Finished! Next one up is a bfu lighthouse AU novel, so stick around for that.
Follow me @camillabluejay for twitter and @3hauntingsat3pricepoints for Tumblr- I'd love to make new writery friends.
.......
They pulled right up to Buzzfeed's front doors. Adam turned the engine off, and both he and Andrew leaned forward to peer through the windshield up at the dark, dark building. Ryan and Shane slept in the back, Shane's head on Ryan's shoulder.
Shane woke at the lack of sound, comforting static hum of the freeway faded out. He was out of the car the moment he saw the building, and the lack of him woke Ryan in turn.
Shane strode right up to the front doors, the others trailing after him like shadows, and the veins untangled from the glass to welcome them home. And the veins kept curling away, drawing back, parting like blossoming tendrils with Shane's every step. Everett might not be in him any longer, but Shane's body was marked the prophet of the mountain all the same- and when Shane strode down the hallway with his hands clenched into fists, the veins obeyed.
Shane was the epicenter of a wave retreating, and as the vines drew away, they left bodies in their wake, rows of them, standing upright against the walls as the darkness ripped from their frames. Bodies, wavering upright for a bare second, and then collapsing one by one to the floor like dominos, deathly still. Keith. Daysha. Evan. One by one, the veins unmasked them.
Andrew and Adam started to go to them, but Shane stopped them with a warning; stay with him. They would be none the worse for the wear, soon enough.
For now, they marched.
Shane cleared the floor by will alone, and they curved up the staircase for the rest, the veins thrashing and twitching in anger, condensing and coalescing until they reached the door to the altar room.
Shane took a breath. The circles under his eyes were dark, drawn long like shadows just before sundown. He pushed open the door.
The god shifted, small faceless void forming the body of their intern, gathering its veins to itself- a dark, thrashing bundle around the slim frame of a girl too young.
"You disappoint me, Shane." Said the god with the intern's mouth.
"I know," said Shane, "I disappoint me, too."
He shrugged, stepping forward to the altar his hands had made. The veins stiffened.
"I can give you so many things," it said.
"Give me her."
The room was silent, the only sound a soft, restless slither as the veins drew back into the void. The intern collapsed into Shane's arms; he passes her to Ryan. His eyes don't leave the god.
"You have one other."
The god grew Steven's face with a nod, but this time when it spoke, it was sharp and simmering. Warning.
"You gave him to me."
Adam and Andrew were matching shades of horrified. Shane pursed his lips, something haunted flitting across his face, and Ryan laid a hand between his shoulderblades to steady him.
"I can give you anything, Shane." The whisper came in Steven's voice, now. "Name your price. Love. Sex. Money. Fame."
Shane reached out to cup Steven's cheek. He looked back to Ryan, just a momentary glance as tendrils curled lovingly over his fingers.
"I have everything I want." Shane said softly.
His hand lifted to cover Steven's eyes instead, and the vines thrashed. Steven howled sharp, inhuman, and everyone covered their ears but Shane.
YOU ARE READING
Host of Sheets (shyan)
Paranormal"I'd say like... 30 percent of my thoughts are ones I recognize?" Shane said after careful consideration, idly tapping his lower lip. "I still care about you, my job, my parents... but I also seem to be caring about a lot of other things I never use...
