Page 142 of Academy of the Wicked, Year Two

The word hangs in the air, heavy with implications that make my blood run cold. This isn't just an attack. This is astrategy. And we are nothing more than pieces being moved across a board whose rules we've yet to fully understand.

Nikki simply smiles, the expression so fucking sad, it breaks my heart.

It's not the kind of smile that brings joy or even mild amusement.

This is a smile carved from pure, distilled pain—the sort of expression that suggests someone has been broken so thoroughly that laughter becomes the only possible response to absolute devastation.

"I love you," Nikki whispers, "but I was too fucking chicken to admit that... because I didn't want them to hurt you. Ruin you. To set this up for you like they always do to anyone who dares come close to me, the apparent heir."

The words aren't just a confession. They're a map of a war I'm only beginning to understand. A conflict that extends far beyond our little bond group, beyond the academy, into realms of power and politics I can barely comprehend.

The mockery in her laugh is a razor blade, cutting through the heavy silence of this desecrated space.

Each sound is a fragment of something shattered beyond repair— hope, dignity, the very essence of who she is. Or was. I'm not even sure anymore.

How long has this been happening?

The thought strikes me with sudden, horrible clarity. In what feels like mere days —but could be months or even years in this fucked-up temporal nightmare of an academy— Nikki has been suffering.

Alone.

While we were busy trying to survive our own trials, she was enduring a systematic destruction I can barely comprehend.

"Why didn't you tell us you were getting bullied by Damien?" The question emerges more broken than I intended, a whisper of guilt and rage mixing into something toxic.

Her response is a wound unto itself.

"Because it's my punishment for hurting you."

Those tired eyes look up at me, and for a moment, I'm struck by how much pain can exist in a single gaze. She takes me in, her expression shifting to concern —concern, when she's the one stripped bare, humiliated beyond human dignity— and asks who hurt me.

The absurdity is so complete it would be funny if it weren't so horrifying.

Tears form without my permission.

"Did I hate what you did? Fucking yes," I whisper, the words emerging with a fury that seems to change something fundamental about my very being. "But for you to be stripped, humiliated, beat, drenched with every fucking thing...that's not fucking deserved, Nikki!"

I don't realize I'm screaming. Don't realize I've shifted to Gabriel.

The anger is a living thing, consuming me from the inside out. These Fae gathered to commemorate her destruction like some twisted celebration, and the rage inside me wants nothing more than to make them suffer. To destroy them in ways that would make their current existence look like mercy.

Most of them are already walking dead, a voice in my head snarls.And they dare do this to one of their own?

The ground trembles with my fury. Literally. Not a metaphor. Pure, unadulterated rage manifests as physical force.

"Did they touch you?" The question is a demand, a knife pressed against the throat of reality.

Silence.

Cassius's voice cuts through like a blade of ice. "Nikolai. Did they rape you?"

More silence. A silence so complete it becomes a sound of its own—a roar of unspoken horror.

"Untie her," I huff, my body shaking so violently one would think I'm having a seizure. If I weren't so weak, I'd do it myself. But Zeke and Mortimer move with swift precision, freeing her from the shambles.

The wounds are worse than I initially comprehended.

Each mark is a testament to a cruelty that defies human understanding. My heart hammers against my chest, a desperate rhythm that seems to screamno, no, NOwith each beat.

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