by Amy Barrett
Ivan sat next to her. “I’m fine. I feel cold.”
He touched the raised hairs on his arms.
“I thought that that was why...” Ciara started but Zerachiel shook his head at her.
“Leave it be. I am going to shower.” He put his sheathed sword into the umbrella stand by the door and made for the bathroom. When he removed his shirt on the way, Ivan noticed that the water had turned his wing feathers grey. The remains of the mangled wing looked angry and bent. Zerachiel cringed when he moved.
Ivan looked back at his own arm. “Oh mate, getting your sexy on.” He teased. “Ladies remember this one is gay.”
Zerachiel rolled his eyes and smiled.
After Zerachiel had gone to shower Ivan forgot about his arm and turned to the laptop. “What are you doing?”
“Watching Netflix.” Ciara moved the mouse so the screen blinked to life.
“Why the weird angle?” Ivan tilted his head this way and that while examining the screen.
“It’s so I can lie down and watch the show without the colour going funny.” Ciara stood up and retrieved another blanket from the pile in the corner of the room. It was purple and fuzzy.
Ivan lay down on the sofa. It creaked as he moved. He focused his eyes on the laptop screen. “I see.”
“Do something for me please?” Ciara walked to beside him.
He sat up and leaned away and regarded her. “What?”
“Just take off that soaking jacket is all.” Ciara laughed and her face and neck went pink.
Deciding the worst that could happen was that she would burn the thing, Ivan shrugged off the jacket. Ciara took it in one hand and laid it on the radiator in a misshapen kind of way. She then moved back to Ivan and tucked the blanket around his shoulders.
“Wow.” Ivan pulled it so tight to him that he was now just a floating head on top of purple fur. “You’re a genius mate.” The fuzzy fabric felt like a hug around him.
Ciara smiled and returned to her own wrapped up state. “I know.”
Ciara lay down and pressed the play button on the laptop. After a few moments of the show starting Ivan gravitated towards her. He found that feeling warm was miles better than being cold. Eventually, he lay almost on top of her as he tried to see the screen and warm up. Ciara blushed deeply. Ivan was dragged into the world on the screen. It was a romance scene. The people held each other, and Ivan obsessed over how much contact seemed to be possible. Her hands on his face. Skin supporting skin. How they sighed at each other’s touch. How he looked at her like an active volcano. They kissed passionately and he screwed up his face.
“Ugh. Why ruin the touch so fast? Jesus mate draw it out a bit longer.” Ivan turned to face Ciara when he spoke and found that she was watching him. She giggled and looked down.
“What is this anyway?” Ivan gestured the best he could at the screen from within his cocoon.
“Gossip Girl.” Ciara pointed at the screen as the two characters appeared in turn. “That’s Chuck and that’s Blair. They are very complicated...”
“Where is the demon?” Zerachiel’s voice from the doorway interrupted Ciara. His hair was damp, and he was in a fresh pair of jeans with a flashy silver buckle.
Both Ivan and Ciara looked up from the screen. The show kept talking away to itself.
“Oh Abyzou?” Ciara sat up a bit. Ivan was perplexed. He shuffled and tried to get comfortable without her.
“Yes, that one.” Zerachiel’s eyes were very wide.
“You might have been looking for my inner demons.” Ciara snickered.
“Shh,” Ivan scolded and gestured to the laptop. “I can’t hear them.”
“We will need to catch you up on the earlier seasons anyway or you will be really confused,” Ciara said.
Zerachiel marched across the room and snapped the laptop closed with a crisp click. “Where is the demon?”
When Ciara sat up fully Ivan groaned and gave up on getting comfortable.
Ciara considered, rubbing the blanket between her fingers. “She said she was going to sort demon stuff.”
Zerachiel ran out of the room towards the bedroom and bathroom again.
“What’s with him?” Ciara asked Ivan.
“He’s a bit weird. Its why I am his friend really.”
Zerachiel came back putting on a t-shirt. “We need to find her. She will try to kill the rest of those wolves to send them to hell.”
“But, mate, we want that.” Ivan sat up, so he could keep sight of Zerachiel as he motored around the room. He collected his sword from the umbrella stand.
“Yes, but the monster will kill her. While I have no love for demons, we need one and her chains to right our wrongs and go home.” Zerachiel blew out the door after he yanked it open. “Come on Ivan!” he hollered back.
Ivan wrestled the blanket as it clung to his limbs. The air coming in smelt fresh.
“We could just let her die,” Ivan said. Nevertheless, he followed Zerachiel outside.
Ciara got up. “Wait for me.”
***
Abyzou lingered outside the wolves’ home for the second time in a few days. She was closer this time, just in front of the door. The rain had stopped, and the street smelt moist. Cars wheels squealed on damp roads and mothers persuaded small children to wear yellow raincoats. The wind nipped at Abyzou and she hunched her shoulders against it.
Ahead of her was the place she knew she would find Nick. She had the chains. She could destroy the wolves and send them all to hell. She knew she would eventually. It was her job, what she was made for. Then why was it that she didn’t want to?
She didn’t care about the wolves. They were flee filled wastes of oxygen.
Maybe it was the need to protect herself. If she went in there, she may be destroyed by Nick. He had sworn to do just that. She had no knife so she would have to hope he had it on him and she could disarm him. She shook her head. Abyzou did not fear death.
She watched the upstairs window and knew why she hesitated. The reason was standing watching her up there. His hair was in greasy chunks, but she didn’t see the dirt too clearly. She saw the eyes, shaded black with only a sprinkling of light around the edge. Hands in his pockets, he was everything she feared. But it was not his might which made her shake. It was the fact that those eyes were full of hatred for her.
He moved slowly. As if the world was on half speed, Abyzou waited for years for him to emerge from the shattered door. Each step announced a splash in its wake as he walked through the puddles on the pavement. His legs were rigid and took ages to lift and fall. Every muscle in his body was clenched tight. Abyzou licked her bottom lip as she drank in the sight of him.
“You are beginning to let the monster show.” She looked through her eyelashes at him.
“I am not.” His jaw muscle jumped.
“Don’t change it.” Abyzou stalked closer to him. Her hair was a damp curtain and from behind it she saw the yearning in his eyes.
“I adore this you.” She was close enough to pick out the yellow flecks in his eyes. The air between them felt charged.
“I will do what it couldn’t.” Nick clenched and unclenched his fists.
Abyzou leaned forward. Her face was so close now she could hear his teeth tightening against each other as he ground them. “There are a lot of things it didn’t do with me.”
Nick stepped three steps back. He acted so fast that he almost lost his balance.
“I will kill you, you demon bitch,” he snarled. Dashes of spittle followed the words out. From the back of the waistband of his jeans, Nick drew out Abyzou’s blade.
“You are gonna kill me with that?” Abyzou raised her eyebrows. Someone walked past them. The clunk, clunk of their heavy boots gave Nick a heads-up, so he concealed the knife.
Abyzou paced in a circle around him then stopped to look into his face.
“You do not hate me. You want to, but you find strangely that you can’t.” She pointed at him. Her fingernail had a sharp e
nd like an arrow. “You know I am right.”
***
Nick gripped the knife harder. He remembered the look on Dan’s face when this she-devil cut him down. His screams echoed around inside Nick’s head until it hurt. He couldn’t forget how they were both stuck in eternal torment. Then an image of that moment during the party leaked through. The way she had been with him then reminded him of all the times in hell when she would touch him gently. For those moments he wasn’t in pain. He could forget his responsibilitys and wounds. She was a port in the storm as well as the storm. He itched to touch her like he had at the party, but he wouldn’t let himself be taken in by her.
“You may be pathetic enough to imagine that I feel anything but sick when I look at you, but I will show you how wrong you are.”
“If you feel sick when you see me then it is only because your own thoughts sicken you.” She smiled. Light was swallowed by her crimson lips and Nick found he couldn’t help but gaze at them.
“Think of it. All the bad things we could do,” she said.
Nick leant in towards her but then he heard Dan’s voice in his head. “Naw, the redheads a little crazy”.
“Is this before or after you doom the rest of my friends?” Nick glared at her, hating her more than anything for taking Dan from him. Dan was trapped in hell forever because of her. “I will destroy you. That is a promise because if I wasn’t a saviour before hell, you have made me become one now. Even if that just means saving a handful of those wolves in there.”
Abyzou backed away from him. “I suppose we will see how you will destroy me then.”
Nick had no idea what she meant. Abyzou reversed down the street, swallowed by the shade of a tree.
“We will meet again don’t worry. And the angel you broke is coming for vengeance and wearing the mask of duty.”
Nick tried to remember ever seeing an angel, but he couldn’t grasp the image. He thought it must be something else he had destroyed. Abyzou was gone as quick as a hummingbird’s wing flap. Nick knew he would see her again.
Nick could not bear to go back in and watch the woman argue to try to get the chance to bury her child with her fallen pack members. So, he stayed outside. His mind wandered strolling back through his childhood. He saw his father standing over him. The man’s name was Manfred. He was stocky. Nick had gotten his height from his mother. Although not very tall Manfred was wide as a barricade. His eyes were green dotted with yellow flecks. On this occasion, his hair was still black without the silver which would later invade it. Nick blinked up at him. It was dull in the old church and it took a while before Nick could see.
The ceiling rose high overhead and a draft howled through the holes in the boardedup windows. There were broken statues and torn bibles strewn about the floor and a metallic smell lay heavy in the air. There was one stained window still intact. It was a man with a lamb at his side. He held a staff and had a halo of light around his head. Nick focused on the light coming through this figure to fully wake up.
“Well done son.” His father offered him a hand.
Nick took it and stood. “Did I do good dad?” The boy wobbled on his feet.
“You were amazing.” The smile on his father’s face was the most brilliant smile that Nick had ever seen. It stretched almost off his cheeks. All his yellowing teeth were out to say hello. At the age of twelve Nick wanted nothing more than to please his dad. Seeing his dad happy with him made Nick smile.
“Son you did better than any of us could have thought.” He rubbed Nick’s back in small circles. This reminded Nick of being very little. Times like first time he had ridden a bike without training wheels, when he had finally passed the maths test Mrs Wilson had made him take three times and when he scored his first goal in a soccer match.
Nick stood taller and pushed his tiny chest out. “How do you mean dad? What did I do?”
“Nick, son, you are not a wolf.”
Nick faltered and dropped his shoulders. He was so taken aback that he tried to move a step away but ended up bumping into one of the tipped over pews instead. “What? I thought I was part of the pack like you are? I turned, didn’t I?”
Manfred laughed. The sound bounced around the room, making it louder than it should have been. It was the same laugh Nick had heard when someone had told his dad a dirty joke in the pub, but the echo distorted it.
“Of course, you turned. What did you think happened last night?”
“Then what’s wrong with me dad?” Nick peered up at his father. His eyes looked round like a dolls. His ears were just a smidge too big for him. His lip was riddled with nibble marks.
“Wrong with you?” Manfred hugged his son to his middle. Nick’s heart hammered like a cartoon bomb. Nick breathed in his dad’s smell. He couldn’t describe it to anyone, but he knew it when he smelt it. It smelt like safety.
“No son there is nothing wrong with you.” Manfred looked down at his child and rubbed his cheek with his thumb. His skin felt rough and dirty on Nick’s.
“You are special Nick. You are going to protect us from the bad guys.”
“I am?”
“Yes. The demons won’t be able to control us anymore. Or make us turn on a full moon. Or hurt anybody.” He hugged Nick again but this time it was tight. Nick was too shocked to squirm.
“You can do great things Nick. I know you can.” He pulled from Nick and looked down at him. “What do you say buddy?”
“Sure dad.” Nick rubbed his eyes. Tears had started to appear in them, and he didn’t want his dad to see. He’s not a wolf? He didn’t know what this meant. What is he?
“Great. You go and find your mother while I handle things here.” Manfred interrupted his thoughts.
Nick was going to ask what there was to do here but upon turning he saw. Seven bodies lay scattered around the church. One was draped over the back of a pew; another was split in half in the middle of the aisle. Two more were torn to pieces around the altar and the remaining three were scattered about the remains of old statues. Strips of flesh carpeted the floor. The walls were painted in something Nick suspected wasn’t paint. But it had to be paint. His breathing became shallow and his head hurt. He moved his bare foot back and stood on something cold. Nick jumped and shrieked. A severed finger rolled from under his foot. The nail was perfectly painted purple. As his father moved forward, his boots snapped bone and squished scattered organs.
“Dad,” Nick cried, “what happened to my group?”
Manfred turned back and knelt in front of his son. “Nick, I know how it looks but it wasn’t your fault. You will get this under control and then you will be a hero like in books.”
Nick tried to run away. To escape the horror and his father’s impossible words. He thrashed in his father’s grip. “I did this? Why? What’s wrong with me?!”
“Listen to me. Listen.” Manfred shook the boy and looked right into his eyes. “There is not a damn thing wrong with you. Have you got that?”
Nick was held prisoner by the sight before him. He was shaking so hard it made his teeth click against each other.
“Nick?” Manfred moved his son’s face to force him to focus only on his father’s eyes. “Do you get that? You are perfect. Do you hear me?”
His tone was so stern that Nick was forced to listen. He nodded. “Okay dad.” But he still felt sick and trembled.
Manfred embraced him. “I know son. It looks bad, but it will just take some practice. You are going to save us all. Don’t worry.”
He caressed the back of Nick’s head and Nick closed his eyes against the nightmare. “Dad, If I am not a wolf, what am I?”
Nick still didn’t want to open his eyes but when his dad didn’t respond he needed to know why. He looked up to see his dad scanning the room feverishly.
“You don’t know do you?!” Panic tightened his throat.
Manfred caressed his face and surveyed the ruined church again. “Of course, I do. You look like that.” Manfred pointed and Nick followed the direc
tion of his finger. To the side of the room there was a statue. It was a creature crouched on a stand. Pieces were chipped off its face, but Nick saw razor teeth and a short snout. It had pointed ears and small bat-like wings spread out behind its body. Its eyes and nose were large, and it had an expression like it was snarling. Nick shivered looking at it. The stone was stained, and moss covered. It looked more like a monster than a hero.
“What is it?”
“A gargoyle,” Manfred said, “its like you.”
Nick swallowed a few times before he spoke so his dad wouldn’t hear the fear in his voice. “Why am I like that?”
“You are special buddy.” Nick smelt sweat on his father’s skin.
Thinking back on it, Nick was sure his father didn’t know what he was or what to believe. He wanted what he said to be true and he had picked the easiest thing to tell Nick. Nick still didn’t know what to call what he was. He wasn’t a wolf or a demon, so he had stuck with gargoyle. Now that he was older he knew it was far from accurate, but it was better than having nothing at all.
He suddenly missed his father. He missed that smell of body spray and old cigarettes. He breathed in through his nose, but it was empty air. He wished someone would care enough to make up comforting lies for him again. He listened for those comforting words but all he could hear was idle chatter stirred into life’s noisy soup.
One voice caught his attention. This was simply because of what the voice was saying. It was a well-spoken individual and he heard the words monster and werewolves. Then another voice took over.
“Ok so just running really fast is outa the question cause I will run away with you mate. You know I will.” This voice was more animated and louder. But the guys friend had mentioned werewolves, so Nick decided to linger to find out what they were talking about.
As they neared, the flamboyant guy just kept talking about running away from a terrible beast. Nick had a horrible feeling that the beast was him. The chatty one was the first to round the corner. He did not see Nick, but Nick saw him. The stranger was dressed in an expensive suit. The shirt was stained a pale brown from the rain and water was still leaking out of the fabric. He walked like a model on the catwalk. It was as if he supposed that all eyes were on him and so he put on a show for them. At the same time the air about him gave the impression that he could care less what people thought.