Page 57 of The Goddess is Angry
Is that was this was? Church thought George was just messing with us for shits and giggles and was going to fuck off with Azren in the end? I grabbed Church and gave him a very straight kiss on the mouth to get his attention.
“Listen, butthead. She might not be a witch, but she’s still a part of Oscar’s coven, my pride, andyourhive. So is Azren. She’s happy with that and she knew it when she took up with us. George has never corrected me when I’ve called her my lioness or part of my pride.”
“She still should have toldusbefore she told everyone.”
I still didn’t get how none of them guessed before now. Like, it was pretty fucking obvious.
“She planned on it. Then Oscar got hurt. Just hear her out, man.”
“Can I have five minutes to just be upset? I’ll hear her out, but I just need to be alone for a bit. And you can’t kiss me like that and say you’re totally straight.”
“Don’t take too long. And I didn’t use tongue, so it was a totally straight kiss.”
I needed to run back to George’s dorm. She didn’t need me to protect her physically but emotionally was another story.
george
Holy shit. I hadn’t really planned how I was going to take my necklace off, but in my head, I told the people I cared about before I told the entire world. Dexter wasn’t the only one filming, but he was the only one who was going to ask me before he posted it. It was all out there now and since Kaylee and Lindsay decided to be as stupid as possible and land themselves life sentences, it was probably viral by now.
My whole life, I’d been worried about what another god was going to do when the necklace came off. Now, I was terrified I’d permanently ruined my relationships with everyone but Azren and West. Oscar got hurt because Kaylee thought that potion would do something to me. Ren was probably furious about that. Drake had been paranoid since I met him over this exact scenario. It was a violation and the only reason it happened was me. Church had been all in from the start and now he wouldn’t even look at me.
I knew Ren and Oscar needed to talk. West left to follow Church. Azren pulled Drake aside. Matilda did a twin check and as much as I needed her right now, I didn’t need my sister fucking up my boyfriends because they didn’t like my explanation.
So, I was alone in my dorm room slowly going insane. It had probably only been five minutes since West left, but it felt like an eternity. Lindsay and Kaylee’s assets were going to be seized and distributed to everyone that potion harmed and Drake, since they stole his genetic material. Losing all the money and the big house she had from the spell she stole from Minerva and the job plenty of people would kill to have was probably the best revenge anyone could get on those two, but I should have nipped this in the bud ages ago.
Drake was the first person to make it to my dorm room. Drake and I started out rocky, but I loved our relationship now. I desperately didn’t want to lose Drake. He was grinning at me, so maybe this wasn’t a bad thing.
“Drake, I’m—”
“You don’t need to apologize to me about this. I grew up around Azren, remember? I’m not mad you’re really a god. I’m kind of pissed I didn’t figure it out. IknowAzren and Loki figured out how to shapeshift into regular, supernatural creatures. Azren told me you’re too young to know how to do that and Lilith gave you a necklace. Honestly, thank you for not embarrassing me when I was being a dick to you. It would have been mortifying if I had been causing a scene and you played the god card. Azren probably would have. They’ve perfected their resting bitch face, but they have limits.”
“Don’t you want to know why?”
Drake shrugged.
“It won’t change anything for me because I’m not mad. It’s probably just as good a reason as when Azren did it.”
I still wanted to explain, but I had other chances. Ren and Oscar came to my dorm before I could say anything else to Drake. Oscar still looked pale and shaken, but Ren came over and wrapped me in a massive hug.
“Thank you. There were about a dozen ways you could have kept your secret, but you wouldn’t have been able to heal Oscar.”
“Don’t thank me, Ren. Oscar wouldn’t have gotten hurt if they knew that potion wouldn’t have done anything to me.”
“Maybe not,” Drake said. “Azren tells me things. All gods have a weakness. It could be anything, but people have found them and killed gods before. It’s not that hard to find those stories. They could just as easily hurt us and other people trying to figure out what that is.”
“That’s dark, man,” Oscar said.
“He’s not wrong,” Ren said. “They aren’t operating with a full deck. Everyone knows the consequences of using that kind of potion. She didn’t hide and throw it where George and Oscar couldn’t identify who did it. Kaylee did it in front of the entire student body and a good bit of the faculty and her mom never told her that was a shitty idea. That’s the kind of delusion we are dealing with here.”
“Please don’t talk about that outside this dorm,” I pleaded. “I did this because I didn’t want to watch anyone else getting hurt, but I’m going to have a lot of legacy students pissed off at me and acting like it’s my fault Lindsay Krauss is in jail. They all got in because of their name, but they have the same amount of strikes and GPA rules as everyone else or they’ll get kicked out.
“Their only hope of graduating was a headmaster who bends the rules. Most of them are going to be nepotism hires at their family companies. They aren’t here to find the mates fate wants them to have but to get handfasted with people who should have been business connections. Most of them have trust funds that are contingent on graduating. They are going to be mad at me.”
“They aren’t as reckless as Kaylee and Lindsay,” Drake said.
I had to warn them because it might not just be students after me. I explained the reason behind my necklace and why Lilith gave it to me. I told them I was either related to, or met all the gods still living on this realm and they didn’t share that view on born gods, but if one was on campus killing witches, I couldn’t say if they’d come for me now.
I also told them Azren helped me figure out what my magic was, so the Academy of the Profane was exactly where I needed to be, but other gods might not like it. They didn’t look scared. Drake just yawned and stretched on my bed.
