Trials of Ravenwell: A Paranormal Academy Romance (Four Kings Academy Book 2) Read online

  FOUR KINGS ACADEMY

  BOOK 2

  TAYLOR SPRATT

  Trials of Ravenwell

  All Rights Reserved © 2020 Tiffany Bent. First Printing: 2020.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical review and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Author’s Note: All characters in this story are 18 years of age and older, and all sexual act are consensual.

  Dedication

  Dedicated to those who dream big, want everything in life and who aren’t afraid to go after it.

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER ONE

  Aria

  When I was dragged from my home kicking and screaming, and forced into this hell hole they call Ravenwell Academy, did I panic? No.

  When the four ruling Kings of the school started bullying me, demanding I be their queen, did I panic? No.

  When they told me I was to be fought over like a piece of meat in a stupid tournament for my hand in marriage, was I pissed as hell? Yes. But did I panic? No.

  And when my best and only friend in this entire damn academy was kidnapped, did I panic? Ok… so maybe I did a little.

  But right now, being strapped to this damn chair, ropes as hard as steel strangling my wrists, with a deranged man in a cowboy hat glaring down at me with pure menace in his eyes… I’m fucking panicking!

  I glanced up at the lunatic in a cowboy hat who’s lurking over me like a crazed serial killer.

  Maybe I heard him wrong. Yup, I had to be losing my hearing.

  “Um, Mr. Butcher? Is that what you called yourself?” I asked, as sweat beaded up on my forehead and slid down my cheeks.

  “You can just call me Butcher,” he said with a nod, beaming his brown rotted teeth in my direction. He hung over me like a bag of rotten garbage, the terrible stench of his breath making vomit rise in the back of my throat as it wafted painfully into my poor nostrils.

  “Can you repeat what you just said?” I choked out, praying to the Gods I’d heard him wrong.

  “I said Queen Galima sent me here and she requested that I cut your head off,” he stated matter-of-factly, the grin falling from his cheeks.

  Okay Aria, huge fucking need to panic!

  The Void expanded in my chest, readying to spring free, but as I glanced over at the Seer on the ground with the red of his blood puddling around him, the cold hard truth hit me square in the jaw. If this lunatic cowboy man could take down a Seer that easily, my Void would be like a joke to him. Like a bunny rabbit hopping into the ring against Mohamed Ali. Still, there was no way in hell I was going down without a fight. I squirmed in my chair, thrashing back and forth, trying my best to break these damn ropes.

  “Now I know what you’re thinking.” My eyes shot back to him as he folded his arms in contemplation. “I don’t want you to worry your pretty little head about a thing, little girly.”

  He waved his palms, reassuringly. “I’ve been doing this for years. I’m a professional and damn good at what I do. I promise you won’t feel a thing. Just one clean cut and it’ll be over in no time.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me right now?” I yelled. “You plan on murdering me and you’re saying I shouldn’t worry?”

  “I’m just saying you don’t have to make this harder than it has to be. You don’t want your last expression to be an ugly screwed face one, do you?” he asked me with a shrug and I just looked at him, my mouth open wide enough to catch flies.

  Great, my assassin is crazy. He couldn’t just be evil, has to be insane too. And who is this Galima person? What could I have possibly done to her to send this guy after me?

  The Butcher outstretched a callous hand to my neck, his dirt encrusted fingers inching closer and closer to me. I jumped back, almost toppling the chair over.

  “Get away from me! Don’t touch me!” I screamed.

  Is this how he’s going to do it? Do lasers just sprout from his fingers and slice my head off? Is that how he cut down the Seer?

  “Okay look, little girl,” he said, pursing his lips in annoyance, leaning down to look me straight in the eyes. A cold warning that he was losing his patience. “I don’t have all day for this. You’re my first job of the day and I’ve many mo…”

  Cutting him off, I gasped. A sharp, frigid sensation erupting from within me, chilling me from the inside out. My vision went blurry, then focused again.

  Was that my Void? It couldn’t be. I’d never felt like this before. It felt like pure power was coursing through my veins. Like an electric current, unstoppable and all-encompassing.

  I shook like a leaf, almost vibrating, my body struggling to contain the sudden surge in power.

  My blonde hair turned black within an instant, staining my nails and eyes in matching darkness. I glared up at the Butcher, as if I’d been possessed by some foreign entity that lived deep within, formally dormant but now awake and ready to play.

  Jumping back in alarm taken off guard by the presence of an unexpected guest, the Butcher stumbled over the stage floorboards almost falling, before finding his footing again.

  “What in the hell? What are you?” The hat fell from his head like it was stolen by an invisible breeze, and his dark eyes gaped as if forced open by pure terror. In their trembling reflection stood a figure I could hardly recognize.

  It sat in the chair I was in, more haunting, like an angry spirit. An entity of pure evil.

  It looked like some fucked up dark deity, engulfed in black flames, so thick it could eclipse the sun and with piercing red eyes bright enough to burn a permanent image into the corneas of anyone unfortunate enough to see it.

  Was I that… that thing? Was that me?

  The ropes around my arms disintegrated and I glanced down at myself. My breath stopped as my body was engulfed in pure virulent cursed flames.

  I was the monster! But how? This power I now felt. It was unreal. I felt lighter than air, strong enough to take on a pack of wolf shifters, a squad of vampires and an angry sphinx all at the same time, and win.

  “Listen, little girly, I don’t know what this is…” the Butcher said, as beams of red laser came shooting out of his hands and went bouncing off the walls, creating a deadly mesh like light show “… but playtime is over.”

  I was completely surrounded by his lasers, any of which could dice me to pieces like a vegetable cutter.

  “Oh, did you think I was playing?” I said, lunging from the chair and taking a step closer to him, stopping short because of the thirty-something beams that separated us like a high-tech security system. Except touching one of these wouldn’t trigger an alarm, it’d leave you maimed
.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t do that if I were you, one more step and you’ll cut that pretty skin of yours,” he laughed. But then his smile flew from his face like a frightened bird when he saw the blank expression on mine.

  It was like he could sense the shift in our situation, even before I did. And the shift in me. A minute ago I felt weak, vulnerable and scared breathless. But now, it was like I was possessed by something. Something ancient and with vast unlimited power.

  All fear had drained from my body like water down a sinkhole. If anyone was dying today, it wasn’t going to be me.

  The Butcher raised both hands in the air, readying to take his strike and I raised mine, preparing to do the same.

  “You want my head that badly, huh?” I said. “Well, let’s see you take it in the dark.”

  A dark miasma rolled off my hands, filling the room in a thick smoky blanket. It blocked out the stage lights and the light emanating from the Butchers red lasers. The sheer volume of clouds was thicker and heavier than any I had ever summoned before. My every move was instinctive, as if this new power had always been there, hidden somewhere beneath the surface, waiting for me to finally summon it. But why now? I’ve almost died a dozen times over and where was this strength then?

  It was ominously silent, with only the wisp of our breaths as a beacon of life in the darkness.

  Even in the choking blackness, I could sense the Butcher’s lasers zooming forward, zeroing in on me, honing in on my neck like a bull’s-eye.

  His lasers ripped through my dark clouds gunning for me with furious determination, my life precious seconds from being extinguished.

  My Void, now bubbling up inside me like tar, more active, more alive than I’d ever felt it, exploded from the depths of my soul and sprang in the Butcher’s direction, zooming through the darkness just as fast as his lasers.

  The victor at this point wouldn’t be decided by anything more than the luck of the draw.

  The first to hit was the only one with a snowball’s chance of survival.

  A sharp pain radiates across the side of my neck and I choke out a yell, falling to my knees. And worst of all, from the Butcher’s direction I heard not a squeal or pain of victory, of anything.

  The darkness shrouding the room faded as if sucked away by a vacuum and the stage lights illuminated the stage area once more.

  Crap! Crap! Crap! Was this it? Am I dead?

  I slapped my hand over the side of my neck and felt the warm dampness of fresh blood wetting my fingers. I’d been hit, but how badly? Fear exploded in my chest and my knees trembled uncontrollably.

  Has he sliced my neck so clean the veins still circulated blood for the moment? Will one turn of my head be all it takes to end me?

  My heart pounded in my chest as the memory of the four Kings came rushing through my mind. They’d put me through hell and back. Because of them I’d lost my home in the forest and was taken to this hellhole of a school. If I died right now, I’d blame them, and yet, now in what could be the last moments of my life, they were all I could think about.

  A cough broke the silence, and at risk of cutting my final moments short, I jerked my head up slightly to glance across the room.

  It was the Butcher. The crazy bastard. He laid on the ground, skin white as a sheet. Wait. Was that a hole in his side? Yes! It was a gaping wound that now gushed blood from his side like a spring; the hand covering it doing nothing to slow the flow.

  He stared at me with heavy lids, clinging to whatever bit of consciousness he had left.

  Wait. Had I actually won? Had my Void hit before his lasers?

  I shifted my head from one side to the other, barely registering more than a tiny twinge of pain. I removed my hand from my neck and rose to my feet to eye my palm.

  My eyes widened at the sight. Only a few drops of blood!

  He’d barely grazed me! I had won. Oh my God, I actually beat him!

  Two points for Kolgrim! I resisted the urge to yell out and jump up and down at the same time.

  “Good job, little girly. I underestimated you,” the Butcher coughed out, a prickle of blood trickling down his chin. He gripped the hole in his side like his life depended on it, and it did.

  I almost felt sorry for him. He looked pitifully at death’s door, resembling a wounded little puppy more than a cold-blooded assassin. But then I frowned, remembering why he was in this position in the first place.

  This monster had killed the Seer and almost killed me. I’d hated that damn seer, but even I had to admit that he hadn’t deserved what he got.

  “Wait, where are you going?” I said with an outstretched hand as he slowly stood, turning to limp away. “The fight’s over! Let me take you to the hospital wing. It’s not far from here.”

  He let out a booming laugh. “You really are a sweet one, little girly. Ha! I try to kill you and still you want to help me?” he said, pausing to pull a shiny blue rock from his pocket.

  What in the hundred hells? Is that a teleportation stone?

  “Listen Butcher, you’re in no position to travel in this state!” I insisted, running towards him as fast as I could.

  “Stop right there, Void User!” His expression turning serious as a heart attack, his free palm raised in warning.

  Was he seriously threatening me with more of his laser attacks? In his condition?

  I should have been pissed, but all I wanted to do was run over to him and stop the poor guy from keeling over.

  “Listen, little girly,” he said, his expression going fierce. “You might’ve bested me, but the next one she sends will be far more powerful than I am. That crazy succubi won’t give up till you’re six feet under with worms snacking on that pretty little face of yours. You’d better get the hell out of this school, run away as far as you can and never look back!” He gave out a cough and staggered a bit. He didn’t have much time left.

  “Who is this Galima?” I asked, “What does she want? Why does she want me dead?”

  “I don’t know what her problem is with you, all I do know is that you must not enrage her, her power is beyond imagining. As tough of a cookie as you are, ten of you are no match for her.”

  Ten of me? Crap.

  I nearly blew this guy to kingdom come, and he said this succubus was ten times stronger than me?

  I staggered back two steps, my eyes bulging. Who the hell was this woman and what did she want with me?

  The Butcher moved the blue teleportation stone high over his head like a tiny piece of sky. The stone exploded into a million pieces, a bright light escaping as it did. Then like a series of ribbons, bands of color soared all around like flying sheets of rainbow tinged silk.

  Beautiful and majestic, it whipped across the stage area. The bands expanded, radiating around him like lines of flying geese, all converging on where the Butcher stood.

  “Wait, I have more questions. Please, just wait one more minute!” I called out as the bands of semi-translucent color wrapped around the man like a blanket, covering him whole. Without another word from him, there were three flashes of piercing blue light, breaking the sound barrier like clashes of thunder.

  And just like that, he vanished into thin air.

  The room was silent once again, with nothing but me and the dimly lit stage floorboards to keep me company.

  “Miss-Miss Aria Void User. Are you there?” a voice choked out, so faint, its owner must have had one foot in this world and the other in the next.

  My eyes inched over to the floor on the other side of the room, not believing my ears. Wait. That couldn’t be, could it? Seer Mordecai?

  A bald man in a red cloak, palms in a pool of his own blood, staggered to stand. Unable to raise more than a few inches at a time. I walked over to him, my eyes falling to where he’d helplessly laid.

  So it’s true what they say. Evil really doesn’t die so easily.

  “Please, please help me,” he choked out, clenching his belly in pain, no doubt trying to stop the blood from pourin
g out of the wound the Butcher inflicted on him.

  Just look at him, trying to get up and failing pitifully, a dying old man in need of help, desperation heavy in his eyes as he looked up at me, pleadingly.

  “So, the Butcher’s blow didn’t kill you?” I said, and he frowned, registering my apprehension to help him.

  Could you blame me? I mean, this was the son of a bitch responsible for the hell my life was now. It was him and his buddy, Seer Michael, who decided it was a good idea to destroy my home and play ‘kidnap the Void User.’ They had me dragged from my home in Horetia Forest, all so they could throw me to four wolfish Kings and have them fight over me like a piece of meat.

  I had dozens of friends back home too, both pixie and fairy kind. All of whom I’d probably never see again. All thanks to this monster in front of me.

  “Please!” He cried, clasping his hands in a prayer. “I’m blacking out. You have to get me to the hospital!”

  “Oh, so now your Mr. Nice guy? Now that you need my help. After all the shit you’ve put me through?”

  “Be reasonable!” he demanded.

  “Was it reasonable to frame an innocent woman for murder? Make her out to be a dirty criminal and have her sent to some hellhole school against her will? Hmm?” I retorted.

  “No… but.” Holding a hand up to interrupt him, I continued. “Was it reasonable to send four powerful elementals’ after me, telling them I was the key to them taking the Grand Lord’s throne, then telling them to fight over who gets to take me? Do I look like a piece of unicorn steak to you?”

  “No! No! You don’t and I’m so sorry, I’m sorry okay! Now will you ta…” he stopped short as his eyelids fell like a curtain, his face crashing with a hard splat into the pool of his own blood.

  “See, how easy that was? To say you’re sorry?”

  I grabbed the old man by the ankle and started dragging the poor old fool off the stage and towards the hospital wing.

  Great, Aria! So now you get to play babysitter to some old dude, while still needing to find out what the hells happened to Cas and figure out where in the hundred hells that new power came from.