Page 7 of Virgo Queen
My gaze drifts away from the forever unattainable Ronin, past his teal-haired punk rock girlfriend Zara who’s adding her own contribution to my gift table and admiring my birthday haul, to the bootleg bar. Back in the last century, between the two Witching World Wars, there used to be a speakeasy down here (centuries after the dungeon was retired). Faded Art Deco frescoes and peeling Prohibition-era posters still cling to the rough stone walls.
Near a flaming oil drum, backlit by a cluster of burning candles under a cobwebby rafter, a jaw-dropping male silhouette catches my eye. Thick arms crossed over broad chest, tight hips sheathed in leather, shitkicker boots spread wide in challenge. Firelight turns a spiky crown of Icelandic hair to silver.
Draco.
That warlock is keeping his distance, thank goodness. But he and Jae followed me right down here. (I mean, they had to be coming to the party anyway of course, but my race’s survival instincts are really well honed, and it felt like they followed me.)
Now, even with the light behind him so I can’t see his face, it feels like Draco’s watching.
And maybe even scowling.
At Ronin.
Does he think I spilled the beans and told Ronin what I saw on the stairs? About their secret relationship which, for whatever reason, Draco and Jae seem determined to keep anyone else from discovering?
Because why else would Draco be watching me?
Suddenly I’m overheated in the middle of this crowded basement, overwhelmed by the waves of sweaty heat rising from the dance floor where half my classmates are writhing in a really X-rated way to the grinding beat. My ears aren’t pointed (luckily, for hiding purposes) thanks to my mixed blood, but I still have enhanced senses. A staccato barrage of death-metal music batters my hyper-acute eardrums. A forest of blazing candles, dripping ribbons of melted wax over every available surface, wavers in my telescopic vision.
Most of the normals can’t smell it, but the musk of my classmates’ sweat and their miasma of mating scents mingles with the metallic tang of old blood and suffering soaked into these ancient stones.
Despite all this sensory overload, it’s the feel of Draco Mars’ glacier-blue gaze sliding down my body, so exposed and unprotected in this borrowed dress, that’s making me shiver like I’m spiking a fever.
If that warlock’s so worried about me spilling his secrets, given his dark reputation and mafia kin, I wonder what he’s capable of doing to keep me silent.
That worry just makes me shiver harder.
Jae Labête slinks up beside Draco like a hunting wolf, beaded braids slithering around his lean frame, a tangle of amulets winking against his tawny chest. Jae’s lost his shirt somewhere…andhis shoes… so the firelight laps the dusky nubs of his nipples and the tight ripple of his ribs and the taut plane of his abs.
That feral Cajun is another sight that makes my mouth go dry.
Especially when he slips a longneck beer into Draco’s waiting hand, then trains those golden wolf eyes on me.
You can run, chere.A molten tenor voice, soft with Cajun vowels, drizzles through my mind like honey.We want you to run,oui? Tonight, Draco and me, we hunt.
Geez Louise. I’m no telepath of any kind, so I have to be imagining that voice in my head.
Right?
It’s winter on this island and bitterly cold, but suddenly I’m sweating in this muggy heat. It’s steamy as a swamp down here in this basement. All those rainwater cisterns in the Roman-era grottoes off the main cavern make the air humid. I can almost smell the mossy green scent of Louisiana bayou—
“Hey, Mal, you okay?” A warm voice (this time a real one) dispels the intense electrical charge I feel building between me and those two guys like a summer storm.
I blink, tear my gaze away from the snare of Jae’s hungry stare, and look into the concerned turquoise eyes of my most famous (or infamous) classmate.
Zara Gemini.
She’s the future queen of the whole witching world, and she knows a lot about electricity herself, because she’s a lightning witch. She’s way stronger than me, even if she’s barely got a handle on all her scary power. She’ll be the first Gemini queen we’ve ever had, the queen who’s supposed to reverse this slow slide to extinction the witching races are facing. She’ll replace the current Aquarius queen who’s old and childless and who pretends the witching world isn’t failing, but who’s still reluctant as heck to step down.
Here’s the thing about Zara. She’s… unconventional. Without even meaning to, she’s polarized this entire Academy. Divided us all right down the middle into two warring camps.
Her allies and her enemies.
Half this school—especially those evil witches in Villa Tiberius who are glaring at her from the bar, all fanatically loyal to the Aquarius queen—they burn to see Zara dead.
But Zara’s always been nice to me, the way no Aquarius never was, and I like her.
So I summon a smile just to keep my friend from worrying. “Oh, sorry, Zara. Yeah, I’m good. Just, um, a little warm.”
