Of Darkness & Light: Blood Descent Book 2

by T. L. McDonald

  “You’re a pain in my ass.” He shifts his gaze to me, and I do my best to not stare at his bad eye with its creepy, yet mesmerizing blown pupil. The way the black spills into the iris in wavy tendrils is fascinating, and so hard to look away from. Maybe it has hypnotizing properties and Chester isn’t as human as I thought he was—or I just have no self-control. My guess is on the latter. “Hello, Indiana. It’s nice to see you again.” He points a thumb at Sebastian. “This guy not so much.”

  Sebastian pulls back, mock hurt covering his face as his jaw hangs open. “I take offense to that. You know you love seeing me. I’m the bright spot in your day.”

  Chester rolls his eyes, freeing me from the gravitational pull of his pupil. He sets the clipboard onto the counter. “You know the drill.”

  Sebastian scoots the clipboard closer and writes down both our names. “Is the man in today?” He says the word man with a heavy dose of contempt.

  “He stepped out about five minutes before you got here. Said something about meeting someone. Don’t know when he’ll be back. Want me to get a message to him?”

  “Nope.” He slides the clipboard toward Chester. “Just let me know if he comes back while I’m still here.”

  “You can’t avoid the man forever you know. He’s—”

  “Sure I can.” Sebastian takes my hand and leads me down the hall.

  “Why do you hate Gavin so much?” I ask when we’re out of Chester’s earshot.

  “Because he’s an ass.”

  “It seems like there’s more to it than just him being an ass.”

  “There is.” The muscles of his jaw twitch, while the fingers of his free hand curl and uncurl. He doesn’t say anything else, and I drop the topic.

  At a split in the hall, he hooks a left, leading us away from the direction of Gavin’s office. One of the super tall twins who’d helped heal my cousin the last time I was here steps out into the hall before I can ask where we’re going.

  “Yo, Bas, what’s up, man?” He grips Sebastian’s hand as the two lean in for a quick bro hug. “Shouldn’t you be in school?” His dark chocolate eyes gaze down at me, and I offer a small wave. The last time I saw him, I’d gone full on witch, hair blowing in the wind, demanding he, his identical twin brother, and Ava leave the room. He probably thinks I’m a lunatic. I would if I were him.

  “Indi, this is either Wyatt or Grayson.” At the punch to his shoulder, Sebastian laughs. “Okay, okay. This is Grayson.”

  “Seriously?” He shoves Sebastian to the side with a playful push.

  “Okay, fine. This is Wyatt.” Sebastian cups his hand around his mouth, and leans in toward me, half-whispering, “Wyatt gets super testy if you call him by his brother’s name. Which is why I do it.” He winks then turns his attention back to his friend. “Wyatt, this is Indi. You might remember her as the girl who scared the literal crap out of you while you were performing healing magic on her cousin.” He cups his mouth again, leaning into me once more. “Wyatt can face hordes of the undead by himself without incident, but a little magic from you, and he was crapping his pants.”

  Wyatt punches Sebastian’s shoulder hard enough to have him rubbing the spot. “I did not crap my pants.” He turns to me, hints of an embarrassed blush complementing the warm brown of his skin. “I’ll admit you were a little scary, but I did not crap my pants.”

  A small laugh escapes me. “I believe you. Sorry for the scary witch theatrics when we first met. It was a crazy day.”

  “No worries. You were concerned for your cousin. I would have reacted the same way if I was in your shoes and it had been Gray lying there. I’m just glad your healing magic was strong enough to save your cousin.”

  “Me too.”

  His gaze roams over me, taking in my deep olive military jacket, loose cream sweater, midnight black boyfriend jeans with a tear in the knee, and hi-top black Chucks as though he can glean everything he needs to know about me from my outfit. His dark brown eyes make their way back to my face, curiosity blazing from within their depths. “You must be a very powerful witch.”

  I straighten my spine under his assessment, projecting an image of badass competence. “I am when I need to be.” He smiles at my bravado as I study him in much the same way he assessed me. While my appearance at the moment may give off your average high school student vibe and not a badass witch who shouldn’t be trifled with, his does. He looks like he just walked off the set of a Shadowhunters episode in his thick leather jacket, form fitting navy Henley, dark wash jeans, and combat boots. The only thing missing is a set of knives strapped to his thigh.

  His smile widens into a full-fledged grin, revealing a large chip in his front tooth I hadn’t noticed before as my gaze meets his. “I like you, Indi. You’ve got spunk. You’ll fit in nicely around here.”

  “Thank you. I think.” I stare at him, dissecting his words for any underlying meaning as I search his eyes. Nothing jumps out. Whatever assessments he’d been making based on my appearance or attitude, I seem to have passed. “Thanks for doing everything you could for Jack before I got here.”

  “You’re welcome. I’m glad we were able to help him in whatever way we could.” He places a hand on my shoulder and tilts his head down to meet my eye, since the top of my head just barely reaches his underarm. I feel like a munchkin standing this close to him. Dude is freakishly tall. “If you’ll excuse us for a second, Indi, there’s something I need to discuss with Sebastian.”

  “Sure, I’ll just wait here.” I pat the wall behind me, then lean against it.

  “It was nice to officially meet you, Indi.” Wyatt calls over his shoulder as he leads Sebastian down the hall and out of earshot.

  “You too.”

  Sebastian returns a few minutes later, his shoulders tense and his lips held in a thin line. All the playfulness held in his eyes a moment ago now gone.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. Everything. Damn vampires.” His jaw clenches in tandem with his fisting hands. He punches the wall, leaving a smear of red against the stark white.

  I grab his arm before he can throw a second swing. What did Wyatt say to him?

  “She was only fifteen.” He turns his gaze to me, the fury darkening his eyes subsiding into an old sadness.

  “Who was only fifteen?”

  “The girl attacked and killed in Briarwood Park last night by a vampire we’ve been hunting for the last couple weeks,” he answers, though it’s clear from the distant anguish held in his eyes and the sorrow laced through his voice, it’s another girl in another park he’s thinking of.

  I pull him into a hug, my heart breaking alongside his because I know exactly how it feels to have the worst pain you’ve ever felt rip the floor out from under your feet when you least expect it. Because despite what people say, the pain never goes away. You might forget it for a while. You might have days where everything is great, and you’re happy. But then something will happen to take you back, and you’ll remember. And right now, he’s remembering Sofia.

  His hands fist around the back of my jacket, and for just a moment, he lets everything go: his walls, his defenses, his bad boy devil-may-care façade, and I feel his sorrow, and his guilt, and this weight he carries around with him every day over the loss of his sister. A weight his father reinforces every chance he gets. A father he resents and hates and holds so much anger for, despite also loving him and wishing for a relationship he knows they’ll never have.

  My breath hitches around the giant hole of misery growing in the middle of my chest, and just when I think I’m about to be swallowed by it, it’s yanked away, and only my feelings reside.

  He steps back, and I rub at my chest. I so get why he does this now when he feels me. It’s intense, having someone else’s emotions override you.

  His gaze drops to my hand. “Sorry. I didn’t mean for you to feel all that. Wyatt caught me off guard.”

  “It’s okay. You’ve felt my out-of-control emotions enough times it’s only fa
ir I feel yours too.” I lean against the wall beside him and slip my hand into his. “And just so you know, you never have to apologize for feeling the things you feel. Nor do you have to pretend around me. It’s okay to let your walls down. I promise I won’t ever judge you.”

  “I don’t deserve you.” He says it with a teasing smile, but his eyes say what he really meant. He doesn’t deserve love. His father really did a number on him. I swear, one day his father and I are going to have words—after my fist meets his jaw.

  I turn his face toward mine. “Yes, Sebastian, you do.”

  He nods the tiniest bit, catching my meaning, and then smashes me against his chest. “I’m glad you’re in my life.”

  “Ditto.”

  “Okay, Sam Wheat.”

  I pull away and stare up at him. “Shut up. You’ve seen Ghost?”

  He shrugs nonchalantly. “Ava has a thing for 90s movies and tricked me into watching it one night.”

  “Uh-huh, surrrre.” I poke him in the chest. “Blame Ava when in reality I bet it’s you who sneaks off to binge all the 90s movies yourself.”

  He laughs and I smile. “You got me. I’m a sucker for them, what can I say?”

  “You know, if you need to go hunting with Wyatt, I’ll be fine with my cousins. You don’t have to stay with me every moment. I can take care of myself.”

  “I know you can, but I promised I’d stay by your side, and I meant it. I don’t make promises lightly, so when I do make them, I don’t break them. Wyatt will be okay without me.” He takes hold of my hand, and resumes leading me down the hall. “How long are you grounded, again? I’d like to start your training back up as soon as possible. If it’s cool with your aunt and uncle, we could train in your backyard, or the basement if it’s big enough.”

  “I can ask, but I can’t make any promises. We’re not supposed to have anyone over—who doesn’t sneak through windows, anyway—while grounded.” I bump him with my shoulder, then pull his hand up to examine his knuckles. The bleeding seems to have stopped, the wound mostly superficial. He watches me with equal parts wonderment and bewilderment, as though I’m the only person who’s ever bothered to make sure he wasn’t hurt. “You should put something on that, or have one of the healers here take a look at it,” I tell him, even though I know he won’t. Sometimes, I think he likes the scrapes and bruises, but whether it’s because he views them as badges of honor, or if it’s his way of inflicting harm onto himself, I don’t know. “I’ll tell Aunt Claudia you’re teaching me self-defense. Can’t say she’ll go for it though since Liv reached black belt status last year and could easily train me herself. She’s been studying martial arts since she was five.”

  “Tell her I’m a third degree black belt.”

  “Are you?”

  “Yes.”

  Turning down another hall, we come to a stop in front of a nondescript door. Keying in a code, he waits for the light to turn green then twists the knob. “After you.” He presses his back against the door, and tips his head toward the darkness of the room.

  The lights pop on one by one the moment I cross the threshold, illuminating a carnivorous white room full of colorful books. Floor to ceiling stacks line up from one end of the room to the other along both walls. Quaint tables with gold-covered desk lamps spread down the middle, with the occasional glass covered case featuring enclosed tomes placed here and there to break up the monotony. Most of the books on the shelves appear to be hundreds of years old and vary in height and width. Afraid to touch them, I read over the spines as I make my way down a row. I stop at a book titled A History of Werewolves.

  “There are werewolves? Like real werewolves? Are there any werewolves around here?”

  He considers me a moment. “There’s a small pack outside the city. They mostly keep to themselves.”

  “Really?” I don’t know whether to be excitedly intrigued or scared by the prospect. I reach for the book and hesitate. Sebastian nods the okay, and I pull it off the shelf and begin leafing through the pages. It’s written in a language I can’t read, but the illustrations are graphic enough I now know what the changing process looks like. It definitely isn’t pretty.

  “Werewolves. Wow. I mean, Liv insinuated there were many different supernaturals in the world, but I never realized how close they’d be. How many more supernaturals are there around here? Were werewolves always a part of the supernatural world, or did they originate from magic too? And are the werewolves good werewolves or bad werewolves?” I can’t help but think of the vampires my family inadvertently sired who are definitely bad. Although, I can’t say with one hundred percent accuracy Seth was wholly bad when he was a vampire. He did try to warn me.

  He pokes me in the shoulder. “There you go with a bunch of questions all at once again.”

  I shrug. “I can’t help it. I’m naturally inquisitive.”

  A smile graces his mouth, and the same contemplative look he had a few minutes ago shines within his eyes. “I spend most of my time hunting vampires, so I can’t say for sure what groups are in this area. Especially when some, like the Fae, angels, and demons, are inter-dimensional. But to name a few there are shape-shifters, werewolves, witches, ghosts, one nephilim when you count you, and potential merpeople. I can’t say I’ve ever seen a merperson before, but the ocean is deep, so who knows what all lives down there. Like humans, supernaturals can be good or bad. It’s my sworn duty as a chaser to weed out the bad ones to keep the world safe. Vampires are high up on the bad list. As for whether other groups were created by magic, I don’t know. The world is a mysterious place, so I guess anything is possible.”

  He closes my mouth with a flick of his finger under my chin.

  I stare at him for a full minute, processing the informational overload, before I find my voice. “I have so many questions, I don’t even know where to begin. How is it possible for a supernatural world so vast to be completely invisible to the human world?”

  “It’s not. Not entirely anyway, but people have a way of seeing only what they want to see.”

  “I guess that makes sense. I saw a ghost once and convinced myself I’d imagined it.” Putting the werewolf book back, I resume scanning the titles. “Have you ever seen a Fae? What do they look like? Is it true they can’t tell lies like movies and books suggest? Or what about a demon? Have you ever seen a demon? I don’t think I’d like to see a demon. I don’t think I’d like to see an angel again for that matter either since, you know, I’m on the forbidden to exist list. Or what about shifters? How many different types of shifters are there?” At the end of the row, I turn to face him. “Have you ever seen a—”

  His hand covers my mouth, his eyes full of mirth. “It’s hard to answer your questions if you never stop asking them.”

  My only reply—since his hand is still on my mouth—is a smile, and a small shrug.

  “To answer your questions so far. Yes. Depending on what type of Fae, their looks vary. They don’t tell lies, but they don’t tell whole truths either. I have not seen a demon, and I hope I never do. I have not seen an angel, but seeing one could be cool. As for shifters, there are more types than I can count on my fingers.” His gaze flicks to his hand over my mouth, then back to my eyes. “If I remove my hand, are you going to ask twenty more questions?”

  “Maybe,” I mumble against his palm, and then lick it.

  He pulls his hand away, and I laugh at the face he makes. “Did you just lick me?”

  I shrug and laugh harder.

  Pulling me to his chest, he licks the side of my face. My laughs come to an abrupt halt while his just get started.

  “Ew!” I push away and wipe my face with the edge of my sleeve. “I can’t believe you just did that. So gross.” I jump on him, catching him off guard, then take his face between my hands and lick him from the edge of his jaw to his forehead. “Now we’re even.”

  A throat clears, and both Sebastian and I turn our heads. Standing just inside the door is a guy I’ve never seen before. I�
��d place him in his late twenties or early thirties. Good looking with blonde hair, deep brown eyes, and a five o’clock shadow. His mouth quirks up, and I realize I’m still wrapped around Sebastian with his face squished between my hands.

  “We were just… This isn’t what it looks like.” A nervous laugh I’ve never heard myself make before squeaks out. I jump down while heat deposits in my face, no doubt taking it from its already blushing pink to fire engine red. I smack Sebastian over the chest. “Say something,” I whisper under my breath.

  “Indi was just licking my face,” Sebastian says like it’s the most normal thing ever.

  “Oh God.” Avoiding all eye contact, I dart behind another row of books and hide myself in the corner. If I’m lucky, I’ll find a book on time travel spells so I can go back and make this never happen.

  Tingles tiptoe across the back of my neck, and I turn to find Sebastian leaning against the shelves, his arms crossed over his chest, and an amused grin covering his face. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you move so fast.”

  I grab a random book off the shelf and throw it at him. He catches it with ease. “Why did you tell him I licked your face?”

  He shrugs. “Why not? It was true. Plus, I’m pretty sure he saw you.”

  I peek between the books. “Is he gone? Or am I relegated hiding in the stacks forever?”

  His lips brush against my ear. “He’s gone.” I jump straight back into his waiting arms. He takes hold of my hand and licks it. “Now we’re even.”

  Laughing at the shocked look so obviously displayed over my face, I get my revenge by wiping my hand down the front of his My Chemical Romance shirt.

  I wipe whatever is left on the back of my jeans for good measure, then skirt around him. “While this side trip into the library has been interesting, to say the least, why are we here and not sneaking into Gavin’s secret lair?”

  He tips his head for me to follow him as he heads into the stacks. A tinge of uneasiness settles in the pit of my stomach for reasons I can’t discern. He makes a right into a section titled Witchcraft and comes to a stop in the O section. There is an entire bookcase dedicated to the Ó Ceallaigh family. My ancestors.