Page 4 of Monsters of Midnight

“You don’t have to go far,” Ratchet pointed toward where the sun was setting. “Just go over the ridge and we’ll settle in for the night.”

I glanced down at Bales, wondering if he was in the mood to settle down. He looked like he would go a thousand more miles of his own free will. However, he also looked exhausted. His head hung low, hair askew, eyes bloodshot and weary. Something similar to what I probably looked like. “We’ll meet you by the fire,” I grumbled.

It took us longer to go across the front of the bluff than I had expected. We arrived in the evening dusk, just before it turned pitch black. It wasn’t hard to figure out where they were. This part of the mountain was steep and dark, but the fire burned bright. Fortunately, the witches would have placed wards to hide the fire from any eyes that may happen to be in the vicinity.

I took a deep breath and sighed as we entered the clearing. Cade had dealt us a terrible blow. In many ways, it was my death blow. Taking Caroline from me - the one true thing that made everything else make sense—was a blow I wouldn’t recover from. She had calmed the chaos inside of me. Her gentle presence had allowed me to see and understand the chaos better.

I had never understood the chaos before I met her.

I had lived a long, long time, and I had grown to know myself very well, but what I had not known was the effect one other person could have on me. The second I met Caroline in that café, I had felt it. Our happenstance meeting when I was passing through Boston and she was on a work break going to meet Laney.

I remembered every detail.

She was wearing a forest green sweater, black leggings, and deep green ankle boots with a little fringe on the back. I thought the fringe was really sassy. What was more surprising was that I was thinking about it at all. Since when had I started considering shoe fringe on a mortal woman’s feet?

Since I first met Caroline.

And she hadn’t even spoken yet.

I was drawn to her and caught up in her personality so quickly and so suddenly. It was like we had never been apart from the minute I said hello. I tried making up a reason why I was saying hello but none was needed. Standing in the line at the café, we had caught each other’s eyes, and that had been the end of it. Caroline was mine. She could’ve told me anything about herself, and I wouldn’t have turned away from her.

The coffee had turned into dinner. It had turned into a late night, a long talk about everything and nothing. She was a brilliant woman who understood science in a way I could never imagine. She made me feel like a blunt instrument. She was given not only great beauty, but great intelligence and experience. We had met when she was thirty-eight.

A mere babe.

For those of us who were the Legendi, it wasn’t a very old age, even for witches, who tend to live longer lives using their magic spells. Caroline’s maturity caught me off guard. How she could be present in the moment and kind to everybody and still touch everyone in the room with her amazed me. Her presence alone made a difference.

Now she was gone forever.

It couldn’t be true. There were too many levels of existence. There was no way she could just be gone forever. I was going to deal with Cade. I was going to deal him a hard, swift blow. Once that was done and the monster threat was dealt with, I was going to Undirheim to find her. I didn’t care what it cost me. Demigods could not go to Undirheim without being stripped of their powers, but I didn’t care. She was worth it to me, even if it meant dying on the spot.

The fire was already burning by the time I arrived, and they had all settled down and clearly eaten before I had gotten there. Ratchet was off in the shadows eating flowers with his crazed, bloodshot eyes, and the witches were sipping tea by the remnants of the fire.

“We need a plan,” I called out to Ratchet, waving him over to join us.

“Coming,” he responded, as if we were an old married couple.

Ever since we had been to the frost giants, he hadn’t quite been himself. I wanted to know what it was, but I also just wanted it to not be a problem. I wanted him to be one hundred percent present. I needed him.

Ratchet was required by law to do anything I asked. Though I only ever asked him to help me stop the monsters from attacking earth. I rarely asked him to do anything outside of that. He was his own person, or demon, and didn’t need someone telling him what to do all the time.

Lately he hadn’t been that present, though.

I didn’t like to look in his eye much lately. Ever since we’d been to see the frost giants and he got his hand on the red flowers, they were all he wanted. He’d still shown up for work. He hadn’t missed a beat. There wasn’t a single thing I’d asked him to do that he hadn’t done, but it was always the bare minimum he could get away with. He never took into consideration the extra mile like he would normally take. There was definitely something wrong with Ratchet, and if I hadn’t just lost the love of my life and if I wasn’t facing a crisis of monstrous proportions, I would maybe have a little more time to deal with it.

Right now, all I knew was I needed him at whatever percentage he could show up for me at, whether it was eighty, sixty, or hell, I’d even take forty percent.

I needed all the help I could get as much as he could bring it.

Lady Albright and the witches were drinking up teas and potions. When I sat down by the fire, one of them immediately handed me a glass. I hadn’t seen her before. “Where did you come from?” I asked.

“She’s a distant relative of the Albright clan,” Lady Albright smiled looking up from her drink. “Her name is Katrina.”

“Technically I’m part of the Cougar Creek Coven,” Katrina said, her angular features casting long shadows in the fire light. “I was out here on vacation, and I heard they had a problem, so I came to help out and well here I am.” She shrugged her boney shoulders and smiling at the witches around our small fire, as if this was exactly where you would expect to find her while she was on vacation.

“Your coven is strong.” I remembered how the Cougar Creek Coven had fought off an attack on their cemetery just recently. I’d been called in to help out with a monster they had discovered in a crypt. “We really appreciate any of your help here.”

“You know you can’t bring back the dead,” Katrina peered at me sharply. She looked like a rather strict woman, but I also understood she was to the point and I didn’t mind that in a person.

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