Page 33 of Quiet Burn

Their version of damage control leaves everyone around them swimming in uncertainty.

“What happened, little dude?” I ask as Kit lowers himself into the chair next to me. His eyes dart around, as if already used to assessing what ears might be in the vicinity before he speaks. Shoulders slumped, he opens the bag to let Dottie scamper out and perch on my shoulder, an action that makes my pandapractically cheese in satisfaction. Trusting someone with your familiar is a much bigger deal than Kit realizes.

He chews on his lower lip, wincing when it splits open the freshly closed tear. His tongue darts out to catch the droplets of blood and my heart damn near stops. “Arms class was rougher than anticipated.”

No shit.

“I see that,” I murmur as I reach over to swipe my thumb over his chin to catch another blood drop. Grinning at him purposefully, I suck that digit into my mouth, but my cheeky gesture ends there when the taste explodes on my tongue. Before I even compute what’s happening, my skin fades to the black and white of my demon and my tail escapes. I know without looking that it’s fluffy as hell and whipping about at my feet.

“Salem!” Kit whispers in surprise, his hand landing on my arm to grip my bicep. “What the hell?!”

“Holy fuck, Salem,” Zavida adds as he walks up to us with his stuff. “Why are you?—”

I grit my teeth, trying to reason with both the demonandthe panda inside of me. My control has been solid since middle school due to our sadistic as fuck Hybrid Health & Safety teacher, so this is much more shocking than if Jas or Slash were doing it. The bigger, apex predators and mythicals have a much harder time with shifting and emotion, much like the heavily powered magic or demonic hybrids do with their powers. “I…”

Kit frowns, his eyes softening as he watches me struggling. “Did I do something wrong? I seem to be doing that a lot today. Frustrating people even when I’m actually trying to follow along.”

Shit. Shit. Shit.

“Kit Kat, you definitely didn’t do anythingwrong. My panda is… having a moment.” I give him a crooked smile, trying to mitigate my unusual display of public predatory behaviour. “Tell Zav and me what happened since it’s obvious no one else deigned to do so.”

He presses his lips together for a second, then looks at the kitsune, then back to me. “Um, okay. But… tell me if I’m making something worse, got it? I’m too damn tired to play games with people.”

“There’s the spark,” Zavida says quietly. His shy smile makes me snort a laugh, then cover it up when the guy we’re all obsessing over looks confused.

“You’re both being really fucking weird,” Kit mutters. “It’s making my hackles stand up, so knock it off.”

Waving my hand for him to continue, I beg my aroused as hell bear and demon to fuck off so I can focus.

He sighs, running his hand over his hair. “When Prince Ballsack got to class, he was definitely off. He assigned magic duels. Once he paired people, it was obvious he’d been instructed to keep the caliphate apart, and to give me an OP partner. Some dick named Furon that I have no idea how I eventually beat. I was kind of banged up, and Anton was upset. He contacted Jasper, I guess, so that when Slash showed up to escort me, he took me to my room and Dr. D came to patch me up privately.”

My inner fuckers lose their grip at that point and it’s all I can donottotally Hulk out in the half-filled classroom. Eyes flashing with the struggle, I look at Zav to see him pushing through his tails with sharp little fangs poking out of his mouth.

I’ll be damned; even the submissive guy is ready to rumble.

“Kit, why didn’t Slash simply take you to the office? It was closer.”

The unemerged demon’s eyes dart between the two of us and Ifeelhis anxiety spiking. His finger spins his ring quickly, a sure indication that he’s having as much trouble controlling the demons in his head as we are the supernatural ones in our bodies. “Look, I don’t want people to see me run for a doctor every time someone gets a lick in, okay? They already think I’m weak. They think I’m your… shared boy toy. If I don’t show backbone when it’s rough, I’ll end up in a room with bad intentions and no Jasper to help me escape this time.”

“He’s not wrong, Salem,” Zavida murmurs. “Hell is enormous, and Discordia is rumored to be full of hidden spots, portals, and passageways we don’t have a handle on yet. He has to be seen getting tougher as people accept our public claiming and induction of him, or they will continue to come for him—even if it’s for nothing more than the clout.”

I frown. The kitsune is definitely the expert on that, so I can’t argue. He’s the smallest and least over-powered of our caliphate—or was until Kit Kat. He and X have been targeted in the past, and they both had to show the rich assholes in our schools that they would give as good as they got, if not worse. “You’re right; I just…”

Kit ducks his head, muttering, “It hurts my fucking soul to admit this, so don’t get used to it, but I don’t think Jasper is to blame this time.”

My jaw drops and I burst into laughter, something that helps calm my raging emotions a bit. “Holy fuckbuckets, KK. I shouldhop upstairs and buy one of those human lottery tickets, then a jacket.”

“A jacket?” His brows furrow as he tilts his head and looks at me in confusion.

“I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a really cold day today in our slice of paradise.” His amused grin as he gets my drift makes my chest do that weird flutter I get when my souffles come out perfect, and my bear puffs up inside.

I want him to make that face all the time—it’s my new obsession.

Lit and Intro toFae both go by with little issue. Oriel, Anton, and Slash have Fae with us, so the gang’s almost all here when we close up our stuff to head out for the day. X has class for the next two hours, but Jasper will meet us back at the dorm to wait until dinner. Normally, on Friday night Kit would get sent to the Hacker Collective with Zavida, but since they’ve aced all our stress relief activities, that’s off the table. The kid’s looking even rougher now than he did earlier, and I suppose his supe healing is really taking it out of him. Dr. D probably did as little as possible to hide the magical signature of someone else's healing, especially since Kit didn’t want anyone to know he’d seen a physician.

“Come on, little lady,” I say to Dottie as I stand up and stretch. She chitters happily, and Kit nods as if to say it’s fine if the kinkajou catches a ride on me. “Where are we headed, guys?”

Oriel looks thoughtful for a moment, his glittering eyes skating around the small, floral scented classroom full of vegetation. “I think we should walk around for a minute and review the stuff in here.”

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