Page 54 of Angel Lost

“Head for the inner sanctum,” Reye says in my ear.

We reach the stairwell before any hellions emerge and bolt through the courtyard toward the main building. The air bends impossibly and another rip opens, only feet away. A giant claw slashes through it, a hairsbreadth from my nose, the moving air wafting in my face. I dive for the ground and Reye lands beside me. We crawl on our bellies a few body lengths, heads down, avoiding the vicious slicing claw. When we’re finally far enough I scramble up, palms slick with sweat and mud, and sprint the last hundred yards to the sanctum, Reye’s footsteps pounding at my back.

Holy Hecate. I bend over, breathing hard, settling my racing heart. Standing, I lean a shoulder on the stained glass, gazing around. Are youshitting me? Students are milling around, aimlessly. A few are even surreptitiously tapping away on their phones. What is wrong with them? There’s a rip. Two, in fact. Who knows how long the sanctum will be safe…

“I told you, it’s a drill,” Reye hisses, furiously dusting herself off, glaring at me like I didn’t just save her.

“What?”

“Breech drill. Drill equals blue light. If it’s not a drill the light is red and the siren is different. You didn’t read the intake pack, did you?”

“It’s a simulation?” I ask in shock.

“Oh, come on. You’re not afraid of holograms too, surely?” She starts to move away, dismissing me.

“I-I…There was a breach in the summer.” I drop butt-first to the cool tile floor.

Reye turns back to me, hands to her mouth. “Lorelei, I’m sorry—”

“Chano, my Aeternum, he lost men. Nearly lost his sister too.”

Reye fidgets with the cuff of her robe. “Well…this…wasn’t real.” She crouches next to me. “Will you be okay?”

I snort a laugh, then another, until I’m laughing too hard. “If I can survive the real thing, I’m pretty sure I’ll manage.”

Reye stands, frowning. She clasps her hands, then turns on her heel and walks away.

Chapter Eighteen: Lorelei

“No, Aether Lorelei,” the professor says. “Your hands are too far apart. It’s not like you want to hide the entire desk in the ley lines, now is it?”

I readjust my fingers. Professor Hardman—or Hardass, as I’ve taken to calling him—is exacting. If I thought the professors here would go easy on me for the first few weeks, then satyr shit I was wrong. They didn’t even take it easy on me on day one. My head aches with that dull kind of tired you just can’t shake. I still have the day to get through before I can leave for Fates.

I tilt my head back, staring at the ceiling. These heated stone loungers might actually put me to sleep. It seems dangerous having them in class…

“Let go of physical constructs. Let go of this reality. Just feel the energy flowing through the room. See the energy as lines flowing around you. Now…move those lines. Fractionally.”

As the diminutive professor talks, his tiny, creepy hands draw waves in the air. My eyelids droop and suddenly I see it. Somewhere between eyes open and eyes shut, with my vision blurred, I see the ley lines. I finally, finally see them. Shimmering currents of power—a delicate network of glowing lines crisscrossing the room like a web of molten gold. Some thin, whisper-like, others thick and vibrating with violent raw energy. Each thread hums in my veins, tugging at my aether like a magnet. So beautiful, so intoxicating…and infinitely dangerous.

Concentrate, Lorelei. The lesson. Centering my energy, I roll my fingers the way the professor taught me.

I open my eyes wide, but my textbook sits resolutely on the floor beside me. I was so sure. So, so, sure I had it right this time. I scowl down at my hands, only looking up when the background chattering reaches fever pitch.

“Aether Lorelei,” Professor Hardass-Hardman says with a growl, “perhaps you would care to untuck my classroom from the ley lines now?”

Mouth half-open, I drop back into the ley dimension. It’s easier this time to see the energy. I trace the lines around us, feeling for the edges of the room. Shit. I did this? Somehow, rather than fold the energy around my book, I’ve folded it around the whole classroom.

“Quickly, aether, before you drain yourself.”

I pull on a strand. It won’t budge. I try another. Nothing. Tiredness washes over me. Finally, I spot a line straining toward me, willing me to touch it. With the slightest of tugs, it slides free, releasing the other tangled threads. The ley lines flow through the room, and I let out a sigh of relief.

The professor steeples his hands together, peering at me over the top of them. “Yes, very good. More precision with those fingers next time.” He pauses. “And, aether? Try not to exert yourself the rest of the day.”

“How did you do that?” Reye asks as I slink out of the classroom. “You went from the skills of a toddler to ascension-ready in the space of five minutes.”

“It just…made sense. I wish I could work out the whole healing thing as easily.”

“You’ll get there,” she says softly, glancing away.

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