A/N: It's 8:50 my time on a Wednesday night, and I usually post chapters every other Friday. So, of course this is outside of the normal, and I am sure you might be scratching your head and wondering why.
LoD hit 1k votes!!! YaY!!! Thank you everyone for voting, and an extra chapter is how I'm responding! Yes, there will still be a chapter on Friday. (In case you are curious.)
Updated 4/27/22
2542 words
Sloppy. Sloppy. Sloppy. I blink as I realize that is exactly the same word that repeated thrice in my head the night that Everleigh first came into our lives. For the same reason too, although I still couldn't tell you if it was the mysterious Cambion in question or the way we were handling it that had me thinking this way.
The Cambion didn't just leave behind a victim or two this time. Somehow, the Cambion had left behind a whole club full of victims. What made matters worse was the fact the club in question was Contagion. The same club Taehyung had first spotted Everleigh in.
We watched from the veil as the criminal investigators recorded evidence of the crime scene. Even though the world moves slower from the veil, sound still travels to us at normal speed if we are standing still. Which means we are able to hear for ourselves what the investigators are discussing. I've never understood it completely, but when magic is involved logic and physics are practically thrown out the window.
"This is insane. What do you think the autopsies are going to say?" The female investigator asked.
The large male across the room from her snorts in response. "What else would they say with something this big that seems beyond reason? They'll probably try to use some kind of reasoning that will get conspiracy loons jumping out of the woodwork; like a gas leak or something of that such nature. You know something that's only moderately believable."
The female shakes her head. "I guess I should have known better than to ask you that." I can't help but smirk when she calls him a 'schmuck' underneath her breath.
We have to wait until they leave before we can investigate ourselves since we can't interact with anything from within the veil. It sucks that the bodies have already been bagged and removed from the scene, but those bodies still left a magical imprint. That's what we will be investigating.
I turn to Taehyung. "Go see if you can find anything out from the coroner or medical examiner on duty. If I were to hazard a guess it would look like the victims' hearts just simply gave out, but I would like to be sure about that."
He nods his head and heads off to investigate his new task.
Seokjin frowns. "I almost wish we had gotten here sooner." I don't need Jimin's ability to know that he is a mix of emotions. On one hand, he really does wish we could have been here to stop this from occurring, but on the other end of the spectrum he didn't want to miss out on his extra time with our mate today.
"I don't think we could have stopped this from happening. It pisses me off that this Cambion is always one step ahead of us." I add.
"I'm more bothered by the choice of location." Yoongi adds.
I feel my eyes comically widen, only there is nothing funny about what just occurred to me thanks to Yoongi's insight. "Oh crap! This Cambion leaves a trace behind that's greatly similar to Ever's. They commited a crime like this at the club where we first met her. Did she say she frequented this club?" I honestly don't remember. So much has happened since that first night.
"Even if she hadn't shared that possibility with us, I would say it's a safe bet to guess that she would have simply because of its close proximity." Seokjin responds before his face turns pensive. "Not to get off topic, but do you think we should stop and get some more of her possessions from her apartment? Clothing and what not?"
"Mmh." Yoongi makes an affirmative noise.
I agree with him. I may be the leader, but he's right that's not a bad idea. Besides, there isn't much more we can do here right now except wait. So, I sent Seokjin off to handle gathering more of her stuff together. When it's just myself and Yoongi left behind I turn to him. "What do you think, Yoongi? Is this Cambion trying to pen all this on Everleigh for some reason?"
"Either that, or Everleigh is the target. Like this is a game of cat and mouse, and Everleigh is the mouse."
I don't make a joke about him being the actual cat. After all, this situation is anything but funny. "I wonder how Everleigh even has an enemy. She kept to herself for the past five years."
"I'm more worried about how we are going to keep our mate safe from an unknown enemy. We don't even know their motivation behind something like this." Yoongi adds.
When I admitted to Namjoon that I was worried it was such a minimization of how I really felt. My fucking snow leopard was growling at me, and he most definitely wanted to sink his claws and fangs into someone right now. Anger and anxiousness weren't emotions that I commonly dealt with, but right now they were currently at war with each other. The problem was I had no one but a shadow to blame.
I tasted their magical signature on the wind, but it was weak enough that I knew I wouldn't be able to track it. No matter how hard I tried, there was no way I would find the damn Cambion who was responsible for all this mayhem. I know that Namjoon also realized that this mysterious figure was always two fucking steps ahead of us no matter what we tried to do.
Finally the investigators were starting to move away. We still would have to wait a bit longer before we stepped out of the veil though.
Namjoon and I didn't often talk about how our alters were reacting to things. We didn't tend to have to when we had Jimin in our group, but right now I had to know. "How is your Gryphon taking all of this?"
"Do you mean the Cambion's presence in general? Or do you mean how this Cambion seems to be targeting our mate?" Namjoon liked to attack a subject from all angles. He was very tactical like that, and I feel for a leader that was an important key element.
I snort in response, although it is more about how I defined his questions than what he had to say. "All of the above."
I keep mentally picturing his eagle's feathers getting ruffled at the back of his head, while the lion side would paw at the ground signifying how it wanted to pace back and forth. I'm guessing I am imagining it that way because of how proud his eagle side tends to be. He interrupts my imagination with a further explanation. "Although my eagle is also being pretty fucking chatty right now. It keeps screeching in my head. It's hard to get my alter to understand that I am doing everything in my power."
"Mm. My snow leopard is most definitely pacing and it keeps growling at me and the unseen enemy."
"I didn't want to say anything earlier, but I was shocked to hear you purr when you embraced Everleigh when we were saying goodbye."
I shrug. "I can't fight how content my snow leopard is around her, so why bother trying."
"I think it's just you and Taehyung who haven't had the opportunity to kiss her yet." He isn't saying it to rule the information over my head. He is simply sharing his wise intuitiveness with me.
"I don't know when Taehyung will cave, but I am sure I won't be the last to kiss her." I predict out loud.
"No, Taehyung has a lot of demons to take care of before he lets his guard completely down." Namjoon agrees with me.
I shake my head. "Yes, and they are all his own."
I know it's going to take forever to wait through all the autopsy results. Thus far the coroner and the medical examiner on duty have got done with two bodies. Both of them came back with the same result. Heart failure leading to the possibility of an undetected heart disease. Both of them know however that this isn't the statement they can deliver to the families waiting to hear the news. It's logically impossible for this to be the truth after all when it involves this amount of bodies. I'm not even bothering to count the number of body bags. There are wall to wall metal tables housing them.
I don't really feel like I have to wait on many more bodies to be investigated; I'll probably try to wait through half if not twenty-five percent of them before relaying my current findings to Namjoon. He will insist that I be as thorough as possible, so I will stick around until he relays to me that I have learned enough.
That gives me time to sort through my feelings regarding Everleigh. I don't often let myself get in touch with my feelings, or really let myself feel anything. I definitely can't help the sins that play through my emotions, and apparently I can't control how I feel about our mate. However, I'm more confused and curious about the situation than the others.
As far as I know my kind has never had a mate before. My father's maternal family had lovers. Numerous one time lovers who most of the time were human. But that side of my family had no reason to keep a male child so once my father became a teenager they gifted him to my mother. My mother's side of the family were vicious creatures. There was no reason to have a mate for them. Only discarded men and slaves, like my father, would ever share their bed. However they too had no use for a male child.
So, while I wasn't half human like the others. I was more unwanted than any of them. I had no true home outside of the one I made with my Legion. Like my mother's and father's people I had lovers, but I didn't think I had the capacity to care enough for a lover to ever have a mate.
I know I need to examine the idea of her presence more carefully, before I can actually get to know her. I also know that my actions probably won't go over well in the long run, but I don't know if there is a way to fix that.
Before I head to her apartment I stop at a coffee shop. That latté sounds exceptionally appealing as I grow more and more tired as the night carries on. Of course I can't help but grab a box of cranberry orange muffins while I am there. They were marked down after all. If they don't sell them tonight then they will probably be tossed out.
After that I realize I am probably going to need some bags to gather her things. So instead of immediately heading to her apartment I take a detour to the closest department store. I grabbed both a new set of luggage as well as a roll of garbage bags. I also stopped by the feminine needs department to get her things I thought she might need with her cycle that I know is just around the corner. Well, I got a little bit of everything since I don't know what she uses.
The cashier didn't say anything but the expression on her face was pretty fucking comical with how her eyes bulged out of her head like that. I blushed, but luckily I thought of a clever way to explain my bulk purchases. "I'm donating them to charity." I explained to her, even though it wasn't true.
Her face brightened with a wide smile. "Oh, is it Days for Girls?"
"No, no. Just the local homeless shelter. But, I will keep that name in mind in the future." I promised her before leaving.
When I did finally get to her apartment I made sure to refrain from turning on the overhead lights. The block was pretty empty, but that didn't mean that someone wasn't watching her apartment for activity. I didn't bother going in the traditional way. I used the veil instead. I still chose to go through her door, and I couldn't help but snort at the eviction notice taped to it. I wasn't surprised by it, but it was funny to me because once I removed more of her things tonight there shouldn't really be any reason for her to come back here at all.
I turned on her bathroom light and double checked the closet sized room first, but it appeared she pretty much got everything from it. The only thing she missed was a collection of bath bombs which I made sure to grab. I don't know why she has these when this apartment doesn't have a tub, but at least she has a use for them now.
She wouldn't need her bedding since she has some already. So I didn't bother with her bed at all. I did look underneath though. I grabbed all the shoes that made it there. I also grabbed everything we left behind in her dresser drawers.
There was a small closet by her door that housed a myriad of jackets for each season. So, I made sure to grab the rest that she left behind.
I scratched the back of my neck after I was done. Something felt off. I just couldn't put my finger on what it was.
I chuckled to myself as I watched the Demon Faerie continue to go through the halfbreed's apartment. It was obvious he sensed me watching him when he stopped to scratch his neck. I was right behind him on the top of the building opposite his location after all.
Well originally I was at the scene of the crime, but when I sensed them coming I got the fuck out of there. Rizahlorahn and Azeryhad each plop down on either side of me. "What are you up to now?" Rizah asks.
"Who are you looking at? Azer asks.
"Go away little brothers. I needed you to help me take care of those people at the club. Now I only need you to scram." I hiss at them through my fangs.
They both ignore my threatening posture. Azer, the more nervous of the two, asks me, "You really don't think our father will ever catch wind of this?"
I roll my eyes at him. "I don't think it's our father you need to worry about."
Rizah, my more intelligent twin's eyes widened in alarm. "Oh Hades! What if she somehow catches wind of this?"
"Then our asses are grass and her wraith is the lawnmower." I respond dryly.
They both groan simultaneously at my sarcasm, before reality seems to catch up with them. "You never did tell me why we were doing this?" Rizah asks.
"Hm. Yeah. Why did you need my help to take out all those patrons at that club?" Azer adds.
"As long as you cloaked your magical signatures the way I asked you to, you don't need to worry your horned little heads about it."
A/N: Originally the cashier and donation explanation weren't a part of this chapter at all. My husband pointed out it was a missed opportunity so I took it and flew with it. "Days for Girls" is a real international nonprofit that provides for people throughout the world. (I used this one as an example due to the 'international' aspect.)
Here's the website that I used as a resource for that moment, and it lists other organizations as well if you are interested in learning more.