AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Looks to me like you don’t belong to any god’s house,” said Misty, a first-year girl who was a bit meaner than the others. “You’re lucky they haven’t kicked you out.”
“I hope my luck runs out soon,” I said.
Yelena held both of my hands in sympathy. I actually didn’t like people holding my hands like that, as if I needed loads of tissues to wipe my teary face, but she was trying to offer moral support.
One did not dismiss kindness.
“An icon will eventually show up on Marigold’s shoulder,” Yelena said, defending me. “She’s just one of those late bloomers.”
“I heard the divine flame jumped on you.” Samantha, a second-year, sent me a pitiful look. “But no one knew what happened afterwards since the demigods kicked everyone out after you screamed bloody hell. What really happened?”
The girls all pricked up their ears.
I wasn’t going to confide in them. Not a damn thing. I definitely wasn’t going to tell them that two demigods kissed me and one threatened me.
They weren’t my people.
“Nothing really happened. The fire went out, and the priest sent me back here.” I yawned. “I’m going to call it a night. I have an early class tomorrow.”
The last thing I wanted was for the whole Academy to know the ritual had probably turned me into a freak. Thankfully, my bunkmates, who had short attention span, soon lost interest in me.
Yeah, I’d lived. Yet I had a bad feeling that surviving the flame was just the beginning of a series of bad things.
First off, unlike everyone else, I didn’t get a power upgrade after the Ritual of the Blood Runes. I neither rose nor fell. I just got burned.
I was also the only one who hadn’t had an orientation. And from what I’d learned so far, Yelena and I were the first years most likely to be treated as a snack between the teeth of the sharks in this predator-infested pool.
Yelena squeezed my hands one last time before she returned to her own bunk. “The most important thing is that you passed the trial. No one thought you would survive the flame, but you did.”
She meant that the clique talked shit about me afterwards. Yelena had briefed me on how Demetra had complained to no end about me holding up the demigods with my stinky stunt during the sacred ritual.
Well, I’d love to give her the honor of having endured burning to catch the demigods’—or any god’s—attention. Demetra had been even more bitter that Axel had personally carried me to the bunk while I slept in his arms.
I didn’t remember that the Demigod of War had delivered me here. I’d passed out at some point after the demigods’ bickering in the Hall of Olympia.
“According to Demetra, they should have just put you in a wheelchair and had a junior escort you to the bunk room,” Yelena had said with laughter. “Everyone can see that the Demigod of War has a soft spot for you.”
And I’d made an enemy out of the Demigod of Sea.
But who gave a shit about the swimming boy?
I lifted my fingers to count how many enemies I already had in this new school—Paxton, Demetra, their goons, and who else?
I hoped all the bullies wouldn’t think to combine forces, but I had a foreboding feeling that they might. An army of bullies would come for my blood, led by a demigod.
According to the intel gathered by Nat, who’d turned out to be a resourceful, good-looking gay man, Demetra had influence at the Academy because of her filthy rich family.
Even though the demigods headed all the Half-Blood Academies, they didn’t exactly run the schools. They had no patience for or interest in any administrative duties.
No, pretty much they just popped in and out of the Half-Blood academies all over the globe and focused most of their time on the war against the demons.
Their favorite hangouts weren’t in the schools but in the war zones.
It was rare that all four demigods were in one place at the same time, so everyone here in the North American academy was thrilled, especially all the girls.
In less than twenty-four hours, I’d heard more gossip about the demigods than I’d heard in my past twenty years.
As my thoughts drifted away, the girls were still eagerly arguing over which demigod was the hottest and betting on who would be lucky enough to be chosen as the demigods’ next lovers.
