I looked up and around the hall. It was dim and cavernous inside, and in the shadows I saw what looked like mounts for torches. At least I didn’t see like, chains or torture devices. Still, I was thinking, Do you sacrifice things here? Does the blood run down into that hole?
I didn’t really have time to think beyond that. I heard some weird hissing and scuffling and splashing outside. Van was fighting that demonic mermaid serpent thing.
Also, I had peed myself. Just a side note.
But I was still holding the shovel, which was the only thing we had that would make a proper weapon.
I had to do something.
Chapter Eleven
Edie
I ran out of the cave screaming. I don’t know if I could actually help the screaming part, but there was a lot of screaming in karate classes, right? It was a good thing to scream. I was holding the shovel like a weapon, ready to swing it before I could chicken out.
Van was standing in the water ripping one of the things in half.
He was also shirtless and even more built than before, taller and stronger, with swirling tattoos down his arms and horns growing out of his head. His eyes had a weird green glow. His jeans were ripped and his left leg was bleeding.
I stopped short for a second.
Then I saw a flutter in the water near him. Another one of those things was under the lapping waves. I didn’t have time to think about what was happening or what Van had become, I just needed to make sure he would be alive to explain it to me.
I charged toward the water and swung the shovel. It slammed into the shallow water, splashing me and Van both, but I felt it hit something. A long white tail churned in the waves. I tried to hit it again, but that time the shovel slammed into a rock. The impact reverberated back through me.
I cried out with pain—and also terror, because I’m not sure I had actually stopped screaming this whole time—but I didn’t stop. There was no time to stop. Van plunged into the water and hauled up another one of the creatures and speared it on his horns, but I only saw that out of the corner of my eye because I was whacking my nemesis for all it was worth.
“Edie!”
I felt a hand on my shoulder and I jumped. Van had turned back into Van again, albeit with some streaks of blood on his face and hands now as well as his leg.
“Edie, it’s not moving anymore,” he said.
I realized that this was true. When I stopped, I could see a pale limp body just under the surface of the waves.
“You can stop,” he said. “Let’s go out of here and let the birds get the rest.”
“B—birds,” I said stupidly.
“Edie—let me explain.”
“I—I peed myself,” I said.
Everything else was too much. Way, way too much. It was like my brain just had to erase all of that stuff and go back in time a little bit, and just say, Ohmigod, you just peed yourself in front of a hot guy, how totally embarrassing!
He paused a minute and then dipped one of the buckets in the ocean and filled it. “We’ll take this up there—“ He pointed at the path— “and wash you off. It’s warm. Your clothes will dry as we walk back.”
“Okay.”
I practically ran up the path. I was very much done with the point. In fact—
“I’m done,” I cried as Van urged me to sit down on a rock. “I want to go home right now.”
He regarded me with a serious expression for a moment. “I don’t want to let you go.”
“Well, I don’t care!”
His expression was strange, considering the situation. It was—approving? “You were pretty badass back there.” He looked very much like he wanted to touch me, like he could hardly take his eyes off me.
“Not really. I was terrified.”
“Understandably so.”
I grabbed the bucket of sea water and splashed some on my jeans. That did not feel pleasant.
“It might help if you took them off first so you can rinse and wring them,” he said. “I can go over there—“
“No.” I grabbed his arm. “No, don’t leave me.”
He draped his other hand over mine. “Of course.”
I studied his face. He looked so normal now. His green eyes seemed human—very beautiful, but not inhumanly so. His shirt was balled up in his hand. His skin was unmarked by the dark tattoos. He certainly didn’t have horns. Had I really seen all of that?
“Explain…a little bit,” I said. I wasn’t sure I was ready to hear him explain himself yet. “What was that thing?”
“It’s a…creature that eats the space between planes.” He frowned. “Alister should be explaining this.”
This little moment where he lacked confidence, oddly made me feel better. “I’d rather hear it from you right now. You were here. The space between planes?”
“It’s like the fabric that links dimensions together, or…well, you can call it whatever. Basically…this island is part of two worlds at the same time. One is what you think of as the real world, and the other is the world called Sinistral, or the Fallen World…the World of the Left Hand… It’s our world. What you saw just now was my real form. The birds you saw are Sinistral, too, but the sea serpents are not.”
My eyes flew open and I almost choked on my own saliva. “This is why I said explain a little bit. You sound crazy.”
“But you saw it,” he said. “So how crazy is it?”
I mean…good point, I guess? “So…the sea serpents are eating the space between this world and your world?”
“Yes. That cave is the heart of the island, which is why they appear there at the point. If they eat around it, this island will disappear from your world.”
“So you have to fight them all the time?”
“Not that often. They usually feed on the island at night, but only bit by bit. They don’t usually travel in packs. It was strange to see one during the day, which is a concern. There’s a way to stop them…” He trailed off. “I shouldn’t say any more without all the guys around. It’s all of our business, if we’re going to tell you.”
“Okay.” I was weirdly calm.
“You’re scared…”
“Scared? A little bit, yeah!”
“Edie…we’ve had many visitors to Marchcliff Manor over the years, and I have to tell you—you’re one of the few people who we’ve told this stuff. And out of those few, you’re the only one who didn’t totally lose it. You’re definitely the only one who went for the kill…” He was breathing a little fast. I could see his muscles tense, as if he was trying to master himself.
I felt like his words meant something more, like the looks the guys exchanged with each other sometimes. Like some greater truth lurked beneath the surface.
“Whatever you decide—” He caught himself.
“Decide?”
“Uh…that’s why I shouldn’t do the talking.”
“What do I have to decide?”
“Nothing. But…you could stay,” he said. “If you wanted to stay, you could stay. We’ve been waiting for someone like you for years. We would give you everything you’ve ever dreamed of and quite a lot more.” His hand stayed over mine, his fingers curling slightly around my wrist, which looked slender in his grip although it was actually a pretty sturdy wrist. It felt nice, like—he was the first guy I really believed could protect me from anything. Even maybe supernatural creatures—even maybe pain and death and loneliness and emptiness.
I knew that wasn’t really possible, but—
I’ve been lost for a long time, I thought. I am never present with anyone like this…looking into their eyes… Something about the terror I had just experienced, since it was over so fast and we were both fine, made me feel alive—and just as into him as before. Maybe more. Despite all the crazy stuff he’d just said.
“Not everything,” I said.
“No, not everything.”
“Some things about the real world are wonderful,” I said. “My family and friends. I would never
even think of leaving them behind.”
“Of course,” he said. “I’m not saying you wouldn’t see them anymore. You could go home for visits here and there. Just that anyone who calls Marchcliff Manor home…well…it’s a simpler sort of life.”
“Is it? Because I have a feeling it might actually get complicated…” Whatever he was trying to say, three guys and one girl was a recipe for disaster.
“Not like you might think. All I care about is making you happy enough to never regret a day you spend here. It’s all Alister and Dante care about either. It’s just that we need to…” His voice was going rough with barely pent desire. I could hear it. No one had ever talked like that to me before, but when he said Alister and Dante in that same voice a shiver went down me. A good shiver. Like…he was acknowledging their desire too, almost putting them right here in the conversation while we were alone.
Like they all want me, and they all know it, and they don’t even care…
My eyes roved over the smooth muscles of his chest. He didn’t have any hair there. I wondered if he waxed. I had this feeling maybe he was just made this way. His skin was so smooth and perfect with a sheen of sea water. But I noticed those little dark hairs at the top of his jeans again. I brushed my fingers across the space between his pectoral muscles…and when he didn’t stop me, I kept going.
At some point, if things got too crazy, you might as well keep going.
“Is your leg okay?” I asked.
“That was just a scratch.”
His head leaned closer to me, his hand slipping around my waist, and I heard his breath quicken. I followed his lead, maybe even pushed his lead, putting my hand to the back of his neck.
His lips met mine, warm and soft—with the same pent hunger as his voice. He was being gentle with me—so, so much gentler than he wanted to be. I could feel how much he wanted to devour me, and yet he was so restrained. Slow and sweet. I drank in the smell and the taste of him. Kisses definitely tasted better after a huge burst of terrified adrenaline.
Maybe I wasn’t in the best state to be doing this, but—
His hand dropped to my waist and I suddenly remembered I was still wearing clothes that I had literally peed on, and that really sucked the sexiness out of the moment. I pulled back.
“I’m—I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t know what I’m doing. We just battled a monster thing and I’m still kind of gross right now.”
“Let me take care of you,” he said.
I let him unfasten the button of my jeans and tug down the zipper. I was not entirely sure where this was going, but he moved carefully and I felt as if I trusted him—with both my body and the embarrassment of the moment. He seemed so impressed by the fact that I’d tried to fight, it sucked all (okay, most of) the humiliation out of it. He peeled down the fabric, scooping me up around the waist a little to tug them off my ass, and then drew the legs off me.
He shook them out a little, and scrubbed them out in the bucket of seawater, leaving me there on the rock in my underwear, generally untouched.
I wouldn’t have minded a little more touching, actually.
No one had ever taken care of me like this, and made me feel so…accepted in my own skin. It was mainly in the way they looked at me. They looked at me with desire, which was incredibly flattering. But they didn’t ‘check me out’. It went deeper.
Yeah, because they’re looking for someone who will stay here on this island of insanity.
I was probably insane for kissing him, too. I mean, even Vegas rules have their limits.
“Van?” I asked, as he wrung out the jeans. “What are you?”
“I am what you might call a demon,” he said.
“A…demon. Like…like your world is like hell?”
“I quite like my world,” he said. “It’s not like hell. But—“
“But?”
“I’d rather have Alister explain it,” he said. “Let’s go home.”
Chapter Twelve
Van
“Are you insane?” Dante didn’t know the meaning of ‘keep your voice down’.
“I had to tell her something.”
“You didn’t have to take her to the point on the first day. She’s going to want to go home.”
We had left Edie alone downstairs, which seemed like a bad idea. I didn’t want to give her that much to think yet.
I didn’t want to lose that girl. I’d never felt so strongly about anyone. “She spilled blood for us.”
“I wish I could believe that,” Dante said. “She was scared, and armed with a shovel. A fight or flight response kicked in, that’s all.”
“She’s the one for us,” I hissed. “You both felt it on the first day. Now I’m sure. The old rules used to even demand that our bride must be willing to spill blood. What else do you want?”
“You’re exaggerating this encounter,” Dante said. “I know it. I didn’t see a girl who wants to spill blood. I saw a girl who looks scared out of her mind.”
“But also…a little turned on,” Alister murmured.
“You don’t feel it, Dante?” I was incredulous.
“I do…” Dante growled, rapping his fingers on one of the antique chairs with ram’s heads carved on the arms. “I’m tired of getting my hopes up, that’s all. We’re demons. We shouldn’t be hoping. We should be taking what we want.”
“We can’t have an unwilling bride,” Alister said.
“Thank you for reminding me about these bullshit rules,” Dante snapped.
“You don’t really want an unwilling bride.”
“Damnit, obviously I’m not saying I want to assault somebody, but I am tired of the gentle approach. Alister, you like her, right? So you told her about our background, which really didn’t do anything except creep her out. Van, you like her too, and you…went a lot farther than that. Well, tomorrow I want to give her that cooking lesson—no holds barred. I want to make that girl sweat.”
Alister smiled a little. “Just sweat, huh?” he said. “Nothing more?”
“If I have time to clear off the kitchen table, who knows,” Dante said.
“While you two figure that out, I’m going back downstairs,” I said. “I don’t want to leave her alone.”
When I came downstairs, Edie was hunched over her phone, which was plugged into one of the few outlets in the house. She glanced up when she heard my footsteps, as her thumb tapped on a cartoon unicorn on the screen. A little fanfare played when she gave the unicorn a piece of cake. Her eyes darted back and forth between me and the game before she brushed her hair back behind her ears and put the phone down as if it burned her. She had changed from the jeans into a casual skirt and hoodie. She had pulled up the hood, although it wasn’t that cold in here, so I could tell she was feeling nervous and trying to hide.
She wiped her eyes with the sleeves, hastily.
Maybe I shouldn’t have come down here. “Homesick?” I asked. Modern people didn’t do very well with being cut off from family and friends for days on end. That was one reason we had trouble getting anyone to come at all. “We do have one telephone.”
“No. I mean, sort of. But…” She made a face at herself. “More twitchy than anything. Like, I—I’m so used to, whenever I’m depressed I get on my phone to distract me, when I’m lonely I text somebody, when I’m bored I fart around on the internet, and when I’m freaked out about something I start Googling it… And right now I have this absolutely burning need to Google you. But I can’t.”
I almost smiled, but I also thought she was just trying to pretend she was okay when she wasn’t. “You looked like you were crying.”
She shrugged.
“You won’t find much about me on the internet,” I said. “We’re careful about that.”
“How can you be? I could go home and post about this.”
“You’ll forget all of this and just remember that you had an amazing time.”
“Like magic…? Amnesia? Stealing memories?”
“It is magic,” I said. “It’s meant to protect you, not to hurt you. So you can go back to normal.”
She rolled her eyes. “Normal.”
“Of course, this is my normal,” I said. “Guarding this place.”
“Why is it important to guard this place?”
“Because this is one of the few spots we have left where normal people and magic can exist at the same time.”
“You mean, your magic doesn’t even work in the real world?”
“No. Just here.”
“Just here,” she repeated. “So…that’s why it feels so different here. When I wish to see magic in the real world, it really is just a wish, then. But here…”
“We come together,” I said. “You and me. Humans and the magical races.”
She smiled a little. “That’s pretty cool. I don’t think I want to forget. Can I take your picture for Insta while my phone is charged?”
“Nice try,” I said with a grin. “Unless you want to find that your phone has no memory when you leave either.”
Chapter Thirteen
Edie
Dinner was surprisingly normal. Van and I described the battle with the serpent down by the water in greater detail and Alister and Dante seemed impressed with my composure. I felt like a different, more awesome person when I was here, I had to say. We had some drinks on the porch outside in the warm summer air afterward, and talked about some easygoing grownup stuff, like I told some work stories and the guys talked about the saga of repairing the slate roof of Marchcliff Manor last year. We hadn’t gotten into anything more about demons or creatures that eat the space between worlds or anything else, and I didn’t bring it up either. I needed a break from thinking. I needed to pretend everything was normal for a bit.
In the morning, though? After I’d slept on it?
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