Page 60 of Malcroix Bones Academy (Bones and Shadow #1)

Not A Small One

His jaw ticked visibly, his eyes turning increasingly cold.

The gold, metallic, vaguely Egyptian mask, which he must have magicked to make it appear seamless when it molded to his skull and face, he now gripped firmly in his hand.

Before I could make sense of where he’d come from, whether he was even real, his gold-painted hand slid through the air, leaving ghosting trails of black and silver magic.

I flinched when those tendrils swam into my skin, sucked into my veins like blood being drawn through a needle. I gasped in shock, and forced out words.

“Don’t…” I managed. “Don’t do that. I told you not to?”

His eyes shocked me when I met them. His face had changed almost beyond recognition.

Ice-cold, murderous fury stood out in his irises, making them nearly glow.

“Who gave it to you, Shadow?” he hissed. “Was it Hollywood again? Or was it that fuckboy flyer who’s been feeding you drinks all night?”

I stared up at him.

It struck me, in that instant between breaths, that he was drunk, and I really wasn’t okay. I wasn’t up to this argument.

I wasn’t even up to answering his question, although some part of me tried.

I tried to think back on when it started, when I first realized something was off.

I’d been a little dizzy right before I left my friends.

My mind replicated the worried look in Graham’s eyes when I’d rebuffed his offer to accompany me to the loo.

My jaw tightened with the effort of thinking, and I had to grip the bannister with both hands now just to keep myself upright.

I glared up at that inhumanly statuesque, gold-painted face, and his significantly harder gold eyes.

“Go away, Bones,” I managed to get out. “Our deal never involved… this. Not my bodyguard. Go back. Back to Elysia…”

“We’re looking for someone who’s trying to kill you,” he growled back.

I blinked at all the light coming off him, and shook my head. “Thought we were done. Thought you were done.”

Fury exploded out of him. “It’s not some small, legal, pub-level dose you can blow off this time, Leda. Did you see who put it in? Or not? You might as well tell me, because I’m going to find out. Even if I have to rip it out of those two pricks with my bare hands…”

I struggled to focus on his words, but another wave of dizziness and confusion hit me.

My magic rippled out in an unruly cloud.

I could see it too clearly; I could see all of it too clearly, and it wiped away everything else.

My magic swam around my eyes like a wall of green-tinted gold.

It confused my vision, making it difficult to know what to focus on.

His hand caught hold of my arm.

I jerked it away, and nearly stumbled.

“No hands…” I blurted. “You don’t like touching hybrids. Remember?”

He stepped closer, crowding me even more. He caught my arm again, and gripped it tighter.

“I’m not leaving you out here like this,” he growled. “You can scream at me about what a bigoted prick you think I am all day tomorrow, when you’re feeling better. I’ll block off my fucking calendar.” His jaw hardened. “That’s what you’ve decided I am. Isn’t it?”

I stared up at him, struggled to focus on his face. “What?”

He tightened his hold on me, even as anger re-heated his eyes.

“I wasn’t offended by the goddamned dream, Shadow,” he said, a touch colder.

“Not like you’ll ever believe me… or likely even remember this…

but I enjoyed it, all right? The only thing I didn’t like was you ending it…

and then asking that prick out right in front of me the very next day.

” His jaw hardened, as if he wanted to bite back his words.

“Let me take you back to Grathrock. I’m not leaving you alone, but you can sleep it off on my bed.

I won’t go near you. I’ll bring you your fucking cat. You can handcuff me to the armchair…”

I stared up at him, breathing harder.

His bed sounded good. It sounded really, really good.

It sounded even better with him in it.

“Shadow.” He exhaled, and some of the anger left his voice. “You don’t mean that. Trust me. You don’t.”

I felt my face warm, but continued to stare down at the balcony’s stone floor. “That all right?” I managed to slur out. “Bed?”

His other hand took hold of my other arm.

“Yes,” he said firmly. “It’s fine. I’ll get you your own bucket to puke in and everything.” He glanced out over the balcony. “I’m taking you out of here, all right? Can you walk? Or do you need me to carry you?”

The thought was so ludicrous, I burst out in a laugh.

I immediately regretted it when my stomach lurched.

“Don’t,” I forced out, holding up a hand.

“Don’t carry you?” he asked, oddly patient now.

“No.” I shook my head, eyes closed. “No laughing. Don’t make me laugh.”

“But I’m normally such a laugh riot, Shadow. How can I possibly help it?”

I smacked him, or tried, missed, and burst out in another laugh.

“Okay.” He exhaled, now holding me up with his arm around my waist. “I think you’re getting carried.”

I didn’t object.

He bent down and wrapped an arm under my knees and the other around my shoulders, and I found myself leaning into his gold-painted chest. He picked me up like I weighed no more than a doll, but I felt strangely guilty about it, and also unbelievably relieved.

I no longer had to figure out how to move my legs, or what to grip to stay upright.

I placed a hand on his chest, and carefully touched the gold paint, then looked at my fingers.

It didn’t come off.

“I used magic,” he said, gruff, as he began walking with me down the stairs to the left of the balcony railing. “It’s make-up, but I used magic to keep it from getting on everything.”

Why hadn’t I done that? It seemed so obvious.

I was frowning, though. I stared at his upper body, and waved my fingers through the visible layer of sparkling light I felt over the top of it.

“You charmed yourself,” I said, baffled.

“Yes.” That odd patience returned to his voice. “I just explained that, Shadow.”

I shook my head. “No. Not the make-up. You charmed your actual body.” I looked up, and found myself staring at his face from only a few inches away. A laugh bubbled up from inside me. “Did you actually charm yourself to make yourself look hotter?”

I saw his jaw tighten, and burst out in another giggle.

He shook his head, but only rolled his eyes. “You’re hilarious like this,” he muttered, a hint of actual humor in his voice. “Droll as fuck.”

I nodded, but my mind had swerved, getting stuck on a different track.

“Why did you give me the cat?” I asked.

He tensed, his arms tightening around me.

“I thought you did it to be a prat,” I explained through my partially cooperative tongue. “To, you know…” I struggled for a word. “…To make fun of me. Call me a whore again. Make me the stupid one. Whatever.”

He turned his head without slowing his steps, staring at me.

Disbelief touched his eyes.

“It was a fucking present, Shadow,” he growled.

“A present?” I frowned, trying to make sense of that.

“It was cute. It looked like you.” His jaw ticked again. He glared at me. “It was your birthday… Eye of Ra, why am I explaining this? Why did you keep it, if you didn’t like it?”

I blinked at him, surprised. “I do like it. I bought it toys. And a little bed.” I used my hands to demonstrate the size of the bed. “It mostly sleeps with me, though. Or in my laundry basket. I named it Wraith.”

“Wraith?” He frowned at me. “It’s a girl cat.”

“There are girl wraiths,” I informed him haughtily.

He stared at me a beat longer, then snorted.

“Right,” he muttered.

I slung my arms around his neck, without really thinking about it.

My eyes turned to look out over the field.

I could see the black waters of Vulcan Lake in the distance, now that we were drawing close to the large fountain that formed the centerpiece of the gardens in front of the Mansion. The Great Lawn was blurry with fog that wafted across the grass and water.

My magic was still getting in the way of my eyes.

Blinking a lot didn’t help.

“I don’t feel good,” I told him.

“I know,” he said, a hint of that growl back in his voice. “Feel like telling me who did it yet? Or are you really going to protect that piece of shit?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

“You really don’t know?” he asked, pointed.

“I really don’t know,” I said truthfully.

There was a silence where he just looked at me, and I looked out over the field.

Then, slowly, he nodded. His jaw tightened again.

“We’ll find out,” he said.

It sounded closer to a threat than reassurance, but it didn’t bother me, maybe because the threat didn’t feel aimed at me.

Cocooned in his magic, I could feel the worry coming off him.

Now that I was so close, he felt a lot more worried than angry.

I even wondered if most of his anger was worry, which made me want to reassure him in some way.

I had no idea how, though, especially if he wouldn’t share his bed with me.

We were both so bad at this.

I was terrible, maybe from being so terrible at social anything in Overworld, and so overly protective of myself, and so distrustful of most people, and always feeling like I had to keep everything together for my brother.

Bones was even worse, just absolutely awful at expressing anything.

Imagine leaving a present like that, and expecting me to know he wasn’t trying to fuck with me, when all he’d ever done was try to fuck with me?

I felt his arms tense.

“Shadow?” he began, his voice subdued.

Unfortunately, that was as far as he got.