Page 99 of Her Rabid Beasts

Metal and wood let out a tired groan before a crack on the side of the mantelpiece appears and I pull it open and rush down the cold stone stairs.

Emerging in my room, I don’t bother changing or cleaning up. But I do need to delay a minute to empty my bladder with happy relief. After that, I hurry right out of my dorm and straight outside.

It’s after dark, no doubt I missed dinner, but now I feel physicallyenergised, like I could run a whole marathon and not be tired. Rage does that to a person. So does fear.

Lyle and I need to have sex more. Not ‘never again’.

Right now, my heart pumps for Minnie… and Yuran’s sadistic voice in my head. Minnie hasalreadybeen attacked once when I was weak, and even though I’ve redirected any psychic attack to myself, my father knows Minnie’s special to me and there are many wounds not so easily fixed by an avian’s healing magic. I can’t rest until I see she’s okay with my own eyes.

I duck in to check the dining hall and don’t see her pink curls anywhere, so I move on to the animus dorm. She’s always with that bastard Titus after class these days, so that’s where she must be.

I rush down the paved path to the dorms, my bare feet pelting on the bare concrete until I skid to a stop at the towering animus dorms.

“My lady!” Bastian the gargoyle calls, waving his stick fingers at me.

“I’m in a hurry. Can you please let me in?”

“Any anima may be allowed in the animus dorms, my lady. However, I cannot guarantee an unmolested exit. It’s rather rowdy in there tonight, are you sure?—”

“Yes! Yes, please!”

“Very well.” He sweeps his hand as both doors dramatically swing open and I rush in. There are males milling about everywhere. Five of them are playing cards in the ground floor foyer.

“I need to find Titus!” I blurt at them. “Where is he?”

A feline with perfectly coifed hair to rival Elvis scoffs, “Why are all the animas after him? You need someone more refined, Aurelia birdy.”

The fact that he knows my name and I don’t know his is unnerving, but there’s so few of us animas that the males know all of us whether we like it or not.

“Just tell me where he is,” I demand.

They look me up and down and I’m suddenly aware that I’m not actually wearing any shoes, only the blood-stained mini dress and probably a dishevelled bed-head. I swear under my breath at my hastiness, but there’s no point in going back now.

“He’s got company,” one of the wolves drawls. “Try someone else. We’re all available.”

“I don’t want to seehim,” I cry out. “I’m looking for Minnie.”

The felines make grumpy faces before one of them says, “Second floor, third door on the right.”

Without thanks, I jog up the stairs to the second floor. There are felines and birds of prey on this level, and there’s a moment of silence before I’m called out by name.

“Hey, Flight Risk, come into my room!” someone shouts.

Urgh, not that name again.

But I ignore the stares and hollers and count down three doors on the right with a pointed finger. I form a fist to get ready to knock, but find it already open.

Titus is starkers, sitting on a bed while an also naked anima bounces up and down on his cock. She cries out with exaggerated pleasure as he thrusts to meet her. There is a huge tattoo of a serpent coiling around her breasts. It smells of weed and sweat.

“Fuck off, Aquinas,” she pants.

Titus bares his teeth over her shoulder. “Birdy can join if she likes.”

The serpent stops her bouncing to glare at me.

“I was looking for Minnie,” I said pointedly, glaring back at the both of them, not moving an inch.

They both laugh and it makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. “She didn’t want to join in,” Titus says, his eyes suddenly hard on me. “It’s her own fault.”

---