Magic Trials (Half-Blood Academy #1)- Meg Xuemei X Page 0,24

had all sorts of battle powers, including summoning storms in the battlefield.

No one had ever said they could read minds.

But then I’d tasted Axel’s compulsion.

I’d better put on an extra mental shield when they were around.

Theodore paused in his speech. I wondered if he’d been reading the same script over and over about the gods’ glory shining upon us and that we were so lucky to be chosen to receive the Blood Runes, which had created the elite gods’ army and culled the unworthy for generations.

“Get a hold of yourself, Axel,” Paxton hissed in a hushed voice from his throne.

“Or what?” Axel asked lazily, and then they were glaring at each other.

I wondered if the demigods picked fights with each other a lot.

Paxton had lost interest in making me kneel, but I still refrained from wiping the beads of sweat off my nose. My palms were also soaked in cold sweat after my efforts to resist his bullying power.

Axel stopped laughing after he spotted his priest’s bewildered look.

“Don’t mind me, good Theodore,” the Demigod of War waved a hand. “Proceed and get them initiated according to the list of the names I gave you.”

My heart rammed into my ribcage. Would he make me go first?

Theodore nodded dutifully. “As you wish, Demigod Axel.” He surveyed us without interest and asked routinely, “Any questions?”

My eyes immediately brightened. This was my last chance.

I threw up two hands and shouted, “I have a question!” just in case he didn’t see my hands.

Theodore looked surprised and not even a little bit pleased.

No one had ever asked him a question before? They couldn’t just go along with whatever he said, right? What about free thinking?

And it was life and death in this ritual!

“Yes?” he asked in a clipped tone, and I forgave his baleful expression.

“I’m curious,” I said. “How do you detect who has a god’s DNA in them? Don’t you want to perform a blood test first so you’ll have a higher success rate getting the type of soldiers you want? Also so you won’t drag a human into this mess and get him or her killed because he or she is just a human?”

“We don’t drag humans into this sacred temple,” Theodore said sternly. “A blood test, however, can’t detect a god’s genes in a candidate. We have our own method of locating prospective Dominion soldiers, which isn’t your concern or for your ear. Now if you’re done, be quiet and wait for your turn, initiate.” His tone said I was done.

But I wasn’t. Cameron had mentioned that they’d used a psychic ball to search for supernaturals. But the magic device had only found Jasper and Circe.

“Your psychic ball didn’t see me,” I said. “I’m not even on the chart of Dominion prospects. Demigod Axel brought me here by mistake. I think we should probably correct that before the ritual starts. There’s no need to get messy.”

The entire hall hushed to a complete silence. No one, to my knowledge, had ever accused a demigod of making a mistake, but this was my only chance to get the hell out of here.

It was now or never.

It wasn’t simply the terror of death that made me fight either. Every fiber in me rebelled against the idea of having any outside force, like that ritual dagger, touch me or test me, as if I had a built-in failsafe and it screamed for me to run and never return.

Reflecting on it, I wondered if Vi might have known something about me. Maybe that was why she’d drilled it into my head to stay far away from any demon’s or demigod’s path at all costs.

I’d holed up in Crack until today, until both a demon and a demigod had shown up, and then shit just blew up.

I heard nasty growls. They were probably from Axel.

I avoided looking at him but gazed at the sky demigod hopefully. Among the three of them, he seemed the most sensible. He’d opened his eyes and learned forward on his throne to listen to me.

“I’m one hundred percent human,” I hurried on. “I don’t have an ounce of divine blood in me, not even remotely. Please dismiss me. If you want, you can send me to the Other Academy. I won’t tell a soul about any of this. I swear. And as you can see, I haven’t seen anything yet.”

“Why did you bring a human into this, Axel?” Paxton turned his violet gaze on the war demigod with great displeasure. “You know the Half-Blood