Zodiac Academy: The Awakening As Told By The Boys
The Awakening As Told By The Boys: Chapter 31

Bile burned the back of my throat as I strode up the stairs inside Ignis House, taking them two at a time and storming into my room.

I threw the door open and it hit the wall so hard that it cracked right up the centre of the solid wood before I kicked it back into place again.

My heart was racing so rampantly that I could feel my pulse everywhere within my body, my muscles shook and quaked and the Dragon in me was clawing at the confines of my flesh, roaring to be set free.

A bellow of fury escaped me and I grabbed the edge of my treasure chest, heaving the whole thing over and sending gold coins and precious gems scattering across the carpet in every direction.

I curled my fist, striding towards the gilded mirror which hung from the wall with the full intention to slam my knuckles straight into it to destroy it, but I fell still as I caught sight of myself in the mirror.

There was a darkness in my eyes which made my heart skip a beat and in the dim light of my room with only the flicker of orange from the fire in my hearth, I could have sworn the man looking back at me was my father. Fist raised ready to strike, fury burning through him hotter than Dragon fire and not a single scrap of mercy clinging to his hulking frame.

I drew in a long breath, the shaking in my muscles increasing as I fought against the truth which was staring me in the face.

I really was becoming him. My nightmare. My demon. My monster.

What I’d done tonight…the fear I’d caused that girl for no other reason than wanting to force her to bow to my superior power, that was all him. It was precisely how he would have behaved and my stomach churned as I realised that he was going to be proud of me for this.

I doubled over, clutching the edges of the dressing table which stood before the mirror and staring down at the dark wood, focusing on the grains which ran through it so that I didn’t have to see my father looking back at me from my own reflection.

This was what he wanted. And all I’d ever sworn I’d never become.

I’d foolishly thought I had more time. Time to learn the dark magic Lance had been teaching me, time to master my fire and water magic, time to grow fully into my strength so that I could challenge him, beat him, destroy him.

I’d fallen asleep countless times dreaming of that monster crushed beneath my heel but instead I’d turned all of that rage and hatred on a girl who hadn’t done a damn thing to me aside from standing in my way.

I closed my eyes but the moment I did, all I could see was her, the way her body shook from the cold and how her green gaze had found me while she lay at the side of that pool, clutching her sister tightly as their love burned between them.

She’d seen me then. The very worst of me. She’d looked into my eyes and I knew that she had known what I was and somehow that had been the thing that broke my resolve, that shattered my will and tore through my determination to see them broken.

But it was far too late for that by then. We’d done it. I’d embodied the man I’d always sworn to fight against. I’d become him just like he’d always wanted and the way she looked at me was the exact same way Xavier always looked at him.

Like I was the worst creature she’d ever had the misfortune to meet. Like her hatred for me was a river of blood which pumped through her body with every beat of her heart and would never run dry.

I was filled with the most sickening certainty that I’d done something I would never come back from. I’d passed through a barrier I hadn’t even known was in place before me. And now that I had, I knew it would only become easier and easier to pass through it again. Each action I took from here on out would be defined by the cruelty I’d displayed tonight and I could never undo it. Never take it back. Never fix what I’d broken inside the girl who had made me burn from the very first moment I’d met her.

I shouldn’t have cared. I shouldn’t have given a single fuck about some lost princess with emerald eyes and fire in her soul. But I did. I did and I’d still done what I’d done. I’d still acted on the orders of the man I hated and let my soul pay the price of my actions.

I tried to cling on to my reasons for doing it. To remind myself that Xavier was safe because of me. But he wasn’t. Not really. Not while that monster still ruled over us and governed our fates.

I was sorely tempted to just shift and let the beast in me be free but I was fighting the urge, focusing instead on the man who had caused all of this and the only chance of freedom I could even imagine.

My eyes snapped open as I came to a decision. One I’d already made a long time ago with Lance by my side and the stars looking down on us. I was going to challenge Lionel Acrux and destroy his hold on me while destroying him in the process.

I would take his place on the Celestial Council and if I was lucky, he would die in the fight it would take for me to steal his position from him.

But this wasn’t going to be a dream for the future anymore.

No.

This was going to happen now.

Because I couldn’t go on like this, a slave to his wicked desires and a pawn in his depraved games. I’d broken something tonight in myself and in a girl who didn’t deserve a moment of my torture upon her flesh.

There was no fixing that.

But there was something I could fix and that was Lionel Acrux.

My head snapped up and I glared at my reflection again, drinking in the similarities between the man in the mirror and the one who had haunted my nightmares for too fucking long. He’d wanted me to become a monster? Fine. I’d be his monster.

I yanked open the top drawer of the dressing table and reached for the bag of stardust I kept there, intending to head straight to his gold clad manor and end this now. I had the rage and desperation of a broken man coursing through me and I would use it as a weapon against the man who had given me life.

But as my fingers brushed the pouch of stardust, a wind whipped around me and someone snatched it away so fast that I barely even caught the movement. The lights flicked on and I looked up, replaceing the image of my father in my reflection gone as my own features were thrown into focus by the light and all of the differences between us were showcased.

Behind me, standing by the window with the pouch of stardust clasped in his fist was Lance, his furious gaze boring into my back as he bared his teeth at me to reveal his fangs.

‘Give that back,’ I demanded, whirling on him and standing up to my full height.

‘No,’ he replied just as fiercely, holding the pouch out towards the fire as I took a step towards him and making me pause.

‘What the fuck are you doing? Give me the stardust, Lance. I need to go.’

‘You can’t challenge your father like this,’ he warned and my frown deepened as I tried to figure out how the fuck he knew where I’d been heading and what I’d been planning to do. ‘Gabriel had a vision about the way it will turn out – you won’t win.’

‘I will,’ I snarled, stalking forward again but Lance threw the bag of stardust into the flames before I could even cross half of the distance between us.

An explosion of dark flames tore from the fireplace as the precious substance was consumed by the fire and a roar escaped me as I barrelled forward, slamming into my so called best friend and grabbing the front of his shirt as I pinned him against the wall.

‘I can’t let you lose that fight, Darius!’ he bellowed, trying to shove me back as he bared his fangs at me, but I refused to let go.

‘Gabriel cannot predict my future!’ I roared in reply. ‘I barely know that half plucked turkey – there’s no way he could see the outcome of my actions. I would have-‘

‘He saw me die,’ Orion hissed, cutting me off and sending panic slicing through my veins.

‘Liar,’ I breathed, but I could see the truth in his eyes.

‘You’re not ready,’ he said in a rough voice, reaching up to clasp my face between his hands as he forced me to look him in the eye. ‘Not yet.’

‘Then when?’ I demanded but he could only shake his head and I whirled away from him in a fury, my whole body vibrating as I fought the shift which was trying to take me hostage.

‘I don’t know,’ Lance admitted, shattering my hope for salvation and making me fist my hands in my hair as I turned to look at him again.

‘You saw what I did tonight,’ I rasped. ‘What I became because of him and you know it won’t stop there. He knows now how far he can push me all the time he uses Xavier as a bargaining chip. And every time I do something like that it will chisel away at the man I want to be piece by fucking piece until I become the very thing he wants me to be.’

Lance said nothing, his hands falling to his sides as he just looked at me and I knew full well what he was seeing. I’d seen the horror in his eyes when he discovered what I’d done to Roxy. I’d seen the disappointment and worse than that, the fear. The fear that I really would fall into the fate my father wanted for me and we would never escape it.

‘You will beat him,’ Lance said firmly like he could see me shattering and wanted to try and hold the broken pieces together. ‘Just not today.’

‘And what about the creature I’ll become in the meantime?’ I breathed, self loathing filling me as Roxy’s scream resounded in my mind and the press of fate weighed so heavily on my shoulders that I could barely stay standing. ‘What happens when I can no longer stomach the sight of my own reflection? What happens when the man you want so desperately to destroy Lionel Acrux ends up being just as bad as him in the effort it takes to stand against him?’

‘You replace something to hold on to,’ Lance said. ‘Something to anchor you to who you are and you don’t fucking let go of it.’

I scoffed at that empty fucking suggestion and turned to look out of the window I’d left open where I could see the stars twinkling in the sky beyond.

‘That’s the problem though, isn’t it? I have nothing but sand in my pockets and sin in my heart. I can’t hold on to the good in me, Lance, because thanks to that man, there isn’t any of it left anymore.’

He opened his mouth to say something else to me, but the beast beneath my skin was done waiting for me to give it permission to break free.

I took a running jump out of the window and the Dragon tore from my flesh with a roar that shook the glass House behind me as my clothes were shredded clean off of my body.

I turned towards the stars and flew straight for them, diving into the clouds and letting a furious stream of fire tear from my lips and billow over my body.

I flew higher and higher, searching for a break in the clouds so that I could look upon the stars and curse them for my fate and how often it was twisted against me, but I couldn’t replace an end to the clouds no matter how high I flew.

And the only thing I found among the mass of grey I flew through was the look in Roxanya Vega’s eyes as she saw the worst in me, and I felt my entire life shatter like breaking glass around me.

Perhaps I was always destined to be her monster, but I found I hated that fate with far more passion than I’d ever be able to hate her.