Page 14 of Wings of Ashes
He spun around and trudged away, into the tree line where Mara and Ryker had disappeared.
Why does he think I am enchanting him?Nix wondered, left alone in the forest.
Nix was not arealcygnus shifter. She was bespelled to look like one due to a weekly potion Elle’s family had made for her, so that the others in their community would not ostracize her for looking so different from them.
Nix had never hadpowers. Not like the other paranormals at Alatus Academy. She had always been physically weak, sometimes growing dizzy after long stretches of standing and walking.
She did not have the ability to enchant.
But Bael sure seemed to thinkshewas the cause of his erection. TheUgly Fucklingdid not give men erections.
Blushing and frustrated, she hid her face in her hands. The hot swell of his cock beneath his pants still seared her palm. The images of them fucking against a tree…
“Damn it,” she cursed at the sky.
Shame.
Guilt.
She had sworn her love to one man and one man only—to the one who held her hand through both of their cages and told her everything would be okay. The one who was always bleeding from where their captor stuck him with rods of iron and plucked feathers from his wings until they were chapped and raw.
“You will always be mine, and I will always be yours,” he told her. “When I get you free, we will trust no one. We willstay somewhere secluded and safe. A hidden beach that always faces the sunset, where no one can find us and use us for what we are.”
She had held his hand so tightly, crying as he bled out in his cage in front of hers. “Persius,” she whispered.
“My flóga. My mate.”
Persius was out there somewhere, in this timeline, not knowing the gruesome fate of them both.Will I ever find him?
She felt sick after the lust faded from her time with Bael.Betrayal. Even though Bael was a sex demon. Even though she did not know Persius yet in this life.
He is mine, and I am his.
In the meantime, she needed to learn about potions, history, and hand-to-hand combat skills that could protect her and Persius from their dreaded, dark future.
6
CHAPTER
They had left her in the forest.
Assholes. Assholes. Assholes.
She finally wandered her way out of the deep maze of trees. She found herself standing near the fields where the academy fae grew magical berries or whatever the heck the pompous group liked to make into their treasured, forbidden wine.
She stomped through the field, angrily making her way back to the main academy building. She was going to be late for her next class: History of Winged Creatures. She had a particular interest in this class because she still did not know what she was, even after years of being kept in captivity and experimented on because of how “special” and “rare” she was.
She knew she was not a swan shifter. She knew she naturally had red hair, and her parents were killed by roaming dragons before Elle’s family stumbled across a young Nix, lost near the woods of their cygni community.
It was not much to go on, considering the wide range of winged shifters.
A bell rang, signaling the official release of her potions class.
I hope Ryker, Mara, and Bael found the rest of the potion ingredients, so we can do a practice potion in tomorrow’s class before the final grade, she thought as she rounded the corner of the hallway and passed an open doorway of another classroom.
Bam!
She slammed right into someone. This time, she didnotpropel off of the man like she had with Bael earlier.
