Page 27 of Savagely Mated

He narrows his eyes at me, and shakes his head. “You know this is going to catch up with you. I’m going to have to put this in my report.”

“Do what you have to do,” I say. I sound like I don’t care, but that’s mostly because I can’t bring myself to right now. I am exhausted. I am alone. I’ve lost my best friend, and I’ve lost all sense of the safety of the academy’s walls. The men who abducted me from here are obvious ex-inmates. They’ll be back, one way or another. I don’t know how I can save myself.

He waves me through, and I go up the side passage, trying to yet again avoid people. Only problem is you can’t avoid everybody on a day where everything is going wrong. It’s like a cosmic rule or something.

I make it all the way to my dorm floor without issue, but the second I set foot on my level, a female voice rings out from behind me with officious annoyance.

“Darcy, you’re late for breakfast, and your room is a mess. Tidy it up this instant!” Matron snaps at me. Of course everybody is on me today. Usually I’d argue with her. I’d tell her some kind of lie, or I’d tell her my room’s not really that messy. I’d defend myself in some way, but today I don’t bother. I always wondered what would happen if I didn’t answer back. Turns out, me being quiet just gives her more space to fill with words.

“You have more space than anybody else here, and you don’t appreciate a bit of it. I’ve a good mind to have you relocated to a storage closet.”

She keeps lecturing me, but I turn my brain off. I can’t listen to any of this. I don’t care.

I walk into ‘my’ room, the room that everybody would tell me isn’t actually mine, the same way this isn’t really my home and I don’t really have a family. I used to think Jory was like family, but family doesn’t tell you that you have to stay away because they’re starting an actual family.

I look around the room and I realize all of a sudden that not only do Ihavenothing, it kind of means that Iamnothing. I’ve lived here my whole fucking life, but the people who looked after me when I was younger have moved on several times over. This matron is someone I met two years ago. She’s only a few years older than me, and she thinks I’m a pain in her ass.

Maybe I’m just tired. Maybe being abducted and fingered in a van has made me look at myself and my life in a way I never have before.

I make a decision in that moment.

I’m going to run away.

I’m going to leave the academy, and I’m going to get a job somewhere in Eclipse. I’m going to start a new life. One of my own choosing. I could be a package runner, or a delivery driver. I’m fast enough, and they’re always looking for new runners because of the death rate. Fifty-something package runners die every day. Or I could be a server in a restaurant or something, but I heard that can be kind of dangerous.

I start tidying up my room for the last time.

I have a pack, of course. Everybody has one. It’s designed to hold clothes, rations, supplies for when we go out on expeditions and things. I pack my prized possessions into it, my street clothes, the shoes I have, my makeup, and… What else is there? I don’t have a lot of stuff. I don’t keep the stuff I steal; I almost always give it away. There are a lot of people in need in Eclipse, but more than that, I’d get in deep shit if I ever got caught with contraband.

I used to hear the others complain sometimes that something being confiscated had been given to them by their family on one of the traditional family giving days. There are birthdays, and winter solstice and summer solstice. I’ve never gotten a gift on any of those days. Academy doesn’t give gifts. It gives the gift of learning and of service. Can’t get emotionally attached to either one of those things, but I guess they can’t be taken away by a power-tripping superior either.

Before I leave, I have a shower and I change into some fresh clothes. I put on underwear that fits. I wish I could sleep, because I’m absolutely exhausted, but I know they’ll just send someone to wake me up every time I miss a class.

I go back out the same gate I came in, but before I go out, I take a small charge and detonator combo, and I throw it over into some bushes. It sparks and explodes in a puff of smoke, making a small fire.

Brian is on that fire in an instant. He’s also no longer anywhere near his post. The bookElements of Deception and DisguisebyE. A. Bittenwins again. I slip out of the academy.

They liked to tell me I’d never graduate.

I guess they were right.

CHAPTER 7

Kirin

The most beautiful woman in the world kicked me in the balls today.

I’ve spent every minute since I met her trying not to show how attracted I am to her, and now Darcy is apparently our group mate.

Not going to lie, I’d much rather have her to myself. I’m the one closest to her age. She’s about twenty, and I’m twenty-five. That’s the kind of age gap that’s considered wrong sometimes. But Rafe is thirty-three, for god’s sake, and I’m pretty sure Einar is over forty, which is ridiculous. She should be mine, and mine alone.

After she stole our van, we went back and got the bikes. They’re much faster than the van, they let us split traffic, and I really like mine. The feeling of power rumbling between my legs, propelling me down the winding hills is an excellent panacea for a bruised ego.

It’s getting on to midday by the time we get back to the city and regroup. I assume there’s a plan. There’s always a plan.

Our first problem is that we can’t seem to find the van. Then we do.

“Van’s been impounded,” Einar says. He pulls out the tracker unit, which shows the current address of the vehicle. “It’s in the police lockup.”

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