Page 4 of Fortune Fae Academy
As well as arrogance.
Every Alpha I’d faced in the WebRing had underestimated me. Arrogance had been their downfall. And when I’d fed on their Dust, I’d reveled in the fear that looked at me through their catlike eyes.
Amell might be an Elder, but he held similarities to those Alphas I had gone up against before.
This was just a new battle. A new challenge for me to overcome.
“What deal?” Seifiek asked. While it was out of place for him to speak, he was still an Alpha.
And, apparently, couldn’t be killed. Not by me, not by Amell, not by anyone except for a timeline that possibly led to his death when he faced off with Roderik.
Given the path Roderik now walked, he and Etu were probably the only entities capable of killing Seifiek.
Amell had shown his cards, though. He didn’t want aimless death.
He cared about his precious “pure” timeline. And since we were wildcards, he was treading carefully.
He was running hisexperiments.
Amell surprised me by answering. “There are two deals in play. Your Omega made a deal for your lives. Or more specifically, that the Elders do not kill anyone in your mate-circle.” He shrugged. “She didn’t say anything about anyoneelsekilling one of you.”
I huffed a humorless laugh. “You think she’ll honor any deal if one of us dies, even by other means? She promised to help you discover Etu’s divinity, or lack thereof, in exchange for our lives.”
He spun a rune, lighting up a number of threads from the Web. “You show your ignorance, Axel. Let me offer you a private lesson since you’ve skipped so many of your classes.” He tugged at the threads, sending one of them choking off my air.
Because the thread was attached to me.
“Right now, I’m pulling on the deal you made with me. I can see it just like any future. And like the future, I have power over those attached to it.”
A fresh growl rumbled in my chest. While he couldn’t see my future, I’d done a disservice to myself by making a deal with him and giving him something he could sink his teeth into.
There was nothing an Alpha enjoyed more than having something to lock their jaw around.
A flicker of a smile lifted his lips as he continued hislesson. “Lucifer, the powerful Hell Fae King I’m sure you’ve heard of, isn’t the only one capable of making binding deals. Fortune Fae are uniquely bound by their promises through the Web. It’s impossible to break a deal forged by Dust. As with Lucifer, deals are linked to our very souls.”
My chest constricted and I slapped a hand over my heart as I struggled to breathe. While I cursed myself, I also feared for my Omega. I’d been the one to place the binding collar around her neck. Amell already had far too much control over her, and by Tunneling her into the Collegium, she’d felt obliged to step in to save our lives.
She’d succeeded, for now, but that would cost her by providing Amell with even more control over our mate-circle.
Overher.
My vision flashed with silver as I struggled against the binding noose of the deal I’d made with Amell.
Come to think of it, I’d made a deal with Roderik, too. Although, I hadn’t paid attention to the exact language I’d used with him.
I knew the general result of the deal had been twofold. I would provide him with a dose of my mate-amplifying toxin to allow him to mate one new Omega at a time, and in return, he would ensure that Etu couldn’t reach my mate-circle.
Well, apparently sending us under the thumbs of the Elders had accomplished his side of the deal.
I definitely should have asked for more.
And then the other side of the deal had been to place Amell’s control collar on Gina to make sure that the Elders didn’t kill us.
I had made the poor assumption that Roderik had some sort of understanding with the Elders. It wasn’t like that at all.
Roderik had no control over the Elders. I’d been naive to think he had. He’d made the deal anyway, though, at the risk of angering the Web. He’d likely assumed that one of us would strike a new deal for our lives.
Or he’d seen the future well enough to know he would be able to come out on top with that deal.
