Shadowborn Academy_ Year One (Dark Fae Academy #1) - G. Bailey Page 0,56

tightly. “I’m just questioning your intelligence.”

It only makes him laugh as he starts drawing a complicated sketch in the air between us. At the start, I only feel trickles of dark magic, but as soon as the spell is done, it’s like a vacuum sucks every ounce of dark magic from my core, and I suspect Jonah feels the same, if the groan he lets out is any indication. I hold onto his hand and it feels like a lifeline until the spell works and we both gasp for air.

Silver light burns my eyes as I look up to the wisp floating in the air. It hovers for a long moment before it floats away and Jonah all but knocks me to the side as he jumps up to follow it.

Crawling off the log, I chase after them through the forest for what feels like ages until we reach a small river running beneath a stone bridge. The wisp stops in the middle of the bridge and then disappears from sight. Jonah waits for me at the start of the bridge but he doesn’t take a step onto it. The bridge is low and dark underneath with ivy crawling all over it. The river all but trickles below and it might be safer to get our feet wet than test the strength of the rotting stone of the bridge.

“You have to be kidding me,” Jonah grumbles, sounding a mixture of disappointed and horrified.

“What is it?” I ask.

“This is a darkness troll bridge. Not just any troll either.” He turns and glares at the bridge like it’s a living thing. “They must have chosen this because no one in their right mind would go in there as a team.”

Confused, I cross my arms and look between Jonah and the bridge. “Well, what do we need to do?”

“You don’t want to know,” he growls and glances at the ground, whispering under his breath. “Why does it have to be her?”

“Come on, it can’t be that bad,” I say, tilting my head at him. “Just tell me what I need to do.”

“All right then. The darkness trolls find clothes offensive according to the book I read on them, and only when you strip off can you walk into the darkness below the bridge and take the prize,” he explains. “If you wear clothes, you never leave the darkness and they’ll eat your soul up for supper.”

“I bet the prize is a clue,” I grumble, unfolding my arms and placing my hands on my hips. “Because you’re right, it is a good place to hide one and no one in their right mind would look for a clue in this place. But I doubt the wisp is wrong. The clue must be hiding in there.”

Pitch’s anger pulsing through my veins is as good a confirmation as any.

“Yeah,” Jonah sighs, messing his hair again. “We both don’t have to do it. I can get the clue for us.”

I shake my head. “I don’t trust you not to tell me the clue once you find it.”

“Well, fuck you, I don’t trust you either. Fine, fuck, we need to go in together.” He shrugs his cloak off his shoulders and starts to undo the buttons on his shirt. “Don’t you dare look.”

“Same goes for you, but the difference is, I don’t want to look,” I snap, unclipping my own cloak. I let it puddle around my ankles, followed by my shirt, and then I kick my shoes off. I feel more nervous by the second as I strip off my bra, and the cold air makes everything a little too perky. My knee-high socks and panties are last and I leave them on the pile before I cover myself up with my hands and look at Jonah. His back is to me, leaving me no choice but to run my eyes over the corded muscles and a strange tattoo of two wings and a symbol in the middle of them. It looks familiar. Of course, I have no self-control and I gulp as I eye up his firm ass. Why are the bad guys always so hot?

“You’re looking,” he grumbles without glancing over, though his usually scornful voice is filled with something I don’t expect.

Desire.

“You know what, Jonah? I’m not even sorry. You can look at my ass too, if you like,” I tease as I walk towards the water. I hear his mixture of curse words as I tiptoe into the freezing water, cringing with every