Bravery

  Bravery

  Lughnasadh Elite Academy 6

  Layla Heart

  Bravery (Lughnasadh Elite Academy 6)

  Copyright © 2019 LAYLA HEART

  All rights reserved. No part of this story may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without express written permission of the copyright holder.

  This book contains sexually explicit content which is suitable only for mature adults.

  Edition: 20190821

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  Contents

  Blurb

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Next in this series: Recovery (Lughnasadh Elite Academy 7)

  Try next!

  About Layla Heart

  About Easily Distracted Media

  Published by Easily Distracted Media

  Blurb

  Two girls moving house, one boy finally facing his feelings.

  After everything from the last week, they all agreed on one thing, it would be better for Litha and Phoenix to join the princes in the same house. ‘To make sure they’re protected’, of course. But even as the girls are enjoying moving into their new room, the tension between Rune and Kit is still brewing, both locked into their own spaces.

  One early morning trip to the kitchen brings the problems between the two princes to a head, making the incubus face his fears, his feelings and his future in Litha and Rune’s arms.

  But then the newfound calm in the house is shattered when they find out that the king of the werewolves and the queen of the succubi are coming to the campus, something that hasn’t happened in years, and the six lovers have to attend the welcoming ceremony…

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  1

  “The bed and the couch are staying.” Phoenix points at the bed at the one end of the room, and the couch, which is still in front of the small balcony, the curtains billowing inside as the doors are letting in the morning breeze. “Also, those closets are staying too.” She looks over the room. “The rest can be moved to the hallway, for now.”

  “Phoenix...” Litha pulls on her arm a little, pouting. “Those little chairs look super comfy, they need to stay too.”

  “They’re going in the hallway first. We have to decide what we need in here before we can decorate.” Phoenix takes Litha’s hand softly. Apparently, they’ve decided to both move into this room, something about Litha probably not spending a lot of time in her own room anyway. Which, sure, sounds like it makes sense, but it also feels like an excuse to brag about sharing more things with Litha than the rest of us.

  Bane bumps into my shoulder. “Don’t stand there zoning out... I nearly hit you with the horrid lamp Kit found in his room before the summer.” Then he grins and pushes past me.

  “Bane?” Phoenix calls out to him. “I don’t think we’re allowed to redecorate, right? Like, a new colour on the walls or other drapes?”

  He shakes his head. “Nope, that stays the way it is. You can choose what to do with the stuff in the room, swap things in and out, just as long as it stays with the theme of the room.”

  Litha nods. “I like it. I like the colours in here. Feels like summer afternoons.” She lets herself fall back on the bed and Phoenix jumps on it next to her, both girls breaking out in giggles.

  I sigh. “If you want to get stuff moved out of here, you kind of need to help, you know?” I look at them both as I pick up a box with stuff from Kit, my heart going heavier. I’ve not seen him since I talked to him yesterday. He apparently locked his door after I left because when I tried to check up on his last night I couldn’t get in anymore. I’ll have to try again later, see if I can bring him more to eat and maybe talk to him, get him out of this mood.

  “You’re the guys. You’re the ones with muscles...” I catch Phoenix grinning at me from the bed, but Litha jumps on her, tickling her, which I know can be very effective... Phoenix shrieks as she tries to get away from Litha’s nimble fingers. “Unfair! Unfair! What use is there doing anything yourself when you’re moving in with some guys? They can carry stuff. That’s the advantage of it.”

  Litha pulls her close, her lips close to Phoenix’ ear, but she’s talking in a stage whisper. “I thought the always available dicks were the advantage?” She’s grinning and flees from Phoenix, who is looking very evil, and ready to take revenge for the tickling. Litha hides behind me as I’m trying really hard not to drop the box with Kit’s things.

  “Girls... Heavy... This is filled with books...” Or something else, but it’s definitely heavy.

  With a squeal, Litha rushes away from me as Phoenix lunges for her, fleeing to the other side of the room and I shake my head as I quickly get out of the room, not wanting to get run over by two too-giggly girls.

  Bane is standing in the doorway, smiling as he looks over the room. “I guess that moving two girls in here at the same time will change quite a few things. The volume level, for one.”

  I let out a laugh, putting the box near the stairs, as far away from the room as possible, as we have a lot to move out, but also in a place we can’t trip over them. “I think it’s more the relief of a new situation, something happier, than this being a girl thing.”

  Bane nods, his eyes going darker as he glances at Kit’s door. “Yeah, if they were on speaking terms, and if Rune wasn’t hurt, they would have joined in too, screaming just as loudly.”

  “Yeah...” I glance back too, and then step back into the girls’ room, grabbing Litha as she rushes past me. “Watch where you’re going, don’t want you to trip.”

  She looks up at me, grinning. “No, we definitely wouldn’t want that.” She winks. “Although, it would be a great excuse so I wouldn’t have to do anything...”

  “Yeah...” I pull her a little closer and her eyes are immediately on my lips. “I could come up with a different excuse not to do anything, one that doesn’t require you to get hurt.”

  She slowly licks her lips, her fingers tightening in my shirt. “I guess we could try...”

  Phoenix bounces a pillow off my back. “Enough of the sticky stuff. If we don’t clean up, we can’t sleep here tonight.”

  “I wouldn’t mind that.” I keep my voice low, just for Litha’s ears, but the wolf-boy has way too good hearing.

  “You’re not getting her the first night, fae.” He tugs on Litha’s shirt and she gives me a quick kiss before she lets herself get pulled away.

  I can’t help but smile as I watch them get serious about cleaning up the room and I grab a new box. So many advantages to having Litha, and Phoenix, here, but I think the best is how much more easygoing Litha makes all of us. She lets us play in ways that we don’t do often, just be playful with each other, relax a little from time to time, even when everything around us is still such a mess.

  I make myself comfortable in a corner of our living room, surrounded by books about magic, spells and herbs. Even though they cancelled classes for the last week, and won’t teach any classes next week either, I can’t just sit around, especially not when there is so much I still have to learn... If the last week has taught me anything, it’s that I don’t know enough yet, not by far.

  Ember has made herself comfortable on the windowsill right next to me, sometimes letting out a low purring, as she�
�s lounging in the sun. Cats have it so much easier, though, since she’s Phoenix’ familiar, I suspect that she’s also fairly knowledgeable about things, especially about magic. But I can’t communicate with her, so none of that is any use to me.

  Soft footsteps come my way and then Litha puts an ice-cold glass in front of me. “You look like you could use something to drink.” She sits down in the chair on the opposite side of the small table, folding her legs under her as she’s holding a cold glass of whatever it is herself too. She’s wearing a fluttery red dress, no longer Rune’s t-shirt. The dress falls over her legs like a soft blanket and the top of her dress closes around her form sexily, even though it’s not really a sexy dress or anything, it just shows off her curves well.

  “Thanks.” I reach out, taking the cold glass and taking a sip. Lemonade, homemade, if I go by the taste. “Did you make this yourself?”

  She nods, her cheeks pinking slightly. “I felt like I needed to do something, keep myself busy.”

  “Well, it tastes really good. And it’s definitely cold enough.” I wink and she grins back.

  “I considered sliding an ice cube in the back of your shirt, but thought better of it. You looked way too studious to disturb like that.” She puts her glass down, leaning back as she looks me over. “What are you reading?”

  “Stuff for class, and just some other things I’ve been thinking about lately.”

  “Like?”

  “Protection circles and hiding spells.” I shrug, it doesn’t sound very significant, but I know that this kind of knowledge will become important to us, especially if things keep going the way they’re going now... With attacks from my dad probably coming in again soon. We can’t just sit around, waiting, we need a better defence plan, we need to act, not just react. We need to find a way to stay ahead of everything, try to be ahead of it all.

  “Like the one you made around Rune?” She picks up a book from the stack in front of me, leafing through it.

  “Like those, yes. But I’m hoping to find a couple of them which are easier to... ehh... transport.”

  “Transport?” She frowns slightly.

  “Yeah. For if we need to run... If we have to get out of here, for one reason or another. I’d like to be able to hide us, or at least protect us from seeker-magic.”

  Her face falls as she nods slowly. “Can you... Can you teach me too? I need to be able to do more than just blast fire at people. It’s been effective, but...” She also had to kill with it, and I know that still pains her.

  “I can try to teach you. Sure.” I put my book aside. “What would you like to learn? I’m not a witch, so I may not be able to teach you exactly what you’d be able to do, but I can try and help.” I shrug. It’s all magic, I don’t think it would be too different from my own magic.

  “I want to know how to do a protection circle, or maybe something that’s more effective than that? Is there something more effective?” She looks so serious as she considers what she knows and what she’d like to know.

  “Your fire shield was very effective, but not really something you can keep up for very long. It’s an active spell, unlike the protection circle we made next, which was passive.” That gives me an idea. “I’ve got just the thing for you to work on.” I down the lemonade, the cold hitting my body fast, making me blink through the brain freeze for a couple of moments, then I stand up, holding out my hand to Litha. “Let’s go outside, I’ve got a plan.”

  2

  It’s really hot outside, it feels warmer than when I got here even. It’s been hot since I arrived here, something I’m not really used to from the human world, even though I’ve been getting better at dealing with it. Finn pulls me along to an area with a lot of sand at the side of the house. It’s fairly secluded, the thick row of trees on two sides hiding it from the other students, and seems to be some training area or something.

  “We all train here with our gifts.” He points to some square pieces of stone on one side of the area. “Rune made those with his earth-dragon skill, he couldn’t be bothered to sit on the ground all the time, annoyed him.” He smiles and my heart flutters, both at his smile and how fondly he speaks of Rune. I love hearing how they all work together to do things, but also just stories of their friendship, of their past.

  “And that?” I point to an area a little off, which looks like it’s some sort of rock too, but at the same time, the surface looks almost like it’s made of bubbles or something and light catches on some of the surface.

  He grins. “Mine. Kit dared me to test how hot I could make the sand with my electricity. It worked pretty well and turned into glass.” He takes my hand again and brings me over to the glass, running his fingers over the surface. “It came out better than expected. In a better location, I could try to actually make real clear glass, that would be cool.”

  I touch the glass, surprised by how smooth it is. There are flat areas that are simply cloudy glass, and the bubbles I’d seen before are made up of clear glass, the air caught inside. It looks very fragile but also pretty. “That’s pretty cool. I wish I had powers like that.”

  He lets out a low laugh, happy. “Bane’s dad didn’t agree with you, he didn’t think it ‘cool’, he thought it was ‘irresponsible’. He told us to not do this out in the open, where other people could see us. Since it’s technically against the Academy’s rules, and such.” He winks, his eyes warm.

  I look around, we’re surrounded by trees here. “Ehh? It’s pretty secluded here, unless they were looking from the house or the wall.” Which are the only two sides that can look into this area.

  “We did that ourselves. Rune prepared the ground, loosened it up so that the trees’ roots could grow easily, Bane got the seeds from wherever, as he tends to do, and I worked with Kit to get them to grow as tall as possible. Kit’s magic as an incubus is all about lust and attraction, but if you use plants and trees specifically known for growing fast under certain conditions and then provide them with the exact conditions they like, helped by fae magic, you can do some cool things with it. Kit’s attraction magic doesn’t influence plants, but my magic does, so we used my magic to convert and then channel it so it did work on the plants.” As he’s speaking, his eyes almost look like they’re glowing with green magic, and he’s looking so proud, and happy. Butterflies zoom through my stomach, making me squirm a little. “We were able to make the trees and plants grow like that in just a couple of hours. We used magic to make them believe that their surroundings had the perfect circumstances to thrive, and they were only too happy to comply. While Kit and I were doing that, Bane and Rune worked on keeping the soil just the right consistency between soft earth to grow roots and watering the area. It came out better than expected.” He sits back, leaning on his arms as he stretches his legs out in front of him, his face turned to the sun.

  A laugh bubbles out of me. “You’re almost like a flower yourself, when you look like that.”

  He grins, pulling me down next to him, letting me lean my head on his shoulder. “Most of the fae realm has a lot of sun, good for trees to grow, but not everywhere. And I guess I can understand plants who turn to the light, it’s warm, and feels much safer than the icy cold of winter.” He lets out a light shudder before closing his eyes, slowly breathing.

  “Are you now going to sleep? Bask in the sun? Become a real flower?” I poke him lightly, but he quickly grabs my arm, putting my hand against his side, smiling my way.

  “While sleep would be nice, I’m just enjoying the quiet for a moment. It was pretty loud inside just now.” He sits up straighter, kissing my shoulder. “Fine.” He gets to his feet, pulling me with him. “I was thinking... You still don’t have very good control over your magic, and you want to learn to make protection circles wherever you are. We can probably combine that.”

  “Combine?” I frown, liking the idea but not sure how that would work out. “You want me to make glass protection circles or something?” I eye the glass he made.

  He laugh
s. “Not like that. I was thinking more like this.” He holds up his hand, electricity sparking around it, and then he wraps his other arm around me, pulling me against him closely. “Move with me, or this could get dangerous...”

  “What?” I try to look back at him, but the electricity sparks from his hand to the ground, making an indentation, then he slowly starts to turn, the sparks of electricity ‘drawing’ a circle around us. The ‘bzzt-bzzt’ of the sparks is almost comforting. Until he’s made a full circle and his electricity stops again before he lets me go.

  “This is just a normal circle, not a protection circle, since we skipped a couple of the steps to make it a proper protection circle, which requires some other types of magic, and runes, but they all start out the same.” His eyes are filled with magic as I look at him. He’s so excited about what he just showed me, about the idea behind it.

  “You think this will work? Can’t I do it with sticks or something, like you did last time?” Using my magic this way feels dangerous, not safe at all.

  “Gaining control over your magic is part of the exercise. We know you can make a shield close to you, running over your own skin, and shields around other people, as you did with Rune, and whatever it was that you used against the soldiers. But unless you want to keep trying to figure your magic out while being in very dangerous situations, you’re going to need to practice your magic, and controlling it, when we’re not in immediate danger.” He puts his hands on my shoulders, his thumbs slowly rubbing over my skin, soothing. “Once you get the hang of it, it will be easier. I promise.”