“You could have told him first though,” Nualla said, poking Travis in the chest. “I’d prefer him not to die of a heart attack, you know.”
She continued glaring at him until he rolled his almond-shaped eyes and put his hands on her shoulders. “Look, I’m sorry, okay Nulala?” It must have been a pet name, but Nualla only looked more annoyed instead of less when he said it. Nualla glared at him even more and surprisingly instead of looking concerned a crooked smile spread across his lips.
“So how do I look?” I blurted out abruptly.
Nualla turned her attention back to me, and a wide grin spread across her face. “You look really cool, actually.” She moved closer and pushed the hair away from my eyes. I just stared at her dumbly; now that I could see her for what she was I was powerless against her eyes. “Patrick?”
“Hmm…” I answered in a daze.
Nualla put her hand over her eyes and I snapped back to reality. “Frak, I forgot about the eyes.”
She turned to look at Travis, but he just shook his head. “Sorry Nualla, I can’t do anything about that.”
She looked back over at me. “Sorry Patrick. I’ll pick up some sunglasses or something on the way.”
“You’re taking me somewhere only meant for daemons, aren’t you?” I asked excitedly.
“Yep,” she answered with a huge grin. The second I looked at her eyes I was lost again.
“Hey Nualla, your dad said he had something he wanted to talk to you about before you left,” Travis said, a hint of a smile on his lips. He probably found the eye thing to be unbelievably hilarious.
“Oh really, what about?” Nualla asked as she looked back over at him.
“I don’t know, he didn’t say.”
“Okay then, I’ll be right back,” Nualla said as she walked to the door.
“Oh Nualla,” Travis said raising his voice a bit. “Your dad doesn’t actually know about the glasses. So do me a huge favor and don’t mention them to him, okay?”
“Will I get in trouble for having them?” Nualla asked, crossing her arms under her chest.
“Possibly,” Travis admitted sheepishly.
She sighed heavily before walking out the door. “Thanks, Travis.”
“Anytime, darling,” he said with a slightly mischievous smile.
Nualla reappeared a second later and pointed at Travis. “Promise you won’t break him while I’m gone.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Travis promised holding up his hands palms out.
“Sure you wouldn’t,” Nualla said, rolling her eyes before disappearing out of view again.
We sat in silence for a few minutes before Travis leaned against the table next to me and said, “You know if you hurt her I’ll kill you, right?”
“Yeah,” I said without looking at him. Silence hung in the air only broken briefly by the occasional noises of others outside or the beeping of machines. “You know if you try to take her from me, I will kill you, right?” I said in a serious voice, finally looking over at him.
“Yep. Wait, what?!” he sputtered as he leapt away from the table to glare at me.
“I may be blind half the time, but I’m not stupid. There is, or was something between you two once.”
Travis slumped into a chair and crossed his arms, looking away from me. “That ship has already sailed.”
“You sure about that?” I asked, arching an eyebrow.
“Hey Patrick, I’m not sure if anyone has told you or not, but we pair off for life,” he said before finally meeting my gaze. “And she already married you. It’s a done deal. Unless you give me cause to get rid of you, there is really nothing I can do about it.”
“You wanted to marry her didn’t you?”
“Yep,” Travis answered, leaning back to look at a poster plastered on the ceiling above him.
“So why didn’t you ask her?”
He let the chair snap back up and glared at me. “Because I, being a sensible person, was waiting until after she at least got out of high school.”
“Oh, right,” I said sheepishly.
Silence returned, and I let my eyes wander around the room again. When I looked back at Travis he had his head resting on the back of his chair as he swung it back and forth. I recognized the gesture instantly; it was exactly what I did when I was thinking about things. Or more often than not, beating myself up for things that I had done, or hadn’t. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who had been in love with her and had done nothing about it.
I hated to admit it, but it could have just as easily have been him who had ended up with her instead of me. And if I didn’t find a way to fix my current predicament, it would be him who got to be with her in the end. It was stupid really; why should a little piece of paper matter so much? As far as I could remember, the words I had spoken in the chapel had been truthful. The fact that I wasn’t an adult didn’t make those words—that oath—any less real or true.
Suddenly I had to know what Travis thought. I turned to him and asked rather abruptly, “Is it the paper or the oath to you?”
His head snapped up in my direction. “Huh?” He looked more than confused, and I realized I had basically started a conversation that was halfway through only in my head.
“Marriage; is it signified by an oath or by a legal document?”
Travis slumped back into the same position. “Oh um—the oath,” he answered then a moment later his face turned toward me again. “Why do you ask?”
“No reason,” I answered, looking away. I didn’t know what else to say, and Travis sure as hell didn’t look like he wanted to talk; so we sat there saying nothing.
After what seemed like hours, Nualla all but skipped back into the room. She stopped dead when the tension hit her and asked in a cautious voice, “Everything okay boys?”
“Peachy,” Travis replied, looking over at her.
“Right… “ she said in a less-than-convinced voice. “So Travis, anything I should know before Patrick and I head out?”
“You shouldn’t let him wear the glasses too long; don’t want him frying his brain,” Travis said, though he didn’t sound concerned in the least.
“Anything else I should know?”
“He’ll probably be really nauseous when he takes them off; so make sure he’s sitting down so he doesn’t hurt himself.”
“Anything else?” Nualla asked, starting to sound a little bit annoyed.
Travis bit his lip and stood up quickly from the chair. “Yeah, this,” he replied and in one swift motion he had his hand behind her head, pulling her face to his lips.
Nualla let him kiss her for one dazed moment before she pushed him away. “What the hell—?!”
I rushed him but Nualla threw her arm out, blocking my way. I screeched to a halt just before she clotheslined me.
“Care to explain that?” Nualla asked, raising an eyebrow at Travis.
Travis looked her dead in the eye, opened his mouth then clamped it shut again. His hands balled into fists so tightly his nails had to be digging into his palms. “I would love to Nualla, but it wouldn’t do either of us a damn bit of good,” he stated through gritted teeth. And then he walked out the door, shoving his hands in the pockets of his lab coat. “Oh and Patrick, don’t lose those or we’ll have to kill you,” he called over his shoulder.
“Seriously?” I asked, looking at Nualla.
“No Patrick, he’s just messing with you. If anyone would get in trouble, it would be him for making the damned things in the first place,” Nualla answered, putting her head in her hand. “Thanks Travis!” she yelled toward the door, though if she was thanking him for the kiss or the glasses, I didn’t know. Finally, Nualla looked up at me. “Did I miss something?”
“Nope, I have no idea what that was about,” I ans
wered, looking at anything but her.
“You’re a really bad liar, you know.”
26
Reflections
Thursday, February 9th
PATRICK
“Your big surprise was taking me to an alley?” I asked as I stared at a dingy unremarkable space between two old buildings.
“Put the glasses on, Patrick,” Nualla said as she rolled her eyes.
I pulled them out of my bag, took a deep breath and slid them on. The alley was no longer an alley. The space now expanded outward to reveal a large galleria. Three floors of shops lined either side and walkways crossed the space at intervals. At the far end there was a set of escalators and a massive clock.
I looked back at her and tried not to get sucked into the unbelievable beauty of her eyes. I had a hard enough time resisting them when she had her human illusion up, but in her true form it was nearly impossible.
“What is this place?”
“The Kalo Galleria, basically a Kalodaemon mall,” Nualla answered with a pleased smile.
I looked back inside. “Really?”
Nualla took my hand and led me forward through the Kalo Galleria. I looked up in awe at the domed glass ceiling, which revealed an amazing view of the tall surrounding buildings. This place was incredible, but the fact that it was just hiding in the middle of the city was even more amazing. It made you wonder what else was hidden here in the city in the places that humans wouldn’t even think to look—or be able to see in the first place.
The daemons in the galleria didn’t even look twice at me as we passed which I found a bit odd. Was it normal for humans to just go wandering through here? I seriously doubted it. Then I caught sight of my reflection in the glass of a shop window and stopped. Two glowing horns flickered just above my ears.
“What on earth?” I leaned in closer to the window to get a better look at the horns.
“Oh right, you wouldn’t have been able to see that before,” Nualla said, leaning toward me. “Your Blue Card makes a hologram around you so no one gets ideas about killing you.”
“Really? That’s awesome!” I said, excitedly looking back at my reflection. “So this is more or less what I would look like with horns?” I had to admit, like this I looked pretty damn awesome.
“Well not at first; it takes about six months for the horns to grow in completely.”
“They grow?” I asked in disbelief as I turned back toward her.
“Of course, they’re not magic, you know. They’re as real as anything; like hair or fingernails.”
“Yeah really awesome fingernails,” I said with a huge grin.
We continued walking through the galleria passing the strangest collection of items. Formal clothing like the ones I had seen in The Embassy. Books written in what was probably Daemotic. Electronics that did God knows what. The more I was with Nualla, the more amazing her world seemed, but I couldn’t ignore the things in my normal human world like school, graduation, my future. I knew about our immediate future together, but what would our lives be like come the end of the school year; the fall; five years from now? I was almost afraid to ask, but like an idiot, I always did.
“So what school are you going to in the fall?” I asked as casually as I could.
“I’m not.”
“What?” There was no way she hadn’t gotten into an ivy-league school; she was smart as hell and more than wealthy.
“I’m an heiress apparent. I have to attend special classes at The Embassy to prepare to take over the rule of the region in the event my dad dies.”
“Oh.” I guess that made perfect sense.
“Why, what are you doing?” Nualla asked with a curious smile.
“Art school.”
She stopped, looking frightened for a second. “Where?”
“Here in the city, at the Academy of Art. It’s one of the best art schools in the country.”
“Oh, well that’s good. I don’t think I could do a long-distance relationship,” she said with a teasing smile.
I knew what she probably meant, but I still asked, “What do you mean?”
Nualla pressed close to me, looking up at me through her lashes. “I don’t think I could stand to be that far away from you.”
I swallowed hard. “I don’t think I could, either.”
Nualla took my hand and we continued walking through the galleria. I stopped to look at something in one of the windows and saw the reflection of someone behind us. Not directly behind us, more off in the distance trying to look inconspicuous. I had seen her before somewhere, I just knew it.
I moved away from the window, and we continued walking. A few shops later I looked back at the reflection, and sure enough, the strange black female daemon was there again. “Nualla, not to sound paranoid, but I think we’re being followed,” I whispered quietly as I leaned closer to her.
“Oh, you’re not paranoid,” Nualla said in an unbelievably calm voice with just a hint of annoyance.
“I’m not?” I asked, a little confused.
“We are being followed,” she stated with a huff as she turned around and made a beeline for the daemon.
The stranger was a daemon—no mistake about that—but she wasn’t pale like Nualla. I had mistakenly thought they would all look similar to Nualla, Shawn and Nikki; otherworldly pale with abnormally blue eyes. This daemon however was African-American; extremely pale but still dark-skinned with a pulled back fro. Her eyes were blue, not pale blue like Nualla’s, but a blue so dark it was nearly black like Travis’. The woman was wearing a black jacket with a blue and silver emblem on the left side and tight black pants tucked into long black boots. “Patrick this is Tylia, one of the Kalo Protectorate officers,” Nualla said calmly as she gestured to the daemon woman with the fro.
“The what?” I asked, completely lost.
“It’s our job to protect The Embassy and ensure the safety of the Chancellarius and his family,” Tylia answered proudly but without the annoying air of superiority that had been present in Natasha’s voice.
“Oh the Kalo Protectorate, that’s that thing Natasha’s in charge of, right? So she’s like your boss?” I asked Tylia. Now that I actually looked at the emblem on her jacket, I realized it was the same as the one that had been on Natasha’s kimono style top.
Tylia couldn’t contain her scowl as she answered, “Unfortunately.”
“Yeah, I don’t really like her either; there’s just something—” I shuddered, there was something off about Natasha, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. It was almost like I knew the answer, but it was lost somewhere in my brain; which was absurd because I really had only just met her. Then something occurred to me. “You’re what was on the other side of the wall in the parking garage.”
Tylia eyed me with amused smile. “You’re damn smart, kid.” Then her look soured into something deadly. “Though, if you call me a ‘what’ again, I will throttle you.”
“Sorry,” I said, taking a step back.
“Your job’s to protect us, not scare the crap out of him, Tylia,” Nualla pointed out as she glared at her.
NUALLA
Tylia suspiciously eyed the glasses Patrick was wearing. “Do I even want to know what he’s wearing?”
“No, no you don’t,” I answered quickly.
“Travis?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.
I nodded.
“That boy is going to get himself into a whole mess of trouble someday,” Tylia said as she sighed and folded her arms.
Yeah, like tomorrow, when I go yell at him for kissing me.
“Well, you two stay out of trouble,” Tylia said as she eyed Patrick meaningfully again. “And I’ll try to follow you a little less obviously.”
Oh, because that is so going to help m
e forget that you’re there.
Tylia stalked away as Patrick turned to me. “Do they normally follow you, or is it just because of me?”
Truthfully they were probably following me more now because of him, but I wasn’t about to tell him that. “No, it’s not you; they always follow me.”
As I looked at Patrick, I caught my reflection in the shop window behind him. The reflection moved, and I thought nothing of it until I realized I hadn’t moved. I looked closer in shock at the me in the window, and she did the same for a brief second before she bolted, disappearing further into the crowded shop. I turned to Patrick frantically. “Did you just see that?”
“See what?”
I turned back around, but the other me was gone; only my reflection was left. “I thought I saw someone just like me.”
“Well yeah, there is your reflection,” Patrick said with a slight smile.
“No, not me, someone like me.”
He looked confused and asked uneasily, “Like what, a doppelgänger?”
It sounded really stupid when he said it out loud. “It was probably nothing,” I said as I looked back at the window.
27
Playing with Fire
Monday, February 13th
PATRICK
“So what are we doing for your birthday? I know we normally do something on your birthday, but since you have a girlfriend now, we really can’t do that anymore,” Connor said as we walked casually through the Japantown Mall. Connor knew full well Nualla wasn’t my “girlfriend,” but I had told him if he ever let anyone know otherwise I would kick his ass.
“Nothing,” I answered, looking away from him at a nearby window display as we passed by it. “I don’t want to do anything; I can’t let Nualla find out I wasn’t eighteen.”
Daemons in the Mist (The Marked Ones Trilogy: Book One) Page 17