Page 181 of Lost in the Dark

His light blue eyes narrow at me. Curiosity and suspicion, both emotions are plain in his gaze, though far more the former than the latter. But also… concern. That surprises me and I stiffen further as his gaze traces over the bared ruin of my face that I had gradually forgotten about while in Naomi’s company.

“I heard that you were captured within the Fire Realms and defeated in attempt to reclaim your charge. All have assumed that you returned to the shadow, celebrating your memory for your sacrifice toward your duty. Many seek to emulate you and will be glad to hear of your survival. How is it that you are still alive?”

Theycelebrateit? Disgust pitches within my belly. My upper lip curls in response, and I see the flicker of distaste on his face at the way the scars pull in a terrible snarl.

“There is nothing to celebrate,” I snap, startling the male, his wings jerking up around him as I take another deliberate step closer to him, my wings expanding around me to block out as much view of the house behind me as possible. “I was justly defeated. I did not merely attempt to regain my charge but attempted to secure her for myself by any means—even after being aware of her developing bond to the fire king. Duty had nothing to do with my desire, nor the cruelty I implemented in pursuit of it. Yet I survived because it was bytheirwill, and I escaped for the same reason, I now realize, once they had been satisfied by my suffering. They showed mercy where I was merciless. Do not laud that.”

Nemonios stares at me, taken aback by my words, yet something akin to understanding colors his expression. “Many of our kind would not see it that way. They would see it as your right.”

“As did I, but I was wrong. We are wrong. Yes, we have a responsibility to see them to the next world, but there is also a line that ought not to be crossed, that we have no permission nor authorization to overrule in the realms of others. The witch was off limits once she was accepted into the fire king’s keep after the request days expired. Thirty days is all we have been given to court them, and that is all we are allowed. Our only right is the chance. There is nothing laudable of my actions.”

His lips press together, but after a moment he nods, and I see the corner of his mouth inch up in a relieved smile. “Finally,” he breathes. “Finally, someone else gets it. That these witches are not just a commodity of potential mates provided to us by the gods but are feeling beings with their own rights and freedoms. They call me soft for my respect toward them, butfinallysomeone else sees what I do.”

He pauses and gives me an incredulous look. “I never thought it would be you, Gralius. Of all our brethren, you seemed to adhere the strongest to our traditions with an eagerness that never seemed right. That you descended upon the path that you did does not surprise me… That you have changed… does. You have become so much more than you were, and our kin should see it and hear of it from you themselves.” He shakes his head in wonder. “You should return home, Gralius.”

“I am not yet ready to return,” I admit, shuffling back, uncomfortable with his words. My wings fan behind me in an expression of my disconcertment, and I direct a curious look at him, an unpleasant feeling clawing its way through me. “Why are you here, Nemonios?”

He nods to the house. “I felt the call of the witch. It is faint and not mine, but with its persistence and the completion of my other duties, I felt it wise to answer.”

I growl, my wings snapping out protectively. “Do not! She is in a delicate state, and I will not have you approach when I barely manage to help her control her fear.”

He raises his brows but then lifts his hands in front of him in a gesture of peace. “I will not interfere, but you must do something soon. It has been too long. You know the risk, Gralius,” he reminds me, not unkindly.

I incline my head to acknowledge his words. It is something I am concerned about as well. “I know,” I rasp.

Something desperately needs to shift, and as much as I hate even thinking of it, I wonder if leaving her to face a taste of what is to come should she remain might be the most expedient. I could remain on hand to fetch her if things get too out of hand, but she is so firmly stuck in her own mind that I see little other recourse. Maybe then things will proceed to where her mind will be open to accept the reality of her situation—that she would believe me when I attempt to address the truth of her situation. That she will truly see that which she is so intently ignoring with the illusions she has set up all around her to protect her mind. Illusions that I know I am unable pierce.

Were I my old self, I might have ensnared her in my embrace and carried her out of there, shattering her illusions violently no matter the terror and confusion she might have felt at the experience to see to the completion of my duty. My old self would not have cared about the trauma that she would suffer and have to recover from. My old self was monstrous. I recognize that now, even when I had a pleasant face to present to the witches I encountered to lure them in. I despise who I was before and am no longer that demon anymore. I cannot bear to even consider harming her and violating her freedom in such a way.

It seems that Nemonios will not be the only one considered “soft-spirited” among our kind, and recognizing that does not fill me with any of the distaste that it would have before.

Nemonios gives me a contemplative look, but any response he might have given is interrupted by a shrill hiss from the tree beside him. His eyes turn up, and I follow his gaze to the familiar hanging in the tree above him, staring down at him unwelcomingly. His lips curve in a wry smile as he looks over at me. “As it seems that my presence is neither welcome nor necessary, I will not keep you any longer.”

Lifting his mask, he gives me one last fleeting smile before securing it to his face once more before turning away, his wings fanning out briefly before he disappears altogether into the night. Wilox—as I recall Naomi addressing him during one of his more active moments during our movie marathon—chirps down at me from his roost, his wings stretching languidly.

“Ridiculous creature,” I chide somewhat fondly, unable to help feeling some warmth toward the familiar for his timely interruption that ended the uncomfortable encounter.

The bat snickers at me as he fans his wings before dropping from the tree to take to the sky with dramatic swoops of his wings. I lose sight of him just over the roof, but I suspect that whatever the familiar is doing, he won’t be far, his attention trained almost devotedly on his witch.

I cannot blame him because I can think of little else myself. It is for this reason I soon find myself returning inside. I barely pause in the living room, making my way instead to her bedroom. Though I don’t enter, unwilling to completely invade her privacy uninvited, I stand at the open doorway, some inner part of me finding peace at the sight of her in her restful repose.

She has been asleep for some hours yet without the intrusion of a dream, but I can feel it coming as the energies that collide with her own energetic part warp around us, fracturing and rippling with every micro collision. Brittle bursts of light crackle at the edges of the darkness as the more sinister energy of death fills the space. In response, I watch as her chest begins to move with her increasingly rapid breaths and can feel the tug of her spirit shifting into the dreamscape.

For one such as myself, the shift between her world into the dream world is a minor displacement of energies, and yet the sinister power of death and decay that breaks free with the shift of her awareness slams into me with seeking barbs designed to rip apart those vulnerable energies attached to the meleth, the corporeal world inhabited by humans.

As the room tilts and the bed slides across the room, I watch as Naomi’s eyes fly open and instinctively find me. For a moment, it appears that she is terrified of me as she once was, and I feel the very core of me wilt and die as I try to decide whether my presence is making the entire experience worse for her. At the same time, I am conflicted with my decision, wanting desperately to spare her this even if it means she will face worse in the future. My presence here is clearly more of a hindrance than an aid. Perhaps I should have stayed away and allowed her to confront this on her own terms.

I consider turning away, though the decision digs into my heart like a knife, but stop, unable to leave. Not when I see her hands reach out for me and hear her desperate cry as the floorboards shatter upward around her bed like a lethal cage. All around her, the barbed whips writhe, fragmenting and cutting through more of our surroundings in her dreamscape, altering and warping every inch of the space in the process so that everything that was once familiar is shattered around her in a floating tapestry of destruction. Wilox crashes through, his wings fluttering as he attempts to navigate the floating debris and tears the energetic fabric of the world around us, the shadows of the veil between worlds bleeding through.

And with it, the predators that feed off the energies of decay, the first and foremost among those that appear the gathalat wyrms. This is the first time that I have seen them approach her, their presence marking the decline of the process. Their shrill hissing fills the air as they twist at the edges of the tears, attempting to work their way through to feed. Each circular mouth full of rows of needle teeth opens wide as the jaws spread out like vast vacuums, and they feed upon what they can reach of the surrounding destruction.

“Gralius!”

Her cry rips through me, clawing through my resolve to remain away. My wings snap open, spreading wide, and I streak forward for her. No doubt I appear very much like a looming monster or phantom, but the welcome and relief on her face as she strains for me as Wilox flaps down to fend another barbed whip away from her, chases away my doubts as I reach for her in turn and swoop her up into my arms, breaking us free of the energetic weave of the meleth to rise into the upper level of her world that humans have taken to calling the astral.

Though the darkness boils below us, the lavender-hued grass I drop her in smells sweet and potent as the herb itself when it is crushed beneath us. Just ahead is the rocky cliff with deep violet stones that we climbed, and Naomi disentangles herself from my grasp to wander haltingly close to the edge. She says nothing, her face shuttered, as she peers down over it.

I am silent as I join her, giving her space to process what she is seeing. The barbed whips twists like a violent sea beneath us, a reminder that she cannot escape what they will bring. I glance over at her solemn face, and her eyes rise to meet mine before they turn to drift over our surroundings. I instinctively brought her to the most beautiful place I could think of, and Naomi responds just as I hope she would, her expression relaxing by increments as she looks upon the meadow.

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