Page 16 of The Goddess is Fierce
This was my chance to fuck up for real and have a true Academy of the Profane experience like my mom did because I was about to learn things I’d never done before.
oscar
. . .
So far, Azren and Zion were the only professors who didn’t acknowledge George had just come out as a god. Azren already knew, and I knew they wouldn’t because they wanted her to feel normal. Zion would have been just as shocked as everyone else. Zion and the internet were a terrible mix, and I was guessing he didn’t use the internet at all, but people had literally been talking about it all day. Magical combat was my last class of the day. Zion would have heard about it in one of his earlier classes.
Zion Skinner didn’t do a damned thing any of our other professors did all day. All of them kissed her ass and then theyspent the rest of class expecting her to know the answer to everything. I knew the answer and had my hand up. A lot of students did, but the professors wouldn’t call on us. When it came to the practical portion of class, she had to do it first.
It was uncomfortable as fuck and it wasn’t even happening to me. I was grateful to Zion. He treated her just like he did before Yule break. Zion treated her just like the rest of us. Which was honestly kind of insulting in this endearing way. If one of us did anything amazing, he just told us it was passable and we might not die in a magic fight. Dude seriously said that to my girlfriend, a literal god.
We were all on the dodgeball field for practice before dinner. It was going to be a beast of a practice. It was still freezing cold out and the field was covered in snow. I wasreallyhoping I didn’t end up face first in that shit. I was trying to stretch and warm up while avoiding getting it on me. I was from California. I didn’tdosnow. West was going to have to rethink his whole naked thing because our first game was coming up.
I was watching George while we warmed up. We were late to breakfast becauseallof our families called. Ren’s sister was stalking us on social media. She saw the video where George got outed. Hana immediately told her parents, who walked over and told my Abuela. My Abuela was close with West’s moms, so she called them.
They all blew up our phone to ask if the video was real and we were seriously dating a god. My Abuela was signing like a mad woman on video chat telling me not to fuck this up because not only was this girl a god, but shelikedher. My Abuela loved Ren, too, but she wanted grandbabies, preferably with someone I loved who was in my coven.
Then we all had to chat once Church came home to change. We decided we weren’t going to treat her any differently. West said she didn’t want that and the rest of the students werealready going to do that. By the time we got to the dining hall, she was putting the beat-down on Eugene because he did. Then, I watched her getting treated differently by most of our professors. It was stupid. I was glad we could count on Azren and Zion to just be normal.
Zion was pacing, and he finally addressed us.
“We have a problem. Some little fucking pissant from Misty Vale got scared by the footage the cheerleaders have been posting of our practices. He knows we are going to beat their asses in two weeks. The sniveling little skid mark has raised a complaint over a video that went viral because our Team Witch isn’t exactly a witch.”
Mother fucker. What a whiner. George stood and bowed her head.
“Sorry,” she mumbled. “I’ll go.”
“You sit your ass down,” Zion growled. “I’ve been watching you play most of the semester and I’ve talked to your daddy. You haven’t been using any more strength than any of the vampires and I haven’t seenanythingfrom you that I haven’t seen on the field before. Your dad says you’re a mimic, so you are actuallydoingwitchcraft, just like the little asshole who doesn’t want to go up against you.
“Your dad, your tutor, the board, and myself have all written a letter to the college dodgeball league in response to the letter I got. If you little ankle biters could raise a stink on that social media thing, that would be great. Georgedeservesto play with this team. She’s an amazing player, and she’s supportive of this team.”
Dexter already had his phone out of his sweatshirt pocket and the cheerleaders were spilling onto the field. West was coming down and so were the dodgeball fans who came out to watch every practice. Belladonna and Matilda were co-captains of the cheerleading squad, but they also had pretty big socialmedia followings and the vampires ended up liking Belladonnamuchbetter once she got the stick out of her ass.
There were a ton of thirsty bitches just waiting for West to drop a shirtless selfie. Ren, Church, and I had decent followings, but nowhere near as big as the rest of our group. Matilda, Mags, Belladonna, and West had their phones out like they were ready to go to war.
“What do you need us to do?” Belladonna asked.
Matilda just tossed her hair over her shoulder and was furiously typing.
“You just leave it to me. Watch for my post and follow my lead.”
Drake didn’t really do social media. Most of his followers were back on the Netherworld. He wrapped George up in a huge hug because she probably needed one right now.
There was one thing I knew about Matilda Bell. Her twin sisterwouldbe on the dodgeball team when all was said and done.
george
. . .
Ihadn’t even thought someone might try to kick me off the dodgeball team when I took my necklace off. Everyone had my back. I knew the dodgeball team, and the cheerleaders did because they really liked me. The rest of them could have either wanted a favor or just knew I could help the team win because a lot of them had never spoken to me before.
After dinner, I just really needed to clear my head. Iwantedto spend time with my guys, but I also wanted an hour to just take a walk in the snow. I promised I’d visit them when I got back. Honestly, I didn’t put much stock in gods and their walkabouts, but sometimes, I just really wanted to go for a walk.Like, just a few miles away from my house, not wandering the globe and realms. It always cleared my head.
I found myself walking toward the staff cabins. I wasn’t looking for Azren, though. I never walked to theirs. I always portalled so no one suspected we were together. Azren’s cabin wasn’t even in this direction. I was looking for Baldur and I didn’t even know where he was staying.
Most of the cabins had these adorable porches out front. I found him sitting on a chair in front of one. I took the other chair.
“How are you doing?” he asked. “The students have been talking about you all day. The professors have been, too.”
