Sinful Things

23

"Try not to kill me,” I mutter, as he moves beside me.

“I think it’s more likely you’ll kill me.” He grabs my hand and adjusts the knife quickly. “Hold it like this.”

“Wow, that’s some great teaching there.”

“Would you rather I spend a long time with you?”

“No, on second thought, let’s get this over quickly.”

He crosses his arms. “Show me what you got.”

I can feel the steady stream of his hate-lust, and it makes my head spin. Hate is a lot like desire, I’ve discovered. It makes you all hot and sweaty, and unable to focus on anyone else but that person. You think about them constantly. You imagine all the things you can do to them. You want to do whatever you can to get them out of your system.

Callan’s hateful eyes are intense as they stare at me. I wonder if he’s thinking about f*****g me or strangling me right now. Probably both.

I roll my shoulders and focus on the target in front of me, but then Callan’s eyes lower to my ass and his lust flares. I drop the knife instead of throwing it, and he laughs.

It’s not a nice laugh.

“Don’t mock me,” I snap at him.

“Sorry,” he says, with a haughty smirk. “Do you need me to show you how to hold the knife again?”

I glare at him as I pick up the knife. “No, I need you to stop thinking about f*****g me. Your lust is very distracting.”

His smirk falls and his eyes go hard again. “Just throw the damn knives already.”

I throw one and it hits the side of the target and then clatters to the ground. I grab another, with even worse results. I bet I could do this if Callan wasn’t hate-banging me with his eyes. And every time I fail, his cruel smile gets bigger and bigger.

“This is your fault,” I say, after picking up the knives off the floor.

"Your inability to throw the knifes correctly has nothing to do with me."

“I thought you were supposed to be teaching me.”

He shrugs callously. “I can only do so much for someone so innately bad at combat.”

I’m tempted to bury one of these knives in his arm next, but before I can, he leaves to go work with the next student. Finally.

But even once he’s gone, his desire hovers around me like a thick cloud, making it hard for me to breathe, or think about anything else other than how much I hate him. I picture his face on the target and throw, and this time, I don’t miss.

I

n Fae Studies, Raziel is discussing time in Faerie, which movies differently than on Earth, and he’s wearing a bowtie with stars all over it.

"The early hours of the morning are spring. The temperature warms somewhat, the flowers bloom, the animals wake and frolic. In the middle of the day, it shifts to summer. The air gets hot, the sun beats down, and sometimes there will be summer showers. Late afternoon is autumn. As the sun sets, the trees lose their leaves, the air grows cooler, and the animals get ready to sleep. And finally, full dark is winter. It's very cold, the animals are snug in their burrows, and the trees are bare. However, this does change a bit depending on where you are in Faerie. For example, in the Winter Court, that season will be the longest."

He continues on about the layout of Faerie for some time, and then asks if we have any questions.

I raise my hand to ask the question that’s been on my mind for months. “What do the fae do with prisoners caught in Faerie?”

Raziel looks taken aback by my question. “I imagine they either imprison them or execute them, but it’s so rare, I’m not sure. No one gets into Faerie these days without their permission.”

Not helpful at all.

In the last few weeks I haven’t learned anything I didn’t already know. The fae are reclusive and rarely leave Faerie. A few of them have wings, and all of them have unusual, colorful hair, unless it’s jet black or pure white. They have extraordinary amounts of magic and can glamour people, although that doesn’t work on Ofanim. Some powerful fae can make magical objects like my necklace. But nothing is getting me any closer to rescuing Jonah, and I’m starting to get frustrated.

“You should go to Faerie and find out,” Jeremy says in a low voice behind me. “Maybe they’ll execute you like the abomination you are.”

My mouth falls open and I spin in my seat to face him, but I’m shocked into temporary silence by his words. I know many people here hate and fear me, but it’s rare for anyone to say something as horrible as that.

Bastien speaks before I can, his voice filled with cold menace. “How dare you speak to her like that.”

“She’s a demon,” Jeremy practically spits out.

“And you think you’re so much better? You, whose father abandoned his post during the Great War, letting his entire squad die? Whose mother left her family to marry a human?”

Jeremy’s face flushes with murderous rage. I’m impressed Bastien knows so much about him. Then again, he probably knows the dirty secrets of every student at this school.

“Jeremy, please leave this classroom until you can compose yourself,” Raziel says with a disapproving tone.

The jerk stands up slowly and gathers his things while glaring at me the entire time. When he leaves the room, I relax and sneak a glance at Bastien, but he’s back to ignoring me. Everyone else in class stares at us with wide eyes for the rest of the lecture, and I doubt any of us hears what Raziel’s saying at all.