The Sons of Satrina: A Sons of Satrina Novel (21 page)

“What’s up, Ash?”  Trey asked.  He may have looked like a big beast of a man, but to her he was a total teddy bear.  He had a heart of gold and was fast becoming one of her closest friends in this place. He was like the big brother she’d never had.

Aisline tried to form a convincing smile on her face but the muscles didn’t want to play ball, “I’m fine.” and she looked back down at her food.

Great.  Her response just brought her the attention of the entire table, who were all now asking her what was wrong with her, if there was anything that they could help her with, blah, blah, blah.

“No guys, it’s all good.  Women’s things, you know?”  She raised an eyebrow at them and in unison they all turned away and started up animated conversations about inane crap.  Aisline grinned to herself.  That was a sure fire way to get the guys off of her back.  She’d have to remember that one for future reference.

A day or so later, walking into the computer suite, the first person that she saw was Denver.  Turning to glance at her as she passed, he quickly moved his eyes back to the screen in front of him.

Yeah, that’s right, Aisline thought to herself.   She was more than prepared to hit him where it hurt if he made a wrong move again.  If he wanted to play that game, she’d let everyone know the foul move that he’d made and exactly how she’d put him to the floor.  At least he seemed to have the sense to avoid her, for the time being any way.  She knew Denver, she knew his type.  Soon enough, he’d be acting the Big I Am again. 

It wasn’t the best introduction to life at the academy, Denver being an ass like that.  But, it showed that she could stand up for herself and not be backed into a corner, just because she was a girl.  No one but she, Denver and Kayleigh knew about the ‘incident’ and that was how it was going to stay. 

She had feared which direction her little altercation with Denver would take and she was glad to see that he had opted for avoiding her.  There was no way that she was going to let herself be walked over, and he knew that now.  She was glad he was keeping out of her face.  She didn’t relish a confrontation every time she saw him. After all, it wouldn’t make for an easy atmosphere for the next four years.

Sitting down in front of her designated computer
, she turned to smile at Jax, who was stationed next to her.  The smile was for real now. Not forced, not fake.  Genuine.  Sure, she was still pissed at Denver and Kayleigh, but it wasn’t worth the time or energy.  She had friends here, friends who wouldn’t think the worst of her, friends like Jackson

“You okay?” Jackson whispered over t
o her. She nodded in return, but quickly faced her computer when she saw Professor Fieldman approaching.

Looking at what was on her screen, she paused for a moment before starting the research on the latest assignment that they’d been set.  She didn’t really want to research all the unsolved deaths and murders in the area that spanned over the last century.  She didn’t want to have to find that connection to the Mortuorum.  But she knew why they had been set this task.

The Mortuorum were former humans.  Humans that had been turned.  Often they were on the police missing list for years. Sometimes their disappearances went unnoticed.  They often preyed on the vulnerable, such as the homeless, knowing that they would less likely be missed.  This was a task to show them that the Matris weren’t the only ones who were at risk from these monsters.  They weren’t just here to train to be a warrior to protect their own race - they had a whole world of people to look out for.  It was a daunting thought.

As a living, breathing person, it made her sick to think about it.  To see the death and destruction that they left in their wake.  Creatures that were so closely linked to them, but were so different.  It was unthinkable.  How and why did they act like that?  What warped them to behave so monstrously?  Were the whole Lamia race at risk of spiralling out of control to the deep, dark levels of the Mortuorum?

When she was a kid, Aisline used to have vivid nightmares about the Mortuorum.  In her childish head, she pictured them with big, googly red eyes filled with insanity, nails that curled into razor sharp claws and teeth constantly dripping with blood.  As she grew up, it was even more frightening for her to find out that they looked just like everyone else.  They could live, they could blend.  The enemy was out there, walking and talking among them. 

How could something be so evil and look so ordinary?

She pushed all thoughts of Kayleigh out of her head. It wouldn’t do to think about her at a time like this.

As a warrior, it made her blood boil and made her want to take revenge.
They shouldn’t be able to do what they did. Which was the exact point of this assignment.

Aisline was glad when their time was up because was absolutely starving and couldn’t wait to get down to the cafeteria.  Anything would have done.  A scabby horse would have looked pretty damn
delicious right about now.  She wasn’t sure if it was all the extra physical activity that she had been doing lately, or what it was, but she seemed to be in a permanent state of hunger.

Moving into the line behind the other trainee warriors in the cafeteria, she shuffled on her feet and sighted loudly at the lack of speed of the others in front of her.  Couldn’t they just please hurry up and ch
oose already?  Didn’t they realise that she was about to faint on her feet from starvation at any given moment?

She was relieved that now she was no longer the centre o
f attention wherever she went. There was no longer that sudden swivel of everyone‘s head as she entered a room.  Finally, the rest of them were starting to accept her as part of the fixture and fittings of the place, which made life a hell of a lot easier for Ash.   She hated to be singled out and to be able to blend in with the rest of them?  Perfect.  Just what she wanted. 

Finally, after what felt like weeks of waiting in line, Aisline grabbed hold
of the first thing she came to, mindless of what it was. As long as it was edible, that was good enough for her.  She wound her way through the crowded tables to go and sit with the usual guys.  Luckily, the fates had been on her side today, and as she walked, she noticed that she had grabbed a plate with a humungous portion of spaghetti bolognaise, one of her all-time favourites.   And, a humungous chunk of garlic bread on the side.  Who cared how bad she stank?  She was ravenous!  It wasn’t like she was planning on kissing anyone…

Stopping just in time, she realised that Denver was blocking her way.  He was lucky, if she had been any less starving, he would have been wearing her dinner.  As it was, she didn’t want to waste even one delicious mouthful on the likes of him.

“Ash-” he started to say.

“No.  You don’t call me that.  You can’t call me that.  Only my friends call me Ash.”

Denver had the sense to step back from her harsh glare.  “Look, I just wanted to say-”

Aisline held up a hand, the universal gesture for ‘shut the fuck up and ba
ck away before this gets ugly’ and barely managed to refrain from saying ‘talk to the hand ‘cause the face ain’t listening’. She knew how lame that sounded, no matter how tempting, and she just settled for barging her way past him.

S
he wouldn’t have chosen to stop and talk to him at the best of times, especially after what had happened between them only a few nights previously, and especially not now when her stomach was grumbling loudly enough that the entire student body could have danced the conga to the beats of her hunger.

Slamming down her plate with a little more force than she had planned on, Aisline immediately started to tuck in.  It wasn’t until she was about halfway through demolishing the plateful that she realised that the rest of the guys on the table were staring at her in amused horror.

“What?”

Not one of them uttered a word.  They all just sat there in stunned silence, watching her as she slurped up another string of the to-die-for spaghetti, bolognaise sauce splattering in all directions.

“What’s your problem? I’m just hungry!”  She grinned between mouthfuls.

“Yeah, we kinda noticed that.”  Jackson was the first to snort out a shot of laughter, quickly followed by the rest of them. 

Her mother would have had a total fit at her complete lack of table manners.  She was getting more and more like the boys here, which in her own mind wasn’t such a bad thing at all.  Aisline could still scrub up well if and when she needed to. Not that she’d tried since she had been here. She’d been too busy getting dirty and working up a sweat in the sparring room for any of that girly stuff. She could look and act ultra-feminine if it was called for, but the rest of the time?  She was one of the guys.  And that was just how she liked it.

Chapter Twenty-One.

The days and weeks merged into one.  There was only the odd day off due to the increase in training in their schedule, but even then, the trainees hit the gym.  The oldest trainees had already graduated and were out there on the front line, doing what they did best, doing what they had trained for, and a whole full year ahead of schedule. It was scary to think how fast things were moving in this place.  How long had they been there now?  Weeks?  Months?  Years?  Who knew?!   Training had become their life. That was all that they lived for.

The death of their leader had demanded that ther
e be more bodies on the streets. More warriors to protect their people. More Warriors out there to avenge his death.   They were all working towards the hard target.

They were still no closer to finding out who in particular had been responsible
for Bartholomew’s death and the time that was passing by, with nothing fresh to work on, was infuriating.  The Master Warriors were sharing their daily reports, or some of them at least, with the trainee’s. They used it as another part of their training tactics, and they were still none the wiser.  They had no leads. The trail was cold.  All they could do was destroy as many of the Mortuorum as possible in the hope that they got their guy.

So, the new warriors were out fighting on the streets, and Jackson was jealous.  Jealous as hell.  He couldn’t wait for that day to come, in his mind it couldn’t come soon enough.

Dusk was settling over the large city and the Sons of Satrina Warriors and trainees were starting to stir in their beds.

Jackson rubbed a hand over his face, feeling the tickly prickle of the stubble brush against his palm, trying to wipe the sleep from his groggy mind.  He knew that they were going to be in for another big day today.   Today, he’d heard that they were going to be pitched against some of the older students again, but he didn’t really know this bunch.  Marius and the other trainees that he had worked with before had already left the school, so this was going to a new lot of guys to get to
know.   Which was fine by him. The more the merrier.   Bring it on.

Jackson was enjoying every intense minute of it.  Physically - he was exhausted.  Mentally - he was exhausted.  But there was no way that he was going to drown under the weight of the stress.  He was going to do whatever he had to do to fulfil his destiny.  If he had to do a ‘little’ work now, then so be it.  It would be worth it in the end.  The harder they worked them now, the sooner t
hey would be out on the streets doing what they were meant to do.

Drawing back the heavy drapes in his room, which blocked the sunlight out entirely during the day, he saw that the evening sky was littered with trails of purple and royal blue, heralding the onset of evening time.  This was always one of h
is favourite times of the day. This was the time when the night came alive.  They owned the night.

Sure, when he was growing up, this also proved to be the time when a lot of the humans also came out to play and have the times of their lives, but in the grand scheme of things, the night belonged to the Lamia.  The night was the time of their power.  They ruled the shit out of it.

Standing quietly in front of the window frame, Jackson opened it up a little to let in a rush of cool air.  He could smell rain, not right now, but threatening to fall later, the downpour wasn’t too far away.  The scent washed over him and refreshed him.

Tugging in a deep breath, Jackson grabbed a clean set of clothes and headed out for a quick shower, hoping again to beat the rest of the rabble to it as he usually did.  This was the time when he needed quiet to prepare for the day ahead and the mindless murmur from the rest of the guys wasn’t very productive.

Training was more intense than ever, and his muscles ached on a daily basis. It was lucky in a way that that it was his turn to sit on his butt in front of a computer this morning, continuing his research on unsolved deaths in the area, because he didn’t think his body could survive another morning of intense training.  Saying that though, he felt like not training was a waste of his time.  He couldn’t win either way.

His mind was fully focused on what he had to do, everything that he was being trained for.  Well, almost totally focused.  Apart from that small, teeny tiny, part of his brain that was becoming obsessed with Aisline.

The girl was gorgeous, funny, smart, everything he could want in a girl.  But there was no way he was going to make a move on her.  No way. They were friends, first and foremost.  There was no point in rocking the boat.  A relationship, especially with her, would make an impact on his training, a detrimental impact.  No way.

And he didn’t have the guts to ask her out anyway.

Where would they go?  It was pointless.  He had to concentrate on his training as a warrior.  No distractions.  Nothing less would do.

Later that morning, as he sat staring blankly at the computer screen, he realised that she was the only other thing he ever thought about, apart from his training.   This was dumb.  Nothing would ever come of it, so why bother?

And right there, right then, he resolved to push any feelings he had for her to the back of his mind and keep them locked up there.  Locked tight.  With a key.  And maybe a pad lock.  Even a safety chain or two.