Killer Crescent by Leigh Kelsey

9

My first magic lesson went so well. I’d been given some one-on-one time with Vivian, the magic guidance counsellor at Blake Hall, a hippie woman in her forties with flowing blonde hair and a million beads dangling around her neck in a rainbow of colours. She was soooo pretty, but extremely dull, and the only bit of magic she managed to coax from me in our one hour session was the time I got bored and sang the entire ‘Bohemian Rhapsody,’ from start to finish. She ended with recommending me to Kris, Blake Hall’s resident psychiatrist.

I wished Kris the best in assessing me, diagnosing me, and attempting to fix every glorious bit of madness in my head. Many had tried, and none had succeeded. But hey, it would give him something to do for the next few weeks. Months. However long I was stuck here.

At least Blake Hall didn’t have timed showers, or people who’d shiv me on the way to and from my room every morning. And I didn’t have to do laundry. I hated laundry. Sheets were like tribbles in Star Trek; I’d just get rid of one and a dozen more would multiply into existence. The moral of the story was it could always be worse; it could be prison.

“Remember, if you fail this, you’re going to jail,” I said under my breath as I lagged behind the seven other inmates—sorry, residents—following Dean down the sloping garden at the back of Blake Hall. The sun had set hours ago, making the whole place even more gothic and creepy, and moonlight silvered everything until the trees ahead of us were ghostly and ominous.

I’d always liked the nighttime; it was way easier to cover up a murder at night. But knowing my only task was to survive a whole night in this place made fear skitter down my spine and my hand flick to my thigh where I’d holstered a knife. I’d brought twenty three blades to Blake Hall with me—Dean either hadn’t known they were there or didn’t care—and I wished I’d worn them all tonight. I only had six. What if I needed seven? What if the woods were full of monsters that hungered for flesh? My flesh would be the tastiest of everyone’s, I just knew it. The others sent to the woods for this trial were vampires and wolves—two vamps, five wolfies, all male—so of course the hungry monsters prowling the trees would want a bite of a witch-wolf dual-blood. The others were supermarket sushi, and I was an exceptionally rare caviar.¹

“Your first test, as you know, is to spend a whole night in the whimpering woods,” Dean said from the front of the group, pausing right before the towering wych elm trees. The shadows and moonlight made him look even more dangerous than normal, and I shuddered, wanting to press up against him and taste the slope of his jaw.

Wait, focus, Rebel. This could be important.

“You can use whatever magic you want, and any fangs, claws, and compulsion you have, too. The only rule is no harming each other, only the dark things that prowl the woods.”

I shuddered again, this time from fear. Sexy Sir definitely had a way with words; I saw all the others exchange glances too. “Any questions?” he asked with a smirk that told me he was going to enjoy our suffering.

I scowled. Just because he was hot and dangerous and alpha didn’t mean he had to be a psychopath about this.

“How will we know we’ve passed?” Brunel, a big, twenty-something wolf asked, his bald head resembling a hard boiled egg. I wondered if he was all yellow and fluffy inside like a yolk, and reached for my knife to crack him open and find out, but Dean spoke, snapping me out of the bloodlust.

“You’ll know, because the sun will have risen. All you have to do is spend the night in there. Anyone who runs out before then forfeits their place at Blake Hall.”

“Fuck,” one of the other wolves muttered, this one a rangy bastard with lank black hair the others had called Vom. I assumed it was short for Vomit, a lovely name. “Then we’ll be like the Discard Society.”

“The what now?” I asked, frowning.

The third wolf—Frank, brunette and nondescript in every way except for a goatee that seemed to have died on his face—snorted, dismissive. “They’re dead and gone. In the eighties, a group of paranormals who were kicked out of Blake Hall banded together and tried to kill everyone.”

My eyes went wide. Woah, that sounded fun.

“So all we have to do is stay in there until it’s light?” one of the vampires scoffed, Dauntley or something like that. He was nowhere near as pretty as my Slasher, more pustule-y and craggy, with blonde-ish hair and an old jacket severely in need of repair. Or being sent to its final resting place in the rubbish bin.

“Won’t you go poof?” I asked with keen interest, peering at the vampires—the craggy one and his friend who looked like every teenager’s wet dream with his sharp cheekbones and floppy brown hair. He must have been in a boy band. Must have been. Who cared if he could sing; those cheekbones qualified him.

Boyband snorted, looking down his nose at me. Okay, his cheekbones were less appealing now. I crossed my arms over my chest and scowled. “Not with these,” he replied, and lifted a chain from his chest to show the vial pendant hanging from it.

“Ohhh, you’ve got those fancy witch potion things. Nice.” I nodded, ignoring Dean’s exasperated glare.

“You’ll each go your separate ways,” he growled, looking straight at Boyband. “No colluding.”

Why did I think he made that rule up on the spot? I beamed, twirling a strand of hair around my finger. “Yes, sir,” I said, sultry and low, and my stomach fluttered with butterflies at his low warning growl.

“In,” he rumbled. “All of you. I’ll be back at dawn to check on you.”

“What’s in there?” I asked, approaching my alpha mate as the others picked a direction and walked into the woods.

“Things that will try to eat you,” he replied with a wicked smile. “Things that will skin your body and eat your bones.”

My eyes widened. “You’re not serious.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” he replied, and brought his hand cracking down on my ass. I jumped, yelping at the rough sting. “Get moving, Miss Falcon, or I’ll throw you over my shoulder and carry you in myself.”

I brushed up against him, licking his jaw like I’d wanted to do earlier. The rough scrape of his stubble against my tongue was delicious.

“Alright, that’s it,” he growled, and I shrieked as I was suddenly airborne, my chest slamming into his back as he set off with fast, bouncing steps. “Dean, put me down!” I complained, wriggling in his hold and shouting as he spanked me hard again.

“Do you always have to be difficult?” he muttered, setting me on my feet so quickly that dizziness flared in my head and I tipped forward. His hands caught me, so big they spanned my shoulders, and I swooned.

“You love it,” I laughed. But I saw that he’d set me down beyond the tree line, and unease curdled my stomach, wiping the smile off my face. “How is this supposed to prove I’ll be a good paranormal in the future? Something could eat me!”

Dean ducked his head to kiss my cheekbone. “You’ll be fine. You’re a smart girl, Rebel.”

“Smart girls get eaten all the time!” I complained, staring wide-eyed at the huge trees all around us, each rustle of leaves and every hoot of an owl making me even more nervous.

“Good girls will get eaten when they come out of the woods tomorrow morning,” he replied with a simmering look.

I huffed, scowling at the dangerous woods. “That better be a promise, alpha.”

Dean smirked, spanked my sore ass, and left me there in the whimpering woods to face whatever monsters the dark concealed.