Jump to Chapter Recap of The Awakening: 1–9 | 10–18
The Awakening Chapters 19–26 Summary
This Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti The Awakening chapter summary contains full spoilers.
The Awakening Chapter 19
Darcy and Tory attend a Siren Order Enhancement class by the lake. During an emotion-sharing exercise, Max’s friend uses his power to get Darcy talking about her attraction to Orion. Before Darcy can recover from that, Professor Undine does the same.
When the class moves lakeside, most students dive in and shift. Max stays on shore and uses his Siren ability to put the twins in a compliant, open state. He gets Tory to reveal her worst memory. She says she nearly drowned in a sinking car after her ex crashed off a bridge and swam to safety without her. He then turns to Darcy, who reveals that a boy she trusted slept with her and immediately ended things. She also admits that she dyed her hair as a reminder of that wound. Once Max has what he wants, he dives in and leaves the twins sitting there.
At lunch, Seth slips a note into Darcy’s pocket before walking off. Across the room, Marguerite confronts Darius about their breakup and blames the twins, but Darius brushes off her accusations and walks out. Marguerite and Kylie redirect their anger at Darcy and Tory. The confrontation escalates when someone magically sends the twins’ table flying and sets it on fire. In the chaos, Kylie snatches the note from Darcy’s pocket, reads it, and throws it back in tears. The note is Seth asking Darcy to the dance.
The Awakening Chapter 20
Tory says goodbye to Darcy after Cardinal Magic and heads back on her own, planning to nap before dinner. A junior student knocks into her in the corridor and sends her books skidding across the floor. While Tory is gathering them, she catches Marguerite and Kylie in the stairwell plotting something. Rather than retreat, Tory blasts the stairwell with water magic, drenches them both, and slips into a nearby classroom and waits while Marguerite and Kylie storm past looking for her.
But the classroom isn’t empty. Caleb is sitting in the shadows, and Tory knows immediately she has no way out. She steps forward and bares her neck, figuring she may as well get it over with on her own terms. Caleb surprises her by kissing her instead, and the two become intimate on one of the classroom desks before Caleb pulls back, telling Tory that a student is about to arrive for a vampirism lesson.
When the student, Teddy, walks in, Caleb bites Tory on the spot and turns the moment into a demonstration, announcing that Tory is his claimed Source. Tory responds with her own warning to Teddy before walking out, leaving without being entirely sure how she feels about seeing Caleb again.
The Awakening Chapter 21
Darcy and Tory are on their way to the dance at The Orb when Seth pulls Darcy aside to flirt with her. Darcy rebuffs him and rejoins the group. Before the sisters make it inside, Darcy gets a message from Falling Star asking to meet in Venus Library.
The twins sneak away and discover that Falling Star is Professor Astrum, their tarot teacher. He tells them he was a close friend of their birth mother, Merissa, and shares what he knows. Their father, the Savage King, was a brutal ruler who died at the hands of the Nymphs, but Astrum believes a Fae conspirator was working behind the scenes and had trained the Nymphs to carry out the attack. Astrum suspects Darius, Lord Acrux, and Orion, whose family has a history of dark magic.
Before he can say anything more, Astrum senses someone else in the library and ends the conversation. He tells the twins to leave and promises to find them again. They run.
Back outside The Orb, the twins briefly discuss whether Darius and Orion are really behind the attacks, but neither sister has any answers, so they let the question drop and head into the dance. Inside, Darcy has a brief encounter with Orion as he passes through the crowd.
The Awakening Chapter 22
Tory is relieved that the evening has been quiet so far. At the bar, Caleb shows up and tries to convince her to sneak out with him, but she turns him down. When Darius and Max appear, Caleb heads off to join them. Tory sends Darius a rude gesture before looking away.
Afterward, Tory bumps into Geraldine, who has recovered from an earlier injury, and hugs her before slipping away from the fawning crowd of A.S.S. members that gathers around them. Diego then mentions that he spotted Darcy heading outside and that Seth followed her soon after. Tory decides to check on her sister and sends Diego back to his date rather than letting him come along.
Outside, Tory senses someone approaching from behind and turns to find Darius. He tells her to take Darcy and leave the Academy for good. She refuses and tries to walk away, so Darius grabs both her arms and uses Coercion to take control of her body, pushing her toward the Lunar building. Tory can’t resist him.
The Awakening Chapter 23
Darcy slips out of the Academy formal to clear her head after spending too much time with Seth. Orion follows her out and backs her against the wall. He clearly intends to bite her but seems uneasy about it. Darcy calls him out. When Seth appears, Orion backs off without biting her. Orion quietly tells Darcy to stay away from Seth and go back inside.
Seth and Darcy end up sitting together on a bench. He kisses her, and she gives in, but midway through the kiss, Seth pulls out something sharp and cuts off a lock of her blue hair. The hair carries deep personal meaning for Darcy as a reminder never to trust people. Kylie then steps out from the bushes with her phone, having recorded everything. Seth coldly tells Darcy to take her sister and leave the Academy, then walks away with Kylie, carrying the lock of hair.
Darcy is still on the ground, crying, when Orion returns. Instead of gloating, he helps her to her feet and makes a joke to ease the moment. Then a scream cuts through the night, and Darcy immediately fears Tory is the one in trouble, so she runs toward the sound.
The Awakening Chapter 24
Darius drags Tory to the school swimming pool, where a crowd of students is already waiting. Max admits that he used his power to discover Tory’s fears and planned the whole thing around them. Under Max’s Coercion, Tory is forced to climb to the top of a ten-meter diving board. She tries to resist jumping, but when Seth threatens to blast her off the board with wind magic, Tory leaps on her own terms.
In the water, Darius and Max use their magic to whip the pool into a violent vortex and crash waves over Tory repeatedly. She manages to wrestle off her waterlogged dress to keep herself afloat. Then the water suddenly goes still and freezes solid above her, sealing her just out of reach of air. Tory fights back with her fire magic and nearly cracks the ice open, but Darius and Max reinforce it before she can break through. Her strength gives out, her lungs give in, and she blacks out beneath the surface after involuntarily breathing in water.
The Awakening Chapter 25
Darcy races after Orion to the Lunar building, sensing that Tory is in danger. She finds the pool frozen over and watches Orion dive in to pull an unconscious Tory from beneath the ice. He uses some kind of healing magic to revive her, and Tory eventually comes around.
Then Orion orders everyone in the room to stay put and goes after the four Heirs, who are already heading for the exit. He physically confronts each of them in turn, demanding to know what happened. Darius is the one who finally speaks, admitting that Max had figured out the twins’ greatest fears and that the Heirs used that information to orchestrate the entire incident in hopes of driving the Vegas Twins out of Zodiac Academy.
Orion hands out a week of detention to everyone present and two weeks to the Heirs, warning them that one more incident like this will get them expelled. Darius responds by telling Orion off and walking out, and Orion lets him go. Tory protests that the punishment is nowhere near enough, but Orion ignores her and gives her additional healing. Darcy is left feeling shattered but holds on to the belief that she’ll get through it.
The Awakening Chapter 26
Orion heals Tory after her near-drowning while Darcy watches anxiously. The Heirs remain present, but Orion keeps them back. When Orion offers Tory Caleb’s shirt to cover herself, she refuses, so Orion gives her his own jacket instead.
Before Orion can walk the sisters out, screaming erupts somewhere outside. The group rushes toward the noise and finds a large crowd gathered near The Orb around something on fire. Diego says that only Dragon Fire burns like that. Orion puts out the flames and uncovers a body so badly burned that it’s barely recognizable.
Tory feels a pull on her magic and moves toward the body. The corpse’s hand falls open, and a tarot card shoots straight into her. A few students manage to snap photos before Orion clears the crowd. Tory slips the card into her pocket.
Once they’re away from the scene, the sisters examine the card. It’s the Death card, and a message signed by Falling Star, who’s actually Astrum, is written on the back. Astrum says that the Shadow found him and that he’s out of time. He tells the sisters that the answers they need are hidden somewhere between Leo and Libra. Falling Star warns them not to trust the flames and urges them to claim their throne.
Tory realizes that Astrum, the one person at the Academy who’d been trying to help the twins, is gone.
Disclaimer: This is The Awakening summary. The original work is the property of Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti and King’s Hollow.
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