Page 54 of The Lost Elemental

“Oh, hell no. Not cool,” Kai added. “We’re moving you in here.”

Riven’s jaw dropped. “Are you out of your mind? You really want to put a target on her? She’ll be enemy number one if you move her in here.”

That was all it took. The guys started yelling, each one louder than the last. They all thought they had the perfect solution to the issue. Except not a single one of them bothered to ask me what I thought about the whole thing.

Slowly, I stepped away from the chaos, my hands fisting at my sides. They were as close as brothers, that much I knew. I wasn’t going to be the reason they fought like this. And the truth was, Riven was right. More time with the royals would just mean a bigger target on my back.

Quietly, I slipped out the front door and into the night air. My chest gave a painful squeeze, as if my body were rebelling from walking away. I forced myself to do it anyway. It was the right thing to do. Even if I felt lonelier than I ever had before.

30

Kerry whirled around in her chair as I entered our dorm room. “Where have you been? The campus is going crazy. Did you really blast out the windows in Headmaster Acker’s office? Someone said they saw Atlas carrying you out of there after telling the king to shove it.”

Her barrage of questions just kept coming. Like a drummer carrying out a solo on my skull, they hit one after the other. I collapsed onto my bed, pulling the pillow over my head with a groan.

Kerry went quiet. A second later, my bed depressed. “Aura? Are you okay?”

“No,” I said through the pillow.

She pulled up the corner a fraction. “What can I do?”

The offer was so kind, my heart ached. “Will you grab the overhead light? My head’s pounding.”

Kerry rose and flipped the switch, leaving us in only the glow from her desk lamp. She moved to her nightstand and pulled out a small bottle. She popped the cap and handed it to me. “These always help me.”

I snagged two and swallowed them dry. “Thanks.”

Her brows arched. “That bad, huh?”

“Long day.” Somehow, they just got longer and longer.

“Super-powered elemental discovery, huh?”

I groaned, lifting the pillow, and putting it behind my head. “It’s already making the rounds?”

“Did you think plunging the entire building into darkness would go unnoticed?”

“Don’t you have normal power outages here? What if it was that?”

Her lips twitched. “Accompanied by power bursts that blow out all the windows in a twenty-foot radius?”

“Eff my life.”

Kerry chuckled. “The good news is that a lot of people are scared of you now. They’ll probably steer clear rather than mess with you.”

I toyed with a loose thread on the blanket, twisting it around my finger. “But some won’t. Some will see it as a challenge.”

Her lips thinned and I had my answer. There hadn’t been a ton of opportunity for someone to sideline me, but after the unbinding, we’d begin combat practice. They’d have plenty of time then.

“Everyone knows the princes have your back. No one’s going to mess with you straight out,” Kerry assured me.

They’d be sneaky and conniving. But having some of the royals wanting to help me meant I’d have a whole new set of enemies. People like Aiden who wanted to mess with me just because the princes had taken an interest in me.

“Riven certainly doesn’t.”

Kerry frowned. “He’s not really fond of outsiders.”

It was on the tip of my tongue to ask why but I couldn’t find it in me to utter the words. He didn’t deserve my curiosity.