The Hunter's Curse (Monster Hunter Academy Book 2) Read online

  Tyler nodded, and Zach sighed, both of them clearly accepting the truth of this. I wondered again about Commander Frost. Despite looking like Paul Bunyan, he was an academic, not a fighter. Had he really fought actual monsters? Or just the holograms they served up to students at Wellington Academy these days, all flash and no fang?

  “Okay, let’s head to the library,” Tyler said. “Zach, try to get some rest. Ideally without setting yourself on fire.”

  Zach laughed a little weakly, but as we turned to go, he spoke up again. “Nina, could you stay for another second? I want to go over…I want to double-check something,” he ended lamely.

  Liam instantly perked up, but Tyler put a firm hand on his shoulder and steered him toward the door.

  “Absolutely, my man,” Tyler said. “Nina, we’ll meet you at the library, okay?”

  I nodded, but I didn’t trust myself to say anything further. There was something in Zach’s expression that unnerved me a little. Like someone desperate to tell you something you equally desperately didn’t want to hear.

  Zach sat as the guys exited, more a collapsing of his bones, and I wondered how exhausted he really was. I moved forward instinctively to help him, but he stopped me cold with a swift jerk of his head. Slowly and carefully, he put his hands on his knees and simply breathed. I breathed too, drawing in the faintly sulfur-tinged breeze, my lips pursed together as my panic grew, but nothing else happened. Zach waited until after the guys were gone a full two minutes, and then he finally shifted his gaze from his hands to me.

  “How bad was it?” he asked quietly.

  I lifted one shoulder. “You were caught on fire, looking like you’d been strung up that way.”

  He winced, then set his jaw, his expression hardening. “Strung up, like in a noose? Or hanging from the ceiling?”

  I shuddered a little, trying to recall. “Your hands were held high, lashed to poles, I think. And you were on fire. You looked like you’d been that way for a while, but you were still alive. When you opened your eyes, they weren’t your own.”

  He wiped a hand over his brow, shoving his hair back. “Did I look like a devil was inside me, a demon?”

  “I’m not sure about that. You just looked like you were in a lot of pain.” I tried to recall more details, but they were already slipping away. I frowned. “It’s already fading. Is that normal?”

  He snorted, sounding impossibly tired. “None of this is normal. You shouldn’t have seen any of that. You shouldn’t have been able to come into my private torment.”

  I flinched back a little, and he lifted a hand that was blessedly intact now, none of the slender, calloused fingers broken. “I don’t mean it like that, I mean it’s just never happened before. It’s really dangerous, and you came right up to me and plunged in. That’s a little scary—not for me, but for you. I don’t know how to protect you.”

  It was almost like he was talking to himself, not me, his words low and wondering, a distracted professor working out an unexpected calculation.

  “Well, have you considered that maybe you’re not supposed to protect me?”

  He looked up at me, startled, but I pushed on. “I mean, Zach, I know the whole point of me joining the collective was to protect me. And I really appreciate it because I need a lot of protection,” I said, trying to go for levity as he grimaced again. “But maybe I can help protect you guys too. Maybe that’s part of the reason I was drawn here, and why Frost went forward with us becoming a collective despite his reservations. Maybe I’m supposed to help.”

  “I can’t imagine Frost would be happy with the idea of you being in danger,” Zach countered.

  “But, you see, that’s not the way it works,” I said. “I fight monsters. I have my whole life, and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. So I was going to be in danger anyway. If I’m near you guys, I at least have a fighting chance to knock back anything that comes after me. If I can return the favor, well, honestly, that makes me feel a hell of a lot better.”

  Even as I said the words, I realized how true they were. I had helped Zach today. Not only here, but earlier in the chapel. I’d been his strength when he had faltered. That was new for me, different. I’d done a good job of protecting myself all these years, keeping others safe, but this was maybe the first time I’d helped protect another hunter. I realized I’d moved closer to Zach only when I saw my hand reaching for his, lying half open on the bed. When I touched his palm, there was no denying the zing of electricity there, the leap of awareness.

  “I don’t understand what this is between us,” he muttered.

  I drew in a deep breath, ready to try to explain further. But Zach’s eyelids drooped as I tried to figure out how to begin, and he sank back into the pillows, boneless.

  “Man, I’m tired,” he murmured. “I need to grab a shower, but…not yet, I don’t think. I’m wiped.”

  I squeezed his hand, perfectly happy to avoid the oh, now that I’m part of the collective, there’s something you need to know conversation. “You should rest,” I agreed. “That’s your number one job right now. I have a feeling that whatever we find in the library, you’re going to be our go-to to handle it.”

  “Yeah,” he murmured, but he was fading fast. As his eyes drifted shut, I leaned forward and dropped a soft kiss on his forehead. He smiled, half asleep as I drew back.

  “I think you’re seriously great,” Zach mumbled woozily. “I really don’t want you to die.”

  He passed out.

  19

  I made it to Lowell Library in just under ten minutes, quickly making my way to the conference room, which had become our unofficial headquarters. Books, scrolls, and various laptops lay open around the space, Liam moving from one to another, muttering like a lunatic. Tyler looked up when I arrived, his smile broad.

  “I couldn’t really get into it when we were with Zach. He was pretty traumatized by the whole thing. But Nina, you were awesome.”

  “So you did see us?”

  He shook his head. “Not exactly, but I could figure it out. You totally marched right in there and ripped Zach out of the teeth of the demon. Not caring about any damage to yourself, not stopping because of the pain. And there was a friggin’ crap ton of pain.”

  Now it was Liam’s turn to stare at Tyler, his river-stone eyes turning speculative. “You could feel what she felt?” he asked, beating me to the punch. Tyler blinked, then nodded, smiling broadly.

  “I sure as shit could,” he declared. “Which makes it even cooler, for those keeping score. I like being this connected. I think it’s helpful.”

  “I’ll remember that the next time I have a migraine,” I snorted.

  Liam’s gaze dropped back to the computer he was holding. He jolted. “Hey, this is what I was looking for, Tyler. I knew I’d read about it somewhere. I just never thought it’d made it to computerized files.”

  Tyler turned to him. “Hit me.”

  Liam started pacing up and down the room, speaking quickly as he read from his laptop screen. “High-level demons don’t travel in packs, like what Reverend Williams said, even if they have bands of scati that show up on their heels to wreak havoc, and timore that follow them around like scavengers, waiting for a strike. But they can attract other high-level demons to their battlegrounds—especially if they feel like they have something to prove.”

  I wrinkled my nose. “Something to prove? Like if one of Zach’s family demons has a pitchfork to grind?”

  “I think so. I think that’s why we’re seeing this uptick in activity, both with the demons on Wellington’s campus and the sightings that have been reported all up and down the coast—maybe they aren’t such bullshit after all. It’s Zach’s time to shine. Maybe it’s his demon’s time too. Remember, if you do subscribe to the whole idea of Lucifer as first fallen, the prime reason given for his downfall was…”

  “Pride,” Tyler said, cutting him off. “Demons are proud. They may not care about much, but they do care about being respected.”


  “Yep,” Liam said. “I think what we’re dealing with here is a demon who’s been disrespected, and he’s out to prove that that was a very bad idea. He’s stirring up the horde to come watch the show.”

  “And that show will play out on campus in real life. Not just in Zach’s mind?” Tyler asked.

  “Definitely in real life.” Liam blew out a breath, tilting his head, the blue-white glow of the laptop reflecting off his deeply tanned skin. “What I don’t know is what will happen once they all converge. Will the other demons chip in to help take out Zach—and us, by extension—or are they just coming for the popcorn? Honestly, we need to talk with Reverend Williams.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure that’s going to go well,” Tyler scoffed. “You see him anywhere around here? I don’t, and that pisses me off. There’s something about that guy that bugs me a lot.”

  I blinked at the very un-Tyler-like anger in his voice. “Really?” I asked. “What do you mean?”

  He shook his head. “You saw the way he treated Zach. Even beyond his disdain for the academy, you’d like to think he would have an appreciation for everything his son has done or can do. And hell, we all saw to varying degrees what Zach went through with demons today. We heard it too. Not only did his dad not give us the intel we need to fight these assholes, but—”

  “The demon said Zach’s dad wasn’t ready to fight,” Liam said, recalling the words from Bellamy Chapel, earlier in the day. “Yeah. I remember that too.”

  I lifted my brows. “Zach’s dad hasn’t told us everything he knows.”

  Tyler finger gunned me. “Exactly. I’m going to text Frost. I expected him to be here already, him and the good reverend.” He pulled out his phone and shot off the text.

  Frost answered immediately…but not in a way Tyler expected. The commander’s heavy boots sounded down the hallway, and a moment later, he swung into the room, bushy brows drawn together, beard jutting out.

  “All of you get to class, now. And look sharp. It’s time to put on the show.”

  I blinked, surprised not only by the demand, but by how quickly the guys were reacting to it. “Put on the show?”

  “This freaking sucks,” Liam muttered, moving around the table, shutting laptops and closing books, stacking everything away in record time.

  “It’s friggin’ bullshit is what it is,” Tyler protested. “They can’t do this to us so randomly. We’ve got work to do. Where’s Reverend Williams? Do you even know what just happened to Zach?”

  Frost’s mouth tightened. “Zach’s injuries will be explained away in one of a couple of different ways, and I left Matthew resting in one of the study lounges. He’s awake, but groggy and a little disoriented. No one knows he’s on campus yet. Let’s try to keep it that way. That means Nina, you’re up for this demonstration too.”

  I stared at him, thoroughly lost. “Up for what?”

  His bushy beard quivered with irritation, and he folded his arms over his broad chest. “Showing our respect for the families that pay our way. Every once in a while, the administration wants them to know that their hard-earned money is being put to good use. The timing for this demonstration is curious, but that doesn’t change the facts. It’s happening.”

  “But what is it?” That seemed reasonable enough. Tyler and Liam had already started for the door, but I hesitated, looking between them and Frost. “Are we going to show people how we hunt monsters?”

  Liam cursed under his breath.

  “That would be a no,” Tyler said drily. “It’s way worse than that. C’mon.”

  20

  “So this is how it goes,” Tyler said as we left the library and began walking swiftly across the campus. “The academy gets a lot of money from donors in very high places. That money funds our tuition in small part, and then our lifelong stipend in large part.”

  “Right,” I said. “Which pisses everyone off to varying degrees.”

  “Pretty much. But all that money talks really, really loudly, and as a result, the administration has deemed it perfectly acceptable for us to serve as ambassadors for any of the donor families, basically at their beck and call whenever they might come to campus. Apparently, this is one of the days we have to pay the price of our entitlement.”

  Pay the price. I grimaced. “You guys are seriously screwed up here.”

  “Don’t we know it,” Liam said, laughing. “But wherever your next class is, look for the fourth horseman of the apocalypse—yours might actually be a horsewoman. Either way, you’ll know who she is—old, rich, annoying. Try not to piss her off, answer her questions, and let her study you like a bug. It gets easier over time.”

  “Study me like a—”

  “Gotta roll. I’m all the way across campus.” Liam peeled off, and, after a quick kiss that left the nearby trees shuddering violently, Tyler did as well. Without any other option, I headed to my Akkadian language class…and found my assignment waiting for me at the door. A thin-faced, sharp-eyed old woman, with her steel-gray hair wrapped back in a severe bun at her nape, her clothes heavy and layered despite the warming day.

  “Margaret Pendleton,” she announced without preamble, clicking her tongue in dismay as she took in my jeans and T-shirt. Clearly not the Wellington uniform, but the Wellington Academy skirt-and-blouse uniform was optional the last time I had checked. Not to mention impractical by any stretch of the imagination.

  I blinked at her. That name…

  Then it came to me. “The Mrs. Pendleton, from my apartment?” I blustered. “You’ve been watching me?”

  “The same. Though rest assured, that’s not my actual residence. And yes, I’ve been watching you traipse between Wellington and your apartment for the better part of a week now. You may enter your classroom. I’ll follow behind.”

  “So that camera is yours?” I demanded, but Mrs. Pendleton merely flapped her hands at me.

  “Cameras,” she scoffed, making me blink. Cameras, plural? “Fat lot of good those are doing with that blocker you’ve set up. Half of them are useless. Bellows is a fool, but at least he had the good sense to alert us when Tyler Perkins brought you home. That’s when we started paying attention, and not a second too soon. Now go. People are staring.”

  My cheeks flaming, I entered the classroom, sitting several rows away from the professor, toward the wall. My iron-jawed senior tagalong drew several curious stares, but fortunately, no one said anything.

  As it turned out, I actually enjoyed this class, which made it almost possible to ignore the old woman beside me. I’d taken Spanish in high school and understood it well enough to test out of it for college, but I’d never really given much thought to the value of learning a second language…especially one not spoken in millennia.

  But Akkadian flowed more naturally to me than I would have expected, and though I’d only taken a few classes, I was able to converse in halting sentences with the instructor, who fell all over herself with surprise and delight at my attempts. I didn’t know if that was, in part, to impress Mrs. Pendleton, but I was still grateful that she made me look competent. By the time class closed, the old woman’s face had softened ever so slightly, but I still wanted her gone. How often did the guys have to deal with this? And when would it end?

  The other students dispersed, and I stood up, gathering my things. I couldn’t stand the tension anymore and turned to Mrs. Pendleton.

  “So did you get whatever you needed? Watching me here?” Watching me anywhere?

  “I did,” she sniffed. “And you should be glad of it. As sponsors of the monster hunting minor, we must ensure the students who receive our patronage are properly vetted. Our vigilance is for your protection as well as ours. Not every student who passes onto our campus has what it takes to be a hunter.”

  “I’m sure,” I said, already tired of the lord-and-master act. Did the guys have to put up with this on the regular? That would get old fast. “Is there someplace that I can walk you to, or, ah, something that you’d like me to do?”
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  She peered at me down her long nose as if she totally saw through my veneer of courtesy. “What I would like is for you to comport yourself in the manner to which a monster hunter should, Miss Cross. You and your fellow students should own this campus. Instead, you’ve been degraded to a shadow of your former selves. Given the givens, I suppose it isn’t reasonable for me to have lofty expectations. However, the least that you can do is not be so dismissive of your own skills. You clearly have been fighting on your own for some time. Stop apologizing for that.”

  I narrowed my eyes at her. “I’ve never apologized for it.”

  “Haven’t you? You second-guess your every move on this campus. Time was, there was more to being a hunter than sticking a knife in some creature’s throat. And not every monster comes from a fairy tale.”

  I blinked at her words—I’d said something similar to Grim the first time I’d met him. There was no way Margaret Pendleton could have known that, right?

  Either way, she drew herself up stiffly. “I’m not a hunter, nor is anyone in my line, but I’m well aware that this academy was put in place to ensure the full extent of your services would be made available to my family should we ever need them. I must say I am chagrined to find you not as prepared as one would have hoped.”

  Embarrassment leapt up inside me. “But—I’ve only just started here.”

  “And you’ve been a hunter your whole life.” She raised a sharp hand, cutting me off. “Enough. I have stayed quiet for all these long years, we all have, as Wellington Academy has tried to stamp out hunters once and for all. It will not continue. It’s beyond time for us to act.”

  Um…what us? I gave her my best smile. Mrs. Pendleton might represent the money behind the monster hunter minor, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t crazy. More to the point, I didn’t care what she said about some of the cameras in my apartment not working—that meant there were more than the one I’d found, and even one was way too many. I was getting my crap out of there, pronto.