Page 95 of Caelum

Swallowing the nerves that had been with me since my conversation with Damon, I kept my gaze up, uncaring that the sky was so blue it made my eyes water. I stared for so long and so hard that I almost missed the plane when it appeared in the near distance.

Rushing out of the common room where I’d been waiting, I headed past a few clusters of people who’d been studiously ignoring me since the boys had left. I was so close to the doorway that I didn’t take note of my surroundings.

Of course, there was no taking note when that leg definitely hadn’t been in my way until now.

I went flying, headfirst, over the guy who’d kicked out his calf to trip me. When I landed on my knees, I tipped forward, my hands scraping on the rug as I came to a halt.

There was dead silence for a handful of seconds, and then, there was anything but.

The laughter had my palms burning as hotly as my cheeks, and I lay there for a good five seconds, just processing what had happened. Processing what was going on deep inside.

My heart was thumping in my chest. Both from shock and from anger, and though I wished it weren’t my Hell Hound’s day, I knew that beast was the difference between me running out of this room in tears and getting my own back.

Before I could get a handle on my emotions, I felt the Hell Hound lunge to the surface. It had me rolling up onto my knees then getting to my feet.

I stared down at the smirking boy, wondering what had changed. Whythe students had gone from ignoring me to trying to intimidate me in one fell swoop.

But even as I questioned it, the beast didn’t. It was there, burning away deep inside me, and when I reached for the boy, someone whose name I didn’t even damn well know, I could tell he was surprised.

He’d expected me to run.

To flee.

Like a coward.

But he was the coward.

Or he would be soon.

My hand snapped out and I grabbed him by the throat. My Hell Hound was there, strengthening me even as the people around him began squealing and shrieking as he clawed at my hands, trying to escape me.

I was weak in so many ways. Terrible in the gym. Useless when it came to fighting. Yet the souls that were going to be my downfall possessed a strength I felt certain was unusual.

Maybe it was because there were eight of them. Seven of which I knew from the boys’ descriptions, the eighth that was still lingering there, undeclared, hidden away, and only coming out at the mention of a few simple words…

Maybe it was that particular soul, though, that tipped the scales in my favor.

I didn’t know, probably never would, but at that moment, I was grateful. So grateful for the oddities in my nature that let me lift the guy off the couch by his throat. That enabled me to be strong when I could have been weak.

“I’m not a violent person,” I rasped, my voice deeper than usual, telling anyone within hearing range that my soul was in charge. “You ever do anything like that to me again, and I’ll tear your head off and make a mockery of what I just said. Do you understand me?”

His navy blue eyes blinked at me, wet from tears he was too big to let fall—shame he hadn’t been thatbigwhen he’d resorted to tripping me—his cheeks burnished with red even as his skin grew pale from lack of oxygen.

All around me, people had gathered, and I knew one of the guys, or several, were about to get involved, were going to save the kid who’d just tried to humiliate me.

In my periphery, I saw the glass coffee table. It was low to the ground, a flat piece of glass suspended in a frame.

Putting pressure behind the move, I hovered him above it and rammed him down into it so his feet slid around on the shattered glass. His cry ofpain was music to the Hell Hound’s ears as his bare feet were torn on the shards as he danced and tried to maneuver off the glass.

“Do you understand me?” I rasped, my eyes on him, my focus branding him until he stopped squealing and his gaze was back on me.

“Y-Yes.”

My top lip curled. “Good.”

I didn’t care about the whispers that appeared as I headed out the door. Didn’t care about the shock I left in my wake. My Hell Hound was furious enough that I didn’t even care that I’d hurt the guy.

Me.

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