Bloodline Legacy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 4), стр. 26

“Nothing. Just checking to see if you have any injuries I should know about. Anything making you feel a bit under the weather.”

My frown must have said it all because Trey scowled. “They’re taking bets,” he told me. “Some moron from Pantheon has set up a pool about whether you or Chanelle will come out on top of the Unity Games.”

The grip I had on my fork grew tighter. “Why am I not surprised?” I said. Clearly there were jerks in all the Academies.

I started stabbing at the scrambled eggs on my plate. “This is just bloody perfect.”

“You’re going to try your best, though, aren’t you?” Trey asked.

“No! I’m not the competitive, stubborn sort at all.”

He flashed me his canines. I thought I saw Winnie squirming in her seat. We both pointedly ignored her.

“All jokes aside,” Trey said, “do you realise just how disastrous it could be if Chanelle wins?”

“Kai won’t agree to the vow even if she does.”

“He doesn’t have a choice,” Trey said. “And in the event that you’re out of the picture, I don’t think he’ll be in the right frame of mind to say no. I’ve been doing some extra study over the break–”

Roland and Sasha made gagging noises. Trey growled at them. “What? Is it so hard to believe that I don’t want to fall behind?”

“You’re a shifter,” Roland said. “Learning all that other junk is pointless.”

Trey’s nose wrinkled. I kicked him under the table to redirect his attention. “Anyway, have any of you read some of the crazy ideas the Nephilim Council have?” He was looking at Sophie when he said this. It was a natural assumption considering she was in closest contact with the Council. All she could do was shrug.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“No, I’m not!” she all but whimpered. “I’m so dead tired I could just crawl under the table and fall asleep.”

Roland scuffed the back of his head. “Yeah, that was pretty noisy last night, wasn’t it?”

“As if you would know,” Trey shot back. “You sleep like the undead and you snore like a mountain ogre.”

He turned his attention back to me. “I read one of the books in the library about how the Nephilim are the oldest of the line of supernaturals. There were a group of them who didn’t want to bring the other supernaturals into the fold at first. They considered us lower beings.”

“The truth hurts, doesn’t it?” a feminine voice said behind me.

I turned to find a girl a couple of years older than us. The golden glow around her body left little doubt what kind of supernatural she was. Her wheat-blonde hair hung in a thick braid over her left shoulder. Though her bone structure was too wide to be considered conventionally pretty, she had an aura about her that made her appear celestial.

“What did you say?” Diana said.

“Nothing personal,” she said. “Just the truth. Nephilim beats dwarf in the food chain. The sooner you accept it, the easier it’ll get.”

I had to physically stop Diana from stomping over the table, and my food, to get to the Nephilim girl.

“Barbara!” Bradley’s voice called out. The girl lifted her head. The smug smile on her face evened out into the real deal. Of course she was friends with Bradley. “My kind awaits.” Her gaze swept over the table until it landed on me. “See you in the Games, witch.”

“I’m going to give her a black eye,” Diana said, still struggling against me.

“Help!” I asked Roland. He shrugged.

“Let her do it,” he said. “The wench deserves it.”

“Too right!” Diana whisper-screamed.

Astrid walked by and helped calm Diana down by settling her back in her seat. “I think I just sprained my shoulder,” I said.

Sasha and Roland contemplated this. “How bad?” Roland asked. “Enough that you might perform poorly…”

I threw my fork at him. He ducked and it dropped on the floor. It made a loud clanging sound that drew the attention of half the room.

“Thanks a lot!” I could feel the eyes on the back of my head as I went to pick the fork up. Diana was still seething when I returned. She was bailing Astrid up about it.

“Yes, I know it’s a prejudiced assumption,” Astrid said. “Which is why the Supernatural Council was formed.”

“I read that the Nephilim were against that too,” Trey said.

Being too straight-laced to sugar-coat the truth, Astrid agreed. “Yes, they were. But in the end, they couldn’t risk yet another war when the forces of the Hell dimension were already so great.”

“Funny,” I said. “You don’t learn about this in Magical History.”

“Perhaps not at Bloodline. As best she can, Jacqueline attempts to bring all races together for the greater good. Headmistress Carmichael does not.”

“You went to Pantheon Academy didn’t you?” Trey asked her.

“Yes. It was by far a less positive experience than what I’ve had since I’ve been here as a guard.”

Diana turned on me, her brown eyes smouldering. “I don’t care what you have to do,” she said. “You’d better win these games.”

All I could do was gulp as I glanced down the table and was met with equal conviction in the eyes of the others.

“Uhh...I think we’re all forgetting one thing,” I said. “I’m human, remember?”

Behind me, somebody snorted. As I turned around, every muscle in my body coiled out of instinct. Giselle Hartnett stood a hand-span away, her icy blue eyes boring into me.