Fallen University: Year One

Nope. I’m not gonna make it. I’m just gonna to have to be a fucking demon all day.

Jayce touched my hand. That simple contact felt like it pulled a trigger somewhere deep in my core, and I felt the change wash over me, easily and naturally. I sighed with relief and opened my eyes to find him gazing at me with concern.

“You are not okay,” he said decisively.

“I am now.” I grinned, almost giddy from the rush of his touch. “Thanks.”

“Uh… you’re welcome? I guess?”

I just smiled wider and flipped my notebook open to a clean page. Clearly, all I needed was to arrange for him to touch my hand every morning. My hand or… something else.

Dragging my brain back into focus, I turned my attention to Sven. I’d bombed the first quiz in this class, and I wasn’t about to make that mistake again. They took bad grades way too seriously around here.

Jayce still looked worried after class let out, and he pulled me aside in the hallway as we were leaving the large room. “Seriously, Piper, are you okay?”

“If everybody keeps asking me that, I might actually start to worry,” I said lightly as Hannah tugged on my elbow, urging me to hurry up with her to our next class. “I’m not a morning person, that’s all. See you in Combat!”

Combat had become my favorite class for a whole lot of reasons. First, punching people was not only sanctioned, but expected. Second, Hannah was taking to it like a fish to water. I never would’ve imagined her becoming such a fierce fighter. She was even better at it than me. Third, and maybe most importantly, all of my guys were in the same section of that class as I was.

I’m not sure when I started thinking of them as being my guys. Apart from Jayce, I barely even spoke to them. The connection was undeniable, though. I could see it in the way Xero sought me out in the cafeteria—which was more like a banquet hall—and the way Kingston always looked a little rattled after I spoke to him. I even saw it in Kai, in the way he bristled every time I walked by.

I was so busy analyzing the situation that I almost didn’t notice the three girls blocking my way into the Demonology classroom. They were the same girls that Hannah had sat with on the first day and had avoided ever since. She hadn’t told me why. I smiled at them as I approached.

“Oh, it’s you,” a little blonde said with a sneer. “Murder any old ladies lately?”

“Not lately,” I said with an easy grin. What the hell is her problem? “Can I get by?”

“I don’t know, can you?” A tall girl curled her lip at me and stood more firmly in the center of the doorway.

I raised a brow. I almost wanted to throw down, but my muscles were still aching like I’d run a marathon on nothing but coffee and spite. The three girls crowded together, tall brunette in the middle, tiny blonde to the left, and a morose looking girl with jet black hair to the right.

“Here’s a thought,” the blonde said. “If you want to get by why don’t you just…persuade us?”

I heard a snicker over my shoulder. I knew who I would see before I even turned my head, but I looked anyway. There was Sonja, walking with a group of third-years, smirking at me. The girls in front of me straightened up and shot furtive glances in her direction. It all began to make sense.

“Maybe you could help me,” I said to the little blonde. “I’ve got my school schedule here, but I’m not seeing the class on Holding a Grudge or Being a Flunky. Could you point it out to me?”

She looked confused for a moment, then realized what I was getting at and glowered. “Careful what you say, bitch. We’re always watching.”

“Gee, sounds like you need a hobby. I hear there’s a great art room in the west wing.”

I showed my teeth and moved like I was going to walk right through them. At the last second they parted for me, seething and glaring. Whatever. I had more important things to worry about, like how I was going to focus with this pounding migraine that had just started behind my eyes.

I ignored the girls as well as I could, but I couldn’t ignore how I was feeling. I had almost convinced myself to go to the infirmary instead of the cafeteria by the time lunch rolled around, but I was swept away in a crowd of hungry students and didn’t have the willpower to extricate myself. Once there, I followed my nose to Jayce’s table. It was far too crowded. The man was liked, for obvious reasons.

And maybe some less obvious ones.

I caught snippets of conversation as I passed that piqued my curiosity despite the massive, invisible hammer bashing against my temples.

“Really? That’s amazing! I knew I’d seen you somewhere!”

“Nah. It wasn’t anything big,” Jayce said with his signature guileless chill.

I drifted with my tray to the next table, where Kai sat. All right, so he wouldn’t look at me or talk to me, but at least I’d feel better if I was sitting near him. I flopped heavily onto the wooden bench and stared listlessly at my food. Ugh. Goddammit. I’d felt so hungry before. I still felt hungry, but somehow the food didn’t look like the nourishment I needed.

“Who said you could sit there, first-year?” Sonja’s snarl cut through my fog.

I glanced tiredly up at her. I hadn’t even noticed she was across the table from the empty seat.