Page 1 of Underworld
Fortune Academy was most definitely not how I remembered it. Gothic towers spanned a blood-moon horizon and set the tone for my future, one where I had come back from the dead.
All I wanted to do was to see my Virtues, but there was one Virtue in particular who I definitely needed to see first.
Cole.
His name rolled through my mind over and over again, a mantra of my untamed Virtue, the one who had abandoned me in Purgatory… but now he was here. I was sure of it. The thrum of his rage through my Virtue bonds burned hot, a tangible flame that had been left untethered and unchecked during my absence.
When I was dead.
A minor technicality.
Clenching my fists, I followed Yuri past the gates into my new home.
Fortune Academy Underworld.
A place where Fortune Academy and Monster Academy merged and supernaturals banned together from both sides of the coin. My mother had created Monster Academy, and she was also one of Fortune Academy founders. Maybe she knew this day would come where the two would merge and each had a place in the spiraling web of my life.
When did things get so complicated?
I took careful steps as I followed Yuri down the broken streaks. Destruction ran its course through the seams along the burgundy cobblestones, searing hot with hellfire that the peppy vampire ahead of me seemed oblivious of, other than her skipping steps evading the worst of the cracks.
Her skirt bounced as she walked. She glanced back at me and smiled, her blood-dipped lollipop sticking out between her lips as she winked. “This place is so cool, right?”
The campus stretched out like a bad omen. “Cool” wasn’t exactly the word I’d use to describe it. Black, monstrous towers that gleamed as if tempered in flame, only to be forged as a glistening, impenetrable fortress made for an army, a kingdom, rather than an Academy.
Perhaps this place was both.
My Kingdom.
My home.
The undeniable claim my heart settled on this place rolled through me. “Yeah, it’s cool,” I finally agreed as Yuri led me into the crowded streets where students gave us a wide berth.
The weight at my back made it painfully obvious that I wasn’t like them. I wasn’t a simple supernatural creature with a single bloodline or a finite source of power.
No, I was a tribrid, reborn with my angel-third unlocked, crowned as a Princess of Hell and the Champion of the Third Echo of Calamity.
No pressure.
Well, I didn’t technically have a crown. Not yet, anyway. That would be super dope, though.
“Where are the guys?” I asked, referring to my Virtues. They would be my anchors, and considering the amount of burning rage that seeped through my chest, I knew they weren’t doing well. I needed to be their anchor, too. Did they really think I was dead? Gods, I hoped not.
“You’ll have to ask Olivia,” she said, plucking her candy out of her mouth with apop. “She keeps tabs on them. They’re a handful, I’ll have you know. Far more trouble than they’re worth.”
“Noted,” I mumbled as I kept pace with her, my back already aching as I used new muscles to keep the massive weights on my shoulderblades off the streets.
I paused when a shadow swept across my feet. My heart jumped into my throat as a mixture of anticipation and fear streaked through me. Glancing up, I found a peculiar barrier that surrounded the campus. It rolled with multi-color waves as if the sky had been splashed with oil.
Before I could ask Yuri about the barrier, the shadow came again, this time with an unmistakable silhouette of wings tipped with deadly talons.
Cole.
There you are.
My rage demon thought that he could stalk me, instill fear in my heart and make me cower at his feet.
The old Lily might have been bullied into submission.
