All That Lives Must Die - Eric Nylund [57]
“Why don’t we forget about this,” the Van Wyck boy offered. “There’s no point in fighting. Unless you were going to use only magic.”
Robert Farmington sidled up next to Fiona. At first she didn’t recognize him in his neatly pressed school uniform. He had gotten a haircut, too.
“I’ve been wanting to talk to you,” Robert whispered to her.
“Me, too,” she said. “But now’s not the time.”
“Right.”
Robert sounded disappointed. But how did he expect her to talk when Jeremy was about to get pounded flat?
Jeremy stuck his face a hand’s span from the other boy’s. “You want to see me magic? Well, here’s some.”
Jeremy spit into his face.
The Van Wyck boy turned red. He stepped back, cleaning off the spittle with one quick angry wipe. “Okay, Covington—you asked for it!”
Jeremy backed off, smiled, and danced back and forth as the other boy started shrugging off his jacket.
Jeremy didn’t wait. He socked him in the nose.
Bone and cartilage cracked.
The Van Wyck boy fell backwards into the wall, both hands covering his face, tears gushing from his eyes.
The students cheered and yelled.
Jeremy punched him in the gut. He lashed out with his foot, connecting with the other boy’s knee.
The Van Wyck boy doubled over. His leg crumpled.
Jeremy kicked him once, twice.
Fiona felt something greasy in the back of her throat and thought she might be sick.
Miss Westin watched impassively, arms folded over her chest, almost as if she were grading the boys on a test.
If no one was going to stop this—Fiona would.
She pushed her way through the crowd.
Jezebel, though, got there first. The other students let her pass, seeming to fear getting in the way of an Infernal. She stepped between Jeremy and the Van Wyck boy just as Jeremy brought back his foot for another kick.
“You’ve won,” Jezebel said.
Jeremy blinked, and the rage faded from his eyes. “Do you think so?” He drew back, smiling, for one final coup de grâce.
“First blood”—Jezebel nodded to the downed boy—“is as far as they allow in campus duels.”
Jeremy lost his smile as he watched his opponent cough a globule of blood and snot from his face.
“Continue if you want,” Jezebel nonchalantly told him, “but it would be a shame to have a team member suspended over such a trivial rule.” She glanced at Fiona. “And over such a slight reason.”
Jeremy straightened his jacket and brushed back his silky blond hair. He knelt and told the boy, “That should teach you a lesson. Next time, mind your manners when in the presence of a lady.”
Jeremy then bowed to Fiona, and although he faced her, he seemed to be performing for the watching crowd. “Your honor be upheld, fair maid.”
A few girls giggled.
Fiona wanted to slap Jeremy’s grin off his face . . . but there’d been enough violence for one day.
Miss Westin, without comment, turned and marched back to class. Most of the students took this as their cue to leave as well.
Fiona went to the Van Wyck boy to help him up, and even though it wasn’t her fault, she thought she should apologize.
The boy’s bloodshot eyes stopped her cold, however; it was pure spitting-cobra venom.
He blamed her. And there’d be no explaining or apologizing it away.
Fiona also knew that somehow, one day, he was going to get even with Jeremy . . . and with her.
17. Cronos the Titan is often differentiated from the Chronos, the Greek deity and personification of Time. Modern mythohistorians, however, now believe they were the same entity, this later persona created for Cronos when he joined his offspring in their rebellion against the ancient Titans. Gods of the First and Twenty-first Century, Volume 4, Core Myths (Part 1). Zypheron Press Ltd., Eighth Edition.
18. The three Moerae, the Norns, or the Fates are Clothos, the youngest Fate, who spins the thread of a person’s life; Lachesis, the middle Fate, who measures the length of a person’s life; and Atropos, the oldest Fate, who cuts the thread of life. Their origin is unclear. In many accounts, they are the daughters of