Page 9 of Shattered Darkness

They’re talking about us.

“I have it under control,” he replies firmly.

“Do you though, we heard that the assassin you like to use is not operating anymore,” a man sneers.

Magistrate Godfrey’s voice snaps out, and along with it, some dark sludge like magic that makes me want to recoil. It’s not natural, and it’s evil. It strikes the person who questioned him in the throat, slitting it open and making him clutch at it uselessly before he drops to the floor, spasms once and then dies. I expect there to be an outroar, but it's quite the opposite; everyone looks terrified but does nothing, and I begin to think that this man is someone high up in the Order.

“I have it under control, they won’t be an issue for much longer. The teachers are doing as they should,” he repeats calmly like he didn’t just end someone’s life.

“Very well,” the woman who asked first replies and then adds somewhat cautiously, “if I may, I know that some of those teachers are fiercely against anything to do with the Order of Kronos, so how have you got them to be compliant?”

I have never heard of the Order being referred to as that before, but a memory ping from a class back before all of this, from when I was human and alone. I am reasonably confident that he was a God, but I need to do some more research to be sure.

“Simple, my dear,” he replies smarmily, making all three of us grimace in disgust, “they don’t have a choice.”

Well, at least we know that they didn’t all suddenly turn into assholes, that’s a bonus. Before we can hear anything else, someone trips and bounces off the shield that Erin has around.

“Fuck,” I curse.

“There’s something there,” the person exclaims, as he points in our direction.

We all move as one, sticking close to the wall as we try to escape the reaching hands, someone manages to find the edge of the shield again and then we find ourselves under a barrage of magic.

“Are you okay?” I ask Erin worriedly as we make it to the entrance, magic still bouncing off the shield.

“I’m not going to be able to hold it for much longer, they’re throwing too much at me, and I’ve already held it up for ages. It’s draining my magic too quickly,” she replies through gritted teeth.

“Cole, grab Erin’s hand and focus on lending her some of your magic, not all of it, just enough to strengthen her, and I’ll do the same. If her shield fails, we’re in big trouble. We may not be able to see their faces, but something tells me that they’ll be able to see ours.” I order, and Cole immediately does what I say.

I do the same, focusing on my magic and steadily feeding her a small amount. Almost instantly, her shoulders drop, and you can see the relief cross her features as our magic strengthens her. We’re still running under a barrage of attacks from the Order.

“How are we going to escape?” Cole yells over the sounds of the shouting and exploding magic; they may not be able to hear us, but we can certainly hear them for obvious reasons. We would be pretty shit spies if we couldn’t hear anything. Although we have been caught so, we’re not exactly great spies as it is. Thankfully, as soon as they started shooting magic at us, Erin expanded the shield outwards so now it's like a dome and having the blasts further away from us is definitely more comforting. The issue is that Erin’s shield is rebounding the explosions of magic, and it's not just the magic that’s exploding but the tunnel and some of the people too. I have to assume that these people aren’t that fucking bright because, they keep fucking shooting magic blasts and, in a minute, the whole fucking tunnel is going to come down on top of us.

“Sage!” Erin exclaims, pulling me from my thoughts and stopping me from tripping over a fallen brick.

“Thanks,” I reply as we rush forward. They’re gaining on us, and I share a scared and anxious look with them both.

“Sage, we don’t even know where we are if we ever do make it out of the tunnel. What the fuck are we going to do?” Cole says, an edge of panic threading through his tone.

I don’t know what to tell him. The problem is, I don’t fucking know. There are no pings of intuition, and the Goddess isn’t talking to me; Cole isn’t the only one panicking; I am too. As we round a corner, I can just make out a dead end up ahead, fuck.

There’s only one thing for it.

“Nyx!” I yell, “A little help please, I have no idea how to get out of this one!”

“Anything?” Cole says, as we rapidly approach the wall.

I shake my head, “Nope. Nyx, please?”

“Jump!” the Goddess suddenly shouts, and without any hesitation, we all jump.

We land in a heap on the floor, in the front room of my dorm and all of us stay down, dazed and unsure of what the fuck just happened.

“Where the fuck have you been!?” Jett asks, the panic evident in his voice.

I pop my head up off the floor and look around, sure enough, we’re surrounded by all of our men, and they all look worried. Which is understandable; we’ve been missing in action, and they couldn’t even get hold of us through the Bond Lines. I'm actually surprised that the academy is still standing.

“I am so fucking glad to see you,” I say as Levi picks me up of the floor, his head immediately goes to my neck as he takes a deep inhale.

---