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Toby gave chase, swearing like I’d personally offended her. She could’ve claimed victory, but no, she wanted blood.

Three students blocked my path. Toby lunged, her broadsword carving the air just shy of my spine.

I whirled around as the dagger in my hand pulsed with sudden warmth.

Pure instinct took over, and I pivoted and parried.

Metal shrieked against metal, the impact vibrating up my arm, nearly numbing my fingers.

The dagger shouldn’t have withstood that blow. Yet it did.

Toby blinked, thrown by my defense. That half-second hesitation was all I needed. I darted past her, scrambling back onto the mat, which I hoped would cushion my fall if it came to that.

My adversary advanced, her sword’s tip screeching against the ground. “Stop embarrassing yourself,” she spat. “Just take your beating!”

She launched into a flurry of attacks—overhead strike, side slash, forward thrust—each more vicious than the last.

Shit , she was relentless.

Somehow, I blocked the first strike, sidestepped the second, and barely avoided the third. My body moved with grace I’d never known I possessed, the dagger’s weight now natural in my hand. With each parry, the obsidian sigils flickered, a ghostly glow only I could see.

I blocked one devastating strike that nearly took my head off, our blades locking with a shriek of metal. Toby’s face was inches from mine, and the murderous gleam in her eyes left no doubt that she’d kill me here if allowed, both as punishment and revenge for Angelina.

Her trained muscles pressed down. My arms shook from the strain.

“First blood!” a spectator shouted, and the crowd chanted, “First blood!”

Toby suddenly disengaged, spinning with increased speed to strike at my blind side. I twisted away, but not fast enough. The tip of her blade sliced through my training gear and scraped across my ribs.

Shit, that hurt.

But when I glanced down…no blood. The cut fabric revealed unbroken skin beneath.

“Bloom!” Sindy shouted in urgency. “Just yield!”

“I yielded twice already!” I shouted back. “But she’s like a rabid dog with a bone!”

Fury twisted Toby’s features. She redoubled her efforts. Each blow drove me toward the mat’s edge. My arms went numb from the relentless impacts.

With no options left, I dropped to one knee as her sword whooshed overhead. In one desperate motion, I thrust upward, not to wound, just to create space. My dagger’s point caught her sleeve, ripping through the fabric.

A crimson line bloomed across her forearm.

First blood.

The gym fell silent. Then a voice cleaved through: “She’s cheating! She used magic!” Never mind that no one even knew what my magic was. Across the crowd, Sindy’s expression shifted between relief, suspicion, and something like newfound respect.

Toby stared at the thin red line on her forearm in disbelief. I stayed frozen in my half-crouch, dagger still raised, equally stunned.

“First blood goes to the newcomer,” Dante announced, stepping closer.

“Can we stop now?” I turned to him, my voice raw, my lips pinched.

“This is a challenge!” Toby spat, her face twisting. “First blood won’t end shit!”

“What if I just call you the winner?” I bargained. The thought of continuing this fight made my stomach churn. What was the point? “My ego isn’t that big.”

“You’re a disgrace, Bloom!” she snarled, as if I’d insulted her. The crowd buzzed like stirred hornets, their glares sharp enough to draw blood. “Just man up!”

“But I’m not a man,” I protested, though I wisely swallowed the explanation that I didn’t have a dick.

“Match continues,” Dante drawled, inspecting his thumb nail. “Rise to the occasion,Carrot.”

Every fiber of me wanted to snap back with something crude, like “rise to my butthole,” but years of proper upbringing left me wordless. My fingers tightened around the dagger’s hilt, its welcome warmth pulsing up my arm, the only comfort in this nightmare.

Then the air changed. A tangible energy rolled through the hall, pressing down on us all. Someone powerful had arrived.

Every movement froze. Blades hung suspended mid-swing. Conversations and shouts died. Toby’s head whipped toward the entrance, mine following.

Ravencrux dominated the doorway, his powerful frame clad in close-fitting black. The sheer force of his presence made the air hum, his masculine beauty more lethal than any blade in the room. A ripple went through the students, the men straightening instinctively, the women catching their breath.

His glacial gaze swept across the training hall, past the rigid students, past Dante, and landed on me.

Shit , I squirmed inwardly. Of course he’d arrived just in time to witness my humiliation.

“Toby,” I called sharply, wrenching her attention back from the professor. “Let’s give the next pairs their turn. What do you say?”

“Sure,” she said. The moment my dagger clattered to the mat, she lunged like a flash.

I’d miscalculated. Of course she’d want to impress Ravencrux, the academy’s most forbidden obsession, instead of letting someone else shine.

I scrambled for my weapon, grasping the hilt and rolling aside, but I was two seconds too late.

Her blade sliced across my thigh. Piercing pain lanced through muscle to bone.

I staggered back, clutching my torn pants where they’d split open, revealing an angry red welt.

Yet despite the angry-looking mark, only a single bead of blood welled up.

Dante hadn’t lied about the protective spell.

“Second point to Carrot’s opponent,” Dante announced, circling our mat.

“It’s Toby, sir,” she corrected, preening under Ravencrux’s shadow.

I risked a glance toward Ravencrux while Dante droned on about challenge protocols.

Those glacial green eyes pinned me in place, his face an impassive mask, yet his attention burned like a brand.

Toby’s triumphant smirk flashed as she advanced, broadsword glinting. When her next strike came, a blunt jab aiming at my midsection, I wrenched my focus back, shoving aside thoughts of Ravencrux’s scrutiny.

Our blades danced across the mat. Shockingly, I began matching her, my body moving with lithe precision, as if remembering battles fought a long time ago. The black dagger became an extension of my arm, meeting each strike with reflexes I shouldn’t possess.

The crowd’s murmurs died. Only our ragged breaths and the shriek of clashing steel remained.

Then a new presence arrived at the scene. The atmosphere twisted, rival predators circling. I kept my eyes locked on Toby, but the energy prickled along my skin. Movements flowed through me as if guided by echoes, executing maneuvers I’d never studied.

Toby’s eyes flew wide as my blade slid past her defenses, coming to rest against her throat. The training hall fell silent.

“Three points—Carrot. One point—opponent.” Dante’s voice carried an odd lilt, as if he were savoring a private joke.

The crowd erupted in hissed protests:

“How did she score three points?”

“She was toying with her from the start.”

“That’s no beginner’s stance.”

I shifted from defense to offense with confidence, yet I wasn’t too aggressive, as violence wasn’t in my nature. I only fought to survive.

“What the fuck are you doing here, Kingsley?” Ravencrux’s voice carved through the clang of steel, dark with warning. “This is my class.”

My breath caught. The second presence was Kingsley—another immortal. I’d established that the redhead’s killer was an immortal.

Against my better judgment, I stole a glance. Where Ravencrux was all darkness and blade’s edges, Kingsley radiated oceanic light.

“Open training means open observation,” Kingsley countered, smirk sharp. “Though I wonder what’s suddenly caught your…academic interest.”

“I’m here to evaluate student progress, as I happened to have a free morning,” Ravencrux snapped. “I don’t owe you an explanation, so fuck off.”

The space between them crackled with barely restrained power. Students shrank against the walls, giving the professors a wide berth. Dante’s gaze darted between his master, Kingsley, and, alarmingly, me. He looked like a man contemplating stepping between two drawn swords.

This was the worst possible moment to become the focal point of the school’s most dangerous predators. Their attention locked onto me with twin intensity, hunters spotting the same quarry.

“I concede. You win,” I told Toby, urgency sharpening my voice.

“Not until you’re down and bleeding, mouse!” she spat, attacking with fresh fury. Her blade shrieked through the air.

I barely blocked in time. The impact jarred my arms all the way to my shoulders. My dagger trembled in my grip—still responsive, but its earlier guidance had faded.

Shit. I’d been trying to fly under the immortals’ radar, especially Kingsley’s, but Toby saw this as her golden opportunity. With each vicious swing, she forced me toward the center of the hall, directly into their line of sight.

She won. Now the immortals’ vulturous stares snapped to us, tracking my every desperate parry, every stumble, as Toby’s blade came at me again and again.

Instinctively, I sabotaged my own movements.

Where moments ago I’d moved with unnatural skill, now I stumbled—overcorrecting footwork, mistiming parries.

I even let her blade graze my arm, biting back a cry.

Pain was preferable to questions about why a supposedly untrained girl fought like a swordswoman.

“Is that her?” Kingsley’s voice turned as sharp as a thin blade. “I knew I felt a disturbance in this wretched place.”

“Get the fuck out of my class, Kingsley.” Ravencrux’s words made the air frost over. “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about, and you have no fucking business here.”

The hall had gone deathly quiet. Even Dante stood frozen, watching the confrontation between the two lethal immortals.