.
His gaze darted between us, as we strolled closer.
“You’re late, Prince Ambrose,” Sleipnir threw back.
Ambrose’s wings drooped. “Are you ever going to call me professor?”
Sleipnir grinned. “Are you ever going to free all the shifters?”
Fox raised his hand. “Is this flirting session open to all of us or do we need to take turns with the sexual tension?”
Ambrose’s expression darkened, and he reached for the whip at his belt.
“Da!” A small, pale face peered around Ambrose’s legs.
My eyes widened. Ambrose had been trying to hide Ty, his son, a tiny fae boy with golden hair that curled behind his ears and jade eyes. He wore a plain green coat and leggings, but he wasn’t a full fae because he had no wings.
Ambrose blanched. Instantly, he reached down to draw Ty, his son, closer against his leg like he needed to protect him against us. His hand shook.
My guts roiled. Byron had attempted to hide Robin throughout his childhood in the same way, every time that he knew Robin was in trouble. It would usually end in the both of them receiving a whipping, but Byron couldn’t stop the impulse to step between the mage and the witch professors.