Page 6 of How to Seduce a Slender

It had been so long since he thought of her.

“Smith?” A weak, wounded croak filled the air and stole him away from his thoughts. He scurried across the room to the side of the bed. The candle he’d left for her was dwindling faster than expected. He wasn’t sure if it was magic…or merely he’d gone so long without having to use a candle to see, that he didn’t know how long they should last.

Smith knelt before her side of the bed. She was drooping like a wilting flower. Eyes glassy, skin covered in a thin layer of sweat, skin sallow…things didn’t look good.Silly mortals, so easily ruined.His heart ached as he brushed limp tendrils of hair away from her face. No longer the bubbly, witty, chatty waitress he’d longed to see after particularly grueling days.

“Ms. Deathless, please, for me, hang in there. We’re getting you a healer right now. I’d hate for you to change your last name,” he teased softly, tucking the damp hair behind her ear.

A flash of a weakened, toothy grin came his way as she snickered into her pillow.Fangs.He’d never realized the fangs. Then again, he’d never been this close to her face. How breathtaking she was even when deathly ill. But those fangs…they were so cute and tiny, just a hint of the paranormal. His waitress wasn’t human.Oh, what a wonderous discovery.

“As a lawyer…you should know… That’s a fuckton of paperwork,” she wheezed, curling up tighter to cough into the pillow. The covers trembled as she inhaled. Smith couldn’t help. He’d already crossed the boundary of touch. His hands had a mind of their own. He stroked along her back.Over the covers, of course, it would be…silly…of course, to be so intimate with her. Even with the gloves, the idea of breeching her cocoon of fabric felt far too forward.Not like he hadn’t been sitting in her section, faithfully, for several years without failure.

“I do know,” he murmured, the pang in his chest growing.

“Smith?” Her raspy voice barely registered in his ears.

“Please save your energy. The healer will be here soon,” he cooed.

“Thank you,” she murmured against the pillow.

He wasn’t able to ask her what for as the door was ripped open.

A flash of red hair and the scent of peonies passed through the air. Smith was yanked rather cartoonishly away from her by a whipping vine. Deposited on the other side of the door, he never did get a good look at the healer as it was shut behind him. He lingered in a singular spot, watching the door in horror as lights began to flash in slow, steady bursts through the cracks.

“Smith?”

He pivoted around, finally back in control of his body. Dahlia stood next to two rather familiar faces.

“Ah, then I take it the lovely healer inside is our favorite druid, Serias? Yes?” He cleared his throat and finally found the confidence he faked nearly every day.

Aravis Blightwood, the Lord Commander and protector of King’s Fall, largest Fowlst Smith ever met, and possibly the grumpiest face in all of the realm stared at him with a singularly raised brow. Hazel Brown, his other fiancé waved vigorously from his side. She was a bundle of joy as compared to the Lord Commander. Short, plump, brown wavy hair, hazel eyes, wrapped up in long flowy skirts and silk blouses with a belt of potions on her at all times.

Theothernightmare in the realm…but the only Nightmare of King’s Fall.

Only on a technicality as now that Dahlia was an Eldritch God, shetechnicallywasn’t supposed to enter the city.Aravis looked the other way when they went shopping or Dahlia went to visit her friends. It was, however, getting harder to convince the council to do the same.

Hazel answered, “Yeah, sorry for the rough handling.”

“No-no, that’s fine. I was very much in the way anyway.” Smith folded his hands behind his back. “Lord Commander, I assume you wish to speak about what happened.”

“What tipped you off?” Aravis grumbled.

“Your face, it’s rather sour. You only look this way recently when someone has royally ruffled your feathers.” Smith nodded to himself, smirking as Hazel choked on her own snort. Dahlia cackled as she descended back down the stairs.

Aravis wasn’t as pleased. “Funny.”

“Your fiancé seems to think so,” Smith shot back. Aravis’ face crinkled around his nose as his eyes narrowed to slits. Smith put up a singular hand as a white flag. “Let me save you the breath, Lord Blightwood. Unfortunately, there is nothing to tell. Ms. Deathless was attacked and chased through the woods and has no memory of what happened. All I know is she was at work yesterday, as I physically saw her there and spoke with her around one pm in the afternoon. Then, last night, after I left the council building where you saw me, Ms. Deathless passed me in the woods on my way home. She was being chased by a pack of eldritch beasts. She hardly remembered the vast majority of the day, let alone how this all came to be. One of them bit her, but that is all either one of us know.”

Aravis sighed. “Great, just what this city needs…more eldritch horror.”

“Is there any other kind?” Hazel sheepishly grinned up at her large Fowlst. He grimaced in return. Hazel spared Smith a more apologetic smile. “We’ll investigate it. She’s going to need to rest up. Serias can patch her up, but as you know, those kinds of beasts do more than infect. Her lifeforce was likely drained and she’ll have to regain it back.”

Hazel plucked two glowing silver potions from her belt. Smith took them gladly, mesmerized by the glimmering stars within the liquid. They flickered like the ones in the sky as they swirled around in the milky concoction.

“That’ll help. She’ll need a shot glass of that every morning before breakfast anddefinitelybefore coffee. And make sure she drinks water throughout the day. If she gets dehydrated, it can cause damage to her liver and kidneys. As she’s a mortal, like my good self, that’s bad.”

Smith rolled his eyes.Not that she could see.“Yes, I am well aware that mortal creatures need their liver and kidneys.”

Hazel shrugged with a teasing glint of mischief in her eyes. “I’m just making sure. Anywho, I’ll get to brewing a memory potion for her today, but that bad boy takes several days to marinate and it’s not a guarantee. If she lost her memory due to physical means, it’ll definitely come back. But if it’s not benign, it could do absolutely nothing, depending on what kind of magic was used on her. So, keep an eye out for any signs that she’s cursed or hexed.”

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