Chapter 19

My heart thudded in my chest. Did he know who I truly was? Was he telling me that through dark eyes and a locked jaw. I had to come up with something and fast. I shoved his chest. Then, I panicked when I remembered what usually happened when I touched him.

But there was no electricity this time. Even more surprising, my shove managed to push Maximus away from me and the tree. He looked at me with wide eyes, full of the same surprise I was feeling. He rubbed at his chest.

“Don’t mess around with me,” I said, softly. “Your jokes aren’t funny.”

“They’re supposed to be,” Maximus said. He still was rubbing at his chest. It was if he was trying to convince himself that he was joking. We both knew that he was somewhat serious.

I started towards the exit of the forest. I half expected Maximus to chase me. But he stood there, hand still on his chest, staring off absently. I took that as my chance to take off. I left him I the forest as I continued my run.

The whole time I ran back to campus, I couldn’t help but think about how complicated this mate stuff was. I decided then that I didn’t care about it. I couldn’t care about it. I had far bigger pressing issues. Like Kairos trying to kill me for one.

I didn’t have time to fall for any man, let alone wonder if one of them was falling for me. I kept my head down the entire rest of my run back to my dorm. I tried to flush away the images of all the golden eyes I’d seen locked on my today.

I managed a quick shower and core workout before I went to Basics. Because I hadn’t passed the run, most of my training was focused on speed and endurance. Everyone else was focused on strength and sparring but Coach kept me on the track, running laps and trying to slim down my pace.

At the end of the class, I didn’t feel as exhausted as I thought I would’ve been, given the immense amount of training I had done that morning. But I sure as shit was hungry. I walked to the cafeteria myself as Loren had a second-year class after Basics that I wasn’t able to attend.

I kept my head down in the cafeteria and sat as far away from Kairos and his henchmen as possible. I did see them looking across their table at me a few times, but I quickly averted my gaze.

As I was returning my tray, I felt a light hand on my shoulder. I whipped around, dropping into the stance Valentin had taught me. The woman standing in front of me held her hands up.

“Woah, woah!” she said. “I come in peace, promise.”

I stood back up straight. “Sorry,” I said, walking away so everyone else could deposit their trays. “Force of habit.”

The girl laughed. She had dark, curly hair. Her curls were much sleeker than my unruly red ones. I figured they were probably fake, woven into her hair rather than waking up with them. She had similar shiny purple eyes to Loren. Hers were more blue purple than true purple. She smiled light at me.

“Zora, right?” she said. “I’m Megra. But you can call me Meg. You ran third string behind me for the Run.”

“Oh,” I said. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Meg laughed. “I just wanted to say I’m really impressed by you.”

“Oh?” I said, again. I started towards the door, hoping that Meg wouldn’t follow me out into campus. Something about her threw me off. It felt forced.

Unfortunately, she kept walking with me. She held the door open for me and I ducked outside.

“Yeah,” Meg continued. “I mean you’re the first wolfless I’ve seen come that close to finishing the run. Were you an athlete in the human world?”

“Sort of,” I mumbled. God, why couldn’t she take the hint.

“That’s cool!” she said. Again, so forced and so fake. “Well, I just wanted to let you know that were having a get together before Mateball. If you wanna come hang just let me know!”

I stopped and furrowed my brows. “Mateball?”

Meg stopped as well. She smacked her hand to her face. “Shit, sorry,” she said. “I should’ve figured you didn’t know what Mateball was. Didn’t you grow up in the human world as well.”

“I did,” I replied, tentative as to what her point was.

“Right,” Meg went on. “So Mateball happens on the night of the fullest moon. This year, it happens to be at the beginning of the semester. It’s the time where everyone dresses up and attends the dance to try and find their fated mate, you know what that is right?”

My face fell. Great. More mate bullshit. I nodded once.

“It’s really important,” Meg expressed. “Further more, it’s really fun! Sometimes the older guys slip a little booze into the punch then it really gets the party going.”

I cringed. Sounded awful. “Yeah,” I said pushing past Meg. “No thanks.”

I started to leave when Meg stepped in front of me. She gave me a knowing smirk. “You know,” she said, as if she knew something I didn’t. “I see the way Maximus Wolfham looks at you.”

“Like he wants to kill me?” I humorlessly-laughed. “Don’t tell me you think that’s flirting?”

“No, no,” Meg shook her head. “But really, he’s made eyes at you when you’re not looking. He was staring at you all morning at Basics.”

Yeah ‘cause we finally had enough strength to push him off me and he felt threatened, My inner voice said. I ignored her. She really needed to learn to shut up.

“I don’t think—”

“He’s never brought anyone to the Mateball,” Meg cut me off. “Just saying, maybe you could be his first?”

I shook my head at her. “Isn’t he like in the running to become King?” I said. “Why the hell would he give anyone else attention?”

Meg shrugged. She looked down at her perfectly manicured nails. “I don’t know,” she said. She looked up at me again with that stupid knowing smirk. “Maybe he’s looking for a bit of fun.”

“Not to be rude,” I said sharply. I started to walk away. “But I think your overanalyzing this.”

“I think you’re under analyzing,” Meg drawled. I paused in my walk and turned back to narrow my eyes at her.

“I don’t know what your goal is here,” I sneered. “But I will not be going to the Mateball with some as arrogant and pretentious as Maximus Wolfham. The guy is a total dick and not someone I’d like to associate with.”

Meg burst into laughter. She turned her shoulders to face the doors of the cafeteria. It was right as Maximus was leaving.

“Oh, brother,” she called. My blood ran cold. She turned back to me with a sick smirk. It was the same one I’d seen on Maximus’s face earlier. “I have some terrible news for you.”