Page 66 of Brutal Birthright

Oriana swiped a bright red swathe of blood from her cheek. Looking like a battle-hardened Goddess, wearing the evidence of where her face had slammed into the ground two rounds prior.

Etienne smirked back with blood-stained fangs from where she’d landed a knee to his face. The crunch that had rung out around the arena had been particularly satisfying.

Students surrounded them on all sides, baying for blood.

Rowan hung back slightly, as usual, but he could see and hear everything from here.

“Fuck him up!” The little sprite, Brynne, shouted over the cheers where the ring of their classmates watched on.

The two were the last remaining pair to complete their sparring round for today’s class.

Brynne wore the wide grin and busted lip of victory from her rounds against the shifter girl, Vanya. She’d taken down the blonde pain in the ass and had every right to be on a high after an emphatic, scrappy as fuck win.

He’d be glad to never see any of these students again, except for the little fae.

The shifter girl had backed off in the past week, thank the fucking ancestors. There was only so much more of her getting in his face at every turn, with bullshit questions and thinly veiled excuses to try and get him alone before he might have had to take steps to officially reprimand her.

Although Vanya had certainly seemed more reserved since Saskia’s death, there was something haunted in her eyes. Rowan recognised that look immediately, and more than once he’d seen her twin brother Glade pull her off somewhere to talk privately.

He didn’t seem to be faring too well either these days.

Rowan suspected the wolf had been hit hard by the death of the girl, although he wasn’t sure if there had been anything more than a passing friendship between the two of them. He was sure he’d seen them getting close the night of the solstice, but then again, he hadn’t been paying much attention to anything beyond a certain silver-clad, drunken faerie.

But right now, there was no time for lingering on unanswered questions because his hands were fisting the handles of his swords. Etienne rushed her, and she narrowly missed being hit by his shoulder. Instead, glancing off to one side, she hit and spun, using his weight against him.

Just like Rowan had taught her to do.

Fuck, that made his dick stand to attention.

The brash little fae whom he was equally furious and obsessed with.

Where she should be screaming at his stupid face or sticking him with a blade for disappearing without a trace… instead she was listening and learning from him.

Which was evident in the way she managed to pin Etienne to the floor, straddling his torso with the dickhead’s bulk beneath her.

Rowan barely fought back the urge to launch himself in there and rip her off him.

She needs this. It’s for the Astrals.

Sucking in a deep breath through his nose, he shifted his weight.

With her chest heaving, the girl winked at the vampire. “You look rather pretty on your back, bloodsucker.”

At least that earned her an indignant growl. He slapped her thighs to move her off just as Finnic called out the strike.

Rowan imagined snapping each of those fingers clean off, one by one, and setting them on fire.

Finnic called the strikes coming from each of the next rounds. With agitation and blind fury growing like a wild thing inside Rowan’s chest as their sparring seemed to linger on and on and fucking on. He was glued to the spot, unable to look away. At the sight of every place the vampire touched her all over her body, it was like another iron being added to the fire. Glowing white-hot and ready to cause destruction.

Finally, when Rowan thought he couldn’t take another second of watching their sweaty bodies slam against one another, the final strike was called out. Finnic grinned maniacally. The students erupted into a frenzy. Oriana wore the brightest smile he’d ever seen… and she radiated with pleasure.

Her ecstasy of victory was a palpable, rippling thing.

And all he could do was stand there silently plotting all the ways he might discreetly murder the vampire in his sleep.

She swung her gaze around, clearly looking for him among the crowd. But as their eyes locked for the briefest second, he saw her brow crease, taking in his appearance. He knew he looked like a vengeful black cloud and didn’t fucking care.

A better man would try to disguise this ugly, bleak sensation crackling and hissing in the air around him.

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