Page 25 of How to Seduce a Slender

Melody

“Youasleep?”Melodywhisperedfrom her pillow, peeking over at Dahlia still in her bed. A slate gray orb cracked open. Melody chuckled, “Good, me neither.”

“Not much for sleep, huh?” Dahlia replied back in the same hushed tone, like they were afraid to wake up the rest of the house.

“I don’t sleep well, not as long as I can remember. And it’s not like I don’t want to here? This is probably the most comfortable place and I feel so safe, which is new for me.” Melody slithered across the bed to be elbow to elbow with Dahlia. The platinum blond elf smiled over the top of silk pillows.

“I was the same way when I ended up here at Rosemont Manor.” Dahlia exhaled heavily with a dreamy smile on her lips.

“It’s bonkers, right? I mean, I shouldn’t feel safer here but…it’s like…I dunno, the closest thing to home I’ve ever had.” Melody traced her fingers along the gathered bunch in the sheets.Nothing’s felt like home for a long time, if it ever had. Not without him…definitely not without the other half of me. And that’s not just my missing wolf.

“It is Sebastian’s home for lost things,” Dahlia chuckled, shifting to sit up. Melody watched her with confusion as the Lady of the Manor stretched with a massive yawn before comfortably settling her back against the headboard.

“Lost things?” Melody pulled her sluggish body out of the trench she’d made in the mattress.

“All lost things end up here. Everyone here was lost once, and they just made their way here. Maybe that’s why you were running here. With no memories…you were just drawn here.” Dahlia folded her hands in her lap.

Melody stared up at the crimson canopy over her bed.Had she been drawn here? Was it some sort of magical lure?She certainly hadn’t been running anywhere in particular. Melody’s whole goal had just been to get away. Maybe the house did call to her?

The door to the bedroom creaked open as a familiar plague doctor mask poked in. Dahlia smiled, waving him inside. Their sleepy ward watched the Lich whisk away his wife and leave her sitting up in the dark, alone. Melody bemoaned the absence of Dahlia already. She wasn’t going anywhere. Her body was a heavy brick. She was awake out of sheer spite. The only reason she didn’t descend back to sleep was the implication of sleep itself. A nightmare taunted her from the other side. All she had to do was close her eyes.

Melody shook her head, resigned to sit up and bludgeon through the day if she had to…she wasn’t going to sleep. She folded her hands into her lap. Dahlia promised to have breakfast brought to her, but Melody wasn’t able to even lift her head in acknowledgement. Sleep tugged at her bones. Stifling yawn after yawn did nothing. Normally she could get by. There was no taking a day off when one lives paycheck to paycheck. She couldn’t afford to sleep in or take a day of rest. But her regular exhaustion plus being drained of life, she couldn’t blink.Blinking took energy she didn’t have.

Gods she was…just…so…tired.

Melody snapped back, gasping as she realized her body lurched forward. Exhaustion snickered from the walls. Teasing her, toying with her, it could take her at any moment. Then she’d be back there, torn between lives and horrors beyond her comprehension.

“Melody?”

She blinked sluggishly, relief flooding her. Smith crept in through the room with a shot glass of her potion.It’s morning.Her arm extended as if to take it but all it did was distribute the weight in her topsy-turvy body. Melody flopped sideways onto the bed. Smith rushed to her side, setting the shot glass aside.

“I made it to morning,” she breathed as long, leather-clad fingers wrapped around her shoulders. He peeled her off the bed and helped sit her up. Smith propped her up with pillows at her sides and back to keep her upright.It wouldn’t last but the thought was kind.

“Sweet girl, why did you not go back to sleep?” He huffed, cupping her face. Melody, delirious and woozy, floated on a pool noodle inside her own skull, barely bobbing on the surface of the turbulent water. Smith tutted. “You’re pale, clammy, and you might be getting a fever. You need rest.”

“No!” she barked suddenly, falling forward. Her heart slapped against her ribs before flopping back into its home. Smith eased her back against the headboard. “No, please, I’m okay.”

Smith shook his head, “No, you’re not. You’ll need to stay in bed today.”

“Please,” she rasped, her head lulling to the side. A long, drawn-out silence passed between them. Her stomach twisted into painful knots.

“Melody, what is your aversion to sleep?” He cupped her hands in his, laying them comfortably in her lap.

“Please,” she whimpered, shaking her head. “Don’t make me go back.”

“Back where?” He slithered forward till his knee pressed against the headboard. His static softened to a low flicker as he sat beside her. He was rendered practically still.

“I can’t sleep.When I sleep, it justgets worse,” she croaked with an angry throat.

“What happens?” He brushed the pads of his thumbs against her knuckles.

The words flowed from her traitorous lips with a wounded whine. “I can’t sleep.When I sleep, my brain is ripped apart. It’s like I’m here, and there, and everywhere. I keep hearing these screams! These awful screams. All they do is open eyes where they don’t belong and stare at me till I’m crying. I beg all the time, and no one will listen. I see things happen to people I don’t know and then I’m in this place with red gravel road and an orange sky and I’m…I’m… I can’t sleep, Smith. I’m just so tired, but every time I close my eyes, it gets worse.I mean, what’s wrong with me?”

Smith squeezed her hands. “When did this start?”

Melody’s lower lip quivered as her eyes drifted down to the duvet. “Since before I can remember. The day I got this scar is the day I stopped being able to sleep.”

He stiffened. The whole bed vibrated slightly to the point she felt a zap through his gloves. Melody peeked up at him in worry. As her gaze landed on his face, he eased his spark. Smith sighed heavily. “So, you cannot sleep…because these nightmares plague you…but you cannot heal, unless you rest.”

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