I snuggled deeper into his embrace. “I love you too,” I whispered.

  His arms tightened around me in a brief, affectionate squeeze before releasing me. “We should get back,” he stated, as he stared regretfully at the moon high in the sky above us.

  I stifled a yawn as I nodded, gathering my clothes and pulling them on whilst sneaking a last glance at my mate doing the same. That last sneaky glance was why I noticed the glowing red dot that appeared on his back.

  I’d watched enough cop movies to know a laser sight when I saw one and my eyes went wide with fear.

  “Daron!” I screeched in warning, but I shouldn’t have bothered.

  As soon as the dot appeared Daron whirled, palm rising as a ripple of power exploded from him. The bullets seemed to appear out of nowhere, hanging in thin air inches from both of us. I hadn’t seen the second laser dot on my own back, I realised as I examined it and the direction it came from. A third bullet, then a fourth joined it and I knew I had to do something before Daron drained himself.

  My odynokinesis sprung forward with a thought, arrowed at the only other two pinpricks of life it could sense for miles. I felt Onyx and Ivory’s glee down our strange bond just a second before screams rent the air. Between my power and imp venom, the attackers were distracted enough for Daron to mount an offensive.

  The bullets melted in front of me, forming together to create a wickedly sharp blade that zoomed off in the direction of the screams.

  My gut churned at the silence that followed, but I forced it back, painfully aware that there could be others. When a few seconds had passed, I looked over at Daron, only to stare.

  Gone was the shy, logical man I knew. Daron was standing straight, eyes burning with anger as he stared in the direction of our attackers.

  “Daron?” I hesitated for a second before rushing to his side. “We should go.”

  “You should tell Enzo first.” Daron still wouldn’t look at me, as his liquid metal blade zoomed back toward us, halting a few feet away. The swirling steel hovered defensively in the air, waiting for his command. “These men were professionals, he might be able to figure out who hired them.”

  I shook my head, but did as he asked, outlining the situation to my Gluttony mate down our bond as briefly as possible.

  “I’ll be right there, Pretty Darling,” Enzo promised.

  And he was. I blinked and my blonde, crazy assassin mate was standing in front of me. “Where are they?” he asked Daron, scanning the horizon with wary eyes.

  “Over in the dunes.”

  “I’ll dump the bodies where they won’t be found.” Enzo’s voice was cold as he reached forward, cupped my cheek and stroked his thumb across the skin there. “You’re sure there weren’t others?”

  “No one that had any metal on them.” Daron shrugged. “I’ll take Lilith back to Vice. She’s too exposed out here.

  “Yes. She is.” Enzo’s voice held a dark note of warning that made me stiffen.

  “Daron kept us safe,” I defended my nerdy mate. “I was fine.”

  He didn’t reply, striding off to the dunes with a parting mutter about the mess amateurs made.

  Chapter 33

  The ride back was quiet, both of us lost in our own thoughts as the shadow of the gatehouse loomed over us. I had helped kill those men, I realised, belatedly. But I didn’t feel as sickened as I thought I should and that left me feeling unsettled. I never wanted to be as callous about death as Enzo was, but I was beginning to realise I might not be able to keep to such a moral high ground if I wanted to stay alive.

  Blaze was waiting when I stepped out of the car, and his huge arms enveloped me in a hug before I could even set foot on the ground.

  “No other problems?” he asked Daron over the top of my head.

  “Not even a pothole.”

  “Good, I’ll get the car back to where it should be, and you get our girl settled.” He kissed the top of my head and bent to whisper in my ear. “You should know, Bane snuck through your window about ten minutes ago. If he’s not gone in twenty minutes, I will come and get him.”

  I smiled softly. “Eventually he might want to stay for more than twenty minutes.”

  “I don’t care. He broke your heart once, he’s going to have to earn back that trust before I give him the opportunity to do it again,”

  I kissed the spot over his heart gently. “Goodnight, Blaze.”

  “Goodnight, Sweetness.”

  Knowing that Bane was in my room and actually seeing him there were completely different things. When Daron left me at the door to my room with a kiss and a whispered ‘I love you’, I didn’t really believe that Bane would be there. Somewhere in the last year, I’d lost the comfortable feeling I’d once had around my Greed mate and grown used to his absence and his silence. Now, faced with him standing awkwardly by my window, I had no idea what to do.

  I couldn’t think of anything else to say, but the urge to speak had me blurting out: “Blaze isn’t happy you’re here.”

  “I know.” He leant against the wall, a vulnerable look passing over his face so quickly I couldn’t be sure I’d even seen it. “You said we needed to talk.”

  I became oddly conscious that I was lingering in the doorway on the opposite side of the room. With soft, cautious steps, I walked over to the dressing table and started to take out my hair, letting the soothing motions of the brush calm me before I spoke again. “I meant in the morning…”

  In the mirror I saw his shrug. “You sounded… serious and it set me on edge. I thought it was probably best to get it over with, since I wasn’t going to get to sleep thinking about it.”

  That level of honesty made my hand freeze mid-motion. “I’ve thought a lot about you since we came back from that place,” I admitted, forcing myself to resume brushing. “I feel like everything about our mating from the very start has just gone completely wrong. All the lies, tricking me into mating with you, the wall across our bond.” My mind reached along our connection at the reminder, checking to reassure myself that the wall was gone.

  “I’d take it all back, if I could,” he whispered, so quietly I almost didn’t hear.

  “I’m willing to start over if you work with me,” I interrupted him. “I mean we’d go slowly, and you’d have to promise…”

  “Anything. I’ll promise anything.” He crossed the gap between us and knelt beside me, putting our faces at the same height. “Use your gift, feel what I’m feeling. You’ll know I’m serious about us. Fuck, I’ve never been more serious about anything in my life.”

  Our eyes met and the connection between us opened, his emotions as visible to me as though they’d been shouted. His hope, sincerity and regret flowed over me like a wave. My pathokinesis wasn’t a fool-proof lie-detector test, but it helped.

  “I want you to talk to me. I want you to tell me about your life, even if it means putting me at risk. I want to know about the Resistance, your friends, your missions, everything. And… I need you to promise me that no mission will ever be so important that you’ll do what you did with Lucinda. If the Resistance ever asks you to seduce someone for them, you have to promise me you’ll say no.” I would never be able to trust Bane if I knew he was willing to follow those kinds of orders.

  The regret burned between us, but I hoped that with time that burn would scar over, and the pain would lessen. “I will never betray you or our bond again, I vow it to the Strange God.”

  I put the brush down and stood, pulling him up as well. “I will hold you to that,” I promised, pulling him over to the bed and sitting on it, patting the space beside me until he did the same. “Now, tell me everything. I want to know all about what you do for the Resistance.”

  “Will you promise to stop burning the roses if I do?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Fine.”

  He bit his lip, silent as he considered where to start. When he did speak, the words were carefully thought out and delivered with the gravitas of a confession.

  “Because I’m so good at what I do my code-name is Wraith, and to protect my mother and father, no one in the Resistance knows my real name except for my boss. I lead a squad of three others. We used to be four, but Lucinda got one of them killed…”

  He carried on, spilling everything about his team, his life before, his worst missions and his best ones. Now that he’d had permission to talk, everything came out in a rush and the more he spoke the more I admired who he was and how much he was willing to sacrifice for what he believed in.

  Blaze never came to kick Bane out, and eventually I fell asleep on his lap, listening to his stories, feeling the mating bond that was denied for so long sigh in content with every brush of his fingers through my hair.

  Chapter 34

  It didn’t take long for Enzo to report that the assassins sent after Daron and I were Abrosiax’s doing. Apparently, he had stuck his head above ground for just long enough to hire them before disappearing once more. But I didn’t have long to dwell on the fact that Circe’s father was still out there plotting my downfall, because the next day a note was pinned to the door of the Carnal Tower.

  “She wants us to write ten-thousand-word paper in one month!” Lulu screeched, following her sister into the common room. “I thought when Vrosis cancelled his evening sessions we’d be free of the yearly caste essays!”

  I had poured myself a large glass of wine after seeing the note for myself; Nelly and Lulu strode over to my table in the common room and took the two I’d poured for them. Only alcohol could seem to blunt the shock of the Headmistress’s declaration.

  “At least you two have fairly common sub-castes,” I grumbled. “Why the hell did she pick ‘A Biographical Analysis of a Famous Member of Your Sub-Caste’ as the title! All I know is that most Succubae are assassins!”

  Lulu rolled her eyes as she slumped into the seat beside me. “We have final year exams to deal with, not to mention those stupid interviews with the elders and the teachers to determine our career path, and now this!”

  Nelly downed her glass in one. “This must be a joke. What exactly does she expect desire demons to have done other than be sexy as hell?”

  “You’re stereotyping.” Lulu sighed, sipping her own drink. “But you’re probably right. And all the research will be filled with the prejudice of whoever wrote it, so promiscuities will be home-wrecking prostitutes.”

  I swirled the red liquid in my cup slowly. “What are you two going to do when you leave?” I asked, curiously.

  I knew that Vice was literally only there to teach us about demonic culture, and the real learning would come when we left and were apprenticed or otherwise pointed in the direction of a career by the elders. But I had no idea how they were going to pick anything.

  “Fortunately, because Vrosis is scared shitless of you now, he’s promised to ensure we remain nearby.” Nelly grinned evilly. “You’re not getting rid of us that easily.”

  “Dorian will still work here, so I thought I might ask for a scholar-in-residence position,” Lulu speculated, eyes unfocused as she stared into the distance. “But Hadrian wants to leave, he said he’s sick of teaching. He wants to start up a duelling arena.”

  “I don’t have a clue,” Nelly admitted, with a grin. “I’m still hoping that handmaiden of the Strange God’s chosen is a well-paid position.”

  I giggled. “Apparently I do have an inheritance,” I admitted. “But I don’t think the elders will happily announce that job at the ball.”

  “I could be a sexy secretary,” Nelly mused. “Or maybe a hot maid?”

  “I don’t think employment is the same as role play,” Lulu retorted.

  I snorted, but no matter how light-hearted their words were, a subtle cloak of anxiety clung to me after that conversation.

  As the weeks passed, I avoided the subject like the plague, burying my head into the sand. The whole of May passed in a blur and the pressure of upcoming exams helped me evade any conversations about the future. Aeron might have sensed something was wrong, but exams ensured that neither of us had the energy to discuss it.

  On a rebellious whim, I wrote my caste essay on one of the Succubae who’d been executed in the 1920’s purge. Bane was more than happy to help me sneak into the restricted area of the library and sneak out the reference material I needed. Isadora Vex had been a complete badass of a woman, who lived as a pirate in the 1770s before retiring as a mercenary for hire, finally ending her career as a private detective before she was gunned down in the purge of the French Lust Embassy. I knew it was risky, but there was so little available on my sub-caste everywhere else and I had struggled to find any account of a Succubus who hadn’t gone into assassination.

  I’d turned in the essay two weeks ago, and since then exams had fallen over the college like an anxious cloud. Although most of mine seemed to go well, Professor Saxon set a gruelling paper that rivalled Pruitt’s from first year and the mess I made of the Healing theory exam had me returning to my room nursing a large glass of whiskey.

  When the day of my combat exam finally rolled around, I felt like a complete wreck. Enzo and I had practiced almost nightly with my spear, and I knew that I had enough power in me to bring down a house thanks to Aeron, Jin and Kain putting aside their differences for a second night of sharing me. But I was still shaking with nerves as I approached the door of Hadrian’s gym with Rina, Bane and Daron. We’d been told nothing, except that we were permitted to bring a single weapon, which was why my spear’s comforting weight rested in a special holster secured to my thigh. That, combined with Onyx and Ivory sitting on my horns, gave me enough reassurance to push open the door.

  An unshown and the other second years were waiting for us in a loose group.

  “Professor McKinnax requests that you follow me to your exam.” The man kept his head bowed as he spoke, but I was nearly certain that it was Dorian speaking.

  He didn’t wait for us to reply, instead moving back through the doors we’d just entered and leading the way out of the castle towards the gatehouse. My nerves only increased as we left the school and saw the waiting line of black Land Rovers.

  Because we were sorted alphabetically, Daron and I managed to sit close to one another, but Bane and Rina were split up and taken to a different car. Our driver, hidden behind a dark screen, barely waited for the door to close before pulling out of the castle driveway and heading down a rough track that led deeper into the forest.

  Although the drive must have been quite short, it felt like an eternity. My wings were squashed uncomfortably against the seat, and my imps buzzed around the enclosed space, their unease only magnified my own. At some point, Daron’s hand gently unclenched my fist and entwined our fingers, and I let the gentle comforting feeling of the mating bond between us relax me as we waited.

  The moment we arrived, a grim Professor Hadrian ordered us to line up in an empty clearing. The dreary drizzle of rain began almost as soon as we were all ready, but I couldn’t focus on the weather when I noticed that Aeron and Ruelle were there, as well as Rezinax and a few other healers. All of them were dressed in combat fatigues, which only added to the intimidating aura they projected as they examined our group with serious eyes.

  “Second-years, welcome to your first ever combat exam.” Hadrian’s mouth twisted downwards at the corners as he paced in front of us. “Usually the exam is a tournament, but this year my imminent retirement and several other factors had to be considered. To this end, the Headmistress saw fit to recommend that your exam be a modified version of the Rite of Privilege.”

  There were gasps all around me, and a huge stone settled in my stomach as I absorbed the knowledge. I remembered the others telling me about the rite of privilege… second-years never won.

  “Unlike in a true Rite of Privilege, none of you will be racing an older year across the obstacle course. Instead the original course has been supplemented with replicas supplied by Elder Ruelle which will attack you until you either finish, concede or lose consciousness.” Hadrian paused in his pacing, surveying the treeline behind us. “The course is 150 yards long. Those who pass the 50-yard mark will achieve the minimum grade, and top marks are only available to those who complete the course. If you wish to take the class next year, completing the course is mandatory, and extra marks will be awarded for lack of injury at the end.”

  Those ominous words hung in the air as Hadrian beckoned Aeron and Ruelle forward. “Elder Ruelle and my replacement, Professor Aeron Saxon, will be assisting in the marking.”

  My wide eyes connected with the golden ones I knew so well, and a flash of guilt hit me along our bond.

  “I didn’t want to get your hopes up until I knew for sure, which wasn’t until Hadrian told me on the way here,” he whispered along our bond. “I knew you were worried about me leaving Vice, but now at least I’ll still be here – even if it’s not in the tower.”