Page 6 of Scorpio Dragon

Her approach alerted him, and he looked up sharply—then exhaled with evident irritation when he recognized her. “Come to gloat, have you?” She hesitated, and Archer scowled. “Go on. You heard all that.” He jerked his head towards the front desk. “Tell me how rude and entitled I am.”

She tilted her head, a little surprised he’d remembered what she’d called him. At the time, it had seemed to glance off him completely unheard. “I was going to offer to share the resources, actually,” she said, gesturing with the borrowed books she was holding. “But if you’d prefer insults…”

His eyes widened in shock as he looked at the books. The thickest contained detailed maps of the way the stars had changed over the decades and centuries since records had been kept, and the thinner volumes contained instructions on how to produce a detailed, complete astrological chart for an individual based on their time and place of birth. These were the books they needed for their assignment. There was something incredibly satisfying about seeing the cocky Archer actually speechless.

“I borrowed them the day we were given the assignment,” she explained, taking the seat next to him and setting the books down on the table. “Which, I’m guessing, you haven’t started?”

A mute nod, those golden-brown eyes full of suspicion. “I bet you finished already, huh? Bet you finished it the day it was assigned.”

“My first draft, yes. This is my fourth.” She tapped on her chart.

“Good for you.”

“I’m offering to help you,” she said impatiently. “So you need to decide if your arrogance is more important than getting this assignment done.” He looked at her for a long moment, and she rolled her eyes. “Come on. Your friends aren’t here, nobody’s going to catch you hanging out with a nerd.”

“I don’t care what they think,” he said, and there was something strange and bitter in his voice that made her curious. Without meaning to, she let her eyes unfocus, inviting the curious, dreamy state of intuition she’d been using her whole life to get a sense of the people around her. She’d always been best at reading her sister, but she could get a reasonable sense of what was going on with most people she tuned into. She hadn’t tried it here, though. Too embarrassed that someone might recognize what she was doing, and know just how inexperienced she really was…

She’d expected a rush of bright, brash colors from Archer, a reflection of the cocksure swagger he moved through the school with. There was plenty of that, certainly—but all it really did was cast more light on the turbulent, murky tangle behind it. Morgan caught her breath, shocked by the textural impact of Archer’s aura, the knotted, rasping tangle of dread, uncertainty, anxiety and loneliness… but even as she watched, she saw a wall of heat and light slam it down. When she looked back at Archer’s face, he was smiling. If she hadn’t seen what she’d seen, she’d have called the expression effortless.

“Some help would be absolutely amazing, Morgan. Thank you. Genuinely.” He ran a hand through those curls. “I’m embarrassed. I was very unpleasant to you when we were paired up in class.”

“You were,” she said drily, but her desire to punish him for that rudeness seemed to have evaporated. “Takes more than that to get under my skin, though.”

“Right, because you are…” He grabbed her chart before she could protest, eyes darting across it. “A Scorpio. Of course. Famously kind and forgiving.”

“What? Absolutely not,” she said blankly. “How did you—” Then she caught the sly twinkle in his eye, and exhaled sharply. “Funny. You’re funny.”

“So they tell me. It’s in my stars, so I can’t take much credit. I was always destined to be this charming.”

Morgan stopped herself from laughing, though she couldn’t help the exasperated smile that was playing around her lips. Archer grinned at her. “Fire signs,” she muttered. “With a name like yours, I’m guessing Sagittarius?”

“Absolutely not. My parents? Give their firstborn son and heir a novelty name? No, if I’d been born under Sagittarius, they’d have called me something else.” His tone was light and jovial, but she could sense a strange sting under the words. Was it coming from his voice, or from somewhere else, somewhere deeper? From the faint shadow of the aura she could still see, gathered around him like a storm cloud?

Morgan shook herself, a little disturbed by how fierce the curiosity was that had risen in her about this near stranger. She cleared her throat and quickly refocused both of their attention on the task at hand, telling herself to appreciate the opportunity to revise what she’d learned. Teaching something to someone else was a good way of making sure that you understood it fully, she told herself. That was why she was doing this for Archer, why she was interested in making sure he understood.

Her interest in the cocksure Leo with the confusing, contradictory aura was purely academic.

Chapter 6 - Archer

It was surprising how quickly the afternoon in the library went by… and how pleasantly, especially considering how grim the beginning had been. He’d been all but ready to write to his parents and get on the next ship out of this ridiculous place. The plan was materializing—he’d hitch a ride through Isthmus and then find somewhere fun to lay low for a few years, until the worst of his father’s temper cooled down. Then, out of nowhere, she’d appeared. The woman from his astrology class, the cold-eyed, straight-laced girl with the weird clothes who had seemed utterly immune to any of his charms or manipulations.

He saw a different side to her that afternoon. He told himself it was because she’d been faking her disliking for him earlier, but deep down he suspected it had a lot more to do with the fact that he wasn’t actively being an asshole for once. He was too tired to be an asshole. The assignment had been bothering him ever since it had been set, and when he’d finally worked up the energy to go to the library to get the stupid thing done, being told that the books he needed had all been borrowed already had been almost too much to take.

But then Morgan was there, and while she stopped well short of doing the assignment for him, it still felt much easier to make progress with her cool, steady presence at his side. He glanced sidelong at her a few times as he worked, quietly readjusting his impression of her. Quiet, sure… but he’d met shy women before. This wasn’t shyness, or if it was, it was a different flavor than the one he was used to. When he met shy girls, they were worried about the impression they were making on him. But Morgan… if anything, she was focused on the impression that he was making on her.

Not that he cared what impression he was making, of course. That didn’t matter. She was some nobody, from a nothing little insula that nobody cared about—he knew, he’d made a few inquiries ever since she’d embarrassed him in class. Just doing his due diligence, making sure it wouldn’t come back to bite him in the ass if he cut her out of his circle of interest. At least, that was what he was going to say if any of the guys asked him about it later.

“That’s most of the work done,” she said eventually, and he blinked in surprise as he realized that the chart before him was actually starting to resemble the complex diagrams in the books they’d looked at in class. “At least when it comes to charting. Interpretation is another matter.”

“Ah, yes. The secrets of my personality.” He wiggled his fingers mystically over the page, but it didn’t win the laugh he’d wanted from Morgan. She was a tough one to crack. He’d forgotten how it felt to joke around with people who only laughed when they were honestly amused, not whenever they sensed you’d made a joke because they wanted you to like them… “You really buy into all this stuff? The stars dictating who you are?”

Morgan shrugged lightly. “I’m more interested in the implications for magic use. That’s why I’m taking the class. What about you?”

“Why am I taking the class?” He exhaled. “Because I thought it’d be easy.”

A faint smile at that. “Joke’s on you.”

“Guess so. Alright. What’s my deal, then? Element—fire. Can’t wait for the fire-breathing class. Fixed modality—what does that mean?”

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