“Is there like a fairy newspaper?” I took a chance and whispered to Alara, hoping to elude notice from the teacher.
“What? Yes. Why? I mean, it’s online, but yeah.”
“Clearly, I’m missing out on some current events. I mean, do fairies really get attacked?”
Alara’s eyes widened, and she blew out a breath. Shit, Maeve must’ve said something important. When I turned my head to see, the teacher was right in front of me, and suddenly I knew exactly that murderous glance she had referred to just moments ago.
“Did you have a question, Endymion?”
My heart beat so hard, I was sure it would rather burst from my chest, sprout legs, and run from embarrassment than to be inside me. “I just didn’t know fairies were attacked.”
She stepped closer, and her eyes bored into me. I was sure she was reading my soul. “We are attacked simply for existing, Endymion. There are those who hate who we are. There are those who hate the light we bring into the world. And there are those who crave to steal our light from us. You, of all people, should know.”
I should?
I didn’t ask the question out loud mostly because Maeve whirled and addressed the whole class again.
“Pair up, and if I see anyone slacking, you will spar with me.”
Alara and I paired up and grabbed swords. Well, Alara called them swords. They looked like toothpicks compared to what Maeve had sheathed.
“They want to cut off our wings,” Alara said, showing me her defensive pose. She was standing with one leg out, and her body was at a diagonal so she could twist to get her wings out of the way of the attacker. The rest of the class were already clanging metal to metal while Alara showed me how she moved to make sure her wings were always her first priority, and then she lunged for me. In a move I could only credit to instinct, I leapt out of the way, her blade slicing the air right in front of my abdomen.
“That was excellent, Endy,” our instructor encouraged “You might be a natural after all. Alara, try again. Don’t hold back.”
Alara balled her hair on top of her head and put on a stern face complete with furrowed brow. She yelled as she tried to cut me, jabbing the knife through the air over and over.
But not once did she even come close.
“Oh, Zephyr, you’re so strong. Oh...oops!”
A dulcet chime of a voice caught my attention. I stopped and gave it my attention just in time for Alara’s sword to make contact with my forearm. It sliced through me. The burning sensation made me grunt, but I contained the scream.
Yeah, I was cut, but it was the woman in Zephyr’s arms that had my full attention. She had the shortest shorts on, and her top was tied under her breasts. He had caught her before she fell, or that’s what I was assuming.
And it was certainly making an ass out of me.
“Endy, it’s okay.” His voice cut through the blind rage that sliced through me and wove its way down my spine and branched out to the rest of me. “Look, I was just helping her.”
He stood and righted the woman. She pushed some of her platinum hair behind her ear and cocked out her hip.
Everything inside me vibrated with anger and jealousy. That was the only word for it. She was in his arms, touching his skin, her face so close to his. She had tipped her chin up to talk to him in that saccharine voice that turned sour as it hit my ears.
“Don’t you ever touch him again!” My voice came out of my mouth, but I would swear it belonged to someone else, along with the words.
I took a step back as though the scene had burned me. My face heated, and goose bumps had broken out along every inch of my skin.
Gods, I had become that girl.
The one that was jealous and clingy and needy.
“Just breathe, Endy.” Alara’s hand on my shoulder jolted me from my trance.
“I’m fine,” I ground out, my teeth clenched, my free hand balled into a fist.
“Your eyes have gone all golden, so clearly you are not.”
Like a snap of her fingers, I broke free and turned to face her. “What? My eyes?”