Rafe swaggered toward the stage, making sure every step was poised and loud with assurance.Ahead of him was a mask of coolness, an icy tint in those emerald eyes. He didn’t know what the problem was, but something told him it was personal.Very personal.“The missing prodigal son,” Dylan spoke blandly as they now stood before each other.Rafe snorted. “You’re gonna get all chatty with me of all people?”“I have a bone to pick with you, yes.”He knew it.“Really?” he gave her a once-over. “I barely know you, but if last more than thirty seconds, I’ll let you break a few.”The Apollo responded with narrowed eyes.“Begin!”Not a breath was wasted.Dylan gestured at Rafe with a finger gun, giving the latter the signal to simply tilt his head to the right and avoid a thin ray of light. The projectile exploded in brilliant fashion behind him, the heat caressing his back like warm hands.He grinned prior to zipping away, narrowly dodging several more beams.Rafe sprinted, ducked, and rolled

A wet, lukewarm sensation on his face greeted Rafe as his eyes struggled to open. Though, instead of the sizzling agony he’d expected to wake up to, it was cool and admittedly pleasant.It didn’t mean he was any less freaked out because when his vision unblurred, the sight of a large, furry, whiskered face with small, beady, and unblinking eyes amid a black mask welcomed him. Its arm, long, mechanical, and definitely looking like it shouldn’t be attached to it moved up and down as it wiped his face down with a wet cloth.Whatever the substance was, it wasn’t water, but it was soothing.“I’ve had strange nightmares before, but this certainly is new,” he muttered to himself, laying still on what he realized was a maroon bean bag. “This place is fucking with my head.”“You don’t say?”That made him wince. Suppressing a gasp, he turned his head to the left to find Bones sitting some feet away, tinkering with a couple of metal parts and tools at his desk near the window.“Y-You? But what h

“So, is this a sleepover party, or…?” Blond Fohawk, who Andre learned was named ‘Niall’ while being dragged to a whole other island, drawled, slouched against the red velvet couch across from the young wolf.Yeah. Fortunately for Andre, he knew he was still in the Ash Lands, but unfortunately, they were far from the Ironward campus. Its familiar scent of sand and rosé forestry gradually lessened in potency as he was smuggled blindfolded across a quarter of the archipelago.Now, he found himself tied up with anti-magical binds­, as Caid called it, in an admittedly comfortable wing chair, eyes anxiously flitting between the three vampires and the fancy living room he was in. Honestly, he wasn’t expecting anything less. It was impressive how vain vampires could be.“What do you mean ‘sleepover’?” Caid balked. “This is the bait-and-kill­ method I told you about. The puppy’s friends will eventually notice he’s gone and’ll come running. Then, the moment they find him, we’ll leap from the sh

Tiny, black ants crept ever so slowly across her arms and back. That was the best way to describe the current state of Lindsay Warlane’s nerves as she anxiously maneuvered through the large space of Ironward Academy’s main building. Seriously, who could find anything in this place? Not only was she a dainty, little thirteen-year-old freshman, but she was surrounded by older, mean-looking upperclassmen who paraded around in massive groups, obviously knowing the ins and outs of the place and were probably internally laughing that the first-years getting lost like lambs.Lindsay sighed and brushed her blue hair back, trying to calm herself in some way. It had been cool in elementary school, using magic to dye it indigo because she loved the beach as a kid, hoping to reflect its waves in her style, but now there were girls with snakes for hair – the gorgons – and others that could literally shift into gorgeous-looking animals. She wondered if there were any liger-“You lost?”Despite the