The Devoted: A Reverse Harem Omnibus (The Devoted Season Book 1)(14)

Leaning his shoulder against the door frame, a familiar face smirks at me. My heart flips as I grab the door and slam it in his face.

But his foot stops me. Wedging his foot into the crack in the door, he forces it back open.

“Look, I’m sorry—”

“Move your foot!”

“I hoped to make it up to you,” he flashes that same roguish smile, “I could take you to breakfast?”

My mouth sours. “If I wanted watery porridge, I’d go to the cafeteria! Alone!” I add, moving the door until it jams against his foot, “Now, please leave me alone,”

His friendly blue eyes lose a bit of their bright blue tint. With his smirk capsizing into a frown, he sweeps his eyes from the floor to me, “C’mon, why not?” he takes a step forward, shouldering the door open wider, “Look, I think we started out on the wrong foot,” and he angles his foot so that I can’t force the door further closed, “I’m Sebastian. Moreau,” he adds his last name like it’s some sort of feat, “You down with the Albius shake or are we just gonna do the Lucan thing?”

I cross my arms under my breasts.

“Lucan it is,” he nods and a tuft of scarlet hair flutters over his left eye. My eyes are drawn to the brilliant color, “Just give me a chance, huh?”

“So you can get me into further trouble?” there’s bile burning in the back of my throat, a surge of guilt riding the wave. I kind of feel like I’m blaming him for my mishaps. For the trouble I’ve caused myself. My shoulders droop as I look into his charming face.

I can’t believe I’m saying this. “One chance.”

His hands grab my shoulders. I take a jerking step back, but he doesn’t let go. From here, the scent of cloves wafts off him. Wild, evergreen, and free.

“Look, that was my bad.” he says, giving me a gentle shake, “I never meant for...well, anyone to get involved with that lot. You know the city down there? At the base of the mountain?”

I shake my head. Milea, the city of steam. My carriage driver took the long way to the academy, skirting around the city. Now, the way this guy’s eyes twinkle when he mentions it, I wish the carriage driver hadn’t.

“I’m from there. Those Initiates, on their days off, always go down and start trouble.”

“So, you were—what? A wannabe guard?” I shrug his hands off my shoulders, “What does this have to do with you getting my evening off revoked?”

He lets out a breath of laughter, “That’s all you care about? Not those Initiates wanting to rip your head off because you turned one of em into a chicken?” he steps back and I almost miss his scent, “Hilarious, by the way. You’ve gotta teach me that...?”

I couldn’t, even if I wanted to.

“Oh,” I run a hand through my frizzy hair. Never before have I been so rude to someone, “Lilac Heart,” I tell him, “I’m from Tulsdale.”

Sebastian’s upper lip twitches, “Is your name...foreign or something...?” he brings a hand to his chin, “Lilac...Heart...,” he chuckles.

I roll my eyes, “My name is not a pun,” I lean against the door, “I’m closing the door now—”

“—wait,” His broad shoulders force the door open even wider.

I back into my room and let out a sigh, “Yes?”

“Come to breakfast with me—in town. It’ll be my, sorry-for-taking-your-evening-away, present, okay?” his sly smile promises that it’s anything but. Yet, I’m compelled to trust him. Less for the breakfast and more for the promise of free food.

A flash of that grainy gruel slopped onto a too-bright blue plastic tray makes me shudder. The stuff the academy feeds us is barely even food—if you can even call it that.

I sigh. I’m going to regret this.

“Fine,” I nod, crossing my arms again, “but you’re buying,”

He flashes a sideways grin, all teeth, “Hope you like pancakes.”

###





THE CARRIAGE RIDE FROM the academy to Milea flashes by in a blur of grass and bronze. The city is so unlike home. Where Tulsdale had ancient architecture built well before the expulsion of the Great Dark and the war that followed, Milea is a testament—just like the academy—to progress.

Steam technology runs rampant in the city. Tumultuous clouds of steam rove from hundreds of interconnected chimneys, some industrial-sized, others smaller than my pinky. Entering the city, we’re greeted by a deluge of people in pinstripe suits and steel-bone corsets, all meandering up and down the city’s main boulevard, the street made almost entirely of reflective bronze metal.

Signs fly around like buzzards, buzzing high above my head. I clamp my jaw closed while my heart flutters. Advertisements for a plethora of establishments bleep and sing and soar. On the ground, there are these humanoid contraptions made entirely of metal that observe and sometimes sell things from the storefronts of tinkerers caves and clothing establishments.

“You live here?”

Stopping before a wide red brick building, he steps back and the glass door slides open with a whoosh.

At the sound, I jump back and almost bowl a couple over. I mutter my apology and freeze. In my mind’s eye, the door decides to slide closed the moment I’m within its steely clutches.