Page 102 of Wicked Heirs

More chuckling ensued, and then we reached the counter and grabbed the food I wanted. Orpheus went straight for dessert in the form of the crumble, and Talon piled his plate high with all the fruits on offer, along with a BLT sandwich. Xavier, who I’d come to know pretty much ate everything, piled as much as he could onto his plate. I went for the crumble too because it satisfied my sweet tooth, but when I was about to grab a couple of slices of pizza, I pulled up short.

“What’s wrong?” Orpheus asked, noticing me screwing up my face.

“Nothing, I just hate mushrooms.”

“How come?” Xavier asked.

“Like slugs, right?” Talon said.

“Yes, how did you know?”

He laughed. “I’m not a fan myself.”

“Cover me, Ore,” Xavier said, and in the next moment, Orpheus threw up a small glamour to cover Xavier asheused his blue sparks to remove the mushrooms from the pizza and any trace of them.

“We’re not supposed to use our magic on the food,” Talon whispered to me, letting me know why they needed to cover it up.

“Thank you,” I told Orpheus and Xavier as they each placed a mushroom-free slice onto my tray.

“Of course,” Orpheus said, smiling at me sweetly.

Sweetly?What was going on?

Xavier lifted our joined hands and planted a kiss on my knuckles.

Then we all gathered our food and headed outside to the quad to a bench underneath an overhanging willow tree.

I took a seat and before Xavier could join me on the same side, Orpheus smoothly maneuvered himself beside me, leaving Xavier to take a seat opposite me and Talon opposite Orpheus.

Xavier gave him a withering look to which Orpheus merely smirked.

And that was it for the animosity.

They both managed to let it go as we all dug into our food.

Despite the strangeness of the four of us sitting down together and breaking bread, with the way things had played out, it was actually really nice.

Comfortable.

Interesting.

Pleasant.

And fun.

The three of them actually had me laughing as they told me about a mishap involving Talon’s phoenix fire when he’d first come to Electi Academy wherein he’d burned off his eyebrows and all his hair and even taken out a couple of the turrets on the top of the main building. Xavier had tried to intervene but he’d been so unsure of his magic back then that it had ended up backfiring and making the flames rage all the wilder. As they’d singed his favorite denim jacket and been on their way to melting through his t-shirt too, Orpheus had shown up and thrown up a shield.

“So that’s how the three of you first became friends,” I mused.

They nodded along.

“It’s also how we bonded with Cornwell,” Talon said between munching on a nectarine.

I cocked an eyebrow. “Professor Callum Cornwell?”

“Yup,” he confirmed.

I eyed Xavier and Orpheus who looked a bit uneasy now that his name had come up.

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