by Emma Hamm
CHAPTER 3
He came back every night. Burke became a dark shadow that never seemed to disappear in the corner of her shop. She opened up, and he was at the door waiting for her. He would buy a different happy emotion every night, and every night, he would give it away to someone else.
But he abided by the rule she had set. A person had to buy something to be in her shop. He even continued to pay her ridiculously high prices that only got higher and higher every night. Wren was trying to scare him away, and yet, he never seemed to step far away from her. She didn’t know if he was watching her because he didn’t trust her or if he was worried someone else would attack her.
No one would. Her customers started trickling slowly back in and apologized for being gone. They all trusted her, even more so now that she had placed labels onto her vials.
Most of them were old Juice. She had made them a long time ago but remembered what they were. Wren had only been a little worried that she was labeling them wrong.
“Stop questioning yourself.”
The grumpy voice in her head was even more gruff than usual.
“I’m not going to stop questioning myself,” she replied. “I messed up. I never mess up.”
“We messed up, first of all. And second of all, we won’t mess up again.”
“It’s only human to mess up, E. But we’re going to prevent it from happening next time.”
E grumbled a little bit while muttering, “You might be human. But I’m not.”
She was standing behind the counter after the last customer of the night had come in. Soon she would kick Burke out of the shop and lock the door firmly behind him.
The last order was an easier one. Depression. It was a dark and dreary thing. Dark grey pooled at the bottom of a bottle that was difficult to move. Depression was less of a liquid and more of a sludge. She still worried every time she handed someone a vial that she was giving them the wrong thing.
She wasn’t sure why the Pixie had wanted Depression. They were usually bright and happy creatures. Wren could count on one hand the amount of times she’d sold a negative emotion to one of their kind. Nevertheless, it wasn’t her business their plans for her product. She simply sold them the Juice and let it go.
The Pixie would remain in the back room for the rest of the night and would let herself out in the morning. That was the deal with emotions like this. Wren didn’t need anyone going home and taking something that dangerous. She already had a bad enough reputation with her recent Juice mix up.
She always added a touch of exhaustion with her Depression that kicked in twenty minutes into the experience. The pixie would be fast asleep for a few hours while the strongest part of Depression rode through her body. Changing the emotions was the best she could do to soften the blow for such an awful Juice. At least it would only be the pixie’s dreams that were sad.
A tsking sound echoed loudly in her head.
“You forget that we’re professionals, Wren.”
“Maybe, but even professionals make mistakes.”
“Stop worrying.”
The words were firm as though E was pressing down against her shoulders. Wren knew that it was right.
That didn’t make it any easier to agree with the statement.
A movement from the shadows had her attention snapping towards the man in the back. Burke stood slowly, stretched his arms above his head, and reached his fingers towards her ceiling.
The man really was beautiful. She caught herself on a happy little sigh and immediately turned back around. There was no place for romance in her life, especially with a man who was that dangerous. He never stopped watching her, but it wasn’t with a heated look. He focused on her as though she was a project or a puzzle he needed to figure out.
Wren hadn’t even figured herself out. She’d lay eggs if he managed to do it before her.
Burke sauntered towards her and placed a few coins on the counter. “I’m heading out for the night. You interested in that job yet?”
“Are you going to keep asking every night until I give in?” She wanted to snatch the coins but left them where they were. “You already paid me tonight.”
“I know.”
“Then you don’t owe me anything.” Only then did she push the coins back towards him. Her fingers curled at her sides.
“Call it a down payment.”
“Burke, you already paid for whatever you bought tonight; I’m not taking your money. I’m not a charity.”
He arched an eyebrow at her. “Never said you were. But there’s a hole in your ceiling, and I’m pretty sure I heard rats. Take the money and fix what you can. You’ll be making more when you take the job I’m offering you.”
“I’m not taking that job.”
“So you say.”
He turned on his heel and left the shop.
The man was completely insufferable. She placed a bottle down onto the counter so hard that the glass split in half with a harsh crack. He watched her all day, offered her a job, then left.
“Who would employ him?” she asked with a frustrated sound.
“Not me.”
“Yes, I know, Donatello, but really. Who in their right mind would employ a man like that? He’s not doing his job right if his job was to hire me. He’s not going to wear me down. He’s just being annoyingly persistent.”
She picked up the pieces of the bottle and tossed them into the trash. E was suspiciously silent after her words. It had recently decided it quite liked being male, and the husky voices in her head were starting to become annoying. Today it was a painter by the name of Donatello, though E had never touched a brush in its life.
That was the second fact she knew about the entity that inhabited her head.
“The question is why he’s so persistent.”
“I don’t want to know.”
At least, that was what she told herself. She didn’t want to know why he was hanging like a dark shadow over her. Except that she did. She wanted to know why with every fiber of her being, and that was driving her insane. Wren continued to tell herself that she didn’t care, but she couldn’t stop watching him out of the corner of her eye. She found herself thinking about his shadowed form just before she fell into the dreaming world.
She couldn’t keep it up much longer.
She made her way up the stairs to her apartment and made her way towards the farthest corner. The studio apartment had no walls, so her bathroom was simply in a corner of the room. She had hung curtains all around the clawfoot tub that had seen better days.
Plastic lined the bottom of it, because the porcelain had long ago chipped away. The feet were brass and covered in rust, but it was sturdy, and that was good enough in her opinion.
The sound of running water eased her troubled mind. Her vast storage of herbs were handy as she plucked out a few sprigs of lavender and a box of epsom salts. Maybe a little bit of Relaxation in a warm bath were what she needed right now.
Of course, there was also the temptation of her own making. Wren looked at the vials that she had yet to put out on the shelves.
“I wouldn’t.”
“Why not?” she murmured as she ran her fingers over the smooth surface of glass.
Her fingers skipped over each of the vials before she lingered upon one with a dark gray fog inside it. Sparks of other colors were hidden deep within the smoke if one looked close enough. The Juice wasn’t dangerous in the slightest. It might actually be the only Juice that didn’t need to come with a warning label.
Comfort was just a warm, happy feeling. Wren usually considered it to be a rather boring emotion. She liked her vibrant thoughts and chaotic ups and downs. But the more she thought about it, the more she thought a bath of nothing but good scents and warm thoughts wouldn’t be all that bad.
“Juice should never be taken lightly.”
“Yes, I know,” she murmured. “I remember everything that you taught me.”
“You don’t need Juice to feel, Wren.”
“That’s not why I’m taking it. I’m just too tired to force it tonight. Be happy I’m not taking Oblivion.”
She wouldn’t take a lot anyways. Just a little bit of a sniff and she would relax enough to sit back in the bath and not worry about everything that was happening. If she was exceeding lucky, she would simply remember the comforting memory that was housed inside the bottle. She hoped it was something that involved a fireplace and snow.
The gray smoke swirled as she shook the bottle. The movement was nearly hypnotizing as she pulled on the strands of her worn pink robe. Her graceful fingers uncorked the bottle and inhaled half of the smoke. It spun towards her nose like cotton candy being pulled out of a machine.
“Hey, E? This would be easier if you were a woman right now.”
“I’m neither woman nor man.” It grumbled. But she was pleased to hear that the indecipherable muttering in her head had switched to a much higher pitch.
Pink fabric fluttered to the floor instantly. She dipped her toes into the water before sliding underneath the warm blanket of liquid. Wren sighed as the water splashed up to her neck and settled at the base of her collarbone. One of her hands raised to sprinkle some of the lavender and salt into the water.
The buds of the lavender danced in the water around her, and her curls floated around her head like strands of ink. Comfort burst into her bloodstream as she sunk deeper into the water. The relaxation she had been hoping for was within her reach now.
All the worries that had bunched the muscles in her shoulders disappeared. It didn’t matter that there was a strange man wandering around or that Pitch was going to put her out of business. It didn’t matter that her house was falling apart or that some mystery person was trying to hire her. She could ignore that she was messing up her Juice and that customers weren’t likely to trust her completely.
All that mattered was the warm feeling of the water around her and that she was safe.
Taking a deep breath, she dunked her head underneath the surface and opened her eyes. The light reflected differently when she was underwater. Everything rippled around her in a way that was effortlessly beautiful.
One of these days, she was going to spend the time to figure out her life. She had never had a lot of things in her life. Material objects were always hand-me-downs and absolutely never new. She didn’t need things that were in perfect shape. But now that she was older, Wren was realizing that she should probably own at least a few things that weren’t falling apart.
She could worry about that later though. The Comfort that was running through her veins pushed those thoughts aside and replaced them with memories of rolling hills and a horse underneath her. It was so incredibly easy to get lost in memories that weren’t hers.
It was easy until a shadow bent over her tub and started reaching for her. She found it curious that her mind would play tricks like that. There wasn’t a clear reason for a shadow to be in some kind of hallucination, but she was always interested to see how something like this would play out. Comfort had her ignoring the danger until the shadow’s fingers closed around her arms.
Wren jackknifed forward and sucked in air. Her forehead connected with what must have been the figure’s nose as she felt a satisfying crunch when she struck it. She was a small thing, but fear made her stronger than usual. She wrapped her arms around the neck of whoever it was and tugged hard into the bath.
She wouldn’t have usually been capable of tossing her weight around, but whoever was touching her had been leaning over the tub. The person lost their balance and fell directly into the tub with her.
She could hear whoever it was swearing something that sounded like, “Again?”
Wren didn’t know if she wanted to hold them underneath the water or if she wanted to get out and run. She was naked and there weren’t precisely a lot of places she could go in such a state of undress. Drowning the person seemed like the best idea.
Until she heard the laughter that rang loudly in her head.
“Let go of him, Wren.” She managed to make out between E’s snorts of laughter.
“Him?” She was out of breath as she held the person against her chest. They were flailing so hard that water was splashing onto her floor, and she had to squeeze her eyes shut.
The laughter in her head made Wren think that the person she currently was drowning should not be drowned. Instantly, she released the person and sunk deeper into the water. One arm curled around her chest, but the other she left free. Just in case she needed to hit them again.
Burke’s hands closed on the rim of the tub and pulled the rest of his body slowly out of the water. His elbows jutted out and the leather jacket he wore squeaked as he moved. His hair dripped fat drops of water onto her forehead as he glared down at her. Blood dripped from his nose and swirled into the bathtub with her.
“Oh,” she said quietly.
“Oh,” he repeated.
He loomed over her. She followed the strong lines of his hands clenched on the porcelain lip of her bathtub, up the bunching of leather at the strong muscles of his arms and shoulders, and into the vivid green and brown gaze of his eyes.
“I’m sorry?” The words slipped out of her lips before she caught them. Instantly, she shook her head. “Wait a minute, no I’m not!”
Water sloshed onto the floor as she shot back up. He reared back and barely avoided her forehead cracking against his again.
“What are you doing here?” she yelled at him, her hands flying to cover her body. “How did you get in here?”
Burke leaned down to grab her towel off the floor. He pressed it against his nose and Wren nearly whimpered when she saw the white fabric tainted blue with his blood. She had liked that towel quite a bit.
He snatched the vial of Comfort off of the stool and sat his weight down in its place. The stool groaned slightly, and the legs quivered. Wren was surprised. That particular piece of furniture was an antique, and she had expected it to buckle instantly. Burke was no small man.
“I’m here because you’re taking this and then trying to drown yourself!” He waved the glass vial at her.
“What?” She nearly shouted back at him. “Excuse me, I’m not trying to drown myself. I’m taking a bath!”
“After taking Depression?”
She sank deeper into the tub and massaged the headache that was blossoming at her temples. “God save me from stupid men that think they know everything. That’s not Depression.”
He swirled the vial in his hand and stared down at the remaining gray liquid. One of his brows raised in disbelief. “It’s the same thing you gave to that Pixie. So unless you’re in the habit of making mistakes now…”
Wren pressed her chest against the inner edge of the tub and her hands clenched hard at the edge as she glared at him. “I do not make mistakes like that lightly, you ridiculous man. That is Comfort, not Depression. It’s lighter gray, it floats rather than sticks to the edges of the bottle, and it doesn’t make me sad!”
She finished her rant with a shout as her fingers curled into claws. She would have liked nothing more than to wrap her hands around his neck and choke him. The man was insufferable and in her apartment without her consent.
Along that line of thought…
“You still haven’t answered how you got into my apartment,” Wren growled at him.
Burke shrugged. “Through the window.”
“Through my window. Why are you even attempting to get into my apartment through my window?”
“I saw the man there a few nights ago and figured you didn’t lock it for him.”
“That’s not an answer at all.”
“Of course it is.”
“That man was welcome at my window.” And that statement was a lie. Pitch wasn’t anymore welcome at her home than Burke, but she didn’t need to fill in the mystery man on that aspect. “You are breaking and entering.”
“I’m keeping you safe.”
“Are you watching me?” She couldn’t
help but ask. His behavior hadn’t changed in the days that he had been lingering nearby. Wren had assumed that he had been solely in her store. Now, she thought it was highly likely that he was watching her all the time. How else would he have known she had taken Juice?
“Yes.”
At least he didn’t lie about it. She sunk deeper into the tub and curled her legs under her. Somehow, the position felt a little bit safer than before.
“Why?”
“Because, I’m supposed to,” he responded.
“Your thinly veiled lies are ridiculous. Who do you work for, Burke, and why the hell are you in my life?”
He took the towel away from his nose then. Wren almost felt bad about the broken angle of his nose before she remembered that he deserved it. No man had any right to sneak up on a woman in her bath, even if he did think he was going to save her life.
“Do you want to have this conversation in the tub?”
“I’m not getting out of it until you leave, that’s for sure.” He’d already gotten more than his fair share of her nudity. Wren flicked a strand of wet hair off of her shoulder and waited for him to continue.
Burke placed the towel onto his lap with a sigh. “I work for the Five.”
He paused and looked at her as though the words should mean something. Try as she might, Wren could not pull anything out of the recesses of her mind that explained what that meant. She had heard of M.O.M, she’d heard of Pitch’s followers, but she hadn’t heard of anything call the Five.
“Is that a shop?”
“No.”
“A club?”
“No.”
“A street address?”
“Wren, shut up. You really don’t know who the Five are?”
She rolled her eyes, shrugged her bony shoulders, and held her hands up in the air. She didn’t know who the Five were, nor did she really care who they were. Wren liked that her life was simple and as far away from politics as possible.
“They’re the most important magical creatures to ever exist. They were dormant for all these years until they recently took on hosts. The Five has come together to form a prophecy. There is an ancient evil that has arisen. His name was Malachi DuBreve, though no one knows whether he’s still going by that name. The people that are in the prophecy are the only ones who can stop him.”