Valkyrie's Claim (Academy of Immortals 2)

He pauses, turning his violet eyes on me. They’re filled with disgust. “Are you deaf? Fill the fucking glass.”

His friends laugh, and I will myself not to shatter the whole thing over his thick, royal skull. I fill the glass with bright pink juice.

That’s the first humiliation. The next hour is much of the same. I wipe, clean, refill, scrape, carry. There’s no end to the demands.

“Oops,” one girl says a moment after her full plate of food slips from her fingers and shatters on the floor.

I bend on my knees and pick up the mess.

“My bad,” says a boy standing over me. His pancake slides off his plate, landing on my cheek. It oozes down the side of my face and lands on the floor with a sticky plop.

Luke and Darius are kind enough to skirt around me.

The whole time I ignore the faculty table, where I feel the hard, angry eyes of the Immortals watching. The weird thing is that just by having them nearby, I feel more settled. By the time breakfast is over and the last of the students step or trip over me, I’m covered in syrup, my back aches, and I have to clean the entire empty room, alone.

Good thing we don’t have classes anymore. I don’t think I’d make it.

I’m wiping down the last table when I see a lanky figure by the door.

“Not now,” I say, walking past Marshal to the kitchen. The staff has vanished. Probably finished an hour before. I’m sure they’re in some dungeon peeling potatoes for lunch.

“How long are you going to let this go on?” he asks, following me in. The sight of him in the dank, smelly kitchen hits me as amusing. I doubt he’s ever been somewhere so utilitarian.

“Until Victorine realizes I’m not going to watch her torture students in her challenges.”

“She’s not going to stop.”

“Then I guess I’ll keep doing shitty jobs around the Academy. Got any laundry that needs washing?”

I push the cart toward the sink, tossing the dirty rags inside. I prickle under the heat of his gaze.

“Do you get off on watching me do manual labor? Fulfill some chambermaid fantasy of yours? Make you think of all the kitchen staff you defiled?"

He attacks like a viper, spinning me against the sink. He grabs my hand and rips the bandages off my fingers. The cuts are almost healed.

He pushes his face against my neck and inhales.

“What are you doing?”

But I know. I always know with Marshal.

“Armin, I expected, but Miya? That’s a bit of a surprise.”

“What are you talking about?”

He inhales again, his tongue darting out against my skin. It sends a hot shiver down my spine. He chuckles. “Rupert…I smell his scent on you but not his cum. You haven’t fucked him yet. Could he not get it up?” His eyes roam over me. “No. Probably the opposite.”

“You,” I say, trying to gather my words. Nothing clever comes. “You are so fucking weird.”

He laughs again, amusement dropping his guard. Using all my strength, I push him off. The smile drops as he flies backwards, and his head cracks against the wall. I walk over and kick him in the thigh, inches from his balls.

“You missed,” he croaks. “Or could you not bear to hurt the one thing about me that you like?”

He’s got a point.

“You’re such a pig.”

“And you’re a slut.”