Page 9 of Land of Monsters

“Tell me.” His voice dragged across the ground, his green eyes looking directly into mine. It made me feel vulnerable. Bare.

“What do you want to know?” I shuffled my feet, folding my arms around me.

“Everything.”

I scoffed, my head tipping back, staring up at the cloudy sky above as flakes flittered down but never touched the glass dome.

“You probably know who my parents are…” I started.

“Yeah.” He laughed. “I actually met your father once.”

“What?” My focus snapped to him, my mouth falling open.

“They came to help us with the battle last year against Istvan.”

“Oh.” My head wagged. “That was the mission Uncle Lars sent them on. Mom only told me Uncle Lars had sent them somewhere.”

“Szar.” Ash’s hand went back to his head, and he started to pace, a crazed laugh billowing out. “Uncle Lars…”

“Yeah?”

“Youruncleis the fuckingking!” He exclaimed, his arms out wide in bewilderment. “Your mother isthequeen… and your whole family are deadly killers!”

He wasn’t wrong. Druids to dark dwellers, I came fromverypowerful roots, not to mention my extended family of pirates, wanderers, incubi, sirens, pixies, and a monkey-sprite.

“How could you not tell me?” Ash’s voice rose. “You are a princess! You should not be here. I thought you needed to go home when I thought you were an average rich girl! I’m shocked they haven’t tracked you down and killed me yet!”

“The bracelet cut off any connection to me.”

His eyes widened. “So now it’s off?”

“It’s not like I have a beacon on me or anything.” I flapped my arms. “And only my brother would have any connection to find me.”

“Yourtwin,you mean?”

“Yes, but we don’t have some supernatural twin psychic connection where he can find me out of thin air. We’re normal twins. Well, he came out normal. I did not.”

“Normal?” Ash huffed. “You think being half Druid and half dark dweller is normal?”

“No. Rook and I are the first of our kind. But at least he isn’t fucked up like me.”

Ash stilled, his brows lowering. “What do you mean?”

“He’s just a regular Druid and a regular dark dweller.”

“You mean he’s not a natural obscurer?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I was the only one who inherited that gene from my mom.”

“Inherited? I thought the mother had to practice black magic during pregnancy for her child to become one. And even that is very rare.”

“Yeah, so we thought.” I rubbed my cheek on my shoulder, feeling prickles behind my eyes. My mother held vast amounts of guilt, though it wasn’t her fault. “My grandmother did black magic when she was pregnant with my mom. It was during the time Queen Aneira was slaughtering Druids by the thousands. My mother didn’t know she carried this power until her twenties. She found out with me it was something that could be passed down.”

“But not to your brother?”

“No. Rook, of course, came out perfect.”

“You keep saying that.” Ash frowned, like he was mad at me for being so hard on myself.

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