Fortune Academy: Year Three - J.R. Thorn Page 0,45

from Lucifer.”

“Savage-ist?” I repeated. “Pretty sure that’s not a word.”

“Well if it was, Cole and Luc would be the inventors of it.” She leaned in and lowered her voice. Rumor is they’re brothers.”

I raised an eyebrow. “How do demons have brothers? I thought they just… existed.”

Yuri shook her head. “Monster Academy 101: Angels and demons are a reproductive humanoid species. They’re no different than other supernaturals, except that there’s that whole divine component to them, of course. They tap into their respective sources of energy, kind of like magnets!”

“Magnets,” I repeated.

“Yup,” she said, grinning. “So think of Heaven as the positive and Hell is the negative. They constantly push against one another. That makes demons kind of like Dark Mages and they can feed off of suffering, especially their own. And since they’re immortal, well, it makes them superpowered.”

I frowned. “I see.” I glanced at Olivia. “A vampire just summed up the entire morality of the universe as a giant magnet. Now I’ve heard everything.”

Olivia crossed her arms and smirked. “Yeah, Yuri keeps things lively around here.”

Yuri burst out laughing. “Ha! Lively. That’s hilarious.” When I stared, she pointed at herself. “Undead vampire, get it?”

I rolled my eyes. “How is she supposed to help us get to Cole?”

Olivia smirked. “She’s going to get Luc to call off the monster attacks so that we can get the Dean’s guard down.”

Yuri’s eyes went wide. “What? No. I am so not talking to that asshole again. He—”

“Yuri,” Olivia warned. “You owe me, remember…? Oh, wait.” She chuckled at the insensitive joke. “I do love my puns today.”

Yuri frowned. “Just because you helped me forget about my Maker and the soul-crushing grief that comes with that can of blood-worms doesn’t mean I want to lie to a demon I’m already double-crossing.”

“Tell him it’s a challenge from me,” I said, straightening. “If he can lay off of the Academy for six months, then I’ll face him in Hell—alone. No mates. No one else. Just me and him. But I need time to prepare… and to say goodbye.”

No fucking way I was going to say goodbye to my guys, but it’s something an arrogant asshole like Lucifer would believe.

Yuri rubbed one of her tiny fangs. “Huh. He might go for that. He does love a good challenge.” She jumped to her feet. “All right. But you two better get all my friends out of there in one piece by the time this is over.” She tapped me on the nose, making me flinch. “That does not include the psycho-demon named Cole. I’ve got enough of those on my plate as it is.”

“Got it,” I murmured. She didn’t have to worry about Cole, because by the time I was done with him, he’d be on our side.

Hopefully.

Olivia showed Yuri back to the mirror which she spritzed with the black ooze again, sending the vampire on her way back to Hell.

“Six months,” Olivia repeated as she blew out a breath. She propped her hands on her hips and stared me down with golden eyes that suited her. “That runs into graduation. What are you planning?”

“The less you know, the better,” I said as I rubbed the back of my neck.

My mind raced through my plan. Graduation was the only time the founders made a visit to the Academy, which just might give me the distraction I needed to take out Calamity and Lucifer all in one fell swoop.

“I hope your plan works better than the last one,” she said with a smirk. “You know, the one where I was captured and you were trapped in Hell.”

“It has to work,” I said, the stone in my gut already sinking.

Because if I failed this time, we were all screwed.

Chapter 15

Olivia had picked up a few new tricks since I’d been gone. There weren’t any classes on how to be a Light Mage, so she was learning it on the fly. She’d taught herself how to mess with other people’s memories, which was how she’d gotten in good with the Dean in the first place and wiped my slate clean—for now, anyway.

She’d also touched on the gift of foresight that few mages ever gathered enough power to be able to do. Hendrik had endured a few visions for the sake of his clan, but I knew that came with a buttload of Blood Duty sacrifices and some illegal fights in the Monster Arena.

Olivia, though, had more than enough power at her disposal since she’d regained her soul, she could feed on