"Right," Fox rubbed his hands together, "I demand my last kiss. After all, I was once Romeo, but this time, my Juliet will not stab herself because I promise, neither of us are truly dying."
Fox twisted to me, but Lysander's wings banded around him, dragging him close. His hand cupped his cheek.
"If I could grant you life with this kiss, I would," Lysander breathed.
Fox's eyes opened comically large, then Lysander pressed his mouth to his with a tenderness that shocked me. Fox sighed, pressing his forehead against Lysander's and swiping his own tongue against his.
I swept forward, clasping my arms around Fox's waist and feathering kisses up the back of his neck. In claims of possession, Bask and Sleipnir pushed in either side, teasing their hands over Lysander's wings, until he moaned and up Fox's sides, before sucking both sides of Fox's neck with deep, marking kisses.
When Fox was taken from us, he'd feel all of us on his skin. I tightened my arms. Could we keep him safe in our cocoon?
Please, don't let him be taken...
"Wow, I've found four Juliets," Fox murmured.
His eyes were hazy in the good way, and I could see how hard he was fighting to restrain a grin, as he sneaked glances at Lysander.
“One is certainly no girl.” Lysander arched his brow. “And since you’re referencing non-magical fiction, which breaks my fae Court Dictates to read, then I can only surmise that it’s a tragic romance. Our story shall be no such thing. I refuse to allow it.”
Bask snickered. “Our hero.”
Lysander’s eyes flashed, and Bask drew back. “Oh, an anti-hero at best. I can be very, very bad.”
"Perhaps, Crown should be next to suffer the Memory Theater and show you why he's such a bad boy that his guardian sent him here to be reformed," Damelza's cold voice rang down the corridor.
When Lysander winced, fury rushed through me. I twisted around, standing in front of my lovers, as my magic surged through me. In a clacking of heels and flurry of feathers, the Principal of the Academy, Damelza, and her daughter, Juni, strode towards us.
Damelza's hair fell like a silver waterfall to her shoulders, and the feather that was a charm against our powers was tucked behind her ear. A shawl of crows’ feathers was draped across her shoulders. Juni simply looked like a younger, smaller, pointier, version of her mother.
Juni avoided Lysander's searching gaze. If it’d been anyone but a witch who'd just punished her student for attempting to save Fox's life, then I'd have thought that she looked...ashamed.
Crack my broomstick, maybe not all the professors agreed with Damelza's motivational techniques.
I truly believed that this academy would not pass its Magical Safety Inspection.
Just for a moment, I stiffened. Damelza could be my mother here to wall up Robin with the way that she held herself, the glittering obsidian of her dress, and her intense gaze that spoke of death.
My nails bit crescents into my palms.
Except, she was here to wall up Fox, instead. How in the witching heavens was that any better? I glanced around at Fox's ashen face. Did he truly believe that the wall wouldn't suffocate him and that they'd be enough air for him to survive, until I could free him? Or had that merely been another one of his lies?
Damelza swept to Fox; her dress swished snake-like across the floor in the chilling silence. Then she snatched him by the curls and yanked him away from the safe cocoon of my lovers. Bask let out a yell, clasping onto Fox's hand with a determined expression. I'd seen it before when Fox had tried to take one of his pillows.
Damelza wouldn't win this.
For a long moment, Fox was caught in a tug-of-war between professor and student. Damelza's eyes glittered pink in warning, but in turn, Bask's glowed red.
They wouldn't tear him in half, surely?
"Come on now, don't fight. There's enough of my foxy cuteness to go around," Fox panted.
Damelza brushed her fingers over her shawl, and the feathers ruffled up. Black sparks shot out, stinging Bask. With a yelp, he let go of Fox and stumbled back into Sleipnir's arms.
With a satisfied smile, Damelza shook Fox by the curls. "What admirable academy spirit. I delight to see such enthusiasm in my students, even if it is over a whipping boy who failed on his very first mission." Fox pinked. "Do you know what disappoints me the most?"
"That you don't own an army of flying monkeys?" Fox smirked.
I expected Damelza to scowl, but instead, her smile became even more smug (which shouldn't have been possible), "Mages. Especially shimages who are just as disappointing as their mother always told me."
Fox hunched his shoulders, dropping his gaze.
Cursed toads, Damelza’s smugness was the limit. She could make us endure dangerous trials and deadly missions but not smugness.
Damelza had been on a fox hunt from the moment that the new mage had walked down the long road of the academy to the castle. I'd sensed it from Hecate's Tree: the danger that the new student would be in because he was the first mage to enter the academy since Robin. Damelza had only been waiting for the moment that she could tear him apart bloody.
Now, because we hadn't brought Marcus back with us, she had her chance.
When she tightened her fingers in Fox's hair, tugging out several strands, my lips curled back. "I'd insist that you not harm a hair on his head, but it appears that I'm too late for that. As I'm Prefect, our failure on the mission is my fault. Why not be original and shut me up, instead?"
"No," chorused from my lovers.
Even Lysander started towards me like he'd pin my arms down, while Sleipnir held onto my legs to stop me moving any closer to Damelza.
Damelza cocked her head. "An interesting proposition."
"Mother..." Juni hissed. She glanced at me in shock, bouncing on the balls of her feet like she couldn't decide whether to stand with the Principal or by my side. "The Wickedly Charmed girl is clearly not thinking straight. She has a crush on this mage."
Damelza snorted. "Well, thank Hecate I have you here to point out the obvious." Juni reddened. "Just like you have a crush on your fae prince."
Juni's mouth gaped, as her gaze shot to Lysander, who straightened like he was on parade. His expression became shuttered.
Lysander and Juni were lovers? Yuck, yuck, and... Why did my heart feel like it was shrinking in my aching chest? When my shoulders drooped, I forced myself to hitch them up again.
Lysander had never been mine. But how hard would it be to win him from Juni?
"I d-don't... I-t's not the s-same," Juni spluttered.
Damelza waved her hand. "Of course not. You haven't acted on the childish urges because if you had...well, Titus is our patron, and I'd rather that he didn't close us down and make it his life’s work to destroy us in the most intimately painful ways possible."
Juni looked like she was about to vomit. Excellent.
"On Hecate, I swear that I shall never tarnish our name," Juni insisted.
Damelza arched her brow. "I'm glad that I don't need to add be ritualistically executed by our patron to the schedule because this is already such a busy start to term. Plus, I have my own execution to perform."