Starlight Mates. All Rights Reserved. 2024.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental and formed by this author’s imagination. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Edited by Polished Perfection

Created with Vellum

Dedication

For the people who think they aren’t enough and hide from the world.

Don’t let the monster in your mind win.

Description

They shouldn’t want me.

I rejected them and ran…and I’ll find a way to escape again.

I grew up knowing three important facts.

One, my parents hated Nexus shifters.

Two, I was taught everyone should be scared of me, and they should be.

Three, I’m a monster.

I’m a Nexus, a powerful shifter bonded to five other souls…only I rejected them all at the mating ceremony and ran away with my parents when I was fifteen.

After five years on the run, I’ve finally been found. My Nexus mates dragged me back to the biggest pack community in the mountains of Scotland, making sure I follow each of their rules and never letting me out of their sight while they torment me for breaking the bond.

Onyx, with his charming smiles and pretty suits, hides the true alpha lurking within.

Aleksander, with his unforgettable hazel eyes and deadly secrets, wants to ruin me.

The twins, Hollis and Rhodes, who capture ladies’ hearts like it’s an art form. One wants to break mine in the name of revenge.

And finally, Finnegan. He is the biggest threat to the Nexus shifter race, and he hates me the most.

They are dangerous alpha shifters who have powers from the Wolf Gods, and I’m the reject who broke their hearts, tore out the bond between us, and left them alone.

Every moment I spend with them is dangerous…

They don’t know the monster lurking under my skin, begging to come out to play.

If they keep pushing…it won’t be stopped.

Then there will be nothing left.

Starlight Mates is a dark romantasy with men who growl more than speak. You can expect tropes like— Who did this to you?, touch her and die, rejected mates, forced proximity and whychoose?

Prologue

“Remember what you need to do, Gwen. It’s for the best.”

I tug the red cloak tighter around myself as a stray tear falls down my cheek. I wish I didn’t have to do this. I wish I wasn’t born a monster. The bells for the mating ceremony ring loud and clear across the pack, and people cheer, their happiness doing nothing but adding more dread to my heart. Today, I reject my five Nexus mates, and they will hate me for it. I tell myself over and over that it doesn’t matter if they hate me; they will be alive and well. That truth is the only reason I’m still standing, holding myself together, even when I feel shattered inside. They won’t have to deal with a mate like me…a broken monster shifter. If they knew what lurks under my skin, what they would be bound to, they’d reject me too.

My mother soothes me, wiping the tear away with a calm hand. I glance at her and see no emotion in her blue eyes. No regret. No pain. No heartbreak. For her, this is easy. She has her Nexus mate—my father—and they have been together since her mating ceremony when she was fifteen, and she has always been this way since.

I want to be like her, unfeeling, and then it wouldn’t hurt half as much as it already does.

“Gwen, don’t look so…broken. The Wolf Gods may have chosen five mates for you, but they are wrong. You would be putting five people in terrible danger every single day, and that would be only if you can control…it.” She tucks my dark brown hair behind my ear, touching the silver tulip earring from my father. He doesn’t want me to do this. My father believes there must be another way, but my mother doesn’t want to risk everyone knowing about me. She thinks they will kill me, and maybe they should. My parents hate the Nexus race, and they make sure I learn the hundreds of reasons why every single day.

Our Nexus pack is small, hidden away in a sleepy town on the east coast of England. The humans have no idea we live among them, go to their schools, and do everything they do. Our pack lives around the town, all fifty families, and until the mating ceremony, I was hidden here. I never attended the bigger pack celebrations, never left the town at all because it was too risky. But every wolf has to give their blood to the Wolf God priests at fourteen so they can see the Nexus bonds throughout the world. At fifteen, if a bond is found, we are invited to the local temple to accept our mating bond and share blood with our Nexus mates. Only, I won’t be accepting mine. I’m rejecting the bonds before I can meet my mates. “It can’t be let out, Gwen. Remember that today.”

It. The monster under my skin, my Nexus. My wolf. It. I push down the unnatural feeling bubbling in my chest and the horrible memories that come with it. I was five the first time my wolf came out to play, and when I got it under control, I was sitting in piles of bodies and pure death. That wasn’t even the worst time it escaped. I got better at controlling it as I aged, forcing my body to lock it in a cage and never let it escape.

No, my wolf can’t have its mates. It can’t be let out and free, not when I know what it wants now. It won’t stop, it won’t be sated, and it wants to burn the world to dust. It only knows destruction, and the longer I pretend I’m normal, the more chance there is of it taking over.

I blink at the mirror by the door, seeing my reflection. My long red silk cloak falls over my head and hits the floor at my feet. Underneath, I have my normal choice of clothing: leggings and a crop top. All chosen to be ideal for running in. My eyes, one blue and one grey, flash back at me like a giant joke. The monster lurks in one of my eyes, and since I was ten, I haven’t been able to change the colour back from grey. “I know, mother. I know the plan, but it feels wrong.”

“That’s your Nexus talking. Honestly, five mates?” She huffs to herself, looking for a second at the suitcases by the door, her short blonde hair bobbing around her chin. “The biggest group in our recorded history had four Nexus shifters bound, and you know what happened to them,” she carefully warns. Everyone knows what happened, and I gulp. “Rejection is the only way you will survive.” Is it though? “We will be ready with the car the moment you say the words, and then we can leave the Nexus world once and for all like we have planned out. It was too risky to take you before we had the money from your grandparents and your father bought us dozens of fake identities to keep us hidden. We have done everything to hide your…Nexus.” Disgust rolls off her tongue with the word. “Now go and do not embarrass us.”

She shoves her small hand into my back, and I stumble to the front door, my legs feeling like jelly. I turn the handle and slip out into the dark night, blinking at the dozens of firelight lanterns that line the street towards the temple on the hill. The humans believe we celebrate a religious ceremony on this night every year, and I was picked on more than once for being in a cult by other kids at school. I don’t blame them—we are sort of like a cult. If they knew we all shift into animals and have supernatural powers that rival the Avengers, they might not have picked on us to begin with. Hell, they’d call us witches and run in the opposite direction.

I hear my favourite Taylor Swift song playing from a house nearby as I walk through the town, joining Annie and Rochelle as I get close to the hill. The lanterns are huge, and there are hundreds of them leading up the winding path to the top of the hill and the small temple there. Annie glances at me, her blonde hair falling out of her red cloak. She lives on the other side of town, and we went to school together…but she isn’t my friend. I’m not allowed those. “Are you nervous?”

I shake my head. Lying isn’t my favourite thing to do, but once you get good at it, it’s addictive. Lying means that I don’t have to tell anyone how I really feel. I don’t have to be raw and open and ripped apart. “No. The Wolf Gods chose our mates, and our Nexus will be happy.”

She ducks her gaze and carries on ahead of me, talking quietly with Rochelle, another beautiful, flawless blonde. Rochelle hates me and has done since the first year of high school, when we both got picked for an award, but I got the prize and she didn’t. I didn’t care about the shitty chocolate and book vouchers, but she did and made my life hell in the years after. If only she knew she was winding up a monster who likes to play sick games.

That monster is the reason today is going to be a nightmare.

The stone steps are covered in ivy. The endless nearly dead-looking vines are wrapped around the several stone half walls and tall matching pillars that line the outside of the tall temple. It’s hidden well in the oak trees that are now empty of any leaves and thickly covered in frost. It hasn’t snowed this year, but it is still pretty, the way the branches shine from the frost as the moonlight trickles through the clouds. The thick, dead bushes and hedges surround the temple, yet there isn’t a weed here, nothing out of place. It smells like vanilla, likely from the hundreds of candles inside the temple. It’s extremely well looked after and beautiful. A place of peace and the beginning of thousands of mates’ love stories.

But for me, it will be the beginning of a horror show. A nightmare.

It’s so easy for us to walk up, even when the temple is completely off limits to humans who try to sneak in to see what we are doing up here. One of the Wolf God priests uses their incredible powers to make sure no human sees anything but forest if they do come close. They never sense the true power of the Nexus lurking in these temples dotted all around the world.

I glance up at the beautiful wolf statue right in the centre above the doors. The strongest of our Gods. There are five Nexus Gods and I’m always forgetting their names, but these two, the leaders of the Gods, stick with me no matter what. Crimson and Darkness. The twins. They are the most powerful Gods known. One black wolf and one white wolf. It looks like they’re running in circles, eternally chasing around each other in stone, and right in the centre is a star for the Nexus they created first. A beautiful bright star, like what is said to be cherished in each of our souls.

Some believe the Gods were fallen stars, all five of them, and they didn’t know what to do with the humans they found here on earth. Crimson and Darkness took lovers, and their children were born with fresh starlight in their souls. Nexus. Something of beauty, apparently. Mine is not beautiful or anything like the stars above. A dark, evil star, maybe.

I glance at the centre of the star above me, the symbol for our kind, an N with an arrow spiked right through the middle of it. Woven into the stone are dozens of different animals, leading all the way round the edges, but I know that they continue far and wide. Inside the temple looks warm, bright, and inviting as the big oak doors slide open and two priests patiently wait. “Annie Donovan.”

I watch as Annie goes in first, the door slamming shut behind her and echoing the noise throughout the trees. I’m next. I remember the list of names pinned to our community board, in the order we are expected to come here. The older Nexus who finally found mates are invited first and then the younger ones.

My hands are shaking uncontrollably as the wind blows my cloak around my legs, sticking to them. “I heard you were given five Nexus mates by the Gods.” Rochelle huffs. “They wanted to make you a whore, not a shocker there.”

Bitch. My eyes flicker over to her. “And you got one who is likely going to be a boring asshole. Five sounds like more fun.”

Even if I’m going to reject them all. She just looks away from me, rolling her eyes and muttering something under her breath that I miss because I’m not focused on her. I straighten my shoulders, like it might make me feel braver and not like the crumbling mess I truly am. Every second I wait feels like torture. I just want to get this over with and leave.

When the doors finally open, my heart races so loudly it’s hard to focus on moving my feet forward a few steps so the bright light falls on my feet. “Gwenieve Patience Autumn.” They say my name to the wind and for the Gods to hear from the skies, my full, ridiculously long name. I was named after several of my grandparents who died in the war years ago. I never met them, but they were one of the many thousands who died, making our community safe from the Vian. They would be ashamed of me right now.

I blow out a breath and walk forward, glancing at the two priests on each side of the door. They keep themselves fully covered in black from head to toe, so they all look the same. Black cloaks, gloves, masks, and I bet even their boxers are black, too. I know that underneath their cloaks hides what tells them apart. Their weapon choice. They are nearly the most dangerous of our kind, apart from the rangers. Everyone here trains after our ceremony, though. Only the best become rangers or priests. We become good at fighting and self-defence so that the Vian, even in their small numbers, can’t easily kill us. We learn to work together in teams to keep ourselves safe. But not me. I will have to train myself with my parents. I will have to do it all alone to ensure my monster is kept well within.

I wonder if these priests, these virtuous, honourable people, can see straight into my soul and the monster playing about in there. I wonder, if they could really see what I am, would they slit my throat before letting me come into this holy place? They should.

Inside, the temple is kept relatively simple. Rows of pews that lead to a raised stone altar at the back, with a basin that resembles the bird water table in my garden. Except this one is made of pure diamond, and it radiates magic in the air like a bee buzzing. A priest waits behind, all in black, but something about him makes me pause, nearly stumbling over my own feet. Not uncommon for me, but I have to tug my eyes away from this priest. A cloak covers his face completely like the ones who walk at my side anyway, so I can’t possibly know him. I’d guess he was a male from the full, thick shoulders I can make out. My red cloak flutters across the stone as I walk closer and look down at the basin. There’s blood in the shimmering water, and the buzzing of the magic is like a headache this close.

The priest’s gravelly, deep male voice washes over me. He has a friendly voice that makes me want to listen to him. “Welcome, Gwenieve. Today is your mating ceremony. When you cut your palm and give yourself to the Gods, they will fortify your bond between you and the five others that have been chosen as your Nexus mates. Your starlight will be mixed eternally, and where you go, they will follow. Only the Gods themselves will ever be able to part you.”

He clears his throat and I look up, wishing I could see who he is under the mask. Priests don’t ever take their masks off or let an inch of them be seen. Not even among their mates. Doing so breaks all the rules of being a priest, and I’ve heard the punishments are barbaric. He moves slightly and I spot a blade clipped to his leg, a shiny purple Nex dagger. “Your power will mix with your mates’ powers, and you will become a conduit for all five of their powers as you grow closer, and you will use the powers you gain to protect the people of the Nexus.”

My hand shakes and I clamp it down at my side. I swear he looks right at my hand, and I feel him frowning. I won’t be getting their powers, because to do that, I’d need to accept the Nexus mate bond. Let it, that horrible monster, get more powers?

Hell fucking no.

I’m doing the right thing. I’m doing the only thing I can. Even if it breaks my heart into pieces. The priest is still talking, unaware of the battle going on in my heart. “Since the dawn of our people, we have come here and offered our blood to the Gods. Your mates have all given their blood. It is already in this water.” I look down at the water filled with blood. This is the closest I’m ever going to get to them. It’s the closest I can ever let myself come to them. “Do you accept your Nexus mate bond, Gwenieve?”

Every part of my heart wants to scream yes, wants to meet them, wants to know who the Gods chose for me. But those aren’t the words that come out of my mouth. I remember the horror in my father’s face as he picked me up, surrounded by all those bodies time and time again, and covered for me. My parents sacrificed everything to protect me, and I only have to do this one thing. Just this one thing.

My heart breaks completely as the words leave my mouth. “I reject the bond.”

The moment the words come out of my mouth, I feel sharp pain spike through my chest as it, the monster, feels the rejection. It reels in my soul, thrashing and snapping at me. It hates me as much as I hate it right back. The priest goes deadly still, as does the room, like the world pauses in horror. His words are raspy, and he steps forward. “Are you certain? This cannot be undone.”

“I know my fate and I have made my choice.” I turn before he can say another word, and run. Tears stream down my face as my heart actually hurts in my chest, but I keep my feet moving. I run straight back out through the door I came through, the doors opening for me like they want me gone too. As I pass Rochelle, her mouth is gaping open as she watches me run. I throw off the stupid red cloak, letting it fall away in the wind. I don’t dare stop until I get into my parents’ car. They drive off through the empty roads as I cry in the back seat, unable to even breathe through the pain.

I swear, just as we leave the border of the pack, I hear a wolf howling in the distance. A howl full of pain, of anguish, and of a cruel promise of revenge.

Chapter

One

There’s a wolf watching me from the tree line.

I can spot him in the corner of my eye, even with his mud brown fur almost the same shade as the bark of the surrounding trees. I wait, seeing whether he’ll pounce first. He usually does. He always attacks my left side, never the right. Clearly, he has a preference, but he’s always too slow. Just as he jumps at me, I easily step to the side, missing his claw, making him skid across the ground. Hard dirt kicks around me as I grin, turning around to face the wolf. I’m on him in a second. Two steps, my glowing dagger pressed an inch away from his eye, and the wolf freezes.

He whines slightly as I pull my Nex dagger back, tilting my head to the side, my long hair falling down around my waist. I should have braided it back this morning, but I was being a bit lazy and enjoying a lie-in instead. The wolf’s body shimmers, like looking through cloudy glass for a second. It always amazes me what a Nexus shift looks like. I can just about make out his features spilling from wolf to man before Harry is kneeling in front of me—completely naked. He’s good-looking, muscular in all the right places… I have to admit it sometimes.

While he’s on his knees for me, we stare at each other, and I wonder if crossing the line is a good idea. It’s almost tempting to return the feelings that he has made no effort to hide from the moment we met. Just to know what it’s like to kiss someone. Just to know what it’s like to escape in pleasure, like the books I’ve read. I’m almost tempted.

But there are five reasons why I won’t.

I turn away first and wait for him to grab his clothes he left out earlier before he used his Nexus to shift into a wolf. He runs a hand through his blond hair as he turns me around, resting his hand on my shoulder with a grin that shows off his dimples and white teeth. His eyes are the same shade as his wolf, and when I look into them, I can see his wolf staring right back. His Nexus likes me too. Which is odd because most of them can sense what I am and immediately hate me. “You’re so fast, Gwen. Am I ever going to beat you?”

“No.” I arch an eyebrow. “Where would the fun in that be? Let’s go home, I’m hungry.”

“Good thing I went shopping with dad this morning while you were still snoring.” He bumps my shoulder, and I stick my tongue out at him. His eyes linger on my lips for a heartbeat before he meets my eyes. Doll-like eyes, as my mother used to say. Too big, too knowing. Harry is a year older than me, and he is a good person. Rare in this world. Especially for Nexus. He shouldn’t be my friend, but he is. I got lucky with him and his family.

We live in a nearly deserted town in the middle of Spain. It’s quiet here, and no one comes this way. Perfect for a monster like me to hide from the world. After what happened two years ago, I desperately needed somewhere to hide. Harry’s dad knew my father before he died, and my father always told me to come here if anything happened. That it would be safe. After I lost my parents, I turned up on their doorstep injured, covered in blood, and with at least ten bones broken. Harry’s mum screamed.

My heart drops to my stomach as I let myself think of the day I lost my parents, knowing absolutely that I don’t want to think about it again. I can’t go back there. There are two memories I don’t let myself dwell on—the rejection and my parents’ death.

Harry’s house is right on the outskirts of the pack, nestled within a human village in Spain. Most of the humans speak Spanish and don’t like the English, and they stay well away from us, which works out pretty well for me.

Harry’s parents took a massive risk taking me in, and I owe them a debt. But not enough to have a relationship with their son, like I think his dad is hoping will happen. Harry never found a Nexus mate bond, and while it’s rare, it happens. Some just don’t. He has already had bad luck, and I know I should run away and not be selfish. I’m selfish because I need to be around him, be around someone. Because when I’m left alone…when it’s just me and it—the monster—that’s when I go mad. That’s when I really believe I’m going to completely lose my mind and be the villain forever.

Harry picks up a tiny orange lizard off a tree, holding it in his hands as I take several steps away. I really, really don’t like bugs or things that crawl. He shakes his head at me and puts it down. “There’s been some Vian spotted near the pack yesterday.” My lungs freeze in fear. He pulls me to him, completely unaware of the struggle in my mind right now. The struggle to hold it back when it knows enemies are nearby. “It’s okay, I’ll keep you—”

I shove him away, gasping in the warm air. “I told you, you don’t touch me when—” I stop in my warning before I say too much. Harry isn’t stupid. He knows something is wrong with me, but he doesn’t know the truth. He doesn’t know what lurks under my skin, and he would hate me if he knew.

He holds his hands up. “Sorry, sorry. You just, you looked really scared.” He rubs the back of his neck. “You never really told us what happened with your parents, but we put two and two together. That it was the Vian who killed them, and you escaped.”

“Yes.” I lie so easily now. That’s not what happened at all. If I told him, if I told anybody, they would hate me. Gods, they would hate me so much. I wonder if my parents hate me too for what I did.

He searches my eyes and thankfully changes the subject. “Anyway, the rangers and alpha gave the order for us to stay in after eight. No going out. You know they’re more powerful at night, and at least in the day, we can fight them off.” No, he can’t. He doesn’t have a clue what they are really like.

I glance at the sun setting in the sky, how close it is to disappearing. It must be at least six already. I nod before turning and going to the house. “How did they even find us out here? Normally, they go after the bigger packs, not us. There are few Nexus here that make it worth attracting the attention of the Nexus capital city.” Starlight City and the Vian. Both threats to me. Every time I hear Harry talk about Starlight, my stomach drops. It’s the very place I’ve avoided for years because my mates live there. They practically rule it from what I’ve heard. The city usually sends teams of rangers to investigate any Nexus deaths, and if they sent one of them out here…

Harry laughs. He is too innocent for his own good. “Well, any Vian would be eliminated in seconds if the city rangers came. It was stupid of them to try to attack us. Their numbers are tiny after the war.”

“Maybe they were just lost, wandering, and got lucky. Let’s always think positively.” He shakes his head at me, and I smile at him. We race up the steps into the house. It has a wrap-around porch, and it’s kind of cute. The whole house is almost an off-pink colour, all made of wood from the nearby trees, and the bricks on top match the stained wood. It’s tiny inside but cosy, like a family home should be. We don’t get a lot of space, but they gave me the attic room so I can get away from them sometimes.

Harry’s father is a lovely person, but his Nexus mate is not. She doesn’t like me, and I don’t blame her. If I didn’t pay my way—thanks to the big inheritance I have in bags of cash hidden in dozens of towns around England, France, and Spain—I would be kicked out by her in a heartbeat. I wouldn’t like me either. On the second day I was here, she told me that her Nexus hated me and knew I was trouble.

She wasn’t wrong.

After dinner, where I scoffed down an almost embarrassing amount of barbeque mini steak burgers and chilli salt fries, I head up to my room and lie back on the plush bed. The skylight is right above my bed, letting me have free rein to look over the stars when they appear later. It’s only then do I let myself think about them, my Nexus mate bonds. I let myself imagine what they’re doing, whether they’re okay. I’d know if they were dead, but would I know if they’re injured? Would I know if they’re trapped? Would I know if they hate me? Duh, of course they hate me. Why wouldn’t they?

Near immediately after I was gone, a price was put on my head. Two million to bring me in. Two million pounds for me, uninjured. I heard rumours that the price even went up after a few years, but my father…his gift kept me hidden. He could make people see things, and he used his power to make everyone see a normal human family when they looked at us. We became invisible as long as I was at his side. For the first two years, I was. The next two…well, I would have prayed for anyone to find me.

My Nexus mates haven’t stopped looking for me. They won’t stop.

But I can never, ever go to them. I curl my arm around my pillow as a wave of sadness slams into my chest. I don’t know if my Nexus is sad or if I am, but I get the joy of feeling it all. Do they want to find me to kill me? I think I must fall asleep crying, because the next thing I know, it’s dark out, pitch dark, and stars have burst across the sky. My door slams open and Harry flicks the light on, his hair sticking up in every direction like he just woke up himself. “Gwen, we need to leave. Wake up! Now!”

The panic in his voice aggravates my Nexus, and it wakes, watching from my one eye like a wolf watching prey. Fuck. Not now. Not Harry. No. It slowly slithers back into my mind, and I slowly breathe out a shaky breath. He grabs a rucksack off the back of the door and opens my drawers, throwing clothes into it in a hurry. “Harry, what the fuck are you doing?”

“Vian are here. They’re killing them. There’s too many. The alpha is dead and his family, too.” He pauses to look at me. The alpha had four kids and twenty rangers to protect his house. My skin drains of colour. “Not just the Nexus…the humans. They’re just…j-just draining the entire town.”

That’s what they do…but to drain an entire town? That is unheard of. To kill an alpha? That’s rare. Alphas are the most powerful and rare Nexus among us, and they become the leaders for that reason. We feel safe around them, and there is usually an alpha in every Nexus town or small community. Why are they attacking us?

The Vian usually come in the night, because for whatever reason, they’re more powerful then. They have one power—they drain people. They only need to touch the human or Nexus to drain them of their entire life. Humans, it takes them a second, but they don’t get any power from them. They only do that to be cruel. But Nexus? When they get hold of us, they drain us for magic, and they not only take our life force, adding it to their own, but they take our powers as their own. The more powerful you are, the longer you can fight them off. An alpha should have taken hours to drain, and he should have been able to fight off any threat. If they drain even one or two of us, they become powerful and near enough immortal. Draining an alpha? That would make them stronger than they have been in years. Like their leader, who is said to have drained over ten thousand of us now and has lived for hundreds of years.

I quickly grab the clothes Harry throws my way and get changed in the bathroom. Simple black leggings and a crop top that has a picture of a sleeping ginger cat on it. I chuck on my favourite leather jacket and pull on my Ugg boots, a gift from Harry’s dad for Christmas last year that I treasure.

Harry hands me the bag and rushes out, expecting me to follow, but I turn to the bed. I lift the sheets, finding the gap I cut months ago, and reach in until I touch the silver box and tug it out. It’s the only other thing in here that matters. A box. A small, tiny box that fits in the palm of my hand and is completely silver with no lid, no markings or keyhole. I know it’s a box because something rattles in it, but I don’t have a clue how to open it. My mother gave it to me and told me never to open it unless I was going to die. She never gave me gifts growing up, no birthday or Christmas gifts because she didn’t believe in it, but she gave me this.

I throw that in the bag last. Harry is at the bottom of the stairs, shoving bottles of water into his own backpack, and we run out the front door together, straight down to where the car is waiting. Harry’s mum, June, is waiting outside the car, constantly looking around and tapping her foot on the ground. Her blonde hair is now grey, short, and cut round her face. Sometimes she reminds me of my mum, who always kept her hair short too. She frowns at me, but relief marks her blue eyes when she turns them to Harry. “Both of you, hurry up! You’re going to get us all killed if we stay longer. Thank the Nexus Gods we live on the outskirts.”

“Sorry, sorry,” I mutter, climbing in the car after Harry, and she slams the door shut before getting in the front.

Macsen, Harry’s dad, gives me a soft look. Macsen is Irish, covered in hair from his thick beard to his curly brown and grey locks of hair. He is ridiculously kind. My father wasn’t a kind person, but I always wonder, if he didn’t have my mother as his Nexus or a daughter like me, would he have been? Some of the stories Macsen tells me of my father seem like he is talking about another person altogether. “The important thing now is getting away from here. We are safe and let’s all calm down.”

June huffs, her eyes glowing blue with Nexus magic. She can connect to birds and spy, almost become them. “You’re not seeing what I am, Mac. Drive, for Nexus’ sake.”

Macsen puts his foot down and speeds out of the driveway onto the back road that leads out of town. I clear my throat after ten minutes of the silent drive because I need to know what is happening. I have never lived in a world where I let someone make the decisions for me since I lost my parents. “What’s the plan?”

June meets my eyes. “We’re going to the meeting point with the survivors of the pack. The rangers there will keep us safe and make a plan for relocation. What else would we do, silly girl?”

Panic locks my body down, and I struggle to hold it together. “You have to let me out. I can’t go to the meeting point with the rest of the pack! What if they recognise me?”

June mutters under her breath. “It’s not all about you, Gwenieve.”

Harry touches my shoulder, and I resist the urge to snap at him. “They won’t. Put your hood up and hide behind us.”

Mac clears his throat. “I’ll tell them that you’re a family friend that’s staying with us. That you’re human. I can barely sense your Nexus anyway, and I live with you. They won’t look twice at you.”

“But what if they do? What if they know who I am?” I snap. Hiding is one thing, but trusting a hood and my self-control when I’m scared is another. “My face is everywhere in our communities! No, just let me out and I’ll run in the opposite direction.”

Mac actually looks right at me. “What, with all the Vian out there?” He focuses on the road again. “We got messages through the system that there were at least a hundred, and they’re draining the entire town to find us. You won’t make it—”

“No, but you don’t und—”

He interrupts me. Something he never does. “Your father was my best friend, and he made me swear to protect you if he couldn’t. I’m not doing that to his memory, Gwen. You are all I have left of him now. The reward for you is old news, and not many out here would have ever seen a photo of your face. It will be okay. I promise.” I grab the door handle, but it’s locked, and panic wraps its claws around my heart as I sink back in the leather seat. His promises mean nothing.

This isn’t going to end well. I have to run when they aren’t looking, which should be easy enough. I know Mac means well, but he could get all the survivors killed.

We drive for half an hour in silence, only the occasional loud crickets chirping outside, the soft wind whipping past the car. Eventually, June feels like it’s safe enough to turn the radio on, and a song about second chances plays, some hippie seventies music that June loves. I prefer Taylor Swift and anything she sings about heartbreak.

It’s nearly sunrise by the time we turn onto an abandoned road, with a broken sign outside with camp written in Spanish on it. I sense the Nexus souls here immediately, like they are each playing their own drums, and I can feel the beat. The meeting spot is in the middle of the forest, and it once must have been a children’s camp, but now it’s full of rickety buildings, broken parks and deserted boats pulled up on the edge of the lake. A few cars are pulled up with their lights on, shining on a group by the boats.

June and Mac climb out first, and I pull my hood tightly around me, tucking my hair in underneath so it can’t be seen, before getting out after Harry. Harry stays at my side as we head over, where there is a group of ten. Ten, that’s all that’s left.

Most of them are kids, but Beta Samuel is alive. Shame. He is a prick I’ve avoided for years. I’ve watched him from the shadows, and I know he isn’t a good man. He regularly cheats on his Nexus, which is a disgusting thing to do when your Nexus can feel you getting off with someone else once you’re bonded.

He comes over, looking between us and pushing Harry to the side. “Who is this? Did you bring a human with you?”

The disgust in his voice lingers as Mac tries to get in front of me, but it’s too late. A heavy wind blows my hood off, my hair falling out around my hoodie as I come face to face with the beta. His mouth parts as he stares at me, and I know he is perfectly aware of who I am. Shit. “Pretend you didn’t see me…please.”

He grabs my hand and before I can say a word, his power washes over me like a drug. Literally like a drug spreading across my body. Even my monster doesn’t get time to protect me because it is just as shocked. I slump into his waiting arms, hearing Mac and Harry shouting at Beta Samuel in my defence.

“This is Gwenieve Autumn, you fucking fool!” Beta Samuel snarls. “Everyone in the world has been looking for her! Do you know what you found? Do you know who her Nexus are?”

Beta Samuel doesn’t know I lived with Mac. Good. They might be safe. I fight the darkness pressing into my mind, pulling me under like a strong current in the sea. Please, this can’t be happening. I have to fight. I can’t be taken to them. I can’t let the monster have them. Please, please… “We’ll be allowed in the capital if we take her in. We will get the money and protection. She is a fucking golden ticket.”

Darkness sweeps me under, with one thought lingering in my head. I’m a ticket to hell, perhaps, because when they take me to the capital…they are risking my monster destroying everything.

Chapter

Two

Idon’t recognise the room I’m in. I’m lying in a small double four-poster bed, and I pat my body, noting that I’m still in the same clothes as before and uninjured. That fucking beta. I can’t believe I didn’t know about his powers or the fact he might know me. I knew he travelled, and that should have made me question going near him. I should have jumped out of the car before getting to the others. It was a stupid mistake, and now look where it has landed me. My eyes flash quickly around the small room. The bed is the focal point, and its white sheets are spotless and riddled with ridiculously fluffy cushions. There are two doors, and one has to be the way out.

I know it won’t be that simple, and my head spins as I rush off the bed and pull the nearest door open to find a small bathroom. The other one is locked. I grab the handle, pulling on it with all my strength, but it doesn’t budge an inch. My heart races as I pace in front of the door. How long have I been asleep? Where am I?

My Nexus is napping, still drugged up, and that’s the only good thing about this situation. Still, I feel it fighting to wake, and I know exactly why, even if I prefer living in denial. My Nexus perks up like a dog sensing a new treat, stretching and purring in my chest. It doesn’t want to come out to cause chaos, for once, but because it senses something far worse.

I feel them too.

Our Nexus mates…they’re nearby. All of them. Nexus feel kind of like a drum that only other Nexus can hear, but it’s not like that with them. It’s like someone is screaming inside a tornado in my chest. Smack smack smack. One of them is closer than the others. I feel him, right before I hear stairs creaking and then heavy footsteps.

I rush to the other side of the room, rubbing my wrists. I don’t need to look to know two runes are painted on me. This power is legendary. Still, I look. The runes are pretty, the black stark against my tanned skin. The letter L but more of a symbol than the actual letter, with flowers curled all around it. Roses, I think.

Where’s my bag? Fuck. It’s got my Nex dagger, the completely irreplaceable family heirloom from my father’s side that I’m bonded to. Nex daggers are random weapons that have their own magic when they are blessed by a Nexus priest in a ceremony, and I got lucky that I felt a calling to one in my father’s collection. The only other defence I have is my wolf, and it is definitely not coming out here when one of my mates is nearby. She will kill him. Or fuck him. Maybe both, and I’m not on board with that.

The rest of the room is plain. There is literally nothing else in here, no cabinets, nothing other than the wood floors and plain beige walls that only make me feel more trapped. I run to the bathroom, pull open the cabinets, finding nothing in there either except for a bottle of shampoo and toilet paper. I grab the shampoo bottle. It might be my only defence, and I flick the lid off just as I hear the door lock click.

I step back into the room just as a huge man walks in, shutting it behind him and leaning on the door. He’s tall, gorgeous, and he’s my Nexus mate. At least one of them. My Nexus groans in my chest, feeling more awake with every second that passes. My blood runs cold as I meet his eyes though. Eyes that are pure black. There’s not an ounce of colour in them. Everything from the pupils to the iris is solid black, but at least they match his hair, which is dark, long, and wavy around his forehead, curling round his ears. He wears casual but expensive clothes, just a black shirt and ridiculously tight sweatpants that only reveal how thick he is everywhere. Damn, those are nice thighs.

My monster wants to sit on them. I push it down—its horny thoughts, too. We don’t have a bond with them. We rejected them and they hate us. How could they not?

The way this one is glaring at me makes my heart shatter, though. “You’re shorter than we were told.”

I tighten my hand on the shampoo bottle behind my back. I can’t make my mouth work. I can’t form any kind of reply, so I shrug a shoulder.

His eyes swirl with darkness and his body tenses. “Nothing? That’s all you have to say to me. You’ve been gone five years! You rejected the bond!” When I still don’t talk, he shakes his head. “Are you really heartless enough to not even ask my name?”

“I don’t care.” I keep my voice flat as I lie. I care. I want to know his name. I want to know everything, but the closer we get, the more dangerous it is.

He doesn’t bother to hide the disgust lingering in his hostile tone. “That’s what you come out with? You don’t care?” His eyes flick to the wall, like he can’t stand to even look at me anymore. “Well, while you’ve been sunning it up in Spain and doing whatever the fuck you wanted, the rest of us here have been looking for you. Where the fuck have you been? Where are your parents, because they are listed as enemies to—”

“Dead,” I snap, interrupting his rant.

There’s no sympathy in his eyes. “Good. They took you from us and deserved death.”

He is so cold, so empty, and I hate him. Gods, I hate him. “They didn’t take me from you! I’m not your property just because the Gods bound our souls together. I had every right to reject the bonds, and I did, and I left. How dare you say it’s good they’re dead?”

He watches me closely and smirks. He wanted a reaction, anything other than my cold attitude, and he got it. This one is dangerous. “It’s never good that a Nexus is dead, but I will never show grief for those who took you from us. Anyone that is in the middle of us is already dead.” He walks into the room, and I glance at the door, taking a step towards it. “Don’t you fucking try it, Gwen.”

I arch an eyebrow at the nickname and his tone. “Did you really think I was just going to stay here? Even I know it’s illegal in the Nexus and human world to kidnap and hold anyone hostage.”

He flashes his teeth as he smiles. “You’re in Starlight.” I knew it, but still, my heart nearly gives out in pure fear. “I’m not sure what you know, but Starlight is a completely fortified city in the middle of Scotland. Our capital. No one comes in or out of here without the Supreme Alpha’s permission. You’ve been avoiding this place for long enough, and now you get to live here. Yes, kidnapping and holding someone hostage is illegal for Nexus, but my father, two uncles and grandfather are half of the eight Beta Alphas and voted for special measures, considering how long it took to find you.”

I see red. Nothing but blistering fiery rage. “How dare you bring me here and get your fucking daddy to lock me up? You are a sadistic prick if you ever think I’m going to take back the rejection and happily bend over to be your mate. Go fuck yourself!”

He laughs. Actually laughs at me. “You have a real fucking dirty mouth, Gwen.” I’m still shaking with anger as he comes closer. Too close. I can smell him, how he smells like vanilla and fresh rain in a forest. “You were lucky to survive, and we are not risking you again. If you died, even with our bond rejected, it would fucking hurt my Nexus. No one is allowed to do that, so I have a mild interest in keeping you alive. That attack you ran from? It was only one of many, and it’s dangerous for all Nexus outside these walls right now. Until it is safe, you are staying here.”

Vian? He is using them to scare me into staying, and it’s almost laughably pathetic. “I don’t believe you. Those Vian were a random attack and bad luck.”

“You know, I’m Onyx, not that you’ve bothered to know my name. This is my house.” He spreads his arms out. “My father put those runes on you. Everybody has them in Starlight.” He shows me his wrists, where the similar runes are. “But yours are different. Ours make us traceable when we leave the city. If we need help, we can press on them ten times. Yours will make sure you’re not leaving, and pressing on it will just piss me off as it’s connected to mine.”

“Then I’ll press it all the fucking time.” He laughs again and I don’t like it. Well, actually I do like his laugh, but not when he is laughing at me. I’m not funny. “Are you going to let me out? I’ll carve off my own hands to escape this place, so the runes don’t matter.”

His eyes widen when he sees how serious I am. Little does he know I could actually do that and survive. The hands would just grow back. “You’re fucking insane.”

Now he’s starting to get it. I shrug, knowing it annoys him, and his eyes do that swirling darkness thing again. Oh yeah, definitely pissed him off. I step closer to the door, right before I run for it. I turn the handle and it opens. I knew the arrogant asshole wouldn’t have bothered to lock it because he wouldn’t have expected little old me to get past him. He’s on me in a second, though, grabbing my wrist to turn me around. Before I think about it too much, I bring the shampoo bottle up and squirt it straight into his eyes. He roars in pain, but he lets me go as he stumbles back, a loud growl echoing from his throat.

From his Nexus.

Time to leave. I don’t know where I’m running as I head straight out of the room and onto a staircase. I barely make it two steps before my feet leave the stone steps and I float upwards. Tipping upside down as a scream echoes from my chest. My hair falls down around my face, long enough to touch the stairs as I look down, brushing it aside to look right at another one of my mates.

His hand is in the air, clearly his power, telekinesis, controlling me. Fucking brilliant. I can’t even move as he wraps invisible arms around me and walks up the stairs until we are face to face.

So close his very minty breath blows over me.

“Put me down.”

He’s all blond hair and green eyes, tanned and a very pretty boy. He’s wearing a suit that screams expensive, with dark blue straight trousers and a white shirt. A few buttons are undone on his shirt, and a tattoo peeks out. He looks at me from head to toe. I can tell he doesn’t like what he sees. “All these years, we have wondered exactly what you look like.” He sighs and I can’t read his expressions. His face barely moves, and his green eyes reveal nothing. “Now, we were all really fucking disappointed that you were stupid enough to get caught and we have to deal with you.” He leans in, our breaths mixing and goose bumps littering down my spine. “I’ll tell you a secret: I’m not. I’m going to make your life hell for rejecting me, and I’ve been waiting five long years.”

“Hollis.” One warning from Onyx, who I think is still in the room.

Hollis walks away from me, even as it feels like he just stabbed me straight into the chest with only words. I knew it would be like this, but still, it hurts more than I thought it would do. Only when he is gone does a gust of wind blow me to the top of the stairs and drop me in a puddle right by the door. Onyx comes out of the bedroom with a towel in his hand, his eyes bright red, and he smells like lemon shampoo. I find it really, really hard not to grin at him, and I know I fail when his eyes tighten.

“Get in there and lose the smile. Now!” he barks.

No one bosses me around. I smirk and lean back. “No. I’m going to stay right here, and you can fuc—”

I scream as he picks me up with a growl, his hands iron tight, and the first touch of his skin against mine is like a fire burning throughout my body. He carries me into the bedroom, even when I’m literally kicking and screaming, and throws me onto the bed. I run after him, but suddenly there’s a magic barrier in the doorframe blocking me. I can see through it, but it’s rock solid. It looks like a glossy, shimmering blue magic, and Onyx slides his hands into his pockets as he watches me from the other side. “You have to let me out. I can’t—”

“I don’t want your excuses, mate.” There is so much hate in the word mate that it hurts my heart more than Hollis’s words. He walks away from me, and I slam my hands on the barrier, but it’s like a brick wall, and it only hurts my hands the more I smack it. If I don’t get out of here soon, I’m going to bring this entire city down with me.

There is only so long before my Nexus will take over and demand it’s time to play.

Chapter

Three

For three days, I’m left in this boring bedroom, and I spend every second pushing my Nexus away when the normal nightmares come to haunt me. The rest of the time, I spend tapping the runes on my wrists to annoy my Nexus mate who locked me in here in the first place.

I can tell it’s pissing him off, because he looks a little more annoyed every time I see him.

I’m thrown new clothes this morning, a little different from usual. Simple black leggings and a black top, which I appreciate, but I still don’t get my bag back, and no one talks to me. Onyx comes three times a day, every single day at the same time, I suspect, not that I have a clock. At least the food he leaves is good. He can walk through the barrier, which is permanently in place. No one even walks past the corridor outside. I know because I sat for hours staring through it, hoping to see someone, but there’s nothing. No one. I can just about see a window down the corridor, and that’s the only way I can see if it’s day or night. The house is too quiet. I almost wonder if anyone even lives here. In the afternoon, right before sunset as usual, the door opens, and the barrier actually fades away.

Onyx, in a dark shirt and jeans this time, strolls in. There are dark circles under his eyes, and I’m kinda proud of them. I spent all last night tapping the runes non-stop because I couldn’t sleep. “Come with me, Gwen. We need to have a discussion.”

“We can discuss it right here, and then I can leave Starlight,” I counter. “I’m not going anywhere with you otherwise.”

“Do you want to stay trapped in here for another three days?” He looks right at me with those dark eyes. Those eyes almost scare me. I know some Nexus hurt and abuse their mates, and for all I know, he could do the same. “Because, trust me, I can leave you in here for a year while we keep repeating this and not be remotely bothered about it.”

“Fine,” I snap, climbing out of the bed and storming past him through the door. He stays right at my back, only inches away, gruffly telling me directions. We head down the staircase and to the left and into a room that is almost like a greenhouse. The one wall is all glass and looks onto a circular driveway and, further away, a cute street. There are tall trees at the end, blocking the view of anything else. I glance around, noting the entire ceiling is all glass too, with green framing. There’s a wooden table with chairs littered around. Onyx waits at the table, and I take the hint to sit down on one of the chairs. The table is covered in plates of food, all Thai food, but with him staring at me and with the feeling the other Nexus mates are close, my appetite has disappeared.

I focus instead on the room, which is sparsely decorated. There are a few paintings to see on the wall, and a few pretty plants in pots near the glass of the ceiling where I imagine the sun streams through in the morning. There’s a big bright chandelier above the table, which catches the dying sunlight.

I tense as I sense two of my mates nearby. Hollis walks in first and I don’t even bother looking at him, but his complete double walks in right after, making me blink. Twins, they must be twins. They have the same blond hair, they’re the same height, same eyes, but the other twin has a horrific scar that creeps down the side of his face. It almost looks like he was burnt in hundreds of small circles. It still doesn’t take away from how ridiculously handsome he is even in casual dark jeans and a black Marvel Spiderman top. He looks like a sexy geek, and next to his posh twin, he’s almost cute enough to make me smile his way. Onyx murmurs. “You’ve met Hollis. This is his brother, Rhodes.”

Rhodes looks at me for a second longer before Hollis nods his head to the table, and they both sit opposite me.

I stay completely silent. Onyx tugs on the collar of his shirt. “We’re just waiting on Alek and Finn.”

Two more of my mates.

The not-so-joyful reunion I didn’t want. Aleksander comes in next, and I actually know this one. I’ve seen a picture of him in a Nexus Starlight newspaper that Harry was given for his birthday last year. He’s quite famous all round the Nexus world. Something to do with his powers and tragic backstory. I never let myself read the rest of the paper, because just the photo of him, even in black and white, stole the breath from my lungs.

In person, he is a thousand times more threatening to me. He is stunning. He’s Mexican, I think I remember hearing Harry say. Aleksander pauses in the doorway and casts his hazel eyes on me. There goes the air in my lungs again. His eyes are absolutely stunning shades of green and brown, all mixed together. He’s bigger than all of them, thicker, more muscular, and he comes right over, taking a seat right next to me, pushing his body close to my side. Everywhere we touch feels like an electrical wire buzzing across my skin. I don’t say a word, but I move over in the chair to the other side. Aleksander smirks, running a hand through his short black hair. “I don’t bite.” He lowers his voice, but I’m sure I’ve heard his voice before. I can’t put my finger on where, but I know his voice. “But my bear does.”

I shiver at his tone, and I struggle to keep my resolve not to say a word. Aleksander looks above me. “I’d ask if she can talk, but I’ve heard the delightful things she has shouted from her room for three days.”

A laugh clogs my throat and I gulp, pushing it down. Onyx takes the seat on my other side, making sure that I’m squished uncomfortably between them. It’s silent between us, only the sound of Hollis tapping his foot in the room, before my final mate appears.

Finnegan. Something about Finnegan completely freezes me to my spot with terror, and my monster watches him too from my grey eye. For fuck’s sake, she loves the scary man. He’s tall, at least six foot nine, taller than all of them, and that’s saying something, as each of them have been at least six foot three. He’s not exactly muscular, more of a swimmer’s body, but I can tell that he’s strong. His brown hair is short, spikier at the front, and his eyes are the purest blue as he slides into the seat next to Rhodes.

He doesn’t even look at me, not that I blame him. The silence that follows makes me want to run and jump out of the window. Hopefully, with a bit of luck, a piece of glass ends my sorry excuse of a life. Onyx clears his throat. “Gwen, now you’ve met everybody, we can discuss the plan going forward. You’re free to—”

“Leave?” I ask, hopeful.

He grits his teeth. “No. I’ve told you already it isn’t safe out there.”

I cross my arms. “I can look after myself, and I didn’t ask for your advice or protection. What if I don’t want to do your plan?”

Onyx whirls to face me, and he is mad. I grin, only winding him up more. I know he is the type to be in control at all times and doesn’t like it when someone doesn’t do as they are told. He is extremely fun to mess with. “Then you stay back, locked in that room. Fucking permanently!”

I roll my eyes. “Fine. What’s your plan then?”

Onyx nods at Aleksander behind me, who continues on. “We have considered that you’ve been missing a long time and you have not done any training in years. You are a liability to us, and that isn’t acceptable. We need to get you trained up, and fast. I have made a plan to train you three times a week on a more intensive course to make up for lost time.”

I’m not doing that. I pretend to agree. The moment they let me out of sight, I’m going to leave here no matter what. Aleksander watches me and I nod. “Fine.”

Onyx looks happy that I’ve agreed. “We all live in this house, and so do you now. None of us will touch you. You don’t have to worry about that. We don’t want a mate.” A sting of rejection lances my chest. “That’s your room and you can do whatever you want with it. You’ll get an allowance to spend, and you’ll go to work with Rhodes at a local charity. You’ll work there two times a week. The other three days, you’ll be training in various combats with us all until you’re fully trained.”

That sounds like hell and I’m definitely not doing that. “Anything else?”

He is looking suspicious now. “Yes, we eat two meals a day in here. Together. It’s good for building trust and communication. We all have stressful jobs in Starlight, and eating together has proven useful in sharing the pressure.”

I dig my nails into my arm. “Great, good for you. I won’t be eating with you all two times a day. That sounds depressing when we all hate each other.”

Hollis coldly laughs. “Like she’s gonna do anything that isn’t benefiting herself. We will find her napping in a sunbed by tomorrow morning.”

Rhodes is kinder than his twin, and he changes the subject. “The Scottish weather isn’t good this time of year, and it might be cold for you.”

I actually love the Scottish weather. I love the rain. I never liked the sun of Spain and how hot it was. But I don’t dare give them any answer. Onyx isn’t done, though. “One of us is going to be with you at all times when you leave the house. Wherever you go. We can’t trust you.”

“I’m free, but not really?” I push my chair out. “I’m not hungry.”

“Where are you going? You can’t just run from every problem, Gwen,” Onyx shouts after me. “Finn, leave her—”

I turn around in the doorframe to come face to chest with Finnegan. There isn’t a hint of kindness in his eyes when I finally look up, nothing but malice, and it is directed at me. My wolf likes it. “If you try to escape, Sun, that pretty Harris you lived with—”

“His name is Harry.” I don’t know why I bother interrupting him to correct him. He just looks more terrifying, and my Nexus is falling more in love by the second.

“I don’t give a shit what your boyfriend’s name is, but I’ll kill him. You step one foot outside this city, I’ll cut him from head to toe and serve you his remains. His family too. Do you understand, Sun?” My heart races as I stare into his blue eyes and see he isn’t joking.

He will kill the boy who cared for me, trained with me, and treated me like family.

Tears threaten to fall, and my shoulders drop as I imagine Harry dead. I don’t bother correcting him a second time by telling him he isn’t my boyfriend. Or that my name isn’t Sun. “I got it.”

He shoves past me, and I look at the rest of my so-called mates. Hollis is smirking, Onyx looks tired, Alek is frowning, and Rhodes is half out of his seat with a worried expression. Hollis beats him, coming over to me and touching a tear on my cheek. “Why did you reject our Nexus bond?”

I would almost believe he cares, but he is a good liar. I know because I’m one too.

Still, I want to tell him it was to protect him. It was to stop my wolf, my monster, it, from destroying this world. That I am a danger to them, and they have successfully trapped me here. That they need to let me go before I lose control of it.

There is no compassion in his voice, nothing but hate. “Or are you too selfish to even answer?” He huffs when I don’t speak. “I wish you hadn’t, because if you’d given us half the chance, if I’d taken one look at you, I would have rejected the bond too. You’re a weak coward, Gwen.” I can barely hold in the tears from that statement, from the pure hate in his eyes. Hollis looks over his shoulder at Onyx. “I’m not her fucking babysitter. I’m not taking her anywhere. Figure it all out yourself, but I’m done.”

My wolf howls in my chest, whining in pain at the firmness of the word done. I wonder if they can hear it as all four of the rest of them look straight at me for a second, like the echo of the Nexus bond between us that I broke is vibrating. I don’t trust myself to say a word without crying.

The door opens behind me, and I turn around to see Rochelle strolling in like she knows this place well. Rochelle is still blonde, very skinny, but as beautiful as she was when we were teenagers and had nothing to do but have petty arguments. She isn’t someone I expected to see though. She looks me up and down, sighing loudly, walking past me into Hollis’s open arms. He smiles at her like she is his world and then kisses her, passionately, clearly to show me my place. She has her own Nexus mate, so why is she here and all over mine?

But he isn’t mine.

I rejected him and I deserve every bit of this pain.

I have to dig my nails into my palms to push my Nexus down. The wave of jealousy coming from it is like nothing I’ve ever felt, and the feeling clashes with my pain, almost toppling me over. My feet feel like they are moving on their own as I turn, running to the front door and straight out into the open just to gasp in the air like a much-needed drug.

I don’t stop running.

Chapter

Four

Ibarely see the street around me as I run; only the feeling of the wind in my hair and the cold air freezing my breath catches my attention. The cobble pavements, the towering trees, and everything else is a haze. All of it is nearly like I’m running through a dream, because all I can focus on is the thumping of my heart, the feeling of my Nexus clawing in my chest, begging and trying to come out. It’s angry, it’s jealous, and I get why. I didn’t expect them not to have relationships and sex. They are handsome and powerful. Why wouldn’t they? I bet half the Nexus girls have thrown themselves at my mates. I’ve been gone five years. Of course they had relationships, but I guess I wasn’t expecting to be faced with it so soon.

Or it to be her.

She was like a glaringly obvious beacon of truth that my Nexus wanted to eat for supper to mark its territory. In fact, I think it felt like destroying the entire world because of Hollis and Rochelle. I don’t know how to stop it, but I keep running, hoping it will calm down when I’m not around our mates. The pounding of my feet on the pavement is almost soothing, but I’m aware that someone’s chasing me. Stopping at a crossroads, I glance behind me to see Rhodes. He’s a few feet away, even though I feel like if he wanted to, he could close the distance between us in a second. He pauses with me, keeping an eye out around us before his eyes lock with mine…just for a second.

For a second, I imagine running to him. Telling him everything and hoping he doesn’t hate me. Hoping he understands why I need to get away from them—from Starlight. But he wouldn’t understand. He would hate me. His mouth opens, but I turn away before I can hear what he shouts. I sprint across the crossroads and down a shorter path next to a busy road. Cars swoop past, but not just cars, horses…Nexus shifters. Three of them, all white, run past me, and I watch them, feeling my Nexus watching too.

The pathway opens up into an alleyway, and on the other side, I see a much busier street. The walls are old down the alleyway, thick grey brick and brown mortar somehow holding it all up. Moss has sneaked in the cobblestone in the alleyway, but as I step onto the street, it’s flawless and clean. Old buildings line the row, with a big clearing path in the middle that looks like it cuts through the city from one side to the other. All the buildings are ancient, old Scottish houses that have been kept and tidied up, so close to the original that it feels like stepping back in time. Each of the shops nestled in the townhouses have triangular roofs with small animal designs in stone. No one notices me as I slip into the crowd and disappear like a ghost. One of my favourite things to do.

I keep running until I stop and realise that I’m hidden in a swarm of people. Of Nexus. I glance around, but no one’s looking my way, and it’s strange to be around so many. There are a few humans here too, but they must know about Nexus or be married in. I’m not sure what the rules are on humans, but I know Starlight is hidden from human knowledge for the most part. Some are shifted into their Nexus; wolves, snakes, bears, and a tiger stroll on like it’s a normal day. Two tiger cubs run after the mother, and I smile, watching them for a moment and just letting myself enjoy the moment of peace after the storm.

Yes, I’m trapped in the city, but I’m safe for now. My Nexus mates aren’t hurt, and I have my monster under control. It won’t stay under wraps for long, but I have a few weeks before it will need to hunt. I make sure my Nexus is tucked away where no one can sense it before I walk with the crowds.

I can feel one of my mates following near—Rhodes, I assume, but I can’t tell the feelings apart. I think the only way I’ll be able to do that is by spending more time with them, and I’m not doing that. Somehow, I have to get away from them all. I don’t think Onyx or Rhodes will hurt me or force our Nexus to mate, but I don’t trust the others. Hollis might just attempt to hurt me, and I have to watch my back with him.

My eyes drop to the most beautiful golden retriever as a human walks it past. He sees me looking and pauses. “This is Gentle. I would let you stroke her, but she has a temper around Nexus. My Nexus wife puts up with her because I love her.”

I fall to my knees in front of Gentle and hold my hand out. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, gorgeous girl. I won’t stroke you unless you want me to.” She stares at me with her big brown eyes before nudging my hand with her nose, and I take that as a hint to stroke her neck.

Her owner laughs. “It must be because she is having pups. She is never this nice.”

I rise to my feet and grin. “I love dogs and I’ve always wanted a golden retriever. Thank you for letting me say hello.”

“Are you new? Only, you look fam—”

I leave before he can figure out why I’m familiar. I only get another mile down the street before Rhodes is standing in my path, right in front of a tea shop. The smell of tea fills my senses as Rhodes crosses his arms. “You can stop running now. We can walk together and talk. Chasing you is getting old when there is nowhere you can run that I won’t follow, Gwenieve.”

I have the feeling he’s definitely going to be the one that plays good cop with me. “Are you my guard for the day?” I spread my arms out. “I hate to tell you this, but bodyguards don’t need to talk. In fact, looking muscular and scary is all the job requires.”

He runs his hand through his blond hair, looking like he doesn’t know exactly what to say to me. My eyes flicker to the scar, the only part of him that doesn’t look exactly like Hollis. “What Hollis did—”

I cut him off. “I don’t want to talk about Hollis.”

Rhodes closes the space between us, too close. I can smell him, like Onyx. “Alright, I’m glad we’re both in agreement about my twin. I want to be your friend, but I’m finding it hard to make up excuses for your behaviour and all the running. Just give me something.” When I don’t say a word, he sighs. “I don’t know why you rejected our bond, and I don’t need to know that yet. If I’m being honest, I just want to protect you. That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less. My brother can be difficult and I’m sorry he did that to you, but he is hurt. We all are, but can you give us a chance to show you who we are?”

I’m not giving anybody a chance. “I don’t want to be here, and I was kidnapped. Learning about you isn’t something I want.” I tap the rune on my wrist a few times with my middle finger.

“Why?” he asks, frowning. “You don’t make any sense. These are your people, too.” For a moment, I let myself look around at the people flooding the area near us. “Why don’t you want to be here? Is it really that great in Spain with humans and a few Nexus? Is that where you were all this time?” He pauses and his eyes tighten. “Is it because you’re in love with that guy you lived with?”

“I don’t have to tell you anything.”

He frowns and it doesn’t suit him. “You don’t, but our Nexus were bonded by the Wolf Gods. We were chosen to be together—”

“They were wrong!” I snap, letting my anger rise. “Our Nexus are not bonded, because I rejected you!”

He steps a little closer and leans down, our faces inches away. “Reject us all you like. We’ll be connected till the day we die, and I’ll make sure of it. Let’s go back before Onyx loses his shit and comes to get you himself. It wouldn’t surprise me if he is already here.”

I lurch from his grip, and for a second, the full force of his Nexus splinters out in the air between us like a rope wrapping around my own heart. I push it away and hate the feeling of rejection that radiates between us. Rain starts dripping from the grey skies on us, just like a mist. He looks up, swearing under his breath, and he takes off his black cloak, handing it to me.

“I don’t want to wear that.”

“Gwen!” he shouts after me, but I’m already rushing into the crowds, trusting them to hide me. The crowd easily splits us up after a second, and my shoulders drop in relief. Rhodes is dangerously nice, with his charming smiles and small talk that somehow makes me want to blurt out my secrets. I have to stay away from him. All of them. I know he can sense me, and no amount of running here will get me far enough away, but I might as well make him work for it a little. I keep tapping my rune for fun as I wind through the crowds until I come to a crowd of teenagers who are talking quietly. I rest on the wall next to them to catch my breath.

“I can’t believe it’s the Ranger Academy sign up today and we are only watching! I’d die to live in that castle.” My ears perk up and I brush my dark hair to the side as I look at the guy speaking. He is smoking and leaning on the wall near me, his eyes on a blond guy opposite. “Why didn’t you sign up like you planned, Deke?”

Deke glances at the woman in his arms, tall and willowy compared to him. I can sense that they’re Nexus mates, and I already know he isn’t signing up because of her. “Being a ranger is hard and dangerous. You have to sign up and stay in that castle for three years without your mate.”

The smoker coughs. “Yeah, but it’s awesome. You’re such a good fighter, and you’d get all the honours and awards. Not to mention the riches.”

Deke rolls his eyes. “Being good isn’t enough to win in that place. The amount of people they cart out of there, not just body bags but brain dead, scares everyone. Even the healers take ages to fix the ones who survive. The necromancers won’t touch anybody from there when they are dead. My mum is one, and she told me the reason is because they’re too broken by the time they’re dead to bring back to life for a goodbye with their family.” Ugh, necromancy creeps me out. Dead should stay dead.

The smoker laughs. “Come on, not that many have died.”

“There’s enough dead that I’m not going in there.” He smiles at the woman. “We want to start a family and have a normal life. Not all of us are cut out to be rangers. The academy is not for me.” Ranger Academy. Memories shoot back to me—memories of my father talking about the Ranger Academy and how he entered it when he was younger. That’s how he met Macsen, who was a ranger too. Macsen said he gave up being a ranger when his mate got pregnant in his last year, and my father left at the same time for personal reasons. My father was a damn good fighter. I know, he taught me himself, and he said he loved the academy because it was an escape from his family. He got his own room, and he could do anything he wanted as long as he went to lessons and passed.

Sounds perfect for me.

Sensing one of my mates nearer than before, I slip in between some people and run through the crowds. I don’t know where exactly I’m going, but I follow the crowd, dodging between them, hearing Rhodes shout for me occasionally but ignoring him. He doesn’t own me. No one does. I’ve done terrible things for my independence, to keep them safe and to escape here…it can’t all be for nothing. I’m certainly not living in that house with them, because sooner rather than later, it will come out. Unless I have some freedom and moments where I’m not watched, it’s going to be a nightmare.

It might not be a great idea to sign up for the Ranger Academy, where they’re going to push me to my limits. But it’s better than being around my Nexus mates—where my monster might come out and kill them all for fun. I’ve done things I can’t even let myself remember, but their deaths would break me. I would never be able to live with it. I’ve never been sure I can at all live with this thing inside me, anyway. But as long as they’re alive, that’s all that really matters. I’ve tried ending my life a dozen times, but it never lets me. It always makes sure that I stay here, that I live, because its need to destroy is never-ending.

I see the sign in the distance, a wide, massive sign for the Ranger Academy sign ups. “Everyone is welcome. Come and fight to be the strongest Nexus.” They might as well be rolling out the red carpet for my escape at this point. It becomes harder to get through the growing crowd to find a small queue with three people waiting in front of a black tent. I look behind, just quickly into the crowds, and can’t see Rhodes anywhere. He’s far enough behind that hopefully I’ll make it to the front before he finds me. There is only one other person in the queue when I get to it.

I just quickly jump to the back of the queue, breathing heavily from all the running, standing behind a woman with long red hair that the wind blows into my face. She looks back at me with her green eyes and smiles softly before turning back. “NEXT!”

The bark comes from inside the tent, and the woman in front startles before rushing into the tent. The rain picks up as I wait outside, soaking my hair and clothes quickly, and I shiver. I don’t stop looking back into the crowds for any of my mates, sensing they are close.

Not close enough to stop me. “NEXT!”

The warmth of the tent washes over me as I step inside. There is a black desk, two chairs on either side, and on the desk is a massive book that is open to a blank page. On the chair behind the desk sits someone who a kid might say resembles Santa. Long white hair mixes with his long beard, and his blue eyes look at me with familiarity I can’t place. He sighs, leaning back in his seat, and it creaks. “Name?”

It’s a sarcastic question. He knows who I am. “Gwenieve Autumn, and I am here to sign up.”

He tilts his head to the side, and the light shows off how tanned his skin is. “The only reason I’m not throwing you out is because I knew your father. He was by far one of the best fighters in the academy. Second only to one of your Nexus mates. You’ve been missing a very long time, Miss Autumn. I feel that signing you up to this is just asking for trouble though.”

I lie. “My father wanted this for me.” I grin next. “And the sign said anyone’s welcome. So, shouldn’t it not matter who my Nexus mates are? I rejected them anyway.”

He sighs and taps his fingers on the chair arm. “Finnegan is my son. I’m Tutor Edvard and president of the Ranger Academy.” That’s why he looks familiar. I’m fucked. He is just going to call Finnegan and tell him I’m here. “You’re definitely going to get me in trouble with my son and his Nexus bonds.” He offers me a silver Nex dagger that unnaturally glows. “Cut your hand and wipe the blood on your fingers and palm.”

I do as he instructs, barely flinching at the cut. He watches me and taps the book. “Place your hand on the page and mark yourself as a ranger in training. The moment you do, you’re binding yourself here for three years. Unless the page is ripped out or burnt by me, you are bound to the academy permanently and you will follow our rules. You’ll share a room with one roommate, and you’ll have freedom within reason. You’ll stay here unless you die in combat or tests.”

“Why are you helping me?” I ask, my hand hovering over the page.

He smirks, lying almost as easily as I do. He reminds me of Finnegan now. “The academy was getting boring, and you’re exactly the kind of trouble we need to liven it up.”

“She is my trouble. Mine.” I turn my head back to see Onyx waiting in the door of the tent, light pouring around him. His eyes are like black fire, and tension radiates off every inch of him. He snarls at me. “Don’t you dare do it, Gwen!”

I wink right as I press my hand straight onto the page.

Chapter

Five

My hand is torn away within a second of it touching, but it’s too late. On my palm, a tulip blooms in black ink, marking me. Black tulips were always my father’s favourite flower, and he used to make earrings, necklaces, and small wooden statues of them as secret birthday gifts. Maybe he did want this for me, and that was his way of telling me. My mother never knew he gave me gifts, and if she did, she would have destroyed them. I got good at lying and claiming to have bought them myself, if she ever noticed them, that is. I lost all of my dad’s gifts a long time ago, and I would kill for one more of my dad’s black tulips.

Onyx grabs me and drags me out of the tent by my arm, right into the pouring rain.

“She belongs to the academy now, Onyx. Careful!”

“Fuck off,” Onyx growls under his breath and tugs me into a gap by the side of the tent—where no one can see us. He presses me into the tent wall and places his hands on either side to box me in. The misty rain pours on us, and I watch drops of rain drip from his cheek onto his lip. He searches my eyes for a second, and whatever he sees only pisses him off more. “Have you lost your fucking mind?”

“Nope,” I slowly drawl, my heart racing.

That only makes him more pissed. “This isn’t a joke, Gwen. What have you just done? Do you know what this place is? It’s going to spit you out broken on the other side within a week. Most people have trained here their entire lives for this, and you’ve done nothing but sun it up in Spain. Are you absolutely fucking mad? Do you want to die?”

I freeze as my instant answer is yes. I just can’t die. Even if I want death. I hold my head high and push down the feelings bubbling in my chest. “It was my choice and I’m standing by it. I’d rather be trapped in the academy than trapped in your house, in that godforsaken room, and forced to eat meals with five men who hate me.”

Onyx pulls away. “We don’t all hate you, for fuck’s sake, Gwen. Not all of us. Give us a chance and you might just see that.”

My heart is pounding as Rhodes finds us. He looks between Onyx and me, frowning deeper. He throws his black cloak over my shoulders, and I tug my arms through, even when it all but smothers me. Rhodes grabs my chin to make me look at him. Him touching me is a bad idea because I like it too much. “Are you really doing this?”

“Yes,” I breathe out, hating how he affects me. My body just wants to sink closer to him and enjoy every delicious inch he is willing to give me. I blink, pushing my Nexus down. He shakes his head and lets go, looking at Onyx. “This isn’t good.”

“I’m well aware of the risks of what she just did.” He steps away from me, and disappointment hovers around him like a snake. When he looks at me next, he is absolutely furious. “You have no idea what you just signed yourself up for.”

Edvard clears his throat, and we all turn to him. “Gwenieve, you’ll be meeting all the tutors in a moment. Go and join the crowd through the tents.”

I glance at where Onyx is and step around them, leaving them arguing about me. I try not to smirk as I tap my wrist three times, just to piss him off a little more than he already is. His scent is still wrapped around me from the cloak and I’m selfishly never giving it back. I know I’m being a bit petty, but he definitely just embarrassed me in front of Edvard and the crowd who are now silently watching the show. I duck into the tent before looking back and around the desk to the other side. The sunlight beams in as I walk out and onto a stage in front of a busy crowd. There must be at least a hundred people here, all similar in age to me, and all staring at me as I walk down the steps. Whispers break out immediately, and my cheeks flush as I move to the gap by the girl with red hair who was before me in line.

“Hello, stranger.” My high school classmate Annie steps to my other side, all in black and just as soaked from the rain as me. She looks at me with wide eyes before grinning. Flashbacks of her at the mating ceremony come back to me. The last time we saw each other. “You’ve changed so much in five years.”

“You haven’t,” I gently reply, and I mean it. I always liked Annie, even if she was friends with Rochelle. She came across as the kind of person who is loyal and kind, even as a kid. Her blonde hair is cut to her shoulders, and the ends are dyed a bright red. She doesn’t look much different, but she is more toned and stronger than she was as a teenager.

“I heard rumours that they found you locked up by Vian for all these years, and they brought you back. Isn’t it amazing that you got here and now you’re in the academy?”

Ah, so that’s the story they’re going with. “Yes, amazing.” I can’t keep the dryness from my voice.

Annie notes it and changes the subject. She smells like a Nexus male, and she must be mated. I’m surprised her mate let her come in here. Most of the crowd are male, only ten or so females to be seen. Usually, mated Nexus don’t let their mates fight or become rangers because of how possessive and protective their Nexus are. “A lot has changed, and I’d love to catch you up. Were you able to train? If not, I can help you before lessons and after—”

“I’m fine,” I interrupt her. I know she is being nice, but I can’t tell her everything, and we barely know each other. She nods, not letting it faze her at all. She was never this much of a talker as teenagers, and it suits her.

“Okay, well, I might need your help then.” She laughs and my lips twitch.

We both go silent as the tent flap is pushed to the side and the tutors walk out in a line. Edvard is first, and then all the blood rushes from my face. The twins and Alek are standing in the line of tutors. All three of them purposely don’t look at me. I almost feel a little bad that Rhodes is going to get blamed for this, and I tighten my hands on his cloak. I wince at Alek though, the tight line of his lips telling me he’s severely pissed off. The other two tutors are men, no women in sight.

Edvard claps his hands. “Welcome, all new trainee rangers!” The crowd cheers, but I stay silent. “These are some of your trusted tutors.” He introduces himself and each of the five. I can only hear the names of my Nexus ringing in my ear and blocking everything else out. They are absolutely going to fail me on everything. “We have rules in the academy, and the main one is this: Relationships with tutors or other academy rangers are frowned upon. Sex within the academy will be punished severely. The academy is on holy ground, and it would be a dishonour. When you leave academy grounds, you will be respectful of the good name of rangers and behave as such. Pregnancy will be avoided with shots given on the first day here, and if you are already found pregnant, we will have an issue.”

Annie winks at me as Edvard continues. “Look at the person on your left. That is who you will be sharing a room with.” Annie is to my left. I remember her being nice when we were kids. I remember her being there on the day I rejected my Nexus bonds. She’s too nice to be my friend, and I’m too dangerous to be around. For her sake, I wish it was anyone but her. “Every ranger who has ever lived has put their hand on this book and spilled their blood in the book. We spill our blood to protect our people. In the name of the Nexus Gods and the people of the Nexus, you have sworn to train to be able to protect them. You will be the strongest of our race, and with the training we give you, comes the responsibility of being a good person who will run into danger to save an innocent.”

He pauses for a second, scanning the crowd. “We start the day at eight a.m., and we finish the day at seven at night. You get a break in the middle of the day for an hour lunch. Weekends are yours to do as you wish, but not only do we train your bodies, we give you information on our enemy and how to defeat them. Now more than ever, it is important that we have rangers who are smart and capable. You must go into a battle and not fear the outcome. Fear is not allowed in a ranger’s heart by the end of the academy.”

Edvard glances at me for a moment, but I spot the look. “Even your Nexus bonds will shadow in comparison to your life as a ranger. It will become your first responsibility over everything else. This is not an easy academy, as I’m sure you’ve been made aware. Life, it can quickly end and especially when you fight our enemies. If you die here, it is still better to die in the academy than in the hands of the Vian.” He straightens his shoulders. “As for your powers, we will test them individually to see how best you can use them.”

I’m avoiding that test.

“But for the first month, we’ll be focused on your bodies and mind. Then we’ll work on your Nexus gift. Any problems, you come to me. But be warned, if you waste my time, you will not like the outcome.” He waves a hand towards the back of the group, and I see cars waiting. “Create a line and leave. Welcome, trainee rangers.”

The crowd cheers, but my eyes drift up, locking on Aleksander, who is glaring at me. He sneers before looking away. He is going to make the next three years hell.

Chapter

Six

Iwake up and stare at the cobweb-speckled white ceiling before turning over in my cream sheets until I’m tangled up, staring at the other side of the room. Annie is fast asleep, face down, and her hand is still gripping her phone. She was talking with her mate long into the night after FaceTiming him to show him the tiny room we have. I don’t have a phone, and I have no idea what time it is. The sun’s not risen, so it must be early.

I climb out of bed, glancing at the white double dresser and opening the drawers to find them all empty. My side of the bedroom is pitiful, plain, and without my bag, I don’t have anything to put in here. Annie already has a poster of the Bear God, not quite sure yet why she does, and a colourful knitted blanket spread across her quilt. She has a black dog teddy snuggled up with her, even when she tried to hide it from me to begin with. I quickly stretch my arms up, washing away another nightmare I can’t quite remember.

Something was weird about last night, though. My wolf is content, and usually after a nightmare, it’s a mess like me. I know it came out slightly in my sleep last night, crawling out of my chest and trying to play games. It does that sometimes, but still, I don’t like it.

Yesterday ended up being exhausting, but I still don’t regret making this choice. After the ten-minute drive of silence and the driver speeding like a mad man, we were dumped outside a castle on the cliff edge. Everyone was given a backpack by older rangers, and then we were given a brief tour and another lecture about the importance of the castle’s hallowed grounds.

I go over to the window and look out across the sea. In the darkness, the water almost reflects the starlit sky. This far north, the stars are so bright, and they are no doubt the reason the city is named Starlight. I have to admit to myself, I like the beautiful castle I can now call home for three years even if it’s not what I truly want. I want to escape, but I’m not stupid and I doubt I’ll get far with these runes on my wrists. As long as I can keep my Nexus under control, the years should pass quickly and then I’ll be free. Three years to control the wolf in my chest and make sure no one knows exactly how much of a monster I really am? Fuck, maybe I can convince my mates that I don’t want to run so they’ll take the runes off.

The castle is right on the edge of the city, nestled on the tall cliffs that almost look like they are going to fall and take us all with it. I noted straight away the thick walls that line the castle’s ground edges and how they are covered in runes. I won’t be able to escape that way. Jumping into the sea isn’t an option either because I hate the water. I’m pretty sure that the sea would not let me die that easily and we’d be thrown around in the waves for years until some poor sailor found us.

I rub my face and go into the shared bathroom, humming the Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack I overheard playing in Annie’s mate’s apartment. The bathroom has a door on either side, and we share it with two other people in the room next to us who I haven’t met. Thankfully, there’s no one in here, and I lock both the doors before staring at myself in the mirror.

“I look like shit.” I look pale and weak. My mates were right about that. My mother always said I was too weak for the monster inside me. My father claimed the opposite. I knew my mother was right. The only thing they agreed on was they hated Nexus and the rules we all must follow to survive.

My dark hair is a mess of tangled knots and frizzy from the rain yesterday. There is a red bag on the floor with my name on it, and I tug it open, finding a hairbrush, toiletries, towels, and every basic thing I could possibly need. There are three other bags in here with Annie’s and two other girls’ names. I quickly clean up, have a shower, and dry off, hanging my towel over a towel rack on the back of the door, before getting dressed in the clothes that were in the rucksack. They’re tight fitting, almost a thick material, and all black. They cover me from my wrists to my upper neck, not an inch of skin left, and I find thick gloves in the bag too. I don’t put those on, choosing to leave them. The clothes stick to every inch of my curves, and there are five sets in the bag, making it clear I can only wear these in the academy for lessons.

Finally, I pull my hair up into a high ponytail and make a single braid. My mum used to tell me to always have a braid in your hair for good luck. I’m definitely going to need luck today. I walk out, only to bump into Annie, who is yawning. She looks far less chipper than she usually is. “Morning?”

She frowns. “Coffee.” A long groan echoes from her.

I try not to chuckle. “I’m gathering you’re not a morning person?” When she rubs her eyes and still looks miserable, I step aside. “I’ll get out of your way.”

She passes me by, grumbling under her breath. “We need a coffee machine in here and asap.”

Waiting by the window, I keep mapping out all of the exits I can see and storing every bit of information. The frosty lawn is quickly filling up with people as the sun peeks out in the distance, throwing orange and yellow bursts of light across the tops of the grey stone castle and its many, many towers. There’s a haunting mist coming in off the salty sea, and as I pop the window open to let some air in here, I let myself breathe it in. The view is peaceful, even if my fear of the water dampens it a little.

My Nexus doesn’t feel the same fear. She can see the beauty, just for a second, through the haze of destruction, and she likes it.

Even when I hear doors opening and shutting, I find myself waiting for Annie because she has been nothing but nice to me so far. I spend my time looking over the timetable of lessons after making my bed and hers next. First lesson, training with Hollis. Brilliant. Second lesson is marked as history, but it doesn’t say with who, and the third is Alek. Sounds like a fun-filled day with people who hate me.

My stomach rumbles loudly, and I clamp my hand on it. I’m definitely going to need food. Nothing on the sheet says anything about food, but the first lesson isn’t until eight, so we must be able to find somewhere for breakfast before then.

The door is knocked twice. Not knocked but banged like the place is on fire. Immediately I sense one of my mates outside. I pull the door open. I wasn’t expecting anyone—especially not him. Finnegan. My eyes widen as they climb up his impressive frame, over his thick chest and shoulders, and to his hateful eyes. My wolf practically purrs in my chest. It has a favourite, but I wish it didn’t. Why is the scary mate your favourite? Finnegan easily fills the doorframe like a damn tree, and a sexy one at that. He looks tired and angry though. I arch an eyebrow. “What do you want?”

He frowns at me, looking me up and down. His jaw tightens and his eyes turn an impossibly dark shade of blue. Like the blue of a deep ocean, something we were never meant to see. “Your clothes are too tight. You will be a fucking distraction to every male here.” I blink, not expecting that. I don’t think he planned to say that…compliment. Was it a compliment? Maybe. He growls and shakes his head. “Fucking Nexus.” He glares at me, angrier than before. “Stay the fuck out of my head.”

I cross my arms. “What? I’ve not been in your head.” I try to shut the door, but he wedges one huge foot in the gap and steps closer to me, nudging the door open with his shoulder. He crosses those gigantic thick arms of his like he is copying me for a joke, and it’s only then I notice a tattoo on his forearm, a rune that I’ve not seen before. There’s a dragon wrapped around it. It kind of looks like the letter B.

He leans down, his voice low and menacing. “I hear you all fucking night, whispering to me, and then you pull me into your nightmares. I don’t care if you have bad dreams. Figure out how to deal with them yourself, but stay out of my head. It’s a shit power to dreamwalk, and I am not your saviour. Do it again, and I’ll make your life hell in here.”

Dreamwalking…was that what I was doing? Fuck. I didn’t even know I could do that. I dread to know where I got—

No, I won’t let myself remember or think of that.

I can’t break in front of him.

Steeling my gaze, I lift the corner of my lips up in a smirk. “I don’t know what to tell you, Finn. Dreaming of me now? Cute, but I’m not interested.”

He growls, his eyes darkening again. The darkness is his Nexus, I think, and we are both playing with fire. Even though my body screams to move closer when he reaches for me, I don’t. I step back away before he can touch me, and a throat is cleared behind him. “This is the female wards. Men are not allowed in here. That includes you, Tutor Finnegan.”

He doesn’t even look back at the woman, only leaning down with his eyes locked on mine. He takes my breath away with that look. “This isn’t over, Sun. Stay the fuck out of my head.”

The corridor is crammed full of gawking faces when he turns, and my cheeks brighten as Finnegan storms through them all and out of sight. An older woman is standing close in an orange pinstripe suit, and her perfectly curled locks of grey hair are pinned back. She is one of the tutors, I’m guessing.

“Nexus mates are not allowed in the wards unless they are of the same sex, and even then, they are not allowed in your room. I will excuse this just once even if Tutor Finnegan does not teach first-year trainees.” She looks past me to where a guy is trying to sneak out of a room a few doors down. “Ranger Luke, good to see you up bright and early. Perhaps you came to volunteer for toilet cleaning duty for the next month? What was that? ‘Yes, Tutor?’ Brilliant.” Her voice changes in an instant from sarcastic to downright scary. “Now get out of this ward before I change my mind.”

Poor Luke runs away without one of his boots. The tutor clears her throat. “It is brilliant to see most of you are out of your rooms nice and early. I’m not sure what Tutor Finnegan was doing here, but do not follow his bad example of breaking the rules.” She pointedly looks at me. “We have a welcome speech in the entrance hall, and then you have your breakfast before your first lesson begins. Let’s get a move on.” She claps her hands and turns around on her high heels, going straight after Finnegan, who I just know doesn’t give a shit about breaking the rules and embarrassing me.

Annie rushes out of the bathroom, braiding the last bit of her hair, and she’s fully dressed in the same clothes as me, but she makes it look cute. In fact, everyone in the corridor looks like they’re wearing the same. “What did I miss?”

“Moody Nexus mates. The usual,” I mutter as we both pull on our boots before rushing out the door, staying close to each other’s side. Annie seems to have decided that sticking together is a good idea. I’ve never really had a friend outside of Harry, and look what happened there. I just got him in loads of trouble and at risk of being murdered by my mates. He has a death threat hanging over him, and I know anyone I get close to is at risk. No, having friends is not a good idea.

Annie doesn’t give me any chance to escape her though, staying right at my side through the walk down the empty grey stone corridor and into the middle part of the castle. We head down the weathered staircase that’s made completely of stone. The thick stone banister wraps around in a circle, and we meet the other trainees from yesterday halfway down from their floor. I don’t know where the rest of the older rangers are, but I can hear people talking and moving about the castle in the distance.

Hundreds of us flood the entrance hall, and we all wait, no one speaking a word, but I assume we are all just as nervous. It’s very obvious how few women there are in this year, and I stand a little closer to Annie. It’s a vast room, making all the hundreds of us look tiny in it. There are so many wide corridors heading off in different directions, all of the walls the same grey stone, and yet it is modernised with electric lights throughout. Framed paintings of people I don’t know line the walls, but I would guess they are old presidents of the academy. There isn’t a single woman’s portrait among them. All old men.

The tutor from this morning claps her hands, and we all turn to see her on the steps. “Welcome. I’m Tutor Jettie, and I want to take a moment to formally welcome you into the Ranger Academy Castle. Some of you may be aware of the castle’s long and dark history, but for those who aren’t, a quick reminder. This was the last stand for our kind against the Vian in the great war. In the early nineteen hundreds, this castle housed some of our most powerful Nexus, and they died in this very room to pave the way for Nexus kind. When you learn to fight here, when you pick up your Nex weapon of choice and fight the Vian, know that the souls who battled here are with you. They are our family, our ancestors, and in their honour, we work here for our future.”

I swear a cold air claws right down my spine. Haunted castle? Fuck no.

“Being a ranger is no effortless task. It is the hardest job in our city, and it comes with the risk of death at every turn. The clothes you wear are rangers’ uniforms. No Vian will be able to take your power and life through the clothes. They are woven with runes to protect us, but we will teach you how to make sure your clothes are your last defence.” She points to the right. “The dining quarter is to your right. Down there, you’ll find food at all times, and beyond them are healers waiting for anyone. That’s where you’ll go for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The healers are there if you cannot walk, are screaming, or near death. I do not expect to hear that you’ve seen them for period pains or a splinter.”

Annie and I glance at each other for a second to smile, but she carries on. “The food options you are given are to sustain you for the various lessons, and we expect you to eat protein to make sure you gain muscle and do not pass out. You’ll begin with Tutor Hollis’s class today, and I would advise you don’t eat too much, because he has a record of making beginners throw up on day one.” My stomach drops. “His lessons are a detailed training class where he will learn your strengths and weaknesses for this first week. Tutor Hollis is one of our finest rangers, and if he tells you to do something, I advise you listen. You’ll be punished hard in this academy for disobedience, and no one’s allowed to give up. You’ll be pushed harder if you do. That’s just a warning. Your second class will be with me, and it will be on the history of the Nexus Beings and on our enemies, too. Knowledge is as strong a power as your Nexus.”

She makes sure to look many trainees in the eye as she advises us. “Your third class is to work on your powers, but for now, while you’re so new, we will extend that to more training with Tutor Hollis or Tutor Rhodes, who teach on alternative days. Tutor Aleksander has you on Tuesdays and Thursdays all day, and this is a great honour. Tutor Aleksander has only ever come in to teach occasionally, and he has never taught a class from scratch. I am excited to see what will become of this year with his instruction.”

He came to torture me, great.

“I will let him explain his particular lessons himself. You’re back to the normal three lessons on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Weekends are yours, but we will be assigning work for you to achieve in your spare time.”

I swear she looks right at me for a second. “If you have any actual problems, my office is underneath the staircase there, along with the offices of all the other tutors. You knock once, and you do not enter without being accepted. Anyone found in tutors’ offices without being invited in there will be subject to severe punishments by the president of the Ranger Academy. Are we understood?”

Yes rings out from us all, and she claps her hands, pointing at the corridor to breakfast. None of us needs to be asked twice. Annie and I get pushed to the back of the queue as everyone rushes down the corridor in front of us.

She leans in. “Any chance Tutor Hollis will be nice to you because you’re his—”

“No chance. If anything, he is going to make it worse than it needs to be,” I quickly explain. “They all hate me.”

Her eyebrows push together. “They can’t really hate you; they are your—”

“I rejected them, remember? Yeah, they can hate me, and truthfully, I’m not interested in getting to know them either. From what I’ve seen so far, they are possessive assholes,” I mutter.

She frowns. “But then you were trapped, and you couldn’t get back to them. It’s not like you…” She drifts off, seeing the look on my face I don’t hide well enough. “I remember that day and how your parents were waiting. I know your parents were difficult, and they didn’t mix well with the other families. I remember it all, and I never once thought you left willingly.”

I can’t say a word, and she watches me. She clears her throat. “Honestly, I always wanted to be your friend when we were kids. It’s the luck of the Wolf Gods that we both came here at the same time, don’t you think?”

We step forward in the line that has built up. “I kept to myself back then, so don’t worry about it.”

She plays with the end of her braid. “I should have been your friend. There were so few Nexus in the town, and I was just stuck between you and Rochelle.”

I tilt my head, my Nexus awakening at Rochelle’s name. “Are you still friends with her?”

“Um, no.” She shakes her head. “She made other friends after what happened with her mate.”

“What happened?” Annie doesn’t get a chance to tell me as we get into the room. It’s kind of like a high school cafeteria, rows and rows of benches and tables. At the back of the room are rows of countertops with trays, some serving hot foods, like sausages, bacon, baked beans, and fried eggs. Others are for cereals, toast, and pastries. At the end is a tea station, and I smell coffee right away. I head straight to the one for the hot food, and Annie joins me.

After loading my plate and grabbing a coffee, we sit down together. Annie has two coffees, and she downs one in a second before even taking a bite of her food. Despite our table being in the middle of the room, no one sits with us. “Are you sure you want to be friends with me? I mean, I think I’m the social pariah here, and no one’s going to sit by you if you stay here.”

She snorts. “Yeah, no, it’s me who is the social pariah, Gwen.” She dabs at her mouth with a napkin. “They don’t sit by me because of who my dad is.” I raise an eyebrow and wait for her to tell me. I remember her dad a little, a tall man with a posh suit and a permanent frown. Annie’s mum is just like her, all blonde hair and big warm smiles. “My dad’s the Supreme Alpha of Starlight City. We moved here after I mated, and he got voted in pretty early on. He was always an alpha, but he wanted to be a father first, so he waited until I was older to apply for the job. He doesn’t always make the best choices, and a lot of people here are not a huge fan of him. So, therefore, they don’t want to be anywhere near me. Both in hate and fear, I guess. Which I understand if you don’t want to, either.”

My shoulders drop. She might not be the safest person to be around, because if she sees my wolf, the monster, she is going to tell her dad. My hands tighten on my drink and a fork. If I walk away, it’s another person who is going to hate me, and I don’t know if I can handle that, especially since we’re roommates. Selfishly, I smile back. I know this is a bad idea, but I can’t stop myself just wanting someone in my life. I hate being alone. “Sounds like we’re kind of perfect pariah friends.”

She grins widely. “Thank you for not running in the other direction. I promise, my dad won’t notice you. He doesn’t really bother with me as long as I do what he wants. Which is stay here and be a ranger. All the honour and all that crap.” I get the feeling she doesn’t want to be here. It’s an escape from her dad. I guess we are both hiding and escaping things. “No one’s not going to want to be friends with you, by the way. If anything, I think that they’d be sucking up to you, considering who your Nexus mates are. When you guys are mated, you could be one of the strongest Nexus bondings in history. There’s no one else here that’s had more than three mates and survived it…” She drifts off. “Is that why? You got scared?”

I swallow the egg and toast in my mouth. “No, and if we’re going to be friends, please don’t ask me again. Alright?”

“Alright. We all have our secrets. For the record, if you want to share some of yours at any point, I’m here.” She lowers her voice. “And I’m sorry about your parents’ death. My dad told me you lost them both, and that’s awful.”

The colour drains from my cheeks as a flashing memory of their dead bodies flickers into my mind. I gulp, pushing it away to the back of my mind like I do everything else. “Thank you. I miss them.”

We smile at each other, and it feels like there’s some sort of agreement of friendship. I really should have been friends with Annie sooner. I’ve barely finished scoffing down my breakfast before an alarm rings out so loud that it shakes the table. I slam my hands over my ears and look up just as Hollis walks in, holding some sort of blaring alarm speaker in his hands. I wince, nearly falling on the table, and Annie cries out.

So does everyone here. I remember the noise and I can barely control my wolf from making me shift into my Nexus form so it can attack the speaker. It suddenly stops after a few minutes. Hollis jumps on my table, right in front of me, his muddy boot leaving a mark. “First lesson, these are what the Vian use to subdue you out in the real world. Humans cannot hear it, but our Nexus are highly sensitive to the noise. We’re going to play it every morning until it doesn’t bother you at all. Now stand up and get outside! You’re all late for my lesson!”

Chapter

Seven

Hollis is brutal, and he doesn’t give a shit about anyone.

My ears are still ringing as I follow the crowds with Annie, who is noticeably pale now. Hollis leads us outside the castle, straight into the cold, brisk air near the cliffs at the back. There’s a grass track marked with white lines right on the edge, and Hollis barks at everyone to start running on it before he makes us. I know he literally could make me run it with his powers, so I make sure to stay near the front. He stays at the end of the group, but I feel his eyes burning daggers into my back now and then.

Eventually he stops, completely unfazed even though the rest of us are breathless and sweaty at this point, and he watches us finish the last part. We stay on the track, and my legs are burning from keeping near the front, but Annie keeps up with me. We run the entire track, which loops all the way around the castle until we are back where we began. I am panting deeply from the exhaustion, and none of us dare stop until Hollis lets off that blaring alarm again. It rings right through my ears, and I wince. I’ve heard it before, so it doesn’t make me throw up like quite a lot of the people here do, including Annie. I hold her hair back for her and rub her back. Hollis thankfully turns it off after a few minutes, and I breathe in the cold air to cool myself down.

He stands on raised steps leading up to the side entrance of the castle towering over us. His clothes are similar to ours but more padded and thicker, and really suit him. He is pretty for a nightmare. It’s a shame I have to pretend to hate him, and he hates me back, but his is real. He doesn’t look at me once though, pretending like I don’t exist. Two can play that game. He is my tutor, nothing more…at least for today. I hold my head up high.

“We’re going to start with the very basics, because seeing how unfit all of you are, we cannot begin anywhere else. You took seventeen minutes to run the circuit around the castle, and by the end of this year, I will have you running it in ten. Nine, if you’re good like me.” Nine minutes? How the fuck does anyone do that? “This class isn’t easy, and I expect you not to be throwing up at the back within a few days. If you are, I’m kicking you out.”

What a surprise, Hollis doesn’t show any of them any mercy. “Today we’ll take it in turns to combat against me. I want to see exactly how strong you are, and don’t worry, I am your tutor, and I will take it easy on some of you.” He chooses that moment to look at me, his forest green eyes taunting my soul. Oh fuck. “Everyone over here.”

He leads us over to a training square, into the grass right next to the cliff edge. He’s definitely going to throw me off that cliff. If he does, jokes on him, I can’t die that easily.

Annie looks paler than I’ve ever seen her. “Do you think running away is still an option?”

I know she is joking, but damn, it sounds like a good idea. “Gwenieve, up here.” I freeze at Hollis’s shout. Why me? Whispers break out round the crowd as I leave Annie and walk through them. I steel my shoulders and close the gap between us. The wind is blowing around him, harsh and as unforgiving as he is, and I know this is all a fun game to him. I can tell by the cruel smirk of his lips as I move into position on the other side of the square. He curls his fingers. “Go on then, show us what you’ve been doing in Spain.” He cocks his head. “Other than getting a nice tan.”

“You seem obsessed with my tan. Do you want to see where I have tan lines? What I covered up and what I didn’t?” I tease, touching the edge of my top, lifting it a little before letting go. I know it’s a low blow to tease him with the fact I ran away, but I don’t care at this point.

His eyes turn fiery before morphing into disgust. “Shut up with that smart mouth and train. I have other students more deserving than you.”

My Nexus claws in my chest, almost rising out of me like a tornado, but I push it down. Calm, my monster. I can’t let it be riled and come out to protect me. Nor can I show him how good I am at defending myself, because he will ask questions that I cannot give him answers to. But I can hold my own at least. Hollis is like a wall when I go for him first, and he dodges me almost effortlessly. I have no chance of dodging him back as he slams right into me, and I fall to the ground with a thud. Air is knocked out of my lungs as he picks me up, pulling me up by my hair to arch my neck, and I wince as he glares at me.

“You can’t even defend yourself? Pathetic.” He throws me down. I feel tears stinging in the back of my eyes, but I don’t allow them to fall. Angry, I swing my leg out to knock him on his ass, but he stops me with his powers. My leg hovers in the air for a second before he throws me backwards in the air. I roll, smacking my chin on the ground, and I taste blood in my mouth. He must cushion my fall, because I don’t slam too hard onto the ground with the rest of my body. I spit out blood between us, and his eyes flare as he looks at my blood on his boots. “I’m done with you. You’re useless.”

He raises his voice. “This is an example of what a ranger should not be. She won’t last a week. She is weak, untrained, surprised by Nexus powers even though she knew what my powers are. The Vian have powers. The most trained of them, the ones who will come after you at some point, will have countless powers to use against you in a battle. You should expect anything and never once let yourself be surprised and on the ground like a victim. Rangers are not victims.” I climb to my feet, my cheeks burning red. “Next. Anyone can do better than her, so don’t worry about following her shitty example.” Everyone laughs at me, and I have to push down the tears that threaten to fall. I will not cry in front of him.

I walk away to Annie, who just holds my hand and squeezes it once. She didn’t laugh. For the rest of the lesson, Hollis is nicer to everybody else that he trains with. He doesn’t use his powers once. Even going as far as smiling at the girls and teasing them with flirty jokes and running his fingers down their arms as they all but faint from his charm. He does all of it in front of me, and I know it’s a punishment.

After about two hours of standing in the cold, he walks away. “You’re dismissed. Head to your next lesson with Tutor Jettie on the second floor. Room two.” I look up to see Rhodes standing on the steps, watching Hollis come towards him, a frown on his pretty face. Hollis tries to go past him, but Rhodes grabs his shirt and stops him. They clearly argue for a second before Hollis storms off inside. Rhodes searches the crowd until he spots me and waves me over.

“I’ll wait here,” Annie tells me, and I nod at her before heading to Rhodes. He comes down the steps, standing way too close to me. “Hollis is a dick, and you didn’t deserve that. I know you likely hate us all now more than ever, but he took it too far. He always takes it too far.”

“I deserved it.” I shrug my shoulder. “You should hate me, too. Why are you being nice?” I question.

He doesn’t answer me, only changing the subject instead. “Do you want to go shopping after class today? You don’t have any clothes or things. You didn’t bring anything with you except for that bag, and we found your Nex dagger. Who gave you it? It’s blessed, so it means you had—”

“I’m not answering any questions today.” Or ever. I don’t add that, though. “Can I have them back?”

He frowns, rubbing the back of his neck. “I left the bag in your room this morning. It’s been checked through by Finn, and there’s nothing much in there, but it’s yours. Your Nex weapon is with Alek…and he will give it back to you in his lesson. I will take you shopping in the meantime.”

“I don’t have any money on me,” I counter, relieved I have the bag back. It’s something at least.

He shrugs. “I’d happily buy you anything you need without so much as blinking. Fuck, you can just have my card, and I’ll be your bag-carrying shadow. But I’m getting to know you now, and I had the feeling you wouldn’t accept that from me. You’ll be working with me on Tuesday and Thursday this week in the animal shelter after class. You earn money there, and I sweet-talked the owner into giving you a month in advance. It’s your money that way.”

I don’t know what to say. He really has thought of everything, so I can’t disagree. It would be nice to have my own things. “I will get you a phone though with my money though, and that’s not something I’m willing to budge on. I want to be able to communicate with you if you need anything. The others…well, I don’t care what they do or don’t. I’m going to be your friend. I’ll be your anything, Gwen.”

I have to ask it again, even when my mouth is dry and my heart is racing like a drum. “Why are you being nice to me? I rejected you, our bond, and ran away. I’m not a good person, Rhodes. I don’t know what you’re seeing in me, but I’m not worth it.”

He touches my cheek with his fingertips, just for a second, but it feels like forever. Frighteningly, I realise I don’t want him to lower his hand. “I know you’re lying, Gwen. I know you’re hiding something big and that you are worth waiting for. I knew from the second I saw you again, you are worth everything. Push me away all you like. I’m going to be waiting until the day you trust me and tell me all the terrible things you think make you not worth it and I tell you I still want you, regardless.”

My heart races as he walks away. Gods, he’s dangerous for me. What’s more dangerous is my monster watching out of my one eye, and I can tell she really likes him too.

Chapter

Eight

Tutor Jettie’s classroom reminds me of a planetarium I went to once when I was a kid. It’s got a huge domed roof, but instead of playing a film about the planet on a screen, and a lesson in how we can save it, this is a stunning roof of stars and constellations that I’ve never seen before. It’s all made of black tiles with dozens of silver and gold metal stars randomly dotted around. In the centre is a version of the sun, a big shining yellow ball of fire that is real, because I can feel how warm it is from down here.

Our raised seats surround a stage in the middle. I slide into a seat next to Annie as we keep looking around at the room, which is full of too many posters, paintings, drawings and other artworks on shelves on every wall. My favourite is the ceiling by far, silver and gold stars twinkling against the light of the burning sun in the middle. Only when we’re all in our seat does Tutor Jettie come in and stand on the stage in the same suit she wore this morning. Not everyone can make orange work, but she does.

“Welcome to Nexus History class, new rangers. My classes are not ones that challenge your body or Nexus like the others, but I will work on your mind. You will be informed of secrets the general public of Nexus do not know. What you learn today is for your ears only. You do not tell your family, you do not tell your children, and you don’t tell anybody the secrets the rangers know about our people. The book will know and mark you if you speak of the secrets you learn. You will find yourself not wishing to speak about it even if you do.”

Annie raises her eyebrows, and I smirk at her. Nexus magic is weird, and we both know it. “We’re going to start with the very basics today, but I’ll have secrets woven throughout all of the stories that I tell you. All the histories of the Nexus and the Vian are open to you, and I encourage you to spend time asking questions, being inquisitive, and reading. You are to learn; you are to adapt and understand where we came from. Peace is just as important as war. You will learn where the first wars happened, why the Vian want to kill us so much, and why we want to kill them right back. Your job is to keep people alive. You are to keep the Nexus alive for future generations. There is a saying for Nexus rangers, one only spoken in whispers to each other… No range of distance comes between protecting our kind and the hand of a ranger. Remember it.”

She waves her hand up in the air. “Above you is the biggest star in our galaxy—the sun. Essentially, that is where we came from. The first Nexus was born out of the sun, travelled as nothing but starlight for thousands of years before finding Earth and humans. It blended itself with the human soul, making the first Nexus being. The first wolf.” She looks around the room, her gaze falling on a guy in the front. “Tell me, what do you know of this? You should have been told these stories at least.”

The guy clears his throat, his dreadlocks bouncing over his shoulders and around his dark skin. “The first Nexus being was really powerful, but he couldn’t live long. He shifted into every animal on earth that he saw. He made cities and new runes. He created a safe haven until it became too much. The first Nexus spent his time with his wife, who fell pregnant in the short few months that he was still alive. Five quintuplets were born, all boys, eight months after the first Nexus’ death. They were the first of our kind, and they are our Gods. The twin Wolf Gods, the Bear God, the Snake God and the Mortal God.”

“Brilliant.” She looks around the room and focuses on another guy, who pales at the attention. “What do you know after this?”

“The five babies all became powerful rulers of Starlight, this city built here that their father began, and they were worshipped by any human who came to visit the city and pleaded to live here. The five rulers put their names together to make the name Nexus for our race, for the being within our soul that is attached to us, and for all generations to remember where they came from. They make who we are. Each one shifted pretty early on in their childhood, and they eventually went on to have their own children who shifted into their Nexus forms, and so on.”

“Very good.” She claps her hands once. “What the stories will not tell you is the first five Nexus had endless power. Not one or two. Endless.” She pauses to let that sink in. “Power that they called starlight. Even back then, they understood that we have starlight running in our veins, attached to our very souls. We are starlight, that’s what a Nexus is. It is pure, unfiltered starlight. Some may say we are stars ourselves, walking around the world, travelling this earth as guests next to the humans. If we are stars, then what does that make the Vian?”

Annie puts her hand up, and Tutor Jettie nods to her. “They’re the opposite to us. They are darkness. A void that drains and pulls in everything. Almost like a black star, my dad once said.”

“Correct. We call them the dark to our light. We do not know their origins or where they came from. They appeared after there had been several generations of Nexus already living, and they soon drained one, marking themselves as our enemy forever. We are both guests on this amazing planet, but we strive for peace, and they will forever strive for destruction. They are not like us. They have no emotions, no guilt or pity. They kill and take and live forever on the payment of our Nexus’ souls.” I gulp. “Our history is bloody. I will not say it is an easy time to be a Nexus ranger, but you are needed in this fight. We may be made of starlight, but our hands are soaked in blood, and our ancestors’ are too. We kill to survive, and when you make your first kill, the first time you take a life, you will know in your soul it was for the greater good. Many wars written into human history were wars between the Vian that the humans sided with. Some humans worked with us to try to save the world in the wars. It all toppled down to the great war that happened in the early nineteen hundreds. Now, the Vian are in minimal numbers, whereas our community is thriving. Light shines brighter. Always. With your help, their genocide is finally in view.”

Not always. I’m living proof of that. Annie leans into me. “You’ve gone pale. Are you okay?”

I nod, but I have to calm my hands down on the bench and hope Annie doesn’t stare at the side of my face for much longer.

“All that stands between the extinction of our race is you. Rangers. We train our rangers to be the very best. The pillars of who protect our society. Your first lesson today is a rather simple one. I want you to go outside into the sky tonight and choose a star. Take a picture of it on your phone, find out what its name is on the Starlight database. Find out why you feel connected to it and write an essay to read in our next lesson. I expect you to take your time and to take this seriously. Find a star that calls to you. Use your Nexus, let it choose, let it spread out to the sky. Our eyesight is different to humans, and we see stars that they never will. Find something extraordinary, and I look forward to hearing your tales. I’m sure you’re all exhausted after your first lesson, and I’m giving you the afternoon off. Now go and rest. Eat. Prepare for tomorrow’s lesson as Tutor Aleksander is not known for kindness as I am.”

She walks out, and no one moves for a second, and I get the impression we are all waiting for Hollis’s blaring alarm or some other kind of joke. Eventually, everyone gets up and chatter fills the silence.

Annie looks pleased. “I know the perfect star. I see it nearly every time I go out and look at the sky. Even Kosma, my mate, sees it, and he loves it too. What about you?”

I soften my voice. “I don’t let myself look at stars very often. I find them…strange.” I can’t tell her the sad truth about how I like the stars. They are the only time I let myself back at Harry’s home to think about my mates. To imagine what they’d look like and to try to feel our bond.

She knocks my shoulder with hers. “Same. I end up staring for hours, and my Nexus sometimes makes me shift so she can look at them.”

I still don’t know what her Nexus is. “What do you shift into?”

“You’re a wolf, right?” she questions, and I nod. “I thought so, I could sense that about you even if your Nexus is shy and hides.” Shy is a new word for my Nexus, but I’ll take it over terrifying or just plain old screaming. “I’m a bear, like my mate. He is all brown and fluffy, yet I got stuck looking more like a polar bear but greyer.”

I grin. “Bears are cute, though.”

She laughs with me as we finally get out of the classroom and down the staircase to the middle floor. “Should we go back to our room?”

“I can’t. Rhodes offered to take me shopping. I don’t have anything much, but he sorted out an early payment for working with him somewhere.”

She frowns. “What about your family’s estate? I mean, it still stands there, and you must be super rich… It’s yours now by our rights, as you’re the youngest survivor of the Autumn family, so why not just ask for it?”

My heart plummets. I don’t deserve that, and setting foot in my father’s family home when I was the one who destroyed everything…no. I’m a monster and I know my place. “Yeah, I know, but I want a fresh start. Not ghosts.”

She comes with me to the entrance hall. “Lost family wouldn’t be ghosts but silent supporters. If you change your mind—”

“I won’t,” I answer quickly.

She searches my eyes and leaves it. “Where are you meeting Rhodes, then?”

“I don’t know exactly where—”

“Because you’re not.” Onyx sneaks up on me like the very ghosts we have been talking about. I barely even sensed him, which is a little concerning.

I end up snapping at him. “What are you doing here?”

His jaw tightens visibly, and I wince. He is wearing dark jeans, a white polo shirt, and a watch that looks like it costs the same as a house. “Hello to you too.” He looks to my right. “Ann Donovan? You look like your father, so I’m taking a guess.”

“Yes, but I go by Annie, and frankly, that is not a nice thing to say. He is old and more wrinkled than our fifteen-year-old cat.” She huffs. “Nice to meet you, Onyx. I’ll leave you two to the awkwardness.”

She runs off like the wind is chasing her, and Onyx crosses his arms. “So…you’re making friends, and you can be nice to people. That’s good to know. I thought your only expression was a frown and you could only call me filthy names.”

I keep that frown he mentioned on my face. “She’s my roommate and I’m not a completely horrible person. I can make friends. I’m nicer to people who don’t lock me in rooms.”

“I didn’t mean it like that.” He groans, rubbing the back of his neck. “Look, can we start over? I would appreciate if you stopped tapping the rune all night to keep me awake and frowning at me like I’m your enemy when I’m not. I do not judge or hate you, but we are in a delicate position and linked together whether you rejected me or not. I have accepted, even if I…” He pauses and shakes his head. “I have made my Nexus accept you do not want the bond the Gods gave us, but living like this is already tiring.”

Onyx waits for my answer, and the sensible section of my brain tells me to run. Tells me that being his friend or whatever he is offering is a really fucking stupid idea, but my heart? My Nexus? Gods…we want to be close to him. I already know it won’t last. He will always end up hating me. “Friends.”

He smiles at me, and my knees instantly feel weak. He is jaw droppingly gorgeous when he smiles. “Why didn’t you say dreamwalking was your power? You were marked as having no powers when you were younger?” I frown and he adds, “Finn told me. He was grumbling about his lack of sleep, and I knew you were awake too, thanks to the rune headache you like to give me.”

“Telltale.” I wrinkle my nose and I don’t say anything else about my power. “Where is Rhodes anyway?”

“He had an emergency at the pet shelter he works at. I’m sure he’ll tell you about it or show you when you join him, but I’m taking you shopping.”

“No offence, but I don’t want to go with you. You don’t come across as a guy who likes to shop or follow me about.” I clear my throat when he stares at me a bit too intensely for a friend. “I can wait for Rhodes to have more spare time.”

I go to walk away, but he catches my elbow. Every inch of skin that touches is burning, not in a bad way, but a burn that spreads across my body and makes everything tighten. “I will follow you, Gwen.” He steps an inch closer and closes his eyes, sucking in a deep breath. “I can hear your wolf, you know, sometimes. When I touch you, it’s like your Nexus is screaming for me, and fuck, I want to kiss you just to be close. To taste what is mine. Can you hear my Nexus?”

For a moment, I let myself close my eyes, to feel that link between us that has never died, only diminished when I broke us. When I rejected him. I never let myself wonder what it would have been like to accept them all, to be normal enough to ever have let that happen. I all but claw my elbow from his. “No,” I bite out.

He rocks back, looking jarred, but quickly slips on a mask of indifference. Good. I need to do the same even if it hurts. “I’ll take you and pretend to be Rhodes. I don’t have the pretty blond hair, but I can copy his awful jokes.” He makes jokes. I don’t know them at all, even if it feels like we have known each other forever. When I don’t answer him, he continues. “I promised him. I don’t like breaking promises. Ever, Gwen. That means we are shopping even if I have to pick your clothes.”

I wince, just imagining what he might choose. “Alright, but make a promise you’re not going to be a total dick this entire trip.”

He smirks, his eyes almost flashing like a star. “Deal. My car’s outside.”

Onyx leads me to the door, and I try not to laugh. “Let me guess, you own an expensive sports car? Mum and dad pay for it all?”

“Do you know about my family, then?” he counters, raising an eyebrow.

“Actually, no. It was a guess. Out of all five of you, you seem to wear the most expensive designer shit clothing, and you’re polished in a way only money gives you.” We step out to the front of the castle, at the top of a dozen wide stone steps that are the same colour as the castle. Right at the bottom is a very expensive sports car. I’ve got no idea what the name of it is. It’s clearly electric, posh and a shiny black.

“Polished. Interesting choice of words.” He frowns at his car. “You’re old Nexus blood yourself, and your grandmother likely rivals my own family’s fortune. Taking the piss out of me being rich is ironic, don’t you think?”

I bite my tongue. I didn’t need to know my grandmother on my father’s side is still very much alive. She has to be getting on a hundred now. Even thinking of her brings back awful memories. Onyx misreads my expression. “You don’t like my car. What’s wrong with it? It’s Italian and—”

“Boring. It’s common and boring,” I answer, and he looks like I just stabbed him. It’s hard not to smile, and the soft look he gives me makes me want to take it back. Onyx is romantic, and I knew he was dangerous for me, but romanticising what I am is a lethal move.

“Fine, I’ll change it.” Before I can tell him not to do that, he asks, “What car would you choose?”

Onyx leads me down the steps, clicking his keys and making the doors roll up into the air until the car looks like a dragon. “Oh, you know what, I’ve never been asked that.” He goes round the car with me and opens the door for me, something I didn’t expect him to do, but it’s very gentleman-like. I slide into the seats, which are all leather, and everything is so shiny in this car. There isn’t a hair, a bit of dirt, just nothing. It’s almost like no one’s ever even driven it before. Onyx climbs in next to me, presses a glowing button to start the engine, but he waits for me to put my seatbelt on before he does his own. Only when the castle is hard to see behind us do I answer his earlier question. “Probably a Land Rover, something with big wheels and a crazy hot pink that makes Barbie’s car look pale.”

“Pink.” He spits the word out, barely holding the pure disgust in his voice. I’m tempted to remind him that he promised not to be an asshole this whole trip, but it’s quite comical to hear him try to hold in what he really wants to say. He gulps and I see his Adam’s apple moving. “Interesting.”

I almost laugh, and I have to look away to hide my massive smile before he sees it. We settle into a comfortable silence, only stopping when Onyx has to slow down as six highland cows fill the road. I lean forward, enjoying them. “How was your first day?” he asks.

“We’re not close friends, you know. We don’t have to do this small talk while you’re doing Rhodes a favour.” I bite on my lip. Being defensive is all I really know how to do.

He sighs. “Then just humour me. I want to know, how was your first day?” He stops the car completely as a cow sits in the road, its brown fur blowing in the wind. “Rhodes told me about Hollis. He is a brutal tutor, but today was personal. I’m sure Rhodes has spoken to him.”

“My stomach’s still turning from the blaring alarm, but the history lesson was actually informative. Lunch was kind of nice. There were times I only ate randomly for weeks when we were hiding, so it’s nice to have choices.” I don’t mention the times we starved because my parents refused to leave the house to get food and only did when I passed out from hunger. Or one of them did. They were protecting me. I know they were trying their best, but sometimes… “It was fine. I made my choice to come here and train.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t know about Hollis,” he softly adds, starting the car again now that the cow has moved on. “I was fucking mad at you for running, again, but you ran yourself into a worse situation than you were already in. I get it, that first meal was rough, and Hollis…he took your rejection worse than all of us. I mean, we all took it bad, but between him and Alek, I’m not sure who would win that shitty award.”

“What happened with Alek?”

He gives me a tight smile. “That’s his story and I’m not telling you shit that would betray the men I count as brothers.”

A feeling of jealousy sinks in the pit of my stomach. They have each other, and they built something while I had to run. I had to do so much alone. “I hardly doubt Alek will be telling me anything, but I don’t blame him for it.”

Thankfully, he doesn’t reply to me, and I keep my eyes on the window as we enter the edge of the city. Onyx drives me into the right side of the city and parks up in a huge car park before a high street of shops. They have such normal shops here, from HMVs to Next and various human clothing apparels with some little quirky shops. There are magic shops that sell enchantments for our Nexus to get high, but most of it is normal. “How do you get human shops in here and actual humans working in them?”

“We pay, handsomely, for the silence. Any humans in the city are on visas or married to a Nexus,” he explains, “or born here without a Nexus in their soul. It happens sometimes.” Onyx gives me a black credit card with my name on it, tells me how much is on it, which is quite a lot for a month’s work, before leaving me to shop. He follows me around, happily taking bags for me at the tills. I only tap my rune a few times to annoy him, and his eyes tighten each time.

I drag him into the quirkier shops to buy tops with questionable things written on the front of them. He doesn’t say a word though, even though I can see his eyebrow twitching every time I pick up a top that you might see at a child’s shop, like the four Pokémon crop tops, but he stays blissfully silent. After a while, we sit down by a vendor selling boba tea, and I pick a mango flavour with pink edible glitter, and it comes in a pink plastic cup too.

Only then does he leave me for a moment to pop into the Apple shop and pick up a new iPhone that Rhodes pre-ordered. It’s got all their numbers on it, and when he hands me the bag, I notice a phone case. It’s got a rune painted in a metallic purple, an S with small wolves wrapped around the letter. “It’s a lost rune, so your phone can be traced if you lose it. Rhodes thought of everything.” He sits down right next to me, his thigh pressed against mine. He’s not going to be happy to learn that I don’t like phones because my Nexus hates technology for some unknown reason. She will break it, or make it disappear when she takes over eventually. I’m surprised when he takes my drink off me, wraps his lips around the rainbow straw, and drinks it.

I blink, completely shocked as he hands me it back, running his tongue across his bottom lip, and I watch every second. “It tastes like a Barbie house threw up in it, but seeing you want a pink car, it is not that surprising.”

“Boba tea is a life choice for me, so shush.” I wrinkle my nose at him. “You’re way nicer when you’ve not got me locked in one of your rooms in your house and aren’t mad at me.”

He leans back on the bench, looking out across the people filling the high street. No one looks at us, it’s like we are invisible. “I fucked up. Is that what you want to hear?” He turns his heavy gaze on me. “I’m possessive. Sometimes I’ve been called an asshole, and I thought you were going to run away at the first chance that you could. I cannot understand why you rejected the bond and ran. I don’t think we will ever be able to move past that, but hating you? What does that achieve? Rhodes and I are in agreement that getting to know you is worth the risk. Alek, Hollis and Finn might never not hate you, and that’s enough for one person to have on their shoulders.”

My stomach fills with unease as my Nexus watches him from my one eye, taking in his words as he continues. “I didn’t know what to do with you at the beginning. The guys, we’ve become like a family, sort of attached to each other almost because you left, because you rejected us, because we’re the first rejected Nexus bonds in hundreds of years. In our own way, we figured our life is shit now and we were always going to be judged by everyone. Sticking together became our way of keeping safe. Then you’re just back, with no real reason behind all the pain you caused us. You’re just there.” That broken thing in my chest beats around the deep cracks. “I have always believed the Wolf Gods had a plan for us. Something, some reason all of this happened, and my Nexus is more stable than it’s been in forever when I’m near you. I fucked up, and I won’t anymore. I can’t fully forgive you, not ever, Gwen, but I will be your friend.”

The unease in my stomach hits an all-time high. “Onyx, I think—” I stop mid-sentence as I finally register what the feeling is, and I glance up, noticing the surrounding silence. Everyone on the street has frozen in their places, like time has stopped, but they are slowly breaking out of it. The only ones not affected are three hooded Vian who are walking right towards us, and I spin my head back, seeing two more coming in at us from behind. My boba tea slams onto the ground as one of them grabs a nearby Nexus woman, his scarred hand wrapped around her neck. “NO!” I scream, but it’s too late. He drains her in a second, leaving nothing but her dark skin now ash coloured as he drops her body to the floor.

Onyx immediately stands in front of me, and he doesn’t take his eyes off the ones getting close. “Run, Gwen, and hide.”

“No.” There’s no fucking way that I’m leaving him here. Near immediately, he shifts, and it’s magnificent. I’m stuck watching as he shifts, his body morphing into a gigantic wolf. It could rival my own wolf in size and height and width, but his is all black, almost fluffy, and he growls low. Nexus are never more dangerous than when their mates are in danger. I might be a rejected mate, but he will protect me on instinct, and we both know it without saying a word. But there are too many here for just him. Two Vian are a big risk, but five? Fuck, we are screwed.

This is another reason I never wanted to meet them. White shields of magic appear around me, almost like a dome, as Onyx casts out his magic. He wraps the same shields around every Nexus and human on the street almost easily. Even using an impressive amount of magic, he moves like it’s effortless, and he is on two of them with nothing but teeth and claws. He jumps on them, ripping claws down the one, literally tearing him apart in a spray of blood. The other is grosser, and I almost wish I didn’t see him bite the Vian’s head off completely within seconds. He chases the third, who runs, and I spin around, coming face to face with one who sneaked up. I can tell it’s him who is using power in a city where he shouldn’t be able to use his gifts. There are too many runes protecting every inch of Starlight, but here he is.

“Running a second time won’t work. We can find you anywhere,” he sneers at me, a hiss echoing from him. Hissing usually means he took a power from a Snake Nexus, and a lot of them have a poison gift. He can’t touch me because Vian can easily use powers like that to poison with a single touch. The asshole nods to the shorter Vian next to him, who holds up a glowing yellow hand, and when he touches the shield, electricity buzzes around it.

—BANG—

I stumble back, my eyes stinging. The shield stays, but it’s broken and fractured. The asshole Vian hand goes through the broken parts of the shield to grab me. I wince and fall back out the other side of the shield and the gaps, and it flickers away.

Panicked, my monster riles to the front of my mind, and it looks for its mate before even thinking about running. I feel sick pushing it down so I can get my feet to move.

I run, knowing I don’t have a choice. I don’t have any weapons on me. I can’t…I can’t let my monster out here. There are too many people. It’s too dangerous and Onyx is here. It would consume him too. Gods, I can’t kill him or any other innocents. I run as fast as I can towards a random clothing shop and through it, to another street behind where there are a few bodies on the ground. I try not to look at them, to have to mark them as more innocents who died because of me. I tug open the door to the shop next door and slide in, rushing to the middle of the store.

I hear a whimper and look down to see a bundle of Nexus kids hiding in a corner of the store behind mannequins. Shit. I can’t let the Vian find them; kids are too easy targets for them. “She’s in here. I can smell her Nexus.”

Tracker. Great. I duck down, but I have time to see two male Vian step into the front of the store. Their hoods have fallen off, and they both have shaved heads with number tattoos all over their skin, marking them as hunters. How did they get into this city? I thought it was meant to be safe. Blaring alarms finally start going off around the city, and I sense magic in the air. I hold my finger up to my lips and tell the kids to be quiet.

When I spin, my eyes widen as Onyx sneaks into the store from where I came in, still fully clothed, and he grabs me around the waist to pull me out, but I push at him, pointing at the kids. He grits his teeth and goes to stand to fight these two off on his own, but I grab him. They are stronger than the others, and who knows what powers they have? They could explode and take all of the kids’ lives with them.

If I’m pushed too far, my monster will come out to play, and an explosion would be a blessing. I glance at his arm where he’s been stabbed with something, and my Nexus blanches, demanding we fix its mate. Protect. Blood pours down to my waist where he is still holding me, and he lowers his hands. He is pale, and I know his Nexus is struggling right now not to shift and protect me. I have to do something. “Keep them safe and I will stop them. I won’t let them hurt you, Gwen.”

“Just stay still and be quiet.” I grab his hand and link our fingers together, letting one of my most used powers spread out around us, morphing us until we just look like mannequins in the corner of the store.

Onyx’s eyes widen as he takes in the magic. How clear it is and how he has learnt another secret of mine. The Vian walk right past us, and one of them picks up a mannequin, throwing it into the wall. “Fuck, we can’t leave without her.”

“We failed and if we stay longer, they are going to capture us. We need to leave,” the other snarls at him. They run out the back door, and only when I’m sure they have left, I let my power drop. Onyx sits down, breathing out slowly. “You have your dad’s power to make people look like…”

“Not the same. He could make people look like others on the street, but I can make a small area look like my surroundings,” I explain. “My dad’s magic was limited to touch, but I can make a small room morph into whatever I want someone to see for a short time.” There’s no point hiding this from him.

“You’re a more powerful version of his gift,” he proudly answers, and I hate that pride in his eyes. “Something good he did for you. Despite every other choice your parents made.” I step away from him. He knows nothing about my parents. “You have two unique powers. That’s interesting.”

Shit, he’s seen more of my powers, and if he sees anything else, he’s going to know that I’m lying about everything. Nexus never have more than two powers. It’s impossible. I’m impossible. When he figures out that I have endless power, he’s going to know exactly what my secret is.

Then he will hate me.

Chapter

Nine

Idon’t get to work in the first week. In fact, none of us do anything but read books on Nexus history in our rooms whilst Annie’s dad issued a lockdown on the entire city while the rangers searched for the security breach. Annie had a few phone calls from her dad, who sounded stressed because the Vian haven’t breached the walls in years. The last time was when only one sneaked in, but he never killed anyone. They killed five people in that attack, two more barely survived, and they haven’t been caught. Onyx killed seven of them before he got to me and is being hailed a hero of Starlight by Annie’s dad, but he was injured, and he needed to recover too. He went straight to a healer after dropping me off at the academy, and Finnegan silently escorted me to my room.

Then left five silent rangers outside the doors to watch me.

Annie yawns, knocking me out of my thoughts. “Finally, we’re allowed to go back to normal lessons. I was getting a little stir crazy, and it didn’t help that I can’t leave the academy to see my mate,” she huffs. “Phone calls are not enough.”

“We both might regret wanting to leave this room when we go to Aleksander’s lesson first.” I wince. Something about him bothers me more than the others. Hollis is angry, Onyx is trying too hard to be my friend, and Rhodes is sweet, which is just going to get his own heart broken. Finnegan is the only one I cannot figure out, and I would prefer to just avoid him.

It’s been fun to be roommates with Annie and be trapped with her for a week while we did homework given to us. I wrote fifty pages on a star in the sky I found, and now I’m a pro at the boring history of the first known war of the Nexus. Outside of studying, we had fun sharing our favourite music with each other, including belting out a hit that our twelve-year-old selves fangirled over.

The only time I wanted to jump out of the window was when I had to listen to her FaceTime her mate and be so in love. It’s unfair that love like that is real. He calls her non-stop to check how she is. Apparently, he was locked down in his house, and he wasn’t allowed to attend his sports university where he plays for a big team. Other than their phone calls, it was normal, just hanging out. Something I really didn’t get on the run, and I kind of enjoyed myself.

But reality is outside the door, and I can’t pretend it isn’t anymore. Annie hands me my boot I lost, and I tug it on before doing up the laces. “Smile, you look like you’re walking to your grave. He is your Nexus mate bond. He can’t kill you even if he wanted to.”

“Hollis proved killing me would be too easy. That embarrassing me is more fun,” I remind her. “And he pales in comparison to how scary Aleksander is.” I don’t think I can take another lesson like Hollis’s, even though I’m well aware that I’m pretty much going to have no choice for the rest of the week.

“Well, at least tomorrow we have Tutor Rhodes,” she reminds me. “You said Rhodes was nicer, right?”

“Yeah, he is,” I admit. “I haven’t seen him since he said he’d go shopping with me and then bailed out for a work emergency.”

She shrugs. “He runs the emergency and foster animal shelter that his mum opened before she passed away. My dad is a friend of the animal shelter’s owner. Rhodes goes to a lot of the higher up functions with the owner to raise money for the shelter or encourage people to adopt animals.”

“Animals don’t like my Nexus, so working there isn’t going to end well,” I mutter, even if I’m a little impressed and want to see this shelter.

She frowns my way. “Oh, my Nexus loves them. She has a weird complex of liking animals that worship her.” She chuckles. “My mum has a tiny dachshund, and my bear loves to make me shift to show the barking dachshund who is boss. It’s weird.”

“Who wins, the dachshund or your Nexus bear?”

“The dachshund every time. My Nexus is a teddy bear at heart,” she admits with a grin. That doesn’t surprise me. “Let’s get to this lesson.”

It’s easy enough to follow the map in Annie’s phone to the back of the castle. The older rangers flood the academy, and the crowds are hard to get through, but everyone just seems happy to be finally outside their rooms. Aleksander’s lesson is held in the gymnasium. It has a wall of glass that overlooks the cliff side and the stormy sea below. The other wall is all steel, layered with different weapons clipped to every inch of it. Every kind of weapon that I’ve ever seen. Axes, bows, swords, daggers. None of them call to me, but I find Annie staring a bit too hard at the swords.

Alek is waiting in the middle of the room in full Nexus armour, all black, and his dark arms are crossed as he surveys everyone that comes in. The second the door slams shut behind us, I let myself really look at him. He looks Hispanic or Mexican in this light, his skin a lovely shade that reminds me of honey. Alek’s dark hair looks soft, but not a single inch of the rest of him does. He’s tall, striking, and holds himself in a way that tells me he knows how he looks and doesn’t care about other people’s opinions. Trained, beautiful and deadly. He is absolutely stunning.

His eyes briefly drift over me before looking away like we are strangers. The disinterest has my Nexus spitting fire in my chest. Not just the disinterest, but somewhere on him is my Nex weapon. I can sense her.

Aleksander clicks his fingers, and the wall of glass has shutters that drop, pitching the room into near enough darkness. Aleksander’s voice breezes through the room like a dark omen. “Welcome. It’s been an unusual week with the attack in the city, as I’m sure you’re all aware, but now we are back to normal. I will remind everyone of you of the new curfews in place. After nine at night, no one’s allowed out of their houses or in the city unless it is an emergency or you have special permission. This is important. We keep to the rules, as none of you would like to find out what happens when you break them.” His heavy footsteps echo in the darkness. “What do you know about Nex weapons?”

No one says anything until the darkness feels like it’s a silent killer. I clear my throat before speaking first, refusing to be frightened of the dark. There was a time where I was locked in the dark, alone, for six months, and I learnt there was nothing frightening in it. Only what your mind makes up could be there. If you can pretend the darkness is a friend, I found it soon became a comfort. “Every Nexus has one weapon that is bound to their Nexus souls. They choose it, and they can call on it. You can’t lose it. It will always find its way to you, unless it’s being held by another Nexus who is stronger.”

“Correct,” Aleksander answers, and I just know he is smirking. “Your Nex weapon is important. I have an unusual gift for my Nexus power.” A soft purple glow fills the room. Aleksander is a few feet away from me, and he is holding his hand out as a Nex sword appears. Literally, it appears in his hand. He holds his other hand out, and a glowing purple bow appears before morphing into a dagger.

I stare at the dagger, feeling like I’ve seen it before. “I can create endless Nex weapons.” His power is weapon creation. I have never heard of that before, and I’m slightly impressed. “You will have one important Nex weapon in your life, and you will pick today. There’s a wall behind you of weapons. Choose one, make sure it’s something that calls to you. That you feel that you need. That you can’t walk away from.” The shutters open and his weapons disappear from his hands. Effortless. He barely uses his Nexus to access his magic. “After making your choice, you will need to go to the back of the room to be tested and make the bond. The test is designed by the priests to see your soul and bind your Nex weapon to it. Some people do not survive the test, and it would be a shame to have a trainee killed on the first day.”

He really doesn’t sound like he cares at all. A nervous tension ripples through the group, and I lean into Annie. “Trust yourself and choose whatever you feel is easier to kill with. It’s how I did it.”

Annie’s eyes widen, and she nods once. Aleksander is still talking but looks at me with annoyance. “Why are you not choosing your weapons? Move, for fuck’s sake!”

The crowd spins and all but runs to the back of the room. I take two steps before Aleksander shouts. “Gwen, not you.”

Annie looks over her shoulder at me, pale and worried, and I nod to her before I dare to turn around. I find him standing right in front of me. The last time I saw Alek, he was standing in the line of tutors and looking like he wanted to ruin every bit of me.

That expression hasn’t changed a bit. “Tell me when and how you got your Nex weapon.”

I cross my arms. “No, but give it back.”

“I’m not asking because of our personal situation. I’m asking as your tutor. I need to know how long you’ve been bound to the weapon in case I send you into training you’re not prepared for,” he reasons, and I don’t find any dishonesty in his eyes. He might be a fine liar for all I know, but telling him this doesn’t cost me anything.

I clear my throat. “Fine. I got my Nex weapon when I was sixteen, so four years ago. I did the correct test, and it was blessed by a priest. All above board.”

He frowns like he is trying to figure out which priest would dare to help me and hide me. “Good, but I want proof. I know you’re a liar and I can’t take your word. Come with me. Our training will be different from the rest of the class. They are new with their Nex weapons, and the obstacle courses I’ll put them through are to connect them with their weapons for the first six weeks. You can join the class after that. Until then, you’ll train personally with me and Finnegan, who teaches year two.”

I blow out a breath, but he is already walking away. I glance back at the class, a few of them watching their tutor just leave. “Aren’t you their tutor and meant to stay with them?”

“I’m not their babysitter. I’ve told them what to do. None of them are fucking stupid enough not to pick a weapon and follow my instructions. If one of them dies, I’ll come back to help with the body,” he emotionlessly answers. Having no choice or a response to that, I follow him out the door, through another next to it, and into a smaller training room with no windows. The ceiling is covered in spotlights, giving the room a clean white light. He walks to the centre of the marked-out gym. “I want you to call your dagger. If you’re not lying, I will feel your attempt.”

Cocky bastard thinks I can’t get past his power and take my own Nex dagger back. He smirks at the defiance in my eyes. “You’ll need to get past my Nexus to do it. Just a reminder.”

I grit my teeth, knowing that he’s implying that my Nexus will need to greet him to bypass his power. His strength. He is powerful, but he just doesn’t understand what I am. I hold my hand out, and almost effortlessly, I connect to my Nex dagger. I feel his Nexus wrapped around it, almost like a purple shadow. Inviting, taunting, but it’s nothing to me. I don’t even need to call my Nexus out to rip through him, grab the dagger, and send it flying through the air straight back into my waiting hand.

His eyes widen in surprise and, fuck, it makes me happy to see him shocked. His lips twitch. “Oh, you’re a good little liar, aren’t you? Bullshit that you can do that in four years. You didn’t even need to tap into that beautiful Nexus of yours. Are you scared of letting me see her?” He tilts his head to the side. “Maybe she wasn’t okay with the rejection? Does she want to be fucked, Sun? Would she beg for me?”

So, we are playing this game? Fine. “She doesn’t have a say and she would never beg anyone. Let alone you.”

I swear pain flickers across his eyes for a second before he hides it. “Come on, then, show me what else you learnt out there. What you pretended you didn’t know in that pathetic fight with Hollis?”

I bite down on my inner cheek. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but stalking me is creepy.”

He laughs, deep and sexy. “Stalking. Watching. Fuck, I don’t care. Stop lying and come to play, Sun. Show me what you know, or I’ll come to make you.”

I take a step forward, but then I notice him, making me stop in my tracks. Finnegan steps into the room from another door at the back, a gust of cold air following him. “She already has private lessons, Alek? Careful, you might be accused of having favourites.”

He slams the door behind him and leans against it, crossing his leg over the other, and his haunting eyes watch me from the shadows.

“Join us,” Aleksander says.

“No.” His answer is clipped. “Is she as weak as she looks?”

Aleksander glances at me, and his eyes are full of distance. “No, someone’s trained her to fight, and I bet they did a good job. She moves too quickly and silently to be untrained.” I hate that he reads me too easily. “Did your father train you?”

I huff. “What part of ‘I’m not telling you anything’ do you not get? Keep asking the same questions. You’re not going to get any different answers from me. In fact, I’m not interested.”

I head to the door, but his shout makes me freeze. “I’ve told you not to leave. I am your tutor and you do not have—”

“And this is personal, right? Are you going to make me stay to torment me? Are you going to hurt me? My father said that you probably would. That powerful men like you wouldn’t take no for an answer when they would want to fuck me to make my Nexus bend to their will. So, yes, he trained me to make sure that you wouldn’t be able to do that to me. To make sure none of you could take me without a nasty fight.”

His eyes darken, and both of them freeze like I’ve gone for them. “I do not hurt women, nor do any of the people I call brothers. We never would have forced you, and it’s shitty you believe that of us without even meeting us.” My parents told me enough to make sure I don’t believe him. “Keep playing weak and innocent while calling us the villains if you want. You ran, you rejected the bond, and now you look like we have hurt you. Fuck you, Gwen.”

Silence drops into the room, and I itch to just run away. I’m too stubborn to do that, though. Finnegan cocks his head to the side. “We need to talk, Alek, before you go out there.” He looks at me. “Alone.”

“Talk in front of her. She doesn’t trust us, and she’ll hear it either way,” Alek commands.

“Doreshire was attacked early this morning.”

Please say some of them got out. Alek has no mercy in his tone. “How many?”

There is no emotion in Finnegan’s answer. “All of them.”

Alek almost stumbles. “What?”

I can taste his grief, like salt in the ocean water. Alek storms out the door, and I turn, almost wanting to chase after him. “Doreshire was a settlement of three hundred Nexus in Cornwall. The last of Aleksander’s family lived there. His aunt and uncle.”

“I’m sorry.” I still haven’t taken my eyes off the door where Aleksander left. Should I go after him?

“No, you shouldn’t.” I jump, turning to find Finnegan at my side. Did I say that out loud? I couldn’t have done. “He hates you like I do. Why don’t you do all of us a favour and just run away again?”

I hold my wrist up. “Take it off and I’m gone.”

He grabs my wrist, bringing it to his mouth, and he bites me right over the rune. He marks me with his teeth. I scream, yanking my arm away, and he grins at me with a mouth of blood. “Now the other one.”

“No, you fucking psychopath!” I snarl.

He shrugs, wiping my blood off his mouth, and I look at the bite mark on my wrist. He actually bit me. Finnegan moves into my space and grabs my neck, tightening his grip to the point he almost hurts me. “I fucking hate everything you are. Die, leave, but don’t mess with my brothers’ hearts.”

“I hate you right back,” I bare my teeth, slamming his wrist away from my neck and jumping on him. He doesn’t expect it, and I lash out with my dagger, pressing it to his neck on one side, right before I bite his neck on the other side. I dig my teeth in as his hands grab my waist, and he groans.

Not in pain.

I pull my teeth away, tasting his blood in my mouth, and look up at him. He tilts his head to the side with a sneer, but his eyes are darkened. The blue now is like the depths of the sea, and I swear he is turned on. He liked the pain. “You’re feral,” he tells me.

“Then stay the fuck away from me. You. Do. Not. Scare. Me.” I make sure he sees into my soul for a second.

He drops me and I back away, looking at the blood on his neck as it drips onto his shirt. He shifts quickly, morphing into a furry brown bear that is the same size as my own wolf. It growls at me, deep and loud. I run away this time, knowing letting my Nexus accept the challenge from Finnegan is a bad idea. I don’t know how I get into the main room at the bottom of the stairs until I bump into Rochelle. She smells like Hollis.

I fucking hate her.

My Nexus slips out, catching me off guard. Rochelle screams, scrambling up the stairs and running from me. I barely get my Nexus under control by the time I get back to my room and burst into tears. I don’t know how long I cry before my door is knocked twice, and I wipe my face, pulling the door open to Rhodes.

He takes one look at me and pulls me into his arms, locking me in tightly before I can refuse. “I’m going to fucking kill them for doing this to you.”

“I bit him back,” I mutter into Rhodes’s chest. I like him holding me and I shouldn’t. I really shouldn’t. Rhodes bursts into laughter and I can’t help laughing with him until he takes my hand and links our fingers. It feels too natural, and I don’t know if I’m in shock from Finnegan, but I let him lead me down the stairs… He takes me underneath the stairs and opens the door to one of the tutors’ rooms. “I always keep good snacks in my desk. Sugar first for the shock, and then you can tell me what happened.”

I sigh. The way to my heart is definitely wrapped in sugar, and I don’t protest as Rhodes leads me in, kicking the door shut. He keeps his office relatively simple. There’s not much in here that even suggests he uses this office other than a few glass displays holding footballs on a cabinet. They’re all signed too. I’m staring at them all as Rhodes hands me chocolate buttons, mini pretzels and brownies. “When you don’t have class to get back to, I have better brownies we can try.”

“I didn’t have you down as the bad influence tutor,” I mutter before scoffing the buttons first and glancing at the display boxes again. “It’s a Nexus football. Who signed it?”

“My dad. He is the old captain,” Rhodes explains, which is a bigger deal than he is making out. Nexus football is a big thing from what I remember. They have championships every year, and teams from all over the world come together to play in Starlight. Starlight City has the best team, and Harry told me they won last year, like the four years before. “I play for Starlight with Onyx. I’m captain now. You should come and watch us if you like sport.”

He wants me to support him, and he is looking at me with big puppy-like eyes. Dammit. “I’d like that. If you can get me tickets and a pass out of here. Kids in my class used to talk about it sometimes, but my parents never took me to see a match.” I don’t blame them for that. There were too many people in those places for me when I was younger and didn’t have the control I have now.

Rhodes smiles brightly. “You’ll love it. Your roommate has open tickets. Maybe if you went with her, you’d be more comfortable than alone?” He steps closer and, to my surprise, he runs his thumb against my bottom lip to wipe away some chocolate before dipping it in my mouth for me to lick it off. Every bit of my body clenches as fire burns through me as I softly run my tongue across the tip of his thumb before he takes it out. He doesn’t step away, but his eyes fixate on my lips. I stare at him too. “It could be a date, instead. The offer is always open for you.”

“I can’t,” I whisper. “Friends. Nothing more. Ever, Rhodes.”

He gently tucks my hair behind my ear, and my body aches to lean into him. “Then I’ll wait until the day you want more.”

We will both be waiting for our graves, then. I turn away from him and go through the door, not daring to look back. “Thanks for the snacks and for cheering me up. I have studying to do.”

“Gwen, you didn’t tell me what happened—”

I run again, and each time I run away from my mates, it cracks my heart just a bit more.

Chapter

Ten

Rhodes doesn’t drive some expensive piece of crap luxury car. No, he has got a four-wheel Jeep, which is far more comfy and doesn’t smell like new leather and male egos. It’s a two-seater, and the back is all filled with metal cages. Rhodes glances at me, driving through the pouring rain. “They’re not to put you in, if that’s what you’re worried about this afternoon.” I roll my eyes at his joke, and he laughs. “You did well in class today, but you’re holding back.”

“You pitted me against Annie, and she is tough,” I remind him. Rhodes’s class this morning was actually enjoyable. Hollis is brutal, but Rhodes, he is strict but instructive. I barely wanted to leave his class to go to history with Tutor Jettie, who waffled on about the stars in our solar system for two hours. Rhodes had us again for the afternoon class, and he made us all meditate for an hour before using our new skills of enjoying silence to figure out where a weapon is being thrown from in a dark room. I caught all four of the arrows shot my way, but Annie didn’t. She got hit in the leg, and I had to half carry her to the healers. There was a line at the healers by the end of Rhodes’s lesson. “Please tell me you aren’t planning to do the dark-room arrow-shooting again.”

Rhodes winks at me. “Not for you. It was too easy, almost like you can see in the dark.” I go silent. I can’t see in the dark, but my Nexus can sense things in the darkness. Rhodes picks up on my uncomfortable mood like we are mated and he can actually feel my emotions. “I don’t know how much you know about the rescue shelter, but there are some things I should update you on.”

“I know some. Annie’s told me that you go to expensive functions to raise money for it, and it was your mum’s thing,” I offer, shivering from the cold.

Rhodes turns the heater up to full blast. “Yeah, my mum opened it. My mum used to rescue animals and bring them home until my dad said enough was enough. He bought her the rescue and donated the first million to set it up, with a family friend adding the rest. She passed away before it could even be opened.”

I reach over, touching his forearm. “I’m sorry. I know what it is like to lose a parent, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.”

He looks at me, just for a second. “There are two memories that rip my heart out, and her death is one.” We both know what the other is. I remove my hand. Rhodes switches his gaze back to the road. “I was seven when she passed, and I wish I had more memories. Dad has had his lovers on and off, but no one serious. He said losing his Nexus mate froze his heart and it will never beat again for another. It’s the one time we have understood each other.”

I want to scream that I’m sorry. That I never wanted to hurt him. That he deserves so, so much better than me, but I don’t. I sit silent, like a coward. Rhodes turns right onto a dirt track road in the forest. “My mum’s best friend was the co-owner, who now fully runs it with me, but I’m more of a behind-the-scenes owner. I prefer working with the animals over shuffling paperwork and making money stretch. I go to the events purely to raise money because my family name, Asura, works well for that. It’s not something I actually enjoy, to be honest with you.”

“It sounds like hell,” I admit. “Please don’t ask me to come with you to one.”

He laughs, the deep sound filling the truck. “I’ll keep it in mind for when you piss me off next. Anything else you don’t like?”

“Bugs.” I frown. I can’t bring myself to tell him about my fear of water yet. “And if you use them against me, I’ll hate you forever.”

“What did bugs do to you?” he jokes, but a memory of thousands of them crawling all over my skin as I scream flashes into my mind. My dinner threatens to rise in my throat, and I quickly look away to the window at the wide fields and remind myself I’m not back there. I’m alive. I got out.

Rhodes is silent for the rest of the short drive. The shelter is on this side of town, on the outskirts though, and nestled in a forest near the wall. I can hear the dogs barking halfway down the road towards the square warehouse-type building with a wooden-framed house built on the front of it, with many windows. There are fenced areas all to the left, and then the kennels right behind them. Out in the front is a gardener’s dream, a bursting flower garden leading from the car park to the front door where a lit-up sign for the rescue is displayed with Rhodes’s last name under it, along with the name Marum.

“Good afternoon, Rhodes!” a woman shouts as we climb out of the car, and I look over to see she is walking two Rottweilers. Behind her, a younger blonde teenager is walking a Shetland dog. “Marty is waiting inside for you.”

“Thanks, Sissel,” he hollers back, leading me through the garden. I notice how Sissel’s eyes stay on Rhodes longer than needed, and when her eyes flicker to me, she pales at whatever is on my face before hurrying off with the dogs, who bark loudly. Rhodes turns back and when he looks at me, he grins. “Ask.”

“Ask what?” I huff, crossing my arms. I know he might have had a relationship and they all will probably have relationships for years to come. I made my choice and I have to live with it. Monsters like me don’t get reverse harems and happy endings. We deserve to burn in hell.

Rhodes touches my back, flattening his palm, and his touch instantly calms me. “Ask anything and I’ll always tell you the truth. But for the record, I’ve not dated anyone. Ever.” Shock makes my mouth pop open, and then I shut it. “I was born for you. I am yours, even if you regret us forever.” He shrugs. “Even when I didn’t know you, I felt you in here.” He touches his chest, where his heart beats. “And I’m aware you have that Harris boy—”

“Harry!” I interrupt. I should tell him Harry was never more than a friend. No one was ever more than a friend to me, because I…

He shrugs a shoulder. “Or you had other relationships. The thought of anyone touching you makes me want to rip every male’s eyes out and break their hands, but I accept you. I don’t come with any expectations, and I’m not Hollis. Ask next time. Don’t go into your mind and wander there.”

“Rhodes…” I whisper. He searches my face, and instead of making me give him an answer, he leans in and kisses my cheek. I close my eyes, enjoying every second his lips are on my skin. Of course, my Nexus decides this is the point to go for a catnap in the day and completely ignore my internal panic of how Rhodes is seeing right through me. How with his words and actions, he is stealing my heart from my chest. Rhodes takes my hand, linking our fingers like before, and leads me into the rescue.

In the reception, two Dobermans start growling at me the minute I walk in, and the woman with them has to walk around us to escape through the door as Rhodes speaks to the receptionist, getting me a badge. I clip the badge onto my denim jacket as Rhodes opens a door to the inner kennels. The barking and the ear-ringing noise of the kennels is deafening, but Rhodes leads me into a small cat cafe at the front, where several people are sitting, with cats walking around or purring in their laps. “The cats in here can’t be re-homed due to needing medications or they are too old, so no one adopts them. This way, they get fuss and love, and people love cat cafes.”

I stroke the head of a black cat, who is the only one who comes near. He has a blue collar on and a bell that rattles when he bumps his head into my hand for more fuss. Black cats are never scared of me, and I’ve yet to understand the reason behind that. Maybe they are just the fearless, badass versions of cats that get badly treated by humans.

Rhodes tugs me along after a few minutes. “You can choose to work in the cafe if you want, or you can come back in the back here with the dogs and cats. We have a few rabbits, ferrets and hamsters, but they are usually adopted pretty quick. There are always jobs to be done either way. I’ll find something for you to do, but for today, just shadow me to get a feel for the rescue.”

I really don’t deserve to be his anything. He is too nice to me. “Okay.”

I brush my hands down my jeans, which are the same colour as my jacket, and underneath I have a black retro top that has a silver Poké ball across my boobs. Rhodes complimented my top immediately, and I just wish Onyx was around to see it. I know he would hate it. Talking of which, I tap the rune on my right wrist a few times for fun. Rhodes unlocks a door with a keycard, showing me how to use it before handing me a new one, which I slide into my pocket. “How is she this morning, Marty?”

The woman who I assume is Marty rises to her feet from her chair at her desk. “No change. I thought we were going to lose her last night, to be entirely honest, but she stuck around.” Her hazel eyes drift to me. “Oh, you must be the runaway mate.”

“This is Gwen. Gwen, this is the other owner I was telling you about. Marty.” I smile at her, but she doesn’t smile back. I get the impression she took Rhodes on like a son, and I’m the runaway mate who broke his heart. I don’t blame her for disliking me. The woman is older, with peppered brown hair, but her expression is soft, kind when she looks at Rhodes. She’s wearing all blue scrubs around her curves.

“Nice to meet you. Are you a vet as well as an owner?” I question.

“I am professionally trained,” she briefly answers. “I’ve had this one to go through veterinary school, but he’s never finished it.”

I frown. “Why not?” He doesn’t answer, to the point where he gets awkward between the three of us. “Who were you talking about before?”

“It’s a sad story. We had a golden retriever in, and she was pregnant. Unfortunately, only two pups survived of eight, and she’s not in a good state.” Sadness washes over me.

Rhodes leans in. “You actually met her in the crowds on your first day here. Remember?”

“I always remember a dog when I meet one. Especially a golden retriever. They are my favourite breed,” I admit. “She was sweet when I met her.”

“Well, she had two pups. One who’s very white and big, and the other one who’s more golden and tinier,” Rhodes explains.

Marty nods her head to the screen, where there is an x-ray up of a leg. “The small one has a leg deformity. I haven’t told the owner yet, but this isn’t a good sign. The white pup is well and feeding good, though. I don’t know if the smaller one will be able to run; if she does, not very well.”

“What’s the owner said?” Rhodes questions, crossing his arms.

“He’s too distraught to make decisions at the moment. He says he’s too old to deal with the pups because they need bottle feeding every two hours on the dot. We will need to keep them at the rescue and raise them here. If we can’t keep the mum alive, I don’t see him taking any of them home. Truthfully, I don’t think we will be able to keep her alive for long, so I might take one of them home and find a volunteer for the other.” She explains the plan. “Such a shame the mum had cancer all the way throughout her body and didn’t show signs until labour.”

Rhodes sighs. “We wouldn’t have known. Dogs hide their illnesses too well.” Rhodes leads me into another room, with glass doors, and in the first kennel on a soft bed is the golden retriever I saw. The pups are nowhere to be seen, but even I can tell she wouldn’t be able to feed them at this point.

The old man looks up as Rhodes lets me in. Marty comes in next. “I remember you from the street. Do you work here?”

“Newly employed.” He doesn’t say anything as I approach them both and then stroke her head, but she doesn’t move or wake from her sleep. “She doesn’t have long left.” Death is easy to sense when you’re used to it. The old man nods, giving me a grim smile.

I clear my throat. “Are you taking the pups back to be with you? They talked about keeping them in the shelter, but I don’t know your plan.”

“No.” His decision is firm. “They need the best chance they can get, and I’m an old man. Getting up every two hours to feed pups—it wouldn’t work. I don’t have a family to help, and my wife isn’t as mobile as she used to be. We were not planning to keep any of the puppies, because her getting pregnant was an accident. She got out one night from our garden. I don’t even know what they’re half of, but I know they are safer here.”

“I’m sorry,” I softly tell him. He inclines his head and goes back to stroking his dog. Marty stays to speak with the owner about the plan with the pups and mum, and I leave with Rhodes.

I don’t even notice I’m crying until Rhodes cups my cheek, wiping a tear onto his thumb. “This is why I believe you’re a good person and I’m not giving up.”

“Rhodes, just stop. I’m not a good person and you should hate me like the others. I deserve their hate, and honestly, when you’re treating me like I’m precious and good, it is more punishing than anything they are doing to me,” I snap.

He keeps his expression blank. “Fine. Let’s get to work.”

Rhodes doesn’t speak a word to me for the rest of the two hours we spend here. He visits every part of the huge shelter, and everyone likes him. Not one person so much as even frowns his way. They all brighten up when he is near. It’s harder to break his heart, I realise, than the others. They are nearly as fucked up as I am, but Rhodes? He just became a good person despite the life he was given. I wish I could be like him. I wish I could let myself be his.

There must be at least a hundred and fifty dogs here, and it seems very well run. Everything is spotless and clean, and I end up back in the cat cafe where I happily serve food to starving Nexus and humans, while petting every cat I can get near. The black one, named Charlie, stays at my feet, and he is my favourite. When the sun has completely disappeared behind the forest outside, Rhodes finds me and tells me we are leaving.

The sound of my stomach rumbling breaks the silence of the car ride back. Rhodes grumbles. “I made sure that dinner was brought up to your room on the days you work with me. I will bring you snacks to eat before and after next time. I didn’t think ahead.”

He is still looking after me.

Oh, Rhodes. My monster would eat you up like a favourite snack if I let her. “Thank you, I appreciate that. I also think I’m getting paid way too much for the work, by the way. You can ask Marty to lower my salary.”

“You get the same salary as everyone else working there,” he quickly answers, but I know he is lying. “We get funding for our staff from the Supreme Alpha and the betas. Including massive donations from your own family. Are you going to see your grandmother at any point? She has asked to come to the academy five times.”

“She has?” I frown. I met her once, when I was five, and all I remember is a bitter woman who hated me. I never understood why she hated me, but I remember her screaming at my mother that she had ruined my father’s life and that his sense of honour was killing him. “I don’t think I want to see her. Not unless I have to.”

He looks at me and nods once. “I’ll make sure she can’t access the academy, and if you change your mind, let me know.”

“I spoke with Annie, by the way, about tickets. She’s asking her dad for permission for us both to go, and she finds out tomorrow when she usually speaks to him. Annie told me there is a big match in six weeks?” I inquire.

“Yes, Morriganis City are travelling to us. It was nearly cancelled with all of the attacks.” He turns onto the road for the academy, and I watch the muscles in his arms flex. Damn. “I’d love to have you there supporting me—as a friend, of course,” he quickly adds before pursing his lips.

“It won’t be a date but I’ll be there.” I have to draw a line right now before he gets the wrong idea.

I’ve upset him. It’s for the best, though. I know it is, but it hurts to do it. Rhodes tries to make small talk a few times, but I block him out, focusing on the window until the car stops. I don’t bother saying goodbye as I rush away, and I only slow down when I get to my floor. My shoulders drop as I turn the handle to our room, knowing Annie will be back. But she isn’t alone this time. There’s a curly-haired redhead sitting with her, and she is sobbing in Annie’s arms. Annie looks up. “Shut the door behind you before someone hears.” She strokes the woman’s arm. “You’re okay. It’s my roommate, Gwen, and she is lovely. She won’t say a word.”

“Do you want me to leave? I can wander around the academy—”

Annie shakes her head. “No, you will get told off for being out of your room.”

I awkwardly move to my bed, where there is a boxed-up dinner for me and a coffee in a stainless steel mug waiting on a tray. It feels awkward to eat, so I sip on my coffee as Annie calms her friend down. I remember her from our trainee group, and she usually avoids me. I didn’t know Annie even knew her. Annie sits up as the woman straightens and wipes her eyes with a tissue. “I’m sorry I haven’t said hello before, Gwen. My name is Sara. I’m not… He doesn’t like it when I talk to new people.”

I frown. “Who doesn’t?” Annie and Sara look at each other. “What’s going on?”

Sara puts the tissue down and looks at me with bloodshot eyes. “I have one Nexus bond.” She sobs slightly and I don’t understand what she’s really telling me until she moves slightly and I see her wrists. There are lots of different coloured bruises on her lower arm. When she tucks her red hair behind her ear, I see a matching bruise on her cheek too. Fury feeds my blood. “Did he hurt you? Your own mate?”

She shakily nods. “Yes, he’s got a temper, and he says it’s because I won’t fully bond with him. Ian…he wants my power. I can see through any wall, anything really. I did the ceremony, so we are connected, but I don’t want to sleep with him and draw the runes for mates to fully share power. He has a little of my power, but my power is a lot stronger than his, and he hates that. I honestly don’t want to be shackled to him for the rest of my life, though. He’s violent and cruel to everyone in his family, but he is seen as a perfect person to the rest of the world. I keep avoiding him the best I can, but he keeps trying to coax my Nexus out. Even she doesn’t want to bond, though,” she says quietly. “Tonight, he surprised me in my room. I hoped coming here would be a way to escape him for a bit. He pinned me down and tried to draw the rune on my chest.”

The mate rune on your heart is sacred, not something that should be forced. I’m not sure it would even work if she was forced into any of it. “My roommate came back early, and she got into a big argument in my defence. He hit us both. I got her hurt, and it’s all my fault.” She starts struggling to breathe through sobs. “I’m just…I’m scared that he’s going to force me at some point, and no one is going to stop him. He is a big guy, and his power is strength. There’s nothing I can do about any of it. I’ll just be bonded to him forever. No one will step in.” She is breathing heavily with each word, like it’s painful to get them out. Like the truth is actually choking her. I’m scared she is going to pass out.

Annie wraps her arms around her. “I’ll ask my dad. He will—”

“There’s no one to help. No one gets between Nexus, not even the Supreme Alpha, because who would anger the Gods by telling them they were wrong?” she whispers, her voice broken. “They apparently make us perfect for each other, but what do I do? My Nexus mate is a monster.”

It feels like ice stings my heart. My mates would be saying the same thing as her if they knew what lies in my soul. “I’m sorry, but it is not your fault. He’s a prick, alright? Just because he’s got a bond with you, doesn’t mean he can abuse you.”

“Fate would deem otherwise,” Sara gasps.

When she has calmed down and had a drink of water, Annie rubs her back. “Can I ask why you didn’t reject him?”

“Ann, I didn’t know he was cruel to begin with. If I had, maybe things would have been different.” Sara softly looks at me. “Everyone says you were terrible for rejecting them, but I think you were lucky. Some of your mates are not nice men. Especially the assassin.”

“Assassin?” I blurt out.

She frowns and looks at Annie. “You didn’t tell her who Finnegan is?”

Annie clasps her hands together. “Gwen doesn’t like to talk about her mates.” She looks my way. “I can tell you about the rumours, if you want.”

“They aren’t rumours,” Sara mutters.

“Tell me,” I ask, crossing my legs on my bed. “Please. Maybe it’s time I’m not in the dark about them all. I can’t pretend they don’t exist.”

Annie sits back on the bed next to Sara. “Finnegan’s power makes him a threat to Nexus, and at the same time, he might be one of the most powerful Nexus in our race. He got through the academy without a scratch, and then he asked my father for a special job. My dad, well, he hires Finnegan to take out people and assassinate them if they are a threat. With Finnegan’s power…it’s easy for him. He soon grew a name for himself as the Starlight Assassin.”

“There are other not-so-nice titles,” Sara whispers. “And his friendship with the Supreme Alpha makes him not liked much in the city.”

“What did your dad do that people don’t like?” I ask. I remember her mentioning it when she first told me about her dad.

Annie clears her throat. “Dad rules with an iron fist and puts the safety of Starlight above anything or anyone. New laws on immigration, leaving the city, and mandatory work have been the least favoured.”

“Not to mention the people that have gone missing. Many blame your dad, as it started when he first ruled,” Sara adds. I’ve not heard any of this.

Annie wrinkles her nose. “Dad doesn’t know anything about that, and he told me he has rangers looking into the disappearances. He’s not evil, not like some people make out.” Annie spends the next half an hour trying to cheer Sara up as I eat until she’s calmed down enough, and then Annie walks her back to her room. I lie back on the bed when she comes in. She sighs. “I’m so thankful my mate is a soft teddy bear, literal bear, but acts like a teddy.” She laughs at herself. “That was a terrible and distasteful joke. I just—”

“I get it. Are you going to ask your dad to help her?” I question.

She shakes her head of blonde hair. “I can’t. Sara was right, not even my dad could get between a bond. Ian Castleton is from a wealthy family, and my dad relies on the support of the rich. I’ll have to figure something else out.”

“I’ll help however I can,” I suggest.

She smiles as she grabs her pyjamas from her bedside unit. “I know. You’re a good person. How was your day at the rescue?”

“Good. Sad.” I tell her all about the golden retriever through the door as she gets dressed for bed.

Eventually, she comes out and drops onto her bed. “That’s awful. I hope the pups make it. My dad never let me have pets.”

“Neither did mine. At first, it was because I wasn’t ‘responsible’ enough, and then when I finally was, we were always on the run, so having a dog—” I stop mid-sentence as I realise what I just let slip out.

Her eyes soften. “My dad makes up lies for a living to keep Nexus people calm and happy. The story about you being trapped by Vian never really felt believable to me.”

I search her eyes and realise she isn’t going to say anything to anyone. Annie might end up being the best friend I’ve ever had. “Let’s get some sleep. It’ll be another long day tomorrow, and we can figure something out, even if it means having Sara sleep in here and following her about.”

“Okay.” She yawns. “I’m exhausted after the healers. They take your energy to heal you. How did you miss the arrows, by the way?”

“Dumb luck,” I lie, climbing out of bed. I take my clothes into the bathroom and shower quickly before changing into my pyjamas and cleaning myself up for the night. By the time I’ve come back out, braiding my wet hair, Annie is already fast asleep, snoring. I tuck myself into my bed just as there’s a bump at the door. My Nexus peeks out of my one eye as the handle turns. I slip my hand under my pillow, grabbing my Nex dagger as a huge bear stumbles into our room, kicking the door shut behind him with a brown, furry leg.

My eyes widen as the giant bear grumbles and lies down on the floor in between us, filling the space with only a tiny gap for me to slide out. I can sense who it is, like a sixth sense almost. “Finnegan?” My Nexus is happy that he is here, as this is her favourite mate, which feels wrong because this asshole is the worst of them all. It’s bad enough dreamwalking into his head, but having him sleep in here? Fuck no.

I gently kick his giant shoulder, but he is like a furry rock. The bear grumbles before snoring loud once, and I notice his eyes are not open.

“He’s not awake,” Annie whispers. “Sometimes bears, because we don’t hibernate in deeper sleeps like we do in the wild, end up sleepwalking. To their mate’s is pretty common.”

My heart races. “Is he even allowed to stay here?”

She chuckles. “Are you going to move him? I like you, bestie, but I’m not helping you drag a bear out of here.”

I huff. “Dragging a bear out of the room is your limit for me? Noted.”

She laughs before lying back down and soon falling to sleep. I lie down and look at the gigantic bear that’s buzzing with purple Nexus magic and go to sleep rather peacefully for the first time.

Until my Nexus decides to take over.

Chapter

Eleven

Idon’t wake up in my room. In fact, I wake up on the cliff edge, sitting, looking out at the sea with my hair down and blowing around me. I’m soaked from the drizzling rain, and I know I’ve been out for hours. Maybe all night. As usual, I don’t remember anything. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. My eyes widen as I look down at my hands, which are too clean and smell like bleach. There might not be blood on my fingertips, but I know, without any doubt in my mind, that my Nexus went hunting last night without my permission. What the fuck happened to make it do that? We are usually in agreement.

My Nexus is sleeping, feeling tired and content in my chest. The last thing I remember is going to sleep and Finn was in his bear form, asleep on my floor. Then, nothing. Crap. Crap, crap, crap, crap. Alarms start blasting off in the castle, along with a message to gather in the entrance hall. I quickly climb to my feet and turn, blessing the Gods for giving me the luck of having no one else around this early. The sun hasn’t risen yet, only making my heart patter faster as I worry about what the alarm is for.

Did my monster hunt in the castle? Did it kill someone I know? I try to calm myself down, hating that I’m in my pyjamas and nothing else as I slip into the castle and shut the door behind me. My feet are dirty, like I’ve been running through mud, and I can smell my wolf all over me. What did she do?

Thankfully, I’m soon lost in the crowds of rangers, and everyone else is in their pyjamas, so I don’t look out of place. Literally everyone is flooding out of their rooms and into the entrance hall until it’s crammed to the brink. I sense someone staring right at me, even in a packed crowd, and my eyes drift up to find Finn is at the top of the stairs. He is wearing tight black shorts and no shirt. No. Shirt. My mouth completely drops open as I run my eyes down his toned chest and flat, muscular stomach. There are grooves from the top of his hips down, and there is a line of dark hair dipping into his shorts. He has to be the fittest man I’ve ever seen.

My Nexus all but bends over and begs him to take us. Fuck her. Finnegan is a psychopath and hates me. His blue eyes narrow and he storms towards me. Time to hide or leave. I scoot through the crowd to the back, near a wall where there is a door.

Tutor Jettie, followed by Finnegan’s father, Edvard, stops at the top of the stairs. Everyone immediately goes silent as Edvard’s voice rings out. “There was another attack last night by a Vian in the city. I’m sure you’re all hearing about it from your family members, but I want you to know that the castle is perfectly secure and safe.” Nope, it’s not. The monster is right here in the crowds. “No Vian has breached our walls, and no one came in or out last night. We’ve double-checked this, and the magic speaks the same.”

Finnegan’s hand wraps around my upper arm, and I jump. He leans down, his hot breath blowing in my ear. “Where the fuck did you go last night, and how did you get past me?”

I flash him an innocent smile. “I went for a walk. That doesn’t break the rules, does it, Tutor Finnegan?”

He growls, but his father is still speaking, and I turn away from him.

“We’ll be sending our best rangers out into the city to investigate, and there will no doubt be more restrictions put in place by the Supreme Alpha. Your families are safe and none of you have leave to visit them, but for the next hour, you are excused to make phone calls. I know many of you will be worried about your families, but we must trust in the Gods to guide us. All will be well, and we will carry on classes as normal.”

“Who was killed?” a man shouts out before Edvard can walk off.

He clears his throat. “Ian Castleton was found dead this morning.”

Sara’s Nexus mate was killed. The name makes my stomach feel like it’s going to drop out onto the floor, and my Nexus is downright smug. It all makes sense now. She went hunting for him and took over. My monster is a living form of feminine rage, and while I don’t mind that fucker being dead, she has to be more careful. We usually go hunting in the bigger cities where it’s easy to find men who make my monster look like a fairytale. But Nexus? She hasn’t hunted one of our own kind before, and it doesn’t bode well for me. Ian deserved to die, but why does it always have to be me? I don’t want to be a murderer anymore. I don’t want to be a monster. I suck in a deep breath, feeling the walls closing in around me, and I gasp.

Finnegan frowns at me, his hand tightening on my arm. His touch feels normal, like something to grasp onto in the shadows of my mind. “What’s wrong with you?”

“She is having a panic attack.” Alek is there, wrapping his arm around my waist and opening the door behind me. Finnegan follows us in, but I focus on my breathing, on the feeling of my heart beating so fast. Breathe, Gwen. I push away from Alek and rush to the other side of the classroom, yanking the window open and finally breathing when the cold air hits me.

They both are silent as I try to stop shaking. My knuckles are pure white as I grip the window until everything stops spinning. I can’t be weak in front of them. I can’t freak out. My mother used to punish me for having panic attacks, taught me they are a sign of weakness, and with what I am, I can’t ever be weak like that. Get it together, Gwen. Finnegan meets my eyes first when I turn, with nothing but cold indifference in his blue pits. “Where were you last night?”

“Finn—” Alek goes to defend me, and I hate that he does. I do not deserve to be protected like a doe when I’m the hunter.

“I didn’t want to sleep in the same room as you, so I went walking,” I answer, lifting my head up high. “Your bear snores.”

“Fucking liar,” Finnegan snarls at me. “Didn’t anyone ever teach you not to lie to your Nexus mate? I can see right through you.”

I snarl right back. “You are not my mate. I fucking rejected you, and it’s not fair I have to put up with you all the goddamn time!”

Finnegan storms out, slamming the door shut so hard it shakes the wall.

Aleksander stares at me, his arms crossed tight. “You don’t have to be scared. No one will touch you. We made a mistake in the shopping centre and risked you, but we have made sure no one will get close again. Can you tell me why they came after you?”

A half-truth slips out. “Because of you five. You make me a target, and you always will do.” His eyes splinter with pain, and my shoulders drop. “But that’s the Gods’ fault for making this bond between us all. I know I’m safe here, and thank you for trying to be kind. I never got to say sorry about your family you lost.”

“Thank you,” his gravelly voice washes over me. “The men I call brother and you are all the family I have left now. I will keep you safe, Gwen. Even if you hate me forever.”

I want to scream that I don’t hate him. I really don’t. We stare at each other, seconds ticking along as tension screams between us. He walks over to me, and I don’t move. I don’t dare make a sound. I can’t find the strength to stop him as his lips crash into mine, parting and seeking, and devouring, all in the same breath. I gasp as he kisses me, his hands digging into my rain-soaked hair and roughly gripping me so I can’t break away. I can’t run from him.

I wouldn’t anyway.

My hands grip his jacket as he parts my lips and sinks his tongue into my mouth, and I feel him harden against my stomach. The door is opened, and Alek pulls away from me, his eyes flashing dark as a sound vibrates from his chest.

A Nexus growl.

Was that really Alek, or was it his Nexus kissing me? Finnegan walks in with Tutor Jettie right behind him, both of them pausing. I can’t read Finnegan’s expression, but Tutor Jettie goes bright pink. “Are we interrupting a very unlawful moment in a castle on holy ground, Tutor Aleksander?”

Alek looks back at me with surprise. This time he seems more himself. “Do you remember yet?”

Remember what? The confusion on my face only makes him look disappointed in me, and it hurts. That was my first kiss, and he already hates me. Aleksander turns to Tutor Jettie. “She is mine, and I’ll kiss her whenever the fuck I want. Find another tutor if you have a problem with it.”

“Aleksander, you know the rules you have to follow because of—” I don’t hear the end of Tutor Jettie’s frustrated shout as they both slip out of the room.

Mine? Did he really just say that, and why do I like hearing it so much?

Finnegan nods to the door. “Go get dressed. You’re done for the day, and you are coming with me.”

“No, thank you,” I snap. That’s why he was with Tutor Jettie. He was getting her permission to take me out of the academy. “Spending any time with you sounds like hell.”

“Then we are both in hell, Sun. It’s been arranged by my father and the other tutors,” he growls right back. “I will meet you at the bottom of the stairs in fifteen minutes.”

I call Finnegan a whole load of nasty names while storming up the stairs and simultaneously wondering where the hell he is taking me. But whatever Finnegan is up to is the least of my never-ending problems. What if someone saw me in the city hunting? I know my Nexus is smart, but she can be reckless and rash on her hunts, and she has never been let loose in a city like this before. We hunt humans, not Nexus. Never our own kind.

I’m a monster and they should kill me.

Already feeling tired, I quickly shower and notice how much mud is on my feet, splattered up my lower legs. There is no way Finnegan and Alek didn’t spot it, and I don’t think they believed me. There’s still bear fur all over my floor, which is nothing but irritating at this point when it’s from Finnegan. I grab my clothes and quickly get changed, braiding my hair down my back.

I find Finnegan outside the front of the academy, with a group of girls watching and giggling a few feet away. I eye them as I walk past, where Finnegan is waiting on a beefed-up quad bike. He looks incredible in a black helmet and a black leather jacket I want to steal. But the bike…

“I’m not getting on that,” I protest, standing close. “I’m certain you will throw me off it just for shits and giggles.”

He pats the seat behind him. “If I wanted to hurt or kill you, Sun, that would be a boring way to do it. Get on.”

“Glad to know you’re creative when you hurt others. Must you be amused too?” I glare at him.

With no expression on his face, Finn holds the black helmet out to me. I still don’t trust him, and I don’t think I ever fully will, but I put on the helmet he offers me and get on the bike. It’s freezing and I have to cling to his jacket as he speeds through the academy grounds and out of the open gates. Finnegan drives like a mad person, soon leaving the flat road for the off-track dirt road that goes around the edges of the city. I don’t know why I bothered showering as mud sprays up my black leggings, and soon, I look as bad as I did before.

It doesn’t take me long to recognise the street that I was on when I ran away from my mates, even if I did run and not look at it all that much. It’s perfect. The kind of street a family of four would live on as their kids play in the big garden and their parents watch on. Picket fences, perfect fake green lawns, and big oak trees are dotted everywhere with their big branches casting shadows for kids to hide in. It’s stupidly big, their home, and as we drive up, I can see more of it than I did last time.

Finnegan parks in the driveway next to Onyx’s shiny black, boring car. There is another car next to it, one I don’t know, but I assume it may be Hollis’s. It’s a red, ridiculously in-your-face type of sports car that I would immediately mark the owner of as the kind of guy who tries way too hard.

Finn doesn’t help me off or wait for me as he turns the engine off and just leaves me. I quickly race after him, only pausing in the entranceway. The last time I was here, Onyx locked me up, and he might have apologised, but I don’t know if he will change his mind. His power would make it too easy to lock me away, and my Nexus wouldn’t be drugged up and content like last time. She would lose her shit and so would I.

Is that why Finnegan brought me here? So Onyx can lock me up again? Finn looks back and somehow, he just knows. “I’m not going to trap you in here. Neither is Onyx.”

“How—”

“You scream your thoughts, and apparently my Nexus likes to listen more than just when we are sleeping. I’ve never once lost control of him, but when you’re here, he doesn’t listen. Another reason I hate you.” Bitterness leaks into his words. “You belong to the academy now. Remember how even we can’t take you? Not that you ever did belong to us.”

I push down the insult. “You can hear my thoughts? How the fuck do you turn that off?”

“Not me, my fucking Nexus because of our bond and your dreamwalking. That power has somehow bled over to my Nexus, who likes to take advantage of the chance to get close to you,” he snaps. “And I don’t like it either. It only happens when you’re scared…like now.” He raises an eyebrow. “Like this morning, too.”

My cheeks burn under his intense stare. What did he hear? Onyx thankfully turns up right on time and saves me from having to ask if he heard me then. If he heard my thoughts this morning. Because if he did, I’m screwed. If he knows, I’d have to ask why exactly I’m not locked up and about to be executed. He would be free then, and my monster is a perfect excuse. “I’m glad you decided to not leave her at the academy, Finn. I would have made the same choice.”

“Everywhere is dangerous today,” Finnegan murmurs, watching me too closely. Onyx steps fully into the sunlight, which bounces off his dark hair and makes his eyes look like black water. He has a denim jacket thrown over a light blue shirt and jeans. Casual, for Onyx at least. I think I prefer him like this. “I’d rather she was being watched by you while I’m not there.”

“Where are you going?” I ask, ignoring the warm feeling in my chest from their protectiveness.

Finnegan walks out, and Onyx shakes his head. “Finn is investigating the death and hunting the Vian in the city. My father hired him because he is the best and the other rangers are fucking clueless.”

“I want to go with him.” I step back. “Can we?”

He frowns. “You want to see a crime scene?” When I nod, he sighs and pulls the door shut behind him as he steps out. He shouts, “Finnegan, we are going with you. We’ll take my car.”

Finnegan is putting his helmet on, but he takes it off, frowning at us both as he walks back our way. “You sure it’s a good idea to bring her?”

“Her is right here and I can speak for myself. I want to go and not be stuck in this house where you locked me up,” I interrupt before they start mansplaining my own feelings.

Finnegan and Onyx look between each other, in the way only people who trust each other and are close can, before agreeing to let me come with them. I wait while Onyx makes some calls and grabs his keys, and Finnegan paces outside the front door like he can’t stay still for even a second. I lean on the doorframe. “Why did your bear demand to sleep in my room?”

Finnegan pauses mid step and turns his devastating blue eyes on me, only to change the subject so I’m uncomfortable. “Isn’t it strange how the girl who was in your room last night, crying, ends up with her mate dead the next morning?” He cocks his head, a predator watching the prey he just cornered. “We can both start asking shit questions if you want. Don’t for a second think that because my Nexus decided to camp out in your room it means anything. I still fucking hate you, and I always will.”

“We will take my car,” Onyx announces, walking out and shutting the door behind him, completely unaware of the staring contest he just broke between Finn and me. He knows it was me. He has to, but why isn’t he telling everyone else?

I plaster a playful, lying smile on my face to hide the freak-out going on inside. “Do you have another car?”

Finnegan looks back on his way to the driveway. “You don’t like his car, Sun?”

He smirks at that before hiding it and turning away. Onyx looks between us, his eyes asking a million questions. I choose to sit in the back, while the two of them talk about classes, Supreme Alpha politics, and more boring crap the entire drive. After about half an hour, Onyx parks outside one of the towers in the centre of the city. The area’s been completely cordoned off with yellow tape, and the minute I get out, I know why. The flowers are dead in bushes all outside of the tower. The stone itself doesn’t even look brown anymore—it’s grey. If I could slap my own Nexus, I would right now. This was a foolish mistake.

My heart races as Onyx opens the door for me, and after getting out, I follow them over to where the tape has begun. He frowns. “This must be a strong Vian. He’s even drained the life out of the flowers.”

Finn leans down, picks a flower, and spins the grey daisy in his palm. “Why bother? They don’t usually do that. In fact, I’ve never seen reports of them being able to drain anything other than living beings.” Finn crushes the flower in his palm, and I feel like he might as well be showing me what he will do to me when he figures everything out.

Onyx only sighs, lifting the tape and holding it for me to step through. “Another thing to add to the growing list of their talents. Including how they got in the city in the first place and through the wards.” Finn walks through the tape, ripping it like it’s not there, and heads straight to the door of the tower. The rangers bow their heads like he is their king, and I roll my eyes. Onyx touches my arm. “You can stay out here with the rangers. I’ve heard it’s not a pretty sight.”

“Blood and gore haven’t bothered me in years.”

“When you tell me truths like that, sometimes I wish it was a lie,” he murmurs, but he takes me with him to the doors. If he had any clue how much I lie, he wouldn’t ask for any more lies. My heart pounds as we step through the glass doors that have been shattered and into a silent entrance hall. Ian’s apartment is on the first floor, and there is a line of blood leading from the plain entrance hall to a black door that is wedged open.

I almost don’t want to look at what my Nexus did, but I look anyway. I walk through the door and see the absolute wreck. There’s not an inch of the wall that doesn’t have blood splattered all over it, and what is left of him has been ripped apart. He’s been drained, but she tortured him first. Scared him.

Finn stands silent in the centre of the room. He touches the blood on the nearest wall with a fingertip before popping it into his mouth. I wince. “I would put money on this being personal. Maybe a psychotic Vian who likes murder too. This was painful, dragged out for hours. The room must have been soundproofed somehow with magic, because otherwise, neighbours would have heard. This…this is different to any known Vian I’ve hunted.”

“It’s a monster,” I whisper.

Finn looks over at me with pure suspicion, and his eyes search mine before he looks away with a tight jaw. “I’m going to start categorising all the body parts and make a report for the Supreme Alpha. Wait outside.”

Onyx turns me to leave, but he pauses by the door. He leans down and picks something up. Only when he holds it in the light does true fear smack into my heart. A grey strand of fur. “Finnegan.”

Finn is at his side in a second, plucking the grey strand out of his fingers. “Wolf. Grey. Not any known in the city.”

“No, there wouldn’t be. Grey is an extremely rare colour,” Onyx agrees.

“But maybe someone unregistered is helping a Vian. Working with them,” Finn suggests.

“It makes more sense,” Onyx is saying, but I can’t focus on anything but my feet walking out of the apartment. I need fresh air. Onyx jogs to my side, his hand falling to the middle of my back and guiding me out. He doesn’t know it, but that one simple touch relaxes me enough that I stop shaking. Four official-looking Nexus rangers are waiting in the entrance hall, and Onyx leans into me. “Wait outside. I won’t be long. Don’t wander off on your own. Not when there’s a murderer around on the streets. Not when they come after you.”

“You don’t know they’re after me.”

He smiles softly at me. “Yes, we do.”

I FEEL THE RANGERS’ eyes on me as I walk out before I can hear them investigating anything more. The broken tape flickers in the wind, but everything else is silent as I let the breeze blow around me. “There you are, Gwenieve.” I turn at the old, earthy voice and find my grandmother standing on the other side of the tape. “I was hoping I’d find one of your mates here and he could get me into the castle, but it looks like we just ran into each other because the Gods wished it.”

I look at my grandmother and I hope to feel something about my only remaining family—I don’t. I can’t see much of myself in her. She’s tall, willowy almost. Used to have red hair, but now it’s all grey. She is all skin and bones in a black suit, like she’s mourning. Her wrinkled face barely moves as she watches me. Her eyes find mine, her dark brown eyes. “Can we talk…alone?” she asks.

I nod and walk with her a few feet away from the building and the ears of the rangers. “What do you want?”

She bristles. “Still as lovely a child as you were back then. All grown up now, though. You look like your mother.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“You shouldn’t.” Cold temper runs through her words. “I’m here to warn you that it doesn’t matter if you’re back. You might as well have stayed gone and dead like I hoped. Everything is mine because you cursed us. I lost my family because of you.” She taps her foot. “I was barely able to even make friends after hearing of your rejection. Your parents running away with you was a slap to the face and dishonoured our family name and line. I know that you somehow convinced them to take you away. I don’t care how you did it, or why you did it, other than being a selfish little girl. All you should know is that you need to stay away, because where you go, death and misery follow.”

Tears burn in my eyes. She is right. “I—”

She points her finger into my face. “I’ll make sure you’re never seen in Starlight if you so much as dare come near my estate or use my family name. You’re dead to me.”

A warm, firm hand wraps around my waist as Onyx steps up to my side. Whatever look he gives my grandmother has her dropping her finger and stepping back. “You’re going to not say another word to her or about her ever again, Lexandria.” Fury captures each word and so, so much possessiveness.

I know I should push him away, but I’d just like for a moment to let him hold me. To have someone fight for me rather than running. I need to have one person who does not hate me. Loving me is impossible, but maybe, just maybe, he can be the one that doesn’t hate me. Even then, no one can hate me as much as I hate myself. My grandmother is right. I am a disgrace to my family.

“I would carefully remind you that there were wills put in place by her parents. She is to solely inherit everything. You are married into the family, and you have no biological descendants. By the laws of Starlight, Gwen is due everything and you are not family.” I’d almost forgotten that fact that we aren’t actually related. “I’m aware that you brought him up, but his father left everything to him, and he left everything to Gwen. Therefore, she is the sole inheritor of the title, the house, the money, all of it. When she wants it, she can simply kick you out. That is Starlight rules. Whether she’s a stain on your family name or not, it belongs to her.”

“Biologically means nothing!” She changes her tune like a pro. “The real mother was a housemaid who slept with him, knowing he was arranged to marry me. Our Nexus bond only kicked in years later. That wench died in childbirth, and I took in the baby as my own. Out of honour for my mate, of course I brought him up, raised him as my own. We couldn’t have children, we found out later, and he didn’t like how I preferred your father was kept in boarding school within the city for the entire year except holidays. He was always running amuck.”

“You were his mum,” I offer. I don’t owe her any kindness, but I won’t lie about my father. He was a great man. “He always did speak well of you, and he loved you. I miss him too, you know? I don’t care what the laws of Starlight say, you were his mum.”

“I don’t want your sympathy,” she snarls like a cat, all but hissing at me. “He didn’t speak well of you. We had a few conversations when he was running away. Protecting you cost him everything. I’m sure you’ll come and take everything from me now, just like the spiteful little girl I knew once.”

I wipe my tears away, and I go to tell her to just keep it all. I don’t want it, but Onyx does it for me. But worse. “It won’t be her taking everything from you. It’ll be me. Including a one-way ticket straight out of Starlight City for talking to my mate like that. You can go and find a place for humans, with no money, and see how they treat you. She is my family now, and you don’t get to speak to her like that.”

She goes quiet and the angry woman disappears, morphing into one who is scared. “Please don’t—”

“Apologise to her and I’ll consider it,” he commands, and I look up at him seething with nothing but ruthlessness in his gaze.

My grandmother turns her eyes towards me. “I’m sorry.” We both know she doesn’t mean it, and it does nothing for me. “If you or your mate come after my fortune, I’ll make sure everybody knows the truth. I know, Gwenieve. I’ve always known.”

I doubt my father told her the exact truth, or she would not keep it silent, but whatever she knows has me nodding. She walks away and Onyx tips my chin up with his finger. “What truth did she just blackmail you with?”

“I don’t know,” I admit the truth. Kinda. “She spoke to my father, and he kept a lot of secrets from me. Whatever it is, it doesn’t matter. I don’t want the house or money or title. None of that shit interests me.”

“You sure?” He lowers his hand, but he doesn’t step away. “You could buy an army of pink Land Rovers and donate them to the city so I have to see the ugly things everywhere I look.” I burst into laughter that I feel all the way from my black heart to the tips of my toes. He laughs with me. He has the biggest smile on his face as he watches me. “I could listen to you laugh all day and night, Gwen.”

My cheeks brighten as he stares at me, every raw emotion in his eyes, and for a second, it’s like we don’t have the rejection between us. We are just people, bonded by the Gods and destined to be together. “Gwen…are you ever going to tell me what it was like for you out there? Tell me something about your life…about why you left.”

“No,” I whisper, knowing the single word will be like a slap in the face to him. His shoulders drop, and he looks away from me. “Let’s go back. I think it’s going to be a while, and we’ve got things to discuss before I leave you today.”

I wonder the entire trip back to the academy what he wants to discuss. He can’t know it was my Nexus who killed Ian, but maybe he figured something else out. My hands twitch to put the radio on or something to break the silence up, as it gets awkward too quickly. He walks me back to my room, through the academy, which is pretty quiet with everyone in lessons.

I open the door and he comes in, shutting the door behind him. Apparently, the rules don’t apply to my mates or everyone is too scared of them to say anything. “Annie is still in class…” I don’t know what else to say to him. She has made my bed up, and it’s tidy in here, no sign of bear fur. She is a good roommate and friend. Onyx is silent by the door, looking around the space, and something is wrong with him. I just don’t know what, but I get the feeling. “You can sit anywhere, if you want.”

Onyx sits on the edge of my bed while I lean on the wall by the window, waiting for him to say something. When he does, it shatters me. “My father thinks it’s about time I settle down. He has set up an arranged marriage for me with a wealthy Nexus who didn’t have any mates appear.” My heart cracks. It literally cracks in two. “But, fuck, I don’t want this. I don’t… You need to say the word and I’ll tell him no. You tell me there’s a chance. Anything. That you don’t hate me when you look at me. Tell me anything and I’ll stop it all. There are things going on in Starlight, and this marriage is my father’s idea of fixing shit, but he can’t make me.”

My Nexus roars, begging to take over, and I push her down. I squash her and harden my heart until I’m sure it can’t feel anything anymore. Monsters don’t deserve feelings. “I can’t. You should go for it and be happy. I rejected you and I stand by that choice. It was for the best for us all.”

He looks at me in pure disbelief that bleeds into anger. He is in my face, pressing me into the window and cupping my cheeks in a heartbeat. “Tell me why, Gwenieve. Why the fuck are you doing this to us all? I know you feel this.” He leans in, pressing his forehead against mine. “We…we could be everything to each other. We are bonded…and it’s real.”

I lift my eyes, looking at him. My Nexus battles me with every breath I take. “It’s not real. It’s just nothing anymore. I don’t want you.”

“How can you be so impassive?” He pushes his forehead into mine. “How can you not care? Sometimes…sometimes I feel like you’re lying to absolutely everyone, including yourself. Because I think you do care, and I think you want me just as fucking much as I want you. This bond, it isn’t nothing.”

Our mate bond isn’t nothing, but I am. I am nothing but a monster. “You’re wrong, Onyx. You don’t know me at all, and I think you should leave before I just end up hurting you more.”

He shakes his head as he backs up, and I immediately miss the connection of having him touch me. “Fine. Remember, you asked for this.” He goes to the door and yanks it open, only to slam it shut as he leaves me alone. The minute the door shuts, I burst into tears. This is the only way. My parents told me it’s the only way. My mates can’t know the truth of what I am, what my Nexus is. I know it’s the right thing to do, that he needs to move on from me…but why does it hurt so goddamn much?

Chapter

Twelve

The weeks seem to blur, and I’m thankful for a bit of normality when it’s always been rare for me. Even if normal means dealing with my rejected mates on a daily basis and the bear that sleeps on the floor in my room every night. I hate every lesson with Hollis. He picks on me and makes sure to embarrass me in front of my class at every chance he gets. If he isn’t harassing me in lessons, he is making out with Rochelle instead while I work out nearby. But that’s the only time I have to see him, so I count myself as lucky.

Rhodes’s lessons are always informative, and I feel like I’m learning a lot of new skills, though it’s hard to hide the fact that I know most of the training he’s teaching. I make sure to fail at least fifty per cent of his instruction so he doesn’t notice the truth. Alek’s lessons are on and off. He turns up to some of them. In others, he just leaves us alone to train with our Nex weapons. Other ranger trainees blame me for his disappearing acts and how he isn’t interested in training the class at all.

I haven’t seen Finn or Onyx in weeks, and I’m glad for it, even if my Nexus is not. She wants to see them…immediately. There haven’t been any rumours of Onyx’s engagement, and part of me hopes that means he said no to his father even when I couldn’t promise him anything.

There’s only been two students who have left the academy, one for unknown reasons. He was a shy boy, so maybe he just wasn’t up to it. The other left because he broke every bone in his body by accident, and it freaked him out so much he begged to leave, or he’d cry all day.

I find myself looking forward to going to the shelter with Rhodes the most. I get to look after the animals, specifically the cats in the cafe where I mostly work. I also get to see the pups and have cuddles. The white one has gotten big and chubby now, with thick fur, and a home is already waiting. The golden one, since the mother passed away, she’s not growing very well or thriving. Helen, a fellow worker, whispered to me that Rhodes specifically spends a lot of time hand feeding the golden one himself. She’s still limping around, and she is quite weak. No one has offered to adopt her yet, and she doesn’t even have a name.

Annie clears her throat and I shake my head. “I’m off to the funeral. I did ask if you could come, but with lockdowns and everything, dad said no.”

I don’t want to attend the funeral of the Nexus I killed, anyway. Annie is in an all-black dress with a fancy hat. “That’s okay. Give Sara a hug from me.”

We both smile at each other. This is a day of celebration for Sara, and only we three know it. I’m sure she will pretend well enough to be sad in front of the funeral, though. Annie already told me she is like a changed woman behind closed doors. “I will. I would have pushed my dad more on the funeral, but I am already pushing it with begging him to let you come to the game. I did ask about Harry, Mac and his wife for you. They have an apartment, and Harry has joined the college. They are okay.”

“I’m grateful for your help,” I remind her. They are okay, and as long as I don’t get caught, they still will be. “I’m going to go to Alek’s lesson, and I’ll see you afterwards?”

Annie pauses in the open doorway and really looks at me, searches for my Nexus in a way that only another Nexus can do. Her eyes slip into her own Nexus, a brilliant white colour before fading back to usual. “My Nexus wants me to bow to you. Why is that? Why…” She pauses. “Some might call Ian’s death an act of revenge by a hero.”

“Heroes aren’t monsters.”

She shrugs a shoulder. “Maybe the best ones are.”

Annie is wrong. They can’t be. I’m no hero and my Nexus certainly is not. I feel myself paling as Annie leaves, and I make myself leave next, shutting the door behind me. I follow behind a group, through to the gymnasium. Alek is in a bad mood. I can tell from the minute I walk in, like his mood is part of me. Usually, he waits for all of us to warm up before he starts barking at us to go and run. This morning, we don’t get time to stretch. Everyone in my class is smart enough to go straight outside and start running laps around the castle on the track. We end up running ten laps until every bit of my body is burning and rain has soaked my clothes to my skin. I squeeze my hair out as I breathlessly sit on the floor of the gymnasium with everyone else.

“You’re slow.” Alek’s disappointing voice echoes. “I’ve been discussing your year with the other tutors, and we all agree you are probably the slowest class we’ve had. We are going to change up our lessons earlier than planned.” He looks right at me for a second. “Tomorrow you’ll be working on your Nexus powers with me. We’ll be connecting to your Nexus in here, and hopefully, the Nexus in your chests are stronger. It’s been six weeks since you’ve come to the academy; therefore, most of you are caught up and have made a good enough bond with your Nex weapon of choice. Today, we will focus on your bond to your Nexus and make your Nexus aware that it needs to be coming out in our next lesson.”

Fuck. Alek calls someone from the crowd forward, and I’m sweating for another reason completely. I can’t let my Nexus out here. The guy is ginger and thin, but under Alek’s command, he quickly shifts into a soft-looking fox with a bushy tail. Alek shakes his head at the fox. I always like seeing the shifts that aren’t the Gods’ forms. I think the cutest one I’ve seen is a penguin. “I want your power, not your shift. Turn back, Howard.”

Poor Howard looks paler when he shifts back. He is fully clothed so at least he can control that part of his Nexus shift and we don’t have to see his junk. Alek taps his foot, waiting. Howard looks around and then leans in, but his voice still echoes. “My power is phasing… I need…”

Alek makes a crossbow appear in his hand, and he shoots Howard five times in quick succession. The arrows simply go through Howard like he isn’t there. Alek looks pleased. “Brilliant gift and very useful. Sit down.” He points at another guy in the crowd. “You. Next.”

Howard comes and sits by me as Alek tests the next guy. I lean in. “Phasing is super cool. I heard when you get powerful enough, you can slip through gaps in time and go into the past for a second or two.”

His gaze shoots to mine, his face covered in freckles. “Thanks. You’re Gwen?” I nod. “Phasing has been in my family for years, and my grandfather could time phase both back and forward in time. He was the last one to do it.”

“Until you.” I wink.

His shoulders move as he silently laughs, and Alek’s shout makes me jump. “Gwen, up here.”

Howard flashes me a reassuring smile that does nothing to make this easier. I can show him the disappearing-blending power he already knows about because of Onyx. Alek waits until I’m right in front of him and cocks his head. “I know your one power, and I don’t need to see it again.”

“Again? You weren’t there.”

“I saw the footage,” he explains and crosses his thick arms. “Dreamwalkers have been known to be powerful enough to day dreamwalk too. Finnegan told me you’ve been in his head, so you can day dreamwalk too. Get in my head.”

“I—I can’t control it,” I whisper, hating that everyone is watching.

“Yes, you can. Get into my head, or we both will stand here all fucking day.” He opens his arms. “You need to remember, and the only way you’re doing that is by getting into my mind.”

Frustrated, I swing my arms out. “My Nexus doesn’t work with me, so I can’t do that.”

“Then let her out.” He moves closer, and I breathe in his scent. It’s addicting. “It’s about time you stop hiding her away from us. Unless you fear that she’s going to suddenly come running to us and we’re going to be mated when you open your eyes.”

It is a worry of mine, but not for the reasons he is thinking. “She isn’t any more interested than I am.”

His laugh wraps around my throat as he lowers his voice, only inches away from me. “It didn’t feel that way when I was kissing you, little liar.”

A few people awkwardly cough, and I take a step back, just remembering that they are here. Sometimes when I’m with my mates, I forget there is a world outside of us. Alek grits his teeth. “You’re failing this class until you get into my head and tell me what you forgot. Get out!”

I don’t need to be given a chance to run away more than once. “With pleasure.”

His very bear-like growl haunts me as I leave the gymnasium, and I don’t stop walking. I don’t know where I’m going, and I don’t want to go back to my room to be alone for hours. As I come out of the corridor, I feel Finn nearby. I feel the pull to him stronger than the others now because of my Nexus’ intense crush, and my feet move of their own accord to a room. It’s one of those doors with a glass square in the middle, and I lean up to look in. Finn is holding a dark-haired woman in his arms. His arms are fully wrapped around her and hers around his waist as they embrace. My heart pounds within my chest. Not him.

My Nexus…she loses it. My Nexus starts buzzing, actually buzzing, and mist starts coating my hands like it’s trying to make me shift. No, no, no, no, no. I start running. I run outside, seeing Onyx’s boring car parked up outside, and the door has been left open. Something crazy enters my mind as I slip into the driver’s seat, finding the key is still in the ignition because he’s cocky enough not to care. I don’t even think about it as I use this new plan to distract my Nexus from Finn. I use my powers to make me look like Onyx as I get to the gates. They open it for Onyx without even talking to me and let me out while I look just like him.

It’s too easy. I drive aimlessly through the city for an hour before my wrists begin to burn. The rune being used. He’s probably worked out I’ve stolen his car and left now, so he called his dad to find me, but I don’t even care. I don’t know where I’m driving until I randomly stop the car and slam my hands on the wheel. I’m definitely getting locked up by Onyx for this. It’s already night out, and I think I’m on the side of the city opposite to the academy.

I lean my head against the wheel. Stupid, stupid. I should drive back, but I don’t trust my Nexus to be around Finn when she is a jealous, possessive mess. She’s not happy, and she wants control. “Please stop,” I whisper, digging my fingers into my forehead. “Please, just stop. My life is a ruin because of you already, and I need you to stop.”

My Nexus sinks away until I can finally breathe. Warm green light shines over me when I lift my head, and I turn to see I’m parked right outside a pub. There’s a sign above it, all lit up in green, and people are passing in and out the front door. Alcohol and a busy pub sound like a superb idea until they find me. I just need some money. Onyx has cash hidden in his glove compartment, and I make a mental note to repay him later.

I head inside and go straight up to the bar, and no one so much as even looks at me. It’s kind of relieving. I order myself a double vodka with lemonade, one of my favourites. The old bartender barely even blinks before bringing me the drink over with a sunny little umbrella in it. I down the first one before asking for another, then another, just to drown my wolf out. I learnt at sixteen that getting drunk is a great way to make sure she doesn’t take over.

A handsome thirty-year-old-at-least slides into the seat next to me. “You’re new. Got a mate?”

I look him up and down. “Nope. I have five and they’d probably kill you for even talking to me.”

He leans in. “But you’re not mated to them, so I won’t tell if you don’t. You’re too gorgeous to sit here alone. Let me buy you a drink.”

“Go on then. What’s your name?”

“Jake.” He grins.

I almost want to roll my eyes. The creepy guys are always called Jake. He looks like a Jake too. He is so normal. “So, Jake, do you have a mate?”

“Nope, I’m one of the single guys here in the city. A mate sounds tiring,” he admits before buying me a drink and one for himself. We drink in silence for a second, and his face keeps spinning a little. I’m not drunk enough yet though for my Nexus to not send her feelings of disgust over Jake to me. Jake is unaware of my internal battle as he smiles at me, and he puts his hand on my knee. So much disgust comes from my Nexus that I almost feel like throwing up all over poor Jake.

My Nexus would like that.

I tug his hand off me. “I’m sorry. My Nexus is being a bitch and doesn’t like you.” I climb out of my seat and shake my head. “I have to drive back, so bye.”

“Wait, you can’t drive like this!” Jake calls after me and follows me out. When I get to the car, he tugs my keys out of my hands. “I’ll drive you back to wherever you want to go. My uncle died in a drunk crash.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I mutter, rubbing my forehead. “I’m not—”

Jake helps me into the car before going to the driver’s seat and starting up the car. “It’s okay. I was trying my luck anyway with you. Let’s get you home and safe.”

I barely clip the seatbelt in before something hits the car, and it flips up into the air. I scream as the seatbelt pulls tight against my chest and the airbag bursts open in front of me. The car slams down before skidding across the ground, glass spraying into my face. I keep screaming and look to Jake, but he didn’t have his seatbelt on, and he isn’t there. Just blood marks the window. I reach for my Nexus, but I find nothing. No connection at all.

Just silence. What the fuck?

The smell of smoke from the car fills my senses, along with the metallic tang of my blood from my arm, which has glass in it. I look through the window gap to see a man walking towards me in a dark cloak. Shit. The door doesn’t open, too crushed, and I leave it. I undo my seatbelt and climb out of the empty window frame, cutting my hand, but I don’t dare stop to look back.

I run past what is left of Jake on the road, his head at a strange angle. Tears fill my eyes. His death is my fault. He was trying to help me. Whoever that is, is being sent for me, and I don’t have my Nexus. I reach for my powers, but they are gone, too.

I run. I tap the rune on my wrist and shout for anyone, but the street is silent. I keep running down the street, down to an alleyway, and decide to hide in it behind a pile of boxes. Finnegan, sometimes Finnegan can hear me. I scream for him. I scream for him in my mind. Hoping that somehow dreamwalking in the day is even a possibility, like Alek was sure it was. Finn said he can hear me sometimes, even if he is my enemy. Even if he hates me. “Help me…please.”

I’m thrown into the air, the boxes crashing around me as I slam onto my back, screaming in pain as his power crushes my body. The cloaked man throws the hood back, revealing all of his bald head and markings. I know him. He is a Vian, and I know I won’t ever forget how he can dull a connection to powers and Nexus. A rare Nexus gift he stole and made himself invaluable to the Vian. It was risky for him to come for me. “I can finally get your power. It’s been a long time coming.”

“Lay a single finger on her,” a dark voice warns, “and you will know pain like no other. I will enjoy every single scream of yours.”

The man disappears like smoke, knowing he wouldn’t win against Finnegan. Finn stalks down the alleyway, leaning down and picking me up in his thick arms. I don’t know what to say to him. “You came for me.”

He glares. “You asked for help. It was you. Of course I’d be here.” Finnegan lifts me closer. Why does he make my heart race? It. Was. You. He came for me and helped me when I’ve never had anyone do that for me before. Even with my parents, they would have left me if it risked their lives. Maybe not my father, but my mother would have without another thought. “You’re injured and you’re fucking lucky I was dropping my sister back to the city this evening, so I was close.”

His sister? The woman from earlier was his sister.

Thankfully, I pass out before Finn can see how happy my Nexus is that the mate she is lovingly obsessed with came to our rescue and doesn’t have another woman she needs to kill. Crazy Nexus bonds.

Chapter

Thirteen

Alek hates me now and I don’t know why it bothers me far more than any of the others hating me. He’s still permanently banning me from his lessons, which means I’m failing at the academy, which means Tutor Jettie looks close to tugging her hair out every time she sees me wandering about. Apparently, she won’t argue with Alek on my behalf, but after one conversation with her, I learnt I can’t be kicked out for attempting to turn up for my classes. It’s a loophole for the academy, and Alek is playing the game perfectly to piss me off. Tutor Jettie has been adding more personal history lessons whilst she sends other tutors to try and convince Alek to have me back. He did come to check on me after the attack—they all did, except for Hollis. Onyx wasn’t even mad that his pretty, boring car was trashed or that I broke a shit ton of the academy rules. He says he’s just getting another car, and he spoke to Finn’s dad, who is just happy his son’s mate isn’t dead. I’m sure Onyx’s new car will be black and boring too.

“You look lost in thoughts this morning.”

I lift my head and look at Annie, who is watching me with a soft expression. Her hair is up in a ponytail, the end resting on her right shoulder. “Wanna talk about it?”

It’s an offer, wrapped in friendship, and I should take it with open arms. I can’t fully let anyone in though. Not even someone as kind and sweet as Annie. “I was just thinking about that attack.” I admit to her a little of my thoughts but not the burning guilt over Jake’s death. He was a dad to a two-year-old and lost his wife the year before. I read the funeral listing when Annie gave it to me and suggested I could get special permission to attend if I wanted. I didn’t go. I haven’t slept well since that attack, since seeing that fucker in Starlight City. How are the Vian getting in here? It’s meant to be safe from all monsters except for me. “Sleeping has been on and off. Last night wasn’t good.”

Her forehead crinkles. “I never sleep well either, thanks to, you know, your mate in our room snoring every night.” She shudders. “He also fills the room with a minty smell, and every time I see my mate at the weekends, he gets all jealous of the bear’s scent on me.” Her cheeks turn pink. “Truthfully, it leads to the best possessive sex, though.”

I grin at her. “I’ll tell Finn he is aiding your sex life. He will love that.”

Her eyes widen in horror, even when both of us know I’m joking. “Do not even think about it, Gwenieve.”

“My full first name, you must be mad,” I tease. “Anyway, if you manage to figure out a way to get his bear to stay out, then I’d be all about it.”

She laughs. “If my mate had his way, he’d be sleeping right now on the floor next to Finn to watch me. It’s a bear thing.”

“You should invite him. We could record them both spooning for Finn blackmail!”

We both burst into laughter just imagining it. Our laughs are stopped short though when Hollis walks in, blaring that stupid alarm. No one throws up or ducks, and only some guys cover their ears now. It’s been two months since we got started at the academy, and they are used to it.

Hollis turns it off and looks around, pointedly not glancing at me for more than a second. “Good, you’re getting better,” he drawls, looking to his right. “You still look pale, Axe.” Axe drops his head and Hollis smirks. “The lesson begins now.”

We all follow him out, knowing better than to make him wait for even a minute with his short temper. The class quickly goes about stretching and warming up before running laps and going back to the training pit. My stomach is toner than it’s ever been, thanks to the running and training every single day. I’ve been training for years on the run, but that training was more for my magic than it was for my body. I learnt how to be quick so I could run and how to fight someone off in close combat, but now I’ve learnt how rangers hone their skills and how to work as a group.

As usual, I expect Hollis to start calling us to gather around the training ring by the cliff side. I don’t bother walking too much closer because he never shouts at me until last. He makes a show of pointing out that I must not be watching anybody else fight when he easily beats me. I remind myself over and over—a monster deserves this. I deserve this.

I’m surprised to see the training ring isn’t empty at all. Finnegan and Onyx are in the middle of it, talking between themselves. Whispers burst out and several people look my way, wondering if they’re here for me. Spoiler, they won’t be here to see me when Onyx is mad at me, and Finnegan has hated me since the beginning. Annie walks to my side, stopping close and brushing her arm against mine in comfort. “Did you know they were coming?”

“No,” I whisper back. I would have warned her and then possibly gone as far as eating rotten food to make myself sick to avoid this class. Hollis moves to stand at their sides and claps his hands once. The silence that rings back is swift.

He may be an asshole, but most of the class admires him, and it’s got everything to do with how well he teaches them when he actually gives a shit. I just get the torment because of our bond. “You’ve got a special lesson today, class. These are some of the academy’s best trained rangers, and both of them broke records in combat and skills in their time here.” Of course my arrogant mates did. “My two brothers are here, and I won’t bother introducing them because you know their names. They both volunteered to show you what you will fight like at the end of this academy and score a personal indifference between them.” What personal indifference? “I want you to pick your winner and stand on the right or left. Right side for Onyx and left for Finnegan.”

The crowd splits up pretty quickly, but I don’t move from the middle, and neither does Annie. I’m not choosing or betting. I don’t want to see them fight either, but with no one else in front of me now, I have a perfect view. Finnegan and Onyx look right at me for a second before they shift their gazes to each other. Hollis scoffs. “Ignore her. I’m surprised she isn’t running away already. Her tan is letting up.”

I have to bite down so hard on my tongue to stop myself from throwing insults back. I’ve learnt Hollis likes it when I insult him. The sadist bastard. Onyx and Finnegan seem content to ignore me, like Hollis suggested, and Onyx draws out his Nex weapon. I’ve never seen it before. It’s almost like a curved axe, but all of it is made of gold metal, and it’s double sided. There’s a handle right in the middle where Onyx holds it and braces himself.

Finnegan owns a beautiful sword as his Nex weapon. It’s all black, matching the dark shades of his hair, with stars drawn all the way down to the hilt from the tip. Each star is glowing a beautiful silver colour, a contrast to the yellow glow of Onyx’s axe. They’re both in loose dark joggers and a dark vest, showing off their muscular arms and toned bodies. They remind me of a fireman calendar that hung on the walls of one of the hostels we lived in for six months. It only had one page left, just December, and it was the only decor on the wall.

This is going to be enjoyable to watch at least. I feel eyes on me, and I turn to the right to see Rochelle standing by the group, her arms crossed and a hostile look in her eyes. My Nexus riles in my chest and sends images of Rochelle ripped to pieces into my mind. Fucking hell. I drag my eyes away and push my Nexus down with a thud. We can’t murder her! Hollis goes over to Rochelle with all smiles, which doesn’t help my Nexus situation, but I roll my eyes instead and look forward. He. Is. Not. Mine.

Finnegan and Onyx wait for Hollis to blow a whistle before they attack. It is like watching two storms out at sea, crashing straight into each other, and the rumble can be felt for miles. Finn is good and impressive, but so is Onyx. Whereas Finnegan is a bigger guy and taller, Onyx uses the fact he is quicker to his advantage. The clang of their Nex weapons rings in my ears as they slam into each other and neither one of them moves. Finnegan smiles like a mad man enjoying the best meal of his life, and Onyx looks determined. Onyx blocks effortlessly and my eyes widen in surprise. I knew they were seasoned rangers and they were going to be good in a fight, but the way they move is something else altogether.

Finnegan lets Onyx attack, blocking some and mostly taking every hit, every blow, but I can see how he is still in control. I can barely keep track of who is winning. After a while, they both dominate the area like Gods. The groups on either side are cheering loud enough for all of Starlight to hear, but I can’t peel my eyes from the battle. Annie touches my arm. “They make us look like toddlers fighting with sticks.”

I don’t disagree with her. I completely get why they think we are funny now. I’ve only seen one person fight like they do—my father. I thought he was a legend, and it’s clear he learnt from the academy. Coming here might have been my secret way to be like him. I always wanted to be able to fight like he did, but he told me once that the only way to fully be at the top of your strength is to be fully connected with your Nexus. Working together in every move, every decision, until you are completely one. For me, that will never happen.

She is a live wire, and I’m the bucket of sand putting her out. The chants from the crowds are deafening as Finnegan and Onyx get sweaty and even more delicious. My Nexus watches from my one eye, and she is loving this as much as I am. Finn manages to elbow Onyx in the stomach before grabbing his arm and flipping him over his shoulder. I wince as Onyx slams straight on the floor, and I think it’s over, but it’s not. He uses his Nex axe to push himself up in one fluid movement and swings it round, launching the axe straight at Finn’s throat. Finn smirks and holds his one hand up.

Cheers ring out from the group on Onyx’s side, and Hollis is clapping loudly as he walks to them. “And we have a winner. Nice move, Onyx.”

“Thanks.” Onyx wipes the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand.

“The winners of the bet are free to do what they want today,” Hollis states, followed by more cheers. “As for the losers, people are needed to decorate the academy for Halloween tomorrow. Head to Tutor Jettie and offer your help for the day. I’ll be checking in.”

Groans and grumbles echo from Finnegan’s side before everyone starts to walk away. Annie and I look at each other, but I speak first. “We didn’t lose, so technically we are free. Dickhead doesn’t seem to be bothering with us, so I’m taking the day.”

Annie looks at Hollis once and then grins. “Perfect, Kos is coming later tonight to pick me up for a few hours. We are trying a new restaurant.”

“I’m jealous.” I bump her shoulder. “How is it Halloween already?”

Her eyes brighten with excitement. “Halloween is fun for us though. Our Nexus love it. Also, have you forgotten the game is on Halloween? So tomorrow? It will be themed, and it will be really cool. I bought you an outfit to wear. Please don’t get mad at me. People dress up for the game; it’s not… Well, people just do, and I thought you might want Rhodes’s team symbol to show support.”

“I almost forgot, to be honest, but I’m excited. Thank you for buying me something, and I’m repaying you,” I firmly tell her. She shrugs and I know she won’t accept any money from me. She is just as stubborn as I am. Onyx’s laughter drifts over, and I’m drawn to him, to the comforting sound. “You get going, I’m just gonna go over to wish Onyx good luck and then head for a walk.”

She hugs me briefly before walking off, and I head to the group. Finnegan watches me as he rubs a towel across his sweaty face, and Onyx looks wary as I approach. I should be happy about their reactions to me, but it sinks my heart like a rock. Hollis looks at me like I’m a bug trying to climb onto the picnic blanket to steal some bread. “What the fuck are you still doing here?”

Onyx’s voice is low. “Don’t speak to her like that, Hollis.”

He glares at me, and I sneer right back at the asshole. I turn to Onyx. “I just wanted to wish you good luck for the game tomorrow. I probably won’t see you before. That was it.”

Onyx looks surprised and inclines his head. “Thank you, Gwenieve. It will be good to know you’re out there.”

It’s so cold between us now, so fractured, and I did the task my parents trained me to do. Break them, hate them, and never let my mates close. Hollis scoffs. “Piss off, then.”

Finnegan growls and moves between Hollis and me. “Fucking enough, Hol. You shouldn’t speak to any woman like that.”

“Like I give a shit what you think, either of you. I’m not playing by your rules or respecting her.” He doesn’t engage with Finn, choosing to just leave, but Finnegan grabs his arm, and Hollis turns. “Get the fuck off me, Finny boy, or we will have a problem.”

Finn shows all his teeth when he smiles. “Is that a challenge?” He lets Hollis go and Hollis stands his ground. I don’t think I could cope with them fighting. It would be like watching two pieces of my soul tear each other apart.

We are all distracted as Rochelle slithers up to Hollis’s side and wraps her body around him. He kisses the side of her neck, and my Nexus pushes to the surface. My hands shake as I watch them both, unable to look away. “Hey, babe, are we leaving? We have that dinner with my parents tonight.”

“Of course,” Hollis agrees, like a fucking puppy. “I love you. Where else would I be?”

Love? “You can never love someone who doesn’t properly belong to you. Your Nexus belongs to me, and our souls are fused in every lifetime. We are destined and she is fated to die.”

My eyes widen as I grapple for control over my Nexus and push her right the fuck down. Hollis is angry, Finn has his eyebrows raised, and Onyx looks ready to jump to my rescue. Rochelle’s cheeks are brightened, and she looks like she is going to cry.

Onyx immediately steps in between Hollis and me. “That’s enough from both of you. You are hot-headed,” he says to Hollis before pointing to me, “and that was her Nexus speaking. We both know Nexus can be strange and come out with weird shit.”

I quickly leave before I get myself in any more trouble, and mentally curse my Nexus for being a total possessive weirdo. She basically claimed Hollis and threatened Rochelle with death in the space of one creepy sentence. We don’t want the asshole one, Nexus! I know she doesn’t agree; if anything, she sees him as the ultimate challenge. Hollis is going to make my life even worse in his next lesson thanks to this. My Nexus never thinks about the consequences. Oh no, she is happy for me to deal with them.

Classes are changing and it’s packed going into the academy, so I take the path around the castle to the back instead, in the opposite direction to everyone else. I’d rather be alone. I go to the back of the castle and find a pair of stairs leading down the cliff side where there’s a big space of flat rock near the coastline. I don’t like the sea all that much, but there aren’t many places that are empty and big enough to train alone at this time of day. I walk to the edge and look over at the sea. It’s quiet today, but the ledge is so low down that the waves crash around the edges, sometimes brushing onto the edge of the platform. The sea is still deathly beautiful.

“Do you know this is the place that one of our famous ancestors sacrificed his life to the sea?” I spin round to find Hollis behind me, casually leaning on the rock wall. He begins to walk right to me, and he is furious. “My plans are cancelled now you’ve gone and fucked with my girlfriend’s head. I really, really want to thank you.”

His sarcasm just scares me. “No need.”

“I’ve come to teach you something.” He is getting closer.

My heart is racing so loud that it drowns out the sea. “Oh yeah, like what?”

He smirks and undoes his jacket, dropping it onto the flat rock. His muscles flex in his shirt as he looks right at me. “Stop me.” I can’t. He crashes into me like a bull, pushing me onto the floor, and my head smacks on the stone with a thud. I see stars as his hands grab both of mine and shove them above my head, arching my back with his weight as he presses into me. “For years, I dreamt of killing you for what you did to me and Rhodes and the consequences. It made Rhodes strong, but it turned me into a monster.”

I flinch at the word monster. He hasn’t got a clue who the real monster between us is. He holds me right on the edge, my head almost slipping off into the sea. Water sprays over my face with every wave crashing onto the shore. He leans right down, his lips inches from my throat. “I am never going to be yours. I don’t want you, or this bond, or anything to do with you.”

“You’re the one following me, not the other way round.” Stupid to rile him up, but I know as well as he does that he won’t try to really kill me. His body is perfectly aligned with mine, and now I swear I see his Nexus fighting and clawing its way to the surface just as much as mine is. We’re both fighting a losing battle here, and being away from him is the only way that I can manage to keep my Nexus away.

He laughs into my face, and bleak, cold green shines bright in his eyes. “That’s not true, is it? You want power and you plan to collect us, but you won’t get me. I want to be with her.”

“Keep saying it and one day it might become true,” I whisper. “Either way, I will never want you back. Never, Hollis. It’s not like I don’t have my pick of mates if I decide I want one.”

“You’re cruel and heartless, Gwenieve, and in a different world, I’d think we are the same.” He grips my hands tighter. “Do you know what happened to Rochelle? Why being a bitch to her is just cruel?”

“No,” I snap. She isn’t a nice person, and nothing he—

“Her mate died just after they were bonded. It destroyed her.” My eyes soften but Hollis’s harden instead. I’ve heard there is no worse pain than losing a mate. Even though I rejected mine, watching any of them die would break me into a million pieces. “And you go spouting off about how mates can only belong to each other in front of her. She is crying because of you.”

“It’s—” Water sprays into my face right before a big wave crashes over me, and sea water makes me choke. I’m thrown straight back into the past, unable to stop myself as the memories flood me, just like they did back then. The last time I was held under water before my parents’ death, and it was one of the worst.

My mum claps my back. “You lasted seven minutes this time. Fantastic, but your Nexus needs to be better.”

I shiver, freezing cold on the edge of the pool as I suck in the air to breathe and shake from head to toe. “She’s had enough,” my father’s soft words echo. The pool is better than the sea or the river we usually use, but I wish the training would stop.

“No, she hasn’t. I need to test her magic, or she might as well be given as a gift to the Nexus when they figure out what she is. She cannot be weak or afraid,” my mother demands. I know why we have to do this, but I hate it. The water scares me now. “Alright, throw more fish in the water, and I’ll throw her in.”

Fear locks my muscles up, and I cling to the edge of the pool. “P-please, p-lease s-stop,” I beg my mother, over and over, but she ignores me. My mother never listens. She effortlessly pushes me off the edge of the pool, and I can’t fight her with how weak I feel after hours of this.

For a second, I open my eyes under the water as I sink down, and I’m surrounded by colourful fish. They are so beautiful and I’m going to kill them all. I try to swim to the top, but the weights wrapped around my ankles hold me down as they thud to the bottom of the pool. I gasp, water flooding into my lungs as I drown again, for the tenth time just this night. Everything dies around me, and it takes seven minutes before I breathe again.

The memory fades but not the fear that makes my Nexus hide and my body lock up as I scream and try to break free of Hollis. He lets me go.

“What’s wrong with you? Stop freaking out!” Hollis demands, but there is an inch of worry in his voice that makes me wonder how bad I look. When I finally stop screaming, he steps away from me, letting me go so I can wrap my arms around my neck and start rocking back and forth. I focus on trying to breathe, trying to remember that I’m not back there, that my mum did that for a reason…that it was all for a reason.

“I’ve got you and no one is going to hurt you, Gwen.” Rhodes’s soft words whisper in my ear, and his hand runs down my back. “I’ll be one second.”

I lift my head, sobbing, as Rhodes walks right up to Hollis and punches him hard. I hear Hollis’s nose crunch under Rhodes’s hit, and I wince. Hollis roars. “She’s just being overdramatic for attention. It’s pathetic you’re falling for it.”

“Get over yourself, brother, before you let our past control you,” Rhodes warns with venom in his voice. Heartbreak too. Rhodes picks Hollis up with his telekinesis powers and literally throws him into the sea. He has the same gift as Hollis but that doesn’t surprise me.

All I hear is Hollis’s shout before he disappears in the waves, and I grasp the side of the cliff as I look for him. “He’ll drown!”

Rhodes leans down to me, and he takes my hands in his. “No, he won’t. He’ll be pissed and soaked, but he’s a very good swimmer. Come on, I want to show you a gift I got you.” He wraps his arms around me and picks me up.

We are silent on the walk back to the academy, and Rhodes leads me to a part of the academy I haven’t seen. It’s high up in one of the towers, and we pass through a door that clearly says No Students Allowed on the door. “Where are we going?”

He nudges another door open. “My room. I moved into the academy this year.” He doesn’t say to be closer to me, but I get that feeling anyway.

“I’m sorry, I… It was a bad memory. The water on my face. It really wasn’t Hollis’s fault, I just…”

“It was Hollis’s fault. It always is with him, and if you want to tell me the story of why, I’m listening,” he offers, but he doesn’t push. He doesn’t demand anything of me.

“Maybe one day,” I hedge. How can I ever explain it to him by telling him everything?

Rhodes puts me down in front of a red oak door, and he uses a key in his pocket to open it up for me. It’s a small apartment with views over the sea, an enormous bed at the back of the room, and in the cage in front is the golden retriever puppy from the shelter. The one with a limp. “She’s yours. The academy let me have her stay here or in your room whenever you want, when she is more trained. We can take her with us to work too, and Helen is going to give her private lessons to help her limp. But I’ll give you a key, and you can come here—” I throw myself at Rhodes, squealing as I hug him as tight as I can. He laughs, holding me right back. “I was worried you’d say you don’t want her.”

“I always wanted a golden retriever and…” I drift off as he stares down at me. I lift myself up and brush my lips across his. A soft kiss, which I break away from quickly, but it makes my whole body buzz to life with just that brush. “Thank you, Rhodes. I wasn’t allowed birthday gifts or Christmas presents, but I always asked for a puppy of my own.”

“Fuck.” He rubs the back of his neck with a cheeky grin. “If a puppy gets me a kiss, I’m going to have to adopt more just for a chance of another kiss.”

I laugh with him as I head over to my puppy and take her out of her cage. She looks up at me with her bright hazel eyes, and I kiss the top of her head. I can’t stay in Starlight forever, but I am going to let myself have something. “Hello, Nibbles. You’re mine.” I glance at Rhodes, and he smiles at me. We both know he is mine, too.

Chapter

Fourteen

Iwas wrong to thank Annie for buying me an outfit. Absolutely and completely wrong. I’m wearing ridiculously tight green shorts that barely go to my thighs, and they show off all of my ass. At least the rest of the outfit is a slightly oversized white top with a crest right in the centre of it, which is apparently Rhodes and Onyx’s team crest for Starlight City. The crest is dark green with a silver snake wrapped around a dark wolf.

My hair is down and straight, despite Annie wanting to braid it for me like hers in pigtails. I’m actually wearing a little make-up that Annie helped me choose, with green and white stripes on my cheeks. I look like I’m going to an American football game. Annie’s mate, Kosma, is waiting outside the front of the academy with his car and is wearing a green shirt. To my surprise, Alek is with him. Alek is in an all-black uniform and looks like he is attending a fight instead of a game.

They’re both talking quietly, but Alek lifts his gaze to me. His eyes widen as he slowly runs his eyes up my bare legs, over the tiny, tiny shorts and the rest of me until he meets my eyes. A slow smirk fills his face, and it’s sexy. Annie is charging into Kosma’s arms as I walk to Alek, where he is leaning on the dark blue Porsche. He locks eyes with me. “Are you ready?”

“Oh, so, you are talking to me?” I innocently ask. His expression is guarded as he opens the door for me, and I slide in. Annie gets in the front with her mate, so Alek sits next to me in the back. There isn’t much room in the Porsche’s back seats, and Alek is a huge guy. He’s so big that his entire thick thigh presses against mine, even with the middle seat between us. It’s a fast enough car to get us through the streets of Starlight with ease and small enough to head down the side roads to miss the bulk of the traffic. Alek finally answers me after a long pause. “I was never not speaking to you, Gwen. You’re just not coming into my class until you start using those powers of yours. The same rules apply to every student of mine, and I can’t make special arrangements for you.”

“Lies,” I mutter. “I know it’s personal.”

“It isn’t,” he snaps, and we glare at each other until Annie turns on the radio to fill the silence, and I decide to focus on the view out of the window instead of Alek’s stubborn mood. I’m here to support Rhodes and Onyx, not to argue with Alek.

The car ride is awkward, even with Annie singing songs on the radio nearly the entire way there until the news comes on. “No suspect has been found for the murder of Lewis Masters, in the early hours of Saturday morning. We remind the public of Starlight of the curfew in place and the one-off restrictions tonight for the—”

Annie turns the radio off and sighs. “Everyone is going to be nervous being out tonight, even with all the rangers on the streets my dad put out. That murder makes twelve.”

Kos clears his throat. “I’d only be nervous if I was an asshole. My parents are interested in this, for obvious reasons, and my mum told me every Nexus dead has turned out to be right dickheads. Lewis Masterton was reported to the school for beating his kid a few days before he was found dead. So, I’m sorry, but if a Vian is killing them, he or she can continue. We don’t want them either.”

Annie sighs. “It’s still not right to go around murdering people. The boy woke up and found his dad. Now he is traumatised.”

My stomach drops and I beg for someone to change the subject. Kos suddenly straightens. “We are nearly here. Look!” When we pull up at the giant stadium to the north of the city, my eyes widen. There are green and yellow beams of light dancing in the sky from inside of the stadium, which is one gigantic oval white building with big screens sticking out of the very top.

There’s a massive queue from the car park, and I wince, knowing it’s going to be a cold night while we wait to go in. Annie and Kosma walk ahead of us, leading Alek and me round to a side entrance, where someone opens the door from inside and lets us in. After we climb a million and a half stairs, we wait to be let into our seats in a balcony area that overlooks the stadium.

Annie looks back at my questioning eyes. “Perks of having my dad be my dad.” We both know she wants to say something like “one of the only perks,” but she winks at me instead. Alek stays close to my side the entire trip, his scent washing over me like a drug, even if he doesn’t speak a word. The stadium is what I’d imagine an American football game to be like. Rows of plastic seats rising high up into the skies in all directions, and every seat faces the massive stadium centre.

In the centre is a pitch, but it’s not like any pitch I’ve ever seen. There are two massive goals on either side, big golden rings that are a hundred feet in the air, and behind them are the huge screens. Drone cameras are floating around the sky above, and I bet they capture every inch of this game on those screens.

The pitch itself is on four levels: the bottom level is pretty much all sand, and the second one curves up with dozens of rows of steps. Some are broken, some are not. The third level above that has a river streaming around in loads of different directions, but that’s all there is, and the river current looks fast. Magic for sure. There is a Nexus controlling that water somewhere close. At the final level, there are fires bursting into the sky from pits of lava in random spurts, and the rest is rock. My stomach drops when I realise two of my Nexus mates are going into this arena to play a game soon.

“This isn’t like football,” I mutter.

Alek coughs. “You thought Nexus ball was like football? You know they shift, right?”

Annie pipes in, “I told her, but I kinda forgot about the stadium set up.” She winces. “It’s a dangerous sport, but no one has died in years, so there is that.”

That doesn’t make me feel better at all. Kosma leans over Annie, his blond hair reflecting the green light show in the sky. Kosma screams bear more than even Finnegan does, with his nearly black eyes and playful smile. He is a good guy, and he suits Annie. The Gods actually chose well with them…but with me? Oh fuck, they messed up. “They will be okay. I’m a big supporter of the game, and Rhodes is fast. Onyx is brutal and smart at tactics. You don’t have to worry about them. The aim is to fling the ball through the gold rings, and the first team to get to four wins. The ball has, like, a grip on it so that most animal forms can grab it. You’re not allowed to fight with the others, but you are allowed to block them, whether that’s using the intimidating force of your shift or not. Drawing blood earns a yellow card, and two yellow cards means you’re out.”

“It’s pretty common for them to be taken out, and they have back-up team members ready. Some use the cards as a tactic to take out the better players on opposing teams,” Annie explains, having to speak louder now the stadium is quickly filling up. “Kos doesn’t like when they play dirty like that, but the crowds love it.”

Kos huffs. “I can’t wait until tryouts next year. I’m applying and I hope to get in. They usually only take rangers because they are the fittest and most skilled of us.”

“Why didn’t you apply to be a ranger?” I question.

Annie and Kos look between each other, and Kos clears his throat. “Do you know the family name Marsenton?” I shake my head. “Well, it’s my family name and I’m the only heir. My parents wouldn’t let me go to the rangers, and when I tried, Edvard said no. My family pay for nearly everything in Starlight, and the only other family close to their power is Annie’s.”

“Funny you two ended up being mates, then. One with money and one with power,” I mutter.

“That’s our parents, not us,” Kos reminds me.

Annie squeezes my hand. “If anyone knows what it feels like to not be who you were born as, it’s Gwen.”

I squeeze her hand back and look at Alek, who is a few feet away, silent and not joining the conversation, as we continue making our way to our seats. It’s hard to look at him and not feel his lips on mine, feel how good that felt and how my dreams have been filled with him ever since. The nightmares have disappeared into dreams of longing and want, and I don’t know which one is more torturous.

Something tells me he won’t kiss me again until I do what he wants, but he has no idea what he is really asking for, and it’s for the best we don’t kiss. It’s bad enough that Rhodes has sneaked his way into my heart, and I don’t know how I’m ever going to break his heart and run. He got me a puppy and saved me from Hollis. The bastard knew I’d be a sinking ship after that.

Cheering starts to echo around the stadium, and it’s so loud already. What’s it going to be like when the game begins? “I know Onyx is a wolf, but what’s Rhodes?”

I never actually saw what the twins were. Alek comes closer to answer me. “He’s a snow leopard, both of them are. You will see soon.”

Snow leopard? Not what I was expecting, but it makes sense for Hollis. He certainly has the attitude to go with a cat. I still feel wary about causing the rift between Hollis and Rhodes. I couldn’t exactly tell Rhodes that I had a freak-out because of memories in my past and not actually something that Hollis did. Hollis will always hate me, but this time, I made it worse. I haven’t seen him since the sea, but I know he is fine, because my Nexus would have told me otherwise. I would have felt it.

We finally sit down in a row of seats, which are cordoned off from anybody else. Alek disappears after a few minutes, and I hate that. I wish he stayed at my side. I blow out a breath and look forward.

“He’ll come round.” Annie hands me a drink, something red and glittery. She holds hers up and clinks it against mine. “Love you, bestie. All that matters is enjoying your first game.”

I know she is right. Boy problems can wait. Annie gets super happy when she’s drunk, and I giggle as I watch her dance in her seat to the songs playing over the speakers as we wait for the game to begin and drink more. The match begins after about half an hour. There’s only a ring of one single bell, followed by ear-splitting cheers and music before animals flood the base level of the stadium. Sand flies into the air, and I lean forward against the bar in front of my seat to watch.

The screens zoom in on Onyx and Rhodes immediately. They have a spray-painted green line straight down their backs. So do all the rest of their team. Onyx’s dark wolf comes running out in a sprint, diving into the middle of the pitch to grab a black ball tightly in his jaws. Many of the other side, including two gigantic bears of pure black, try to block him with no luck. But a familiar snow leopard jumps over, grabbing the ball straight out of his mouth and jumping on the bear’s back to get to the other side of the pit.

Rhodes’s snow leopard is stunning, all grey and white, but the rings on his fur are in a halo of gold. He is also massive, nearly matching the size of Onyx’s wolf. My Nexus proudly preens in my chest, and she feels happy? Not a feeling I’m used to feeling from her unless she is murdering someone. Huh.

A massive kangaroo blocks the path for Rhodes, but he dodges the kangaroo’s hits to get to the second level. Rhodes is quick, jumping from one side to the other. A lion from the other team slams onto his back, and I wince, watching the ball fall out of Rhodes’s mouth as he wrestles the lion off his back. A snake, which I think is our team, gets the ball next and wraps around it as it falls into the water. The current makes them float away fast. “Is the snake on our team?”

“YES!” Annie shouts in a fever before cheering loudly, and her happiness is contagious.

Rhodes and the lion fall into the water, both of them hissing and forgetting the fight in order to drag themselves out. It was quite amusing that they don’t like the water. Onyx is right behind them now. He jumps into the water, swimming through the current, and picks the snake up, ball and everything, before diving on the other end. He grabs the ball in his mouth, the snake going onto his back as he races up to the final level.

The cheering grows louder and louder, deafening me, but I join them. Several of the opposing team just get to the last level as Onyx flings the ball into the air. The ball goes flying through the gold ring, and cheers break out from the crowd. Cheering and hollering must echo to the moon with how loud it is. I cheer right with them. The game pretty much continues like this, and my throat is sore from cheering by the end. They lose one goal, but it is four to one by the end. Annie and Kos are thrilled, and the cheers don’t stop. I could come to every game, I soon realised, to support them or just because it’s amazing to watch. The atmosphere…there’s nothing like this.

We wait downstairs by the private exit by the changing rooms for half an hour before Rhodes comes out. He’s fresh from the shower, in black jeans and a white shirt. Onyx is right behind him in a shirt and dark trousers. I grin at them both. “You were amazing!”

Rhodes leans in and kisses my cheek, and Onyx’s eyes lock with mine as his lips touch my skin. Something flashes there, but he looks away. “I’m so fucking glad you were here. I swear I could feel you cheering for me,” Rhodes says.

“She was screaming for you,” Annie tells them.

“What all mates want, right?” Kos jokes, and Rhodes laughs as my cheeks burn.

He wraps his arm around my shoulders, and I smile at Onyx. “Well done.”

“Thanks,” he coldly replies, making everything awkward. “See you around.”

We all watch Onyx leave, and only when he is gone does Rhodes lean into me. “There’s a small after-party I want to take you to. It breaks every rule at the academy to take you, but I’d break them for you.”

“You’re a bad influence.” I raise an eyebrow. “Thank the Gods we are both on the same page because hell yes!”

He laughs and looks to Annie and Kos. “Do you both want to come? I won’t tell the academy if you don’t.”

“Partying with you? Fuck yeah,” Kos blurts, and Annie squeals, nodding her head a million times. “I’ll drive. I don’t drink, so I can get us there and back,” Kos offers.

Rhodes grins. “Thanks, man. I never drink at the parties, so I’ll be able to tonight.” I almost feel bad we are leaving Alek here, but he is a big moody guy, and I’m sure he can scare someone into giving him a lift home.

“Happy to help.” Kos is fangirling like a pro right now. We all get into Kos’s car while Kos and Annie run a hundred questions by Rhodes, who happily answers all of them while holding my hand the entire time. We drive for about twenty minutes before we come across a huge house right on the outskirts that looks over the stadium in the distance because it’s on a hill. It’s a brown brick mansion with a private electric steel gate and pretty white-framed windows. It’s packed full of people and cars lining the road to the house, but we find a space not far from the gates before walking up together.

I lean into Rhodes. “I thought you said small party.”

“It was meant to be.” Rhodes frowns. “The team doesn’t usually invite this many outsiders, but whatever, we’ll have fun either way.” Alek is waiting in the doorway like an angel of death, and I almost stop and run in the other direction. Rhodes’s hand tightens on my hip. “Don’t worry. He came ahead to check it out, made sure it was safe for you.”

Annie and Kos go inside without us as we stop in front of Alek. Alek frowns at Rhodes’s hand on my waist. Rhodes doesn’t notice or doesn’t care, I’m not sure which. “Everything alright in there?”

“No Vian in sight. She still shouldn’t be here,” Alek growls low. “Let me guess, you didn’t tell Onyx about this party and her?”

“He isn’t her owner,” Rhodes snaps. “And I’m fucking tired of his demands ruining everything. I care about what is good for Gwen and getting to know her. Fuck anything else.”

“You’ve made that clear enough when you punched your brother. Am I next?” Alek leans into Rhodes’s face. “Since when are we fighting with each other?”

My heart pounds. “Maybe we should leave—”

“No.” Rhodes drags his eyes to me, and they soften. “Alek is a jealous fucker who can’t let go of the past. I’m not and I want a future with you. Fuck them.”

Alek laughs. “You’re betting on the girl that, given half a chance, is going to run away.” He waves a hand at me. “Go on, ask her what she would do if we removed those runes and gave her a choice? Stay or leave?”

Rhodes tugs me forward, past Alek who is still laughing. It hurts, the way he looks at me like I’m nothing to him. “We both know it would be leave. She wouldn’t even look back for you, you fucking fool!”

I wince because he is right in a certain way, but he doesn’t know the reason why. If I could leave, I would without looking back because I care about them and I’m a walking bomb. One day, my Nexus will get out, and she will take everything I care about away. For now, she is happy hunting in the city, but every death is a step closer to us being found out, and I doubt she will be happy with just that for long. Being around her mates makes her remember that they are hers, and makes her want more.

It does the same to me, but when my heart breaks, I know it will be me broken, and my Nexus won’t be. She will just go on a hunting spree to calm herself down.

Rhodes leans into me. “Ignore Alek.”

“I’ll try,” I mutter. I always wanted to go to a party as a teenager, but my parents never let me. This is my first chance, and Alek is not ruining it for me. I made friends throughout our travels who always invited me out, but my parents said it was too dangerous, and usually they moved once I got close enough to someone who would invite me to a party, anyway.

People are dancing and jumping about, laughing like they have nothing to worry about. I don’t know what that feeling is like. It’s just relaxing and happy in here. Things that I’ve always craved for nearly my entire life. Rhodes gets me a fruity but spicy drink that I sip on as I take in the room. I swear Rhodes watches me the entire time.

He tugs me closer and takes the empty drink out of my hand. “Mate, dance with me.”

I don’t think he’s ever called me that before. Mate. Something about it sounds right, even if it’s completely and utterly impossible for us to be true, bonded mates. Maybe we can pretend for one night. His hands sink around my waist, just above the tiny little shorts, and he pulls my body close to his before controlling how my hips sway to the music playing. Something about his dance is way too sensual. I like it way too much.

I press closer and look up at him, my arms wrapped around his neck. His eyes trace over my face before he leans down and kisses me, just softly, once, twice, and the thump of the music is nearly as loud as the thump of my heart as his lips slowly part mine, slowly take what they want. I moan into his mouth as he deepens the kiss. He breaks it after a while, kissing at my jaw instead until he whispers in my ear, “If I keep kissing you like that and anyone else hears those moans, I’m going to have to immediately kill everyone in this room. You’re mine.”

I chuckle, and my Nexus preens in happiness. “You could always put your hand over my mouth.”

His eyes darken, and he tilts his head. “Would you like that, mate?” He leans in and my breath hitches. “Because I’d like to swallow every moan of yours. Say the word and I’m yours.”

I can’t. We can’t cross that line because I don’t know how to have sex with him and not bond our Nexus. Sex is usually the beginning of the bond link, and our Nexus would take over after saying the words and sharing blood. It’s a dangerous game we are playing, but Rhodes is playing for keeps. I let myself sink into his arms though, to avoid his question, and he doesn’t push me because, if anything, Rhodes is a good guy. I look over Rhodes’s shoulder to find Alek nearby and watching like a stalker. He’s furious. I can practically see the green shining in his eyes as he glares at me.

He pushes two people out of the way to get closer. “We need to talk, Rhodes. Now.”

Rhodes grits his teeth and turns. “What the fuck do you want? Haven’t you said enough tonight?”

“Come outside. Alone,” Alek demands before walking off, parting the dancers with his huge body and making several people fall over.

Rhodes looks frustrated, but I lean up and kiss him softly once. “Go, I’ll be right here. I’m not leaving.” Not yet anyway. I shouldn’t have said that, because the way he smiles only makes me feel like an awful person.

The second Rhodes has disappeared from my sight, a hand taps me on my shoulder. I turn round, and a grin spreads over my face as Harry looks down at me. “I thought it was you, but I wasn’t sure,” he says.

Laughing, I wrap my arms around his neck and hug him. He looks great in a brown shirt and jeans, but paler than he was in Spain. We both are now after months of living in Scotland. “What are you doing here, Harry?”

“It’s a party.” He rolls his eyes at me. “I was invited, and I got lucky seeing you. Gwen, I wanted to thank you, actually. I know coming here probably wasn’t what you wanted, but just watching you with your mate, you look happy. I’m happy too and found a girlfriend who I’d love for you to meet at some point. I know we were weird for a while, but you wanted your mates, and I was lonely. I think we are meant to be good friends. It all worked out in the end, didn’t it?”

“It did.” I softly smile, delighted to hear that getting captured actually made someone happy in the end. “Harry—”

I don’t get another word out as the floor completely collapses underneath me, and an explosive bang fills my ears before it feels like the entire house itself falls straight onto my shoulders.

Chapter

Fifteen

“We should tell her the truth. It’s not fair anymore, and—”

I wrap my arms around my legs as I sit at the top of the stairs at the hostel, listening to my parents at the vending machine below. It’s cold in France, not yet snowing but chilly enough that it might. I like it here, with the mountains, and the French language has been easier to understand. They think I’m sleeping, but I couldn’t, no matter how long I lay there. Too many nightmares tonight. My mum interrupts my dad. “The truth? It would destroy her! You’re her father, you’re meant to protect her from—”

“I know, but this is about who she is. It’s so much bigger than our hate of the Nexus people.” I hear him step closer. “Protecting her has been my duty from the moment I knew she existed in your stomach. Sometimes I wonder if this life is no longer protecting her but destroying her. The truth is hers to know, and I think it’s cruel to hide it.”

What truth? My mum scoffs. “Fine, let’s tell her the truth and take her back to be a whore to those five mates of hers. I’m sure they will accept their monster mate and happily watch her destroy the whole fucking world.”

“Elly…”

My mum softens her voice in response to my dad’s tone and nickname. “Exactly. We both know we are the only ones who will accept and protect her in this world. Telling her the truth is pointless, and it’s better she is kept in the dark. At least for now.”

My dad’s words haunt me. “I will pray to the Gods that she doesn’t hate us when she finds out.”

Screams wake me up and, for once, it’s not my Nexus who caused them. I gasp through the pain as I try to focus on anything. My hands reach out, touching a heavy piece of brick wall slammed against my hip and my upper thigh. It isn’t the only place throughout my body that hurts. My Nexus rolls about in my mind, feeling as dizzy as I am from blood loss, no doubt. The heavy smell of blood lingers in the air, along with smoke and dust. I’m trapped.

Panicking, I start wiggling around, and every movement hurts. Ash sticks to my arms and legs, to the cuts in my white shirt and bare legs. I cough on smoke as I blink and try to see where I am. Calm down. I need to calm down. My hands grab the wall lying on my hip, and I push it with everything I have until I’ve lifted it high enough to slide out from underneath it. It slams hard on the ground and smashes to pieces the second I roll away with a scream. I wince as I suck in a deep breath, feeling like my pelvis is broken, or maybe I have internal bleeding, because everything hurts around there. My Nexus is healing me the best it can, but it will take days to heal something this big naturally.

Rhodes and Alek…they were here, and Annie too. I sense my Nexus bonds, and I know they are hurt but okay. Alek is closer, though, and I might be able to get to him if I’m lucky.

It must have been a bomb or something similar to have destroyed the house that quickly. It’s the only reason I can think of for the bang and the way it felt like the house just collapsed underneath me and above. I rub my eyes, only spreading the ash and dust around as I try to see in the fading, dim light shining in from a few feet away, from a big gap. An exit maybe? I look down and see blood all over my hands as I finally focus. I feel the colour drain out of me as I realise that I’m not lying on the ground, but a person. A man. The brown shirt is familiar as I pat upwards and find his face after pushing off sheets of rock and rubbish. “Harry!”

My scream echoes as I gently lift his head onto my lap to look him over. Blood is pouring out of the side of his mouth, and he is covered in bruises and dust and too much blood. His eyes flicker open, and his chest is still moving, even if it’s haggard. “Harry. Harry, come on, talk to me. You’re okay.”

“I n-never believed you,” he groans, his voice cracking. I can’t heal him. It’s not a gift of mine. Fuck. I have to get him out.

“Don’t worry. I’m going to pull you out of that gap and find a healer. There have to be a bunch of healers running here after they heard the explosion,” I softly tell him. It’s a lie though. There are too many screams outside, and the sound of magic clashing fills the silence between the screams. There is a fight happening outside, and the Vian must be here. “Harry, I got to see you again, and I didn’t think it would be possible.”

His whispers are not much more than a broken crackle. “Tell mum and dad that I love them. This isn’t your fault, Gwen.”

“It is,” I cry, shaking my head. “And don’t you dare say end-of-life shit like that. You aren’t dying here like this. I won’t let you.”

“Do you remember that night we went to watch the shooting stars, and I told you that story of the Mortal God?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me it. I want to hear it now,” he asks…and I can’t say no. I know I won’t be able to get him out of here when he is this injured without making it worse, and I don’t think he has long. I can feel death. I always have been able to, and he is dancing with it now.

My tears fall onto his face like stars dropping to earth but they can’t save him. I never give life— I only take it. “The Mortal God was the youngest of the five, and he had no power. When he was eighteen, he felt a pull to an empty field in the middle of the night, and the stars began to fall around him. One hundred stars burst into our world and crashed around him in a circle, and when it stopped, he finally had his power. They say every Nexus is made of pure starlight, and he was blessed from the stars that night because they watch us all. The Mortal God stopped wars, and he became loved by the mortals far more than any of the others. When he died, they cast his body into a pure diamond star coffin and prayed for years in his honour. Now they say, when you watch a falling star, know in your Nexus soul that the Mortal God is watching you.” I smile to myself. “You made me cry that night because you told me that my parents would be with the Gods and stars watching us, that one night, in the far future, we will dance with them in the sky.”

I look down, and Harry is smiling…but he isn’t breathing anymore. No. NO! The sickness rises in my throat. I feel I can’t breathe as I shake his shoulder. “HARRY!” I scream, shaking his shoulder harder, but his eyes are empty. He doesn’t move and I feel his soul is gone. He’s dead. Everything seems to drain away into pure anger as I stare at Harry’s dead body. It’s my fault. They came for me and killed my friend, who was nothing other than innocent.

Fuck them. I can feel Alek and Rhodes nearby. I need to know they’re okay, and I need to kill whoever did this. I can’t do anything for Harry, even if it destroys me inside to turn away. I close his eyes first and lay him down, kissing his forehead once. I don’t let myself stay any longer, or I won’t be able to let go.

There’s a small gap of light pouring through a few feet away, and everything shakes as I crawl towards it. The ground rumbles hard beneath me, and broken glass tears into my hands. I crawl over to the gap and don’t dare stop. Something else might collapse on me. Blood is pouring down from my shoulder, there are cuts all over my face, my body is in a state, but I’m pretty sure adrenaline is running the show right next to my anger.

No one else is dying because of me. I start hauling myself out of the gap and manage to grab onto a ledge to finally get above the ruin of the house. I look up at what is left of half the house. Some of the top bedrooms and the corridor are still intact, but the rest of it is shattered to pieces. That isn’t the horror that chills my blood. It’s the fight. Vian are everywhere and they are taking out drunk, young and defenceless Nexus like it’s a sport.

One is near me, draining two injured girls at once, his hands around their throat as they fight him, but they can’t move much. There are dead bodies everywhere, some that clearly didn’t die from the explosion alone; I’m thinking they’re too pale, too drained.

“Shit,” I whisper. I open my hand and call for my Nex weapon, knowing that if I’m going to be found out, it’ll be trying to save someone. My Nex dagger flies out of the air like Thor’s freaking hammer, finding its way to me anywhere. I think of Harry laughing, of Harry’s innocence and kindness, as I rush to the Vian. My injuries slow me down, and I’m pretty sure my shoulder’s dislocated, but pain is something I’m very used to fighting through. The Vian turns to me, his hand going straight for my arm, and I let him grab me.

Shock floods his face as he drops the second girl and tries grabbing me with his other hand. “Bad fucking luck.” I slam my dagger straight into his neck, and blood sprays all over me as he drowns in it. “Whoever sent you shouldn’t have.”

The two Nexus girls are passed out on the floor as I move to the next Vian in my path. Two of them are together, stepping over a guy they just drained. He is playing with the air around him. “Nice new gift. Hey, isn’t that the one we’re looking for?”

They both turn to me. “Use the new gift to knock her out.”

I rush them before he can take the air from my lungs. I’m too quick, too swift for him to even raise his arms to stop me. My mother’s power, speed, kicks into my blood, and I move before he can even see me. Every bit of my training my father and mother gave me kicks in even after months of pretending to be useless at the academy. With joy, I jump onto the Vian, and I slam my dagger into his chest and rip it out. I grab the one next to me before he can use any of his powers, and let my Nexus have free rein with just my hand. She kills him in an instant from one touch, his body dropping straight to the floor.

Who is next? I lose track of how many of them I kill, one after the other, until there is silence on this side of the house at least. I sense Alek and lift my head. He comes around the side of the broken house and sees me. He is far away, but we stare at each other like there isn’t a battlefield full of bodies between us. I can see his relief, his possessive hazel eyes latched onto me, right before he shifts and ten Vian jump on him.

A scream echoes from my throat as I run to save him, but his huge black bear shakes the Vian off him like they are nothing more than rats. He’s a bear, like Finn, but his bear is gigantic. He is at least twice the size of my wolf, which is saying something, and there’s some kind of electricity bouncing off him that kills all the Vian the second it touches them.

It shoots off his body like arrows straight into any Vian nearby. His magic’s exploding in a deadly wave when he shifts. Freaking hell. He looks like a monster in his bear form, and he kills like one, too. I wonder who the hell did that to him. He starts running right towards me, and I’m relieved. I know we don’t always get along, but our souls are bonded.

I need to know he is safe as much as I can see. He wants to save me too. I reach for him just as someone steps up behind me and, before I can turn, a sharp pricking sensation like a needle slams straight into my neck. The last thing I hear is Alek’s roar before I pass out.

Chapter

Sixteen

Iwake up groggy, feeling a nasty medicine taste in my mouth. The world is completely spinning as I try to wiggle my arms and realise that I’m tied to a chair. Thick, glowing blue chains are wrapped around me a dozen times from my feet to chest, pressing on my injuries. These magical chains are familiar and designed to hold me in place and drain my magic all at the same time. Great.

My Nexus is still a little drugged up, but she’s coming to, and she will easily get me out of these. They used to be strong enough to hold her, but not anymore. We outgrew them a few years ago, thanks to training with the chains over and over. Whoever it is that’s taken me is going to regret it.

Only when my eyes focus do I see a man standing a few feet away. I look round and realise I’m in a packed warehouse. There must be at least two hundred, if not more, Vian circled around the edges of the warehouse, watching me. The warehouse is old, half the top of the building missing, and nature has tried to take it back. The tiles on the ground have moss and ivy growing through them, and a whole ass tree has sent branches through the top level to fill it with green leaves. “If you think you only need this many to stop me from killing you, you seriously underestimated me. You just got my friend killed, and I’m not leaving here with a single one of you still breathing.”

His laugh freezes my blood, makes everything in me run cold. I know him. I ran from him for months. There is no one in this world that scares me like he does, and he is one of the few people in the world who truly have any power over me. “That’s not how you speak to your mate, is it?”

Severi lowers his hood, and sickness rises in my chest. Mate. He is a Vian, and he is bound to my soul. I met him when I was seventeen, apparently when Vian have a similar ceremony to find their own mates, and he sensed me out in the world thanks to his tracking powers. Severi came to get me, and we had to run from him more than we ever did the Nexus of Starlight and people looking for us from there. The Gods bound me to him, gave me a Vian as a mate, and he’s an absolute psychopath. The only reason he couldn’t find me in Spain was because my Nexus spent every second blocking out the bond and making sure he couldn’t. She couldn’t do that in Starlight because I didn’t let her out.

He has long black hair that he keeps tied at the back of his head, and he is tanned in the way only someone who lives anywhere else in Europe other than here is. He was born in America, though, carrying that accent with him. He’s different now than I remember. He’s also not a teenager anymore. He’s older, the same age as me, I think, or at least close. Now he’s a man. Everything about him is filled out. Still, disgust roils in my stomach because I know exactly what he’s like. Severi is basically a prince of the Vian. He likes hurting me over and over to see how far he could push my Nexus before she hurt her mate. He made me kill my parents and drain their powers to try and break me.

My Nexus didn’t hurt him. Severi is the one person, along with my other mates, who has the power to stop my Nexus. My Nexus, even now, blanches in fear from him just as much as I do. Mates aren’t meant to hurt each other, but he has no problem hurting me. Hurting me was fun for him because I wouldn’t accept our bond. He could have forced it, but he claimed he wanted me begging first.

He leans down, crouching in front of me, searching my eyes with his dark brown ones. Looking into Severi’s eyes is like looking into a pit empty of feeling or life. There is just nothing there, and I don’t know how the Gods could have ever bound me to him. “You went running to the mates you rejected? After everything I did for you so you could be free.” He tuts and I sneer at him. “I got rid of those parents who were torturing you, restraining your true potential, and I gave you every chance to be a princess of the Vian, but you left. You ran from your mate.” He sighs. “For what? Straight back to those weak asshole Nexus? Can they protect you like me?” He laughs into my face. “They can’t. Where are they?”

“Fuck you, I’m not talking to you about any of this and especially not them.”

“I am your mate.” He grabs my neck, tightening it in his grip. “We both know I’ve got no qualms about breaking your bones and making you scream, so let’s leave the bullshit behaviour at the door and talk like adults for once.” I gasp as he lets me go. He paces in front of me as I reach for my wrist, hoping to feel the runes there and maybe some sign Onyx is hunting for me, but I gasp in pain. “Your runes are gone. Stop reaching for your wrists. I will accept a kiss in thanks.”

“I’d throw up first,” I snarl. “How did you get a bomb into that house? How have you been getting your people into Starlight at all?” I hope my other mates are coming for me, and this fucker always likes to talk. It will buy me some time if I get him bragging.

Severi smirks. “Not all Nexus are loyal. Especially not Onyx’s father.” Shock makes my stomach feel like it’s dropping onto the floor. “See, he has ideas of being the Supreme Alpha, and he’s quite easy to bribe. Tonight, at the same time we blew up that house, we went after the Supreme Alpha’s daughter, too. We took her for blackmail, and she is a pretty little thing. She’s currently being used to make the Supreme Alpha kill himself so Onyx’s father can take over. He’s next in line.” Annie? “Of course, the public won’t know anything about that. They go on with their little happy lives in Starlight. We’ve always had an agreement with Onyx’s dad, but that agreement didn’t stretch far until you came back. I kept trying to get you in that city, which proved a lot harder and more annoying than it should have been.”

“Don’t you dare hurt Annie, she’s…”

“I’ve been watching you too, mate.” He deliberately drawls out the word mate. “What are you going to do when you’re tied to a chair? You going to let that Nexus out to play with me? She always hid inside you like the terrified little girl that you are. Pathetic, really. I thought my mate would have this big, powerful Nexus for me to try to drain when I was done with her body in other ways. Tasty, perhaps…but no. Your Nexus didn’t even come out to save your parents from dying in front of you. You just drained them and didn’t move. Pathetic.”

I can’t breathe. She didn’t come out because my parents wanted me to live. If he saw my Nexus back then, he would use her like a weapon. He would unleash her on the world and force me to back down. We always had a plan if we got caught and my parents wanted me to let them die. It was the worst moment of my life.

“You took their powers, though, didn’t you? A handy gift of yours to take the powers of the dead. Almost like a Vian.” He winks at me. “Isn’t it nice having their powers swimming around in your body?”

“Fuck you.”

He laughs at me like the weak little girl he thinks I am. “You were made to be mine, so we will get to that and have pretty little babies to lead the Vian. We’ll work out everything else now that you’re back at my side.”

A cold fury washes over me. I might not have been blessed with the best mate bonds in the world, but fuck am I going down like this. “I am not made to be yours. The Gods made a mistake binding us, but maybe they did it because they knew you were a monster and that I am one, too. They knew I could stop you.” I let my Nexus take over fully. I let her come out when I hid her before from him, and I shouldn’t have done back then. My hesitation got my parents killed. I won’t let it take anyone from me this time.

My Nexus fully takes over, shifting both my eyes to that pale grey colour, and grey fur starts sprouting all over my hands, my nails spreading into long black claws. A half shift so I can still speak. Severi pales as he watches me, stepping away to the crowd, who are getting their guns, swords and various other weapons out. Underneath my feet, all the ivy and moss that has grown through the cracked tiles of the warehouse drains of its colour, because whatever I touch drains of everything. Including its life. I can’t stop it when I shift. My Nexus will spread her power wide and leave the ones she wants to rip apart for fun.

Before I fully shift into my Nexus wolf, I look up at the stars once, and I pray to the Gods to keep my other mates alive if they come after me.

Chapter

Seventeen

FINNEGAN

“Ithink I finally found our mate,” I snarl into the phone. My Nexus is on a rampage and won’t be calmed until he has eyes on her. His obsession is like a teenager with a crush, and it’s getting on my nerves. Yes, she is fucking beautiful. Yes, we have this bond that makes me hard as a rock the moment I so much as walk past her, but she rejected us. Not only that, but she also ran away, and when we found her again, she had the nerve to act like we are the villains and not her. She is fucking lucky I’m coming after her at all.

Alek is on the other end of the phone with Onyx. Both of them checked out another possible sighting. Onyx puts me on speaker. “Where are you? Tell me and I’ll be there.”

Like I need him. “The warehouse, but don’t bother. There aren’t many Vian here, and it’s silent. They likely took her and left her when they realised she was powerless and not worth draining.”

Onyx’s clipped reply matches Alek’s growl. “Keep her safe for me, Finn. I want her safe.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I put the phone down and peek at the abandoned warehouse only a half an hour drive from Starlight. None of them should have let her go to that party in the first place when she was being hunted by Vian. I don’t know why they wanted her, but there are too many unanswered questions around Sun. For all I know, she could be on their side and spying on us. The city’s under lockdown, so at least it’s safe there until I’m back.

Onyx’s got things to worry about other than Sun. Something was happening with the Supreme Alpha and his daughter, who was missing from the attack. Her mate is gone, too. Rhodes was badly injured and was taken to the hospital. Hollis is losing his shit about his twin. Alek and Onyx need to find out what’s going on with our government, because that wasn’t the only bomb that was set off through the city, so that leaves me to focus on rescuing our mate. We all have our jobs, and the dozen texts I’m sent tell me no one is doing their job except for me right now.

They think with their hearts and not their brains as far as Sun is concerned. We all used to be one fucking messed up happy family until her perfect ass turned up and shook the boat. Alek said she was taken by one of them, some shit injected into her neck when he was attacked by a hundred odd Vian who knew how to slow him down. It was all planned. She was dragged away before he could get to her, and they literally vanished.

After a few minutes here, no guard or any Vian seems to run the perimeter, and I frown at the silence. I approach the warehouse with Nex guns in my hands, ready to shoot down any Vian in my path. I only stop when seeing a door slightly ajar and a river of blood pouring through the gap. “The fuck?”

I know my mate is alive. I can sense her alive and in here…so whose blood is this? I slide through the door and pause at the literal sea of fucking bodies everywhere. The Vian body parts are splattered on the walls, thrown around, all of them drained. In fact, everything is drained in here, from the colours of the walls to the moss on the tiles. There’s a tree with branches stretched through the window, and now it’s grey and cracked, like the life has been sucked from it. Right in the middle, covered in blood, is a grey wolf the size of a car.

Sun.

She is pure grey and fierce, and magic is hovering in the air with a buzzing noise. Death. She is death. She shifts back, leaving her crouching in a pool of blood. I nearly fall to my knees and fucking bow like the mortal I am compared to her. My small, long-haired, gorgeous mate is covered head to toe in blood, but she has never looked more perfect. She’s slightly breathless, her eyes widening at the room, but she doesn’t scream or lose it like a normal person seeing a room of death and body parts. She holds a head in her hand, a literal fucking head, and throws it between us. She shrugs a slender shoulder. “They picked the wrong wolf to take.”

Blood rushes through my body to my cock. “Fuck, you’re perfect for me.”

She blinks in complete confusion and shock. Everything clicks together for me. I’ve been hunting her this whole time. She’s been the one going round the city, draining and killing. This is the same work as the person that killed the others. They’re all monsters, and they definitely deserved to die at her hand. They were lucky to have ever met her. If I knew what they were doing behind closed doors, I would have killed them myself so my mate didn’t have to bother. I’m really fucking impressed.

“You’re not horrified or scared of me?” she asks.

I walk through the blood and gore, right up to her. I fucked up so much, and I’m going to grovel until she accepts me. I sink my hands into her wet hair and kiss her, tasting the blood of our enemies in her mouth. I fucking love it. She freezes for a second before kissing me back, responsive as fuck. I want to do more to her. I want to strip her down in this warehouse and fuck her in the blood of all of our enemies. I really don’t care if some God thinks I’m crazy or sinful for it. I only care about her. We can remake this world in blood if that’s what she wants it to look like. She’s my mate. I was an idiot to ever question that, and my Nexus was right. “Why did you run and reject us? The truth, Sun.”

“I’m a monster,” she whispers, tears making a clear line through the blood on her cheeks. “I’m a monster, Finn. My Nexus just kills, and she won’t stop. When I shift, I kill everything nearby. Everything from the flowers to humans. You’re not safe to be around me. No one is.”

Hearing those words, her explanation, a fucking roar slams into my chest. She thinks she’s a monster. We’ve been so cruel to her, all of us, and the whole time she’s been protecting us from her. “You are not a monster any more than we are. No more running. We face all of this together. Do you understand?”

“You can’t take me back to the city.” She touches my cheek. “I’ve always wanted you all, but I don’t want to kill. You should let me go. I’ll just run again to save you. I can deal with being alone.”

I smirk. “You’re mine, and anywhere you run, I’m going to be at your side from now on. I’m going to protect you; I promise you that.”

When the others learn the truth, they’ll want the same. Rhodes is already in love with her, and Onyx is just as obsessed, even if he doesn’t admit it. Alek, well, he will protect her, and I know that for certain. “Finn.” She whispers my name before passing out, probably using too much of her magic. I run my eyes over her body, looking for the injuries from the bomb but not finding any. If anything, she is flawless…and she should have broken bones or something from a house falling on her.

I pick her up into my arms, as she weighs practically nothing, and walk out through the spree of dead bodies to the outside. I put her into my car, strapping her in, before driving her back to the city. I’m so deep in my thoughts, seeing the past in a whole new way, that I don’t bother answering my calls or anything before I park up at our house. I carry her inside and Onyx looks at us in shock. Some of the blood from her is on me, and she kind of does look dead in my arms. “She’s alive, and the blood isn’t hers. It’s a long story, but she is fucking amazing.”

“What the hell happened out there? I thought you hated her?” Alek asks, running his eyes over every inch of her for injuries he won’t find.

“I imagine he has found out the truth and lost his mind due to the bond.” Onyx’s father is waiting in the living room, and behind him is a row of Nexus guards. I turn to him, seeing the guns now facing me. I don’t have anything against Onyx’s father, but I never liked him, and now he is talking about my mate. He looks just like Onyx, only older and grey. “In your hands, you hold the murderer we’ve all been looking for. She killed the Supreme Alpha earlier on today, and then she set up that bomb as a way to try to escape.”

“Like fuck she did,” I growl, tightening my grip on her. I mean, she did. She is a murderer and killed loads of people, but at this point, who cares? She’s my mate and I won’t let anyone touch her. They die if they try. Her other idiotic mates look at her warily, whereas Alek doesn’t seem to be completely in shock. Maybe he knew?

“No wonder her parents took her away,” Onyx whispers.

“Whatever her power is, whatever her Nexus is, she needs to be studied and watched in a protected cell. When we know she is safe to be kept alive, then she’ll stand trial for the murders that she committed.”

“Father—” Onyx begins, but he is cut off.

He shakes his head at his son. “She is a monster, so hand her over.”

I can fight them all and I’m willing to, even if it kills me. Onyx’s voice enters my mind and I stare at him. I didn’t know he could do that. “There’s only seven of them in here; there’s probably hundreds outside waiting, and he won’t kill her. He will lock her up and I’ll play along to find out where. We will break her out and hide her away. Fighting them now won’t do anything.”

“You’re giving up?” I speak back in his head.

Onyx is calm but his lips tilt up with a smirk. “Trust me. He’s my dad, I know him. He won’t hurt her, and it will be one night. We will get her out tomorrow before she even wakes up.”

Two rangers step closer, and I grit my teeth as I place her in their arms. My Nexus roars in my chest, and everything feels wrong. Especially when I just promised to protect her. Especially when we just promised to protect her. One night. It will only be one night.

KEEP READING WITH CELESTIAL ALPHAS HERE…

G. Bailey is a USA Today and International Bestselling Author of fantasy and paranormal romance. She is an avid reader, with her own library, where she spends her days pushing her cat off her laptop.

She lives in England with her sweet children, her gorgeous (and slightly mad) golden retrievers, cats who own the house, and her teenage sweetheart turned husband.

(You can find exclusive teasers, random giveaways and sneak peeks of new books on the way in Bailey’s Pack on Facebook or her being awkward on Tiktok— gbaileybooks)

FIND MORE BOOKS BY G. BAILEY ON AMAZON…

LINK HERE.

HER GUARDIANS SERIES

HER FATE SERIES

PROTECTED BY DRAGONS SERIES

LOST TIME ACADEMY SERIES

THE DEMON ACADEMY SERIES

DARK ANGEL ACADEMY SERIES

SHADOWBORN ACADEMY SERIES

DARK FAE PARANORMAL PRISON SERIES

SAVED BY PIRATES SERIES

THE MARKED SERIES

HOLLY OAK ACADEMY SERIES

THE ALPHA BROTHERS SERIES

A DEMON’S FALL SERIES

THE FAMILIAR EMPIRE SERIES

FROM THE STARS SERIES

THE FOREST PACK SERIES

THE SECRET GODS PRISON SERIES

THE REJECTED MATE SERIES

FALL MOUNTAIN SHIFTERS SERIES

ROYAL REAPERS ACADEMY SERIES

THE EVERLASTING CURSE SERIES

THE MOON ALPHA SERIES

THE DRAGON CROWN SERIES

CHRYSALIS PACK SERIES

THE LOST FAE RIDERS SERIES

THE NEXUS SERIES

CROWNED BY WINGS SERIES

Bonus read of Court of Dragons and Crowns by G. Bailey

The dragon kings need a queen, and they have chosen me to compete in their race.

Four gorgeous dragon shifter kings break into my home and kill my ex-boyfriend before taking me to their world to compete to be their queen. Once every thousand years, the dragon kings come together to find human brides from Earth, and if they don’t have their brides in one hundred days, their courts will lose their magic. I didn’t know the world of magic and dragons existed, not until I’m thrown headfirst into it and expected to compete in a deadly competition to be one of their four brides.

Arden, Emrys, Grayson and Lysander are cruel, entitled, and I don’t want anything to do with them.

In this world of glittering dresses, sharp teeth, and claws, I need to become stronger than the dragons themselves.

They want a bride—but I’ll be nothing but a nightmare when I win.

This is a full-length enemies to lovers fantasy romance with dragon shifters, a badass heroine and possessive alpha males.

Perfect for fans of spicy fantasy whychoose? romance.

Chapter 18

Bonus read of Court of Dragons and Crowns by G. Bailey

“There’s a dragon in the sea. Can’t you see him?”

The waves brush against the stone steps, smothering the bottom two until they can’t be seen anymore as the local crazy man walks past, muttering to himself about sea dragons and magic. The cold, beautiful coastline of Silloth stretches out for miles, wrapping around a small corner of England, but it feels like it’s a million worlds apart from the rest of the busy world. It certainly is in the middle of nowhere, for me at least. The sky fills with bright, vibrant oranges and yellows that reflect across the calm blue sea as the sun sets. This is my favourite part of the day, but it fails to make me smile, to make me feel less lost and alone today. I wrap my tanned arms around my short legs, breathing in the familiar sea air, and try to forget today. It doesn’t work.

“Ellelin!”

Fuck. I knew hiding here wasn’t a good idea, as he knows it’s my secret spot, away from the visiting tourists. This is the end of the promenade, where it meets the old lighthouse. I climb to my feet, just as my boyfriend—no, ex-boyfriend as of half an hour ago—stumbles to a stop in front of me, sand spraying onto my worn boots. He’s handsome, so my grandmother says, six foot tall with blond hair and honey brown eyes. She also told me the pretty ones always, always fuck up in the end.

She was right.

“I can explain. If you’ll just listen—”

I chuckle, wiping a stray violet lock of my hair out of my eyes. Dying my black hair violet was one of the only things I’ve done for myself in a long time, and I love the colour. Finley said he preferred it black. “Explain what, exactly, Finley? You want to explain how you slept with a friend of mine? I don’t think that needs to be explained. We’re over.”

I turn around and leave. I’m done with him, and this damn town I’ve been trapped in since I was six and my grandmother took me in. The sad truth is this is the only place I have ever known, and I don’t have any friends except for my ex-boyfriend and my friend who he slept with. I don’t have anyone but my grandmother, and something about that fact makes me sad. I can’t remember my life before I was six, and my grandmother won’t tell me anything about where I lived before that. I only know that my parents died tragically after travelling for years but that my mum was born here, in Silloth. I’ve been stuck here with my grandmother, my only remaining family, and I’ve never left.

School finishes soon, only three days away from graduating, and then I can leave. I can get out of this small town, see what the world has to offer me. My grades are high, and I’ve been accepted to several universities from Edinburgh to London. I just need to make my choice exactly how far I want to go from my grandmother. She still needs my help, but I’m not sure I can be here to help her without giving up the chance of leaving this town. The stubborn old lady refuses to let us have any carers in.

Finley scrambles up to my side, grabbing hold of my arm to pull me to a stop. “Let me go,” I demand, loud enough to turn the heads of several people nearby. Finley looks around, noticing how many people are looking, and roughly lets me go. I shake my head and turn away, walking back to my house.

“Ellelin, please, just listen to me!”

I pause, turning back to look at him standing on the edge of the road. “Look, we were going to break up. I’m going off to university, and I’m sure not staying around here for you. Just go and live your life. We both know your life is here with your family. Just leave me the hell alone.”

“But I love you,” he weakly protests.

I chuckle as I walk away. I’ve always told him not to say that to me, because I don’t believe you can fall in love at eighteen, or at least, I never felt that way about him. Love is destruction, according to my grandmother and every romance book I’ve ever read. So no thank you. I want security, a decent apartment, and money to travel the world. Not a life trapped in a small town, popping out babies with a man I don’t really care that much for as he cheats on me. That would be my life here with Finley, and I’d rather have no life than that.

I look at Finley once last time, remembering that he was charming and made me laugh once, but every one of those good memories is now tainted. “You certainly didn’t love me when you were screwing my only friend. It’s over. Leave me alone.”

Finley looks like I’ve broken his heart as I tuck my hands into my pocket to warm them up and cross the road, hoping he doesn’t follow me this time. The bitterly cold sea breeze blows against my black hoodie and leggings, reminding me I shouldn’t have left without my thicker coat this morning.

I head down the streets until I come to our small, terraced home, the street quiet and empty. All the terraces around here are a multitude of colours like a rainbow, and ours is yellow. The yellow paint now is chipped, faded, and cracked in so many places, and the windows look close to falling off, but I love this house. It’s quirky, like my grandmother, and I’ve never not felt at home here. Our house stands out in the row as every other house is freshly painted, but we don’t have the money for that, and our neighbours make sure to mention the paint every time I bump into them. One day, I’m going to have a good job and be able to repaint the house for my grandmother. One day.

Unlocking the latch, I open the door and head inside, where the warmth of the lit fire makes me sigh. “Nan, it’s me.”

I take my coat off and rub my eyes. I’m exhausted after cleaning caravans for two hours after school to give us a bit of extra money for food, as my grandmother tries her best, but everything is expensive. Between work and school and caring for my grandmother, some days I feel like I never rest. No wonder my boyfriend cheated on me. Never have enough time to be with him—with anybody, in truth—which makes it sadder that I decided to surprise him by walking to his and sneaking in through his bedroom window today.

My grandmother doesn’t reply to me, and I frown as our cat, Jinks, jumps up onto the back of the sofa. Jinks is pure white with strange red glowing eyes, but the vet swears it’s normal. I swear he looks like the devil, especially in the middle of the night. I stroke the back of his head as he purrs at me for food. “Alright, Jinks.”

I feed him in the small kitchen at the back of our house before going to search for my grandmother in the garden, where she usually is. The thick grey clouds above suggest it’s going to rain soon, and the sun has nearly set completely. The solar fairy lights around our garden flicker to life along the path as I walk down the long stretch. The garden stretches all the way back, and my grandmother has filled it with beautiful flowers, trees, and bushes. I find my grandmother at the back of the garden, on a metal bench, wrapped in a pink knitted blanket, watching the sky above. Her sea-coloured blue eyes, the same as mine, fall on me, and her wrinkled face lights up with a loving smile. Her grey hair is messily pulled up into a bun, exotic, multicoloured flower slides clipped in, and she is barefoot even when it is a cold late summer day.

“Elle, darling. How was your day?”

I sigh, sitting next to her and crossing my boots. “Finley cheated on me with Daisy. You were right about him.”

Her hand picks up mine and she pats it twice. “I don’t like being right, dear. He was never good enough for you.”

I lean my head on the rotting shed behind the bench. “How did you meet this one true love of your life you tell me about? How did you know you loved him?”

She sadly smiles at me, looking away after a moment. “You simply know when you meet the one who will turn your life upside down. I knew because I couldn’t stand your grandad. He was arrogant, annoying, and always two steps behind me. He drove me around the bend most of the time. But one day I realised it wasn’t that I hated him, that I loved him, and I didn’t want him to ever stop annoying me. We built a life together, had your mother, and we were happy until his stupid heart packed out on me. Typical. Men always leave first.”

I smile at her, enjoying her story. “I don’t think I ever cared about Finley all that much.”

“I know, dear. That’s why you are allowed to feel sorry for yourself tonight, and tomorrow you’re going to face the world with a smile. He isn’t worth crying over. When you meet the man that is, you won’t ever be able to move on. You will just exist.”

For a moment, I see her sorrow, and in a blink, she hides it. I’m all my grandmother has left now everyone else is dead, and sometimes I think I’m lucky I don’t remember my parents or grandfather. I don’t have to mourn them like she does. I change the subject, as I don’t want to upset her. “Are you going out tonight?”

She stands up. “Of course. Dorris needs her ass kicked at bingo. If I don’t go, who else would put her in her place?”

I chuckle, standing up and linking my arm through hers as we walk back to the house. “I’m going to curl up on the sofa, watch some disgustingly cheesy movie about love, and eat chocolate ice cream, because that will make me feel better.”

My grandmother kisses the side of my head. “Leave some ice cream for me, dear. When I’m back, we can share and talk shit about Finley.”

I laugh, breathing in how she smells like mint and garden herbs, which makes me relax. This is home and I’ll miss it, but I’m ready to get out and see the world.

A few hours later, I curl up on the sofa after my grandmother has gone out and turn on the TV to search for a good movie. I just pop open the lid of my chocolate ice cream when there is a frantic banging on the front door. I groan, putting down the tub as the banging continues. I know exactly who it is. Finley knows when my grandmother goes out to bingo, as it’s usually our time alone. I unlock the door, intending to tell him to piss off, but he barges in without asking. I slam the door shut behind him.

“You’re interrupting my ice cream and crappy movie. What do you want?”

Finley runs his hand through his hair, and I smell the alcohol on him. Great, he is drunk. “To talk to you. You have to give me another chance. You just have to let me fix us. I love you so much.”

I roll my eyes, going back to the door to open it, but he grabs my arm to stop me. He’s always been a bit grabby when he’s had a drink, and considering he’s twice the size of me, I can’t do much as he pulls me away from the door and back into the living room. For the first time, I realise that I should not have opened the door to him. “Let me go, Finley, and go home. We can talk when you’re sober.”

“No,” he angrily snaps, tugging me against his body. “Look, you just need to listen to me. She kissed me and then one thing led to another. I was just horny and stupid, but I love you. You have to forgive me, Elle.”

I try to pull myself away from him, but his grip is iron-tight, borderline painful. “No, I don’t. We can talk tomorrow, Finley. Let me go.”

Instead of letting me go, his thick hand wraps around my throat as he tries to kiss me, and I panic, trying to push him away. My voice comes out frantic, and I scream, “Let me go!”

Finley doesn’t listen, pushing me backwards towards the sofa, kissing my cheek and mumbling about loving me. Dread pools in my stomach as I struggle in his arms, trying to get away and fearing what will happen if I can’t. Dating Finley was a big mistake, but I was never scared of him until now. I manage to lift my leg and I knee him hard, making him groan in pain and let me go. He trips on the sofa, falling to his knees and cupping his balls. “What the hell is wrong with you? Get out of my house and don’t come back!”

He glances up, and the look he gives me sends chills down my spine. He’s going to hurt me for that. “No, I’m going to make you listen to me. You’re mine, Ellelin, and we are not breaking up!”

I back away towards the kitchen, knowing I’m going to have to leave and run. He is drunk, so I have a good chance of escaping through the garden if I run fast. At least if I scream outside, my neighbours will come and see what is happening.

I hear the back door unlock, and my shoulders sag in relief. My grandmother’s back from bingo early, and maybe the shock of seeing her will make Finley leave. Finley rises to his feet as I stumble away, and he pauses, looking over my shoulder to the kitchen. All the colour leaves his face. A shocked scream rips out of my throat as a silver dagger swiftly flies past my cheek and slams into his chest, blood spraying across the carpet between us. His scream is bloodcurdling and terrible, as I freeze in shock. Red hot fire spreads out from the dagger, burning him so quickly that, within seconds, he’s nothing but ash falling softly on the blood-stained carpet. The dagger falls with a thud, and my scream dies away as I turn around slowly.

My heart pounds in my chest as I face the four massive men standing in my tiny kitchen. The man in the middle lowers his hand, smiling at me through waves of shiny thick black hair as his red, fiery eyes meet mine.

“You can thank me later.”

Chapter 19

Bonus read of Court of Dragons and Crowns by G. Bailey

“Y-you killed him?” I sputter, taking a step back in shock. I’m shaking from head to toe as the men all look between each other.

“Humans don’t like murder, dumbass,” the red-haired man says, patting the shoulder of the man who threw the dagger. He is wearing a black shirt tucked into black trousers that scream money. “Arden, you broke this one. You can deal with her. The last one bit me.”

Arden groans. “I’m not dealing with this one, Lysander. I’m already bored.”

Arden leans against the wall, picking up another dagger from his long trench coat and playing with it, throwing it up and down in the air. Lysander looks at the other two. One of them watches from the darkness of the back of the kitchen, and I can only see his outline. The other steps forward, a playful smile on his lips as locks of white hair fall into his moss green eyes, and he pushes it aside. He goes to say something when a deep voice speaks from the back of the kitchen. “She’s going to run, and then she’s my problem.”

“She’s not going to run, Grayson. Arden just saved her from whoever that fucker was,” he murmurs. “I’m Emrys. You’re Ellelin, right?”

“Boyfriend. That was my ex-boyfriend, and you just murdered him,” I croak, snapping out of my shock. “How did you do that? How did you burn him?”

Arden’s laugh is deep and taunting, just like his eyes as they meet mine. “We are dragon shifter kings, babe. Fire is my skill.”

“Arden, you’re being a dick and scaring her,” Emrys mutters, stepping closer to me with his hands in the air. He is wearing a dark blue jumper and dark jeans. For some reason, I get the feeling they don’t wear clothes like this often. “He forgets humans don’t know about magic and dragons. We aren’t here to hurt you.”

Lysander sits down on my grandmother’s chair, crossing his legs at the ankle. “Just let Matron explain it all. We burnt her boyfriend to a crisp; she isn’t going to believe anything else we say.”

Emrys ignores him. “We’re dragon kings from four courts. We’re not from this world. Your world is connected to several worlds, including ours, and we can travel between.”

My hands feel sweaty as I cross my arms. “What does this have to do with me?”

Lysander grins. “You’ve been chosen. All you need to do for now is come with us through a portal.”

I lower my arms. “I’m not going anywhere with you.” I step back and accidentally stand in what is left of Finley. I step aside, cringing as I rub my shoe on the carpet.

Arden laughs, the sound echoing. “She just stood on her piece of shit boyfriend. It’s almost funny.”

I narrow my eyes at him. “Fuck you.”

He meets my gaze, running his eyes up and down over me. “Anytime, princess.”

My cheeks burn as I take another step back, looking between them all, focusing on the shadow outline of the man in my kitchen. For whatever reason, he feels like he’s the most dangerous of them all, and I can’t even see what he looks like from here. They all look pretty dangerous, and I’m not sure how I’m going to get out of this. They’re all muscular, ridiculously tall, and handsome. All I can think about now is how they just burnt my ex-boyfriend to a crisp in the middle of my living room. How is that even possible? And now they’re talking about kidnapping me.

I steel my back. They aren’t taking me anywhere without a fight. “I’m not going with you. Get out of my house.”

Emrys tilts his head to the side, his forest green eyes softening. “I know this is creepy and you don’t trust us, but we don’t want to harm you. You have been chosen to come to our world and compete in an event. This is an honour. There are several bloodlines in this world that came from ours, including yours. Your bloodline was sworn to the same magic we are bound to, allowing us to find you and bring you back to our world. Four of the chosen will become our brides. Become dragon queens. More will be explained later.”

I feel delirious as I chuckle and then laugh. “I’m pretty sure I’m going mad. I must be dreaming. Going completely mad. You’re kidnapping me to become your dragon queen, and I have to compete for the honour? I’m not fucking doing that. Find a girl the normal way.”

“I like this one,” Emrys laughs.

Arden throws a dagger at him, and swiftly he catches it midair. “I don’t.”

Emrys pockets the dagger before he runs his hands over his face, looking frustrated. “We are wasting time here. Let’s just knock her out and go home.”

“Agreed,” Arden replies, leaning off the wall. I don’t think, only act, as I turn and run. The front door lock melts as I run for it, so instead, I fly around the banister of the stairs, lugging my ass up the steps as fast as I can, my heart pounding.

“Arden, go after her. You freaked her out by killing someone!” Emrys demands.

“He was going to attack her! She should thank me for killing his worthless ass!” Arden all but growls.

“I will go and fix this mess,” Lysander sighs, my grandmother’s chair creaking, “while you two fight like children.”

“Good luck!” Arden shouts while laughing.

I get to the top of the stairs, stumbling around the corner and pulling the bathroom door open, slamming it shut behind me and locking it. I don’t know what use the locks are going to be against—what did they say they were? Dragon shifters? Are they actual dragons, wings, and scales and all that? No, this can’t be real. No, none of this can be real. I’m going mad.

I hear Lysander’s heavy feet thudding up the stairs after me. He is real, and I have to find a way to escape. I look around the room for anything. Anything at all to defend myself with. My eyes flicker to the small, frosted window. I’ve never climbed through it. It’s thin and I’m not sure I will fit through it. Fuck it. I have to try. I start cranking it open when I hear the bathroom door handle being twisted, the door shaking. My mouth parts in surprise as clear water runs up the door from the bottom, smothering every inch of it. I don’t move as the water suddenly turns to ice, the door shattering in shards of wood and ice. Lysander stands on the other side, leaning against the frame, his thick arms crossed. “Running is completely useless, Elle.”

“Don’t call me that. You killed the last person who called me that!” I snap. I might have hated Finley for cheating and attacking me, but he didn’t deserve to burn to death.

He raises an eyebrow. “I don’t control fire, Elle. I’m the water dragon king, so you can’t blame me for that one. If it matters, I agree with Arden. He deserved to die for laying a hand on a woman. I would have done far worse with him if we had more time.”

For a moment, he lets me see past the charming smile to the true darkness hidden in his soul, and it scares me. I’m not going with them. No fucking way. “Don’t make us chase you. It’s boring and pointless. You can’t escape.”

“Fuck you!” I snap, picking up the nearest thing and throwing it at him. My nan’s multi-coloured squeaky duck flies pathetically through the air, and he catches it. Lysander’s lips twitch in amusement before he squeaks it once and throws it over his shoulder. “Fine. We’ll do this the hard way if we must.”

He steps into the bathroom and reaches for me. In a split second, I look around quickly for anything and grab the top of the toilet lid, lifting it and smashing it straight across his head. He looks so surprised for a second, right before he collapses onto the ground, blood pouring from a deep cut on his forehead. “Holy shit.”

I drop the toilet lid on the floor, wasting no time as the others might notice. I go to the window again, propping myself up on the ledge and pushing my legs through first. I manage to squeeze right through the window as I hear them running up my stairs. My heart pounds as I softly shut the window and lie down on the tiles of the back porch, listening to them for a second.

“Whoa, the little human princess knocked him out. How the fuck did she do that?” Arden questions.

Emrys laughs. “Make sure Grayson doesn’t do anything stupid, while I heal him. She’s impressive, that one. Make sure she doesn’t hurt herself trying to escape.”

“It was the toilet seat,” Arden laughs, and I hear him picking it up. “Or was it the rubber duck in the hallway? Either way, it’s hilarious.”

“I’ll get her,” Grayson’s dark voice states.

The others go silent. Emrys clears his throat. “Don’t hurt her.”

His voice is like death. “The brat hurt us.”

“Gray!” Emrys shouts, but Grayson doesn’t reply. Dammit, he is coming for me, and I’ve wasted too much time. I slide down the roof panels, some of them clicking under my weight. Rain begins to pour out of the sky, making the roof slippery. A cry escapes my throat as I slip, sliding off the roof and slamming hard onto the grass. Ignoring the pain in my ribs, I climb to my feet and start sprinting straight up the garden. All at once, thick green vines shoot out of the surrounding ground, coming out of everywhere, and one trips me. I fall over, only to be caught in the vines. I fight them as they are wrapping around my legs, arms, and chest. I manage to snap a few of them, but more just keep appearing until they’re wrapped so tightly around me, squeezing me until I almost can’t breathe.

Grayson’s face comes into the moonlight. He is gorgeous with thick brown hair, dark golden skin, but there is a harshness to his silver eyes that matches the cruel smirk he gives me. He looks at me like I’m pathetic. “You’re going to die first in the Dragon Crown Race. You’re clearly stupid.”

“Let me go, you fucking monster!” I scream, struggling and wriggling the best I can. He smells like the earth itself and a mixture of sandalwood that reminds me of forest walks. “Let me go! Let me go! HELP! I’m being kidnapped by crazy magic men who think they are dragons! HELP!”

“Shush, brat. You’re just embarrassing yourself and giving me a headache,” he mutters, picking me up with the vines like I weigh nothing. He throws me over his shoulder. “It’s time to go.”

My eyes widen as he twists around to look at the others, who are walking up the garden path to us. There’s something in the middle of our garden. It looks like a shimmery wall, almost like it’s water, but it’s gold, illuminating and bright on the other side. Creatures fly through the air around the mountains and castle in the distance. They are too big to be birds. They are dragons. Actual dragons. Through it, I can see tall mountains and a silver castle nestled right in the middle of them. Orange fields surround the mountains, luminated by the night sky full of glowing yellow stars. I scream, panicking as Grayson turns and begins to walk towards it.

“Will you knock her out, Emrys? She is pissing me off,” Grayson growls. I’m pissing him off? They are literally kidnapping me and making it sound like a chore. I hate them so much. What is my grandmother going to think when she comes home, finding a pile of ash and that I’m missing? She is going to be so worried. She has lost everyone else.

Emrys walks up to me, his eyes surprisingly soft as I keep screaming, hoping someone will come and help me. No one is going to save me from them. Oh my god. “I’m vaguely impressed with you, Elle. I hope you win.”

He touches my cheek, and suddenly I can’t breathe. I gasp for air right before everything falls away into darkness, where I can hear wings.

WANT TO READ MORE? Court of Dragons and Crowns.

Table of Contents

Starlight Mates

The Enemy

Copyright

Dedication

Description

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

About the Author

Other Books by G. Bailey

Bonus read of Court of Dragons and Crowns by G. Bailey

18. Bonus read of Court of Dragons and Crowns by G. Bailey

19. Bonus read of Court of Dragons and Crowns by G. Bailey