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A/N: Important author’s note at the end, please read!!!! It is a bit lengthy but it contains very VERY important information!!!!
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It was late in the afternoon when Samuel and Jayden walked into the hospital wing. The windows were flung open, letting in sunlight that bathed the half-empty room in golden light as the curtains flapped lightly in the noonday breeze.
Azrael lay in one of the beds in the far corner with his now bandaged ankle propped up on a pillow, and there was a pleased smile on his face as the school nurse fussed around him.
‘My word, students out of bed at midnight? What were you lot getting up to at that ungodly hour? No wonder you twisted your ankle, you poor thing. It would be a miracle if you could see your own nose at such a time.’
Azrael gave her a cute pout. ‘My leg hurts real bad, Nurse Mary.’
‘I’m not surprised at that, you poor thing. That was a nasty twist if I’ve ever seen one. Do you want me to fluff your pillows again?’
Azrael beamed. ‘Yes, please.’
‘So polite as well, such a darling,’ Nurse Mary crooned as she busied herself fluffing his pillows, taking extra care to make sure he was as comfortable as he could be.
Azrael settled back into his freshly fluffed pillows, looking as content as a kitten as Samuel and Jayden walked up to him.
‘Oh, look, I have visitors! Hi, Jayden. Hi, Samuel.’
‘How are you feeling?’ Samuel asked, taking a seat on the edge of his bed.
Nurse Mary gave them a stern glare. ‘It’s not visiting hours yet. Shouldn’t you both be in class?’
‘We…’
‘I think we can give them a pass this time, don’t you?’ Azrael cut in. ‘If I get any more rest, I’ll slip into a coma.’
Nurse Mary frowned, but one look at Azrael’s entreating face and her firmness melted away.
‘I suppose you’re right, but don’t overexercise yourself.’
‘You have nothing to worry about,’ Azrael promised solemnly.
The matron’s tight lips lifted for the briefest of seconds in a ghost of a smile. ‘Would you like some tea to entertain your guests?’
Azrael’s smile blossomed, and his entire face lit up like the sun. ‘That would be marvellous.’
Nurse Mary giggled. ‘Such a dear.’ she said, and as she walked away, the faintest blush could be seen appearing on her cheeks.
Azrael made himself comfortable on the bed as Samuel stared at him in open-mouthed wonder.
‘What was that?’
‘What was what?’ Azrael asked distractedly.
‘That,’ Samuel said, gesturing faintly with his hands. ‘How do you get her to do what you want? She scolds me literally every time I come in here, but she fawns all over you like you’re the second coming of Jesus.’
‘Maybe she doesn’t like you?’
Samuel shook his head. ‘She’s like that with everyone. You’re the first person I’ve seen her act like that too.’
Azrael shrugged. ‘I just have a way with people, I guess.’
‘So do I, but not like that,’ Samuel muttered under his breath as the still-blushing matron came back with three steaming cups of tea.
Jayden watched as the matron placed the cups on the table and worriedly adjusted Azrael’s leg before walking away.
‘You know, for someone who is usually so self-aware, you are pretty ignorant of how narcissistic you can be,’ he observed.
Azrael frowned. ‘Really?’
‘Yes.’
Azrael considered it for a moment. ‘No, I don’t think that’s it. I get why you would think that, and I am sure there’s some deep psycho-analytic explanation for it, but quite frankly, that’s a road I would rather not travel, so I won’t.’ He paused. ‘What I am interested in is finding out how you figured to use my mother against me. I’ve already filled in most of the gaps, but I’m sure Samuel here would like to know as well, so feel free to start from the beginning.’
Jayden looked like he was about to refuse but in the end, he gave a small nod and began to speak. ‘It started with Samuel asking about your mother. I told him I asked you about her, and the look you got when you spoke about her was familiar, but I couldn’t remember what it reminded me of. Then it hit me. That’s the expression I get when I speak about my mother.’ A wry smile came on his face. ‘. It seems we both have unresolved issues with our mothers. You were right. We are more alike than I care to admit.’
Azrael didn’t say, “I told you so,” but his smirk said it for him.
‘Anyway,’ Jayden went on. ‘I had to know how deep these issues run and whether it was enough to push you out of balance, so I went to see your brother.’
Azrael let out a derisive snort. ‘I can’t imagine he was of any help.’
Jayden’s lips quirked slightly in wry amusement. ‘He notices more than you give him credit for, and he is interesting enough in his own way,’
Azrael scoffed in disbelief but didn’t say anything else.
‘Granted, what he told me wasn’t a lot, but it was enough for me to make a gamble on. I now had the information I needed, and all I had to do was wait for you to grow bored.’
‘I see,’ Azrael said. ‘And I take it your friends’ unexpected appearance was all part of your plan.’
‘It was.’
Samuel looked at him in surprise. ‘What?’
Jayden avoided his gaze. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t want to put their lives at risk, but we needed their help.’
‘So that’s why Leo woke up early. It was all part of your plan?’
Jayden nodded.
‘Why did you do that, though? If you had asked, they would have been happy to help.’
‘It’s because he wanted me to think I was winning,’ Azrael explained in a disinterested voice. He had already grown bored of this conversation. ‘The game, the questions, all of it, was just to make me feel confident in my victory. He was not expecting you to win. He just needed to make you think that to fool me.’
He gave Jayden an approving look. ‘Very well played. I would say I’m impressed, but I honestly expected nothing less.’
‘How touching,’ Jayden drawled with false humour. ‘This experience should be a lesson to you on the dangers of playing fast and loose with your sanity.’
Azrael lips snaked into a small smile. ‘Alas, we both know I’m hopelessly addicted to danger.’
‘That would someday be your undoing.’
‘It would,’ Azrael agreed.
Jayden didn’t respond. Instead he stood and dragged Samuel to his feet. ‘We should be heading back now.’
Samuel glanced unsurely at the bed. ‘But we’ve hardly spent any time here.’
‘Go,’ Azrael assured him, letting his eyes fall close. ‘I can feel the drugs starting to work, so I would be in barely any shape to entertain.’
‘Oh erm… alright then. See you later,’ he said as Jayden dragged him out of the hospital wing. ‘That went better than I thought,’ he stated as they made their way down the flight of stairs.
Jayden glanced at him. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You two actually got along. I was afraid that you won’t even be able to stand being in the same room as him. You know, since he tried to kill you.’
Jayden snorted. ‘He has been trying to kill me for as long as he has known me. This isn’t anything new to me.’ He was quiet for a moment. ‘I should hate him,’ he said finally. ‘Especially since he tried to kill you too, but as strange as it is, I don’t. I have a strong dislike for him, but I don’t hate him. I know he wasn’t doing it out of malevolence and in his own strange way, he cares about you, and I can’t hate him for that.’
‘My guess would have been that you don’t care enough about him to muster up such a strong emotion as hate.’
‘That too.’ He paused. ‘When it comes to people like him, your best bet is to tolerate them or, at the very least, ignore them. I want to pay him back for putting us through this, and if this had happened a few months ago, I would have, but I have too much to lose now to antagonise him further.’
Samuel placed his hand in his. ‘I understand.’ He released a deep breath. ‘At least now it’s over, and the only thing we have to worry about is finals.’ He closed his eyes and groaned at the thought.
Back in the hospital wing, things had finally quieted down and the elderly matron had withdrawn to her office to get ahead of the paperwork.
A lone fly buzzed lazily through the room as a peaceful silence enveloped the space. Azrael was just about to slip into a drug-induced sleep when the doors swung open, and a furious Valentina stormed in.
‘You won’t believe what has happened!’ she screamed.
Azrael waited to hear the door to the nurse’s office fly open and a furious matron marching in, but his hopes were dashed when the doors remained stoutly shut.
‘Jayden and Samuel are back together,’ Valentina was saying as she paced around his bed.
Azrael sighed. ‘Are they now?’ he said with his eyes still closed.
‘They are! You need to put a stop to it.’
‘In case you hadn’t noticed, I am currently incapacitated at the moment.’
‘I don’t care. You need to do something!’
‘Do I?’
‘Yes!’
Azrael stifled a yawn. ‘I neither want to nor am I going to.’
‘What do you mean you’re not going to?’ Valentina demanded furiously.
‘As humbling as it is to admit, I’ve been bested.’ Azrael sighed. ‘That bleeding heart defeated me with his friendship.’
Valentina stared at him. ‘You can’t be serious.’
‘I know, it’s so unlike me. I must be growing soft in my old age.’ He shrugged. ‘Either way, the point still stands. I’m afraid you are on your own now.’
Valentina stopped her pacing. She turned to face him as her voice grew threatening. ‘Don’t forget we have a deal.’
Azrael slowly opened his eyes, and she fell silent as a bolt of fear ran down her spine. He studied her for a minute, then closed his eyes again.
‘Do you know why I haven’t killed you yet?’ he asked in a conversational tone.
‘You don’t want to?’
Azrael laughed. ‘Oh, I very much want to. However, I am holding myself back because you, my dear, have potential.’
Valentina was surprised. ‘What?’
‘Yes, you see despite your delusions with your grand designs the potential you possess is staggering. Take, for instance, your skill in manipulating Jayden. It was brief, but for that brief period, you did what few had ever done, and you did it so expertly, I must admit, I’m rather impressed.’
‘What does it mean?’
‘It means, my delightful little harlot, that instead of dispatching with you -as was my original plan, I would wait for you to achieve your potential.’ Azrael opened his eyes and smiled at her. ‘As a matter of fact, I’m going to give you a friendly tip as well. Call it a secret of the trade, if you will.’
Valentina’s gaze turned wary. ‘And that is?’
‘You are an extremely unlikable person.’
Valentina’s voice was sarcastic. ‘Wow, thanks for that helpful tip.’
‘I wasn’t done. Most people control others through fear and the rest through love or devotion. Both are powerful forms of control, but they are also extremely unreliable. Fear and love are emotions, and human emotion is more unpredictable than the weather. Let’s take fear, for instance. There is a limit to how much fear a person can take before they lash out. Love seems noble and firm, but love has the tendency of making people blind. A person can do the opposite of what you want just because they thought it was in your best interests, and the results from that could be disastrous, even fatal for you.’
He paused to smile at the thought. ‘Anyway, where was I? Yes, your problem is you have been trying to control people by inspiring some sort of devotion for you. You haven’t been met with much success in the area because, as I said, you are an extremely unlikeable person. Whatever form of devotion you get is shallow at best and fake at worst. Your other option would be to use fear, but as I have explained that is unreliable.’
Valentina was growing impatient. ‘Is there a point you are getting to?’
‘Why is everyone so impatient these days? Yes, there is, and if you had just waited for a few more seconds, you would have known that. The key to controlling people is not through love or fear but by appealing to their selfishness. Everyone tries to ignore it, but humans are selfish at their core and that is not a bad thing. The best way to get someone to do what you want is by making them think what you want aligns with their own self-interests.’
‘That logic sounds extremely inefficacious.’
Azrael smiled. ‘Is it? Do you know why you targeted Jayden in the first place? You think it’s because his family is the highest in the Noble 52, but who planted that idea in your mind? How many of your actions arose from your own directive or were planted by mine?’
Valentina’s scornful expression froze in place and slowly took on a look of dawning realization.
‘You’ve been manipulating me all this time?’
Azrael laughed heartily. ‘Give yourself some credit. I may have sown the seed, but you reaped it on your own. I could in no way have predicted the kind of nastiness your entertaining mind could come up with.’
‘All this just to give up in the end?’
‘Perplexing, isn’t it?’
Valentina stuck her chin out defiantly. ‘If you won’t go on, that’s your decision, but you can’t stop me from getting him back.’
Azrael was highly amused. ‘I think you would find that I can, but luckily for you, I won’t. Whatever happens next is of no concern to me.’
‘What are you going to do now?’
Azrael considered that question for a moment, then shrugged. ‘Do my job, I suppose. I have nothing keeping me here now that I have grown bored with my favourite toy, but the headmistress already dislikes me enough. I see no reason to stoke her dislike even further. After that, well, who knows? Go wherever I end up, I suppose.’
Valentina straightened up. ‘This is it then.’
Azrael smirked at her. ‘Oh no, you are not getting rid of me that easily. Haven’t you been paying attention? I’m not done with you. You are going to be my new favourite toy, and I’ll be coming back to play with you when you’re ready.’
Valentina stared at the smirk on that insufferably pretty face, and she was filled with such a rush of pure loathing, she was struck by the sudden desire to grab the pillow and snuff that smirk off.
Her fingers twitched as she thought about it. This was the perfect moment. Azrael’s leg was still in bandages rendering him immobile, and the drugs in his system would make his reflexes slow and sluggish.
Her hands almost reached for the pillow, but a feeling at the back of her mind stopped her. Instead, she regarded him with a cool gaze and responded with, ‘Fine.’
Azrael smiled at her and stood up, ripping the bandages off his feet as he did so. He walked up to her and patted her shoulder fondly.
‘Until next time then,’ he said before strolling out of the hospital wing with his hands in his pocket.
Valentina stood stock-still as the weight of the moment descended on her. She knew then that despite all of Azrael’s talk about her potential if she had tried to do what she had been thinking, he would have taken her life without a second thought.
A faint tune of Ring around the rosy drifted in with the noon breeze as Azrael whistled away, out of sight.
Author’s Note: I know it’s been a week since I promised this update but I’ve been addicted with playing Hogwarts Legacy. Literally GOY.
This is the end of Azrael’s arc ladies, gentlemen, and everyone in between. To all the PaulxNoel shippers out there you’re in luck because the ship is finally about to sail. The next few chapters would be about them with of course, some SamuelxJayden because they are still the main couple and Valentina is not done with them yet. But of course, this isn’t what this author’s note is about. It’s about best boy Azrael.
It has come to my attention that most readers have a deep dislike for Azrael. This is very concerning because, as far as I’m aware, he is the sweetest and most lovely person to ever grace the planet -or more accurately the pages of this book. (Yes, I am aware I am horribly blind when it comes to him but he can do no wrong in my eyes. And to the people who know me personally, no it’s not because you think he’s freakingly similar to me. Do I look homicidal to you???🤨)
I was going to leave this news to the end of the book but I need to address this expeditiously. To make sure we are all on the same page and in love with best boy Azrael I am pleased to announce *can I get a drumroll please🥁🥁🥁* a whole new book just about him.
To those who doubt my writing skills watch me make you fall in love with him. I have already drafted his relationship pairing and no it’s not going to be with Leo -though I will say I do not hate that ship. It’s been rather growing on me lately if I’m being honest. (I was going to say guess who it was but I just remembered I took down the chapter that mentioned him. I am going to post it back up so be on the lookout on my page for it.) All that’s left for me to figure out is the plot.
I am physically unable to write romance as the focus of any story. In Under the Same Sky, the focus is self-acceptance and self-love as young adults try to figure out who they are. In Azrael’s story, it could be a battle between good and evil, a mystery, an adventure, who knows. This feels like a good time to mention that this book would be a fantasy. You know with witches, vampires, werewolves, demons, the works. I just need to find the plot that would drive the whole thing.
I am writing finals for the rest of April, so UTSS would be completed by the end of May. For the rest of the year I have a crazy amount of free time I plan on devoting to Azrael’s book and Chronicles of God, my other novel (please check it out). I don’t plan on Azrael’s story being as long as UTSS but that’s what I said about UTSS and look where we are now.
Anyway, this author’s note is lengthy enough so I’m going to end it here. I’ll have more information for you by the end of this book. I hope to get one or two chapters in during my finals but updates would be infrequent until May. So best of luck till then!
Huggies🤗
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