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I’d had enough. Dani had been through enough.

Disgusted, I pushed through the circle of students that had formed around Dani and her tormentors. As I made my way to the front, I heard the sound of fabric ripping and saw Lochlan holding up a piece of red triumphantly. Behind him Dani was sobbing and clutching at the bodice of her dress.

“Hey!” I snapped, feeling a ridiculous sense of déjà vu. I shoved through the last of the crowd and snapped my fingers, loudly. “Hey! That’s enough.”

The girl with braids looked at me. “Look, Drakharrow’s pet is here, Lochlan.” She sneered at me. “Going to defend this one? That makes sense, you’re no different. Part of a special highblood sluts’ club, aren’t you?”

I could feel my blood boiling. “That’s enough. Back off. You have no idea what this girl has already been through, believe me.”

Lochlan stepped forward. He was taller than me, brawnier. But if I had to, I knew I could take him. I tensed my body.

“What? You think you’re better than us because Drakharrow feeds from you?”

I decided not to point out that this was exactly what the Sanctum taught, what every blightborn had been brought up to believe. The only reason these two felt so feisty right now was because the compulsion magic woven through this world was faltering. Funny how I’d originally thought that would be a wonderful thing.

“So do many other blightborn. And they do so willingly.” I tried to lower my voice. “This is different. Dani wasn’t willing. I understand why you’re so upset, but you need to leave her alone.”

“Not willing?” one of the boys behind Lochlan hollered. “She looked pretty fucking willing to me. Let’s take her back to the First Year tower and see how willing she is with us, hey, Lochlan?”

To his credit, Lochlan looked a little repulsed by that proposition. But he didn’t back off.

“Your friends are mostly First Years, aren’t they?” I said to him quietly. “You’re going to get them all expelled, Lochlan. Or worse. You’re interfering with a highblood thrall.” Immediately I knew I’d said the wrong thing.

Lochlan’s eyes blazed. “Fuck that. They act like they own us. Own our women.”

“Your women?” My hackles rose. “We’re not your women, you prick. She should be able to make her own choices. But that’s just the point, she didn’t get to make one. You know how hard it is to say no to a highblood,” I pointed out. “So please. Just leave her the fuck alone.”

“You’re not one of us.” The girl with braids pushed in between Lochlan and me, her voice raised. “You let one feed from you, too. You’re no better than her.”

I stood my ground, heart pounding—not from fear but from rage and frustration. “Look, it’s not about that. It’s about consent. It’s none of your fucking business what I do or what Dani does—as long as we’re all right with it. But what that highblood just did to her? He did it with thrallweave. You and I both know that. She doesn’t deserve to be attacked just for being manipulated.” I raised my voice so the students around us could hear me. “Because we all know the same thing could happen to you or to me.”

The girl blanched a little but her lips were still set in a stubborn expression. “Fuck that. It’s not happening to me.”

I rolled my eyes. “Fine, then I won’t bother talking to you. If you want to be naïve about things, go right ahead.” I turned to face the students behind me. “But the rest of you—you think tearing each other apart like this is going to help anything? Change anything? You think it’s going to stop them from doing what they want to us? This isn’t the way.”

Some students looked away, suddenly uncertain. Others moved off to the side, clearly deciding they weren’t going to get involved.

A tall skinny girl wearing a blue dress stepped forward. “Easy for you to say. You belong to a House Leader.”

“I’m not Blake’s property, and I assure you he’d say the same thing,” I said firmly. The way Blake and I talked to one another when we were alone? Absolutely none of their fucking business. “I am my own person. Otherwise, would I really be speaking to you all like this?”

She ignored me. “You’ve got a dragon! That’s real power. If you really hate the highbloods so much, why not use it? Why don’t you stand up for us?”

My heart sank; I should have known it would come down to that. It was, of course, an excellent question. And with the way things had been going at Bloodwing, I was reaching the end of my rope. If Nyxaris had truly been mine, I might have been reaching out to him—begging him to intervene. But he was not mine. He was Florence’s.

A chorus of murmurs followed the girl’s questions. Obviously many agreed with her.

The weight of responsibility that those murmurs placed upon me was heavier than anything I could have imagined. Even without Nyxaris, I was burdened by their expectations. I wasn’t even from this world, and yet I felt a horrible awareness of letting them down.

Another student shoved forward. “Forget the damn dragon, Isha. There are bigger things happening than our little problems at school. Haven’t you heard the rumors? There’s a plague. A highblood plague. And it’s spreading.”

The girl he’d called Isha scoffed. “Rumors? Lies, more like. Highbloods don’t get sick.”

“No one is sick in Veilmar,” someone protested. “We’d have heard if there was a plague.”

“That rumor came from a little town thousands of miles away, Alain,” another called.

Alain set his jaw. “So what? Doesn’t mean it can’t still be true. A thousand miles, a hundred. Plagues spread, you idiots.”