Page 28 of The Deer and the Dragon
“You’ll go mad,” he said with certainty. From his level chin to the set of his shoulders, I knew the conversation was over. Yet the voice within me told me that if he’d needed to go, he could have. Instead, he said, “And even if I wanted to…” He saw the light in my face and clarified, “Which Idon’t—there’s a bond that happens when one of us takes in a human. It’s a permanent decision on both ends. I don’t want to be responsible for you in this lifetime or the next. If you get into trouble, it would be my fault. Andclearly, Marlow—human woman who’s gotten herself into two near-death situations in a single season—you would get into trouble.”
“Three,” I said.
He arched a half-curious brow before turning his back on me.
“The man in my apartment, the boy tonight, and this basement now. If you don’t get me out of this room, I’ll die down here. It’s locked and no one is coming for me. I can’tcall for help. If you leave me, you can add my blood to your hands.”
He took a step away, but I felt his hesitation. He rotated toward me. I watched the debate in his eyes and hated him for his indifference. I wasn’t sure what he was weighing. What incentive could there possibly be to allow me to starve to death until my bloated corpse was found by a forensics team in the subsequent weeks? I didn’t know this man—this thing—from Adam, but he was my only hope, and he was genuinely considering murdering me through inaction. My eyes narrowed incredulously as I watched him.
“Silas!” I yelled.
“I’m thinking.”
“Aboutwhat?”
I knew I didn’t have room to argue. I couldn’t push him. I couldn’t force him. He was…nonhuman. Even in the cold, unflattering light of the basement, there was a beauty, a handsomeness to him that I rarely, if ever, saw inanyone, even art. His broad shoulders, square jaw, and rippling muscles were astounding on their own, but there was something else about him. An unmistakable glitter fluttered around him whenever he moved, almost as if he were glowing. It was a second light, a cleaner, better light than the one that hummed and flickered ominously overhead. He was in the same white-and-beige leathers I’d seen him in when he’d snatched me from certain death. Even then, he hadn’t done it to save me. He’d been irritated that I’d seen him. I supposed some things didn’t change.
Richard had been marked. Even if I didn’t know what the words meant, I clung to the fact. This mark had brought Silas to my apartment then, and though I had no concept of the specifics, I knew a similar incentive had to have pulled him here now.
“I suppose it wouldn’t hurt for Caliban to owe me two favors,” he said finally, voice thick with reluctance. He sighed, “I guess that means we’re taking the stairs.”
It was unceremonious, but I didn’t care. I bathed in relief,practically dancing as Silas led the way. He rested a hand on the doorknob until it melted into a shimmering constellation of copper and gold. When he moved his hand away, the knob retained its earthly shape, but the door opened noiselessly on its hinges. He stepped onto the top floor of the house and ushered for me to follow.
I’d barely released the anxious breath after cresting the stairs before I dared ask, “And the veil?”
“Not a chance. And please, Marlow.” He paused, resting his weight on my name.
I looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to tell me to stay safe.
“Do us both a favor, and never see me again.”
I shivered on the corner outside of the taped-up house like a wet kitten, rain-drenched and trembling. The night was dry, but every part of me felt dirty, soaked, and terrified. I sat directly beneath the puddle of a streetlamp as if the light might keep away the terrors that lurked in the shadows, and I stared at the sleeping houses, wondering if any of them knew who and what had existed just a few homes away. I couldn’t get warm no matter how tightly I tucked my arms against my chest, hugging myself against the curb and waiting the twenty minutes it took for a driver in the remote neighborhood to find me. I triple-checked the license plate to ensure I was getting into the right vehicle and not crawling in the car with yet another Cheshire cat.
I’d lost the remaining scraps of my mind.
I was in desperate need of the pudding cups and numbing pills of a grippy-sock vacation. It had been nearly a decade since my dad had come home to find me in a snowbank outside of the house next to an empty orange bottle and driven me to the ER. They’d put me on a seventy-two-hour hold, which had leeched into the three-week in-patient stay before they determined that I was no longer a harm to myselfor others. I’d wanted to drift off while looking at the bright, silver burn of the moon and diamond-soaked night sky. It was a memory I’d done my best to bury. While I no longer wanted to end my trips around the sun, I was an inch away from having the driver take me directly to the psychiatric facility to check myself in voluntarily.
The last time I’d been unable to deal with the world, it had been because of my imagination. This time, it was because of my reality.
It had been years since I’d given a rideshare driver a poor rating, but if this loud-mouthed son of a bitch didn’t shut the hell up, he was getting one star. The man with one knee on the wheel and an arm loosely draped over the passenger’s seat couldn’t smell the trauma pouring from me despite my raised hackles, my crunched position, my wild eyes, and my unwillingness to speak. I reeked of confusion and terror, yet he didn’t stop prattling.
The driver’s voice and the deafening dubstep thumbing through his speakers competed for my attention against flashing visions of the night. My nerves were so frayed from my brush with the nightmarish, cat-like child with the vibrantly blue blood. I’d been trapped in a locked basement. I’d walked into the killing room of a man who’d wanted me dead. Agony wrapped its icy talons around my heart and squeezed, forcing the remnants of dread through my veins. Then there had been Silas. Sword. Golden eyes. Shimmer and indifference and power. He’d said so much, and I’d understood none of it, save for one.
He’d told me to ask Caliban to lift the veil.
The veil.
I knew enough from literature, mythology, and fantasy to understand its meaning.
I could see through the human realm into the one filled with Cheshire-cat children and tall, muscular men with short tempers and, hopefully, Caliban.
It was all I wanted to think about, but the rideshare driverremained on his boisterous soapbox voicing his opinions on politics and religion. I was officially resigned to giving him zero stars and refusing to tip when he started referring to women asfemales. I did my best to tune him out while I focused on Silas’s words.
A bond. If he lifted my veil, we’d be bonded.
“And that’s why, I told her, listen: men are hunters. We’re not made for monogamy, we—”
“I’m sorry,” I said curtly. “I’m really tired. I need to sleep. Would you mind turning down the music so I can nap for the rest of the drive?”
