on the elbow with my own right hand stick. He growled, actually growled, and swung on me again, knocking my stick almost out of my hand. The force of his blow was enormous, reminding me of his power.
“What’s this?” Jenks suddenly asked, standing ten feet away.
“Declan’s throwing sticks at us, sir,” Delwood said, his snarl replaced by a mask of righteous outrage.
“O’Carroll, I warned you not to pick fights you’re not prepared to win, yet you refuse to listen,” Jenks said, studying me.
“Sir, that’s not what happened,” Mack started to explain.
“Quiet please, Mr. Sutton. I don’t need your help to run my class. Got it?” Jenks said, fixing Mack with a stare. Then he snapped back to me, coming to a visible decision.
“Clear back. Okay, Mr. O’Carroll. Maybe you’ll understand the differences between weres and non-weres if we have a little demonstration. You two stand here and here,” he said, putting Delwood and me together, facing off.
“Alright, wait one,” he said, turning and trotting to the bag of gear he kept on the bleachers. He took out a light-colored wooden box and opened it, revealing two metal bands. They twisted my vision hard as he pulled them free from their cushioned resting places and came back to where we waited in the center.
“Hold out your hands, Mr. O’Carroll,” he said, looking at me expectantly. I didn’t know what those bands were, but I didn’t want them anywhere near me.
“Hold out your goddamn hands.”
I finally did and with two swift movements, he snapped a band around each wrist.
It felt like he tore half of me away. Part of me was gone, the part that sensed magic, just snipped off like I’d never had it. Was this how normal people felt?
“Can’t have any temptation to cheat, now can we?” he asked, raising one eyebrow at me. “Okay, sticks up.”
Still struggling with the loss of so much of myself, I put my sticks up and tried to concentrate on the smirking giant in front of me. The hair on the back of my head was lifted and what senses I had left were screaming that this was all wrong.
“Now, try to block his strikes, Mr. O’Carroll. It’ll hurt if you don’t,” Jenks said. “Fight!”
There was a blur, a sharp smacking sound, and my right hand went numb. My rattan stick went flying and when I lifted my lefthand stick, it was pummeled out of the way by a truck. Delwood gave me a vicious grin, just before his massive leg came up off the ground and hit my left side too fast to dodge. Searing pain lanced through my ribs, stopping my breath in my chest and freezing me for a second. The world slowed to a crawl as I watched Delwood’s right hand back swing at my face, the end of his baton hitting the side of my jaw with a dull crack. Things went blurry and I felt myself falling.
My next clear moment was on my hands and knees, feeling my opponent pressing down on my neck with a massive hand. Instinct took over and I pulled at Power, only nothing came, just pain.
The jumble of sounds around me cleared in bits and pieces as the ringing in my head dulled slightly. Delwood’s whisper reached my brain. “You’re my bitch, witch, and next I’ll take your girl.” Then his massive presence was gone, pushed back by others who crowded around me.
“—insane? What the bleeding ‘ell was that about?” an angry Irish voice demanded.
“Enough, Miss Flynn. That was not the intent. Delwood simply got carried away,” Jenks said, his own anger evident.
“Carried away? He just about killed him,” another voice hissed. Jetta’s, I think.
“Mr. Jenks, just what is going on here?” Gina’s voice.
“He had the fucking monster wolf beat the shit out of Declan, that’s what went on,” Jetta said.
“Enough, Miss Sutton. Another word and you’re gone from this class,” Jenks said.
“If this is how you teach—using your favorite monsters to half kill your students, then I don’t want to be here,” Jetta said.
“Especially when you’ve gone and crippled his Craft with those bloody things on his wrists,” Ryanne agreed.
“You two can both leave,” Jenks said, but Gina’s voice overrode his.
“You both stay, until I say otherwise. Jenks, get away from that boy and let Dr. Rosewell look at him. You’ve done more than enough damage already,” she said in a cold tone.
Hands helped me upright, the world weaving and waving. Pushing against them, I struggled to find my enemy, pulling at