Pure

I made a face. “It smells better? What does your bed smell like? Regret and bad taste?”

Seth chuckled. “Wherever you sleep, it smells like you.”

“Gods, that has to be the creepiest thing I’ve heard in a long time. And that is… that is saying something, Seth.”

“You smell like roses and summer.” He tossed the ball a little higher. “I like it.”

I choked. “I smell like summer? For real? Summer?”

“Yeah, you know. Warm. You always smell warm.”

Two pures passed us, glancing over their shoulders at Seth’s little display of power. I started to smile at their shared looks of shock, but remembered I was supposed to be mad. “I don’t care if you like the way I smell, you freak.”

“It’s not like Marcus is going to walk in.” The ball grew bigger, swallowing his hand. “That’s why I locked the door. He can’t interrupt our cuddle-fest.”

“That’s not the point, and would you put that away!” I snapped.

Seth was quiet for a whole minute—a new record for him. “Don’t worry; you’ll be able to do this one day. And you’d miss me if I didn’t want to cuddle.”

“That’s not true.”

He cast me a sideways glance that said he remembered mecuddling up against him last night. I groaned, wanting to smack him with every fiber of my being. But he did put the ball of energy away as we cleared the labyrinth and the amphitheater came into view. A shudder ran through me that had nothing to do with the temperature. “Where are we going?”

“Not in there.”

“Well, I figured that much.” I followed him around the building, refusing to look at it. Just like the servants we passed on the way refused to look at us.

Behind the Council building I could finally see the actual Covenant. A wrought iron fence surrounded the campus grounds. While our school looked like something straight out of Greece on a good day, theirs looked like a medieval fortress with creepy turrets and towers that rose out of the fog. Behind the sprawling structure, I could see the tops of gray buildings I assumed were the dorms.

I noticed the designs in the fence as we neared it. “What’s up with the torch thing?”

“Huh?”

“These downward torch things.” I pointed one out on the fence, “They’re everywhere here.”

“Yeah, I’ve noticed that. They’re a symbol of Thanatos.”

“One of my Instructors at the Covenant has a tattoo of it on his arm.”

His lips pursed. “Minister Telly has one on his arm, too.”

“How in the world do you know that?” We cut across the frost- covered lawn to one of the covered walkways co

“Don’t be jealous. You’re my only cuddle bu

“I wonder if they belong to some secret society or something.”

“A secret society of douchebags, maybe.”

I snickered. “Sounds about right.”

We passed two halfs walking to class and they came to an abrupt standstill. Eyes wide, they gawked at us. One boy elbowed the other. “That’s him! And that has to be her—the other one.”

The other boy’s mouth dropped open. “Then it’s true! There really are two Apollyons.”

“By the gods,” his companion ran a hand over his chest, “this is so cool.”

Seth bowed at them. “Way cool.”

Rolling my eyes, I pushed him to the side. The whole sensing Seth thing was getting a

“Since it’s freezing up here in the mornings, I figured we’d do our first session in a training room. Then move outside.”

My shoulders slumped. “I have to practice with you all day?”

Seth spun around in front of me, the perpetual, cocksure grin on his face. “You have to spend allday with me. Every day. For as long as we are here.”

I stared at him.

He clapped his hands together, letting out a rather high-pitched squeal before grabbing my hand. “Oh, we are going to have so much fun! Aren’t we? Fun, Alex—we will have fun.”

We weren’t having fun.

I spun around, blocking first his kick then his jab. Sweat poured off me and my muscles ached from the never-ending onslaught that was Seth.

Then again, I preferred these morning sessions over the afternoon ones. Over the past three days, I’d come to dread the outside training sessions. The weather didn’t warm up very much by then, and the frozen ground was unforgiving, even with the magically green grass springing up from it.

Seth tossed me a bottle of water. “Five minutes.”

I retreated to the edge of the mats and took a long swallow. Seth, who never seemed thirsty, decided to entertain the ever-growing crowd of gawkers. In between class changes, half students had started gathering at the doors. Seth left them open since this kind of thing stroked his ego. All the halfs were pretty cool, though, and they didn’t treat me like people did at my Covenant. Somehow—and I totally blame Seth—they’d found out I’d already made some kills, which upped my cool factor into uncharted territory. We had students and Instructors watching us try to tear each other’s heads off.

This, in a way, was what we really wanted to do.

It seemed the only time we didn’t fight was when we slept. There hadn’t been another repeat of the night I’d used Seth as a pillow, and I think that ticked him off.

I strolled across the mats, catching that tail end of what Seth was saying to the pretty little half with eons of red hair and a chest that made me feel like I wore a training bra.

“Maybe after practice I’ll show you my balls of—”

I chucked the water bottle at the back of Seth’s head. He spun around and caught it before it co

“Not nice.” Seth threw the bottle to the floor.

“Five minutes are up.” I bounced back a few steps, gri

Cross, a half-blood who’d become a regular at the door, elbowed his friend. “Hundred dollars they end up in a fight to the death by week’s end.”

“Who’d you think would win?” Will, another now familiar face, gri

“I’d put my bets on that one.” Cross jerked his head at me.

I tossed my head back, smiling at Seth. “Me,” I mouthed.

Seth looked bored.

Boobs stopped twirling her hair for five seconds. “Oh no, I’d say the First would come out on top.”

My smile faded, and I decided to ignore them. I turned to Seth. “Ready, sweetheart?”

He moved to stand in front of me, his back to his—our—groupies. “I’m always ready for you, cuddle bu