Page 19 of Prince of Ruin

“Some assholes might come over and play a prank on Dad,” I tell Mom. I don’t bother telling Mom that these assholes possibly drugged me. Why bother? I sink onto the leather couch against the far wall. “Ihate that people try to take advantage of Dad’s…hobby as a demon hunter.”

“Probably some students from his English class.” Mom stares at the canvas they’re working on—a spiral of tiny bones fitted on a black tapestry. They’ve always been fascinated with bones, even going so far as to create some sick art with my teeth that fell out when I was a kid. Some moms have framed pictures of their children decorating the house. Mine has a bone-art tapestry made from my teeth.

“I’ve never seen these guys before,” I say. “Besides, they’re too old to be in high school. I don’t think they’re even from town.” I would recognize both Aden and Tarsus in a heartbeat. They’re beautiful and flawless.

Mom places the bone in its place on the canvas. “What do these kids look like?”

“One is a boy with shaggy blond hair and green eyes. The other…well, they were in cosplay so it’s hard to tell. But they were tall and lean, with pale skin.”

“What was their cosplay?” They’re looking at me now, and for fucking once I actually have their direct attention. Because Mom usually acts like everything in my life is minute and small and not important, even if it’s important to me. But Dad must have said something about these guys because Mom is looking at me expectantly, waiting for me to go on.

“Um, well, they had, like, a wig of long white hair. It was way too silky and fine to be real hair. And they had, like, these enormous antlers.” I gesture with my hands, trying to show them the size. “Which, I mean, I’m not even sure how they made them stay in place, because they looked like they popped right out of their skull.”

“Tarsus was here?” Mom’s voice has lowered to a shocked whisper that makes a chill shudder down my spine.

“Yeah.” I blink in surprise, lowering my hands. “You know them?”

Mom just stares at me, mouth slack, the wheels turning in their head. They often live inside their head, thinking about how they’re going to word something before it leaves their lips. I’ve always admired that quality about them—their ability to think carefully before speaking. Instead, I seemed to have taken after Dad—even if he isn’t my bio dad—spewing the first thing that comes to mind and sounding like an idiot.

“It must be time,” Mom says. They wet their lower lip with their tongue as they pick up another tiny mouse femur, coat it with their hot glue gun, and carefully place it onto the design.

“Time for what?” I finally ask, my foot tapping anxiously on the floor.

Instead of answering, Mom puts the final piece on the tapestry, finishing off the spiral made of tiny bones. “Do you know what the spiral symbolizes?”

Are you fucking serious? I roll my eyes. “Now’s not exactly the time for one of your words of wisdom, Mom.”

“It’s one of the most ancient symbols, spanning across worlds.” They trace their finger from the freshly placed bone, following the spiral inward. “It represents our journey inward to truly know ourselves.” Finally, they lift their gaze to mine, their gray eyes pale as the moon, their skin white as moonstone, their coarse hair the same shade as the bones they craft with.

I heave out a sigh and roll my eyes. “How do I begin this journey?” I ask, deciding to play along because god knows Mom won’t give me any answers until I humor them.

Bending down, they pull their bottom drawer to their desk open, shove some papers aside, and pull out a knife with the hilt all the way to the point made of black jagged stone.

“This obsidian dagger never misses its mark.”

I stare at the dagger. Now that’s a relic that would have made a great add-on at the cosplay. “Okay?” I take the dagger. The stone is cold, the blade heavy in my hand. “That’s sick.” I place my finger on the point, but Mom smacks my hand away.

“That’ll turn you to ash if you draw blood with it. Even your own blood.”

I blink at mom. “I think you lost me.”

“Listen closely, then, Clav.” They stare at me, dead serious. “You were born out of wedlock twenty-three years ago in the field out back.”

I blink. “Thisfield? That our house is on? I thought you didn’t move here until after I was born.”

“I didn’t own it, but I lived inside this old house.” The wrinkles in their face seem to deepen. “I wanted to stay close to the place where you were born, because in the exact spot you were born, a portal was created that opens up to the Fae realms.” They meet my eyes. “It’s the same portal where Dad’s so-called demons enter the human realms.”

Thunder fills my ears. This isn’t a time to joke around, but Mom doesn’t look like they’re joking. In fact, in all the years I’ve known them, Mom has never cracked a joke. Not once. Knowing Mom won’t deal with me when I’m panicking or overwhelmed, I keep a calm expression on my face and wait for them to go on.

“The house was hardly functional,” they say, looking at their knotted fingers. “With a leaky roof, rotted floors, and no place for a fragile human babe to be raised in, but it provided respite from storms and a hiding place from strangers. I’d steal grain and goat milk from the farm down the road to feed us.” Theylick their lower lip and glance out the window, their mind traveling to a past I never knew about.

“Rick was traveling around the country to different haunted houses in search of portals like the one on our land, and he found us living here.” Mom huffs out a laugh. “Mortals are so easily won over. I agreed to marry him if he fixed up the house for us to live in. Living on demon lands as a demon hunter seemed to be a thrill for him. I let him fall in love with me, let him build a life for us. I wasn’t about to go out and make a living in the mortal realms myself.”

I blink, trying to put all this together, and the first question that leaves my lips is, “So there are actually demons crawling up from hell onto our land?”

Mom clicks their tongue and shrugs. “I wouldn’t call them demons. They’re just…faeries crawling up from the Fae realms, not hell.”

“Fae realm? Like in the books I read?” Just like Aden said. My heart is racing now.

---