Page 87 of Gemini Wicked

“What the fuck?” No one lobs the F bomb like my Zara. “Lu—uh, Master Aries, why is that Fae suddenly standing in our history class?

Lucius is a stickler for old-fashioned courtesy, which is what happens when you are strictly raised in a gloomy old castle with a gruesome history by an aristocratic Hungarian grandsire.

Now my headmaster’s brow furrows in a repressive frown. “I should think it quite obvious—”

“I was invited.” The Unseelie’s smooth voice ripples like water running over rock. “To deliver the capstone lecture for your Faerie history lesson. The Discord is where your history books begin. But our noble race is far older than that.”

By now this creature has prowled right into our classroom like the predator he is. His otherworldly scent of burnt amber twines through the dusty classroom smells of chalk and parchment like a magical miasma.

If my enemy dares to come anywhere near my breeding queen, I swear I will lunge for his throat.

Instead he flows toward the blackboard with that uncanny liquid grace, feet soundless as mist on our creaking floorboards, hair spilling like ivy down his straight back.

Deftly Zephyr captures a stick of chalk and writes in a flowing hand that is like calligraphy.

Prejudice. Jealousy. Greed.

The entire class, even those bullies from Villa Tiberius, is riveted.

“This is where our tale rightly begins. With the whole world’s hatred.” Zephyr pivots smoothly on his heel, hair swirling around his shoulders. He spurns Lucius’ podium and hops lightly to sit on Lucius’ desk instead, legs folding over each other like a lotus, fingers tenting under his narrow jaw.

My classmates stare at him. Clearly, they are enraptured.

The fools.

Aware of Lucius’ irate frown at my threatening stance, I subside warily back to my seat.

“We Fae were here first,” Zephyr murmurs, so softly we all lean forward to hear, “dwelling in harmony with nature and the childlike mortals who worshipped us. The other arcane races… your honored ancestors of ever-so-sainted memory… they came later.”

His tone turns cruel and his face turns mocking.

“Your ancestors despised and envied mine,” he hisses. “They distrusted our differences and they feared our power. So they set out to slaughter us down to the last babe. They drove us into hiding and stole our ancestral homes and profaned our sacred spaces with their churches and the stink of incense. Just as upstart peoples have always slaughtered and stolen from those they deem to be lesser. The embattled Fae fought to protect their lives, their homes, their children. That is the truth of the Discord you will never read in your histories.”

As he settles into his story, he loosens his tie with an impatient tug. Truly, I cannot imagine where he has found that clothing. Or how he has even managed to arrange his tie, which is very unlike anything in his homeland, in that confident twist.

But I darkly suspect Neo (who is supposed to be in Honors Alchemy this period).

My Neo has always harbored a soft spot in his tender heart for this deceptive and terrible creature.

“As our sacred spaces diminished and our numbers dwindled,” the creature says, “the Seelie and Unseelie cast blame upon each other. They began to squabble among themselves over the scraps. Those squabbles led to bloodshed and then—inevitably—to a bitter and brutal civil war. Fae against Fae. The Dark against the Light. In the end, my people—the Unseelie—withdrew from the mortal world entirely. They passed through the portal into Avalon where they would be safe.”

His ruthless mouth twists in a mocking grin. “Or so they imagined.”

Ronin utters a rude snort they can surely hear in the hallway. “Skipped over a bit there, haven’t you, mate? You glossed over that ghastly bit where your Unseelie ancestors sacrificed a thousand of your Seelie kin to open the portal.”

The class sucks in a collective breath of horror.

“A footnote to the text.” The Fae’s shoulder flexes in a shrug. “If you expect me to deny it, by the moon, I will not. Unlike the flotsam and scrum of your arcane races, the Fae alone cannot lie.” His sleek ribbon of voice goes thin. “I never claimed we were nice, Ronin.”

“Too right.” Ronin pushes back in his chair and scowls.

“Let’s return to the lesson, shall we?” Lucius is leaning against the podium, watching his guest lecture with a degree of fascination I find concerning. “What of the Light Fae who survived the, ah, incident? What became of them?”

“Well.” Zephyr presses the tips of his tented fingers to his lips. “The Seelie survivors remained here, of course, while the Unseelie vanished into the depths of our secret world for our thousand-year Exile. Traumatized by their ordeal, the Seelie chose to conceal their origins. They wove a powerful glamor to disguise their most distinctive feature—their wings. The better to hide among the common folk, yes?”

His gaze drifts across the scatter of curious and (in my case) hostile faces. His stare pauses on Ronin, who is seething in a silent fury, then on Zara whose face I cannot see (but whose blend of annoyance and fascination pulses through our mating bond with an intensity that is very alarming). Then Zephyr pauses on Mallory, who is unremarkable in all ways except for her commendable loyalty to Zara.

At last, his glacial gaze finds my bristling frame and narrows.

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