Page 14 of A Haven of Brimstone and Darkness

Sometime later, the Terra stops and turns to face us at the end of a short hall. "Males to the left," he announces, gesturing with his lit staff to a row of doors to one side of a hallway, then he immediately switches to the doors on the opposite side. "Females to the right." Cold eyes land on Niall where he stands slightly behind Maeryn. "The Terra may follow me to the servants' rooms."

My brow puckers, but I bite my tongue against requesting Niall to stay here with us. No doubt the Terra will run back to the Divine Beings and those strange Mortal Gods with the information. Maeryn, too, doesn't look happy, but she doesn't say anything as Niall glances over at us and then moves to trail behind the dead-voiced servant as they go back the way we'd come.

Peering up one side of the corridor and then down the other, I frown and cross to the corner wall to peek around and into the next hall. There are more doors on either side, but no one between. An eerie silence echoes back at me. It’s unnerving,almost as if we've entered a different world—one that swallows sound and turns its inhabitants into ghosts. Quickly returning to the others, I find Maeryn with her back pressed into a door and two of the five bedroom doors open to reveal large interiors with beds, wardrobes, and windows.

"In here," Ruen orders, tucking his head towards one of the open doorways on their side of the corridor.

We file inside, even Maeryn, though she maintains a careful distance from the Darkhavens as she strides across the room to a single chair against the wall and plops down into it. In turn, I move towards the window, frowning as I notice the grime and dust coating its surface. Running one fingertip down the pane of glass, it comes away brown.

"This is certainly different than Riviere," I murmur absently, rubbing away the dirt onto my trousers before pivoting to face the room.

It’s beautifully decorated with arching walls and ornate frames reflecting large flowery painted images in great depictions of sea monsters and castles. The cloak of ill use and neglect, however, hangs heavy over what might have been a luxurious chamber.

"Something's not right about this place," Ruen agrees, crossing his arms as Theos is the last to step inside the room and close the door behind him. "Surely the Academies are not this different."

"That’s because this isn't an Academy," Kalix replies as he strides across the room to my side. He takes a seat in front of the window, stretching out on the settee in front of it, propping his legs up on one end and reclining back on the other.

"What do you mean?" I ask, frowning at him.

He gestures to his lap. "Sit on my cock and I'll tell you." He grins.

Maeryn makes a noise of disgust in her throat as I give him a definitive ‘no.’ Kalix's green eyes flash red for a brief moment as he passes her a deadly look. Just as quickly, though, the red shimmer disappears and his features smooth out as he returns his gaze to me.

"My lap then," he insists.

"No." I grind my teeth as I repeat the word. “This isn't a playground, Kalix. What do you mean this isn't an Academy?"

He groans.

"Kalix." Ruen's tone is a warning.

Kalix snorts in response. "It's fucking obvious," he says. "This place isn't a school." He fixes me with his impenetrable gaze. "It's a prison."

Chapter 7

Kiera

Hours later, when the day has waned and night has fallen outside the windows, Kalix's words still echo in my head. Bidding everyone goodnight, I leave the Darkhavens in their new chambers and head across the hall to the door alongside Maeryn's. I pause, looking back to the floor and checking my pockets before I reach my door, not finding my Spider Queen. With a sigh, I realize Ara has snuck off again.

It's common for spiders to exude curiosity alongside caution, but in this new Academy, I’m not so comfortable with her wandering. She knew Riviere well, was born and raised there—or so I’d guessed from the memories she’d shared with me in the past. Ortus is nothing like Riviere and had I realized sooner that she’d snuck along for the ride by burrowing into one of my trouser pockets, I might have left her behind.

I stare into the empty eyes of the brass animal knocker on the outside of my door with a frown. I’ve seen a multitude of wild animals from boar to spotted cats ten times the size of the tame street felines in various cities on the continent. I don’t recognize the animal the knocker on my door is fashioned from. Twin dagger-like canines jut out and down from an oddly shaped face, almost like that of an octopus—one of the few animals I’d onlyever seen in books. Slitted eyes stare back at me, unblinking, and I’m left wanting to tear the damn thing off the face of the wood and cast it down the long dark corridor.

With a sigh, I twist the handle and enter the room behind. Darkness seeps from the corners of the chamber, keeping the majority of its contents in shadow. What I can see, however, tells me it’s similar to the Darkhavens’ rooms. Large and square with ornate furniture, but smelling of must and decay.

A lone window, wide enough for a body to fit through, but not so wide that it allows in much moonlight rests across the way. An iron frame juts up through the middle of the glass pane with a latch to open it centered unevenly lower than I know it should be. The muted light through the glass is the only illumination that reveals the rest of the pathetic corrosion of what might have once been a beautiful room.

Then again, I have slept in worse places.

The reminder that I was not always here—under the thumb of the Gods as their offspring and their hostage—almost makes me think of my life as an assassin as something out of a storybook.

In just a few short months, my entire life has altered and so have I.

Eyes burning and nose twitching at the dust that coats the furniture as well as the rest of the room, I walk across the stone floor until I come to the bedside. A fairly sizable piece, the bed has two stands on either side of its expanse. Twin candelabras along with matchsticks rest on the scarred wooden surfaces. Striking one, I light the series of candles on the larger of the two realizing that they might possibly be the only things in this place not covered in a thin layer of grit and grime.

Frowning, I lift the candelabra and turn in a circle, surveying the rest of the room.

It's not a school ... it’s a prison.Leave it to Kalix to point out something so terrifyingly obvious.

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