Page 6 of SIN Bone Deep

As we descended the steep and uneven stone steps, Nova’s bag clinked and clanked. Our eyes met and we burst into laughter as I realized that she had stolen some bottles of homemade wine. “Here,” she paused, leaning back against the stairs, and retrieved a bottle of wine, breaking it open and taking a gulp, before passing it to me.

I took a sip, some of it spilling around the seal of the bottle’s mouth and my lips. I giggled as I caught the spilled drops on the back of my hand and sucked them off as I returned the wine to her. Like most of my aunt’s wines, the buzz of the alcohol was counteracted by the addition of fruit, herb, and floral tones, and the wine both burned and soothed.

We continued to trade the bottle between us as we descended the stairs and by the time that we had reached the bottom, I was quite drunk, and silly with it. Arm in arm, we staggered across the soft sand, our feet slipping beneath us.

The bonfire was a flicker in the distance, but gradually brightened and music spilled into the darkness to greet us. “Here,” Nova pressed the remainder of the bottle into my hands and pulled away, walking ahead, deliberately putting distance between us. I lingered back, suddenly cut out and abandoned in the dark, and watched as she greeted a group of girls, my hopes of introductions and inclusion dashed. Nova did not want to be associated with me.

Embarrassed, I circled the fire avoiding its light and took several more mouthfuls of the wine. I took off my shoes and walked along the water’s edge, feeling the wash of the waves sucking at the wet sand. When I looked up, I could not see Nova. She must have gone up the path towards the ruins of the old colony.

In the shifting light, I saw a group of girls that I had gone to high school with and decided to approach them. We had never been friendly, but nor had we been hostile. It was either that or return home.

“No one believes in witches, for real,” someone snorted out their laughter. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” one of the girls said. “You see the lighthouse on the hill and the house before it? The women who live there are witches. They have all always been witches. Generation after generation of witches. One was even burned on the stake in town.”

“No way!”

“Yes, way!”

“What sort of witches? Like ride broomsticks sort of witches?”

“More like the curse you so that your hair falls out sort,” the girl’s giggles peeled out around her fingers, her eyes dancing with laughter. My family was a joke to her. Something told around the fire in the dark of the night to shock and scare. “Truly.”

My cheeks burned and I headed away from the light of the flames, and deeper into the shadows. I should not have come, I thought to myself. I had been stupid to think that I could make friends. Vossen women did not make friends among the townspeople. History had been clear that any Vossen woman who made the mistake of thinking a woman from the town was her friend, that so-called friend would betray her.

I hoped for Nova’s sake that she was keeping history in mind and that she would not let her pursuit of these new friendships lead her into trouble.

I didn’t know what I sought to achieve by seeking her out along the dark overgrown path that led to the ruins of the original settlement. I did not want to leave without letting her know that I had done so, and there was something dark and dangerous about this party and these people. I knew she would not heed my warning and would resent my intrusion, embarrassed by it. I would cause a fight, a rift between us.

The spiny saltbush caught at the lace of my dress, and I paused to free it my eyes catching on a darker shape within the shadows. For a moment my heart picked up speed, but my logical mind reasoned that it was just a partygoer relieving himself where he had thought he would have privacy to do so.

I started to retreat the way I had come, but the saltbush snagged again on my skirt, and I cursed under my breath, fighting to free my skirt with one hand, shifting my hold on the bottle of wine that I still carried.

In the darkness, his fingers were the bleached white of bone as he reached out to take over the task of freeing my lace from the bush that sought to tear it. They were long and thin, the knuckles distinctly larger, and their movement ascetically elegant. As he leaned over me, the dark silk on his hair fell forward and against its curtain, his profile was revealed by the moonlight as strong sharp bones, hollows of cheekbone, and feathers of shadowy eyelash against the white of skin.

The scent of dragon’s blood incense, clove, orange, and patchouli clung to his clothing and hair. His position meant that his cheek almost brushed against mine and I wondered if it would be hard, cool, and smooth as bone, or soft and warm as flesh. I turned my face into his instinctively, my lips almost brushing against his skin.

“Thank you,” I was breathless as he freed me from my entanglement.

“It is my pleasure,” his eyes picked up the distant firelight, the warm red glow dancing in the pupils. When he spoke it was hushed, somewhere between a murmur and a whisper, an intimate sound that had me leaning in closer to him to capture every syllable that left his lips. His voice was deep, slightly hoarse, and soothing. A voice that would comfort the sick and dying or settle a restless child into sleep.

“I’m…” My brain failed me, the words scattering like rain into water and my heart beat a rapid staccato against my ribs. “I am Elenyx, but everyone just calls me Nyx.”

“Elenyx,” he tasted my name with relish. “I am Ender.”

“Ender,” I repeated, enchanted. It was a foreign name, not one commonly used in the region. “Are you from…?”

“I am not from around here,” he confirmed my suspicion that he attended the academy. There was no other reason a young man would be in town and attending the bonfire. “May I?” His fingers wrapped around mine on the bottle I held, and he guided it up to his lips so that I fed him the wine. His tongue flickered over his bottom lip, capturing the last drops.

“What are you doing out in the dark?” I asked him. “Hiding?”

“I am not hiding. I am merely watching from afar.”

“Watching what?” I turned to look back at the beach. The flickering flames cast those that gathered around it into silhouette. I looked back up at him and found him looking down at me. A flush of heat rose up my chest to my cheeks. “You’re not missing anything,” I told him.

His lips curled gently in answer.

“Do I…” I hesitated. The sense of knowing him was so strong however that the question was irresistible. “Do I know you?” Was it a trick of shifting shadow that as our eyes met, his skin seemed almost translucent, the skull beneath revealed, and his eyes glowed with inner fire?

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