Page 22 of Wicked Bonds (Serpentine Academy #1)

Twenty

Rose

I slam the book shut because the words keep swimming into each other, and I keep replaying earlier with Lucien like a bad movie in my mind.

My ass is going numb on this bench, but I can’t make myself get up.

The oak tree above me drops an acorn that bounces off my shoulder, and I flip it off because everything in this place seems determined to piss me off today, even the plants.

The mark throbs, a reminder that I’m basically magical cattle waiting for slaughter.

Two years . That’s it. That’s all I get before the Coven drains me like a juice box.

I press my thumb against it hard enough to hurt, but the pain just makes me angrier.

Lucien knew. The whole time he was playing helpful mentor, following me around with those concerned looks, he knew exactly what they planned to do to me.

And then he kissed me. Like that would make it better.

Like his mouth on mine would somehow erase the fact that he’s been lying since day one.

My stomach clenches, and I’m not sure if it’s rage or something worse.

Something I want less than anything. There’s no way I’m going to fall for any asshole here, not Lucien, not Soren, not anyone.

My priority is surviving, and love is a complication I do not need.

I need to find a way out of this contract and escape the Coven and their twisted Accord.

If only I knew where to start. I can feel all the frustration, rage and to my shame, desire, flood my body, and it makes me want to claw the skin off my arms. I realize I’m gripping the edge of the bench so hard I’m making my fingers bleed.

Then it happens. The magic starts as a flutter in my chest, like a bird flying around in my ribs.

Oh no . I’ve felt this before, but this is different. Bigger. It spreads down my arms, tingling in my fingertips until they feel like they might burst into flames.

Not now. Please, not now. Not here.

But the magic doesn’t care. My mother’s bindings are breaking down faster now, and every surge is worse than the last. I try to breathe through it, the way Soren showed me, but thinking about Soren makes me remember his hands on my skin, his mouth on mine, and that just makes everything worse.

The stone fountain twenty feet away, some ancient thing covered in moss and bird crap that probably hasn’t held water since the academy was built, starts to vibrate.

Just a little shaking at first, barely noticeable, but I can feel it through the ground.

The vibration travels up through the bench, into my bones.

No, no, no .

I stand up, backing away like putting some distance between it and me will help, but the magic is already loose, feeding on every bit of anger, horniness, and frustration I’ve been fending off since I sat down.

The fountain’s trembling gets worse. Bits of moss fall off, revealing carved faces underneath, like cherubs or water nymphs.

I try to pull the magic back, to stuff it down the way I’ve been doing all week, but it’s like trying to shove a river back up a mountain. The pressure builds behind my eyes, in my throat, under my skin until I feel like I might actually explode. The bloodmark burns so hot I gasp.

The fountain cracks.

Not a small crack. A massive splitting sound like the earth ripping open.

Water explodes from the stone like it’s been waiting a hundred years for this exact moment, but it’s not normal water.

It glows blue-green and shapes move inside it.

Translucent forms that look almost human but wrong, with too-long limbs and faces that disappear when you try to focus on them.

“Fuuuck.” The word comes out as more of a whine than the curse I intended.

The spirits, because I know that’s what they are, pour out with the water, three of them, maybe four.

It’s hard to count when they keep flowing into each other.

They circle the fountain, making sounds like drowning laughter, and everywhere their watery forms touch, frost spreads despite the warm, afternoon sun.

A girl walking past with her friend screams as one spirit rushes toward them, leaving a trail of ice in its wake. They run, slipping on the suddenly frozen pathway, and more students start noticing the chaos. Great. An audience. Exactly what I need.

“Get back!” I shout, but my voice cracks. The spirits are spreading out now, one heading toward the building, another diving into a decorative pond where the koi fish immediately go belly-up. The third one starts climbing the oak tree, leaving the bark black and wet.

I try to grab the magic, to do something useful with it, but I don’t know how.

Every time I reach for it, it slips away like I’m trying to grab water.

My hands shake as I raise them, trying to remember literally any spell from any class that might help, but my mind is blank except for the growing horror that I’ve just released something ancient and pissed off.

More students gather at what they think is a safe distance, and I catch sight of Thorne’s blonde head in the crowd.

Of course she’s here. She’s probably already planning the group chat title and mentally designing a meme.

Harry’s with her, his nose still bruised from Drake’s intervention, and the look he gives me would curdle milk.

One spirit lurches toward the crowd, and they scatter like startled chickens.

Someone shouts something about getting a professor, but most of them just stand there with their phones out, recording my spectacular failure for posterity.

My cheeks burn with humiliation that’s almost as hot as the bloodmark.

The water keeps coming, impossible amounts from a fountain that’s been dry for decades. It pools around my feet, up over the toes of my boots, and everywhere it touches me, I feel it pulling at something inside me. The magic. It’s attached to the magic.

“Stop,” I beg the fountain, the spirits, the magic, myself. “Please, just stop.”

I know without looking that Soren’s here. He strolls through the chaos like he’s walking into a cocktail party, not a magical disaster zone. His shirt is half-unbuttoned as always, and he’s actually smiling as a water spirit swooshes past his head.

“Well, this is fun,” he says, stopping just outside the expanding puddle. “Did you mean to summon century-old water spirits, or is this just a happy accident?”

“Shut up and help me. Please.” Another spirit dives at a group of witches from my Alchemy class, who shriek and scatter.

He tilts his head, watching me struggle like it’s entertainment.

Before I can yell at him, Lucien appears. His eyes take in the scene in one sweep, the spirits, the growing flood, the crowd, me.

“Move,” he orders the watching students, and his voice carries enough of a threat that they actually listen, backing up another twenty feet. Then he’s beside me, careful not to touch, and I hate that I notice his distance.

Soren laughs. “The cavalry arrives. How predictable.”

“Not the time,” Lucien barks. He’s focused on the spirits, tracking their movements.

“Lighten up, Lucien. Now, the question is whether our Rose can put them back, or if we need to call in the Coven.”

They’re both looking at me now, and I want to disappear into the ground. “I don’t know how. I didn’t mean to do this.”

“Intent is irrelevant,” Lucien says. “You woke them. You need to contain them the same way.”

“Helpful as always,” Soren drawls. “Perhaps something more specific? Unless you’d prefer I handle this.” His eyes go black, and I feel a pull, like he’s reaching for something inside me.

“Don’t you dare,” Lucien growls, and for a second I think they’re going to fight right here while water spirits turn the courtyard into an ice rink.

“Both of you stop.” I feel a bubble of panic rising. “Just tell me what to do.”

They exchange a look, the kind of male communication that involves a lot of jaw clenching and eyebrow movement. Finally, Soren steps closer, but Lucien doesn’t stop him.

“The spirits are water, but they’re bound to earth,” Soren says. “The fountain is stone. Stone that’s been here longer than anything else. You need to connect to that.”

“I’m not an earth witch,” I protest. “I can barely light a candle without setting something on fire.”

“You’re not any one kind of witch,” Lucien says, and before I can be offended, he continues. “You’re all of it. Stop trying to force the magic into categories.”

Easy for him to say. But I close my eyes, trying to block out the screaming students, the sound of water, the way my whole body shakes. I reach for the magic, but it’s like trying to grab falling sand.

“Not like that.” Soren’s voice is closer, and I feel his presence at my back, not touching but close enough that his heat is there. “Stop thinking. What do you feel?”

“Wet,” I say. “Cold. Pissed off.”

He actually laughs. “Besides that.”

I try again. Under my own panic, there’s a heartbeat, deep and slow, coming from the ground itself.

It’s been there all along, I realize, since the moment I sat on that bench.

The oak tree, the stone fountain, even the earth under the academy, they’re all connected, all part of something older than time.

“There,” Lucien says quietly. He’s moved to my other side, still not touching, but I can feel him there too. “Now pull.”

I don’t pull. I ask. Some instinct I didn’t know I had takes over, and instead of forcing the magic, I reach out to that ancient current and make a request.

Please.

The ground quakes. Not violently, just a gentle acknowledgment, like the earth is waking up from a nap. The water spirits pause their haywire dancing and twisting, turning toward me with faces that almost look curious.

I kneel, placing both palms flat on the wet ground, and the connection strengthens. Through the stone, through the roots of the oak tree, through the very foundations of the academy, I can feel the water calling its children back.

The spirits resist at first, pulling against the summons, but I push more of myself into the request. Not my magic… me. My stubbornness, my anger at being lied to, my grief and defiance.

One by one, they flow back toward the fountain, leaving trails of rapidly melting ice.

The watching crowd has gone silent, and I can feel their eyes on me, but for once I don’t care.

I’m too focused on the sensation of the spirits passing through the connection I’ve made, cold and old and even grateful.

The last spirit pauses in front of me, its face solidifying just enough that I can make out features.

It’s young and sad, familiar in a way that makes my heart move into my throat.

Then it dissolves into the fountain with the others, and the water stops flowing.

Within seconds, the fountain is dry again, moss-covered and innocent, like nothing happened.

The courtyard is soaked, ice melting into puddles, and several decorative plants are definitely dead, but the crisis is over.

“Well, then.” Soren says, breaking the silence.

Lucien helps me stand, his hand on my elbow for just a second before he pulls away. “You did well.”

The crowd starts dispersing, conversations erupting as they process what they saw.

Thorne lingers, her perfect face twisted in something between annoyance and envy, before Harry pulls her away.

They’re all talking about me, about what just happened, and I know by dinner this will be another story about how Rose Smith is a walking disaster.

“Fuck,” I breathe, running a wet hand through my hair.

“Language, young lady,” Soren teases. “You might want to work on control before you accidentally summon something worse than water spirits.”

“Worse?” I ask, and immediately regret it when both men nod.

Movement in my peripheral vision makes me look up. In a third-floor window, Headmistress Wickersly stands watching, her face unreadable. She doesn’t move, doesn’t acknowledge that I’ve seen her, just stares down.

“She’s watching,” I say quietly.

“She’s always watching,” Lucien replies, bitterness in his tone.

I’m about to respond when I catch sight of another figure, in a different window, on the floor where students aren’t supposed to go.

Drake. He’s more solid than usual, solid enough that for a second I think others might see him too.

But no one looks up, no one notices the ghost boy watching from the forbidden floor.

He raises one hand, not quite a wave, more like a warning. I remember what he told me about the Accord, about what the Coven really wants, and suddenly I’m exhausted. The magic, the spirits, the constant feeling of being watched, it’s too much.

“I need to go,” I say, not waiting for either of them to respond. I turn and walk away, wet boots squelching with every step, leaving Lucien and Soren standing by the fountain.

Behind me, I hear Soren say something, followed by Lucien’s sharp reply, but I don’t care what they’re arguing about. I’ve got bigger problems.

The bloodmark throbs, reminding me that time is running out, and every day brings some new disaster, some new reminder that I’m in over my head.