The Unclaimed (University of the Gods Trilogy Book 1) (4 page)

It took several minutes for the room to abate.

“As usual, we will issue the challenges again this year.”

Cheers yet again and Cassandra wondered what he meant by that.

“Let me congratulate the three best third-year contestants from last year. Come on up to receive your prize.”

The prize was a small golden needle and a certificate.

“Not much of a prize”, Cassandra muttered and almost choked when Charlie whispered into her ear what the certificate was worth. Enough to pay their way through university and then some. Heracles announced the three names and Cassandra wasn’t surprised however that it was three Claimed who took the prize.

Heracles shook their hands and waited until they had taken their seats again.

“Serve and protect”, he boomed again. “Never forget. Classes for Protectors start the day after tomorrow at seven in the Colosseum. Everyone else has to be in the classroom at eight the day after tomorrow for their first lecture. Which brings me to the last point on my agenda – sending you all downstairs for a round of well-deserved champagne. Go ahead, celebrate the beginning of the new academic year, get to know each other, have a little fun.”

He bowed to the demigods and then left the stage. The golden twins acknowledged that with a gracious nod. Arissa, the ice-queen, proceeded to stand up from behind their table and stepped a little to the side. Cassandra expected her brother to do the same; except he couldn’t. With a shock, Cassandra realized that he was bound to a wheelchair. The son of Hades pulled him back from the table and started pushing him off the stage.

Everyone waited silently until the beautiful boy and the rest of his friends had passed them. Cassandra thought that she should have noticed that there was something off about the way he had moved. But she had been distracted by Shadow boy, she had to admit. There was something about him that kept her teeth on edge. Passing them, he kept shooting menacing glances at everyone around them while the beautiful boy called Alexander was attempting to smile upon the rows and rows of staring Claimed and Unclaimed alike. It was a tired smile though and one that barely concealed his underlying pain.

With a sigh Cassandra followed Charlie downstairs and saw that he had already organized two glasses of champagne for them and was trying to stop Jim from obtaining one as well. Despite what Heracles had said about them all having been accepted because they were something special, it was obvious that there still was a clear distinction between Claimed and Unclaimed. The Unclaimed stayed back, quietly nipped at their glasses and looked like they would rather be anywhere but here. The Claimed formed small groups but most were either staring at the demigods or trying to get a word with them.

The ice-queen Arissa was bored and made no attempt to hide it. She only spoke to her friends and basically ignored everyone else. Her brother, on the other hand, smiled and seemed to try to say a kind word to everyone. Cassandra wondered what would happen if she simply walked up to him. Nothing good she guessed. The son of Zeus was finally relieved by the dean who asked the demigods to retire to another room with him. Just before they exited, Arissa pointed out Cassandra to the two boys called Bear and Wolf and Cassandra felt her stomach tighten.

The two huge demigods started moving deliberately towards her. Cassandra did a quick calculation. They wouldn’t take her on in here – or would they? The room practically parted before them and Cassandra made a split-second decision.

“You, my new friend”, she said and took Charlie by his sleeve so he couldn’t run, “are coming with me.”

No one could ever say that alcohol didn’t sharpen the wits of a descendant of Dionysus, so when Charlie turned around and saw Wolf and Bear coming their way and Cassandra heading for the stairs holding on to him tightly, he said “ohnonononono” and tried to get away but Cassandra had him in an iron grip.

“I am going to need your diplomatic skills with them”, Cassandra said through gritted teeth and cursed herself for listening to Pandora and not wearing her belt. “And if everything goes as I expect it to go, you’ll be a witness that I didn’t attack them first.”

Charlie muttered that he didn’t think that would matter because they’d both be dead soon anyway.

“Where the hell are we going?” he cried once she had managed to drag him upstairs.

In lieu of an answer, Cassandra pushed him into the Ladies’ room. She quickly surveyed it again and guessed it would do. She couldn’t have taken them on outside, not unarmed, not like that. At least here she would greet them on her own terms and would maybe, just maybe, stand a chance. She breathed in deeply, closed her eyes and imagined her moves. When they entered, Cassandra was ready for them.

Two pretty Claimed girls came out of the stalls in the Ladies’ room giggling but when they saw a long-legged girl wielding a towel in one hand and a vial with multicolored liquid in the other hand, they quickly left. Charlie pressed himself against a corner, looking pale and scared when the two huge demigods called Wolf and Bear entered through the bathroom door.

“Look look, who’s here”, Wolf said, casually leaning against the wall and playing lightly with his spear.

He made it all look easy but it was clear that he wouldn’t miss if he decided to use his weapon. He was almost as tall as the doorframe, thin but muscular. He had shorn off most of his pitch black hair and had the rest drawn back into a ponytail.

Wolf’s skull was covered in thin black lines reaching down his neck, disappearing into his shirt and coming out again at his sleeves, revealing an intricate net of tattoos that undoubtedly covered the whole of his body. His teeth had been filed into sharp little triangles and when he stuck out his tongue, he looked like a reptile licking its lips because his tongue was split at the front.

The only thing he hadn’t changed were his almond shaped eyes that looked at the world with cruel detachment and barely concealed disgust. Cassandra had a fleeting thought that if he hadn’t worked so hard on looking tough, he would have an almost effeminate beauty that, despite all his efforts, was still quite hard to hide.

Bear was almost as tall as Wolf but twice as broad and packed with muscles. He had gotten rid of the bear hide somewhere between downstairs and coming into the bathroom and was now basically only wearing shorts, exposing a well-trained, v-shaped torso, thighs that were as thick as tree trunks and arms that looked like they could crush an ox. His skin was dark brown from too much sun and looked kind of leathery. His head, too small for his body, was covered in short, dirty brown hair and his face, although covered by a full beard, still looked like it had been kneaded by a child who had lost interest in its work, had stuck two raisins in for eyes and dug two holes where the nose was supposed to be and one for his mouth. But despite his bulky frame, he moved with surprising grace and Cassandra knew it would be a mistake to take him for a brainless brute.

With a roar that shook the bathroom he raised his hammer, accidently smashing it into the ceiling.

“Where is it?” he growled and stepped a little closer. “If you tell me now, I might consider letting you out of this alive. If not…”

He indicated towards his hammer and Cassandra tried very hard not to show her fear.

“I have no idea what you are talking about”, Cassandra said calmer than she felt and stepped a little to the side because Bear’s hulking frame was obstructing her view of Wolf.

“Your tiny companion took something from us”, Wolf said, cleaning his teeth with a knife he seemed to have produced out of thin air. “As she seems to have left the party early, we wanted to give her some incentive to give it back to us.”

By going at me, Cassandra thought and didn’t have much hope of getting through this in any shape to chide Pandora for having lied to her. If she survived this, they would definitely have to talk about boundaries. Again.

Cassandra inched a little to the right, following Bear’s movement with her eyes and registering Wolf’s changed stance when he saw that someone else was in the room with them. But when he realized that it was only Charlie crouching near one of the stalls he relaxed. No threat to them. No help to Cassandra either.

Bear came closer but Cassandra had been expecting that. There would be no playing cat and mouse; simple violence worked just as well for him. Cassandra didn’t wait for him to get close enough to her that he could swing his hammer. She threw the bottle she had been holding at him instead. It was made of light glass and filled with some soapy liquid that exploded in his face and spread its oily content s all over him. It didn’t hurt him but distracted him long enough for her to run up the bathroom wall, wrap the heavy towel round his neck and use the force of the momentum to smash him into the mirror that covered the whole side of the bathroom.

The impact shattered the glass like she had hoped and he fell on his knees. She used the force of the jump to crash down on his arm. He roared, in no way seriously injured and already about to get up again, and Cassandra reached to the side, picked up a shard of glass and rammed it into his neck.

“I thought you wouldn’t attack them first”, Charlie whimpered beside her covering his head with his hands and looking more than slightly panicked.

Cassandra didn’t answer. Even though she might have stopped Bear for a second, there was still Wolf to consider. She more felt than saw Wolf release the spear towards her and instinctively threw herself to the side, smashing into one of the sinks and trying to reach for Bear’s hammer in the process. But her hands were slippery from the blood where she had cut herself on the glass shard and the hammer slipped away.

She immediately rolled to a standing position and once again jumped up the side of the walls and threw herself at Wolf. He was standing there calmly and with no apparent effort threw her across the room against the toilet stalls.

Cassandra, who was used to being thrown off by someone much stronger, was ready for the impact. She let herself crash against the stalls and then rolled towards one of the heavy wooden chairs that were standing in the bathroom. She snatched one up and tried to ram it into Wolf’s side but he evaded the chair with ease, still sneering. The sneer turned into a grimace when Cassandra aimed well and kicked him where it hurt most.

Wolf fell to his knees groaning and Cassandra felt a hand close around her foot, then a tug and with a heavy thud she hit the floor. Bear had her ankle in an iron grip and Cassandra felt herself being mercilessly drawn towards him. Cassandra saw a movement at her side and reacted instinctively. She stuck out her hand, took the hammer Charlie had slipped towards her and in one fluent motion sat up to smash the hammer down on the hand that was holding on to her.

The howl of pain was loud enough that the whole bathroom shook. Cassandra, expecting Wolf to attack her from behind, turned around with a raised hammer but Wolf was looking at a spot behind her, hesitating. Bear, too, slumped down when he realized who was looking at them from the doorframe.

“Stop it, all of you”, the beautiful boy called Alexander said.

Cassandra felt his voice tug powerfully at her mind, then turned around and threw the hammer at Wolf. She intentionally missed him by a fraction, shattering another sink in the process. Then she calmly turned around.

Wolf and Bear had joined ranks with Alexander and Arissa who was standing beside her brother looking furious. Shadow boy, too, was standing at the entrance to the bathroom, looking at them with an expression that was hard to read.

“You need to punish her”, Arissa hissed. “Look what she has done to Bear and Wolf.”

Her brother looked at the two warriors who were torn between shame and rage but didn’t dare do anything to Cassandra as long as Alexander was there with them.

“And for what should I punish her, sister?” Alexander said, looking at Cassandra with interest. “For being attacked in the restroom? Or for reducing two fierce warriors to a bawling heap of shame?”

Wolf gave a sharp growl and Cassandra, shaking with after-battle adrenaline, hurt and rage almost laughed because of the absurdity of what he had just said. A minute, or even ten seconds later and not much would have been left of her.

“What do you think, Ben”, Alexander said, his eyes still not leaving Cassandra’s face as if he was looking for something there. “Maybe next time my dear sister should send an army to retrieve what she has lost. Just imagine if something else went missing. Like her good judgment, for example.”

Arissa snarled and the boy called Ben, who had been watching Cassandra with the same intensity his friend had, didn’t answer, only wrinkled his brows when Cassandra swayed slightly and eventually steadied herself against one of the few remaining sinks.

“Maybe next time she should just ask for it herself”, Cassandra said hoarsely and Alexander laughed.

It was a nice laugh, warm and honest, but she didn’t trust it or him. He knew too well how to use his voice and she felt that this was just as dangerous as Wolf or Bear attacking her. Again, she felt dizzy so she wasn’t prepared for what came next. Cassandra felt something sharp slash her cheek open. Surprised, she reached for the spot where blood was running down her cheek.

“Don’t ever talk to me like that again, brother”, Arissa said, her voice cold and burning hot at the same time. “And you, Unclaimed, don’t you dare think that I would ever lower myself so much as to ask you for anything. You and your blue-haired pixie scum of a sister have something that belongs to me and whatever you think you did here…”

She didn’t get any further because Cassandra, with the deep calm that always came with something she knew was unavoidable, went straight at her. Because she could bear being attacked for something Pandora had done, she could have even lived with promising Alexander to get that thing back to his sister but what she wouldn’t accept was anyone insulting her sister.

Despite Charlie’s cry of warning and the sure feeling that this went against everything her father had taught her, Cassandra went straight at Arissa. Before she came even close, the son of Hades was on her. With a force greater that anything she had ever met, he threw her into the wall. Her head went smashing against it and her world turned black.

Cassandra woke up with the thought that no living being should be so fast. Her hand was throbbing from where she had cut herself with the glass shard and her cheek hurt more from pride than actual pain but the real damage lay in her head that felt like it had been split in two. She tried to move and immediately felt bile rise in her throat and slumped back again.

“You have a minor concussion”, a dark voice suddenly said beside her and Cassandra scrambled to the side, frantically trying to get a hold of some kind of weapon.

She had been sure she was alone and suddenly he was there, detaching himself from the shadows as if just a moment ago he had been one too. She had never felt so exposed in her life.

“What do you want from me?” she said hoarsely.

He didn’t look as strong as Bear or as fierce as Wolf but he had something about him that made her skin crawl. He was night moving, shadows reaching for you. A nightmare come alive. Except, he wasn’t. Because when he came to crouch down next to her, his eyes weren’t cold, opaque holes of darkness but it was rather like looking at a silent lake in the middle of the night.

“We have a proposition to make”, he said, his voice making every fiber in her body vibrate. “You will give us back what your sister took. And in return, we will not tell the dean about it if you agree to pay us back five times its worth.”

Cassandra started to shake her head but thought better of it.

“I am going to give it back to you”, Cassandra said, finding it in herself to smile. “But I am not going to pay you for it.”

If he was angry about her resistance, he didn’t show it.

“And why do you think we would let you do this?” he asked, curiosity disturbing the peace of the lake that were his eyes just enough to see a tiny sliver of silver moonlight reflected in them.

A reflection of the light in the bathroom, Cassandra told herself, but still. Beautiful. She felt bile rise again and hoped she wouldn’t be sick in front of him. She breathed in and remembered the glittering object, tried to remember why she had thought that it wasn’t right somehow, why it had been so bright. Her brain was grasping at the answer, almost had it, let it slip away again.

She looked at him again. Silver moonlight. Reflecting on a lake. And suddenly she knew what it had had been bothering her. Pandora’s room faced North. There had been no light to reflect on the object.

“Whatever it is my sister stole from you is illegal”, she said, exhaling slowly. “Regulations state that you are not allowed to possess true mythological artifacts in here. Not even you.”

When he slightly raised his eyebrows in surprise she knew she had gotten it right. Or rather that she had gotten something right because it wasn’t quite the answer he had been expecting. Cassandra made herself sit up a little straighter.

“So here is my proposition for you”, she said and got up staggering. He raised himself too in one swift movement. “How about you leave us alone and…”

She didn’t get any further because this time she couldn’t control her stomach. Once she was finished, he handed her a towel.

“You know that your little speech would have been much more impressive if you hadn’t puked”, he said and waited until she had cleaned herself up.

“You don’t say”, she murmured, pressing the wet towel against her temples that were throbbing like crazy now. “Tell him that I am going to give it back tonight and that I want you to leave us alone. All of us. No repercussions on anyone or I will tell the dean about the object. Even though I am just an Unclaimed, this should matter. He can’t ignore his own rules.”

At least she hoped he wouldn’t. The son of Hades didn’t give any indication that he was impressed by her threat, simply gave one sharp brief nod. But that was good enough for her.

“And now, if you don’t mind, I will get myself home. And tell your girlfriend that if she ever sets her dogs on me again, they will not survive it.”