Slow Dancing In a Burning Room
Blaine had been right. When I awoke, it was still dark outside, but the clock told me it was a quarter after five. Almost sunrise. The world was no longer spinning, and my head felt okay for the most part. Only a dull ache rested behind my eyes. The fire inside the hearth had died hours ago, leaving the crisp winter air to bite at my skin as I tugged off the blankets. My ears strained to hear something in the silence, but alas the house remained quiet with the exception of the soft ticking from the grandfather clock.
Without the glow of the fireplace, I found the room still bathed in a warm orange light. I craned my head behind me, expecting to see some kind of nightlight. Instead, I beheld the strange pinkish-orange rock placed on the corner table I’d noticed during my investigation of the house. It appeared translucent, like fogged crystal, as a glowing light rested in the center of its base. Up close it looked less like a crystal and more like a giant piece of orange rock candy.
A Himalayan salt lamp. I’d never seen one in person, but I remembered my aunt talking about wanting to get one. They supposedly helped balance positive and negative ions, which in turn improved energy levels. I wasn’t sure if any of that was true, but I had to admit, it certainly looked interesting, almost magical.
Something stirred in the opposite side of the room. I snapped upright, straining to see in the limited light. A dark silhouette filled the corner chair with a crown of blonde hair catching my eye. Blaine. I hadn’t noticed him when I awoke, his figure unmoving in the dark leather chair as his feet rested up on the matching cushioned ottoman.
His head was propped up on his bent arm, his cheek resting on a closed fist. I inched closer, waiting for him to move or say something, but he remained still. It wasn’t until I was a few feet away that I realized he was asleep. It seemed odd, really. I mean, even Mages required sleep, but I would never imagine seeing him like this.
So peaceful.
So vulnerable.
Without those startling pale eyes boring into me, the smooth planes of his face made him appear almost…lovely. Sleep stripped us all of our masks, and in this light, he was beautiful. Delicate. Beautifully broken. I’d seen glimpses of his kindness, of his affection, felt it the very first time he’d kissed me. But everything else I witnessed, everything he put me through, it painted a much uglier portrait.
Why did you do it?
That question had haunted me these past months. Whether I had been singled out because of my bloodline or even just by happenstance, I still couldn’t figure out why Blaine had gone about all of this the way he had. If he wanted me to become his ‘mate,’ then why had he killed me the night of the bonfire?
Blaine wasn’t impulsive. Everything he did was calculated, mapped out ten steps in advance. When he had tracked me down, he could just as easily have shown up on my aunt’s front porch one morning, taken me hostage, and simply bided his time till the hex kicked in. Instead, he bought the house next door. Why? Because he knew I couldn’t run away from him, not again. It allowed him to meddle in my life, allowed him to keep a watchful eye on me, all without having to put in the added effort. So why hadn’t he tried to seduce me before choosing to kill and resurrect me?
I liked him the moment we first met, and Blaine knew that. But we hadn’t even gone out on an actual date yet. All he had to do was wait for things to progress on their own. With him being nothing more than a relative stranger, Blaine would have known I’d be afraid of him, of the Crown Prince of Hell. So why? Why expose me to this world, to this madness, without any assurance that I would succumb to him? Using some hex to brainwash me seemed like it should have been a last resort, not Plan A.
Was that all he wanted from me? To be a witless, indoctrinated servant?
He stirred for a moment, and I leapt back, nearly knocking over a floor lamp in the process as I bumped into it. Catching it before it toppled over, I stole a look back at him, seeing him still fast asleep. And in his hands rested the same old leather-bound book he had been reading in the library.
The new perspective gave me a clear view of Blaine’s right forearm. My eyes widened. The buttons lining the cuffs of his sleeves were undone, exposing the inside of his arm. Curiosity got the better of me as I knelt down to get a better look. A long ghastly line maimed his otherwise perfect skin, so extensive that it continued on well beneath the remaining fabric of his sleeve. Why had I not noticed this before?
***
I was a hot mess. With all the smeared mascara and smudged eye shadow around my eyes, I looked as if I took make-up tips from the Joker. I didn’t have my purse, so I couldn’t even attempt to clean it up, leaving me with no choice but to just wash my face when I ducked into the bathroom. All I needed was to look presentable. I wasn’t sure if Jenna was awake yet, and I didn’t want to risk waltzing in the house at dawn, looking like the poster girl for the Walk of Shame. I still didn’t know how to explain my absence last night or what had happened with Blaine in my bedroom yesterday morning. If things didn’t return to normal, and soon, I suspected my aunt’s goodwill would run out as well.
I needed to get the hell out of here.
Bolting from the bathroom, I went to close the door behind me. It wasn’t until I grabbed the handle that I noticed the vibration dancing up my arm, and by then, it was too late. I’d ripped the doorknob right out of the wood.
Seriously?
I’d managed to go a whole month without one of these mishaps.
My emotions were all over the place, and my runes couldn’t seem to decide what to do with them. I wanted to cry, I wanted to scream, I wanted to punch something in… Every last sentiment had my arm illuminated like a kaleidoscope lightshow.
I prepared to slam the stupid handle on the counter as I cut through the kitchen to the side entrance, but decided against it. Without my emotions in check, I’d probably end up smashing my fist through the marble countertop. I turned the corner to find Blaine leaning against the table, eyeing the colonial handle still wielded in my grasp.
“Sorry,” I murmured, attempting to set down the device as gently as I could.
He smiled, pressing back a laugh. “It takes some getting used to. Our power, I mean.”
Power?
I scoffed. “It’s a curse.”
Of all things, he glared at me. “It’s a gift. You’d see that if you’d open yourself up to its potential.”
I wanted to laugh. It was the only thing I could think to do to fend off the tears building behind my eyes. I threw the handle to the floor, letting my unruly magic obliterate the porcelain into tiny pieces across the hardwood. “You call that potential?” I snapped. “How about me nearly tearing Reese’s neck out? Is that your idea of a fucking ‘gift’?”
“Is that what happened yesterday?” His face, his tone, everything was so extraordinarily detached.
I wasn’t sure why I had expected more. It wasn’t like I was anticipating an apology, but maybe, just maybe…a little remorse? A glimmer of regret, perhaps? But there was nothing. Nothing except a hint of mild curiosity.
“Why are you here?” I growled.
His shoulders stiffened. “You know why—”
“No, I don’t. You don’t give a shit about me. I’m nothing more than a plaything to you, so cut the bullshit and just tell me what you want! Tell me what you want, so I can get you out of my life.”
“Well, that’s unfortunate—for you,” he mused. “Because I’m not going anywhere.”
“What did I do to deserve this? Huh?” I slammed my hands into his chest, knocking him back with enough momentum that it thrust the entire kitchen table behind him across the hardwood as well. “Why are you torturing me?”
I couldn’t stop it, couldn’t stop the tears from pouring down my cheeks as I sobbed. “I cared about you. I cried over you when I thought you were dead. I cried at your goddamn funeral!”
He flinched.
“And you were there all along, alive and well,” I bawled. “You let me believe for weeks that I was responsible! You let me torture myself, thinking that I had inadvertently killed you!”
“I never meant to hurt you—”
“Bullshit!” Those icy eyes sharpened, and the quiet rage behind them should have made me recoil, but fury had taken me over. “I never did anything to ever hurt you, or anybody else, and you do this to me?” My fingers furiously dug into the ink on my arm until I nearly drew blood.
“Stop!” He snatched me by the wrist, prying my hand away. A metallic scent engulfed me as his voice fell ragged. “Don’t do that.”
Pain. That was…pain in his eyes.
His voice was nearly a whisper as he said, “You have no idea what I’ve done to protect you.”
That strange essence living beneath my skin—that essence buried deep into my bones, into my core—it tugged inside my chest. A silent plea. A plea to make me stop, to not say what was resting on the tip of my tongue.
“I don’t care,” I bit back, merciless, as I ripped my hand free from him. “Your own mother didn’t even cry at your funeral. It doesn’t matter how many of my dreams you invade, or how many hexes you put on me. I don’t ever want you to touch me. You will never find me in your bed. And I will never be yours. All you are is a pretty face with a black heart. No one could ever love you.”
Words were a funny thing. They couldn’t be taken back, and their damage festered longer than any physical wound. I could have literally stabbed him in the chest, and it would have hurt less.
He did feel pain. True pain.
His jaw was set, forcing his features into neutrality, but he couldn’t hide the anguish in his eyes, couldn’t hide the fact that he wasn’t breathing.
After everything he’d put me through, I had every right in the world to be cruel. But looking at him in that moment, I felt as monstrous as how Reese looked at me yesterday.
Without another word, I turned and headed out the side entrance. It took four steps to reach my aunt’s house. I froze as I reached for the doorknob, but not because I was afraid of tearing it off. It was from what had caught my attention. How could that be? Blaine had driven me back last night in his car, yet my little red Civic was parked out by the curb. I started making my way towards the front yard when another vehicle caught my attention. I hurled myself against the side of the house, praying he hadn’t seen me.
Reese.
I did the only thing I could think of.
I ran.
Darting inside the house, I cringed as the floorboards creaked overhead. Yep, my aunt was up, alright. And I was totally busted.
But the floorboards kept squeaking, in the exact same place. Rhythmically. Right around where I’d estimate Jenna’s bed to be positioned in her room.
Can you say awkward?
I still tiptoed up the steps, but even as a loose floorboard creaked beneath my feet, no one seemed the least bit interested enough to investigate. Especially as what I could only assume was the headboard pounding against the wall. At least someone’s love life was faring better than mine.
I took a quick shower and changed my clothes, clinging to the hope that Reese wouldn’t still be waiting outside when I finished up in the bathroom. Since I hadn’t taken my phone when I ran off yesterday, all his texts and phone calls went unanswered. Why was he still here?
I already knew the answer, but I didn’t want it to be true. I didn’t want to face him.
My inner coward pleaded with me to sneak out the side door again, run to the car, and burn rubber as I floored it out of there. Yet, I opened the front door, finding Reese slouched on the porch swing. His clothes were rumpled, and his hair was equally disheveled. He still donned the same outfit as yesterday.
Had he stayed here the whole night? Had he seen Blaine carry me inside his house?
The moment I stepped out on the porch, his amber eyes met mine as he sat upright, smoothing a hand over his hair as if to make himself more presentable.
“Hey.” He rose up from the swing and made his way over to me, but I quickly countered it with clumsy backward steps.
“Please, don’t….” I barely managed to mutter, desperate to keep what little space was left between us. I couldn’t bear to see him afraid of me again, but I also didn’t want him to pretend everything was okay either.
He stopped, noting the unmistakable panic in my eyes, and I at last breathed a sigh of relief, convinced he’d stay away. But before I knew it, he advanced on me, so fast I barely detected the movement until his hands suddenly cradled my neck. His lips crashed against mine, and I staggered back. Only, he didn’t let me go.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered against my lips as he broke the kiss. The words rattled through me, and I couldn’t fend off the tears. After I had nearly bitten him, Reese was the one asking for forgiveness.
I choked on a sob, trying to pull away from him. “You need to leave.”
His hands clamped around my forearms. “No.”
“Reese, please!” I shoved at his chest, but he only hauled me closer until my face buried in his shoulder. “I’m going to hurt you!”
“And I’m going to help you.”
I kept shaking my head, even as Reese lifted my chin.
“This is what he wants, to isolate you, to make you feel helpless,” he said. “If you push me away, you’ll be playing right into his hands. We’ll find a way out of this, I promise, but we have to stick together.”
Something slammed behind me, and I felt that invisible leash tug against my bones, forcing me to turn around. Blaine locked his front door and headed down the porch to the driveway, stealing only a glance at the two of us—locked in each other’s embraces—before climbing in his car. His face was a perfect mask of indifference, and I couldn’t catch any scent from this distance, but something ached in my gut.
Reese growled, and a bitter metallic tang wafted in the air. “How can you stand seeing him?”
My stomach twisted tighter. “It’s not like I have much of a choice.”
“You will, if I have anything to say about it.”
***
It didn’t matter what I said; Reese wasn’t leaving town. He wasn’t leaving me. And that was the only thing I could take comfort in as I walked into school. That deep ache within me never subsided. Every corner I turned in the hallways, I ran into Blaine, but he never taunted me. In fact, the moment he so much as sensed me, he disappeared just as fast. We hadn’t spoken a word the entire day, even when we both arrived at the same time to AP Chemistry come final hour. Without meeting my eyes, he gestured me inside before slinking in after me to the other side of the classroom.
“Okay, class. Open your textbooks to page 258,” announced Mrs. Woodard. “We’ll be continuing our studies on Thermodynamics.”
That alien energy inside me compelled my head to turn, and before I could find the will to resist, I found myself staring at Blaine. Thank God he wasn’t looking back. His attention was wholly fixated on the textbook in front of him.
Who knew he found entropy to be so fascinating?
He flipped the page, exposing the paper for what it really was. Parchment. Ooookay, so maybe he wasn’t reading our chemistry textbook after all. Big deal. I tried to turn my head back to my own desktop, but that force inside me wouldn’t relent.
“What the hell do you want?” I wanted to scream at it.
When Blaine prepared to flip to the next page, he found the aged sheets sticking together. Upon separating them, he lifted up the book just enough to reveal the familiar leather-bound brown cover. But that’s not what earned my attention. It was the design on the page he’d just turned to. I nearly gasped, instinctively leaning in as close as I could get.
Two swords crossed together, making an upside-down crucifix, with a gigantic snake wrapped around the blades, appearing to consume fire.
“Ms. Shaw?” announced Mrs. Woodard sharply.
Her voice startled me enough that I actually jumped. Since I had literally been on the edge of my seat, the scare sent me falling off onto the floor. A chorus of giggles and snickers inevitably followed as I pulled myself back up into my chair.
“Would you mind terribly if I continue in my lesson, or do you wish to further ogle over Mr. LeBeau?” the elder woman huffed, nodding over to Blaine.
I surprised even myself as I jokily replied, “Nah, I’m good. I can see him just fine from here.” I added in a whimsical smile that only had Mrs. Woodard crossing her arms over her chest as the same group of students laughed again.
My cheery brush-off seemed to convince my fellow classmates that perhaps Mrs. Woodard was mistaken in her assessment of me and Blaine, but I knew all too well what I would find when I looked back over at the Prince of Darkness.
As certain as death and taxes, I wholly expected to see a massive smirk beneath a victorious pair of gleaming icy eyes. So it came as one hell of a surprise to find Blaine staring back at me, looking particularly…unnerved. His gaze swept back to the book, then to me, and he only became paler. I shot him a competitive smirk, but even then, he failed to return it, hunkering down in his seat.
His breathing hitched as his fingers clawed into the book’s cover. He suddenly shot up from his desk, taking his belongings with him.
Mrs. Woodard didn’t even have time to say his name, let alone reprimand him, as he took one look at her and said, “You have no problem with me leaving.”
Like all his other victims, the hypnotized teacher simply shrugged her shoulders and returned to the lesson plan without another thought.
Something had definitely just rattled him, and I had a pretty good feeling it had to do with that book.
I pulled out my phone, hiding it beneath the bulk of the desk as I texted Reese. “You near the school?”
The phone buzzed not a moment later. “I’m at the corner café just down the street. Everything okay?”
“I need you to follow Blaine.”
***
“Dare I ask why you have me stalking your stalker?” Reese queried the moment I called him after class let out.
“Do you see him?”
“You mean Tall, Blonde, and Creepy? Yeah, I have him in my sights,” he answered flatly.
“Where is he? What’s he doing?”
“He’s sitting on a rock.”
“He’s what?”
Reese gave a noisy exhale, evidently bored. My phone buzzed a few seconds later, showing me a picture of Blaine indeed resting on top of a massive boulder beside a lakefront of some sort. His legs hung over the ledge that jutted out into the water, his toes mere inches above the calm surface. Surprise, surprise. He was looking at that same leather-bound book.
“I have to admit, when you sent me out to spy on a Dark Lord of the Underworld, I kinda anticipated a bit more excitement. You know, like me hiding in the bushes as he makes shady transactions, or entering into a high-speed chase to escape his evil cronies. Spending the last forty-three minutes watching him read isn’t exactly adrenaline pinching.”
I couldn’t fight off the wicked smile pulling at my lips. “Are you really up for a little excitement?”
“At this point? Watching grass grow would be more stimulating,” Reese laughed.
“I want you to swipe the book he’s reading.”
“Why? Did he check out the last copy at the library?” he mocked.
“Remember that image I sent you and Madsen the other day? Of the drawing I sketched when I fell asleep in class?
“Yeah.”
“I just saw the exact same thing printed inside that book Blaine’s been carrying around. I think he’s up to something, something bad.”
***
The hot, buttery aroma of baking dough engulfed me as I stepped up to the soft pretzel stand. Reese handed me my very own gigantic, salty treat, and I thanked him between delicious mouthfuls before we took a seat in the back corner booth of the eatery. Between my overactive metabolism and the fact I was wired, my appetite was insatiable.
“I don’t know how much time we have,” remarked Reese under his breath as he slid the book my way.
“How’d you get it?”
“Blondie made a pit stop across the way, over at the bar and grill. And let’s just say there’s perks to him driving an old car,” he sassed, flashing me a long, flat piece of plastic.
“Is that a car window regulator?”
“Among many things.” Reese smiled guiltily. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that he’d used it to lift the interior latch on the lock. Without the hi-tech security that modern vehicles were equipped with, classic muscle cars were much easier targets for break-ins. “Putting my vehicular transgressions aside, would you mind filling me in, Nancy Drew? I have to get that book back inside his car before he realizes we were snooping around in it.”
Cracking open the spine, I began my investigation. The cover may have been blank, but the insides…they were brimming with sigils. And not just any sigils. Enochian runes.
Black Magic.
Page after page spoke of curses, and divinations, and necromancy, and...hexes. If my heart had fists, it would have punched itself free from my chest and flown away; I couldn’t contain the hope rising inside of me. It was too much. I didn’t know what any of these sigils were exactly, and I couldn’t read any of the spells, as they were scribed in Latin, but this had to be it! This had to be the grimoire Blaine consulted to perform the mating hex.
I skimmed through the pages, trying to soak in as much information as I could, until I finally found it. Halfway through the book, the familiar symbol practically screamed at me, the black ink so heavy and thick, it seemed to weigh down the parchment. The next five pages appeared to be dedicated to this sigil’s history, so I turned the book back to Reese in the hopes that he could make sense of it.
“I haven’t seen this symbol before in any of my research, but I’ve heard about this.” He tapped the title written beneath the illustration. “Potestas Binding, also known as Power Binding. It’s typically accompanied with Sanguis Bindings, used for summonings and proscribing.”
“I have no idea what you just said.”
“Blood Bindings. Certain blood has magical properties, so it can be used in rituals to build or break seals,” Reese attempted to clarify. “Remember the vision you had a couple months ago, about the girl in the woods?”
I shuddered at the recollection. One of the cheerleaders attacked on the Hersey bus had been taken by Hellhounds and held captive for over two weeks, only then for Raelynd’s cronies to drag the poor girl out into the forest and slash her throat. Then I remembered the strange symbol they’d created with rocks and loose tree branches inside a makeshift pentagram. It wasn’t the same as the one on the page, but the very thought of it sent ice into my veins.
“Why would I draw this?”
Reese shook his head, unable to answer, when a low hiss crept its way back into my mind.
“Sanguis quia sanguis.”
His eyebrows furrowed in an instant. “What?”
“When I was in the fortunetelling shop,” I gasped. “That’s what Lucinda said to me when I saw that vision. ‘Sanguis quia sanguis.’”
“‘Blood for blood’?” Reese pulled the book closer, combing over each word more intently, as if the proximity would make something magically jump out at him. “Did she say anything else?”
“Uhhh…” She had, at the very beginning of the session, but what was it? “‘Moss…venti…queen avose’…” By the look on Reese’s face, I only assumed I’d spoken pure and utter gibberish. I mean, seriously? Did I just say ‘venti’? I highly doubted an omen about my untimely demise had anything to do with freaking coffee.
But Reese’s eyes suddenly widened. “Mors venit quia vos?”
Holy crap! I nodded like an anxious bobble head. “What does it mean?”
“Death is coming for you.”