Page 7
A fter a miserable half hour, the trees became less crowded, but the road was a nightmare to follow under the rising water. For all I knew, we had veered in the wrong direction. Even between our flashlights and Sylvia’s glow, we could only discern more darkness ahead of us.
We all nearly jumped out of our skin when my beam caught faded white boards and a colorful glint of stained glass.
“Fucking finally,” Cliff groaned. “We can wait out the storm.” He trudged forward without waiting to see if we would follow.
“A house?” Sylvia’s detached light grew dimmer by the minute. “What if someone lives there?”
“It’s not a house,” I said. “But there could be squatters, especially in this weather.”
However, ordinary humans were the least of my worries, especially with the scare we’d gotten outside the wreck. I strained my senses, scouring the clearing around the church for signs of something more sinister out here with us. There was no tell-tale stench of decay, no trace of mutilated animals… Of course, the damn storm could have washed away any lingering odors.
Judging by the church’s architecture, the lone building was sixty years old at most, but corrosion had reduced it to a husk. Ivy and lichen crawled over the crooked steeple that jutted accusingly toward the heavens. Peeling white paint exposed cracked gray boards beneath, and the arched windows were stained with grime and graffiti. Some windows were missing entire panes of glass, leaving them to gape like empty eye sockets as we approached.
I vaulted up the stairs behind Cliff, each step making the old wood shriek. Up close, the neglect of the structure was more pronounced: wild grasses pushed up through the rotting floorboards, and the sign beside the entrance was too faded to read. The door was locked, but it took no more than a firm shove to force it through the warped frame. A thick wave of musty silence welcomed us as we stepped inside.
“Smells like ass in here,” I remarked under my breath, nudging the door shut behind us. Still, a shiver of ease kissed down my spine at the sudden relief from the pelting rain.
Sylvia reduced her fae light once we were safely inside, draining the ethereal blue from the aging building. Dust danced in the beam of my flashlight as I swept the room. We stood in the remains of a lobby. The partition wall was reduced to a skeleton of support beams, revealing a cavernous room lined with dusty pews. The distant drip of water disrupted the otherwise stagnant air that made it feel like the whole place was holding its breath, frozen in a moment of time.
Gravel and glass crunched under our boots as we moved inward. I grunted, nearly tripping over a candle holder in pieces just beyond the threshold to the next room. The likeness of the prophet engraved was in the bronze, weathered beyond recognition. I kicked it aside, trying to temper my expression as I eyed the shadows.
Although my jacket was heavy with a small arsenal of iron and silver, the distinct lack of my favored sawed-off shotgun left me feeling exposed. It was too conspicuous for a sleepy Louisiana town, too large to stow in my bag. Last we’d been to Cypress Hollow, local civilians had welcomed visiting strangers with open arms, but I doubted they’d extend the same hospitality if we came waltzing in brandishing machetes and scoped weapons. My fingers twitched as I dwelled on everything left behind in that patch of swamp.
Cálmate, I told myself. We’d been in far worse pinches before. There was no need to feed the rooting fear in my gut.
I idled by the doorway and reached for my shoulder, brushing Sylvia’s side. Her cropped sweater and leggings felt like they were frozen to her delicate body. My heart lurched at the thought of her limited belongings getting ruined or lost out there in the wreck. I couldn’t shake the pain in her voice when she’d lost track of her snowflake charm.
“How are you holding up?” I asked.
She gave my neck a reassuring pet. “You act like it’s my first time being stranded in a terrifying swamp in the dead of night,” she simpered, drawing a chuckle out of me. “I’ll be better after a hot bath, but I’ll pull through for now. No tengo mierda .”
My heart stuttered as it always did when she spoke Spanish—broken as it was. There was something otherworldly and undeniably hot about hearing my second language on her perfect lips.
But this particular mispronunciation had me sharing a slow smile with Cliff.
“What?” The purr of Sylvia’s voice rose to a snap when Cliff and I snickered.
“Look, that’s adorable,” Cliff said. The irritation in his voice had softened gradually during our long trek, and he now shot Sylvia a crooked smile. “But you just told him you don’t have shit . You meant no tengo miedo .”
Sylvia made an indignant noise that tapered into confusion. “How do you know that?” she demanded.
He glanced back over his shoulder, smirking. “What? Ten years with this guy, and you don’t think I picked up a few things? Me has hecho dano . ”
I could imagine the expression on Sylvia’s face—the pinch of her lips as she pouted in thought. “Bathroom?”
“That would be bano ,” I said.
“Ugh.” And that was her rolling her eyes.
Her waterlogged wings tickled my neck as they tried to shake themselves dry. She might have attempted flight if it weren’t for the flash of lightning through one of the broken windows. Even I flinched in tandem with her yelp when a bolt illuminated the silhouette of a person outside.
“Just a statue,” I assured after blinking a few times. The image in the billowing grass stayed etched in my mind’s eye—a crumbling woman in flowing robes, arms outstretched as though awaiting an embrace.
We moved away from the shattered windows, inadvertently herded closer to the altar. Tattered bedding, food wrappers, and empty bottles between the pews pointed to squatters, but the makeshift camp looked like it hadn’t been touched in ages.
Sylvia breathed in sharply. “There’s something about this place,” she said in a softer voice.
“What?” I asked, my voice a whisper.
“Like… something used to be here. A bad memory.”
My flashlight beam swept over the crumbling pews. A few of them were shoved about haphazardly, splintered in some places. Upon closer inspection, I found a couple of bullets lodged into one of the backrests.
“Places like these are prime real estate for hauntings,” Cliff muttered. “But with the outpost so close, nothing around here can stay haunted for long.”
Legs aching, I lowered myself into the sturdiest-looking pew up front. “You’re sure it’s gone—whatever was here?” I asked Sylvia.
“It feels like a smudge of sorts, like a handprint on glass. Nothing more.” In her brief silence, I had to wonder if I was feeling the same thing as her—that unsettling heaviness in the air. “I’ve been feeling it lately after you’ve killed a monster.”
“Sounds like your senses are getting sharper,” Cliff called over from where he was rifling through a stained chest of drawers in the left alcove. “Good girl. Keep it up.”
“Tell that to the vampire king that snuck up on me,” she muttered in reply. Managing a short flight, Sylvia perched on the backrest across from me. As she combed her fingers through her hair, wringing out the tiniest droplets. “Whatever I felt by the car definitely wasn’t a memory, though.”
The mere mention of the close encounter added another layer of tension to her face. I studied her, noting the circles under her eyes—which she had been diligently trying to hide from me lately.
“How’d you sleep last night?” I asked.
Her pout was reproachful, but she averted her eyes like she’d been caught. “I’m wide awake, Jon. I know I sensed something out there.”
“I believe you, it’s just—” I sighed, wishing I could ease every sign of stress from her features. “You look like you’re burning the candle at both ends. You have for days.”
She looked ready to soften, but another flash of lightning accompanied the muted drumming of the rain. She went rigid, fists clenched in her lap to weather the answering crash of thunder. The illumination cast a fleeting pattern of colors on the walls as the light refracted through the intricate windows.
“You’re sure you don’t wanna hide until it passes?” I asked. It wouldn’t have been the first time a coat pocket or sheltered space had served as a panic room for her.
Sylvia shot me a hard look, shaking her head. Frustration laced her voice like thorns, but not directed at me. “I’m not under the willow anymore, and I’m tired of hiding,” she said. “I should be better than this by now. ”
My jaw feathered. Sometimes, I saw too much of myself in her. Sylvia had voiced embarrassment over her panic attacks more than once, but soft assurances from Cliff and I fell short when it wasn’t us she needed to prove something to. Though, I was sure his callous remark earlier hadn’t helped.
“We all have our blind spots,” I said. “If we were at a high altitude, you know I’d be worse off.”
“Damn straight.” Cliff’s voice was further away now, his athletic frame barely visible as he rifled through a pile of rubble behind the altar.“Remember that time we had to take out that ghoul in a high rise? Thought you were gonna hurl when it went out on the fire escape.”
He chuckled to himself as though he could sense how I paled at the memory. Sylvia shot him a grateful look—seeming to take the shift in his tone as a signal that his anger was not lasting. She sighed, cupped her hands in front of her, and gathered a shimmering orb of ice between her palms. The cool breeze of the magic caressed my face as she stretched the substance—somehow both liquid and solid—into different shapes. She settled on a small double-sided spear before pushing her palms together and ousting the magic like a snuffed candle.
“Father used to tell me stories about Fae warriors from long ago. Ones who lived hundreds of years ago, their days filled with danger and excitement.” Her smile turned bitter. “Living in Elysia, you can understand why I clung to those stories so ferociously. I lived through those heroes like a second life when I was a child.”
“Like Karolyn the Gilded?” I ventured.
The corner of her mouth lifted. “Good memory.”
Sylvia had readily latched onto this legend and shared it with me our first week on our journey west: a fairy who had supposedly used gem magic to change forms into various animals, even stealing the likeness of other fairies temporarily. Fitting, considering our joint quest to find Sylvia an equally capable stone.
“She’s an obvious favorite of mine,” Sylvia said, giving a little toss of her hair. “But most fairies don’t see it that way. She was a little cutthroat, and trying to use deception to steal the crown became her legacy above all her other feats.”
“Royalty?” I quirked a brow, recalling the Elysian governance Sylvia had explained. A few of those assholes I’d seen with my own eyes.
“Apparently, her coup is part of how my village eventually moved to the council of Elders.” Sylvia shrugged, some of the light dimming from her eyes at the very mention of them—the people who had banished her. It didn’t escape me that while she cared for me—for both of us—her decision to stay with us was made under extreme duress.
“There are so many others, though,” she went on, brightening. She stretched her legs out, wings fanning in sync with the motion. “Heroes that became legends in the stars, like Edin the Valiant. Father loved him—another gem scavenger of old. I think Father was jealous of the prestige scavengers used to get. The story goes that Edin used gem magic to protect his village, somewhere far off where streams and mountains cut through vast red trees. His greatest tale of bravery—the one all the children cared about, anyway—was when he was supposedly trapped in a cave with a wolf for three days. Only his magic and wits to protect him.”
“Hell of a bedtime story,” I scoffed.
Sylvia grinned, shaking her head. Her gaze was distant, torn between me and that cozy hearth room under the willow she had described so often.
“He conquered it against all odds. Some thought him immortal, but he ultimately sacrificed his life for his closest friend. Another reason Edin’s name is synonymous with courage and kindness. That’s his legacy.” Sylvia fell quiet, her eyes dropping to her lap. “And my legacy? Crying like a child at every thunderstorm that passes.”
My smile dropped away, the bitter tone in her voice cutting like poison. “Sylv—”
“It’s true,” she insisted, voice hardening. “I can’t shake the feeling that I should be better by now. Like… maybe it’s time for me to stop being afraid. I should be something to be feared. It’s safer that way.”
My lips pulled into a mournful smile as I felt torn between protecting her from every dark corner of the world or admiring the hell out of her, because that’s my girl.
I leaned my arms on my knees, pinning her with a look until she met my gaze, a flicker of uncertainty crossing her face. “You may be the bravest person I’ve ever known.”
“I don’t see it that way,” Sylvia snorted, but there was a threadiness there—that sacred trust she reserved for me.
“Then, I’ll help you see.” I gave her a once-over, my certainty pushing a brighter smile onto my face. “Give it time, I think you’ll have no shortage of legends in every corner of the country about you.”
A wash of satisfaction softening the anxious lines on Sylvia’s face. “I look forward to hearing them. But I know how hunters exaggerate. How can I trust a word you’ll say?”
I let my voice drop to a conspiratorial whisper, leaning closer. “You can’t. I’m extremely biased.”
Despite the gusting wind rattling the wooden walls, she and I shared a soft laugh. Seeming to wrestle herself into a new train of thought, Sylvia leaned back on her seat and craned her neck to study our surroundings.
She gestured at one of the intact stained-glass windows, where there was a depiction of an angel. “I’ve never seen such colorful panes. It makes the lightning a little less horrifying, I suppose. ”
I shined my flashlight where she pointed, illuminating the figure and its glorious feathery wings. Sylvia’s eyes lit up at how the beam sent refractions of color across the rest of the room. She looked down at her hands, marveling at the light dancing across her skin. For the first time since the storm had begun, a breathless grin brightened her features as she wiggled her fingers. In the moment I was studying her, I forgot I was cold and soaked to the bone.
Sylvia looked up at me, grin faltering as she studied me. “What bothers you so much about this place?” she asked in that gentle tone that read far too deeply. “You look ready to bolt, but I know for a fact you’ve seen worse than a few creepy statues.”
“Just because hunts tend to take us to rotting buildings doesn’t mean I like it,” I deflected, lifting my eyebrows at her.
Sylvia rolled her eyes, her smirk flickering with transparent disappointment. Don’t hide from me, her gaze pleaded. That chafing feeling panged me again—the relentless prying at the careful walls I maintained. She deserved more, and I resigned even as my throat closed around the words.
“The last time I was inside a church, my family was still intact.”I exhaled through my nose, pushing a hand back through my wet hair to sweep stray locks off my face. “I really never minded going; it was tradition. But after everything that happened to us… The evil I’ve seen thrust onto so many others—good people, innocent people…”
I trailed off, my chest tight. I still remembered some of the faces, and my pulse raced. For every life Cliff and I had saved over the years, there were ten others who had suffered a brutal, unjust fate. We hadn’t been enough—hadn’t been fast enough.
“I can’t help but feel cheated,” I finished softly, pinching my shoulders in a tight, dismissive shrug. “There’s nothing out there listening to our pleas. So it’s up to us to carry out what we want to happen. ”
Sylvia’s expression knit thoughtfully as she eyed the vacant outline of a cross between windows. She lifted her hands and whispered a spell, conjuring another fae light—golden this time—to replace the one that had faded. I watched the glow’s trajectory as she sent it soaring toward the ceiling with a flick of her wrist.
Her magic was a reflection of her , and I was beginning to understand how to decode it. The shimmering orb, a little larger than my palm, bore a steady light, suggesting that she was recovering from the initial shock of the accident. It never ceased to amaze me how resilient she was for someone so delicate, even if much of it came from sheer stubbornness of will. The added light fixture illuminated more of the windows, spreading a warm hue over some of the peeling walls.
“Well, the stars brought you to me,” she said, almost shy as she faced me again. “So I wouldn’t rule out hope entirely that nothing is listening.”
The corner of my lips lifted. She was wrong, but her idealism painted color into the world.
“The stars couldn’t give us a less violent way to cross paths?” I asked. Though our first encounter at Dottage mansion felt like another life now,the image of her terrified expression was etched into my mind like glass. More than once in the last few weeks alone, she had brought up our use of that damn box with icy bitterness.
But now, she laughed.
“How could it be any other way? Look at you,” Sylvia said. “All you boys do is raise hell wherever you go. And besides, who are mere mortals to question the cosmos?”
I grinned gamely, leaning my arms on my knees as I leveled my gaze closer to her. “Give me names, I’m more than happy to rattle the stars for you. ”
Her drooping wings gave a flutter as my words washed over her. “Jon, don’t give me filthy thoughts during a thunderstorm. It’s confusing to sort through,” she breathed out.
“What? I didn’t do anything.”
“You know exactly what you’re doing! With your stupid, wet hair and that tone in your voice…”
I flicked my gaze over her. She had a point about the wetness; her hair hung in tight crimson ringlets just above her shoulders, and her sodden clothes clung to every curve, leaving very little to the imagination. A few scant droplets still lingered on her exposed shoulders and navel—and my single, consuming thought was how much I wanted to kiss them off of her body. Maybe ease a few of those bruises with some warmth.
Jesus, I was such a freak.
But now that we’d started, I couldn’t bring myself to stop. “It’s not too late to admit that I’m too much for you,” I challenged, letting my voice dip lower.
That familiar spark of wildness crept onto her face. Slowly, she leaned forward to match my smoldering gaze—unafraid.
“No. I’ll have you, violence and all,” she said. “I already tried to push you from my mind a million times before—and look where that got me.”
I felt my heart give a very physical ache in my chest. Fuck , the hold she had on me. If we found that gemstone, I would never let her go.
Not human , screamed the voice in the back of my mind. She's not human.
But lately, it didn't seem to matter anymore. Not like it should've.
“Hey, pornstars. Take a break from being gross and check this out,” Cliff interrupted, approaching us with his arms full .
Sylvia scowled as we broke apart. If she weren’t so miserable and soaked, I had a feeling she would have doubled-down and closed the distance to me just to spite Cliff.
“Here, hold this.” He handed me a small, leatherbound book so that he could focus on inspecting the kerosene lamp in his other hand.
I wrinkled my nose, thumbing through the worn pages. “What is this?”
“Definitely bound in human skin and inked with blood,” Cliff said chipperly.
Gagging, I dropped the book to the floor and kicked it across the aisle—eliciting another booming laugh from Cliff.