Page 48 of Only a Monster

Ruth must have known what Joan was thinking, because she squeezed Joan’s hand. ‘You know it wouldn’t have mattered whether you’d sent that message for help or not. The other families were attacked too. He would have found us wherever we were.’

Joan squeezed Ruth’s hand back. ‘I still wish I’d never sent it,’ she managed.

‘I know,’ Ruth whispered. ‘And I wish I’d been there sooner. When I got there . . . Uncle Gus and Aunt Ada were already dead. Bertie was barely alive. I tried to call an ambulance, but my phone didn’t work. I held his hand.’

Joan swallowed around the lump in her throat. God, Bertie. She couldn’t believe this had happened. Was going to happen.

‘How could those humans have known so much about us?’ Aaron asked. ‘How did they find us?’

‘I don’t know,’ Ruth said.

‘You went looking into the records afterward, though?’ Joan said.

Ruth nodded.

‘Did you learn any more about the attack?’

‘You mean, did I learn any more about him?’ Ruth said.

Him.

Joan swallowed. She’d been trying not to think about Nick directly. Now she felt a flash of anger, followed by pain. It hurt to think about him. She didn’t want to think about him.

A memory came to her anyway. Not of the night itself, but of before that. Of a morning when she and Nick had arrived at work before anybody else. They’d cleaned the Gilt Room together. Joan had dusted the picture frames and Nick had mopped the floor, his shirtsleeves rolled up. The morning sun had been soft and warm. And Joan had thought, If every day were like this, I’d be happy forever.

She heard her breath shudder out. ‘Did you learn anything about him?’

‘I never actually saw him, you know?’ Ruth said. ‘I only heard you talk about him.’ Her mouth twisted, sad and wry. ‘You talked about him so much that summer. I remember I used to tease you about him. God, that was so long ago.’

It had been two days ago for Joan.

‘He doesn’t seem to exist,’ Ruth said now. ‘I know he was working at Holland House because you said so. But there are no employee records of him. I tried to trace him through security footage near the house. He somehow never appears.’

Joan waited for more, but Ruth had stopped. ‘What else?’ she said.

‘You’re the one who knew him, Joan.’ Ruth’s voice was gentle.

‘I didn’t,’ Joan whispered. She remembered how it had felt when they’d met. Like she’d known him her whole life. Like she could trust him with her life. She’d just known. But she’d been wrong. She’d never felt so sure and been so wrong.

Her throat felt tight. Last night, she and Nick had sat together under the window in the Holland House library. Nick had touched her cheek and she’d leaned up to kiss him. When the Olivers had attacked, he’d saved her life. And then he’d stood in front of her and said: If you ever steal time from a human again, I will kill you myself.

‘I haven’t learned anything about him,’ Ruth said. ‘Not his real name, not who his parents are, not how he came to learn about monsters. I don’t know who he is.’

Once upon a time, Joan thought, there was a boy who was born to kill monsters. A hero. ‘Gran used to tell us stories,’ she said. ‘Do you remember?’

‘Joan . . .’ Ruth was already shaking her head.

‘About a human boy who was destined to kill monsters.’

‘Those are just stories,’ Ruth said. ‘They’re just bedtime stories for children.’

Joan looked at Aaron. He was watching her with an expression she couldn’t quite read. ‘That man in the maze,’ she said to him. ‘He had a tattoo.’ She touched the back of her neck. ‘Here, where a monster would see it if they tried to take time. A warning. You didn’t believe that your father was dead until you saw that tattoo. And then you knew.’

Aaron couldn’t seem to take his eyes from hers. ‘It was the hero’s emblem from the stories,’ he said. ‘The wolf.’ Joan felt the hairs on the back of her neck rise. That was in the stories Gran had told her too.

‘The human hero is a mythical figure,’ Ruth said. ‘Like King Arthur. He isn’t real.’

But Joan could see it in her eyes. She was remembering the same sweltering night that Joan had been remembering. Years ago, Joan and Ruth had fallen sick with a fever, and hadn’t been able to sleep. Gran had sat up with them all night and told them a story about the hero—one Joan had never heard before.

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