Page 41 of Skalterra By Nightmare
“Wren Warrender!” A voice, deep, desperate and, for once, welcome, boomed over the clamor behind me. “I release you from my service!”
And the rotsbane disappeared.
The summer heat of my bedroom was too warm and too disorienting after being inside the rotsbane’s mouth. I stumbled out of bed, sweating profusely, and staggered to my window. A single moon hung over the quiet harbor.
I was still in my hoodie from earlier in the day, and Riley’s missing flyer from the first marina crinkled in the front pocket. I pulled it out, trying to orient myself, trying to remember where I was and how I’d gotten here.
Had I died? Ferrin had said the rotsbane would kill me for real if it ate me. I flicked my bedroom lights on, much to Jonquil’s ire, but I ignored the cat as I inspected my palm.
There were still only two slashes through the “T”. I still had three lives left.
Then that must’ve been Galahad’s voice there at the dream’s end, releasing me from my Nightmare form to avoid being devoured.
I shoved the flyer into my nearby backpack and pulled the hoodie off, still breathing hard, still mentally replaying the rotsbane unhinging its humanoid jaw as it descended on me.
Taking the hoodie off wasn’t enough. I needed air. Or water. Or anything.
I slipped into the apartment hall, passing the stairwell that led to the shop and tip-toeing to the tiny kitchen and living room.
The full moon lit the space through the open curtains, and I kept the lights off as I fumbled for a drinking glass in the kitchen cupboards. A row of ceramic chickens, painted all different colors, stared at me from the windowsill, and I stared back as I filled my cup at the sink. Jonquil must’ve been on the counters again, because one of them had a crack along its wing.
“What’s happening?” a groggy voice asked behind me.
I jumped, and my cup fell from my hand, shattering in the sink.
“What the hell?!” I spun around, ignoring the broken glass, to see a shape pushing itself into a sitting position on Gams’s old couch. The moonlight tinged Liam’s dirty-blond hair, and his mouth drew downwards in a confused frown. “What are you doing here?”
He extricated himself from the sagging cushions with a groan, and tried to stretch out a kink in his neck by pushing on his chin.
“Trying to sleep,” he mumbled. “Unsuccessfully. Maybe you have some pointers for me. Not only do you drop dead asleep without warning, but you’re impossible to wake up.”
I groaned and leaned against the counter, running a hand over my face. I’d fallen asleep in Sabrina’s car but had woken up in my own bed. Gams definitely wasn’t strong enough to carry me up the rickety flight of steps to our apartment.
“You…” I pointed at Liam, and he blushed in the moonlight. “Because I was…”
“Asleep.” He nodded in confirmation. “I should thank you. It was a real ego-boost learning I could carry an entire person up a flight of stairs.”
My cheeks warmed, and I turned around so he wouldn’t see the heat rising in my face. I tried to busy myself with pulling the chunks of broken glass from the sink, but he came up behind me.
“Let me.” He pulled an empty cup down from the cupboard and filled it before handing it to me. I stepped to the side, drinking the water, as he cleaned the glass from the sink.
I watched him work for a moment, letting the cool water calm the last of my nerves after my encounter with the rotsbane. I finally spoke as he rinsed the sink out.
“Why are you so nice to me? Did Gams put you up to it?”
He laughed softly, throwing away the last of the larger glass chunks.
“What if she did?”
“It would make sense.”
His brown eyes looked black in the dim light as he turned to study me in the dark.
“Why’s that?”
“She thinks I can’t make friends.”
“You told me you had friends, but they sucked.”
