Page 18 of Wings of Ashes (Wings of Ashes #1)

CHAPTER

“ D id you dye your hair?” Sarasa asked excitedly at the lunch table, staring at Nix in awe—the way people normally stared at Elle.

Elle was the center of attention of all the other cygnus shifters. After all, her father, Kellan Oadess, was the cygni clan leader and president of the winged shifters council.

Nix was the fade-into-the-background, boring but loyal friend. She was also the “Ugly Fuckling,” where any attention she did get was entirely negative and derogatory.

Sarasa was one of the few people who gave Nix positive attention. In her past life at the academy, Nix had never had pink hair or taken classes full of male alpha shifters. Was being daring the secret to respect?

Elle whined, “I don’t understand. You look so pretty as a blonde.”

“It was an accident in potions class. Hopefully, it will wash out when I shower tonight.” Was the pink stain washable?

Nix sighed. “Oh, I did want to ask for, um—” Nix glanced at Sarasa, who did not know Nix took an illusion elixir to appear like the other cygnus shifters.

“Uh, one of my drinks, in your fridge,” she told Elle.

Elle’s eyes widened, and she scanned Nix’s pink hair again with a new analytic expression. “Y-Yes, of course. I’ll bring it over tonight,” Elle promised.

“Great.” Nix was still unsure if she planned to give Professor Bowen a sample to “test” for malicious ingredients.

“So, do you have a date to the dance yet?”

Nix sighed again. The school dances had been the life of swan shifters when Nix was in school. Now, after knowing her future and all the things at stake—including her freedom—Nix could not care less about the newest spring dance.

Tuning out the talk about the upcoming dance, Nix silently ate her lunch, which consisted of massive helpings of food since her brain remembered years of starvation even if her younger body did not.

“Did you hear me?” a feminine voice asked.

Nix swallowed and glanced over to a girl who now sat across from Elle. “Hmm?”

“I said you can’t have them all to yourself,” the girl sneered at Nix.

What was she talking about? “I don’t know—”

“Don’t act innocent, bitch. We all follow the rules here. Enrolling in their classes gives you an unfair advantage. It’s selfish.”

Nix sat in mild shock for a moment. “What?”

“We all know what you’re doing, slut.”

Elle raised her hands to try to act as a mediator. “Whoa, now.”

“Don’t stand up for her; you know what she’s doing is wrong,” the girl—whose name Nix could not remember, due to having six years of future memories taking up space in her head—told Elle. “She is hurting your marriage chances too, Elle.”

“By getting an education?” Nix asked.

“Wow, you won’t even admit it.”

Nix clenched her fork in her fist and spoke slowly, “I am only in those classes to learn about something other than how to be a good wife. I have no interest in the alpha men.”

“Of course, she doesn’t. She likes my brother,” Elle told the girl.

Nix’s mouth opened in surprise. Elle just threw out Nix’s crush like that? It wasn’t even a real crush now. It was a crush from six years ago, not that Elle knew that.

“So, not only are you trying to get all the eligible alphas’ attention, but you’re trying to steal Elle’s brother from her, too? How selfish can you be? And stupid if you think your ugly fuckling ass can claim those men.”

Nix blinked.

Nix had lived through four years of torture. Being bled out and poked and prodded and kept starving in a cage. This was just petty, meaningless drama.

This conversation was boring. “I’m not interested in any of the alphas.”

“You’re lying.”

“I’m tired of you accusing me of idiotic things.” Calmly, Nix went back to eating her lunch, completely ignoring the feminine rage bursting from the other girl.

“Stay away from them or you’ll be sorry,” the girl threatened her. “Ugly slut.”

Elle gaped as the girl stood and left their table. “Gods, Nix, I’m so sorry you had to hear that.” Elle reached over to touch Nix’s hand in a show of support. “Astrid went over the line.”

Astrid . So, that was her name.

Nix shrugged and continued chewing a delicious bite of buttered bread. “I really don’t care.”

Something dark and angry flickered across Elle’s expression for a quick second before she was back to appearing sympathetic. “Of course, you care; you just don’t want to show it.”

The old Nix would have burst into tears and hid in her room for days after being verbally attacked by the other cygnus shifter. The old Nix would have taken the verbal assault, lowering her eyes and agreeing with whatever the other person said.

But that’s not me anymore .

Nix had survived worse. She had died .

“Elle, it’s fine. I’ll see you later?”

Elle nodded and winked. “I’ll bring it over.”

“You cannot keep up with the class, Oadess,” Nix’s female combat instructor, Professor Matten, told her when Nix clutched her side and laid on the field after running only one lap. “What are you doing here, Oadess? Why are you taking this class?”

Nix ground her teeth as she watched all of her other classmates easily run their fifth lap around the field and laugh whenever they passed her. “I don’t want to run . I want to learn how to fight. I want to be stronger.”

“Swan shifters don’t have the same bodies as the other shifters here,” Professor Matten explained. “Building muscle is going to be difficult for you.”

Well, I’m not a swan shifter. “I’m dedicated.”

“ Very difficult.” Professor Matten crossed her arms and looked Nix over. “You need a strong motivator. Do you know your ‘why?’”

“Yes.”

“And that is?”

“I want to become strong enough to bend metal.”

Professor Matten raised an eyebrow. “How…oddly specific.”

The sound of a masculine throat cleared, and Nix looked over her shoulder to see Ryker jogging over to them.

The hulking, deadly dragon shifter who was friends with the mentally unstable incubus.

I guess my day could get worse , Nix thought to herself.

Ryker wore the same workout uniform as the other men; yet, on his bulky body, it was…tight.

Um. Wow . Nix’s mouth watered as she watched Ryker run in slow motion to her and Professor Matten.

His light gray work-out shirt with the Alatus Academy symbol fit him like a second skin. It was stretched so taut over his broad shoulders and chest that the fabric clung to each ripple and line of his muscular abs.

Could they not find him a larger shirt? Damn.

The long, dark blue cotton shorts also fit him differently than the others. Due to his thick, muscled thighs and his extreme height at over six feet and five inches, the shorts rode only a few inches down from the danger zone. Danger zone: his crotch.

Nix swallowed her excess saliva and tried not to look at how the shorts cupped his dick. His massive, bulge of a dick. That was flaccid?

Nix shook her head, trying to physically shake the inappropriate thoughts out of her.

The thin fabric of the shorts hid none of the bobbing movement of his dick as he ran toward them. It was so blatantly pornographic; Nix wondered how no one was talking about it. No one else seemed to notice. Was it wrong that Nix noticed and did a double-take?

He was a dragon shifter. A mindless, violent destroyer—probably related to her parents’ murderer.

You cannot be attracted to a killer, Nix!

“Ah, that’s my TA,” Professor Matten said as Ryker landed on the grass a few feet from them. “I’ve been wondering where you’ve been. You missed class yesterday.”

Ryker looked at Nix before nodding to Matten and grunting, “Sorry.” His gaze snapped right back on Nix. “Why is she on the ground?”

The most words Nix had ever heard from him, and they were demeaning.

Pride hurt, Nix ground her teeth again. She got up on her knees to wobble into a standing position.

“The running got to her,” Matten replied. “She’s a prey shifter after all. They’re not built for it.”

Rude . Also, how unfair was it that other prey shifters evolved to have camouflage abilities or weaponized skin? Yet, Nix and the other cygni had learned to mate with and appease their predator instead of developing ways to protect themselves.

Matten told him, “I’d like you to take over some of her training to get her up to speed. She’s been tearing my focus away from the other students who are ready for harder drills.”

Ruder .

Wait, what?

“Um, I don’t need to be paired with him,” Nix said quickly. “Please.”

Matten frowned. “Did you forget your ‘why?’” She referenced Nix’s motivation to get stronger.

To never be kept in a cage. To never be captured in this new life .

Nix huffed and mumbled, “No.”

Matten nodded to Ryker. “She wants to build strength. Once she has more endurance and a bit more to work with, we can run some self-defense drills with her.”

“Self-defense?” Nix scoffed. “What, because that’s the only fighting a female is expected to do?”

Ryker snorted and hid a smile from his gorgeous face, looking at the grass.

Matten cracked a smile at Nix and replied, “No, because the academy only allows self-defense combat.”

“Oh…okay then.”