“Okay, the basics,” Eric said as he walked back and forth on the mulch path. “GRAY’s the bad band.” He reiterated. “All werewolves: one girl and four—do you need me to stop again?”
I realized my heart was pounding again. “Sorry, natural reaction to thinking,”
He smiled grimly. “No wonder it’s a new reaction for me,”
I smiled and stared at the ground, swinging my feet lightly on the stone wall.
“Four males,” he continued, getting the hint. “Angeline’s the leader for now but they have a secret weapon and while I’ve only heard rumors that no one will see it coming, I doubt it will be unstoppable. Anyway, Angeline’s very hot-headed. She’s also a harlequin, a drama queen, whatever. The rest are basically her pets even if R is larger than her. Fends follows him a lot. Daniel and Christopher are the strongest. If they were a pack of wolves, they would be the hunters. Extended family of theirs caused the plane crash for a midnight snack,” he said grimly.
Great. What did I expect in the Underworld? Angels and—well, actually, to see angels on Earth was a little disturbing too.
“Wait, why did you have an invitation of theirs?” since we were getting into new material.
Eric rolled his eyes, which was still a little funny. “Angeline wants me to be her king when she takes over.”
Ugh! How was that even fair! I flushed when I realized that I thought I had more of a claim on Eric than she did. It was so inappropriate to be fighting over him as though he were incapable of choosing. I was becoming a boneheaded guy thanks to my guy friends.
“Whatever,” I erased the question in his expression that was on the verge of smugness. “So why can you be in sunlight? You were walking around like nothing. And you—you have a heartbeat! Which is even worse, I hope you know! Appalling, in fact!” my blurting out made me flush but it distracted him.
“Real…” he watched me carefully. “Mes will die in sunlight. It makes them decay.” He turned down. “But I’m only half. I have a heart and it does beat,” he said with a dry attempt at funny haughtiness. “And it makes me less susceptible to the sunlight because I do regenerate unlike other…mes.”
I rolled my eyes, pretending like I didn’t mind the word.
“But I continue to form myself in the same way.” He exhaled loudly. “And I’m also the baby sibling of the Three Souls, if you wanted to know or if you hadn’t already figured.
“We used to have a mentor, the person who started us with a formula to clear the world of unnecessary people. It was right after the Black Plague when he realized that losing fifty percent of the people had transformed world history and it seemed to be going for the better. People believing in God and science and the whole Renaissance. If he could attack certain places in sequence, like—like dancing on the lit squares on those dance machines—that he would make something sort of like a melody, a rebirth, a renewal that could only have one drastic outcome. It took him awhile to find out how and when he gathered us years later, he taught us how to incite wars and plagues and get rid of unnecessary people—or necessary ones. He was our messiah. He made sure that the Underworld had a chance to prosper alongside those normal people.” He retorted.
“But he wasn’t at all tied down. He was wacky and artistic and he was a free spirit. One day, he was just gone and while we were always all over the world, we never found him. Surely, he’s not dead because he was very crafty, but he disappeared just before I met Catherina. Maybe a few years,” he allowed, mumbling to himself.
“Why were you so bitter? It sounded like a cool job; killing people, it’s the old fashion version of video games only it’s more real,”
He bore dully into me. “Bitter?”
“Oh please, you weren’t exactly prancing around through the meadows. You could go out in daylight and you decided to lock yourself up all the time,”
“That wasn’t in the diary,” he squinted.
“Well, you’re bitter,”
“Well, whatever. After Catherina, it’s obvious. Before, I was,” he shrugged. “I got picked on. It sounds stupid to you and sometimes to me but they treated me like a kid. Newsflash, boys want to be men no matter if they’re two or sixty-two,”
“Well that’s stupid,”
He rolled his eyes with a flicker of a smile and turned away. “Impossible,” I heard him murmur. “Anyway,” he turned toward the ground. “I plan to rise to power, since, you know, half-me is actually an advantage nowadays, and I’m going to get back at Kane and Alma who continue to think that Catherina was no big deal,”
Continue? Revenge? What? No! I crumpled my hands into fists behind me. Eric? Alone, facing…them. No! “Is this my fault?”
“Why would it be your fault?”
He probably didn’t mean it as harshly as it came out so I stepped around it before I clung to it later in my despair. “You were getting back to normal when I came along,”
“True that I was beginning to block out Sally, but I would never be able to get rid of her. I was planning to blow up the world in any case,” he laughed at his own morbid humor...or my startled face. “In any case, it’s a good thing you came along. Might have not forgiven myself if I killed her again,” he said sardonically, drifting into thought.
Poor Eric. I wanted to feel sorry for him like I did with Jerry about Adelita but I just didn’t want to.
“Just in case,” he said as I continued to think about it on the way to the house. I turned up to him attentively. “The…things that harm or…eat your kind aren’t allowed to go after any close tasting substitute. We’re supposed to act completely human. It’s our job to protect lives for the coexistence of worlds,”
“That didn’t make me feel any better,”
He stepped in front of me, cupping my face in his gentle hands. “You can get hurt. That’s not the point. I’m paying for my sin with you for not following that rule,”
I didn’t think I wanted to know but because God had a sense of humor, I was abundantly curious. “Why?”
He stepped back, letting me go. “Your blood is strange,”
I didn’t like it when he said that word. It hurt me.
“It’s like cold water in the desert to the senses,”
He was scaring me. My eyes moistened a little. Was that why Margret…?
Her face, her desperation.
Eric was coaxing me again. “I will stay up and take care of you. I’ll watch you more closely,”
I trusted him as though nothing had changed and, of course, nothing had, just the secret hadn’t been released between us.
“People here aren’t exposed to things like you. Desire,” Charming. “Mainly because of the lack of light which more often than not dulls the predatory instincts.”
Well, that was a relief. Now, what to do about my…scent.
It hit me. The day I met Catherine, how Eric avoided me. Oh God. That was horrible! I noticed that now that his secret was out, we couldn’t pretend the other didn’t notice when a human moment happened.
Instead of embarrassment, I felt bad. Could I really live with something like this? I shuddered.
He lightly called me look at him. “I’m glad we live in a cloudy place because I wouldn’t know what to do if I hurt you,”
The flame erupted again with a cataclysmic authority over me. Eric. Eric whose eyes were as clear as raindrops. Beautiful Eric that, even in the night, even in the darkness of the wildest day, was still the center of my universe. Sweet Eric who could do no wrong.
I smiled at him. “Ha, then you’d be alone for another hundred years,”
He groaned. “That’s not funny,”
Of course it wasn’t. I just wanted to avoid the quiet. If I was going to wean myself from him before I began to worship him as some sort of sun god, I had to avoid the quiet but that was what he wanted. And what Eric asked of me, he received.
Couldn’t he just ask me to kick his butt instead? I could live with that but his meaningful eyes made me surrender. He was dead serious about what he said, about what he practically swore.
“Nothing in the world could ever compare to my feelings if anything were to happen to you…I’m not strong like you,”
He moved closer and I blinked at the tears, trying to dissolve them. “I can’t stand to hear that. It’s unhealthy,” he stepped away from me and he walked away calmly.
I turned around and watched him fade.
Of course, Catherina loved him the same way. And she died.
No surprise Eric ride. I made it to school with Uncle John before he rushed off to save the world or whatever he really did while I was at school. Unlike other days, and possibly the day before, the team of super friends wasn’t huddled.
No Eric either. Oh no, was he still upset that I blurted out something atypical of me? The whole promising stupid crap and meaning it with a suicidal passion? Like him? I groaned. Eric needed to be there. I didn’t like it when he wasn’t.
He probably watched me all night because in the morning my school stuff was on the branch. It wasn’t smart of him but he left it there for me to get.
Eric, Eric, Eric. I looked around the courtyard. If I didn’t see him, I would have to go inside. But I wouldn’t stop there. I would run around looking for him. As if he was allowed to skip out on me after such a huge thing.
Ugh. Maybe he was with Dylan and Devin. Maybe there was something wrong. Maybe I was already paranoid.
I walked right into something, hard. I had no idea something stood in the middle of the courtyard. It hit me that it must have been a person. I stumbled back, looking down at the ground. “Sorry, sorry,” God! What was wrong with me? Didn’t everyone else get a sensory device to tell when someone was around them?
“Oh! Sorry,”
I turned up at the beautiful echo. I blinked. He was tall, broad-shouldered; he looked inexplicably small in the uniform, though. He was definitely a larger angel than Eric. His eyes were a deep blue, cartoon like in beauty.
He mirrored my shocked expression which made my cheeks grow warm until I remembered Eugene and how he’d given me the same look. I tried to think of an escape plan.
“Er, sorry, lamb,”
Lamb? Ugh, my curly hair gave it away. Lamb. Ridiculous. As though I could ever find a use for such a terrible animal.
“Yeah, my fault,” I said out of common courtesy but I forced it out in a dull note.
His eyes glittered unexpectedly, like the bay when the sunlight hit it back home and he beamed down at me. “No, it was mine. I should have seen you coming,”
Ugh. I crossed my arms and pouted. “Yes, of course. What a funny joke.” I put my hands on my hips. “Listen, pal, I know I’m not exactly tall but at least I’m normal size,” I shook my head moving around him.
“See you around,”
Hmph. My cheeks warmed up. I rolled my lips into a line but I couldn’t stop it. It somehow amused me to hear that from him. It was like a natural curiosity piece. This one I knew wasn’t dangerous but who even thought anything was dangerous when they were protected by a super guardian?
Then again…he wasn’t around.
But there was the annoying angel, promising things playfully.