Tales & Time (Lost Time Academy #1)(20)

“Their parents are on the Masters’ council and extremely powerful. The brothers disappear every other week for days at a time, and the school doesn’t even ask where they go. Their previous fiancé turned up dead, and no one knows who did it. I saw Noah and Knox come back covered in dirt and blood one morning not long after she died…just be careful. They have dark secrets.”

“I think the boys I remember as a kid are long gone,” I admit. “I need to remember that when I see them. I need to remember things have changed.”

“There is nothing boy about the Tale brothers. The sooner you learn that, the safer you will be.”





Chapter 12





“Why do I need to wear stretchy clothes, Lane?” I ask Lane as I pull up the leggings that fit just a little bit tightly. I look over at the book I opened up and rested against my pillows after getting dressed in what he suggested for today. Lane just smirks as I pick up a black hoodie out of my wardrobe and put it over my tight clothes, hoping to cover up some of my skin on show. I glance in the mirror at the tight black leggings that go up to my mid waist and the light blue crop-top that hangs over one shoulder, short enough to show off my ribs. Yeah, that didn’t work.

“What time is it?” Tavvy groans, before climbing down the steps of the bunkbed with messy hair sticking in all directions. She rubs her eyes and then pauses, staring at my outfit and then to Lane. “Oh god, it’s Friday, isn’t it?” she says with a long groan of annoyance.

“Considering yesterday was Thursday? Yep,” I reply, and she grimaces at me like I just confirmed the world was ending.

“Wow, your second day at this school is going to suck. It’s fight training class all day,” she explains why she doesn’t look happy and why Lane suggested stretchy clothes. I’ve never even punched someone before, how the hell am I going to survive fight class?

“Fight training?” I nervously question her, hoping she is going to tell me it’s a big joke or something.

“Yep,” she says, yawning and grabbing clothes out of the drawer as I go and sit on the bed. “Be prepared to get your ass whooped, but they have this healing cream that is amazing to mend you. So don’t worry too much.”

“There is no part about that sentence I don’t worry about,” I admit to her.

“Why are you up so early anyway? I thought Sleeping Beauty’s descendant would like to sleep-in like yesterday,” she asks me as she picks a brush up and starts sorting out her hair. “It took me an hour to wake you up.”

“I get these bad dreams sometimes. I just couldn’t get back to sleep, and I thought I might as well get up. Though I’m regretting it now,” I say, covering up a yawn as she pulls her hair into a tight bun. I wonder if I should put my plaited hair up but decide I should just leave it.

“What do you dream of?” she asks, pulling off her pyjama dress and getting changed as I figure what exactly to tell her. The dreams don’t even make much sense to me, and most of it, I try to make myself forget as soon as possible.

“Crows. Fire. People dying. The same dream I’ve had for months. It doesn’t make sense and never changes,” I admit to her, and she finishes pulling on leggings and a long vest shirt before replying to me.

“It might be a power of yours, you know. The dreams could mean something,” she suggests.

“I don’t think I even have any powers. Nothing weird has happened so far, and these dreams happened before I opened that book on my birthday,” I explain to her. I guess the dreams could be trying to warn me of something, but I highly doubt crows, fire and dead people are clues of anything good.

“It takes fear, Madi, true fear to access your powers at the beginning. I got mine for the first time in fight class, so do most people,” she tells me. “The teachers will let your opponent push you harder to see what you can do. As no one knows your powers yet, they will be expecting a show.”

“Great, so I have to be close to peeing my pants to get my powers?” I sarcastically ask her.

“Yeah. I heard a kid actually did that once though,” she says, making me more nervous, and she glances at my pale face as she pulls her trainers on. “We will skip breakfast because you might throw it up, now I think about it.”

“Might?” I whisper.

“Actually, you will. We always run ten laps around the academy before we even start the practice fight. The teacher shoots the people at the back with streams of water from her hands if you fall behind or try to stop,” she tells me. “Freezing cold ice water as well.”

“Any chance I can just skip this class like yesterday’s?” I ask, rubbing my hands together as I get more nervous.

“Nope. Even the Tale brothers don’t skip this one. The academy is serious about fighting class above all else,” she says, and I sigh, looking down at Lane.

“Any tips, Lane?” I ask him.

“Avoid pointy things,” he replies. Yeah, as if that isn’t obvious.

“I meant more along the lines of you explaining my family’s powers and how I should use them, not general useless advice I already know,” I say, and Lane grins at me.

“Your power is going to help you beat them all. I won’t tell you though, it should be a surprise,” he says and then fades away so there is only blue smoke left.