Page 46 of Fortune Academy: Year Three
Hendrik went still and glanced away. “Nothing.”
Wait. Did Hendrik actually look… guilty?
“Whoa whoa whoa,” I said, jumping to my feet and crowding him before he ran off on me. “You know something about Cole you’re not telling me. What is it?” When he didn’t answer I shoved him hard, earning a growl. “Tell me!”
“It’s not important,” he said through gritted teeth.
I gaped at him in disbelief. “You know something about Cole, the key to Calamity, saving the world…everything,and you say it’s not important? No. Fuck no.” I grabbed his head and shoved myself into his mind, searching for what I needed to know. “Tell. Me. Now!”
Hendrik roared when I hit a dark memory buried deep in his psyche, one he’d kept walled off from me with those onyx barriers he preferred.
Except this was a place I was never supposed to find.
The past unfurled in my mind in an instant, showing Hendrik with the other Dark Mages around a symbol of fire on the ground, chanting as they summoned…
“You summoned Cole?” I shrieked, launching away from him as he roared and took a swing at me. I dodged and snarled.
“It was before we were mated!” he cried, rage and pain evident on his face. “I didn’t know!”
Tears sprang to my eyes as he hurt me in the only way any of my Virtues could ever hurt me. Physical violence didn’t scare me, but this?
True betrayal.
It broke something inside of me that I knew would never mend.
“Youknewabout Cole? Youknewhow I could have completed the mate-circle before we nearlydiedin Hell? How could you? Why would you do that?”
The memory played out in my head even though I didn’t want to see any more. I’d already unlocked it and I witnessed Hendrik summoning a gorgeous, wicked demon with long bat-like wings and red eyes that promised murder and death. It cursed him with the sin of unrighteous wrath before Dante and the Dean managed to lock him up.
“Dante…” I whispered, holding my chest as if I could keep my heart from shattering. “He knew, too?”
That’s why my Dark Mage and the Hunter had gotten so close. They held a dirty, dark secret, one that would destroy everything we’d all built.
“Donotlook at me like that!” he roared, his pain and anger flashing in his eyes. “We didn’t know what you were to us, not at the time. All I knew was you were at the epicenter of the vision where everything ended. My clan. The world.Everything,Lily! If you mated with Cole… then it would have meant Calamity would be here and it would destroy us all. I didn’t know the vision… the vision that I saw…”
“The vision was if Ididn’tmate Cole,” I confirmed with gritted teeth. “You want a self-fulfilling prophecy? You’ve fucking got one.” I gathered my crumpled uniform and yanked it on, then turned to storm out and Hendrik gripped me by the arm—hard.
“Do not walk out on me. Not like this.”
I ripped myself free and punched him in the face. He lashed to the side as his lip split, sending blood splashing across the floor. “You can go fuck yourself, Hendrik. Or better yet, go fuck Dante. I don’t give a shit. You and me, we’re done.”
I knew my threat was empty the moment I said it, but I didn’t care, the anger inside of me blossomed with no end in sight and all I wanted to do was murder this bastard who dared to break my heart.
He’d tried to destroy everything. Cole had been here, right under my nose and I’d been too weak to feel him. Wherever he was imprisoned, it had taken my entire mate-bond to break through and find him. If Hendrik hadn’t summoned him… if he, Dante, and the Dean hadn’t locked him away, maybe I would have found him faster.
“Lily,” he persisted. “Don’t just—”
I snarled as I released my claws, slicing him across his chest and leaving streaks of blood. He growled and the air around us trembled as the scent of blood and roses overwhelmed my senses.
“Get out,” he warned. “Get the fuck out before I lose my patience and I do something I regret.”
“Don’t have to ask me twice, asshole,” I shot back as I ran out of his dorm and bolted down the stairs.
One of the Dark Mages let me outside and didn’t comment on my apparent rage. They were probably used to Hendrik having this effect on students by now.
When I walked out onto the campus, I let the tears come and they steamed down my heated face. The only hint that I wasn’t alone was a lingering black fog that trickled around my ankles, followed by a rumbling laughter from a demon who’d gotten exactly what he wanted.
Chapter 17
