by Emma Hamm
“I could have swore it was only a few nights ago.”
“Mm.” She pursed her lips as she looked him up and down. The sweater she wore started to slip down her shoulder. “You’ve got the wrong woman. And I don’t have time to be standing around all night talking. You buying or not?”
“Not.”
“Then you can leave. I’m sorry, but this store is for patrons only.”
It was a little harsh. She wouldn’t have refused anyone space in her home, and the locals knew that. Wren even let a few people crash in her apartment when they had a particularly bad day. She worked nights. She didn’t care who was in her apartment while she was gone.
But this man? He put her on edge. There was something about the direct gaze of his eyes that made her feel as though he was peeling her open. He wouldn’t find anything underneath her acerbic attitude other than a regular Curiosity.
Maybe that was why he had wandered into her shop. People tended to want to gawk at Curiosities as though they were some kind of zoo animal. Wren didn’t like it one bit when people asked if she put her pants on the same way. She wasn’t a freak, and she didn’t exhibit any oddities that came with hosting a magical creature.
Even Rupert had horns. Wren just looked like a boring human.
“I’ll take a little Calm then.” His voice cut through her thoughts like the sun cut through clouds.
That wasn’t the right analogy at all. She scowled at him before turning to find the bottle. His voice was more like a blade cutting through flesh or a hacksaw wielded by a butcher. At least that made her feel a little bit better about the voice that sounded like whiskey and was a hell of alot easier to swallow.
“Get ahold of yourself, Wren,” she muttered as she wrapped her fingers around the pale blue liquid.
“Don’t like him.”
“Me either.” She was staring at her reflection in the bottle as she spoke under her breath. People got uncomfortable when she talked out loud. Most people spoke to their magical creature in their own heads, but Wren had never managed that. E wanted to speak to her like a normal person, and she wasn’t about to insult it.
“He’s slimey.”
“I wouldn’t say slimey at all.” Mysterious, intriguing, and thought provoking were a few words that came to mind. “But I don’t trust him even for a second.”
“You shouldn’t. Good thinking, girl.” It sounded like E had chosen the disguise of a man at the moment. E didn’t usually lean towards the masculine side, but Wren wasn’t going to complain. The male voice was comforting in a time like this. It made her feel a little more powerful.
“You sound like you know him,” she murmured as she turned back towards the counter.
“I don’t think so. But there’s something about him that is familiar, and I am not impressed. Stay away from him, girl.”
She didn’t remember meeting him either. E, as far as she knew, had never had control over her body when she wasn’t aware of what it was doing. It was a pact they had made a long time ago. They wouldn’t ever do something without the other. The body was theirs to share and not for either of them alone.
She handed the bottle to the man. His fingers slid along hers as he took it, and Wren distinctly felt the roughness of calluses that decorated his palm. She recognized the placement of them. This was a man used to fighting and one who could handle a weapon.
“That’ll be eight coins.”
The price was outrageous. Calm was one of the easiest emotions to make, and it was the cheapest one she had. It shouldn’t be sold for any more than two coins at the very highest.
He reached into his pocket without question and counted out eight sparkling coins for her.
She swallowed hard and took the money but couldn’t stop the wrinkling of her nose as she held them. Her storm grey eyes looked up to meet his gaze. “Have we met before?”
“In a manner of speaking.” The whiskey voice nearly made her shiver. She hated that.
“I don’t remember meeting you.”
“I don’t suppose you would.” He turned away from her then and wandered to one of the ripped booths.
Wren forced herself to get back to cleaning and preparing for the other customers. They would walk in at strange times and request their usuals. There were even a few surprises when some people came in for her line of odd emotions.
But her eyes kept straying towards the dark man in the corner with his dirty blonde hair and black clothing. He watched her the entire night. She could feel his eyes on her as though he was stroking her spine and shoulders.
He never once opened the bottle of Calm.
She realized in a fit of anger that he had cheated her. She had said he couldn’t stay unless he bought one of her emotions, and he did exactly that. But he wasn’t here for the Juice, instead he was here for her.
The question was why? She hadn’t done anything wrong. M.O.M. wouldn’t be sending one of her agents to investigate her, because Wren had always been the kind of person who walked the line they required. Certainly, she had a few Juices that weren’t meant to be sold, but they were in the back storage, and she hadn’t peddled any out tonight.
So the question remained. Why was this man sitting in her shop and watching her?
“Wren?”
Fingers snapped in front of her face, and she realized she had been staring into space.
She cleared her throat. “Rupert. You’re back again.”
Rupert looked as though he was going to spit fire at her. His brows were furrowed, and his already thin lips were pressed firmly together so that there was no color left in them. She glanced at his horns as he tilted his head down.
Right, this wasn’t good.
“What did you bloody well give me?” he asked.
Her brows furrowed, and she stepped back a little further from the angry Satyr. “What do you mean?”
“Euphoria? You didn’t give me Euphoria, Wren.”
“I most certainly did!” She knew every Juice that she made. It wasn’t easy to remember all of them, but she had always had a knack for it. Never once had she given someone a Juice that wasn’t exactly what she said.
That’s why she didn’t have to worry about labeling them.
He plunked the bottle down in front of her and let out a very goat like grumble. Wren stared at the white mist that was halfway gone and realized two things at the exact same moment.
First, the mist inside of that bottle was not, in fact, Euphoria. White mist could be many things. Euphoria had a distinct sparkles inside of it that looked as though some child had gone mad dumping loads of glitter into her smoke. There was another emotion that was very close to the same thing, but the sparkles were actually chunks of reflective material inside of it.
This mist did not have glitter, but reflective notes. That meant this mist wasn’t actually Euphoria at all. It was Disdain. And given the fact that Rupert was likely trying to use this mist to win a lady, Disdain was the last emotion he would have been looking for.
Second, she realized that this situation was about to escalate far beyond her own control. Rupert was a Satyr and a Demon, which meant he had very little control when he got angry.
She swallowed hard and looked at the ridges of his horns. Those were going to hurt very much when he hit her with them. It was highly unlikely that anyone was going to step in to help her. Given the situation, she deserved a little bit of a roughing up if she had made the mistake and sold the wrong emotion to the wrong person.
She was going to be in even bigger trouble if anyone let that slip out to the agents of M.O.M.
Her eyes darted around the store as though searching for an escape, but she found none. Rupert was standing next to the only exit from her current place behind the counter.
“Rupert, listen.”
“I’m not listening anymore, Wren. You gave me the wrong thing. Do you know what that cost me?”
She leaned back further and tried to make a joke. “A good lay in the hay?”
> “The only lay in the hay!” he shouted at her. “That was the woman of my dreams, and I was going to win her over. And you? You gave me the wrong Juice!”
Everyone in the shop went silent as they stared at the pair who were quite clearly making a scene. This was part of the problem with being a Juice producer. Everyone got a little bit angry over the same old things.
Of course, this time it really was Wren’s fault.
She cleared her throat. “I’ll make it up to you, Rupert. You can have your pick of Juice-”
“I don’t want my pick of your Juice!” He interrupted her and leaned over the counter. His meaty hand nearly grabbed onto her skirt. “I want to make you regret your mistake.”
“I’m sure you will, Rupert. I’ll start labeling things, yeah? That sound good?”
“No,” he growled as he swiped for her again.
Things were quickly getting out of control. Some of her patrons were leaving, which meant she was going to sell even less tonight. She would probably be regretting this for a couple of weeks with this mistake looming over her like a blinking sign that still worked. Unlike her door.
“I’m sorry?” She dodged his hand again.
Rupert had just managed to grab a hold of her shirt when a hand clamped down on his shoulder. The long fingers were perfectly manicured, and Wren had a stunned moment of shock as she wondered how such strong hands didn’t have a bit of dirt underneath their fingernails.
“I believe your business is done here.” The whiskey voice again made her want to melt, and now he was saving her hide. Who was this man?
Wren wrested the fabric of her shirt from Rupert’s pudgy fingers and stepped back further until she was pressed against the wall of shelves. Rupert turned to glare at the man that wasn’t letting go of his shoulder.
“I don’t think so.” Rupert exhaled into the man’s face. “The lady has a bone to pick with me.”
“I’m certain that you are the kind of person to ‘pick bones’.” Wren flinched as the man smoothed his fingers across Rupert’s jacket and settled it more firmly upon his shoulders. That wasn’t a good move. Satyr’s didn’t like to be touched except by their chosen sex.
Some of them fancied men, others fancied women, some even fancied both. Likely, there were more Satyrs who fancied both more than only one. Wren knew for a fact that Rupert was not one of them. He liked the ladies and particularly did not like the men. He viewed them as competition that needed to be wiped off of the earth.
In short, this was not going to end well for either her or the mystery man.
“You shouldn’t have done that.” Rupert growled the moment before he headbutted the man in the face.
If it had been a normal person, that headbutt would have broken the man’s nose. As it was, Rupert had the added help of horns that had split the skin on the man’s forehead as well. The wounds gushed open and blinded her would-be savior as Rupert used his substantial weight to push the man all the way onto the ground.
He sprawled onto her floor in a tangle of long limbs and black fabric.
“Now, where were we?” Rupert said as he turned back towards her.
“Nowhere?” Her voice was shaking. “I think you’ve gotten your fight. No need to look to me for more.”
“Oh that was just a warm up.”
“E,” she muttered as she tried to stay just out of Rupert’s grip. “A little help?”
“I’m curious to see what he does.”
“Rupert?” she asked. He growled when he heard his name and started clambering over the counter. It was a difficult task for him as he was rather short and particularly overweight.
“No. The other one.”
“Now’s not a time for you to be channeling Cleopatra’s grandmother and falling in love with tall, slightly dark, and handsome.” She tossed an empty vial at Rupert’s head.
“3. 2. 1.”
E had barely managed its countdown before that strong hand once more grabbed onto Rupert’s shoulder and hauled him back over the counter.
She nearly felt bad for the Satyr. He had really expended quite a bit of energy getting over that counter and was already breathing hard. He wasn’t particularly dangerous. Wren wasn’t certain if he would have really hurt her or just tossed her around the shop a little bit.
And anyways, they all had magical creatures inside of them. They healed so much faster than the average human. She might have had a split lip and a few bruises, but they would have been gone by the morning.
Rupert was just angry and rightfully so. No one wanted to be given bad Juice by someone that they trusted. Of course, she wasn’t ever going to let him set foot back in her shop after this. He was costing her money.
“Do you have any idea what I am?” The mystery man’s voice was as calm as ever. But Wren could feel the power underneath that tone.
He held Rupert firmly in place with one hand on the man’s shoulder and the other wrapped around his throat. Compared to the short and squat Satyr, the other appeared to be impossibly tall. His broad shoulders swamped Rupert as he loomed above the angry creature.
“Don’t care.” Anger had clouded Rupert’s judgement, clearly.
“I’m a Dream Walker.” The mystery man blinked his eyes, and the lovely shade of green was gone. In its place was an electric blue that seemed to glow so brightly that Rupert’s face held a bit of the same shade. “I’m going to find you when you sleep, Rupert. And I’m going to make you live your worst nightmare over and over again.”
The words shattered through Rupert’s gaze of red as though they were a bullet through his brain. He started to stutter a response but paused as the hand on his throat flexed.
“You’re going to leave this place and never come back. You will not raise another hand towards any woman. Do you hear me?”
“I do,” Rupert croaked.
“You’ll see me again, friend. In your nightmares. I’m going to make sure that you have them every night for the rest of your pitiful existence.”
“Who do you think you are?” Rupert’s hands were claws that pulled at the man’s grasp.
“The name’s Burke. I’m certain someone like you recognizes it.”
Rupert froze and then began to whimper. He dropped limp in the man’s hands and started to whisper prayers over and over again. Burke curled his lip at the sight and dropped the Satyr onto the floor.
“Get out.”
Wren had never seen Rupert move so fast. His legs were moving a mile a minute as he banged his shoulder into her door, put out one of the last two remaining lights, and disappeared into the night.
She threw her hands up into the air. “Now look at what you’ve done!”
Burke turned to stare at her with a shocked expression. There was blood still dripping out of his nose, and it coated his hands in vivid blue. The cut on his forehead had already healed, but that had also managed to douse him in the thick liquid.
So he was a Blue Blood then. Wren could have guessed that from the blue of his eyes, but the blood was another way to be certain of it.
“Excuse me?”
“My door!” She burst out from behind the counter and pulled the door the rest of the way shut. “Now I have to fix it!”
“I just saved your life!”
“Rupert wouldn’t have hurt me that bad. He’s just got a stick up his ass because he lost a potential lay.” She opened the door and shut it again as though to direct his attention to the real problem. “My door, however, is a serious problem.”
“It closes and opens just fine.”
“It doesn’t light up anymore! There’s only an ‘n’ to let people know that I’m open! What am I to do now?”
“You’re really concerned about this? I’m bleeding on your floor and saved you from whatever that thing was!”
She put a hand on her hip and gave him an unimpressed look. “First of all, that’s a Satyr. It’s not that hard to tell. Second of all, you managed to scare all my customers out of the store by causing a
brawl. You stepped in when I did not need you to. And now you’ve cost me money!”
He whipped his hand away from his nose to open his arms out at his sides. Blood splattered on her counter from the tips of his fingers. “Are you asking me to apologize for being a gentleman?”
“A gentleman doesn’t break things! Besides, I’m not a fainting maiden who needs someone to help her!” She stepped closer and brandished a finger in his face. “Why are you even here anyways? All you’ve done is cause a mess and stare at me!”
“I haven’t been staring!”
“You most certainly have! All night, in fact.”
He growled at her. Wren knew that she should have been scared of the fearsome man, covered in blood and clearly angry with her. Any sane person would have run at the sight of him. But those green eyes were even brighter when he was angry, and she had always been a sucker for men that argued with her.
She pushed passed him and made certain that her shoulder connected with his. If only she hadn’t been so small, she might have managed to rock him a little when she did so.
“You can leave now.”
“I’m not leaving.”
Wren spun back towards him. “Excuse me? This is my shop. Get out!”
He ran a hand down his face, only managing to slick the blood even more across his stoney features. “Can I have a towel please?”
He barely finished his sentence before a towel was tossed across the room to smack firmly against his face.
“Thank you.”
She tried very hard to ignore him as he attempted to clean himself up. But he removed his jacket while he did so and her eyes lingered a little too long on the biceps that flexed with each move. He was a perfect figure of a man who appeared to be made entirely out of marble.
Wren hated him for it. It wasn’t fair that he was so perfectly formed when she was… well, average. Her hair was somewhere between curly and straight. Freckles were dotted all over her body and her nose was too long. Her lips were too wide, and she was neither tall nor short. The slope of her forehead connected right to the tip of her nose so that her profile was decidedly unimportant. She was by no means ugly. But she wasn’t normally considered beautiful either.