Page 1 of Ethereal Shifters

Chapter

One

“Everything’s back to normal now. Isn’t that great?”

Normal?I smile at Annie from across the room as I lie in my bed, watching the ray of sunlight peek through the gap in the curtains. She sits up in her bed, her messy bed hair sticking everywhere, and she smiles back. Her smile doesn’t hide her sadness, the redness of her eyes from crying, or the echo of how much losing her mate has destroyed her soul. Her Nexus.

Normal. Normal. Normal. Onyx has done something to make sure I can have this, and it is everything I’ve always wanted. To be the same as everyone else and not seen as a monster, to have a chance of living with my people and not a life on the run. I’m not locked up waiting to be killed, and everyone knows what I am. Or at least the Supreme Alpha, Onyx’s father, does. Is this normal? I don’t think I’ve had a normal day in my entire life. I repeat the strange word, even though it feels weirder every time I say it.

“I’ve still not got over the fact that they’re not carting me out here to, you know, kill me.”

Annie winces. “Don’t say stuff like that. They’re not going to kill you, okay?” She throws back her quilt. “Whatever Onyx did, he made sure you’d be safe. He’s not a liar, from what I can make out, and he’s here, okay? You got this, you’re okay.” She cups her hands together. “I can’t lose you, Gwen.”

Am I okay though? “You won’t,” I tell her, but the words don’t register fully to me. It’s an empty promise, at least in my chest. It makes her feel better though, and she grins at me. “You can have the bathroom first,” I offer.

I yawn, lying back to stare at the ceiling before closing my eyes. “Are you there?” I reach for my Nexus in my mind, but all I get is a shivery feeling. Like she has frozen the space where she lurks in my mind and she is happy for me to get frostbite trying to communicate with her. I wince as I pull away from her and sigh. I’ve pissed her off somehow, but she isn’t going to tell me why. Well, fuck her. I have a chance at a new life, one where my parents aren’t training me, no one is hunting me in Starlight City at least, and I have a friend. I have mates who don’t altogether hate me.

Annie is talking through the door, chatting away about our lessons and the ones she has missed as Nibbles grumbles from her bed at the end of my bed. “Morning, Nibbles.” She doesn’t even lift her head; instead, she rolls onto her stomach and I grin, climbing out of the bed to fuss her. “I’ll get you breakfast and a walk soon.”

“Are you going to behave?” I whisper into my mind. But frostbite is still my response as she blocks me out. I almost feel a burst of pure bitchiness coming directly from her, aimed at me. Oh, she’s super pissed. Awesome. Just what I need when everything is going to shit. After pulling the curtains open, I grab my clothes for the day, and I’m surprised to find everything is exactly how I left it in my chest of drawers, including the box from my mother, which is tucked up at the back.

“Bathroom is all yours!” Annie chirps as she steps out, freshly dressed and her hair tied back. “Oh, and this is for you. I forgot to give you it last night. Alek passed it to me.” She hands me a red silk cloth, and inside is my Nex dagger. I knew it was close, and the moment I hold it, the unease of not having it with me disappears.

“Thank you.” I put it on the dresser to take my clothes with me into the bathroom.

“I can’t believe it’s the first day of winter!” Annie shouts through the door. “Have you ever been to the Falk’s night celebration in Edinburgh? We always…” She drifts off and clears her throat. She always went with Kos. “Well, it’s in a month’s time. If you haven’t been, it might be nice to go together.”

“I haven’t been, but I’d love for us to go.” But I doubt they will be letting me stray that far. I focus on the good, not the bad. It’s the only way to keep going, or at least it’s the only way I’ve known how to keep going. Winter is here, and it is my favourite season. It’s one of the things I missed when I was living in Spain, that their winters never really got cold. Not like they do here in Scotland. Here we get possible snow.

Annie’s second alarm goes off, and I know I’ve only got fifteen minutes now to get dressed, and I need to do something with my hair before going out to my lessons. Do I just go back to lessons like normal? Go back to pretending not to have an out-of-control Nexus in my soul…and not see Onyx?

Diomi. I stare at the rune and tap it. I used to tap it to piss him off, but now? It’s all I have. Six months, he said. I can’t see him or leave the academy for six months. I’m not sure how much of that was true, but I’m going to find a way to see him. I have to. He thinks I hate him, but he saved me. He put me first, when no one has ever done that for me before.

We can’t be together. That was part of the deal, and that is permanent.

No. I don’t care what deal he made, because us being apart and never together can’t be permanent. Not after this. I need to see him. I throw the academy uniform on, the familiar tight black clothes fitting me perfectly. Now that my tan has faded, the dark makes me look pale. I pull my hair into a loose braid, looking at myself one more time in the mirror. My grey eye looks darker somehow, but the other is normal, and it’s still easy to see the monster lurking in my soul. How can I hide what she is now? What if she kills here? What if I lose control?

My breaths come out in big gulps, and I breathe deeply to calm myself down. When I look down at the counter, I flinch, seeing that the mahogany tiles partly turned grey under my touch. That doesn’t happen unless my Nexus comes out, rarely anyway, not unless I start losing control.

Thankfully, someone knocks on the dorm door twice, and Annie’s footsteps echo to me as she goes to open the door. “Rhodes! You look well! She’s just in the bathroom.” Nibbles is barking and in his arms when I come out of the bathroom a minute later, and there is something deeply attractive about Rhodes holding Nibbles gently in his arms and fussing her.

Rhodes is wearing a soft blue jumper and brown trousers, which make him look more tanned everywhere on his muscular body. His blond hair is bright like the sun, and his green eyes are greener than any leaf in the forest as he smiles at me like I’m not a complete mess. “Good morning, beautiful.”

“Are you talking to me or my dog?” I arch an eyebrow.

His laugh makes my skin warm. “There is only one being in this world I would ever call beautiful.” My mouth dries. Annie coughs to remind us that she’s here, and Rhodes blinks. “I have come to get Nibbles as it’s my morning to walk and feed her while you’re at class. We’ve made a timetable so Nibbles is well cared for and your lessons aren’t interrupted. But first I’ve got to take you down to a meeting with the tutors of the academy.All the tutors will be there, including me, Hollis, Alec and Finn.” He pauses. “Okay? If you need more time to rest or you’re not ready?—”

“I’m fine.” I nervously nod. “And Onyx?”

Rhodes hesitates. “He’s in the city.”

“Is that all you’re going to tell me about him?” I dig my nails into my palms.

“Gwen.” He walks past me and puts Nibbles down. He picks my boots up and pats the bed. I arch an eyebrow again but do as he says. I sit down, only for my cheeks to flush when he kneels down in front of me. He picks my one leg up, sliding my boot on. He’s caring for me. It’s such an unusual thing that I don’t know what to make of it for a few moments. He puts my other boot on and begins to tie the laces, his knuckles grazing my legs, and I shiver. “Whatever they say down there, they’re not here to harm you and they are here to help. So it’s not going to be bad, and I’ll be with you the entire time.” I still don’t get how or why they allowed me back in the first place.

“They had me at a trial. They were going to kill me, and what did Onyx do to save me from that?” I roll my eyes when he doesn’t reply. Annie makes a slight noise in the back of her throat. “Annie, seriously, my Nexus murders like it’s a fun game of sports. I shouldn’t be here.”

Annie puts her hands on her hips and glares at me. “She only murders bad people. It could be argued it’s public service.”

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