Chapter 8

Ava felt all the eyes on her as she made her way to her Needlework class. It was back to the same old rubbish again.

Only it wasn’t the same now. Over the weekend, she’d gone and got mated, then beat the crap out of an Alpha, and to top it all off, she'd willingly walked into the darkness of the forest. She was not the same person as before.

Instead of shoving her, they were moving out of her way. She couldn't be sure whether it was because they had heard what she had done or they had seen her holding hands with Zeke. However, she didn’t think Zeke’s dad would have publicised what she had done to him.

But none of that mattered now, anyway.

She’d felt something in her chest the moment Claire and her friends had walked in.

The first had been the brief joy when she had realised that she hadn’t killed them. She wasn’t a murderer. She didn’t have to hand herself in to the Council.

Then came the feeling of dread. The darkness she felt was coming to claim her had been coming from those students. She could sense it all over them.

She didn’t know how they were in the assembly, considering what she saw in her nightmares every night. What she heard. The screams, the blood, the sound of breaking bones. Was that just her overactive imagination, then? Had going into the cursed forest and in Isolation messed her up so much that her mind played tricks on her?

A voice in the back of her mind told her not to be stupid. Even if these students were no longer presumed dead, the Council was still coming for her. And that nagging voice also hammered in the fact that no one could have survived what she had seen that thing in her body do.

There was something seriously wrong with Claire and her friends. It was as if the darkness had claimed them completely.

Maybe like it was trying to do to her.

When they’d sat behind her, she could feel the sickly feeling from the forest as if she was still in it. She had remained frozen in her seat for the whole assembly, afraid to move. How could someone emit so much darkness and still walk around like this? It felt like they were creatures from the forest, like the violet-eyed things Zeke had fought twice to save her.

“Ava.”

She was about to enter the First-Year block when the timid voice called her attention.

She tensed when she saw Emily standing next to the door as if she had been waiting. And her guilt and shame threatened to swallow her up again.

Maybe she hadn’t killed Claire, but what had happened to them seemed worse than death. It was still her fault. And this Omega knew that.

Though Emily had been the one to beg and grovel for forgiveness, she felt like she was the one who needed to do that. But she couldn’t even look at Emily, let alone speak.

She looked away from Emily and opened the door, ready to ignore her, but the wolf pushed it closed. It was a bold move from someone who’d shit her pants every time she had seen her since that fateful Saturday. And she was still scared now. Emily was a trembling mess and was paler than she had been before.

“Please,” Emily whispered. “I know you don’t want to see me, and I know you won’t forgive me. But give me a chance to make it up to you. Let me try. Please. I can’t live like this anymore.”

“You don’t need my forgiveness, Emily,” she said, pulling the door open again.

“I do. Please,” Emily said again. “Claire and her friends...”

She looked at Emily and realised that the Omega had all the answers she needed. She knew what had happened that day.

Someone pushed the door open, pushing her to the side. It made her remember where she was. There were too many people around to talk about this so openly. Too many sensitive ears. The last thing she wanted was for people to know what she had done to Claire.

“I’ll find you later,” she said, opening the door again.

“Can I stay with you in the dorms?”

What?

She closed the door again and looked at Emily with a questioning frown. The Omega immediately lowered her gaze.

“I can stay in your dorm room and guard you,” Emily continued. “I know you don’t need it, and it’s not the same as having Alpha Ezekiel with you, but I can sense when there is danger. I can be useful. I can be brave.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The new rules,” Emily answered. “I can help you move if you want me to.”

She felt like she had been sucker punched. Was she being forced to move out of Zeke’s house now? Was that how the dean was going to punish her?

“I... I’ll speak to you later,” she repeated, this time not giving Emily a chance to stop her again.

She went straight to the Needlework class and ignored how everyone went quiet as she entered. Their Instructor was not there yet, so she found her seat and immediately pulled her tablet out of her bag.

There were two notices from the dean. One was to the whole school, the other was in her private messages. Both filled her with a sense of doom. If this was her last week at school, the dean had obviously found a way to ruin it.

She looked at the new rules first.

The first rule was that every student was to stay in the dorms allocated for their roles. All Omegas who had duties in the student residences were to move back into the dormitories and report for their duties by five every morning. That included the Omegas allocated to the Alpha houses. Rule breakers would be put in Isolation.

She knew that one was targeting her. She was being separated from her mate. How were they supposed to plan for the Council’s visit if their contact was limited? How was she supposed to stay safe from Claire, especially in the first-floor dorm room with the flimsy window? And how was she supposed to stay away from Zeke when she had already bonded with him?

This was seriously messed up.

The second rule was that everyone was to strictly adhere to the rules of their ranks. Proper respect was to be given to those ranked above them. For Omegas, that meant lowering their gazes when addressing anyone, doing as they were told, serving where needed and knowing their place. There would be no exception to the rules. Rule breakers would be put in Isolation.

Again, this one was directed at her. She knew it was the dean’s vindictiveness and pettiness showing through in every rule. He had not broken her in Isolation, so he would try another way. She had known he would retaliate for that meeting with her father, but she had assumed she would be gone by now.

She looked down the long list of new rules and sighed. No mixing in the dining hall. No holding hands.

She shook her head and clicked the next notice without reading the rest of the rules. And as she had expected, she had a meeting with the dean at lunchtime. She would bet everything that she would get punished for the weekend. She would spend time in Isolation, after all.

But maybe that was the safest place to be. It was somewhere Claire and her friends wouldn’t be able to reach her.

“Alright, everyone. Let’s begin.”

She put her tablet away and looked outside her window. Her dad was probably still on his way home, but she hoped he would understand why she’d had to send him away. Everything had gone wrong. There was nothing he or Zeke could do to protect her now.