Her Psycho Beasts, page 7
part #3 of Her Vicious Beasts Series
I slap a hand over my mouth in shock. We know Xander’s hearing is better than anyone else’s, but the fact that he can hear that far ahead, with a noisy crowd between us, is astonishing.
My animas stare at me while all I can do is stare at the back of Xander’s big head. All my blood rushes to my face and I know I’ve turned bright pink.
Minnie seems to understand first. She clears her throat. “Anyway, make sure your phones are hidden in your bras,” she mutters. “I wouldn’t put it past Dolores to do a pat down.”
When we get to the head of the queue, I get my first closeup of Damien Agnis. He looks almost exactly like an oversized bird that’s had all of its feathers plucked. His bright red hair is perfectly styled and combed into waves falling onto his large forehead, the white spectacles framing his darting golden eyes like headlamps. He stands stiffly with that big stick up his ass, wearing a maroon shirt and business pants, in the middle of a row of our academy guards in their tactical gear. It’s obvious this is all quite specifically done to intimidate us.
If I hadn’t eaten a crushed man’s head between my jaws a week ago, I might have been scared. Suddenly, I wonder what Savage would have to say about all of this. He probably would have gotten himself locked in the dungeons by now and I smile wistfully at the thought.
Damien’s eyes dart down my body in a scientific manner, and I immediately feel like I’m some weird specimen on a petri dish being observed by a team of scientists.
Today, I’m wearing a lovely black blouse with poofy sleeves and a pink miniskirt, which I can’t pull any lower without risking thong exposure, and that might give the geezer a cardiac arrest.
On second thought…
“Borderline,” Damien Agnis announces. His voice sounds a little nasally, and I wonder if he has sinus issues. A phlegm over-producer, perhaps.
“Which part?” I ask innocently.
“The part where you’re begging for every male in the room to look at your legs.”
His response is so unexpected that I barely have time to gape at him before one of the guards throws a new lanyard around my neck and shoves me along and down the corridor.
Everyone complains about it all the way to etiquette class. Minnie got told off for her cleavage, Stacey got sneered at for her signature pigtails, Connor got attitude about his long acrylic nails, and Raquel wouldn’t say what they were cautioned about. It made me miss Sabrina. She would’ve gotten detention for sure and still loved every second of it.
When I take a look at my new student lanyard, it’s a unique black one. Where the previous one declared me a ‘Flight Risk’, this one declares me a: ‘Convicted Felon: Grand Arson and Murder.’
I make a strangled sound and show my tag to Minnie, who goggles her eyes. To our great misfortune, our second class of the day, normally human studies with Theresa, is hijacked by the phoenix lord.
“I have been looking at your alternative therapy projects with great interest,” he declares, commandeering Theresa’s desk and shuffling our project booklets. “And have been extremely disappointed to find some rather disturbing proposals.”
We glance at each other, wondering what the hell the old bird is on about.
“Swaddle therapy, colouring therapy and sound therapy were all acceptable, if not laughable, projects. However, the Twerking as Therapy struck me as particularly nonsense material.”
“That’s Sabrina’s project!” I hiss to the animas. “It was her version of somatic release therapy!”
Raquel and Minnie shift in their seats.
“What was that?” Damien frowns at our table.
Minnie rescues me. “Sir, we were just saying that Sabrina, who is currently kidnapped, in case you didn’t know, was—”
He snaps, “What makes you think I do not know?”
“I was just trying to be helpful,” Minnie mumbles.
He stares at her over the top of his white glasses. “Well, you are not. Inappropriate comments to a teacher will get you three nights in a cell, girl.”
Stacey gapes in horror and dismay. Raquel lets out a slow, measured exhale.
I, in turn, stare at Theresa, observing a little way from the teacher’s desk and slowly turning redder by the second. But he’s her superior. She can’t do anything as Damien returns to shuffling his papers.
“Lyle?” I project.
“What is it, sweetheart?” comes a quick reply.
Raquel, being a powerful broadcaster wolf and can sense telepathic waves, glances at me on instinct.
“Dolores is being a real asshole.”
Instead of a reply, a rumbling growl vibrates the inside my skull.
A cold presence replies to me instead. “Aurelia, do not rile him up,” Scythe says sternly. “He’s two waves away from killing the beast. What did I tell you yesterday?”
“Right,” I say, thoroughly chastened. “Sorry. It’s alright, Lyle. He was just insulting Sabrina, and I want to punch him in the face.”
“I wouldn’t complain if you did, angel.”
“Such a gentleman.”
“Is there,” comes a loud snide voice in the room, “something you would like to share with the class, Aurelia Boneweaver?”
I freeze like a wallaby caught in headlights. “Uh, nope, sir.”
“Then you will refrain from telepathic communications in my classroom. You do not get special privileges for being what you are.”
My brows shoot up. Being what I am has landed me the opposite of privileges.
“Is that clear, Aurelia Boneweaver?”
He seems to be obsessed with my name. “Yes, sir.”
The sound he makes tells me he doesn’t believe me. “Stand up immediately.”
I shove my chair back and drag myself up to standing. Henry reassuringly bops on my shoulder.
“Why don’t you tell everyone a bit about being a Boneweaver? I’m sure everyone here is rather pressed to know what you’ve been hiding from us all this entire time.”
Okay, this is completely uncalled for. I try not to cross my arms, and resort to clenching my fists instead. “I would really prefer not to. Sir.”
He narrows his eyes at me. How can they be so much like Celeste’s and yet the opposite in every way? “I’m not giving you a choice.”
Everyone stares at him in disbelief.
Theresa tries her best to rescue the situation. “Lord Agnis, I—”
“Theresa, really, let the young lady clear the air with all her friends.”
It’s like he’s taking this personally. That my hiding my Boneweaver order was a personal affront to him. I don’t get why. I’d never even heard of the guy until yesterday.
I’m suddenly aware of the intense silence of the room, and the many eyes staring hard my way. Xander sits at a table with some wolves, but his eyes don’t have their usual glow. He walked into class with obsidian shackles on, though no one knows why. It was clearly Damien’s doing, but it meant that his empty eye sockets, with their old, slashing scars, were now visible again. Everyone is avoiding looking at him.
“So yeah, I can turn into other beasts,” I start slowly. “But I don’t really want to talk about it. Like I said.”
I return Damien’s stare, trying to match his confidence.
“Sit down,” he commands. “I won’t oblige your penchant for attention seeking.”
“Fucker,” Raquel mutters into my mind. “Don’t let it get to you, Lia.”
My ass isn’t halfway into my seat before Damien snaps, “Who was that?” He points to our table. “It’s coming from your table yet again!”
I blow out an exhale. Granted, you had to be pretty powerful to detect telepathic waves in your local vicinity, but none of the many teachers ever called the wolves out for their mind-conversations.
The wolves sitting by Xander bristle in their seats, casting their eyes around the room and back at Damien.
“It was m-me,” Raquel says flatly.
Damien regards my friend with disdain, taking in the beautiful silver brow, lip and nose piercings gracing Raquel’s face.
“What were you saying?” Damien sneers. “You will share it with the group.”
Raquel tosses their head. “I-I was j-just telling L-Lia how m-much I hate bullies.”
Damien shakes his head, making the fiery strands look like living flames. “Clearly you haven’t been taking your speech pathology classes seriously. This will go onto your record.”
We all make choked noises of disbelief while Yeti shakes his head. Raquel just stands there, though their body is stiff.
“A night in confinement will help you learn some manners.”
Three tables—ours, and the two wolf tables—erupt into an outburst of loud protest.
“Unfair!” Connor shouts, pounding the table with his fist. “You don’t even feed us down there!”
At the mention of no food, the rest of us start pounding our tables too.
Damien leaps to his feet and whips out a walkie-talkie, muttering something into it.
It’s only when Eugene squawks loudly from where he’s hiding under our table that us animas shut up in alarm.
Eugene, being poultry, gets flashes of the future five seconds ahead. He’s a good alarm that way.
But in that five seconds it takes me to bend down to look at him through his be-goggled eyes, no less than ten academy guards sweep into the room with their rifles raised.
The class quietens their shouting enough for Damien to point to us and yell, “Take them all downstairs!”
Chapter 12
Scythe
Eleven years ago
I’ve always been big for my age, but it doesn’t take full effect until a growth spurt in my early teens. Seemingly overnight, I shoot up a foot, and the men and women at the parties my dad takes me to start talking to me differently.
It’s no longer a cooed, “What a pretty boy,” but a silken, “Come here, love.”
I’m too big to sit in anyone’s lap anymore, and instead, they want to sit in my lap.
On Thursday nights, Dad makes me walk around the edges of the fighting ring and I have to run my fingers through my elbow-length silver hair in just the right way. He walks behind me, watching out for anyone who might get too bold. He teaches them with a quick fist. My protector in all ways but the most important one.
Something lovely and golden spreads through my chest every time he swats a beast away from me. But it’s always quick to fade. I admire him in a lot of ways. The way he commands a room, the way other beasts seem to grow smaller in front of him. I want that effect on people. I want people to be scared of me too.
But instead of cringing away from me, beasts lean towards me.
I’m like a lure. Like a flower that beckons to be touched, one female told me. Or like a worm, dangling off a sharp metal hook ready to catch big, nasty fish, as one male told me.
A few potential clients beckon my father to where they sit on the black leather couches on the other side of the ring. The VIP area.
There’s a group of males and females, and the wealthiest of them are a feline couple who sit thigh-to-thigh on the long couch by themselves.
“Come sit,” the female says, gold rings twinkling on her fingers as she shifts to the side and pats the leather.
“If you want time with him, you’ll have to pay for it,” Dad growls. He names his price and the male feline nods. The cash is exchanged, and I dutifully squeeze in between them.
“This is, like, real silver silver?” the female breathes, raising her hand in question. “I wasn’t expecting that. Can I touch it?”
“Yes,” I say, leaning down to get my comb from my bag.
“Oh, his voice,” she titters, before taking the silver comb Dad got for just this occasion. “It’s like warm honey.”
“His official debut is Saturday night,” Dad says, and I might’ve thought that was real pride in his voice, but I think that’s pride for the money he’s going to make. “He’ll be the main auction. A big crowd is coming in for it.”
“Do you know what to do with it?” the male asks, jerking his stubbly chin at my crotch.
“I’ve seen videos,” I say smoothly. Dad has been preparing me. Plus, I had Sex Ed in school just before he forced me to leave. “I’m not stupid.”
“Of course not,” she says. “How can such a handsome boy be stupid? Can we afford him?” she whines to her partner. “Oh please, Donald, can we?”
“Saturday night,” Dad huffs. “Come and bid on Saturday night, but for now, you can…look at him.”
More money is exchanged, and I am escorted into a room with a red couch, a bed, a cold spa big enough for my shark and not much else. The door closes behind me and the couple sit at the edge of the bed, holding hands and excitedly waiting for me. I set my bag down and begin a routine Dad made up for me a long time ago.
By now, I’ve learned how to turn it off. Savage calls it when I ‘turn cold’. A place like the deepest ocean, where all is black and there is no light. No nothing. A place where I can float in a void and nothing can hurt me. So when other beasts reach for me, when they pet my skin, or stroke my hair and whisper things they should not whisper to a teenage boy, I am not hurt.
I am not dirty.
Until afterward anyway, when I switch myself back on and remember what happened to me. What I did.
Saturday night comes, and I am prepared with the utmost care. Dad pays for a hairdresser and it’s the first time my hair is trimmed and dressed with an oil that makes my silver shine even brighter. I am presented on a bright stage in only a pair of brand-new black jeans, my bare, oiled torso shining under the hot overhead lights. My heart thunders like a pack of horses on a field because I cannot see the large audience I stand before. It’s a black sea of murmuring voices, and the only other person on stage with me is a tiger in a professional black suit, standing at a lectern, pointing into the crowd with a large hand.
The beasts and humans in the audience, rich and influential politicians and businessmen, place their bids, and I try to keep track of the voices and the white paddles with numbers, but everything is a blur. My palms sweat, my throat grows dry, and it takes everything in me to remain still. This is my future. The future my father has planned. Did the Wild Mother really intend nothing more for me?
The auction ends suddenly with a round of thundering applause, and I’m brought back to reality and ushered off the stage by males who smile with too much teeth.
My father receives me with open arms and a beaming smile that I cannot ever recall seeing on his bearded face.
“My boy,” he says with glee, thumping me on the back. “We will be wealthy until the end of our days!”
“Fengari,” says a deep, draconic voice from behind us.
Hastily, Dad pulls away and brings me forward by the shoulder. A dragon strides towards us and I know it because it’s obvious. Seven feet of lean muscle, long black hair, and dripping in gold and silver over an expensive tuxedo.
“Kneel, boy,” he commands. The winning bid of the night, and my first patron.
I quickly oblige him onto the hard wooden floor. “My name is—”
“I do not care,” he says in a voice of obsidian rock. “You will respond to whatever I see fit to call you. Is that clear? Do you know how to obey, shark?”
I look up at his massive height and the scent of his power fills my nose. Dread floods my every vessel. My stomach tightens.
“Yes, my lord.”
“Good shark.” He turns to my father. “He is a fine specimen, to be sure. But he better be worth the money, Fengari. We leave in ten minutes for my brother’s house. Drakos Estate.”
“Oh, he’ll be worth it.” My father’s tone is a warning, the flash in his eyes an overt threat cast over me like a midnight curse.
My father goes to ask questions from the auctioneer while I go to collect my bag. A tiger from the shadows stalks up to me, his steps slow and measured in the way of apex predators respectfully approaching another predator. Strange, foreign tattoos pattern his cheeks and down the sides of his pale face, giving him an unsettling look. Pitch black hair is neatly oiled and tied back. He is not a territory leader, but perhaps someone equally important by the gold Rolex around one wrist and the fancy, charcoal two-piece suit. He’s a little older than me, but I can’t tell by how much. How does someone so young become so wealthy? Does he, too, have someone who sells him?
“You have the look of a man who speaks in sonnets to the moon.” He has a slight Middle Eastern accent.
I am so taken aback by his statement that I stare blankly at him for a moment.
“People underestimate you,” he continues. “Do not make the mistake of underestimating yourself.”
It takes me a moment to recover from my shock. “I don’t understand what you’re saying.”
He bows. “I’m saying that my name is Marduk, and I would like to be your friend.”
I offer my hand on reflex born of years of practice. “A pleasure to meet you, Marduk. I am Scythe Kharkorous.”
He does not take my hand. Relieved, I lower it.
“I’m not in the business of buying flesh,” Marduk says matter-of-factly, clasping his hands in front of him. “There are different types of monsters in the long grasses of the world, shark-friend, and I am the one who eats them.”
I am taken aback by his frankness. I think I like it.
“When it is time, when your spirit no longer submits to lesser beasts, come and find me. Alas…” Marduk smiles then, but it’s not a smile I’m used to receiving. It’s aware. Like he sees me. The real me behind the silver hair and perfect skin. Behind the large muscles and the honeyed voice. And for the first time in my life since Savage was born, I don’t feel so alone. “I do not think I will have to wait long.”
Chapter 13
Scythe
Ivisit Marduk in the motel he’s staying at in town. Ernie, one of the Forklift Twins, takes me in the black Jeep I got him on his second year anniversary working for me. As I sit in the passenger seat, I keep my breaths slow and measured.
