Destiny Realised: Destiny Series: Book Three Read online

  “God, I hope so. I could eat you right now.” I blushed when I realised what I’d said, and Britt threw back her head and started to cackle loudly.

  “I would let you eat me anytime,” Virion whispered into my mind, and I blushed a little more.

  Britt was at a stage where she was heaving for breath, and tears ran down her cheeks. It hadn’t been that funny, and even the guys were giving her strange looks. When she finally had herself under control, I had a suspicion the tears were maybe not all from her laughter, and I started to get concerned.

  “I’ve missed you guys,” she said soberly. “Don’t get me wrong; this place is awesome. But most of them have been here for centuries, and it’s just hard to relate to a lot of them. They think I’m a bit weird.” Her shoulders slumped, and she just had a general ‘someone just kicked my puppy’ look going about her.

  “I think we should go and do the dishes and leave you to do some girl talk,” Kyle whispered into everyone’s mind.

  “Wait! What? I suck at girl talk. Let me do the dishes, and you guys do it.” I panicked back.

  Sykes grinned at me. “We don’t have the necessary parts for girl talk,” he whispered back. All of the guys were already getting to their feet and leaving the room.

  “It’s not like I talk out my vagina!” I shouted into their minds.

  The guys just all laughed and left us to it. Britt looked up at me with these big puppy dog eyes, and I just sighed in resignation. I felt like I needed to warm up or stretch or something. I could do this. Girl talk. How hard could it be?

  “How are you feeling?” I attempted and then scrunched up my face in disgust. Even I knew that wasn’t right.

  Britt just laughed when she saw my face. “You look like you just licked a turd,” she observed. I mean, wow, it wasn’t that bad!

  “Harsh, but I can take criticism,” I pointed out. “Okay, let’s try this again. I can do this.” I cracked my neck from side to side and shuffled in my seat to get comfortable.

  “Okay, lay it on me,” Britt said seriously, turning in her seat, so she was facing me.

  “Are you okay?” I pushed out and then sighed. “I suck at this, I’m sorry.”

  Britt threw back her head and laughed. “Actually, this is making me weirdly happy. It’s nice to know you suck at something. It’s making me feel loads better about myself.”

  “Well, that just seems mean,” I muttered. “Seriously though, are you okay?”

  Britt sighed and slumped into her chair. “I think so,” she said, cocking her head to the side as if she was genuinely considering how to answer the question. “It was hard at first. Everyone looked at me like some kind of miracle when I got here, and it just made me feel more like I was this freak that just popped up out of nowhere. Everyone wanted to know my story, how I got here, what was going on in the realms like I even really knew … I’m rambling. Give me a minute.” She huffed out a breath, and I couldn’t help but smile at her.

  “I’ve missed you,” I told her honestly. “How about you think about what you want to say, and I’ll fill you in on what happened after you selfishly died on us.”

  Britt nodded quietly, and I thought about all of the crap which had happened up until now.

  “I feel like I need to be asking if you’re okay,” she observed.

  I just shook my head. “I never asked for this,” I told her, looking her in the eye. “I don’t even know if I can do this.”

  Britt reached across and grabbed my hand, squeezing it. “Fate really hates you,” she said seriously, before breaking into a smile. “But at least she gave you four hot mates. And that latest one, by the way, woof! I mean, girl, the amount of man-candy you have now is just unfair.”

  She started to fan herself, and if it had been anyone else, I would've been pissed about them thinking that way about my mates. But this was Britt. She always could make me smile.

  “Okay, the story up to now. We only got thirty-six out of the academy. We had a break when the first wave of demons pulled back. Everyone retreated and ran, and I stayed and held back the second wave. We tried to get them all to the pack, but everyone was so tired, and we knew they wouldn’t make it. Madame Nines managed to get a message to her sister, and we held up in a cave waiting for reinforcements. They came, we rested. We eventually got a portal opened and everyone back to the pack. Met Kyle’s Dad. Hated him immediately. Had a few skirmishes with random demons wandering around. Was told I needed to come here. Then we had your funeral. You know, you were there. Isaac tried to ambush us on the way back. Kyle killed him. Trent’s pack joined with us. Kyle has like some weird strong Alpha thing going on. Marcus went mental when he found out. We ran before he could get Wyatt to kill us. He came after us anyway, so I kicked his ass. Then Virion found us wandering around the forest trying to find the portal here. He basically took us prisoner, and then we went to the Fae realm. Then he told me he was my mate. Then we ran out of there because there’s like loads of men and I was about to be mobbed or something. Ooooh then we rode these giant squirrels up the world tree, which was fun, but then we got attacked by this massive swarm of flying demons at the gate to Valhalla. But we opened it and made it through here.” I cocked my head to one side then nodded to myself, I just about covered it all.

  When I looked at Britt, she had this weird expression on her face, like she was chewing on her laughter. “You’ve been busy. I love the cliff notes version, and we can talk about giant squirrels later. Tell me more about this realm full of men who look like man candy and don’t have enough women.” She propped her elbow on the back of the sofa like she was waiting for me to enlighten her.

  “Please, as if your realm wasn’t like that already,” I scoffed. “Now, tell me about what happened when you got here.”

  “Argh, blurgh, fine!” she said, rolling her eyes. “They were a bit shocked because no one knew you were out there. Then they all started getting excited because the Phoenix was out there. You’re like a rock star here, you know. But they’ve all been locked in here for hundreds of years. Don’t get me wrong they’re all nice, and I’ve made friends but … I don’t know. It’s not the same. It’s like trying to make your mum, your best friend. They just don’t quite get it.”

  “Okay, I can see where you’re coming from. Maybe it’s just one of those things you need to get used to, like the fact you’re not going to get Netflix here. It’s a completely different world. Also, you’re still kind of dead. Maybe this is just a chance to start again,” I reasoned. “Basically, what I’m trying to say is at the end of the day, your life hadn’t been too easy. Marcus gave you to Issacs’ pack to be their mate. Even though you didn’t want to be, this could be your way of starting over again, getting away from all the madness.”

  Britt nodded thoughtfully. “I never thought I’d get away from them, you know. I know you scared them off, but I didn’t think it was going to last. Who would’ve thought it would take dying to finally be free?” she chuckled sadly. It was grossly unfair. Britt should have been able to have any life she wanted. She shouldn’t have had to get away from anything. She should have been free to live; however she wanted.

  “So, tell me about everyone here. What do you think of them?” I asked, changing the subject.

  “Okay, you’ve two classes of people here: The Valkyrie and; The Warriors. The Warriors are people like me that were reaped from the battlefield and came here. It’s not like back home where being different makes you lesser; everyone is pretty much treated the same. I haven’t met any Gods yet, so I don’t know what that’s all about. When I first got here, everyone was excited, but kind of sad. I don’t know. I think they were tired of being locked in here. The past week since I got here, everyone got crazy excited. The training yards were cleaned up, and equipment was fixed. It was like everyone found a reason to live again,” she said.

  “Argh, why did you have to put it like that?” I sighed.

  “Oh right, sorry, no pressure or anything. You just need to save these people as well as everyone else,” she laughed. But then her face turned serious again. “They need to get out of here, Aria. Someone has to get the gate unlocked.”

  “I know. When we went into the Fae realm … there’s none of them left. We can’t rely on them to save everyone again. We need to bring an army back with us. We need to bring this army back with us. You do realise to do that we have to go find Odin and get him to unlock the gate right?” I told her.

  “By we, I’m assuming you mean, you and the guys. I’m pretty sure I’m as locked in here as everyone else is,” she pointed out.

  “There’s something else,” I admitted. “I need to train Kyle. When I took out Wyatt, I sort of had a strange conversation with him. Kyle is going to have to challenge Marcus.” I dropped my voice low as I told her and checked none of the guys were within hearing range. I had no idea what their hearing range was, but I hoped they hadn’t overheard us. None of them came storming in or started screaming in my head. I was going to take it as a good sign.

  Britt looked shocked, but then said, “I suppose it was inevitable.”

  “There’s more,” I admitted with a wince.

  “The revelations just keep coming,” she muttered with a smile.

  “Marcus has been blackmailing Wyatt, so he does what he wants. He has his mate,” I told her quietly. I really hoped the guys weren’t listening in. I’d promised Wyatt I wouldn’t tell Kyle, but I realised now I was wrong. I needed to talk to them all about this, but I’d prefer we did it properly rather than them overhearing me discussing it with someone else.

  Britt’s mouth dropped open in shock, and she spluttered, before finally getting out. “I suppose that explains why he’d support him. But that’s low, even for Marcus. That’s like supervillain type shit.
Kyle doesn’t know?” she asked.

  I shook my head. “Wyatt asked me not to tell him, but I think I need to.”

  “You think?” she sassed back at me.

  “How do I tell him something like that?” I asked her. I was genuinely upset about having to do this. Fucking Wyatt and fuck Marcus, the evil dick!

  “I can see you ranting in your head,” Britt told me. I could see her struggling to hold in a smile. “You’ll find a way,” she said, managing to reign the smile in because it really was not an appropriate time.

  Liam stuck his head through the doorway with a sheepish expression on his face. “We need to get going. It looks like Geta is heading over this way.”

  Britt popped up off the sofa and started doing a weird shuffle on the spot. “What on Earth are you doing?” Liam asked her, watching her shuffle about.

  “Geta’s coming!” she said, flapping her hands in the air.

  “Oh my god! Are you crushing on Geta?” I laughed.

  “What? No! She’s just amazing,” Britt swooned. She, for real, swooned.

  “So, it’s more like a fangirl type of situation,” Liam pointed out.

  Britt scowled at us both but didn’t get to say anything because just as she opened her mouth, there was a knock at the door. Liam jogged over and opened it up, greeting Geta and letting her into the house.

  “Good Morning,” she said as she entered the room. When she saw Britt, she nodded her head at her, just saying “Britt.” I thought Britt was going to pass out; she was so excited.

  Liam started talking to Geta and leading her into the kitchen where the guys still were. Britt came up beside me and excitedly whispered, “She knows my name!” I thought she would squeal for a second, but she managed to reign her crazy back in. We were going to have a ball making fun of her for this later.

  The guys were clustered around the table leaning their heads together murmuring. Liam coughed quietly, and they all looked up, Sykes gave us one of his blinding smiles, and I just squinted at them suspiciously. They were up to something. And they were leaving me out. Rude!

  “I thought I’d show you around the training grounds this morning,” Geta said to me. “I won’t lie. The other Valkyrie are excited you’re here, and they’ve been training for some time already.”

  “Well, let’s see what you’ve got going on,” Sykes said, standing up.

  “Don’t think we aren’t talking about this later,” I whispered into all their minds.

  Virion at least had the decency to look bad, but the others just smiled.

  “Because I have something I need to discuss with you as well,” I admitted.

  Now it was my turn to look bad. At least now, I was committed, and I couldn’t chicken out of it. Unless they forgot, then I was totally chickening out of this shit.

  We all followed Geta out of the cottage. I was surprised when we got outside that we hadn’t realised what was going on. It was like we hit a wall of sound. The sand area where I’d put the hurt on a load of Valkyrie was completely packed. It was like the scene in Wonder Woman where the Amazons were training and kicking ass, except these badass bitches had wings.

  Francesca was right, everyone had varying colours of brown wings, there were a couple of dark greys, but none were white like mine. When we got to the edge of the training ring, my attention was entirely on what was in front of me, and Geta was just an afterthought. It was probably rude, but this was just my thing. I loved this shit.

  It seemed like there were only Valkyrie training in this area. Most of them were training with swords. There was a section of the far side with bows and were firing arrows at targets, but they were on the far side from me, and I decided to go over there later. Directly in front of me, most of the training involved swords, but some were also going hand to hand. They were good. They were a bit out of practice, but I wasn’t going to say it to anyone’s face. If someone shoved me in this place and locked the door for a couple of hundred years, I’d probably get a bit bored of training eventually too. The Blood Moon, when we were expecting the demons to stage their final attack, was just over four weeks away. If they put the work in between now and then, they’d be more than ready.

  After I stood there watching for a few minutes, they started to realise I was there. The change was noticeable. The fighting became more aggressive, and the noise increased along with it. When they were trying to show off, I had to admit they did get better.

  It took me a while, but I realised Geta was still standing next to me. “They’re very impressive,” I told her.

  She didn’t say anything back to me, and I turned my head to look at her and make sure I hadn’t said the wrong thing. She had a proud mama look on her face, and I turned back to watch the training in front of us. She should be proud. What they had here was impressive. It was a community of women, working and training together. And they kicked ass. In fact, they were the last hope for the magic realm.

  “The Warriors are training in the ring behind the mess hall if you’d like to inspect them as well,” Geta told me, walking away already. I guess that meant we were going anyway.

  “Inspect? That sounds very formal,” I told her.

  Geta looked back over her shoulder at me. “They are your army, Phoenix General. You need to inspect them to see if they are up to your required standard.”

  Well, now I kind of felt bad for thinking they needed a bit more training. Actually, no. It wasn’t that they needed more training. They were just a bit rusty. They were miles ahead of anything I’d seen the shifters doing.

  As we walked through the Valkyrie village, I fell back away from Geta until I walked with Virion. “How do they hold up against the Fae army?” I asked him.

  He thought about it for a moment. “There are so few of us left we don’t really have an army anymore. I wasn’t old enough to remember the army before the Galvinae Wars. If you want to know how they hold up against our current warriors … they are perhaps better,” he admitted.

  I smiled. I didn’t know why. Maybe because these were my people and it was nice to know. Britt dropped back to join us. She linked arms with me as we walked over to the next training yard.

  “Are you doing this just to make yourself look cool?” I asked her, looking down at the way her arm was threaded through mine.

  “You know it!” she singsonged back to me, and I threw my head back and laughed. There was something about being around Britt that just lightened your mood. Even Virion was smiling, and he hadn’t even had the chance to get to know her yet.

  When we reached the training yard, we were met by pretty much the same sight as before, except this time, no one had wings, and they were mainly men with a few women. They trained with a mixture of weapons. I could see swords, axes, spears and a couple of bows. Some held shields but most were without. These were the warriors reaped from battlefields having been judged as the best warriors from their clans by the Valkyrie. They trained hard. I suppose they probably felt like they had something to prove.

  As I stood and watched the warriors train a small glimmer of hope started inside me. This was a massive army, which was trained to the point where they could actually fight. Maybe we could do this. Of course, we had the small problem of getting them there, but I was happy to just deal with it later because there was only so much a girl could do at any one time. Right!

  Britt was bouncing up and down on the spot as she watched. She was the one who’d instigated the training coup and gate crashed my morning run, which felt like an age ago. In fact, there would probably not have been any Elites if it hadn’t been for her. I looked down at the little energetic brunette next to me, and I realised she was the reason we’d made it as far as we had. She was the reason we’d got anyone out of the academy at all. I hadn’t realised it before.

  While I was having my reflective moment, a big burly Mama-Jama of a warrior came strolling up to us. Because I was too busy staring dreamily at my friend, I didn’t notice until he’d been standing for an awkward amount of time waiting for me to catch on. By the time I looked up, not only was he standing there staring at me, but also Geta and my mates. Like me, Britt was still in a world of her own, enjoying watching the training going on in front of us.