Bloodline Alchemy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 6), Lan Chan [free ebook reader for android TXT] 📗

of this for real. All we know is that there’s another force out there. The malachim, who were once angels too.”

“How old are you, Isla?” Agatha asked.

“Twenty.”

“Twenty. And you know all the machinations of this dimension in which we live?”

“Err, no. Isn’t that why I’m at the Academy?”

A few of the students laughed nervously. “It beats me why you’re at this Academy. Or any of the others. They’ve done nothing but fill your heads with ideas about humans needing to be protected. When the time comes, they will be nothing but a nuisance.”

She kept talking about some mystical time in the future like there would be something still here once Lucifer was done. In a really twisted way, it was kind of comforting. When she gave us the reason why, I ate my words.

“If we want to survive the impending war, we must embrace the Hell dimension.”

Isla started snickering. “Is something funny?” Agatha asked.

“Oh, you weren’t joking,” Isla said. “I just assumed because what you’re saying is nuts.”

“How so?”

Isla pointed at the small mound of dust where the remains of the demon was collected. “Who or what did you invoke to get the power to do that?”

Agatha raised a brow. “Who do you think?”

There was no doubt after that demonstration that she had called upon something in the Abyss. Was she just going to answer one question with another? Isla made a dismissive sound.

“Why are you in a class called Arcane Magic if you think it’s crazy?” Agatha asked Isla.

“Arcane magic isn’t about abusing power from an unreliable source,” Isla spat. Professor Mortimer would have been proud of her. “And I’m here so I know what not to do. When my time comes, I want to be with Azrael. Not some psychopathic ex-angel who was on Lucifer’s side in the war.”

Agatha pressed her hands together in the shape of a triangle. The sign of the Trinity. Out of sheer habit, I found myself drawing a protective circle around Isla.

“Do we ever really know whose side was right in a war when the victors are the ones ruling us?” Agatha posed. She flashed a winning smile that fooled absolutely nobody. I doubted she was really even trying.

“We know that Lucifer is trying to kill us,” Kieran said. “Or enslave us. At least the seraphim have given us free will.”

“How do you know Lucifer would not do the same? The seraphim have given us rules to live by. But a war is about to reach our doorstep and they won’t lift a finger to help us.”

“So you’re just trying to rewrite history?” Keith asked.

“I am attempting to open your tiny little minds that have been warped by your Council and your headmistress.”

“If she says one more thing about Jacqueline, she’s going to get an axe to the head,” Diana muttered.

“So, one of the people you’d be happy to kill?” I asked her.

She turned to me and grinned. “Tell you what, if it comes down to it and you need to steal some essence to use as a power booster, you have my blessing to kill her.”

I suppressed a laugh. “Something funny, Sophie?” Agatha asked.

Uh oh. “No.”

She wouldn’t let it go. “Take Sophie, for instance.”

“No,” I said quickly. “Let’s not take Sophie anything.”

Some of the students laughed. The ones who didn’t know me gave me sidelong glances. Agatha was not dissuaded. “Her great-grandfather was one of the most powerful blood-magic users in the world. Whether you agree or disagree with what he did, there is no disputing that he was a great wizard.”

I very badly wanted to turn around and see what Noah’s reaction to her assessment was. She kept going. “He had the spine to use the power he was given to his advantage.”

“He murdered people!” the Pantheon Fae said.

“He did what he had to do. If he were still alive, there’s every chance we wouldn’t be in this predicament in the first place. For instance, if Alessia Hastings’s great-grandmother hadn’t shown such poor judgement, she would have let Alessia die as an infant. That would have saved us all.”

“You...” I started to say. But I couldn’t get the words out of my mouth.

She held up a finger at the room because we were all choking on our indignation that didn’t seem to want to come out in a satisfactory way. “Before you give in to your indoctrination, strip all the emotion from it and tell me whether her death would have saved us all.”

I couldn’t listen to any more. When I stood, Diana and Isla got up with me. “Sophie,” Agatha said with a note of exasperation in her voice. “You’ll never get anywhere if you continue to–”

“She didn’t choose to be born from Lucifer’s blood,” I snapped at her. “And she did everything she could to stop him. Where were you, if you think you could do better?”

“I’m here now, cleaning up her mess,” she said. The kicker was that she really seemed to believe that. “And if I’m ever given the opportunity to rid the world of Lucifer’s scion, I would make the choice in an instant.”

A red haze swiped across my vision. “If you ever go near her, I’ll burn you at the stake myself.”

“You think so, Sophie dear? Because I believe the problem is that you wouldn’t be able to even if you truly wanted it.”

Her laughter followed me out of the room and joined with that voice inside my head that said when the time came, I would surely fail.

14

Of course we then didn’t know what to do with ourselves. Isla bade us goodbye, claiming she needed to return to Morgana. “Are you coming back?”

Why had I asked that now? Isla was the ultimate frenemy. Even though we had a truce, she didn’t bother to soften any of her sharp edges for us. I had a feeling that was why Lex secretly liked her. “If I leave for good,” Isla said, “I’m not going to get to see when you finally lose your temper.”

There was