Bloodline Secrecy: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Academy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 2) Lan Chan (pdf e book reader .TXT) 📖

magic was earth-based. So unless I wanted to point at something and have it grow, there wasn’t really much I could achieve with that particular skill set. At least he made no comment about the fact that it looked like a rainbow had thrown up on the blade.

“What about your other power?”

I stilled.

“What other power?”

He tilted his head to the side. “The one that hides beneath the surface of your seemingly helpless façade.”

“We’re done for the day,” Kai said.

He grabbed my shoulder and we were back in the portal field before the guard or Astrid had a chance to react. She appeared a second later.

“This is beginning to become dangerous,” Astrid said. “Something is not right about him.” She considered what she was saying for a moment. “You know what I mean. Something other than the fact that he’s a psychopathic killer.”

“Agreed,” Kai said. “I might have to speak to Gran about further visits.”

“Excuse me!” I stamped my foot. “Don’t I get a say in this?”

“No,” they both chimed.

“Your safety is the priority,” Kai said. “It’s no longer safe.”

“But –”

“This isn’t a discussion, Blue.”

“How am I supposed to learn how to use this thing then?”

He shrugged. “Maybe you just shouldn’t use it.”

“Great plan. I’ll just go back to getting my ass kicked, shall I?”

“Weren’t the nymphs teaching you to wield it effectively?”

I glared at him. My lips quivered. I hadn’t been into the Grove in weeks. Not since the day after my bust-up with the nymphs. I’d woken up at my normal time to go to work, but the forcefield had been erected again. I’d stormed off in a huff instead and hadn’t gone back. “I’m leaving now.”

“Wait –”

I shook my head. “I’m okay,” I said, purposefully not using the word fine. “I’ll find some other way to figure this out.”

Turns out, there was no other way. Basil and I scoured the books in the library. As soon as they referenced anything that remotely mentioned demon blades, the topic veered off or away onto something else.

Jem, the imp who helped behind the library information desk, vetoed our questions about whether there were any hidden books on the topic. “No can do, folks,” he said. “There’s a reason we don’t keep those books in the library. Anything remotely close to that was taken away after Fred Mendlesen was expelled.”

I paced around the room, frustrated by the lack of reference material. “This is so annoying,” I said. “How do they expect us to be able to defend ourselves if we don’t understand what it is we’re defending against?”

Sophie sat on the floor, her potions books scattered around her. “To be fair, they do teach it in the Black Magic class in third year.”

“I’ll probably be dead by then,” I said.

“Way to be dramatic.”

“Perhaps if you spent a bit more time training with it,” Basil suggested.

I skewered him with my gaze. “I’m just saying,” he said, “it feels a little like you’re trying to avoid the blade altogether.”

“He has a point,” Sophie said. “Didn’t Skander tell you that the best way for you to learn is to become attuned to the blade? You barely touch it. It spends most of its time gathering dust under your bed.”

“I carry it around with me all the time!”

“Not for the past few weeks.”

“What are you, my mother?”

She grinned. “Sometimes it feels like it.”

“Oh, shut up!”

Her point was proven the next day when I turned up to Demonology 101. Charles took one look at me and groaned. “No demon blade again?” he said.

“I can’t carry it around with me all the time,” I huffed, sinking into the chair beside Cassie.

“With everything that’s happening right now,” Maddison interjected, “The Nephilim are all armed and ready.”

“Well, I don’t have the luxury of dematerialising my sword whenever I feel like it,” I snapped.

“You don’t know that. You’re too chicken to try.”

“Excuse me?”

Cassie placed a hand on my arm when I leaned forward. Maddison snickered and turned back around. Luckily Professor Magnus walked into the room and we continued our lesson on native mythological creatures. We were gearing up to visit the billabong soon. I had been excited last week to actually see the bunyip with my own eyes.

I was just getting into the lesson when Maddison tossed a piece of paper onto my desk while Professor Magnus’s back was turned. I opened it to find a very skilled drawing of a chicken holding a sword in its beak.

Cassie snorted beside me. When I turned towards her, she tried to hide her smile behind her hand. Great. Now the kids were ganging up on me too. It didn’t help that Isla and I were paired up again in Weaponry and Combat. It was like they didn’t learn.

“Do not stab her,” Professor Eldridge said.

“Seriously,” I asked, when she walked away, “that’s all you’re going to say on the matter?”

She shrugged. “It was just a tiny flesh wound.”

Isla smirked.

“Don’t forget I know your greatest fear,” I told her.

She flipped the handle of the sword she was holding. It spun in mid air and landed deftly in her palm again. Show off. “Don’t forget I know yours!”

If anything, I’d wanted to forget last semester’s exams. Thankfully, this semester we had the Halloween Showcase, and we only had to pick one of our skills to perform. Maybe I wouldn’t get killed this time around.

Isla might not be trying to injure me anymore but that didn’t mean she went easy on me either.

“Ow!” I said when she rapped me on the wrist for the fourth or fifth time.

She ground her teeth together. “I don’t see the point,” she said. “You’re seriously not good at this.”

“How many times do I have to tell people that I’m human and you’re all a bunch of supernaturals? How am I expected to keep up with you?”

“Sophie doesn’t seem to have a problem.”

“Yeah well, good for her.”

“I’m going to find another partner.” She huffed. “I would have thought this would be the one area where you’d be trying harder.”

“Are you serious?”