Page 26 of Blood Court (Cursed Darkness #2)

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

DATHAN

Blackgrove’s gaze sweeps the room, a storm of fury contained behind a mask of cold indifference. He takes in the exploded heads, the frozen corpse, the smoking ruin that used to be a person. His frosty gaze finally lands on us. He doesn’t look surprised. He looks fucking bored.

“An unscheduled practical exam, I presume?” His voice is a low, dangerous rumble that vibrates in my bones.

Verik opens his mouth, probably to say something monumentally stupid, but Lysithea cuts him off. “We were attacked.”

Her voice is steady, a clear note in the chaotic aftermath. Blackgrove’s gaze softens for a fraction of a second when he looks at her. He sees the state she’s in, the way I’m still standing a little too close, a shield she no longer needs.

“You don’t say,” he says, his eyes flicking back to the carnage. He nudges one of the headless bodies with the toe of his immaculate boot. “And you defended yourselves. Vigorously.”

The sarcasm is a weapon sharper than any of the enchanted blades lying on the floor. He’s not angry about the bodies. He’s angry we got caught making them.

Blackgrove turns his back on the mess, his focus entirely on us now. “My office. Now. All of you.” He strides out without waiting for a reply, a king leaving his court.

“Fuck is about right,” I mutter to Lysithea as we file out.

“We stick to our guns. We were attacked. We defended ourselves,” she whispers back.

I nod, falling into step beside her.

The walk to Blackgrove’s office is a fucking funeral procession.

No one speaks. Verik is still buzzing from the fight, hellfire a low hum under his skin.

Evren is a ghost at my side, his silence heavier than usual.

Lysithea walks with her head held high, a queen who has painted a room with her enemies’ brains. I’ve never been prouder.

We file into Blackgrove’s office. The walls are lined with books bound in things that probably used to scream, shuffle about, trying to find their place, or their peace. He doesn’t offer us a seat. He stands behind his, his hands behind his back, his eyes boring into us.

“Six operatives,” he says, his voice flat. “Highly trained, magically shielded, and carrying unsanctioned dampening tech. Not your average disgruntled students.”

“They attacked us,” Lysithea repeats, her voice unwavering.

Blackgrove’s gaze snaps to her. “Oh, I know that.”

Silence descends. No one knows what to say after that.

It grows uncomfortable, and I have to break it. “So? What now? Are we punished or praised?”

Blackgrove’s lip curls. “Praise? For making a mess in my training rooms? Punishment? For successfully eliminating a threat?” He circles his desk, his movements slow, deliberate. A predator sizing up his pack. “You were unprepared. That cannot happen again.”

“We were caught by surprise. We figured it out,” Lysithea counters.

“And when you are fighting the Warden, you expect to simply figure stuff out?”

“Why not? We don’t even know what we’re walking into,” I snap.

His gaze shifts to me. “No one does. That’s precisely the point. The four of you have been dragged into a millennia-old fight against evil and… eviler.”

I snort but shut my mouth when he glares at me. “Nothing is good in this realm, Mr Dathan.”

“Oh, I get that, and I appreciate it. But this is ridiculous. You know how Lysithea was made; you know who she is. What is really going on here?”

Blackgrove’s cold gaze sweeps over me, unimpressed.

“What is going on, Mr Dathan, is that you have been chosen. Not by me. Not by this academy. But by a force far older and more absolute than either.” He walks to the large window overlooking the grounds.

“The Tenebris Vinculum is not merely a book. It is the architect of a truth this realm has forgotten. The opposition seeks to keep it that way.”

“We know that already.”

“You are the final frontier. The last line of defence.”

“Gee, that’s not dramatic,” I mutter with an eyeroll.

He ignores me completely. “But with the power that will come from the completed grimoire, you must be prepared to face the consequences.”

“Which are?”

“Absolute truth. Dismissed.” He waves his hand, and we are ousted, with probably more force than necessary, out of his office.

The gargoyles leer at us as we stumble and straighten up.

“Did anyone else get the feeling that was completely unnecessary? He didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know.”

“Yeah,” Verik says. “I think that was an excuse to get us out of the training room, so the clean-up crew didn’t see us. He was in phase one of this shit show. He knows this has to happen. He’s protecting us.”

“So why let those infiltrators into his academy?”

“Maybe he didn’t,” Lysithea says. “The trapdoor is a way in and out of this academy, not to mention various other hidden nooks and crannies. Whatever is going on, is going on underneath us. We need to get back to the Blood Court.”

“Not before the other trials,” I say, shaking my head. “We are not prepared. Whatever happened to your magic with Verik was a liability.”

“Yeah, it latched onto him after he absorbed the sound waves earlier, so I could heal myself. It was… unexpected.”

“And that is precisely why we cannot storm the Blood Court yet.”

“I don’t like sitting around waiting,” Verik grumbles.

Evren makes a noise of agreement.

“Look,” I say. “It’s not a case of what you like or not. We each need our separate powers. Why am I needing to explain this?” I glare at them in exasperation.

“You don’t,” Lysithea says. “We know. Like I said, it was unexpected, but we broke it and forged it into something new, something more powerful. Verik boosted my power when I touched his Soul Scar.”

Evren nods and clicks his fingers.

“What?” I ask with a frown.

He constructs a raven to speak for him. “I broke the trial by forcing it to show me how to save Lysithea. The Soul Scar is the key. All of our power combined.”

“That makes sense if the opposition is the one who is forcing this corruption. The Soul Scar is the grimoire’s thing. It wants to help her.”

Evren nods, and his raven croaks, “We can’t cure this, not in a normal way. We have to think outside the box.”

“Great,” I say, my voice dripping with sarcasm. “Any actual ideas, or are we just going to stand here and admire the gargoyles while we talk in riddles?”

Evren scowls at me, but I don’t give a fuck. We are running out of time. Blackgrove can’t save us. It’s up to us to save ourselves.

“Right now, we go back to classes, we meet for dinner, and we carry on with our lives,” Lysithea says. “Then we wait for the next trial to make us stronger. We won’t fail, no matter how hard they try. We are stronger than that.”

Her words hang in the air, a fucking battle cry. A queen telling her monsters it’s time to sharpen their claws. It’s the hottest thing I’ve ever heard.

Verik nods. “It’s about the best we’ve got right now.”

Evren just watches her, his usual mask of ice cracking to show the devotion underneath.

I just want to drag her into the nearest dark corner and remind her exactly who she belongs to. But she’s right. We wait.

We split up.

The halls of DarkHallow feel different now. Every shadow could hide an enemy. Every face is a potential assassin. My nightmare magic hums under my skin, tasting the air for fear.

I walk into my lecture on Advanced Fear Consumption. Professor Snakeroot drones on about psychic parasites. I don’t listen. My focus is on the students around me. Everyone is a suspect. Everyone is guilty until they are proven innocent.