Phoenix Academy: Reborn (Phoenix Academy First Years Book 4) Read online

  Phoenix Academy: Reborn

  Lucy Auburn

  Contents

  Get Updates

  Author’s Note

  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

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  34. It continues…

  Read Next: Fae Like Me

  Read Next: Three for a Witch

  Also by Lucy Auburn

  About the Author

  Copyright 2019 Lucy Auburn.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This is the initial version of this file. If Amazon sent you this version, and you pre-ordered it, please note that this book has not yet had its final edit and proofread. Ask Amazon customer service to push an update to your device.

  Created with Vellum

  Get Updates

  Want three free books? All you have to do is sign up for my mailing list.

  I’ll email you a free book bundle as well as new release alerts, book sales, and the occasional fun newsletter.

  Download now!

  https://dl.bookfunnel.com/2mmiulv36m

  Join my Facebook group to interact with me and other fans. It’s where I do cover reveals, spoiler discussions, and post deleted scenes and bonus material from my series!

  Thank you to all my lovely readers.

  You make writing the best profession possible.

  To keep in touch, don’t forget to check out my website:

  www.lucyauburn.com

  Readers can sign up for advanced copies of soon-to-be-published books on Booksprout.

  Author’s Note

  This book contains some violent scenes, especially in the climax.

  Phoenix Academy contains a reverse harem romance. I hope you enjoy!

  Chapter 1

  A new year. A new semester. Time to go back to school and get shit done.

  No severed dicks this time. At least, not the real kind. I don't count the new plastic keychain Petra is smugly dangling from her fingers—she's quite pleased that her parents gave her a brand new car to go with her new designation as my Shield.

  "It must've been hilarious," she says, holding up the tiny purple dick. "I mean, you're saying he ripped the whole thing off?"

  "I don't know how many times I've told you this story."

  "Yeah." Her eyes get a faraway look. "I just love hearing it over and over again."

  What can I say, my Shield has a sadistic streak to go with her powerful wolf form. That's probably a good thing, given that she has to get along with my quartet—four powerful demons who are bonded to me for life, our souls connected by the same magic that brought me back from the dead and turned me into a Black Phoenix.

  "If I tell you the story, will you give me a French fry?" Leaning over, I peer into her bag of food. "I'm hungry."

  "You already ate all your food," she says accusingly, flipping her blonde hair over her shoulder dramatically. "At this rate you're going to die of overeating and I'll have to get reassigned to some new, less dumb phoenix."

  "Just one little French fry." I put a wheedling tone in my voice. "C'mon, we have to go back to campus in like, one hour. It's our last jaunt outside those walls for months."

  "Yeah." Grabbing a French fry, she holds it out in front of my eyes—then shoves it in her own mouth, like the vicious wolf shifter she is. "What do you think will try to kill us this semester?"

  "I dunno. I was hoping maybe we'd get something a little more interesting. A ghost maybe. Enough students have died now that there have to be a few haunting campus."

  She wrinkles her little button nose, shoves her hand into the bag for more fries, and promptly puts them in her own mouth instead of mine.

  It's a damned tragedy.

  "I'm personally hoping we get like, a gargoyle or a dragon or something. I'd like to protect your heart from something new." Grabbing another fry, she holds it in front of her. "Then again, maybe this whole time I should've been concerned about protecting your heart from a coronary blockage, considering your eating habits."

  I roll my eyes, snatch the fry, and chomp down on it. It's not enough—one French fry never is—but at least it makes her glare at me in outrage. "You were being a miser."

  "And you're being a glutton. Tell me the story?"

  From the way she begs me you'd think that it was some kind of bedtime story, but it's nothing of the sort. More like the beginning of a strange, macabre, bloody, and eventually wonderful night.

  The night I fucking died.

  Sighing, I take a deep breath, and delve into it.

  "You see, it all started with a severed dick..."

  We pull up in front of the gates of school at the very last moment, putting off the end of summer as much as possible.

  Phoenix Academy. Here I am again.

  The academy looks exactly the same, but also completely different. For one thing, the watchtower has been rebuilt, and I can see its spires past the roof of the Great House.

  But there are also new buildings, like the spillover dorms for the new students arriving, and the old gym has been extensively renovated. A large sign near the front gates has a map of the new campus to guide students. The back building has been tentatively named after Victoria Cheng, the teacher who died last year after someone evil—who I believe now was Lainey Vera—brought her back to life as a White Phoenix. I severed the necromantic connection that kept her alive past her time, which let her rest. And I killed Lainey Vera by removing the stolen phoenix heart in her chest. I can still remember what it felt like to hold that heart in my hand.

  So many memories here, good and bad. It's hard to even look up at the new watchtower, after everything that happened there. The design is different, but the location is the same.

  I haven't been to Darkness Island to see my imprisoned biological father since the end of last year. Though I considered going over the summer, during my extra classes, I decided it was better to just leave him and his bullshit in the past. The last thing I said to Meyer was about Lainey; he hid the fact that she was also his biological daughter from me.

  The last thing he said to me was happy birthday.

  Yeah, maybe some memories are left in the past, permanently. There's no reason for me to see my biological father ever again. All he's ever done is fed me lies and given me doubts. If there's anything this summer at Montauk taught me, it's that I'm better off with the family I found: Petra, Olivia, Liam, Sam, and of course my quartet of demons. They, and the teachers here at Phoenix Academy, have done more for me in the past year than I ever could've imagined.

  "What are you thinking about?" Petra asks, coming to stand beside me near the front gates of campus. "How you're totally gonna fail out this year?"

  I roll my eyes. "You wish. No, I was thinking about how dumb it is that you're still here even though you already graduated."

  "Someone has to protect your ass."

  I glance dramatically over my shoulder and towards the butt in question. "Doesn't look like you're shielding it at all right now."

  "Trust you to make a simple expression as gross and literal as possible."

  I scoff at her. "What I was really thinking about was how much my blood family sucks, and how glad I am that they're not the only people I have to rely on."

  "Yeah." A pensive expression crosses her face. "Although, y'know, maybe you shouldn't write off your bio family completely. I mean, what do you really know about your mom?"

  Nothing I want to talk about to a girl like Petra, who lives in a nice house with two parents who love each other. "You sound sappy."

  "I'm just curious what hell-spawn birthed you." She flashes me a wolfy grin. "Sure you're not the daughter of Lilith?"

  I shove her in the shoulder, and she laughs, then pushes me back. But her words stick in my mind a little.

  I haven't thought about my mother very much in a long time.

  "Let's go," I tell Petra, grabbing my duffel bag out of the back of her car. "We've gotta find out what new ways they're going to torture us this year. Maybe Yohan has a three hour class he's enrolled me in. Or Fisk is creating some kind of Hunger Games style death maze for us to compete in."

  "There is a new teacher," Petra points out. "Some mage or somebody. He's going to teach all the new students about magic."

  "Yohan mentioned that
over the summer. But I didn't think it would really happen. Aren't mages super secretive about their magic?"

  "Headmaster Towers still has family among them. She pulled a lot of favors to get this guy. Apparently he's expensive."

  "At least he probably won't try to murder us." Petra raises a brow, and I add, "I said probably. I mean, given our luck..."

  "Let's just get this meeting over with already."

  I stare up at the Great House as we take the stairs to its front doors. Petra is already setup in her new Shield apartments across campus, but we're both due for an appointment at the headmaster's office to talk about this year's classes. The whole new teacher thing is the part I most want to cover. It'd be nice to have a teacher who can show me a few things about magic, but doesn't want to kill me, steal demons from me, kill my classmates, put the campus under a spell, or any other evil nonsense.

  So basically, it'll never happen. But a girl can dream.

  The hallway in front of the headmaster's office is empty when we get there. Most of the campus is busy preparing for orientation; new students will be arriving in three hours. Those who aren't getting the classrooms and Great House ready are probably out spending their last few precious moment of freedom partying, which is where I would be if Petra didn't insist on being both responsible and fully capable of killing me if I don't do what she says.

  Knocking on the office door, the pint-sized blonde wolf shifter says, "Don't embarrass me. More than usual, at least."

  "So what you're saying is, I should pick my nose and eat the fruits of my nostril digging in front of the headmaster?"

  She's rolling her eyes when the headmaster calls out, "Come in."

  I open the door and stride through in front of Petra, her angry glare digging in between my shoulder blades. Taking a seat opposite the headmaster's desk, I beam at the mug of coffee she's set before me already—Lana Towers has her flaws, but at least she knows the way to a girl's heart: through the caffeine in her veins. In my case, served black, and bitter as my childhood.

  "Welcome back, Petra, Dani."

  "I was just here," I point out. "Yohan beat my ass five ways to Friday over the summer."

  Headmaster Towers frowns at me a little, and Petra mutters, "Language."

  "What? My butt is sore."

  "Regardless." The headmaster sighs a little. "Your summer classes were only part time, and they were more of a supplement to your shortened first year here than anything. This semester is going to be wholly different from the ones that have come before—which reminds me, can you have your quartet join us? Some of the matters at hand will concern them as well."

  "Sure thing chicken wing." I glance at Petra. "See? I can banter without cursing."

  She mutters, "Jesus fucking Christ."

  Ignoring her, I reach towards the bond I share with four upper level demons and tug at it until I feel their spirits.

  It sucks that my four demons are no longer a little secret. As nice as it is to have them around during classes, I liked it when no one knew they existed. Now even when they're incorporeal people know they're there. My friends have started to figure out what it means when I stare off into the distance and laugh, or roll my eyes at empty air.

  Of course, it's better than them thinking I've lost my marbles and am talking to myself all the time. And the guys like having someone to talk to other than me.

  I summon the demons' spirits first, then pull them into the mortal plane until their bodies are here too.

  Within moments they're among us: steady, solid Lynx; ever-responsible Ezra; bawdy, winking Mateo; and my brooding, beloved Sebastian. I just saw them this morning at the Smith beach house in Montauk, where I spent my last weekend between summer classes and the start of the new semester, but every time I summon them it's like I'm seeing them again for the first time.

  My heart races. Butterflies erupt in my stomach. Heat rushes to my cheeks. And tingles go through me, undeniable—especially when they touch me, like Sebastian is now, brushing my shoulder as he comes to stand behind my chair.

  "So, what's threatening to kill every student on campus now?" Mateo asks flippantly. "I have more bombs if you want to take down the watchtower a second time. And I've been experimenting with gunpowder."

  Ezra sighs. "Look around, dumbass. We're in her office and no one is bleeding or on fire. I'm sure it's just a routine meeting about the new semester."

  "It is," Towers confirms. "I thought you four should be here for the updates."

  "How boring." Mateo sulks and pouts in my direction. "I liked it better when we only came out for the fun stuff, like killing and maiming."

  Some things change, but others stay the same. Even as Lynx and Ezra roll their eyes at Mateo, I feel a little smile tug at the corners of my mouth. I want to tell Mateo that I'm sure there will be killing and maiming at some point—there's no way the headmaster has somehow hired a teacher who we can all trust—but I keep my mouth shut so she doesn't burn me to death with her scorn.

  Headmaster Towers breezes past Mateo's thirst for bloodshed without even blinking. "Mostly we need to talk about the new setup we've made for Shimmer's classes this semester. Like last year, you'll be helping her summon sirens in order to test out students' abilities, but unlike last year you'll also be her teacher's assistant."

  "What," I say.

  "Huh?" Petra chokes. "No way."

  Lynx says, "You won't be needing us for that..."

  "No, I wanted to talk to you four about another matter." She shuffles the papers on her desk, while I stare at her with a wide mouth. "Mr. Johnson, our resident history teacher—"

  "Hold up. Go back. Let's talk about this whole teacher's assistant thing in more detail." I feel like I'm hallucinating or something. Has Headmaster Towers forgotten who I am, or does she think I've been body snatched? "I'm not great at the whole... authority thing. You know: respecting, obeying, and aiding."

  "It was Shimmer's request that you be her TA."

  The headmaster looks at me like she expects this to end the conversation, and truthfully it basically does. Those sharp teeth, the golden skin, the unnatural glamour... I'm pretty sure the ancient pixie could smash me to bits, strain said bits through her teeth, and drink my blood and marrow like juice.

  "Okay, teacher's assistant." I take a deep breath in, and slowly let it out. "If that just means summoning demons and scaring the newbies, I'm cool with that."

  "You'll also have to help file papers and grade them."

  All the breaths. "Cool, they all fail. Next subject."

  "I'm sure Shimmer will show you the ropes." Headmaster Towers looks to the demons now, and I swear there's a glimmer in her eyes. "So, we've already had you four help out in our Group Combat training, and it's helped immensely. What we need from you now is something new, and a bit... different."

  Ezra warily asks, "What is it?"

  "As I was saying, our history teacher, Ocean Johnson, wants to do something new. He'd like to study the four of you and write down everything you know about demonology."

  "That doesn't sound so bad," Lynx admits.

  Mateo mutters, "Maybe for a geek like you."

  "That's not all of it." I can tell by Headmaster Towers' tone of voice that more is coming. "He wants to know where demons come from."

  Chapter 2

  Wariness runs through me. "What do you know about that?"