Courts and Cabals Read online

  St. Vincent’s didn’t have a bell to chime every time class ended. Apparently, it was up to the students and teachers to adequately manage their time. I was too busy having an internal bitch session to care how stupid and pointless that little rule was. All around me the rest of the class rose to their feet and began to file out. I grit my teeth, collected my bag, and started to rise out of my seat; but a hand the size of a hubcap clamped onto my shoulder and pushed me back down.

  Miller was already gone, always the first out of the room, and the rest of the class wanted nothing to do with what was coming. They hurried to clear out and leave me alone with my new best friend. His name was Samuel Little. His last name held a certain irony when it was attached to a seventeen-year-old who was 7’2”, four hundred pounds, and had a fucking horse cock. We’d all seen it in the locker room and there was no denying the man was hung like a porn god.

  Keeping his hand on my shoulder, Sam moved around to my front and eased himself into Sally’s vacated chair. His milk-chocolate-colored skin offered a nice contrast to the school uniform’s white button-down shirt, blue and black plaid tie with the school crest, and navy-blue pants. All of which had to be custom made for Sam because he made pre-1980s NFL offensive linemen look small. The big man gave a sigh. He was a man of few words, but when he spoke, people listened. I sure as shit was about to.

  “That wasn’t nice,” his voice was a rich baritone that the school choir director would die for if Sam would ever transfer over from the football team.

  “I know, I’m sorry, Sam,” I answered quickly. “Miller was just getting to me, and I took it out on Sally. My bad. It won’t happen again.” The last part was a lie, but Sam was pretty quick to forgive and forget. He was by no means dumb, but he wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed either.

  In actuality, Sam was a pretty good guy. As Sally’s boyfriend, he was just defending her honor. If anything, I felt sorry for Sally. She had to take the python he was packing in his pants. That couldn’t possibly be comfortable.

  “I’ll tell you what,” I continued, when I saw the apology itself wasn’t going to work. “How about I cut you a break on the next test. Fifty percent off. Does that sound good?”

  Sam’s brow scrunched as he studied me for a second. Then he extended his hand and enveloped mine as we shook on it. Without another word, the big man on campus, the star lineman of the St. Vincent’s Academy Fighting Eagles Football Team, and one of the most powerful shifters in the school, walked out of the room. I released a breath I didn’t know I’d been holding and shook out the adrenaline that had rushed through me when I’d been cornered.

  What did you do when fight or flight weren’t an option? The answer . . . you negotiated.

  Sam Little was a shifter, some people called them Wer’s, and they were probably the most populous group of supernatural creatures revealed in the United States after the Revelation. Of the three major shifter communities in the US, Sam was a member of the most physically powerful. When riled up emotionally, or through conscious effort, Sam’s body shifted into a ten-foot, human-grizzly bear hybrid. In this form, he was even more intimidating than his human guise; if that was even possible. I’d never seen Sam transform, but I knew people who had, which was why I’d offered him half off the answer key for Miller’s next history test. Sam’s life was football. He had a full scholarship to play for the Crimson Tide next year as long as he could make the grades. His worst subject was history, so to get on the big man’s good side, I’d made myself indispensable.

  In a school surrounded by the rich, powerful, and straight-up supernatural; I was a simple townie: a local yokel from the small town of Vincent’s Hollow. The only people who lived there were people who worked at the academy, or people who couldn’t get out of the small town.

  My parents weren’t billionaires, or CEO’s of Fortune 500 companies. I wasn’t on a first name basis with the President of the United States, and I sure as shit couldn’t grow scales, fangs, and a pair of wings to fly away from this place.

  I learned long ago that if I didn’t have power myself, I needed to make myself valuable. Since this was high school, I’d found the perfect way. Minor skills with a computer, a backdoor into the school’s computer network, and the self-taught ability to pick a lock . . . bingo! I had quizzes, tests, midterms, lab reports, book reports; hell, I even had those stupid aptitude tests if someone wanted to show mommy and daddy that the US Department of Education predicted they’d be an entrepreneur. I was the man to go to if you needed anything.

  I meant man in the strictest sense.

  Sally was a banshee. Sam was a shifter, and sixty percent of the other students at St. Vincent’s hailed from one type of supernatural lineage or another. I was one hundred percent, Grade-A, USDA approved, all human baby.

  I’m Cameron Dupree.

  Chapter 2

  I counted to thirty before I left the classroom. The last thing I wanted to do was put myself in a position to poke the bear. A quick check of the hallway showed it full of students moving to their next class. The retreating mass of Sam could be seen at the end of the hall with his arm around Sally. I breathed a sigh of relief and leaned against the wall next to the door. I had nowhere to be for the next hour.

  “Cam!” a familiar voice yelled my name. I opened my eyes to see my best friend coming to my rescue a few minutes too late. “I heard you put the moves on Sally with Sam sitting right there,” he stated as he came to hover over me.

  “Aw hell,” I cursed as the grapevine already twisted and distorted what really happened. That wasn’t going to put the big man in a better mood.

  Speaking of big men, my best friend since freshman year was Jerome Whitepaw. At 6’3”, two hundred and twenty-five pounds, he was taller than my own 5’10” one-eighty-five; and, if you could believe it, he was the runt of the litter.

  Literally . . . Jerome was a shifter, just like Sam, but at the same time different. He was what was conventionally known as a werewolf, lycan, chupacabra, and a few other names depending on the culture. To make matters more interesting, Jerome was the youngest son of the reigning alpha of the Whitepaw pack, which dominated most of the Great Lakes region. Being a friend of the clan gave me more cover than any other human at St. Vincent’s when it came to human-wolf relations. Jerome might be the runt, but his papa was the man in charge. Since things in a wolf pack tended to be solved under the might-makes-right principle; other bigger wolves tended to not fuck with me because Jerome said so.

  It was mildly irritating to owe my survival to someone else, but Jerome was cool, if a bit odd; which was just fine with me. He practically vibrated with energy as he hustled up to me in his camouflage pants and Peace, Love, and Donuts t-shirt. He wore Walmart sandals under those old-school, knee-high, white gym socks – a fashion faux pa if there ever was one – and his sticker-covered backpack promoted everything from universal peace and harmony to support for 4:20. He was handsome in the preternatural way all supernatural creatures tended to be, with bronze skin, and long raven-black hair tied in a braid that fell below his shoulders. Perfectly white teeth grinned down at me as his eyes darted down the hall at Sam’s retreating back.

  As a matter of principle, bears and wolves didn’t like each other; and that deep cultural dislike extended to fun-loving Jerome as well. There had been plenty of lives lost on both sides of a feud going back to before Columbus landed in the Caribbean. With lives measured in centuries, shifter grudges tended to last.

  “I didn’t hit on Sally,” I began to defend myself, but was interrupted as a door smashed open and a cold wind blew down the hall.

  The wind dislodged notices from the cork boards hanging next to all the classrooms; throwing homework assignments and request for study groups up toward the arched stone ceiling. Notes and notebooks went flying, and more than one skirt was tossed up to reveal everything from boy shorts to bare ass.

  “Fuckin’ perv!” one of the bare-ass girls growled at the guy who walked through the doors.
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  It was a pervy mood, but I knew the guy who did it, and he was by no means the type to peek up women’s skirts. In fact, he rarely took his eyes off the tablet in his hands. He was one of my other close friends: Bradley Cunningham. While I might enjoy the view of a nice toned ass, Brad was all about dick; sucking, blowing, and ramming it in other dudes’ asses. So, the perv factor was an absolute zero, but that didn’t stop another blast of air from smacking him hard in the face.

  It knocked off his glasses, and almost ripped the all-mighty tablet from his grip. “What the hell?” he yelled, and glared at the hallway.

  You know how some gay guys have a certain accent, inflection, or effeminate way of speaking. Brad had that in spades, and he only emphasized it by putting his free hand on his cocked hip as he glared at his target.

  “Sorry, Brad, I didn’t know it was you,” the girl who gave the air-powered slap blushed.

  “That’s ok, honey,” Brad’s gaze softened, as did the bite in his honey-tongued southern accent.

  Just like that the confrontation was over. If I had blown up women’s skirts there would have been an angry mob forming to castrate me on the spot, but Brad got away with it. They even apologized! “Gay guys get away with everything,” I griped.

  Of course, I couldn’t blow up women’s skirts in the first place because I wasn’t an elemental mage. The magical discipline was exactly like it sounded. Human’s lucky enough to have a link to the natural world could manipulate the elements to their will. Usually, as was Brad’s case, they had skills in a single element. On some rare occasions, a person could control two, but anything above that was a once in a generation phenomenon. There was even a kid’s cartoon show about elemental mages; although, all the karate bits weren’t true.

  Because this was the real world, and because, in my experience, most magic users tended to have a giant stick up their ass; the elemental mages had given themselves douchey names depending on their specialty. Brad was a Caeli, which was Latin for an air mage. There were also Aqua, Ignis, Terra, and Anima; for water, fire, earth, and soul users. All of them had their pros and cons, and like in the tv show, some specialties were stronger or weaker against others.

  The four basic elements were pretty straightforward. As Brad had shown, he could control bursts of air; everything from full-on tornados to finely-manipulated tendrils. Something cool Caeli could do was create shields out of air. The strongest could stop tank rounds by hardening the air between them and the incoming ordinance. Brad wasn’t that strong, but he claimed he could stop bullets. That was still pretty cool.

  For me, it was the Anima who really freaked me out. They dealt with soul magic, which translated into English meant things like telepathy and being empaths. The other elemental mages would drown you, throw you, crush you, or set you on fire. Anima mages could fuck with your mind and read your deepest, darkest desires. Thankfully, Anima mages were rarer than the rest, and I only knew of two at St. Vincent’s. They mostly kept to themselves, and people preferred it that way.

  “Hey, honey,” Brad sauntered over to them and plopped himself down in my personal space.

  It was a running gag between us. Brad thought I was hot, and he constantly hit on me. It was a nice boost to my ego, but I didn’t swing that way. We both knew it, but it was fun for him, and he had a forlorn hope that one day I might give him the opportunity in the name of experimentation.

  “I heard you grabbed Sally’s ass and Sam beat the shit out of you,” Brad began as he looked me over. “What did you do to piss off the big teddy bear?”

  “Fucking high school,” I growled. It hadn’t even been five minutes and everyone was DMing everyone about this shit. “I need a smoke.”

  “Bleachers?” I asked, and my two buddies nodded. Jerome even rubbed his hands together in delight.

  We turned to leave with the rest of the crowd, but a disturbance up ahead stopped us. A bubble of empty space was moving forward, and pushing everyone back. That only meant one thing.

  “Lilith,” Jerome and I breathed together as we were pushed to the side of the hallway.

  The creature at the center of the bubble emerged in all her glory. She was a Victoria Secret supermodel, Sport’s Illustrated swimsuit cover girl, Pornhub pornstar of the century all rolled into one. Anyone within five feet of her was attracted by pure animal magnetism. Girls flushed and had to fan themselves. Guys suddenly found their pants constricting in all the wrong places. It didn’t matter what your sexual orientation was; I popped a half-chub right along with Jerome and Brad as she walked past. That was the effect a succubus had on everything.

  “God, I would love for her to bob on my knob,” I groaned, and then immediately snapped my mouth shut when I noticed I’d said it out loud.

  “Smooth, honey. Real smooth,” Brad chuckled as Lilith sashayed away with her school-mandated skirt just low enough to not show ass, but just high enough to let guys know what they were missing.

  A normal girl would have at least turned around and glared at a guy for proclaiming he wanted her to suck his dick, but not Lilith. She acted like I didn’t even exist, which I didn’t to the likes of her. She was a supernatural powerhouse; a creature of the high-level infernal cabals. She was immortal in the sense she would live forever; as long as she fed and wasn’t killed. Killing her kind was a lot harder than it looked. Preternatural strength, speed, and magical talent came along with the package that fueled the spank bank of every guy in school.

  If you’re guessing what ‘feeding’ means for a succubus, you’re spot on. Lilith and her kind feed on erotic energy, the libido of anything with a sex drive, the Muladhara Chakra, or whatever else your culture called it. All the dirty thoughts being thrown her way in the hallway, my own included, were probably a refreshing shot of coffee to her energy levels. But thoughts only went so far. Action was where she got the juicy stuff.

  Basically, any myth of a sexual creature preying on humans was a succubus tale at its core, and there were good reasons people called her species whores in myths and legends since caveman times. It could be a simple kiss or an orgy that consumed an entire town. Those sexual actions filled her with the life force she needed to survive. As a young succubus, her battery wasn’t huge, and the school was able to manage her unique dietary requirements; but as she got older and more powerful, she’d need to feed more to remain at full power. Or, she’d need a superior quality to her meals. Supernatural creatures were better for her diet. They were the organic, grass-fed beef, while a human was the equivalent of a fatty, Burger King Big Mac.

  My chances of scoring with the likes of Lilith were less than nothing. Not only because I was human, but because I was poor. I was an orphan. My mom died when I was eight, and I never met my dad. The fucking lowlife disappeared before I even reached the zygote stage. My mom said it was a one-night stand and she’d never been able to find the dirtbag.

  I ended up spending a year in the foster care system before being adopted by a family right here in Vincent’s Hollow. This had been my turf long before I started at the prep school.

  My adoptive parents weren’t wealthy, so it was a surprise when I found out I had a scholarship to St. Vincent’s. For what, I had no idea because I didn’t play sports, and barely managed a 3.0 GPA. I’d learned long ago not to look a gift horse in the mouth, and St. Vincent’s was a thoroughbred you took to the Kentucky Derby. Students who went here had pipelines straight to the Ivy’s, Oxford, Cambridge, you name it. I couldn’t make it at those types of places, but I’d get into a decent school just by virtue of graduating from here.

  Back to the really important matter at hand: Lilith. She fed on members of the student population as long as there was consent, which there always was; but she also had a side business like any entrepreneurial young person. She threw a bone to the lowly humans every once and a while for the right price. It only reinforced the whole whore argument, but she gave zero shits, and that was all that really mattered. Being poor, I didn’t have a shot at a night with t
he succubus, which made my earlier BJ comment that much more pathetic. I watched her walk through the doors Brad had entered, and sighed in defeat.

  “Come on, honey. Let’s turn that frown upside down,” Brad put his arm around me and steered me after Jerome.

  A lot had changed since the Revelation, but somethings remained the same. Whether it was a rom-com set in 1980s suburbia, or a modern day elite private school, it was all the same at the end of the day. When classes let out: the jocks went to practice, band geeks went to play, drama geeks went to act, and the undesirables, the rejects, and everyone who could be described as other, went under the bleachers to do whatever the hell they wanted. There, I was king.

  I exchanged fist bumps and cool-guy head nods to a half dozen stoners scattered between the steel pilons. Jerome had already lit up and taken a deep drag before handing it off to me. I took it without hesitation and took a hit. The smoke soothed me as I inhaled, and brought a little bit of joy to my shitty day.

  As our trio ventured deeper, I heard a rustle from the darkest corner. Down here, under the VIP section, the sun barely penetrated. Weak rays were all that was leftover of the bright fall day.

  “I hear you are the latest piece of toxic masculinity infecting our school,” a voice stated from the shadows.

  “Not you too,” I groaned. “I didn’t feel her up, grab her ass, or anything else that you might have heard.” I’d had it up to here with this rumor mill shit.

  “I heard you embarrassed Sally. You said she had a pointy head, it was sexy, and it distracted you in class,” the speaker emerged from the shadows.

  “Well . . . yeah, that’s about right, but it doesn’t sound good out of context like that, Makaylah,” I replied as the fourth member of our group stepped into the pseudo-light.

  It didn’t take long to realize why she buried herself deep in shadows. Her skin was chalk white, her eyes a hungry crimson, and her canines were about a half inch longer than they should be. In a world of mages and werewolves, of course there were vampires; although, legends had it wrong more times than not.