Zodiac Academy Fated Throne - Caroline Peckham Page 0,130

what he'd been before. But everything about him had me feeling so confused as fear and pain mixed with hope and longing and it was too much for me to cope with all at once.

Right now I needed to just get through the week and perfect the shadow mask I had to wear. Because come Friday night I was heading back to the palace and I was going to need to fool the worst monster of them all. Lionel Acrux was my priority at the moment.

Darius was going to have to wait.

M y first few weeks at Zodiac had been freaking intense. I’d made it through Hell Week and soon had The Reckoning coming up which I was studying my ass off for. I barely had time to chill out and the fact that I’d brought my Xbox with me to the academy was kind of laughable now. Any free time I had I spent flying with my new herd. And shit, it was the best fucking thing I’d ever known. Being around my kind, soaring through the clouds and feeling as free as a damn eagle was unbelievable. If it wasn’t for my father being the absolute asshole of the year forcing all of the Orders to stay apart, I would have said this time had been perfect.

I didn’t care that I worked my ass off from dawn ‘til nightfall. I didn’t care that I was exhausted and waking up early was brutal in comparison to the lazy mornings I’d been used to. I had a purpose now. And freedom that made me grab life by the balls because part of me feared how long it would last. I only got four years at Zodiac, then who knew what kind of life Father would design for me beyond that? I just hoped it didn’t get that far. That Darius, the Heirs and the twins would find a way to bring him down, because we were all screwed if not.

It was difficult to see the other spares, but we made it work. All of us but Ellis anyway who seemed more concerned about breaking the law than the others. Athena, Grayson, Hadley and I had found some unused caves out in Earth Territory which we met up in as much as possible. Athena and Grayson had brought a bunch of blankets and lumen crystals for light to make it comfier, and me and Hadley had carved a few roughly hewn seats out of the rock with our earth magic.

I sat on one now, the four of us having preferred to eat our lunch here instead of at The Orb where the K.U.N.T.s watched our every move. The place wasn’t very busy these days and I reckoned a lot of the other students had the same idea. I hoped most of the Fae here weren’t abiding to my father’s new law, but it was hard to say. The problem was, I couldn’t work out anyone’s allegiance. So I made sure I only spent time with the few people I trusted. And it turned out, once I’d let slip that I didn’t approve of my father’s shit, these guys had agreed.

Athena was floating on a cloud of air near the cave roof while Hadley gazed up at her in frustration. He’d tried to bite her again and I was pretty sure she loved evading him.

“What if you just did it as a favour to me?” Hadley called up to her. “I won’t hunt you. Just help a friend out.”

“Bite Gray if you want a taste of Wolf,” Athena called, hanging herself upside down and spiralling through the air toward us.

Hadley growled and leapt up to try and catch her hair, using his strength to throw himself higher. She spun up and away from him again with a taunting laugh.

“If you wanna bite me, you’ll have to fight me for it,” Grayson said where he was lying on a blanket, tapping out something on his Atlas.

“I don’t want you,” Hadley muttered, pacing beneath Athena. “All of her taunting sparks the hunger in me.”

“Tut tut, Had, you’re not supposed to get yourself caught up in the hunt,” Athena teased.

“Get down here and say that to my face,” Hadley dared and Athena lowered herself to the ground like she was about to do just that. Hadley immediately shot toward her, crashing into an air shield that made him fly backwards and hit the ground on his ass. I broke a laugh, whinnying at his attempts.

“For