Page 3 of Monster's Melody

I spentmy entire holiday break trying to get Yukiko to tell me who my mate was, but she just taunted me instead.

She’d say things like, “You’ll just have to figure it out for yourself.”

Or, “If you can’t recognize her on your own, you don’t deserve her.”

And multiple variations that always began with, “According to The Darlings,” followed by descriptions of some idiotic thing I’d apparently done (spying bastards), before ending with, “Better get ready to grovel.”

Ugh.

“Those little bastards are no darlings,” I growled, an argument we’d been having pretty much our entire lives.

She snickered.“Are you sure about that?Because at least The Darlings recognized their mate when they met her.”

“Are you saying we’ve actuallymether, as in, been properly introduced to her, had classes together and all of that?”If so, that would narrow things down a bit, but I’d also be shocked if that were the case.After all, I should have recognized her the moment we were introduced.

Yukiko just gave me a little smirk and said, “I guess that’s for you to find out, isn’t it?”

“Oh, come on, Yukiko.How can I make it up to my mate if I don’t even know who she is?”

“Maybe you should listen to your snakes once in a while.”

“Are you kidding me?You know I can’t hear what they’re saying!”

“That sounds like a you problem.”

And so it went.The entire month we were on break, Yukiko took great joy in torturing me with little side conversations only she could hear.

“Really?”She’d exclaim at the dinner table, at least once every night, making our father grin and our mother scowl.

Our father delighted in Yukiko’s sassy attitude and beamed with pride anytime she tortured me by communicating with my snakes.

Our mother, on the other hand, hated being reminded that her gorgon genes had split in ways that made neither one of her children a gorgon to be proud of.

Despite this, Yukiko never hesitated to engage in one-sided conversations with my snakes, tilting her head to the side as she listened intently, all while giving vague responses that did nothing more than torture me.

“He didn’t!”she’d exclaim.“Why, his mate must have been devastated.I’m sure she’llneverforgive him for that.”As usual, she took great pains not to say my mate’s name.I had no doubt she knew it though.The little bastards had probably said it right off the bat and she was just taunting me by keeping it a secret.

“What’s she like then?”A pause as she listened, nodding with delight, a look of joy on her face.“Oh, I like her already.”

And so it went.

The entire holiday season.

Finally, though, it was time to return to Blackthorn Academy and for the first time in my two and a half years of attending the Academy, I was excited to return.

Every other semester, I’d been full of dread.

As much as Yukiko and I gave each other shit, we were closer than most siblings.We’d grown up practically joined at the hip, our powers so intertwined that when it came time for us both to head off to an Academy, our parents had insisted we attend separate ones.

Yukiko, as heir to the throne of the snow beasts, would eventually stand as the first guardian of that race, and thus, was always destined to attend Guardian Academy, and I had always planned to go with her.

Instead, our parents had insisted that we needed time to develop our powers independent of each other, and so, I was sent to Blackthorn instead.

That first year was the worst year of my life.

The only thing that kept me sane was knowing that Yukiko could communicate with my snakes, even over long distances.Though I couldn’t hear their conversations, I always knew when they were speaking because my snakes would begin to dance and weave.

In those moments, I no longer felt so abandoned or alone.