Page 36 of First Ritual

“That Wild has mentioned all this to you already, and you’re trying to downplay the situation while fishing for information.”

Sven regarded me.

I regarded him right fucking back.

“When is your affinity test?” he asked.

Subject change. “A few weeks. I’m asking for a transfer, though, so I may not do it here.”

“Hmm.”

Hmm, what?

“Sven.” A cold voice cut through the space so hard I wouldn’t have been surprised to see slices in the rock by my head.

The large magus didn’t move away from me other than to look at the person who’d joined us.

“Wild,” Sven answered.

I closed my eyes and thumped my head back on the tunnel wall a few times. How many times a day was I going to see this guy?

“What’s going on?” Wild said in the same cold, hard voice.

Opening my eyes, I looked at him and blinked at the stark difference between this version to the magus I’d encountered outside at dawn.

Chaos. Plain and simple. How could Sven not see?

Sven straightened away from me. “Just walking Tempest to apothecary. I’m going, too, I’ve decided. Can never know too much about other affinities.”

Sven was coming to apothecary when he didn’t have an apothecary affinity?

Wild glanced between us, breathing as though he’d climbed ten flights of stairs. Maybe a bit of asthma with the chaos affliction.

“I can make it there myself,” I said, slipping from between Sven and the tunnel wall.

The large magus stopped me, splaying a massive hand across my stomach to do so. “We’ll go together. As one.”

My brows shot up. “The fu—"

A growl filled the tunnel, and I jumped as a blur filled my vision.

Wild had moved to clamp a hand around Sven’s wrist. Still growling, Wild removed his friend’s hand from my stomach.

I’d barely seen him move, but that sound. That growl made my heart hammer.

“Wild,” Sven said sharply.

The growling cut off, and Wild exchanged a long look with his friend.

I shook my head. “Sven, I meant what I said before. Be a good friend and check things out.” Wild was embracing chaos in a way I never had. Then again, chaos hit all of us in different ways.

I may be a Corentine, but I just couldn’t afford to get sucked into Wild’s storm.

10

“So.” My cousin set her food tray on the crystal table and plonked herself down. “You slept with Wild until midnight, then Sven until morning.”

I swallowed my mouthful of orange and watercress salad. “Quite the night. Is this the rumor mill?”

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