Page 35 of Satanic Shadow
It’s handwritten in English. A language some creatures here are still learning. I frown at it before turning the page to an animal, like a bull. A snake wraps around it, with two broken hearts trapped between its horns.
And handwritten again is,The heir of all the realms will wield the power of darkness until its love returns.Death to her, death to all.
11
Dane Dalton doesn’t know what ChapStick is.
The message that probably took him all day to type stares at me as I sit in the library.
Dane:Where do I find ChapStick and what does it look like?
To annoy him, I’ve so far waited three hours since receiving the text. Instead of going to combat training with the twins for some extra credit with Valin, I came back to the library to read more of this book. Well, read what I can. Basically, none of it makes any sense to me. I’ve even hunted for books to help translate certain words and phrases and symbolic meanings, but it seems it’s a dead language of which there’s absolutely no trace in the history section.
That’s strange. All the other realms have shelves upon shelves of research, yet I have one tattered book that better not give me a rash.
I scratch my arm impulsively and chew my lip.
Surely there must be more? I could ask our history professor, but I fear being trapped in a room with him. He reminds me of Slenderman and, from what I’ve heard, is a cannibal.
The librarian also looks like she wants to eat me, so I don’t bother asking for any assistance, even though she’s been watching me for the past hour.
I sip on my fruit juice while I flip through pages and take notes—mostly scribbles of faces and three-dimensional houses as I try to figure out what the hell certain equations mean.
Eventually, I give up and slam the book shut with a loud thud, pushing it across the table.
I cross my arms and ankles before slouching in the chair. Annoyance and something similar to deflation have me sighing and huffing as I stare at the papers before me.
“There you are! I snuck away from combat class to come sit with you,” Poppy says with a huge grin. It falters when she sees my expression. “Cheer up. It’s Wednesday.”
“Although it’s Friday, there’s nothing good about Wednesdays, Poppy.” Her smile drops completely, and I instantly regret my words. “I mean…” I sigh and lean forward. “In the human world, I used to hate mid-week. It dragged in, and all I wanted to do was go out on a Friday night, get drunk, and dance until my feet fell off.”
The smile thankfully returns, and she’s intrigued. I know for a fact that she’ll fit in so well. She’s mesmerized by everything human.
Sitting across from me, she rests her chin in her palm. “Your feet fell off when you danced?”
I can always count on Poppy to cheer me up. “It’s a figure of speech.”
She giggles. “Humans are so different from us, so I never know what’s serious and what’s not. I know my sister can be moody with it, but can you tell me more about your kind?”
“What do you want to know?”
Her eyes light up, bright and alive. “Everything.”
My plan to message Dane back with some snarky response floats from my mind and takes flight out the window as I go into hours upon hours of details. From being young and playing in the yard, to going to a normal school and experiencing life as a teen. Poppy listens to every word as I tell her about high school, about sneaking out of the house to get drunk with my friends and then sneaking back in. She gasps when I tell her about the game of dares that landed me my first kiss with the school’s bad boy, and that he turned out to be a terrible kisser.
Blushing through each story, Poppy stays with me until it’s dark outside, and she has more than enough to keep her fascination with humans at bay.
She even asks me how she would be able to have a relationship with a human and tells me she wants to have a family one day. Her partner, she explains, is fun, but she can never see a future with him.
She wants happiness and peace and love.
Without thinking, I tell her all three of those exist—an instant thought that makes me question myself. I’ve never once found happiness. As I said, I grew up in the system. Peace is make-believe in my world, and love… I can’t imagine being in love.
But telling my friend that she could have all three puts a huge smile on her face. It has her clapping and laughing and getting excited about graduating.
She has a pure heart.
When Poppy and I finish up, she eyes the large, tattered book. “What’s this?”
