“Sorry,” I whispered and wrapped my arm around his shoulders.
He leaned against me.
For the first time in my life, the touch of my Revered wasn’t enough to calm the sensations boomeranging through me.
Something was very wrong.
Everything felt off.
When we entered the classroom, Lothaire was speaking to Corvus. “Yes, you can watch. Take a seat.”
We sat down at our usual desk.
Orion pressed his lips near my ear as he prepared to describe everything that the enchanted projector showed. Our routine.
I dug my fingernails into my Revered’s palm.
He tapped his fingers impatiently against the desk.
Corvus slumped down in his usual seat next to me. He huffed at Arabella and the twins. “Stop cuddling in the classroom. It’s disgusting.”
He was really in a mood today.
“Take the stick out of your ass,” she grumbled under her breath so quietly that only I could hear.
Corvus sneered loudly, “What was that about an ass? You want me to beat yours?”
The twins breathed harshly.
“Are you threatening her?” Lothaire spat at the front of the classroom.
The three of us sat up straight. “No, sir,” Corvus growled as we all waited for the blow to fall.
There was a scratching noise as Lothaire rubbed at the stubble on his jaw. Then he said, “I have a feeling what you’re about to watch will be punishment enough.”
I swallowed thickly.
The desk creaked beneath us as my mates shifted uncomfortably beside me.
There was a familiar ticking as the enchantment began to play.
Orion whispered in my ear.
His tone changed as the projection played, disbelief dripping from his lips. Then horror.
I gripped his thigh when he said Arabella didn’t have a flame above her head.
My nails created holes in his sweatpants when he said she jumped and pulled the girl off the platform.
When wings exploded from her spine, I gouged his skin.
I drew blood when she slammed into the post.
Orion’s thigh muscle bunched as he described Arabella throwing herself atop of the marked girl.
Corvus held his breath when on the screen, Orion said he pointed his flaming hand down at her.
“She’s on fire now.” Orion’s voice broke.
All three of us went still.
Orion gasped, “Holy sun god.” He didn’t elaborate.
I shook his thigh. “What happened? Tell me.”
“She—” He swallowed thickly as he repeated what was happening on the screen. “—somehow put out Corvus’s flames. Both she and the child are unharmed.”
All three of my eyes widened.
Then he gasped like something worse had occurred.
I was afraid to ask, “What just happened?”
Orion’s voice shook. “We stopped using our powers. Now we’re fighting with the angels. Whatever she did pulled us out of the killing state.”
“No,” Corvus whispered.
Orion repeated, “We regained control because of her.”
The room fell quiet as the projection stopped.
“Told ya,” Arabella said snottily.
I keeled forward.
Cold sweat broke out across every inch of my body, and I pressed my face against the chilly desk.
Corvus wretched beside me.
Orion hyperventilated.
“What’s happening to them?” John asked, and our teammates murmured with confusion.
Lothaire responded, “They’ve realized what we, the judges, did when we watched the tape.”
“Realized what?” Arabella asked.
Corvus gagged louder.
“You’re their missing mate,” Lothaire said.
The realm stopped spinning as he spoke our realization aloud.
She laughed loudly. “No, I’m not.”
“I don’t think—” Orion’s voice cracked. “I don’t think that—” He broke off and breathed shakily. “I want to protect her.”
Liquid splashed across the ground as Corvus lost the contents of his stomach.
Trepidation transformed into pure horror.
The desk shook from the force of my trembling. “It can’t be,” I said weakly. Desperately. Futilely.
But it made sense.
Orion’s reluctance to being coddled.
His urge to defend us.
His aggressive characteristics.
We’d assumed he was just unique.
I’d always known in my bones that he wasn’t a gentle guy.
We’d characterized him as such because he was quiet and physically smaller than Corvus and me. Plus, he was breathtakingly stunning. Corvus always said he was the prettiest male devil he’d ever seen.
It had always made sense.
It had always been the most obvious explanation.
Until we’d met someone physically smaller than all of us—someone who spiraled and fell apart during battle; someone who grieved over the people she killed while the rest of us felt nothing; someone all of us wanted to protect.
The only person Corvus had described as prettier than Orion.
A person who all three of us were obsessed with.
A person we irrationally wanted to protect.
The woman that had given us something we’d never had: control.
A woman that had all the famed characteristics of a certain type of person. Someone who was different, physically and mentally, from the three of us.
A person who had my infamously grouchy Ignis apparently blushing and tongue-tied whenever she spoke to him.
The silence had started after she’d taken off the enchantment that disguised her.
I loved the quiet. It calmed me and allowed me to hear the world around me better.
The silence was peace.
The silence was our new mating song.
Our complete one.
“I think she’s our Revered.” Orion cleared his throat. “And I’m the other Protector.”
Skin smacked against the desk, then the floor.
Our Ignis had passed out.
Chapter 48
Aran
DESIGNATIONS
Rebirth—Day 62, hour 14
We stood in a line on the lawn of the arena.
Pipe hanging loose from my lips, I stared at the ocean. My wings were retracted tight against my spine, but it felt like boulders were sitting on my aching shoulders.
Salt burned my eyes.
The angel legion stood in a line with their wings proudly extended behind them. It was all for a show.
“Everyone here today has been blessed,” Lyla’s enchanted voice echoed across the island, and my ears buzzed. “The gods themselves have analyzed every second of the games.”
She paused. “And after careful consideration, the gods have determined that no more competitions are necessary. All teams will be given their demarcations for the war.”
The student section cheered.
Hollered and clapped.
They stomped their feet against the metal bleachers.
Lyla spread her arms wide as she said, “Every few millennia, a red giant explodes in the galaxy. It collapses in a solar system that contains a portal connecting it to realms within the jurisdiction of the High Court.”
White caps crested and crashed.
Sea-foam sprayed across black rocks and glistened maroon under the eclipse.
I didn’t blink.
I felt the weight of the kings’ gaze on me, and I made a point to not look over at them.
Lyla’s words were straight from a nightmare. “The resulting energy flow forces all portals open for indeterminate amounts of time. Centuries at the least.”