Dark One- The Khiara Banning Series Book 1

Twenty eight

I have an aunt on her side, but I've only met her once and she wasn't very nice and her son – my cousin – was a little brat who tried to cut off my ponytail.

These people, Cael, Vicky, Lisa, Liam, Sam, Samael, Tristan, and even Jack, have become part of my family too, in such a short period of time. I don't know that I will ever want to meet my blood relatives, the ones who gave me up and damned me to be cursed. They aren't my family. They lost that privilege when they gave me up.

But right now, at this crowded dinner table, with Humans, Angels, Nephilim, a Nymph and the child of two Fallen Angels – a member of the Rephaim race – I have never felt more like part of a big, important, and loving family. 

~*~

Mirrors. They're everywhere I turn.

 I keep walking down this long hallway, but never get to the end...is there an end to this hallway? Everything seems suspended in blackness, this thick black shadowey stuff that encases the entirety of the hall. It feels like I assume space would look like without the light of the stars. I know that there is a floor, kind of, beneath my feet, only because I haven't fallen into an abyss yet and because the mirrors must be resting on something. I assume that there are walls on either side of me, holding up the mirrors, but I can't see them. It's just me and the mirrors in this strange darkness.

 There is no voice this time.

 Usually there's a voice telling me to choose something, or I end up in front of this man made of shadows and I am not aware that I'm dreaming. But I know that this is a dream. I don't remember going to be, though...I remember sitting on the couch watching infomercials with Cael, laughing like we always do. And now I'm here. But logically I have to be dreaming

 I just can't get out of it.

 Vaguely, I can hear somebody speaking to me, but I don't understand the words. It sounds like a strange humming. I keep walking down the hall, trying to find a way out.

 Time doesn't feel like it's passing as it should. I feel like I've been here for days, but logically it's only been minutes, or maybe an hour...I don't exactly know how long dreams last.

 And then, suddenly I'm in front of an old, cracked mirror, and...wait, is that Cael? Why is he banging on the mirror? Doesn't he know that it's going to shatter? What if...can I talk to him somehow?

 The mirror's reflection only shows him standing there in darkness, illuminated as if there is only a small light overhead, banging on the mirror and soundlessly yelling.

 "Cael," I whisper, trying the idea out while reaching out and placing my palm flat against the mirror.

 "Khiara?" he stops banging and his reflection ripples under my hand like a pool of water for a moment, fading in and out of view.

 "You took the keys, and I didn't know what to do so I just followed you to the car but I couldn't let you drive, obviously...what's going on?" he questions, his eyes searching my own.

 "What do you mean I 'took the keys'?"

 "I mean you took the keys from my pants. They were on the floor. You just got out of the bed, grabbed my pants and-"

I cut him off. "Wait, what? I don't remember going to bed."

He looks conflicted for a moment and says hoarsely, "What do you remember?"

"Watching old Billy Mays infomercials and laughing."

He frowns, and then swears. "Fuck," he says. "If I'd have known..."