Page 31 of Beasts of Shadows #1

I’m nearly to the dorms when someone stumbles against the lamppost lighting the sidewalk.

I flinch. My first instinct is to run—because nothing good ever happens this close to midnight—but then I see the tumble of ink-dark curls, the glint of gold at his throat, the glimmer of something ancient and sharp behind his eyes.

Nikolai.

He’s draped over the lamppost like it’s the only thing anchoring him to this realm. His arm slung high, head tipped, face half in shadow.

I stop cold.

He looks pale. Disoriented. Like he just walked out of a dream—and lost a fight in it.

I should ignore him. Walk past. Pretend I didn’t see anything.

But it would be ill-mannered to leave a drunk nephilim sprawled on academy grounds. I’m sure someone will find a way to blame me if something happens to him.

“Are you okay?” I manage, inching closer.

He blinks slowly, gaze unfocused. A loose curl sticks to his cheekbone.

“Reema?” he asks at last, voice low and slurred but still somehow smug.

“Nari,” I correct stiffly. “Do you need help? You look—.”

He laughs. Then immediately trips over his own two feet, and sprawls before my tennis shoes.

I curse under my breath.

I should leave him here to explain himself to the next divine authority with a clipboard.

But I sigh, crouch, and hoist him up. He’s heavier than he looks. One hand tosses over my shoulder, his head resting on my clavicle. I hoist him up to the best of my ability, wrapping both arms under his pits to keep him steady.

“Morsel?” he manages.

The nearly nostalgic tone on his lips makes me stiffen.

“How much did you have to drink?” I demand.

“Ta?sse…,” he drawls, “she’s mad at me.”

He laughs bitterly, rubbing his cheek into my shoulder. He’s not making sense. Not even in the poetic, unsettling way he usually speaks. This is something else.

I eye the lobby doors, not thirty feet away. No one will bat an eye if I bring him in like this, given the rest of the debauchery still going on at the bonfire. But it feels…wrong to just abandon him.

I bite my bottom lip, debating.

“Is someone else with you?” I ask, speering into the stiff darkness beyond the sidewalk. “Ta?sse? Kilronan? Anyone at al—?”

Before I can get the rest of my question out, Nikolai catches my cheeks in his two unstable hands and presses a soul-splintering kiss over my lips.

It’s not charming or seductive or divine. It’s messy. Desperate.

I stumble with both surprise and the unexpected weight of his form falling into me. It takes every bit of strength in my legs to keep us both upright.

I freeze. Not because I’m scared—but because I don’t know what this is. A joke? A dare? A curse?

But then my fingers tighten in his coat, and my mouth betrays me. He seems to take that as my approval, because one hand slides to the nape of my neck and the other roams down my shirt.

It’s clumsy and hot and too much—and it shouldn’t work—but something in me fractures .

I should shove him away. Scream. Hex him. Leave.

But I don’t.

Because for one heartbeat, I don’t want to be good. I don’t want to be clever or principled or strong .

I want to feel something that isn’t dread.

Just for a second.

Just for now.

So I kiss him back.

My mouth opens under his, angry and hungry and wrong. My hands fist in his coat, not to push—but to pull . The hand at my neck tightens, and the other is already beneath my shirt, palm against bare skin like a brand.

It’s dangerous. Stupid. Unforgivable.

But oh, it feels so good to let go.

He tastes like regret and power, bitter and wild, and everything I shouldn’t want—but do.

My body betrays me before my mind catches up. I arch into him, my breath catching, my heart thundering in time with his.

And then I remember who I am.

What he is.

What this is not .

I rip away from him with a gasp, like surfacing from a near-drowning. My chest heaves. My mouth burns. My hands still shake.

And he just stands there.

Drunk. Beautiful. Smirking.

And the worst of all is the pleasant coil of tension knotting within me. My traitorous hands want to wrap around him and drag him back.

That, more than anything else, prompts me to react.

“What in Hades is wrong with you?” I demand, aggressively wiping my mouth over my arm. “Don’t ever do that again.” My heart giving a colossal attack.

“Sorry,” he says, though he doesn’t seem to mean it. “I needed a win.”

“So you assaulted me?”

“I didn’t hear you complaining,” he taunts.

Despite the cold, my cheeks warm, and I lengthen the distance between us for good measure.

“Get over yourself, you conceited ass,” I growl.

“Come on, Nari. Everyone knows mortal girls are loose. Stella’s already spread her legs for our protection. Isn’t that why you and Lord Sumner—?”

Is he for real?

My fist meets that fine cheek before he can finish. The knock takes him down. He laughs unsteadily, palms still rough in the slick grass where he’s fallen.

When he lifts his face into the light, a slew of curls slide over his features, casting the left cheek in shadows. The lamppost marks the other side, making his seafoam gaze pop. His eyes are the deepest part of the ocean as he grins at me. Like we’re both happy about this situation.

Nikolai rubs his face as he climbs to his feet. He seems in slightly better shape than before, although his lips twist bitterly.

“I’ll go easy on you, since I’m desperate. I can buy you safety this month for another kiss. Isn’t that a bargain?”

He steps toward me again, and I give him a sharp, warning shove. I know my eyes are large with wild panic, and I wish he was coherent enough to see that he’s scaring me.

“You’re a mess.”

He frowns and finally seems to realize I’m not exactly thrilled about his advances.

Gripping the lamppost, he blinks liquidly at me. The amusement in his expression begins to fade.

With a groan, I turn and strut away.

Not to the dorms.

Not back to the party.

But to the Warfare College.

To outrun the ache.

To chase the girl I used to be.

To feel anything but him.

#

I want a reprieve. A reckoning.

Something that doesn’t taste like power and poison and guilt.

Something that doesn’t taste like Nikolai.

I want someone who knew me before the bruises.

Before the frost crept in.

Before gods started asking things of me I never offered.

Before I stopped recognizing the sound of my own name.

I want Ravi.

Not because I’m sure.

Because I’m not.

Because he used to be the thing that tethered me to myself—and I need to know if any of that’s still there. If I’m still in there.

The night splits around me as I move—silent, heavy, wet with mist. It curls against my coat, clinging like breath too close to skin.

I don’t knock.

The door gives—warm at the hinge, like it’s been waiting for me. Or bracing.

Inside, Ravi’s residence glows low and gold. Shadows stretch long across the floor. The scent hits first—sandalwood, scorched herbs, and something unmistakably human. Him. The smell of nights we thought were eternal. The smell of a future I thought I wanted.

Steam coils from the bathroom. A ceiling charm pulses above, slow and steady—like a second heartbeat in the room.

His coat’s on the hook. His boots are off.

Of course his door’s unlocked. Of course the bath is still steaming. It’s so Ravi—so him—to leave his guard down when he shouldn’t.

Where is…?

He steps into view.

Stops short.

His mouth opens—then shutters again, like he’s forgotten the shape of my name.

“Mutt? Why aren’t you with the others at the bonfire?”

I don’t wait for permission.

I’m not here for answers.

I crash against him.

My mouth finds his, all teeth and heat. Not a kiss. A warning. A challenge. A plea.

I don’t even know what I’m asking him for—only that I need something inside me to shut the fuck up before it devours me.

My fingers tangle in his hair, yanking. I want to feel him fight for air the way I’ve been fighting for peace.

Fuck, I need…

I need…

To feel like I’m still human. That this place hasn’t killed what was left of me.

His hands slam against my back, my waist, my hips—everywhere at once, too much and not enough.

We stumble. His back hits the wall, then mine.

Hands drag at fabric. My coat hits the floor.

My legs wrap around him like they remember this, like I remember this, even though I don’t think we’ve ever touched quite this desperately like this before.

He grinds into me like it’s instinct.

Like we’ve been doing this forever.

Like he’s never stopped wanting this.

Maybe he hasn’t.

But I’m not her.

I’m not even sure who I am right now.

And still, I can’t stop.

Because I need this to mean something.

Or nothing.

Anything but the ache still crawling under my skin where Nikolai touched me like I belonged to him.

We don’t speak. We don’t breathe.

Because if we do, we might remember when we are.

What this is.

We crash into the cot. His belt’s undone. I yank it like it’s strangling me. Like every breath I take outside this moment will cost me more than I can afford.

His mouth is on my neck, my chest, biting. Not sweet. Not sacred. Just desperate. Animal.

“Yes,” I manage, grinding back. I claw at his back. My hips roll with a rhythm that isn’t about rhythm at all—it’s about erasure. I don’t want to be touched—I want to be wrecked.

This isn’t about Ravi.

This is about obliteration.

About smothering the fire Nikolai lit between my thighs with his cursed, beautiful mouth.

I want to come apart under Ravi. Forget what it felt like to want something I didn’t choose.

Ravi’s fingers slip beneath my waistband. I moan—loud, reckless. I don’t care. I want his hands on my skin, in my skin, under it.

Everyone else is hooking up. Why can’t I?

Why shouldn’t I burn something down, too?

My bra is half-off. His mouth drags lower. My thighs tremble, ready to fold. Ready to give.

Then he says it.

A whisper. Barely breath. More memory than malice.

“Samhain’s always been our night. You wore that silver dress. I remember how you looked… right before you—.”

He cuts himself off, kissing around my belly button.

But I freeze.

Because I never wore a silver dress.

Bea did.

Samhain wasn’t our night. Not really. Not unless we count the year he stopped showing up. The year he said he’d outgrown trick-or-treating and left me waiting.

And suddenly, the timeline ruptures.

I jolt. A breath I didn’t mean to take. A thought I didn’t ask for.

His lips are on my stomach. His fingers trailing lower.

“I still love you,” he whispers.

I go silent.

Because I don’t know who he’s saying it to.

Does he love me?

Or the ghost of Bea inside me?

Or just the memory of the girl I was, before everything fractured?

How much of this—of us—has ever been about who I am now?

This was supposed to be forgetting. A purge.

But Ravi remembers everything.

And I…

I’m the one who’s drowning in it.

My hand slams to his chest.

“I’m sorry,” I gasp, pushing hard against him. “I can’t. I’m sorry.”

He pauses. Like the words hit him late. His hands glide up my sides, slow, tentative, like he’s afraid I’ll dissolve if he’s not careful. He cups my face; thumb brushes under my lashes.

“Please don’t kill me for that.”

It’s too soft. Too tender. He means it as a joke, but it’s too much of the real thing.

And I can’t handle the real thing.

Not tonight.

Because the last time we were together, really together, was the night before I killed him.

I shake my head.

Pull away like I’ve been branded.

I reach for my shirt. My coat. Anything that will make me feel hidden again. Ravi sits up, shirtless and stunned, lips parted in something that might be grief.

He doesn’t say a word.

Neither do I.

I stand. Still trembling. Still hungry.

Still haunted.

Let tonight be another of Samhain’s ghosts.

And when I leave, he’s still sitting there, still watching me like I’m something he already lost.

Like I was never really his to begin with.