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Chapter 5
Ishove my class schedule back into my bag and sulk toward my next class. Middlebrooks has given me cleaning duty again, and given the spark in her eyes, I’m certain she enjoyed it. And why not? I killed her fiancé. She didn’t give Earwyn a single punishment.
Absentmindedly, I rub my stitches. When I reach the classroom, it’s empty. I check the number on the door. It’s the right one. Unless I remembered it wrong. I yank out the paper. It’s correct. Yet nobody is here, and the bell is going to ring in less than a minute.
“Oh, good. You’re here.”
I whip around, and my mouth falls open in surprise. “Uncle Tiberias? What are you doing here?”
A flicker of disappointment crosses his face, probably because I didn’t call him Dad. We’re definitely not there yet. Not sure we ever will be. He clears his throat. “I’ll be teaching you magic this term.”
I lift a brow and glance back at my paper. The class says Magic, but nothing else. No teacher is listed. “Why?”
“Because you need to learn the Ayers power more than anything else. And I’m the only one qualified to teach you.”
So much for avoiding my parents. “We’re going to work on it every day?”
He nods.
“What about basic magic? Don’t I need to know that?”
“I can hire you a tutor if you really want one. But trust me when I say that with our power, normal magic isn’t necessary. It can come in handy, sure. However, nothing comes close to the Ayers power. And not everyone in our bloodline gets it.”
Awesome.
“And you say Drake didn’t teach you anything about it?”
I take a seat. “Nope. I knew nothing about it until we returned. He didn’t tell me anything beyond the fact that it’s called the Ayers power, and he seemed pleased.”
“Probably because it tends to follow those who are in line for king or queen. The fact that you possessed it made him think he would have a good run as king—that killing me had gotten the job done.”
“So again, it was all about him.”
He frowns. “Unfortunately. That was the way he worked. And eventually what got him killed.”
Not the Queen Sirena curse.
Tiberias studies me. “Is something the matter?”
I’m not going to tell him about that. It’s all too much to take in, and I’m done killing people. I’ve already killed two mermen since arriving to Valora. Both were necessary, but I don’t want this to become a regular thing. And besides, I still have to process the fact that my uncle is actually my dad. A week wasn’t enough time.
I get up from the seat. “Everything’s fine. Let’s work on the power, shall we? Am I going to be graded?”
“Yes, in order to meet your magic requirement, but don’t worry about that. As long as you’re trying to grow it and improve, you’ll get high marks.”
“Sounds good to me. So, it’s controlled by anger?”
He frowns. “Is that what Drake told you?”
I try to recall if he said anything about how it works. “Just seems to be when it activates.”
“We can use it whenever we want. It’s our servant.”
My mind flashes back to the incident with trying to remove the fish’s teeth with a spell in my remedial magic class. “It seems to be the other way around. I don’t really have any control over it.”
“You don’t?” He sits on the desk next to me and studies my hands. “Show me.”
“Right now?”
