The Portal to Sidhe: Book 3

by Kelsey Schaeffer

  Finally, after what seemed like forever, the blond haired woman took Damon’s hand, and the two headed towards the poolroom doors. I quickly looked around to see if anyone had spotted me, and I went after them. I had to stay quiet, but I wanted to see where they were headed. I stayed a distance behind them, as I quietly followed them out of the poolroom and into the halls.

  As they walked, they stumbled around, laughing and holding onto one another as they journeyed down the hall until they reached the portal. As they waited for the portal to open, I stood behind another statue, waiting for them go, and once the portal doors shut behind them, I sprinted off towards the portal, to see what floor they were headed to. They were headed two floors above, so with superhuman speed, I raced up the stairs to catch up. I was panting when I heard their voices echoing down the hall, and I quickly snuck towards them.

  When I finally caught up, I quickly hid behind a plant so they wouldn’t spot me. I continued watching them, as they stumbled down the hall with laughter filling the air until the stopped in front of a room. The blond woman quickly took out a key and unlocked the door. I watched as she stepped inside the room, pulling Damon in behind.

  Chapter 19

  I sat on the floor near the suite room door for what seemed like hours. Eventually, my eyes grew so tired I drifted off to sleep. I’m not sure how long I was out, but I suddenly heard the sound of a door rattling. The noise jolted me awake and I quickly jumped to my feet. I heard laughter from a woman, and the sound of my husband’s voice. I decided I would confront him with surprise. As I stood up, I hoped there was logical explanation, some good reason why Damon was intoxicated and alone in the room with this woman.

  I was already standing in front of the door when Damon walked out. When he saw me, he jumped in surprise.

  “Miranda!” he cried as his blood shot eyes grew large.

  I didn’t know what to say as rage soared through my brain. My mind felt as if it was going to explode when I saw the blond woman come up from behind him, wearing nothing but a skimpy pair of underwear. When she saw me, she gasped and quickly grabbed a blanket to cover up.

  I grabbed Damon’s arm and pulled him out the door, as I thrust my arms out, using magic to slam the door behind me. I didn’t say a word as I pulled him behind me.

  “Miranda…stop…Miranda…wait,” he huffed as I dragged him towards the portal.

  I didn’t say a word. I didn’t know what to say.

  When we stepped inside the portal, Damon looked terrified as he quietly said, “I can explain.”

  “Then explain,” I growled.

  “I…I,” he stammered.

  “Go on!” I said with no patience.

  “Okay,” he began, “I don’t have an explanation.”

  “What did you do?” I demanded. “How long has this been going on?”

  “Uh..uh,” he started.

  I burned my eyes into him as I waited for an answer. In shame, Damon looked to the ground.

  “Fine,” I said as the portal door opened, and I dragged my husband down the hall. “Don’t tell me!”

  I dragged my husband as he stumbled behind me in silence, until we arrived home. I finally let him go, and he followed me up the stairs until we stopped in our room. It was five o’clock in the morning, and the others would be waking soon.

  Exhausted, I plopped down on the bed, and waited for Damon to speak. In fear, he stood anxiously on the other side of the room.

  Finally he spoke. “I’m tired,” he said. “I think I’m going to sleep some.”

  “No,” was all I said.

  “What do you want from me Miranda?”

  “I want you to tell me what’s going on.” I said, “The drinking, the potions, the women.”

  “How did you know where I was tonight?” he asked.

  “I heard you get up, and when you never came back, I went looking.” I didn’t mention anything Alice had told me.

  “I don’t know Miranda…” he began, “I’m just depressed. I’m lost…I have nothing anymore. My only child was taken away, and no matter how hard we try, we can’t have another.”

  “So you get intoxicated and sleep with other women?” I asked. “You want to get someone else pregnant, since you can’t get me pregnant fast enough?”

  “That’s not it,” he said. “I’m just lost. My mind isn’t in the right place.”

  “This isn’t the first time this has happened…has it?” I asked.

  Damon turned red and looked down. I immediately knew the answer, despite what Alice had told me.

  “How many woman have your cheated on me with?”

  Damon didn’t answer, but he began to tremble.

  “I just want an answer. Then you can go to bed.”

  Damon sat down on the bed, his face was beat red and he was shaking.

  “I want to know,” I said, feeling anxious about the answer from Damon’s petrified behavior.

  “Uh,” he said, “six…I guess. Not including the things that happened on Hell…but that wasn’t…”

  I nodded my head. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to react. In that moment, I was so exhausted I just wanted to sleep.

  “Let’s go to bed,” I said as I threw off my clothes and began to get in bed.

  Damon looked surprised, but he quickly undressed. Then he stood by the bed as if he didn’t know what to do.

  “Take a shower or sleep on the couch,” I growled.

  Damon nodded his head. He must have been exhausted because he quickly grabbed a blanket and collapsed on the couch.

  I slept for quite some time, as exhaustion overtook my body from the night before. When I awoke, I saw Damon’s body still lifeless on the couch, as the sun shined brightly though the window. I lay still with my eyes shut, still exhausted in every way.

  I didn’t know what to do. I was lost. I had put up with so much from Damon, but he had given up so much for me. He cheated on me multiple times, but he had allowed Ben into our marriage. He had stuck by my side even after Alice and Isabella were born. I was lost. I needed to talk to Damon.

  I quickly climbed from the bed, and wrapped a blanket around myself, and went to Damon’s side. I gently shook his shoulder and waited. Damon’s eyes shot open. They were still blood shot, and he looked terrified.

  “It’s fine,” I said quietly. “I just want to talk.”

  Damon looked relieved as he sighed and nodded his head.

  “I don’t know what to do,” I said quietly as I sat by his side.

  Damon nodded as he struggled to sit up. With his eyes still red and his face puffy, he looked physically ill as if the night before had worn him down. “What do you want to talk about?” he asked.

  “Us.”

  Damon gave me a blank stare and was at a loss for words.

  “Just tell me why,” I said calmly. “Why,” I repeated. I paused. “Why the drinking, why the psychedelic potions and why the cheating. Give me an answer.”

  Damon shook his head. “I’m just broken,” he said. “I can’t be fixed. The things that have happened…I can’t,” tears began to fall from his eyes, “I just can’t.”

  “Damon, I know it’s a lot. We lost a baby together…the things that happened on Hell. You lost another baby, and now Luke. I know. I do,” I said.

  He shook his head as tears began to pour from his eyes, “No,” he shook his head. “You don’t know.”

  “I do,” I said, “I’ve been through all of this with you.

  “You don’t know what I went through on Hell. The things they did.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked. “When I tried to talk to you about it before, you acted like everything was okay.”

  He shook his head again, as tears continued to fall from his eyes.

  “You can tell me,” I whispered as I tried his forehead.

  “Like you,” he began, “they drugged me with magic, and Desmorelda’s companions had their fun. They did whatever they wanted to me.” He scrunched his face is
disgust, “Even Desmorelda…had her way with me a few times.” He paused, “I don’t remember much, and I was so drugged up, I didn’t even care. Honestly, I don’t even know how many women…or even what I did.”

  He paused and wiped the tears away.

  “I know,” I said, “They did the same to me.”

  “No you don’t!” Damon shouted unexpectedly. “You don’t know what they did, because Taylor saved you. The women eventually grew bored of me so they locked me in a cell.”

  “One of those horrifying cells?” I asked in shock, as I had never found out what had happened to Damon on Hell. I had tried to ask him many times before, but he shut the question down, and acted as if he had just been off doing his own thing.

  Damon nodded his head. “I don’t know how long I was in there,” he said, “Weeks, maybe a month…two.”

  I gasped. “Damon…I’m…I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.” I tried to stroke his hair again, but he suddenly pulled away.

  “It..it was awful,” Damon stuttered as he shivered in horror from the thought. “They stripped me down naked and threw me in a cell. It was tiny and dark, just like Desmorelda described, but so much worse.”

  I stared intensely as I waited for Damon to go on. He looked disturbed as he reminisced the horrifying memory, and I could see he was shaking from apprehension.

  “It’s okay,” I said softly, “you can tell me.”

  Damon wiped a tear away, and quickly wiped at his nose with his blanket. He sighed and continued, “It was so cold…and dark. The cell was completely solid, so I couldn’t see a thing. It had one little slot where they fed me.” He shivered, “They gave me one bottle of water a day, and…what they called feed, once a day.”

  I shook my, as I remembered, Damon looked as if he had lost some weight when we had returned from hell. As Damon told me his story, his eyes turned even redder, and his face grew more swollen from the emotional stress, but he continued.

  “I had to…go to the bathroom and sleep in that tiny cell. Miranda, it was disgusting. I slept off and on, hardly able to sleep in that tiny space, with the horrible smell.”

  “My God,” I sighed, almost in tears myself.

  “Once a week, they took me out of the cell to clean it. Since I’m not a demon, they didn’t torture me, instead they sprayed me down with ice-cold water, and laughed and mocked me. They gave an awful razor and let me cut my hair and shave.” He looked down in disgust. “Once I was cleaned up, they shoved me back into that dreadful cell.”

  Damon paused as he wiped another tear away. I shook my head in disgust, by what Desmorelda had done.

  Damon wiped away his tears and went on. “It went on like this for what seemed like…forever.” Damon’s facial expression looked hopeful as he said, “One day the door opened up, and instead of a guard, it was Taylor. I didn’t know what to expect, so I sat there, just waiting for him to drag me out. Instead he told me he was helping me, he was sending me home, and I had to follow him.”

  I sighed, feeling grateful Taylor found him.

  “I didn’t know whether to trust him,” Damon said, “But it was a chance to get out of there. He quickly found me some clothes, but by then, the guards had figured out I escaped. That’s when they sent the hell hounds after me.”

  I threw my hand over my mouth as I remembered the horrifying growling just before Damon and I had escaped.

  “I hear them,” I said. “It was hell hounds?” I asked in surprise.

  He nodded his head and looked terrified from the memory.

  “They were disgusting,” he said. “Huge nasty black dogs, big red eyes, with blood dripping from their mouths instead of slobber. Almost as big as a snow beast…but nastier,” he described. “I’m lucky I have superhuman speed, although my imprisonment had weakened me.”

  “But Taylor’s human, how did he outrun them?” I asked.

  “They weren’t after Taylor,” he said, “They’re profoundly trained, and they were sent after me. Taylor went a different way and was able to catch up to me just before we made it the room.” Damon paused for a moment to catch his breath.

  Suddenly he began to sob, and his sobs turned to a horrifying scream, as if all the pain he had suppressed had suddenly exploded.

  “Shhhh,” I said as I tried to hold him, “shhhh.”

  “I can’t!” he screamed, “I can’t do it anymore. I sent my son to that place. I SENT MY SON TO THAT PLACE!”

  “Shhhh,” I said again and again as I tried to hold him, and keep him from waking the other, but he wouldn’t stop. He continued to scream and yell and shake as if he was losing control.

  “I’m going to leave…I’ll go to Earth. I’ll disappear.” he sobbed. “I can’t be here anymore. I can’t do this anymore.”

  Before he could say another work, the door was thrust open. Damon and I both jumped in surprise. Standing in the doorway stood Alice, her blond hair in tangles with her pajamas still on.

  “I can hear you from my room!” she hissed.

  “Go back to bed, honey,” I said trying to sound calm.

  “No!” she screamed just as loud as Damon had. At the top of her voice she yelled, “I know everything too, and I hate you for it! I know about the potions, staying out all night drinking, and I know about all those women!”

  “Alice!” I cried as I stood up to try and calm her, but she jumped away from me. “You don’t know the whole story,” I said calmly.

  “No!” She screeched, “I don’t care! I don’t want to hear the whole story! Mom you’re soft, and you forgive, but that’s not me!” She looked at Damon with a horrifying look on her face and screamed, “You’re not my father, and you never will be! I hate you and I wish you’d just die!”

  “Alice!” I screamed as I tried to catch her, but she kept backing away.

  “No!” she screamed, “I want him gone! I don’t care how! I just want him gone!”

  “Please!” I cried. “Please stop!”

  As Alice screamed, Damon sobbed and began shaking from emotional distress until he collapsed onto the ground. His emotional power was so strong; the walls began to shake from his excessive energy.

  Suddenly I heard a commotion and saw Nathen and Ben at the door.

  “What’s going on!” Nathen demanded as he stood in the doorway with Ben standing behind.

  “Damon’s freaking out. Alice is upset!” I cried out. “Someone get Alice,” I cried.

  Nathen immediately went to Damon to help him, while Ben ran to our screaming daughter. I stood still as I tried to keep my emotions under control. As I stood still, I grasped my head between my hands and tried to remain calm. As I tried to gasp for air, I felt the arms of my mother wrap around me.

  “Shhh,” I heard her soft whisper, “It’s going to be okay.

  I looked towards Ben and saw that she was holding our daughter as she sobbed into his arms, and Nathen calming Damon down. As I saw my family begin to tatter, I began to wonder, was this fault?

  After the ordeal the morning after I caught Damon having an affair, our family wasn’t the same. Alice continued to grow cold and bitter, and her hatred for her stepfather couldn’t go unnoticed. Damon continued to travel down a dark path, as his late night habits didn’t cease. His physical appearance only mangled more along with his emotional state. I was lost in my own mind as my family was falling in pieces around me.

  Finally, one night, when it seemed as if things couldn’t go worse, Delia and Nathen asked if I would meet with them alone. I agreed, and that evening, I met with them in their suite.

  As soon as I sat down, Delia began, “Honey, we need to talk to you about Damon.”

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, realizing they had to have taken notice in his downfall.

  “Has he been taking the potion I made him?” she asked.

  I shook my head, “I don’t really know. I’m sorry…things have just been…a wreck lately. I guess I haven’t paid attention.”

  “Well,” Delia said nervously as she lo
oked at her husband, “we’ve both noticed his…appearance hasn’t been very well kept lately.”

  When she said appearance, I knew she was refereeing to the mangy beard he was beginning to grow, and his haircut that was long over due.

  Before I could say anything, Nathen said, “And…his smell.” He frowned, “It seems like he doesn’t shower anymore, and he reeks of alcohol.”

  “I know, I know,” I said.

  “We’re just worried about,” Delia said. “Do you know what’s going on?”

  I nodded my head. “He’s drinking again,” I said. “And… other things.”

  “What do you mean?” Delia looked heavily concerned.

  I frowned and knew if I told her the truth, my eyes would burst into tears. It took a moment, but finally I said, “He’s doing some psychedelic potion…and sleeping with other women.”

  As tears began to fall from my eyes, Delia threw her hand over her mouth in shock, and Nathen slammed his fist into the end table.

  “That boy!” Nathen yelled.

  “Now, Nathen,” Delia said as she quickly wiped a tear away.

  “No!” Nathen cried, “I’ve turned my head the other way my entire life. “He neglected his son for years, and now he’s throwing his life and his marriage down the drain.”

  “It’s not his fault,” I said quietly as tears fell from my eyes. Delia wrapped her arms around me as we cried together.

  Nathen was so mad, he ran out of the room. I stood up after him, but Delia quickly pulled me down and said, “Let him go. He’ll run around and be fine.”

  I nodded my head as she held me tight. “I don’t understand thought,” she said. “How is it not his fault?”

  I quickly told her some of what happened on Hell, but I didn’t feel it was my place to go into details. After I told her the short version of the story, she understood Damon’s behavior.

  “Miranda,” she said after several moment of silence. “I have an idea, but I don’t think you’ll like it.”

  “What’s that?” I asked in curiosity.

  “Well…” she began, “I think it may be best if Nathen and I take Damon back to Earth.