Royals of Villain Academy 2: Vile Sorcery Read online

  The prickling shot deeper. “You’ve been spying on me from down there?” He was a scion, which meant they’d have given him the corner room—his bedroom would be right under mine. It wasn’t as if he could watch me through the floor, but suddenly it felt as if he might as well have.

  “No, nothing like that.” Declan held up his hands. “I only checked because I wanted to talk. And I can’t tell anything other than that you’re in the room. I don’t know any mage who can look inside someone’s head without actually seeing that head to focus on it.”

  My hackles came down a smidge. I did remember Professor Sinleigh mentioning something about that. And I was glad Declan had waited until my conversation with Imogen was over before coming up. All the same…

  “All right, you’re here and I’m here. Again, what do you want?”

  He gave me a slightly exasperated look that I didn’t think was completely fair. “You asked for those extra shielding lessons, but you haven’t gotten back to me to set up some times. I thought, considering… everything that’s gone on, it’d be a good idea to get started sooner rather than later. I’ve got time right now, if you want to come back to my office, or you can tell me—”

  He broke off at a sharp laugh on the other side of the door. Victory’s laugh.

  My heartbeat stuttered. Maybe I’d give as good as I got from Victory, but I didn’t exactly want to hand her ammunition. That’s exactly what she’d make of the idea that I was getting extra help. No doubt she’d use it as an excuse to test my mental shields in every possible way at every possible opportunity.

  I already knew Declan wasn’t going to be on board with pretending he’d come to visit for non-professional reasons. I grabbed his arm. “Come on.” I hustled him across the common room and yanked him into my bedroom just as the lock clicked over.

  Declan moved away from me as soon as the bedroom door had closed. I released his arm automatically, and he backed up to stand near the window, leaving plenty of space between him and me. Not really enough, though. The room felt abruptly twice as small, especially with my bed right there less than a foot from both of us. I very studiously did not look at it.

  Victory’s voice carried in from the common room. “If she tries to make us go over the project again, we’ll just have to… convince her otherwise.”

  “You’d think they’d know better by now,” Cressida replied, alongside a giggle I thought was Sinclair’s.

  They kept chatting away, sounding as if they’d gone into the kitchen. I caught Declan’s eye where he was standing tensed with one hand gripping the back of my desk chair. Now that he was in here, there was definitely no way he could leave while they were there without raising a whole lot of questions he wouldn’t be happy about.

  “Sorry,” I whispered. “I heard them coming and sort of panicked. They probably won’t stay out there too long.”

  He nodded and inhaled slowly. With his exhale, he raised his hand and spoke a few words made of the nonsense syllables all the more experienced mages used to cast their spells. Once you could create a strong enough association between whatever sounds you picked and the magic you wanted to evoke, fearmancers preferred to ensure no one around could guess what they were casting and prepare.

  My back went rigid, but all that happened was the voices from the common room snapped out. The room fell into silence.

  “I conjured a sound barrier,” Declan said. “Physicality isn’t one of my strengths, but as long as they don’t go prodding it, it should hold just fine. It’s easier if we don’t have to worry about them hearing us.”

  It was. I swallowed hard. “We won’t know when they leave.”

  “I can pay attention to my impression of them out there. Don’t worry, as soon as the coast is clear, I’ll get out of your room.”

  Right. “Just like you knew when Imogen left.”

  He grimaced. “I promise you, I haven’t generally been monitoring your comings and goings. It’s just a skill that comes in handy from time to time.”

  He did have a point there. “Maybe you’ll need to teach me that too,” I said, leaning against the wall to increase the distance between us.

  “Shielding seems like the more important skill to begin with.” He paused. “Do you have time to come with me now—after they leave—or do you want to decide on another time to meet? We might as well get that sorted out while we’re stuck here.”

  I had a pretty good sense of my schedule now. I probably should have sought him out to make arrangements earlier, but part of me had still been balking at the thought of spending more time in his presence. He clearly intended to hold up his side of the deal, though, and having someone I didn’t trust as my tutor would at least give me extra motivation to develop my mental defenses fast.

  “I have a seminar in about half an hour,” I said. “But if you’ll have time later this afternoon…?”

  He nodded. “I’ve got my own classes too, but I’ll be free from five onward. Meet me at the aide office then? It’s right at the start of the hall by the professors’ quarters.”

  “Okay.” There, we had a plan. For everything except how to get him out of my dorm room unnoticed. I tipped my head toward the door. “They’re still out there?”

  “Yeah. If they don’t get going soon, there are a few tricks I can try. We just have to be careful with Victory, since she’s pretty sharp… as I guess you’ve noticed.”

  “Kind of hard not to.”

  He motioned toward the book on the bed. “If you want to get back to your reading or whatever, don’t let me stop you. You didn’t ask to play host. Feel free to pretend I’m not here.”

  I definitely didn’t want to be on my bed with Declan Ashgrave just a few feet away. “I’m fine right here,” I said. “We don’t exactly have the best track record with tight spaces.”

  A shadow crossed his face, and his gaze twitched away from me for a second. His jaw worked. “I’m sorry,” he said. “For what happened in the library—I handled it badly.”

  Understatement of the century. But the fact that he’d apologized—and looked legitimately pained about it—softened me a little.

  “Is that a big problem of yours?” I said, more wryly than I might have otherwise. “Preventing yourself from kissing your students?”

  Declan gave me a narrow look, but a faint flush crept over his cheeks at the same time. He hesitated for long enough that I started to think the glower was the only answer I was going to get.

  “No,” he said quietly. “Only with the ones I’m strongly attracted to. Or rather, the one.”

  Heat flared beneath my skin at that remark. I fumbled for my tongue. “Well, um, I’m sorry for existing in your general vicinity, then?”

  “No apologies necessary.” He exhaled in a rush. “Just to be clear, I’m not saying that as a come-on. It’s not going to happen again. I just don’t want you to think I go around leching on every girl I see.”

  “Just me.”

  “Rory. I can control myself. I’m generally very good at it. That was… a particularly unfortunate combination of circumstances. I promise you, it was the first and last time.”

  Remembering the kiss, the demanding passion he’d somehow hidden behind that strict and often cold exterior, part of me couldn’t help thinking that was kind of a shame. Which was maybe why my mouth kept talking without bothering to consult my brain.

  “So… if you weren’t a teacher’s aide, then this wouldn’t be a problem at all? You’d—I don’t know—ask me out or something?”

  He laughed, but there wasn’t any humor in the sound. “No, the circumstances are never going to be good, with the positions we’re in.” He paused at my quizzical look. “Has no one explained about the pentacle inheritances yet?”

  “I know there’s a pentacle of barons and of scions,” I said. “The five ruling families—I think that’s how Ms. Grimsworth put it. And the authority is passed on from parents to kids. I don’t think anyone’s mentioned more than that. Why? Are the f
amilies not supposed to mix?” Connar hadn’t seemed worried about that, but then, as far as I could tell, he’d simply been stringing me along until he got what he wanted.

  “There aren’t any rules along those lines. But you can’t be part of two families at once, and you’re the only living Bloodstone. Whoever you end up marrying, they’ll have to be a Bloodstone too. If you partner with another scion, they’d be giving up their barony.”

  “Oh.” That possibility definitely hadn’t occurred to me. “Then what happens to that barony?”

  “It’d go to the next blood relative, assuming there is one,” Declan said. “But I don’t have any plans to throw away my position. I’ve spent my whole life working to make sure I can take it in the first place.”

  Well, that made sense. I wasn’t sure what to say to that, though.

  Before I could decide on an appropriate response, Declan’s head twitched toward the door. “They’re heading out,” he said. “I’ll give them a minute to go down the stairs, and then I’ll get out of your hair.”

  Now that he’d actually been talking to me like a human being, I didn’t completely want him to go, regardless of the circumstances. I’d see him in a few hours for our tutoring session, of course. But the thought of Connar had stirred up too many little knives of emotion for me to ignore.

  “I get that the favoritism, and rules, and circumstances, and all that are important to you,” I said with a vague gesture. “But—can you pick how you’re going to act with me and just stick with that, no matter who’s around? Because I would really prefer not to deal with being jerked around between friendly and asshole any more than I already have been, if that’s all right with you.”

  My voice might have gotten a little raw. Declan considered me. “You’re not just talking about me.”

  “I—”

  His expression tightened. “Did Malcolm—”

  “No,” I said quickly. “No, Malcolm has been an asshole the whole way through.”

  Declan hadn’t stopped studying me. With a jolt of panic, I concentrated on the steel shell around my mind I’d pictured before, however useful that amateur shield would be against a guy who’d specialized in Insight for years. “I’d also appreciate it if you didn’t go magically poking around inside my head.”

  He blinked. “I’m not. I was just thinking back. When Connar tore into you the other day… you looked shocked.”

  Fuck. “I’d really rather not talk about it.”

  “Okay,” Declan said, even though his expression was still puzzled. Given the alternately stern and ferocious demeanor his friend had shown any time I’d seen them together, it probably would surprise him to think Connar and I had somehow found common ground, even if it hadn’t lasted. “I’ll do my best to be predictable. We’re still on for five?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  He dipped his head to me and waved his hand, I assumed to bring down the sound barrier he’d conjured. “I’ll see you then.”

  It was only after he’d ducked out that the other implications of his confusion sank in.

  He hadn’t known that anything had happened between Connar and me. Which meant Connar hadn’t told the other scions. Why not, if he’d only buttered me up so he could get his rocks off and then taunt me afterward? Shouldn’t he have been celebrating how he’d landed that blow?

  And if his betrayal hadn’t been part of their whole scheme to knock me down, why the hell had he done it?

  Chapter Five

  Rory

  We were all getting up to head out of my second Illusion seminar of the week when the door shifted. In the space of a second, the wooden surface twisted into a gigantic demonic face, gnashing its teeth at the nearest students, who stumbled backward.

  The demon let out a harsh cackle that set my nerves jangling and then was absorbed back into the door. A guy at the back of the class—Alex? Alan? I had a lot of names to pick up—chuckled and gave a bow.

  “Very nice detail and combination of visual and auditory components, Mr. Rutland,” Professor Burnbuck said in a dry voice. “Credit to Illusion.”

  And a nice jolt of fear for the caster too.

  I hurried on out with the rest of the class, but somehow Alex-or-Alan Rutland caught up with me, sauntering down the tower stairs with a smile that could only be described as self-satisfied.

  “I think that was my best work yet,” he said.

  I glanced around. As far as I could tell, he was talking to me, even though we’d never spoken before. “Ah,” I said, with as clear a lack of enthusiasm as I could pack into one syllable. What did he want from me?

  “I’m strong in Physicality too—it makes for a pretty potent combination. While you’re getting the hang of things around here, I’d be happy to give you a few pointers.”

  If this had been my regular college back in California, populated by regular people who didn’t make a living out of terrorizing everyone around them, I wouldn’t have blinked at the offer. But I was at Bloodstone University, accurately nicknamed Villain Academy by the mages who didn’t attend it, and this was the first time in a month anyone had volunteered a helping hand, unless you counted Malcolm’s initial posturing offer of friendship.

  There was not looking a gift horse in the mouth, and then there was not being a total idiot.

  “Thanks,” I said mildly. “I think I’m picking things up okay, though.”

  “Maybe I could treat you to a night on the town then,” the guy said as we stepped out into the cool morning air. The day had started out damp and dreary and was continuing in the same direction. “And not that dinky town down the road. Much better nightlife if we take an hour’s drive in my Jag.” He slung his hands in his pockets, putting on a casual stance even as he purposefully flexed his arms.

  Oh. Oh. Was he flirting with me?

  I had to catch myself before a laugh sputtered out of me. This guy clearly hadn’t paid much attention to me if he thought the promise of nightlife and a fancy car was the way to my heart. Why the hell was he even—

  Declan’s explanation about the fearmancer laws of inheritance came back to me. Whoever you end up marrying, they’ll have to be a Bloodstone too. Although the way these people jockeyed for power, to anyone not already a scion, that “have to” was probably more like “gleefully get to.”

  My affections were a ticket straight to the ranks of the barons.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said.

  “You won’t know until you give it a shot, will you? I promise I’ll show you a good time.”

  I stopped and spun on the guy. “What do you know about me other than my name and the fact that I was assessed with all four strengths?”

  He just stared at me for a second with his mouth half-open. Yeah, obviously nothing, because those two facts were all that mattered to him.

  “You don’t get along well with Malcolm Nightwood,” he ventured after way too long a pause.

  I restrained a snort. That fact was almost as obvious as the other two. “I don’t think I’m going to get along very well with you either, all right?” I said. An instinct took over to step a little closer, to draw myself up straighter, as I let steel lace my voice. “I’m not here to be your stepping stone, and I don’t think you want to find out what’ll happen if you try.”

  A wave of fear raced from him into my chest. He backed up, his eyes narrowing. “Message received,” he snapped, but he hightailed it out of there so fast you’d have thought I’d sent a demon charging after him.

  The rush of power I’d felt in that moment faded with a queasy twist in my stomach. I hadn’t needed to be that harsh with him.

  Making him scared shouldn’t have felt that good.

  I was built to enjoy it. Built to seek out every opportunity to absorb people’s fear. That didn’t mean I had to give in to those impulses, though. I’d just keep a closer rein on myself the next time I got frustrated.

  And maybe I’d be less inclined toward those impulses if I made sure
I had plenty of magical energy already stockpiled.

  Instead of heading to the library like I’d planned, I set off across the field toward the forest that surrounded most of the campus. Making the local wildlife nervous with my comings and goings was an easy way to top up my supply of fear without being a jerk to anyone.

  The air in the woods clung even more damply to my skin, but as soon as the trees closed around me, I reveled in the relative silence and solitude. No one watching me, evaluating me, deciding how they could use me or hurt me. Even in my bedroom, it was hard to feel completely alone with just that thin door between me and the common area.

  A little melancholy crept in with the peace. The northern atmosphere might not match the one I’d grown up with, but it was hard not to remember the walks I’d taken with my parents on our periodic trips to this or that state park: Mom snapping photos, Dad chatting it up with other hikers we passed, me pulling out my sketch pad whenever we paused to make a quick pencil study of this flower or that interesting tree.

  Never again.

  That knowledge squeezed around my throat. I walked faster to outpace my grief as well as I could. It wasn’t going to help me in this place.

  I rambled through the brush until the uneven ground started to make my calves ache and a multitude of tiny quivers had filled the space behind my collarbone. As I turned back toward campus, a heavier crunch of a fallen branch froze me in my tracks.

  A figure was picking his way through the trees toward me. It only took a moment for his coppery hair to stand out amid the vivid spring greenery.

  Jude cocked his head as he reached me. “I thought I saw someone from the path. There is a path, you know.”

  “Sometimes I like to make my own,” I said, my posture rigid.

  He laughed, but it didn’t sound as mocking as usual. “Fair.”

  “Well, now you know it’s me. I’ll be on my way.”