Betrayed

Council. Maybe Deino would be the right choice. I could ask Erik about her. With Aphrodite out of power I could give Deino a chance (as well as sincerely wish her name wasn't so disturbing).
    I was still considering how to go about telling my friends (who were also my fellow Prefects) that I was thinking about asking Terrible to join our Council when Professor Nolan returned to the stage and waited for the audience to quiet down. When she started speaking her eyes were shining with excitement and she seemed ready to burst. I felt a little thrill run through me. Erik had finished in the top ten!
    "Erik Night is our final performer. He has been an incredible talent since the day he was Marked three years ago. I am proud to be his teacher and his mentor," she said, beaming. "Please give him the hero's welcome he deserves for placing first in the International Shakespearian Monologue Competition!”
    The auditorium exploded as Erik strode, smiling, onto the stage. I could hardly breathe. How could I have forgotten how utterly gorgeous he is? Tall—taller than Cole even—he had black hair that did that adorable Superman curl thing, and eyes so brilliant blue they were like staring into the summer sky. Like the other performers, he was dressed all in black, with the fifth former insignia of Nyx's golden chariot pulling a trail of stars over his left breast as the only break in the dark color scheme. And, let me tell you, he made black look good.
    He walked to center stage, stopped, smiled directly (and obviously) into my eyes, and winked at me. He was so damn hot I thought I would die. Then he bowed his head and when he raised it he wasn't eighteen-year-old Erik Night, vampyre fledgling, fifth former at the House of Night, anymore. Somehow, right in front of our eyes, he had become a Moorish warrior who was trying to explain to a room full of doubters how a Venetian princess had fallen in love with him, and he with her.

    "Her father lov'd me; oft invited me;
    Still question’d me the story of my life
    From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes
    That I have pass'd.”

    I couldn't take my eyes from him, and neither could anyone else in the room as he transformed into Othello. I also couldn't help but compare him to Heath. In his own way, Heath was as successful and talented as Erik. He was Broken Arrow's star quarterback, with a bright collegiate and maybe even pro football career in front of him. Heath was a leader. Erik was a leader. I'd grown up watching Heath play ball, had been proud of him, and had cheered for him. But I had never been awed by his talent like I was awed by Erik. And the only time Heath had ever made me feel like I couldn't breathe was when he sliced into his skin and offered his blood to me.
    Erik paused in his monologue, and moved forward until he was standing at the edge of the stage, so close that if I stood I could reach up and touch him. Then he looked into my eyes and completed Othello's speech to me, as though I was the absent Desdemona he spoke of:

    "She wish'd she had not heard it, yet she wish'd
    That heaven had made her such a man; she thank’d me,
    And bade me, if I had a friend that lov'd her,
    I should but teach him how to tell my story,
    And that would woo her.
    Upon this hint I spake:
    She lov'd me for the dangers I had pass'd,
    And I lov'd her that she did pity them."

    Erik touched his fingers to his lips, then held his hand out to me as if to offer me his formal kiss, and then pressed those fingers over his heart and bowed his head. The audience erupted into cheers and a standing ovation. Stevie Rae stood cheering next to me, wiping her eyes and laughing.
    "That was so romantic I almost peed my pants," she yelled.
    "Me, too!" I laughed.
    And then Professor Nolan was back onstage, closing the performance and directing everyone to the wine and cheese reception set up in the lobby.
    "Come on, Z," Erin said, grabbing one of my hands.
    "Yeah, we're staying with you 'cause that friend of Erik's that played Romeo is insanely hot," Shaunee said as she grabbed my other hand. The Twins started hauling me through the crowd, shouldering us past the slow-moving kids like mini-tugboats. I looked helplessly back at Damien and Stevie Rae. Clearly they were going to have to catch up on their own. The Twins were a force beyond even my control.
    We popped from the bottled-up crowd trying to exit the auditorium like three corks coming to the surface. And suddenly there Erik was, just