Page 38 of These Eternal Bones

Back at Eden but With Books

Daylight - David Kushner

Tien

My back aches as I press into a nearby tree, watching the slimy golden one check over his shoulder as he sneaks through the woods toward town.

It’s been like this for months. He sneaks; I watch.

He whispers; I listen, as best I can anyway.

It seems after nine hundred or something years, this odd, mismatched form of mine has finally begun to break down.

I would smirk, maybe even laugh at the alchemist who made me this…

horrific amalgamation of flesh. He was a terrible man, and I had hoped to be like him, his apprentice.

I trusted him until the straps bound over my wrists and ankles.

Until my once beautiful fae form was po lluted, I trusted him.

I do not trust lightly these days.

That is only compounded by the golden man, angel or not. You don’t get to be in my condition without sniffing out deceit when it is just a seed planted in the minds of corruptible men.

When he rounds a thicket, I’m waiting. My claws digging into his chest before he has the chance to react.

“Get your hands off of me,” he demands, not even having the decency of looking sheepish for getting caught.

I ignore his request, digging them in harder through his shirt. I wonder what punishment you glean from making a child of God bleed. Perhaps not much if the child is a forgotten bastard. Nephilims are said to be giants of great power. Inflatable creatures of light.

His small stature fools me not. That strength is why he’s survived here this long with his blatant disrespect and soured disposition.

That and her. The memory of what they once were stilling Elric’s hand.

He could kill the piss-colored man without a doubt, but it wouldn’t be easy.

It would only serve to further his guilt.

All of ours.

“You’ve been sneaking off into town. Why?” The question leaves me in a growl, his eyes flashing in a warning I do not heed.

“As if there is anything else for me to do? As if I answer to you .”

“I am not interested in your games. You are not nearly as clever as you think.”

He laughs at that, but I can see the nerves frayed under the surface of his bravado. “If you are so suspicious, then follow me to town. Perhaps you can watch while I fuck a–”

I stab into him, my claws like butter as they sink into his chest. That’s all I get, a second of the upper hand before a blast of heat and light hits me, robbing my breath from my lungs.

My back collides with a nearby tree, the world lost to the power of the sun for a moment, while the smell of singed fur and scales fills my nose, my very soul throbbing.

I am too damn old for this. I’m still regaining my strength as his boot meets my chest. “If you want to speak upon suspicion, upon crimes of others, perhaps first consider owning up to yours.”

I still, regarding him carefully as he jerks his boot from my chest.

“Do not meddle in this! I will see to it you are reunited with your father!”

He scoffs as I get my bearings. “It is madness to let it continue. A hell of his making!”

“It is not your place! You cannot change it any more than they can. Set aside your grief before it becomes regret you cannot escape from.”

It’s that , those words that show a crack in his aloof and arrogant facade. It’s then that I am positive he has long crossed that line.

That he knows far more than he should.

Molly

My fingers skim over rough canvas, smiling down at my work.

It’s far from my usual taste. There’s not a pink or purple to be found.

No, this piece is dark, befitting its subject.

My heart aches for a moment, and he stares back at me from the canvas, seeing it all.

I wonder what he was like in that first life, if I could recognize him. If I would want to.

“Péal, would you know where I could find a hammer and a nail?”

The selkie looks up from where she polishes a bookend in Elric’s office. “Yes, of course, mistress.”

No matter the times I tell her to call me Molly, it’s always mistress.

It makes sense, out of all my names, that is the one the tiny woman is most familiar with.

She’s been on her best behavior after being removed from my side for a few weeks, something I had fought hard to prevent, but Elric is unmovable to a fault.

I watch as she breezes through the door.

I turn my attention toward the windows, the canvas gripped tightly in my hands.

My brow furrows as Tien stalks from the castle, blazing a sure path halfway to the woods before blipping out of sight.

Cartiel had headed that way just a bit ago.

It’s clear that there is disdain for one another, although I can’t tell if it’s because Tien suspects him of helping me look where my gaze isn’t wanted, or just several hundreds of years spent coexisting with the moody Nephilim.

After months here, with my new family, I’ve learned everyone has a role.

Tien takes care of everything Elric may need, mostly things to do with the town, paperwork, and when someone comes wanting his financial support.

When new supernatural’s come, Tien is also the one to help them settle, to warn them away from the upper floors I call home. They come often, but don’t last long.

Péal cares for me and for the inside of the estate.

She is a cook, housemaid, handmaiden, and anything else required of her.

She loves it; the selkie had blanched with downright horror when I once brought up her surrendering her workload a bit.

Many of the others, the small shadow creatures, mostly seem to take care of the outside of the castle, but only at night.

It seems it’s the only time of day they can comfortably leave.

Tien once told me they were a type of soul spirit, a human soul corrupted and lost after their physical form had passed.

I’d thought it odd considering their small winged bodies were very much physical but didn’t press further.

Any interest shown in other beings tends to make Elric growly and grabby.

Neither of which I mind, but I try not to provoke him.

We’re playing the long game now, he and I.

I search and question. He avoids and redirects.

I display my neck, bite my lip so it bleeds, and he nearly goes mad with want but refuses to feed.

My days and nights are spent where I always am, by his side, being adored and loved in ways I’d never thought I was worthy of.

That’s my role. To be his, it’s a position I love just as much as the man.

The fox lurks outside, dipping in and out of sight.

I almost get the impression he wants to come in by the way he paces the wood line, darting out only to stop himself and turn back.

I can’t blame him. Apparently, Elric and he have a demented game they play over their long years.

A rivalry I can’t help but think has everything to do with me.

Elric kills him, as best he can, and tosses him into the woods.

The fox comes back and makes Elric’s life a living hell.

They fight, seeing who can damage whom more, and then part ways for a time.

The fox has even lit Elric on fire once.

The information alone was nearly enough to make me lose my breakfast. I’d asked Péal to stop after that.

Everyone, even more of the supernaturals who haunt the woods and lower levels, is such an assortment that I can’t keep track but everyone has a role.

Except Cartiel. I had once thought him to be a footman of sorts.

He’d try to assist Elric and mostly be ignored, threatened, or dismissed.

He’s out of place. Doesn’t fit, and I can’t help but feel profoundly sad for him.

It must be lonely, impossibly so…yet he stays.

They all stay, ever-long lives, and they spend them here.

It’s strange.

Everything is strange, and the second I’m alone, I’m going to figure out what old me thought.

Maybe past Molly, or whatever her name was, also had questions.

Maybe Elric was more willing to share them.

Maybe he was more whole in his mind. He seems to believe telling me, even a little, will irreparably damage us, like it would ruin everything.

I cannot fathom the same man who brushes my hair and hangs on my every word, the one who adores and worships me. Who dotes and frets…who loves me in a way that leaves me breathless could commit any crime so terrible.

My eyes slide back to the painting, at the picture of Elric not lost to his madness, not pacing but looking at me like I alone hung the sun in the sky.

His silky, dark hair hangs in his face as he sits at his desk, a small tilt to his lips because he again caught me looking. He’s beautiful and frightening.

Mine.

And I’m tired of waiting.

Like before, when he finally took me, perhaps he simply needs a little push.

The bond, whatever it is, is my right. I am tired of this emptiness.

“Here we are, mistress, where do you want it?”

“The upper halls next to the portraits.”

She stills before offering me a bright smile. “I think that’s the perfect place.”

And it was, his portrait taking the place I’m sure he intended mine to go after I am gone from this world. Another of my ghosts to haunt this hall.

“You’re dismissed for the night.” His deep voice sets a tightening in my core and a flurry of nerves in my gut.

What if he hates it?

“Goodnight, mistress. Goodnight, master.” Péal offers a smile in her voice. Always so knowing, although her lips have regrettably become much tighter.

“Goodnight, selkie, thank you for helping me.”