The Mistwalker (Dark Tales Book 2)

by Regine Abel

  “You greedy little shit. I would have shared her with you. But no, you needed to hog her all to yourself, stealing her from me and interfering in our time together!”

  “You would have shared what?” I asked with contempt. “The broken, scarred husk of Jade? I couldn’t have taken her if she had wanted you. She wished me and, above all, she wished me to take her away from the Nightmare. You lost her by your own actions, by your lust for her pain and terror.”

  “There is pleasure in pain,” Morgan argued.

  The front of his pants strained as thoughts of Jade’s pain—no doubt—excited him. It made me sick to my stomach.

  “She hates pain!” I spat, fisting the flashlight in my pocket.

  “She’ll learn to love it. I’ll make sure of it,” Morgan said with an evil grin. “But first, you die, little brother.”

  “I’m no brother of yours,” I said, whipping out the flashlight as he lunged at me.

  He shouted, closing his eyelids and averting his face as the bright light stabbed his eyes, allowing me to easily dodge his blow. Pressing my advantage, I wrapped an ethereal glove around my fist which I threw at him. Although still blinded and blinking, Morgan raised his palm in the trajectory of my fist, stopping it before howling in pain. I felt the bones crushing in his hand with the impact.

  Despite the pain, Morgan reacted like a wounded beast by lashing out with a fist. I tried to get out of its path, but it solidly connected with my left side. The blow took my breath away as my opponent had put his ethereal strength behind it. I staggered a few steps back, holding my side. Had I not shielded my human form with my ethereal aura, Morgan would have not only broken my ribs, chances were he’d have punched right through skin and bones, smashing my internal organs in the process. Instead, the Nightmare had smashed the bones of his own hand, not having shielded it with his aura. His knees buckled and his eyes rolled back in his head from the pain as he struggled to remain conscious.

  I seized the opportunity to regain my breath. Morgan’s blow would leave a bad bruise on my side that I’d have a hard time explaining to Jade. Being bound to her, using my ethereal aura as armor or to battle, depleted me quickly. A few more such blows would leave me completely vulnerable. But as I had hoped, being newborn to this world, Morgan hadn’t learned how to shield his vessel. The humans he would have hunted over the past five days would have been paralyzed with fear upon seeing his aura, making them easy victims to his superior strength.

  “So, brother,” I said with contempt, “are you finding much pleasure in this pain?”

  Despite my urge to finish him and in spite of his broken hands, Morgan’s ethereal form remained too strong. Trusting in his apparent vulnerability would be my downfall. I needed him to shed even more of his reserves before I went in for the kill. Had I not been bound, he’d already be dead.

  “I’m going to kill you, Kazan Dale,” Morgan hissed with such hatred my skin crawled.

  The sight of his human eyes glowing freaked me out for a second before realizing his Mistwalker form had surged forth. This was what I’d hoped for. His energy would drain very quickly, but he would be deadlier and faster than before.

  He charged me. I blinded him again, making Morgan falter and avert his eyes while I moved out of range. After repeating this a couple of times, he finally caught on to my game. Shadowy tendrils protruded from his aura, similar to the ones I’d restrained Jade with on our first night in the Mist. When he next lunged for me, he whipped them in my direction. While I avoided most of them as I blinded him, a couple tendrils found their mark with the burning sting of a lash.

  Grinding my teeth through the pain, I continued to kite him around as he depleted his reserves, taking my licks until I felt him weakened enough to go on the offensive. The next time he lashed at me, I held onto one of his tendrils and sucked the life force out of him. In his panic, he didn’t think to drain me in return but fought to free himself, trying to pull away. He whipped at me, but I let go and stepped back to avoid the blows. I’d taken too many already but his life force, slimy though it was, gave me a boost to replenish my shielding aura.

  I advanced on him, drawing on his life force. When he whipped his tendrils at me to keep me at bay, I caught as many as I could and jerked him towards me. This time, he sucked at my life force. With my free hand, I punched his human body beneath his Mistwalker aura, using the maximum ethereal strength possible without hurting myself. Morgan clawed at me with his ethereal hands, forcing me to let go.

  Every time Morgan managed to free himself of my hold, I verbally taunted him before resuming the chase, pummeling and draining him.

  “You should have fought me in the Mist when you had the chance rather than cowering away. This is my world now. You don’t attack a Hunter in his own territory,” I said, before charging him.

  For the first time, I read true fear in his glowing, yellow eyes. Morgan had never imagined defeat to be possible, having always crushed his prey in the past. He was staring into true death’s eyes, knowing there would be no mercy from me.

  The force of the impact as my body collided with his knocked him off his feet. His already injured human vessel writhed from the shock. Morgan choked my neck with his ethereal hands while his tendrils wrapped around me to crush me while sucking my life force. But they were too weak to break through my shielding aura. Fisting his human form’s hair I smashed the back of his head repeatedly on the asphalt. Dazed, his hold weakened until it dropped.

  “You shouldn’t have come after my woman,” I hissed in his face. “Now you die.”

  “Nooo!” Morgan pleaded in a pained whisper.

  Heedless of his final word, I sucked the life force from him, watching his ethereal aura turn to ashes while his human vessel withered to a shriveled husk.

  No one threatened my woman.

  CHAPTER 11

  Jade

  “Well, that was odd,” I mumbled, as Kazan all but rushed out of the office.

  Monica chuckled and walked towards the mini-fridge.

  “You’re dating an odd man. Him acting weird is normal.”

  I scrunched up my face. “Yeah, I guess.”

  Pulling up one of the chairs, I all but collapsed into it and rubbed my ankles. It had been a while since I’d worn fuck-me shoes. Although they gave me killer legs, they wrecked my back and feet. Casting a furtive glance at Monica as she grabbed some mineral water from the mini-fridge, I couldn’t help but admire her ease on her even higher heels. She waved a bottle at me with a questioning look on her pretty face.

  “Yes, please,” I said with gratitude, suddenly realizing how parched my throat felt.

  I hadn’t known what to expect when Kazan had first told me about his agent. Monica didn’t have a classic beauty, her features were lacking a bit of symmetry for that, but her inner strength and confidence gave her an irresistible allure. At first glance, I feared she’d be the tough, bitchy chick, used to having things her own way. She was, but thankfully without the bitchy part. Platinum blonde—though her darker eyebrows suggested her to be a brunette instead—she couldn’t be taller than 5’1, which probably explained those stilts she called high heels. Although on the skinny side with delicate bird bones, Monica didn’t inspire the instinct to protect but to watch out, because she’d kick your ass if you crossed her.

  I liked her.

  Monica and Kazan’s visibly friendly—but unmistakably platonic—relationship did wonders to alleviate my resurfacing insecurities. Having met some of the other models in the exhibition hall had made me feel incredibly self-conscious. They were as gorgeous in person as in their paintings. Despite Kazan swearing up and down that he hadn’t enhanced me, just painted me the way he saw me, I feared the patrons would call me out for a fraud when they saw the real me compared to the paintings. To my relief, they’d either been too polite or they hadn’t given a shit. The latter was probably the case.

  “Thank you,” I said to Monica as she handed the bottle over.

  I opened i
t and guzzled down half of it. Monica laughed again while sitting on top of the desk at my right. I turned slightly on my chair to face her, intrigued by the assessing look she was giving me.

  “He’s crazy about you, you know?” Monica asked, although it came out as more of a statement. “I mean, head-over-heels in love with you.”

  My face heated, and my chest warmed. “I don’t quite get why,” I said shyly, “but I’m grateful because I’m bonkers for him, too. No man has ever treated me so wonderfully or understood me as completely as he does. He’s perfect.”

  She smiled, but I didn’t miss the flicker of sadness that crossed her brown eyes. “Of course he is,” she said wistfully. “All Wishes are.”

  I stiffened, and my gaze flicked up to hers. She held it without flinching, her lips stretching into a strange smile I didn’t know how to interpret. Pulling down the zip of her sleeveless, form-fitting, black leather top with one hand, she spread the collar open with the other, revealing a brand over her heart, similar to mine in style but depicting a different symbol. My jaw dropped, followed by a sharp intake of breath.

  Mind racing, I cycled through my memories of the guests for any dreamy looking man who would have shadowed Monica with the same possessiveness Kazan did me, but came up empty.

  “Who…?”

  “She’s dead,” Monica interrupted before I could complete my sentence.

  I covered my mouth with my hand, my chest constricting, and my heart filling with compassion for her. I couldn’t even begin to imagine losing Kazan.

  Wait. What does she mean by dead?

  “Dead, as in…?” I asked, kicking myself for the insensitive way my mouth just blurted it out.

  “As in permanently,” she said, devoid of emotion.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t…”

  “Don’t worry,” Monica said with a dismissive wave of her small hand, her long, manicured nails painted with black nail polish. “It happened over seven years ago thanks to a bunch of stupid frat boys DUI. We weren’t even driving, just strolling on the sidewalk. The kid lost control, then bumped into another car before crashing into a shop. It was the other car spinning from the impact that hit Donna. She died in my arms.”

  Monica’s voice choked on those last words.

  “I’m so very sorry,” I said, not knowing what to do. I wanted to go give her a hug but somehow suspected she wouldn’t welcome it.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Monica said with a tired voice. “Why didn’t I wish her back?”

  I bit my lip and nodded. The thought had indeed crossed my mind.

  “I did, but it doesn’t work that way. Once a Mistwalker meets true death, it’s over. If you want it hard enough, another Wish will spark that may or may not achieve self-awareness. But when it does, the chances that it will develop the exact same personality as the previous one are slim to none.”

  Monica ran her fingers through her shoulder-length, curly, blond hair, her expression distant as she reminisced.

  “In many ways, Donna’s death had been a mercy for her, and an eye opener that came too late for me.” Monica smiled sadly at my confused expression. “I was a self-centered, spoiled, rich daddy’s girl. Being a lesbian didn’t fit into Dad’s perfect plans for me, but as long as I remained discreet with my relationships, he didn’t give me a hard time. A few months after the rifts first opened, I’d spent the Mist with a bunch of friends at Simon’s house. He’s an investment banker, the son of my dad’s partner. He’d just replaced his windows with bulletproof glass so that we could leave the shutters up and safely admire the freak show outside.”

  Monica snorted in self-derision then took a swig from her bottle of water. From the look on her face, she could have used something far stronger.

  “That’s when I met Donna for the first time. I had no idea she was a female when the dark wraith made a beeline for me. It freaked us all out at first but then everyone teased me about a demon having the hots for me. She was creepy, and yet she fascinated me. See, unlike you and Kazan, I have zero interest in fantasy and fairy tales. I’m the hardcore evolutionist and scientific type. Having a mythical creature in my life didn’t compute.”

  The petite woman took another long sip of water, screwed the lid on, and fiddled with the bottle pensively.

  “For the three days at Simon’s, the Mistwalker just followed me around, wherever there was a window that allowed her to see me. By the next Mist, I’d installed bulletproof windows in my own flat, unable to forget about the strange creature. And sure enough, there she was. It took me two more Mists to finally gather the courage to let her in.”

  Monica’s index finger absentmindedly traced the pattern of her brand the same way I often did. My heart ached again for her.

  “I hated when she took me to the Mist. It messed with my head. As much as I loved being with her, that place was too much for me. I was such a selfish princess. Everything had to be about me. I bound her to me and then, not content with having forced her to forfeit the Mist in favor of a uniquely human life, I also made her change her real name Adoan to Donna, to make it more ‘normal’ sounding. I treated her like a simple friend in public, forbidding her any public displays of affection. To make me happy, she took it all. The more human she became, the more miserable she was because of my treatment of her. I knew it but turned a blind eye, too happy in my own little bubble.”

  Monica fiddled some more with the bottle, lost in thought before plopping it next to her on top of the desk. Locking eyes with me, she gripped the edge of the desk with both hands.

  “If death hadn’t claimed Donna, she would have left me regardless because I treated her like shit. It took that tragedy for me to understand she was my partner, not my pet or my property. For months after her passing, I scoured the streets and homeless refuges looking for her until I had to accept that she was gone. One day, at the county fair, I felt the Mistwalker tingle again. It was different, but I wanted to believe she’d come back to me. Instead, I found a giant man in clothes too small for him, sketching people for a pittance.”

  “Kazan,” I whispered.

  She smiled. “Yep, your Kazan. I initially took him under my wing as a way to make amends for my Donna. But in truth, he helped me get my life together far more than I helped him. He has an amazing talent and would have succeeded either way, if only by sheer determination to make something of himself that was worthy of you.”

  My throat tightened as my heart filled with love for my wonderful man.

  “I’ve never seen Kazan happier than he’s been since he has finally reached you. Thank you for being smarter than me and realizing the gem you have. He’s the best of men.”

  I nodded, my eyes misting.

  A soft knock at the door startled us both. I blinked the tears away before they could fully form. Monica pushed her shoulders back and lifted her chin, becoming once again the no-nonsense tough girl that I’d met earlier.

  “Come in!” she called out.

  The door opened and one of the hostesses peeked her head in. “Sorry to disturb you, Ms. Sheffield, but you are being requested at the exhibit.”

  “I’ll be there in a minute,” Monica answered.

  As soon as the door closed, she jumped to her feet and gave me a serious look.

  “By the fancy detailing on your brand, I can tell that you’ve bound Kazan. You must let him return to the Mist every month for the three days it lasts to replenish his ethereal essence. The longer he remains in our world, the more human he will become. If he dies, it will be permanent.”

  I nodded, my stomach knotting with anxiety. “I promise. In fact, I already agreed to let Kazan bind me to him in his world at the next Mist.”

  The smile she gave me was a strange mix of sisterly gratitude, sadness, and envy. With a final nod, she walked out, leaving me alone in the office. I stared at the door long after it had closed behind her.

  * * *

  More than half an hour had gone by before Kazan finally returned. I’d bee
n on the verge of sending a search party after him. When he walked in with his shirt and pants almost in tatters by what looked like whiplashes, I nearly lost it.

  “Oh my God, Kazan! What happened to you?” I asked, running up to him.

  “I’m fine. Everything is fine now,” Kazan said with a soothing voice.

  “What the fuck do you mean, you’re fine? Your clothes are torn to shreds. Did you get attacked? Are these bruises?” I asked, frantically pawing at him to lift the rags of his shirt only to find a network of darkening bruises and red welts all over him. “Oh God!” I whispered in horror. “What the hell did this to you?”

  Then a cold shiver ran down my spine as the tingle of an ethereal presence wrapped around me. I recognized it as Kazan’s but yet, not. It held a slimy, evil undertone I’d only felt once before that made my skin crawl.

  Tearing my hands away from him as if they’d been burnt, I took a few steps back, fear rising from deep within.

  “Who are you?” I whispered, casting furtive glances around the room while keeping him in my line of sight, looking for something to use as a weapon.

  Kazan froze, taken aback by my question. In light of his genuine confusion, I wondered if my paranoia had me overreacting. But after Morgan, I would never ignore my instincts again.

  “You don’t feel like my Kazan,” I said, taking another step back. “There’s something off about you.”

  From the expression on his face, understanding dawned on him.

  “You’re right, there is something off about me,” he said in a reasonable tone. “Please do not fear me, my Jade. It is me, your Kazan.”

  That he didn’t try to approach me further alleviated some of my fears, and the feel of Kazan gradually overpowered the lurking sliminess beneath his energy.

  “Our first physical meeting was in a grocery store,” Kazan said. “On our first date, I realized Sangria and barbecue ribs are far too sweet in this world. You’re more ticklish behind your left knee than your right.” Pointing at my feet, he continued, “You don’t like wearing heels this high but insisted on wearing them tonight because you wanted to look your best to make me proud. Except, I’m always proud of you, Jade.”