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“Vorzyr—”

“Like you got caught up in Kai, too. But you use that barrier to keep him at bay, to keep your own feelings at bay, too. You see him straining to hold his magic up against your power so you don’t lose control and smite him as you’re… fornicating. And that’s a good enough reason for you to stand at a distance emotionally, while still getting what you need sexually. You were starved from a sexual standpoint until he made a move and gave you what you needed, helped you to explore it in a safe way—you know, the degrading dirty talk notwithstanding. But with me there’s not that fight, not the ferocity, nor that barrier or a strain for me. I don’t need to cast a spell to hold your power at bay if we went to a carnal place. With me, it’s easier, smoother. And that’s why you’re pulling away now. You know you could sink into it, get emotionally attached. And you worry it would be all roadblocks down once that happened, that you’d let go in every way. It has already been established, even to somebody new to you in me, thatletting go like that terrifies you to your core… the ramifications of your power unleashing.”

“You have no idea.”

“But I do. We’re alike in that powerful outcast role. I showed you that.”

“Tell me then. You said you were different. How? What is it about you that scares your father, that really sent you here to be controlled and reshaped into somebody who would conform to their liking?”

I looked out, seeing him tense right up at her pointed question. Well, more like a demand. I guess it was only fair, considering what he was putting to her.

As he went to speak, his was saved by the professor calling the start to the class.

Ariana shook her head at him, then moved her chair away as far as possible to the edge of her desk.

Hmm.

Hopefully the littlemanipulationthat I’d put in place by having them work together during this class would ease some of that tensionandhave her getting a fucking clue where all of this was concerned.

The goalof our first class inArcane Combustion & Elemental Synergywas to delve deeply into the intricacies of elemental magic through focusing on fire manipulation and elemental fusion techniques. It was designed for those who wield raw elemental forces to interact with other magical disciplines.

Nyx stood opposite me with our desk between us and carefully pulled on his Incubus abilities to create a ball ofswirling smoke. I waited patiently as he took some time to form it into a mini-cyclone.

“All right?” I asked, as his hands shook while he held it in place between them.

“It’s instinctual to call on my sorcerer side. It’s fighting me.”

“Focus and breathe, like we’ve discussed before. You’re resisting your Incubus side, but I have that spell in place, remember? So your allure won’t leak out as you draw more on the elemental nature of your abilities.”

“Yeah,” he breathed, nodding. “You’re right. Okay… hold on.”

He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and sucked in a couple of deep, soothing breaths.

The swirling baby tornado stabilized, holding there steady between his hands even as it continued to create a mini windstorm all over the desk and over me, my hair and trench coat flapping about because of it.

When his eyes snapped open, they were glowing brightly with his blue fire mixed with flecks of shimmering black.

“Well done,” I said, smiling out at him. “You’re controlling both sides of yourself.”

This was a major deal for him.

And it was all because he’d let go of his worry about infecting people around him.

“Impressive,” Professor Caelum said, coming up to our desk and taking in what Nyx had created.

Nyx beamed out at him. “Thanks.”

“Now, can you replicate the vortex? Make two identical ones?”

Nyx shifted his weight, his eyes blazing, but his hands remaining steady, as he pulled some elemental energy from the swirling blackness and used it to form another right beside it.

“Very good,” Professor Caelum told him. “Hold it steady first, then grow it to match the first creation.”

Nyx took his instructions in, and I smiled as I watched him stabilize the new one first, before then weaving his fingers to grow it into another swirling mass of shimmering black.

“Perfect,” Professor Caelum commended. He eyed me. “Now, you’ll use your arcane reserves to energize one, while incapacitating the other. It will take great skill and concentration, as well as some unique problem-solving to achieve both simultaneously without creating any blowback in the process. We’re using this exercise both to show how different approaches between elemental magic and sorcerer magic can interact, and to learn how to counter one another’s without any collateral damage. The latter issue is why we’re creating the elemental magic on such a small scale.”

I nodded, letting him know that I was taking his words in.