Shadow People (The Forbidden Darkness Chronicles, #2)

Nineteen: Heather Hawkins

"I still don't think we should believe this," Kristen said. She was sitting at the kitchen table across from me, and brushed the black streak in her blonde hair out of her face. "Something about this just feels odd to me."

"It feels weird to me, too. But what other choice do we have?" I said. I looked at Philip, who sat beside me. "Don't you think this explains a lot? Hayden is a Nephilim. We know that we can trust him. And if it's true he's a Nephilim, that means there has to be such thing as Angels."

"Plus, if there's Angels in Paradise, who are we to say there's no such thing as Demons in Hell?" Lena asked from her spot. "It makes sense. But how have we gone our whole lives not knowing this stuff?"

The answer was simple—despite being Monster Hunters, we were still considered human. The only thing different about us was that we had Monster in our DNA. That was the hardest part about all of this. If what Kadin and Frostbite said was true, we were products of creatures from Hell. I was not okay with that.

Mom stood over at the sink, washing the breakfast dishes. I could tell she was taking this the hardest. Because she wasn't my birth Mom, she was human. All of this was new to her. She knew I was a Monster Hunter my whole life, but she never could have seen this coming. My heart hurt for her. I could see the fear in her eyes when she looked at us. That made my heart hurt for me, too.

"Do we think this could be a misunderstanding at all?" Kristen asked.

Philip shook his head. "No. Heather's right. The logic all adds up. Haven't we always mentioned how strange it is that The Council didn't know where we came from? We've spent years trying to figure it out. In the handbook, Ronald Johnson even proposed the idea. But the fact that we came from Demons? That's a little much, but it works."

"Not Demons. Monsters," I said. "Kadin said they are two different things. Somehow, Monster blood mutated us."

"Then why don't we look like them?" Lena asked.

"I have no idea," I said. "All I know is that if this is true—that humans and Monsters managed to get into it one day and our blood mixed—it could explain a lot."

"I don't buy it," Philip said.

"Why's that?" Lena asked.

"Isn't it too convenient that the story is told the way that it was? Humans couldn't see Monsters. And one day, a human just happened to have a knife on him when he get attacked and got our blood mixed up? The story sounds like bullshit to me."

My Mom glared at Philip.

"Sorry," he said softly, putting his head down.

Philip did have a point. In fact, I made a mental note to ask Kadin at some point where this story originated from. Something wasn't adding up, but I wasn't sure what. Maybe it was the science behind it that was off, but with otherworldly creatures, did science even apply?

Frostbite and Hayden entered the kitchen together, and both of them took their seats together. I couldn't help but notice Hayden stare at Frostbite. I also couldn't help but notice that Frostbite actually looked human right now. Must have been a Djinn thing.

"Hayden asked me about the Djinn," Frostbite said. "I figured you all were curious about it, so feel free to ask me any questions you have about us."

I already knew the first thing I wanted to ask. "Do you grant wishes?"

The Djinn laughed. "No. Gotta love Western culture sometimes. They really manage to get things twisted. We do not grant wishes, but the bottle thing is true. We are capable of living in bottles, but we prefer not to. The Between is so much better."