Gift of the Gods (Magic Blessed Academy 1)

“Hey, Merrick.”

I glanced into his amber eyes, trying to read the emotions that burned in their depths.

“Are you all right? How’re you handling… being back?” he asked.

This was the most we’d spoken in days, and I found myself stepping closer to him unconsciously, as if my body gravitated toward his.

“Not great. Is it always like this? Things going back to normal so quickly?”

He shrugged. “Last year, I didn’t pay too much attention to the challenge. But yeah, I think so. It’s just an accepted part of the event. People mourn the dead, but almost everyone here believes that the chance to meet the gods is an honor worth dying for.”

His words sparked something in my mind, and before I could back out of asking the question, I blurted, “Do you believe that?”

A dark look passed over his face. “No. I don’t think so.”

“Is that why you let me win?”

He blinked, glancing away. “I didn’t.”

I rolled my eyes, feeling a little bit of the dynamic that’d developed between us in the godly realm returning as I huffed a laugh. “Come on, Merrick. Either you really need glasses, your depth perception sucks, or you let me win. You almost grabbed the gem, but you missed it on purpose.”

The ghost of a smile passed over his face, and he stepped closer to me, leaving just a few inches of space between us. “Okay. Maybe I did.”

“Why?”

“Because you deserved to win, Ari. You deserve to meet the gods. You’re more powerful than any of us, you know. Even Trace, with all his fancy tricks. I don’t think you even noticed it because you were so busy doing it, but your magic grew by leaps and bounds while we were in the godly realm. You were amazing.”

His fingers reached up to brush along the curve of my cheek, and I closed my eyes for a second as a rush of emotion flooded me.

But as soon as my eyes closed, all I could see in the darkness was Shane and Brielle’s faces.

They had died.

Two other students had died too.

And I had won.

Nausea roiled my stomach, and I stepped back, my eyelids snapping open.

“I—I have to go.”

Tightening my arms around my books, I ducked around Merrick and headed down the hall, running away from the cliff’s edge once again.

Chapter Twenty-Five

That evening, I spent most of my time studying, going through the different assignments I had missed while I was gone and the study guides that some of the professors had put together for me so that I wouldn’t fall behind.

I was getting close to finishing it all and catching up completely, but it was taking me twice as long as it should have. My mind was all over the place.

Around eleven o’clock, I passed out on my bed surrounded by notes and assignments, a pencil still clutched in my hand.

At first, my dreams were the same as usual—memories of the men and I navigating our way through the godly realm and the little moments that had passed between all of us.

Then, like a storm cloud rolling across a sunny summer sky, everything grew darker. I couldn’t tell what it was or where it came from, but a threatening presence lurked just out of sight.

Malevolent.