Outside the Falden gate, Mel suspected they would head toward town square. She expected Austin to lead her to a small house down by the walls, or maybe one by the market stalls, in the midst of the bustling city. But he turned sharply, heading up toward a large gated area.

Close to Falden’s grounds, there was a gated mansion with a stone wall with barbed wire. Austin walked casually up to the gate and swiped a bracelet against a plate. His bracelet was only a thin leather strap with a piece of metal attached to it. As he lowered his arm, Mel saw the water imbued inside the metal and she took a step back from Austin.

A mechanism in the gate clicked and then hummed at Austin. The doors opened up before them and a narrow stone path was revealed with small dark violet bushes surrounding it. The path led up to a huge mansion in gray stone. But on top of the roof, long spires stretched up toward the sky. They gleamed like metal in the shaded light from the sun above the clouds.

“What is that?” Mel asked, looking up toward the spires.

“Hmm,” Austin said, and then followed Mel’s gaze. “Oh, that’s just the design of the house. Purely ornamental.”

“But they’re so sharp,” she said. “Like lances.”

Mel turned to Austin, and he had a frown on his forehead.

“Do birds get caught in them?” Mel shivered. “Impaled?”

Austin turned his face away from her, and a low murmur escaped his lips. That sounded a lot like agreement.

They walked down the stone path and Mel threw glances up toward the roof with its spires of metal. This house, this mansion, was like a death machine. How could someone live in this place?

She looked over at Austin again and realized he could live here. Somehow it made sense, his dark and gloomy aura, his face that always seemed to wear a frown. This was where Austin came from. No wonder he was difficult and hated the world.

Austin opened one of the large doors and let Mel walk in first. He followed and closed the door behind them. From the ceiling in the dingy lit hallway hung unlit chandeliers in gold and diamonds. Mel swallowed hard.

To the left there was a large spiraling staircase with a red carpet attached to the steps, leading up to a top floor. In front of her stretched a long, dark corridor, and she heard voices coming from the end of the hallway. Maybe behind one of the many doors facing the corridor.

“It’s just upstairs,” Austin said. “In my room.”

Mel felt her heart beating fast. Had she made a mistake coming here with Austin?

She didn’t really know anything about him, except that he liked to mock her and feel superior to everyone around him. She knew he hated people from Stonehearth and, standing here now in his house, she had absolutely no idea why he hated them. He was just as rich as a noble, if not even richer, and he had received training in magic that was obvious from his bracelet-trick by the gate.

Austin put a hand on Mel’s back, right between her shoulder blades, and Mel felt her body growing stiff. He gave her a small push toward the stairs, but Mel felt unable to move suddenly, feeling as though she might have been wrong about him. Did he even have tuning forks up in his room, or had that just been bait to get her here?

Mel pressed her back against his hand and took a step to the side.

“I will just wait here and you can run up and get them for me,” she said.

She felt Austin’s gaze on her, but she refused to meet his eyes. To let him lure her upstairs. She heard him releasing a sigh from his lips.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea…” he said.

Mel felt her mouth dry, but before Austin could continue his sentence, a door swung open at the end of the corridor. Mel felt Austin grow ridged behind her and his hand fell down from her back. From the open door, a man’s head popped out. His hair was gray and his face angular.

“Yes, Sir,” the man said. “It’s the young master and a… servant girl?”

Mel frowned, and her gaze turned to Austin. Who was this man?

Austin stared straight ahead and took a step forward, in front of Mel, as to shield her from something. Steps sounded from inside the room and out walked a tall, middle-aged man with wide shoulders. His hair was black and his eyes too. He stared at Mel from the end of the corridor. The distance seemed like no hindrance for his piercing gaze.

His eyes were intense and his face gloomy, like he always wore a perpetual frown. Mel recognized that look instantly. She had been on the receiving end of it many times. It was just like staring at Austin’s face, only older.

“Hi, Mr. Taveck,” Mel said. “I’m just here to borrow something from Austin. Sorry for interrupting you.”

Austin held out his hand in front of Mel, as if holding her back from his father, and a frown descended on Mel’s face.

“Why have you brought home a servant girl?” Austin’s father asked in a loud booming voice. “What is this idiocy? Are you trying to start rumors?”

“She’s a student at Falden and…” Austin said.

His father cut him off before he could continue with a wave of his hand.

“I don’t care to hear your lies, son. Just get her out of my sight and make sure no one sees you with her. I don’t care who you take to bed, just don’t parole them around the city.”

Mel took a step forward, ignoring Austin’s hand. Anger pumped in her veins and she was about to bite Austin’s father’s head off. But Austin spoke first.

“I’m not taking her to… bed,” he said. “She’s just a student. In my year at Falden. Please, don’t embarrass me. Just leave me alone.”

“I will leave you alone when you start acting like a Taveck. Like an elemental warrior. When you start behaving like a man.”

Mel glanced over at Austin’s face. She saw redness spreading over his cheeks and she saw his jaw clenching. Mel grabbed his arm, feeling like this conversation was not about her at all. She pulled him toward the stair leading up.

“Go to hell,” Austin said to his dad and then let Mel pull him away.

His father laughed, a horrid sound that seemed to echo all the way upstairs. Mel shivered, and she kept studying Austin’s face.

He walked ahead of her, his head held lowered, and opened a door down another corridor on the top floor. Mel ran after him, barely catching up with his long strides. They passed old paintings of people she didn’t recognize and then Austin held up a door, his gaze held firmly at his feet.

Mel didn’t hesitate this time. She slinked inside the room and Austin closed the door behind them. Mel heard Austin turning a lock and then she realized she had willingly walked into Austin’s room alone and let him lock the only door out.

Frantically, she scanned the room. It was large and mostly painted white. There was a huge bed in the middle, a double bed, big enough for two. Mel felt her gaze stuck on the cover that was thrown to one side. Like it was ready for someone to just creep inside and pull over the flap of the cover.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

Her throat got dry again, and she turned to Austin, stepping back from him toward a window at the other end of the room.

He was still looking down at his shoes, then he walked over to a dresser and pulled out the bottom drawer. He picked up a black case and put it down on the floor beside him. Austin turned to Mel, catching her gaze. Mel felt her eyes, beady and wide. She heard her heart beating inside her chest.

Austin stood still and Mel saw his jaw clenching, then relaxing again.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “There is really no excuse for my father. I thought maybe he wasn’t home. He isn’t usually at this time. I thought that maybe even if he was, we could sneak up here before he noticed.”

Austin shook his head and averted his gaze from Mel again.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated.

Mel saw his shoulders slumping, and she released a tense breath. Maybe he hadn’t meant anything by locking the door behind him. Maybe this was just his normal response to his horrible father. Maybe Austin always locked the door when he was inside his room.

She took a tentative step forward.

“It’s not your fault,” she said. “I’m sorry your father sucks.”

Austin shot her a glance. It looked icy at first. But then his face broke up in a half-smile and he let out a soft chuckle.

“Yeah, he sucks alright,” he said.

He turned back to the door and placed his hand on the knob. He hesitated, looking back at Mel.

“Can we please just run outside?” he asked. “I really don’t want to interact with him again.”

“Are you coming with me back to campus?” Mel asked.

Austin shrugged.

“If he’s here,” he said. “I’ll be happier in school. Maybe I can spend a few hours in the library or something. In any case, I’ll follow you back. If that’s alright?”

“Sure,” Mel said.

Austin unlocked the door and Mel felt her shoulders immediately release to the floor. She wasn’t comfortable being alone with Austin. She didn’t trust him yet, and she was definitely not comfortable being locked inside this eerie house.

Mel and Austin sneaked out from the mansion quietly, managing to not attract his father or anyone else's eyes. Outside, they walked in silence toward the school again, Austin holding the black case with the tuning forks in his hand.

By the gate to Falden, Mel saw a figure who looked strikingly familiar and when she got closer, she saw it was Marcus. He was pacing outside the closed gate, waiting for something or someone.

“Marcus?” Mel asked when they got closer.

Marcus turned from the gate to the road and caught her gaze. He looked over at Austin and then back at Mel.

“Hi, Mel,” Marcus said. “I was just here to see you. This stupid janitor, or whatever, didn’t want to hand you a note. Said I had to come back or something.”

“Oh,” Mel said. “Do you mean Henry? He’s red haired with a beard and always smiling.”

“Yeah…” Marcus said. “Except he wasn’t smiling at me.”

“Well, I’m here now. What did you want to tell me?”

Marcus’ eyes slipped from Mel to Austin again, but Austin just stood there silently, listening to their conversation. Marcus’ eyes landed on Mel again.

“I wanted to invite you tomorrow night,” he said. “Me and two friends from the army are going to the Last Stance to drink and play cards. They would love to meet you. Do you want to come?”

Mel looked over at Austin, but he just seemed to stare into the space above Marcus’ shoulder.

“Maybe,” Mel said. “I have to study. Austin here, my classmate, has been kind enough to let me borrow his tuning forks for a test that’s coming up. I have to learn the notes by heart and I don’t know how far I will have come until then. But maybe.”

“Oh okay,” Marcus said.

His gaze slipped yet again over to Austin, and Marcus took a step forward. He held out his hand to Austin, and they shook.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Marcus, Mel’s… guy.”

Austin gave Marcus a flat stare and said, “Austin.”

Mel winced and inwardly sighed. This was going great.

“So…” Mel said. “If I have time tomorrow. I will see you at the Last Stance. Otherwise, I will see you next week, maybe after the test. Okay? We can grab dinner or something.”

“Sure,” Marcus said, and gave Mel a warm smile. “Let me know.”

He walked off, and Mel and Austin continued inside the gates to Falden. After walking only a few steps inside, Austin cleared his throat.

“So…” he said in a deep voice. “That’s your boyfriend?”

Mel looked over at him, but he was staring at the ground.

“No,” she said. “Marcus is just… he’s just… I don’t know. Like my best friends, except that’s Minnie or Gabriella, I guess. He’s my protector. But like, I don’t want him to be…”

Mel released a deep sigh and decided to start over.

“It’s complicated,” she said. “I have this destiny. It’s supposed to be important, but it really isn’t. Because I'm never going to fulfill it. But Marcus thinks I will change my mind and his destiny is sort of connected to mine. He has to protect me while I fulfill mine… It’s all just a huge mess with dragons and destinies and duty. Not really worth getting into. Sorry.”

Mel winced and felt like it was the longest and most confusing explanation she’d ever given someone. But it was the truth. She couldn’t easily define Marcus and her relationship. He wanted to date, wanted to be boyfriend and girlfriend. But it wasn’t possible.

They could never be together when he also saw her as this great person who was going to change the world. Saw her for someone she didn’t want to be, someone she really wasn’t.

“Okay…” Austin said after a long pause. “But does he know that?”

“Know what?” Mel asked, holding up the door to the dormitory for Austin.

He walked inside.

“Does he know you’re not together?”

“Yeah,” Mel said, walking inside her room, realizing it was empty and Gabriella was somewhere else. “He knows. I’ve told him dating isn’t a good idea right now.”

“Right now?” Austin asked, and his left eyebrow rose slightly.

“Yeah,” Mel said.

Austin closed the door behind him, and Mel swallowed. He was doing it again, forcing them to be alone behind a closed door. Austin walked up to Mel’s bed and placed the black case on top of her cover. She wondered how he had known which one was hers. But then she quickly glanced around and noticed a laced dress lying on top of Gabriella’s bed.

Yeah, Mel had never worn anything like that in her entire life. Austin probably took one glance at her and thought she looked like she just walked up from an open trash can.

Mel brushed down her hair at one side and wondered how she really looked. What did Austin think of her?

She shook her head and forced herself to stop these trains of thoughts. It was really not worth worrying about, since Austin seemed anything but nervous about being left alone with her. She must just really look like a brown paper bag to him, nothing descriptive about it.

“Okay, so let me get this straight,” Austin said. “You have a nice guy in your life who has followed you to Aldrion and is sworn to protect you. He has asked you for more than just friendship, dating, I suppose. And you have told him, not right now?”

“Yeah,” Mel said. “That’s actually exactly what happened. How did you know?”

Austin shook his head, and a wide smile formed on his lips. So he could smile?

“When are you planning to start dating him, then?” Austin asked.

“I don’t know. Never?”

She bit her lip and looked down at her shoes.

“He will probably figure that out. You know. After some time passes and we’re not dating. It will be no big deal.”

“Oh god,” Austin said, shaking his head. “I feel sorry for Marcus, poor guy. Why don't you just rip off the bandage?”

“What? No,” Mel said. “I’m doing it for him. So I don’t have to hurt him.”

“Yeah, but in doing so, you will hurt him more,” he said. “You should just tell him already that you never want to go out with him. That you’re not attracted to him, I’m assuming. Put him out of his misery.”

Mel huffed. “It’s not so much that I find him repulsive or anything. He’s just not my type. Or rather, he can’t be. Because of all the destiny stuff, you know. He doesn’t like me for me. And I mean, what do you even know? Your dad knows you sleep with servant girls? What is that all about?”

Austin’s wide smile fell from his lips and was replaced by a frown immediately.

“It’s not like that,” he said in a low voice. “I don’t sleep with… It wouldn’t matter to me even if I did if someone was a… It’s just not true, okay?”

“Okay, sure,” Mel said, and rolled her eyes. “You just sleep with other more impressive people. Maybe someone who isn’t as far beneath you. I wonder who that could be? Since you think you’re superior to everyone. Whoever you’re sleeping with, they must be a fierce creature to behold, like God or someone.”

“Yeah, no, I’m not sleeping with God,” he said. “And you do know that my God is like the sun, right?”

“Yup,” Mel said. “So you’re sleeping with the sun.”

Austin chuckled and held up his hands in front of his chest.

“Okay, I get it,” he said. “I won’t give you relationship advice and you won’t rat out that my partner is the sun, like the monk I am.”

Mel widened her smile at Austin. Laughing at his silly comment and at the thought of him being intimate with the sun. It all sounded preposterous, but of course there were actual people who probably did that in Aldrion and in the Valley. But no, the dragon cult was the strange one.