Chapter 43
Quentin
Twisted
Two Feet
As the hot water hit my tense body, I groaned, because it was as if all the weight in the world had been lifted from my shoulders for a moment. I put my head back, rotated it, closed my eyes, and let the heat flow down my body.
A mistake.
Immediately, an image of J popped into my head. Her, sitting on top of me, naked and beautiful, with her perfectly shaped tits that were so delicate you never wanted to take your hands off them.
I wanted to suck on her nipples, lick them until she moaned in ecstasy and her wet pussy tightened around my cock.
“Fuck,” I growled as my hand automatically traveled down and gripped my throbbing dick.
I wanted to fuck that woman’s mind away until she collapsed on top of me, breathing heavily, so I could bury my nose in her fragrant hair and cum inside her.
I didn’t have to do anything. I just came in my hand, holding on to the rough black granite wall while pressing my lips together.
It took a full minute for my vision to clear and for me to be able to continue showering as if none of this had just happened.
Just the thought of that woman drove me crazy, and ever since I had slept with her, these images haunted me, sometimes even forcing me to touch myself three times a day, throwing my structured daily routine off kilter.
Reality caught up with me. The pain in my chest returned, throbbing unpleasantly.
J wasn’t here. I would never be able to hold her in my arms again, never be able to show her all the feelings I had for her.
Every damn day I wondered if it was really so easy for her to forget me, if she had ever felt even a hint of what thundered like a storm in my heart for her.
If I hadn’t met her, everything would be fine. I would continue to text with her every evening, share my ideas and theories with her, and not run around like a horny dog.
What if she felt pressured? What if she regretted the sex? What if she felt uncomfortable with me?
Fuck . How could I have messed things up so badly with the only person who would forever hold my heart? Whatever would come...
Talk
Hozier
The hot water had already lost its relaxing effect, so I got out of the shower and wrapped myself in one of the white towels.
I noticed the shimmer on my skin: the transparent and – barely visible – warm yellow-green shimmering scales on the sides and on the back of my hands.
My jaw tensed, and I walked to the mirror, only to realize that the shimmer had also spread across my chest and that more soft green transparent fish scales with a slight yellow tinge were subtly visible on my neck.
Deep down, I wanted to rip them out, but I waited with growing impatience for them to disappear on their own.
It was the damned water that reminded me of what I really was. That I was one of them.
I knew that not all of them were to blame for the system having become so corrupt, but none of them were better. Blind followers trapped in a circle of lies, treachery, and oppression.
I hastily reached for my father’s ring, adorned with the snake and the raven, and put it on my left ring finger.
Satisfied, I watched my body return to normal until I could no longer feel my own magic and could be sure that no others could either.
Then I reached for the refilled injection syringe with the elixir I was currently experimenting with.
It gave me the strength I needed to use Umbra without having to take off the ring that dampened my Quatura element.
As soon as the elixir shot through the needle into my vein, cold spread through my body, followed by a warm, intoxicating tugging and the following convulsive pressure that settled on my body.
The pain this stuff caused me was worth it. Even without the ring, I wouldn’t have had the strength to use Umbra without ramming a damn dagger into my hand every time.
I watched my eyes turn completely black in the mirror while my veins bulged unnaturally.
A self-satisfied smile crossed my lips.
If only the Councils knew what kind of enemy they had made for themselves...
I reached for the second ring that reminded me of J, carefully slipped it onto the still-free ring finger of my right hand, and as always, I felt as if I were carrying a part of her with me.
I had it made four months ago. I had a goldsmith engrave the J on the inside of my parents’ merged wedding rings.
A glance at the vintage clock told me that I had already wasted far too much time in the bathroom, so I quickly changed into fresh clothes and rushed through the open ground floor to gather my things.
The professors’ houses were renovated Tudor-style houses in apartment size with loft-style open living areas. The windows were large, tapering from the ground floor to the first floor, allowing light from outside to flood the entire indoor area. However, the professors’ accommodations were located directly in the dense forest to the east of Vanderwood, so there were trees and bushes right outside the windows, as if they wanted to hide the modernized old houses.
I had spent a lot of money on the furnishings for this house, because one had to pay for their own interior decoration here.
The wooden floorboards were a cool, matte dark brown, the walls were made of gray or olive-green painted concrete, matching the fabric of the seating furniture. The wooden furniture, black and elegant, in the same elegant Victorian style as the banister of the staircase and as the furniture on the second floor, where the sleeping area and my work space was located.
The wood of all the vintage furniture was engraved with patterns or carved out with floral shapes, and the countless bookshelves were filled with my collections from the local antiquarian bookshop or old scriptures that I had brought back from my expeditions through Europe. Just like all the other souvenirs between the black candles and books, which were scattered everywhere and already piled up on the table next to the olive-green velvet armchair by the fireplace.
Under normal circumstances, I was very organized, but in the last few weeks, everything had changed.
The house was full of plants, some of which even grew out of the shelves and past the dark olive-green floor-length velvet curtains of the window, which were pinned to the side with gold cords. Some plants grew wildly out of the built-in holders for plants on the bookshelves.
In combination with the dark furniture and the old iron chandeliers, the birds of paradise flowers, bonsai, philodendrons, and many other plants created a dim atmosphere that – especially on evenings by the fireplace or when I worked by candlelight at my desk – gave me the feeling of living in my own world.
My kitchen was my second favorite place in the house. It was adapted to the style of the interior, with high ceilings, a spacious work area, and old-looking, modern, refurbished black wooden furniture that was also carved. The furniture against the walls had doors with glass windows decorated with iron ornaments.
I quickly packed everything into my leather shoulder bag before leaving the house.
A stone staircase, decorated with large stone balls and stone pots for further plants, which every house here had, led me down to the gravel path.
The house itself was nestled in a picturesque setting, surrounded by old trees, as if it were part of the forest. Its characteristic facade showed visible half-timbering, already infested with ivy and tendrils on the lower facade. The protruding windows, adorned with leaded glass, cast soft shadows on the stone cladding, enveloping the house in a timeless elegance. It had a steep roof with carefully laid black slate roof tiles that shimmered in the sunlight, as well as towering gables and a massive oak door made of fine wood.
Comedy Funny Music
Gold-Tiger
I hurried along the gravel path through the small grove, but I didn’t get far before something bright trotted across the path in front of me.
A dog.
Ten feet from the small creature – which on closer inspection turned out to be a golden retriever puppy – I stopped, looked around for a possible owner, but only spotted a married couple of professors who lived three houses down from mine. They had three aggressive cats that had chosen my window, of all places, to either scratch out their eyes, hunt ravens or mate loudly in front of it at three in the morning.
Sighing, I turned back to the puppy.
The little one spotted me and came trotting over, but it was only at this moment that I noticed that he was limping.
He sniffed at my shoe, then looked up at me and sat down, only to tilt his head.
“Hey, little guy...” I said, squatting down, scratching his warm chest and letting him lean against my hand. “Did you get lost?”
He tilted his head again.
Someone could have abandoned him, and once the thought entered my mind, it was too late. Sympathy spread in my chest and I lifted the dog’s paw. Blood was sticking to the velvety fur.
“What did you do?” I sighed, cursing the people who would abandon a helpless puppy in Blairville, left to survive on its own. It reminded me of my second foster family...
My jaw tightened, and I pulled the dog up, but he wriggled.
Maybe I was wrong, and he had simply broken out, but I couldn’t leave him here alone. Not like this.
The wriggling became more intense, probably because he was in pain.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, took out the syringe, which was actually dosed for a fully grown human, and injected the dog with an eighth of it, hoping that it wasn’t too much.
He lost consciousness within five seconds.
It was the only way I could take him with me, even though I didn’t know what to do with him. Out here, he was food for what lived in the woods. And, the way his leg looked, he wouldn’t get far.
The Room of Hidden Things
Alexander Horowitz, Hogwarts Legacy
The dog had slept in my bag during the Greek mythology seminar and my colleague, Sarah, had almost discovered him if I hadn’t pulled the bag under the table in time.
Now he was lying on a cushion in my office, slowly waking up, which eased my concern that the dose might have overwhelmed his nervous system.
He raised his head with fatigue, his injured paw shaking.
I took off my glasses, rose and crossed the office to kneel down next to the little dog.
“Okay, I haven’t done this in a long time...” I sighed and reached for the bowl, took off the ring and dipped my fingertips into the water.
I could use Umbra, but I still needed that kind of energy for the experiments tonight, and I wouldn’t take more than one dose a day. So, for better or for worse, there was no alternative to this. Hopefully it would work, and I wouldn’t break the dog’s leg.
I carefully placed my fingers on the injured area and the dog began to squeak.
“It’s all right...” I tried to calm us both down and felt deep into my body.
I let the energy come, let it flow through my veins.
The dog squealed loudly, and I pulled my hand away. The paw was still trembling.
Cursing quietly, I ran my fingers through my hair.
What had I expected? The last time I had healed someone had been my first foster mother after she had cut her finger. She had been so disturbed that I had come to my next foster family a week later and had learned that humans knew nothing of our elemental magic.
I was lucky that the woman hadn’t reported anything to the youth welfare office, but had kept quiet, because every youth welfare office also had a Quatura who made sure that supernatural children were brought to the Councils immediately. And I don't just mean Quatura babies. By now, I was sure that they were also responsible for all the missing Senseque children.
I patted the puppy’s head, and it immediately snuggled against my arm. I forced myself to take his paw in both hands again, but this time I placed my fingertips and his leg in the bowl.
I closed my eyes, felt inside myself and tried to remember the feeling that my mother had taught me to manifest when she had taught me my element.
I narrowed my eyelids, because it was difficult for me to evoke these distant memories and not to overshadow them with emotions of sadness, because automatically I had images of Dylan in my head, watching Mama and me with a fascinated expression.
“You need to focus on the fluids. Your element and the fibers in the body of the one you want to heal.”
Mama had been so patient.
I pressed my lips together and breathed heavily.
The dog yelped, but this time I felt not only my magic, but also the dog’s blood.
“Come on...” I whispered tensely.
Energy flooded through my warming fingertips. Then I felt pure warmth.
I opened my eyes and looked down at the paw, carefully cleaned the blood off and searched under the wet fur for the wound.
It was almost completely closed.
Euphoria flooded through me, but didn’t last long, because the water in the bowl began to rise in uncontrolled drops, and suddenly it shot through the entire room.
I got splashed and immediately put the ring on, cursing.
To make matters worse, my phone started ringing.
“Yes?” I said quickly, trying to calm myself by running my hand through the soft dog fur.
“Quentin.”
When I recognized the voice of my boss, I rose and went to the window.
Comedy Funny Music
Gold-Tiger
“Aww, look!” I heard one girl say to her three friends as they passed us, and I was grateful that her gaze was not on me, but on the dog, who was happily running in front of me and chasing one of those black butterflies that seemed to only exist in Blairville.
Even if his wound still had to heal internally, the closing of the wound seemed to affect the little one’s well-being.
“Oh, how cute...” another girl in the group said, and she stopped, which the dog saw as an invitation to run to her, sniff her and let her pet him.
“Alyssa, we’re not getting a dog!”
I toyed with the idea of giving the dog to the girls, but when I noticed the flirtatious gaze of the other three girls on me, I lost the desire to approach them at all.
The fourth girl sighed, rose to her feet and followed the others, while the dog continued to run alongside me as if he had already gotten used to me.
Great... Now I had a dog stuck to me.
“Oh my God!” a female voice rang out and the dog jerked its head up. “Buddy!”
The dog charged off in the direction of the call and I stopped, looking around the campus path.
Office Talk
Christopher Tyng
When I spotted the braided platinum blonde hair that belonged to the fragile-looking girl in the Vanderwood uniform, I stopped abruptly.
She didn’t notice me, but bent down to greet the playful puppy that threw itself at her as if they belonged together.
Realization dawned on me.
Oh, fuck. This couldn’t be true.
What if she had a camera hidden in the dog’s fur and intentionally hurt him so that I would take him in?
I wanted it to be true, because the image of her petting this dog as if she cared about it didn’t match the image of Julie Blair, who had embarrassed me in my seminar classes, broken into my office, and was one of those people.
“Where the hell have you been?” she laughed, and I didn’t like the fact that her laughter sounded pleasant and brought back memories inside me that had nothing to do with her . “I was worried sick...”
I narrowed my eyes, annoyed at this unfortunate coincidence, but didn’t move from the spot.
“That’s your dog?” I shouted across the short distance.
She jumped up and dragged the dog up with her, immediately dirtying the white sleeves of her blouse with paws that were still wet from the sidewalk.
Julie’s eyes were full of horror.
And only now did it occur to me that she might have thought I was going to harm her.
But with all the stress caused by the experiments I had been doing over the last few weeks, I had completely blocked her out. And it was only now that I remembered that I hadn’t seen her at all for the last few lessons.
Even that had slipped my mind, because J had taken over everything in my head, occupying my mind in every possible way.
Julie looked around with that innocent, though barely interpretable look – that I hated so much because it hid deceptively well what she really was –, before staring at me one last time, wrapping her arms tighter around the dog and finally turning to disappear behind the nearest building.
Damn it . Now she was gone. But what could I have done?
Every time I planned how I would act if I met her; that I would erase her memory with Salma at some point, but every time I missed the opportunity.
And the fact that the dog had been her dog had unsettled me so much that it was still bothering me when I had already arrived at the professors’ accommodation.
Suspenseful Investigation Piano
RealTunesStudio
It wasn’t until I reached my front door that I was snapped back to the present. By the sharp sound of a blade cutting through the air.
Fwhip.
Clunk.
I backed away as a knife pierced my wooden door and spun around instantly.
At that moment, a sharp pain shot through my left shoulder.
“What the...” I gasped in pain and looked at the knife in my shoulder. Blood stained my pastel blue shirt and crept down to my gray vest. Then the biting pain intensified, and I staggered back with my hand on my shoulder. “Fuck!”
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to dull the pain with Umbra, but I didn’t even get a chance because someone rushed to me and yanked the knife out of my shoulder.
My shoulder went rigid with a burning contraction.
I groaned.
“Nice little house, Quentin,” I heard my attacker joke, and as I bent over, looking up in stabbing pain, I spotted the Ruisangor from the bar.
Miles DeLoughrey.
He was inspecting my house with interest, polishing the blade with a black piece of fabric as if he hadn’t just shoved it into me.
“ Fuck!” I squeezed out again under the next wave of pain. “You hit me.”
Miles looked at me as I straightened up in alarm and staggered backward.
He grinned. “I hit when I want to hit...”
“Why…?”
Before I could finish the question, I found myself slammed into my front door, in Miles’s stranglehold.
“I could ask you the same.”
Miles’s hint of humor was gone.
“Seriously?” He pushed me against the door, laughing coldly, not choking me, but his grip was firm. “‘Come on... Did you think I couldn’t put two and two together?” He glared at me fiercely. His jaw was working. “What have you done to me?” He fixed me with his gaze and his eyes began to glow. “What’s a guy like you hiding?”
Damn . He had found out. However, he had done that. The dosage must have been incorrect.
Now he was angry, and I had only one chance to get rid of him.
“I don’t see how that’s any of your business!” I forced out.
“You should have thought about that before you rammed a fucking needle into my neck,” he grumbled unenthusiastically.
“Okay, okay,” I began, lifting the bloody hand from my shoulder, although I would have liked to have kept it pressed on the badly aching wound. I grimaced in pain. “Let go of me, and I’ll tell you.”
“I’d like to believe you, but your other hand is too close to your pocket for that.”
I gritted my teeth.
I was finished. I had been too careless, and now I was paying the consequences. All because I couldn’t get a woman out of my foggy head. And I knew I would never get J out of there.
“Fine,” I murmured, unhappy with myself. “You win.” I raised both hands, but prepared to let go, because another wave of pain shot through my entire arm. “I needed a blood sample from a Legacy Ruisangor.”
Miles eyed me, seemed to be waiting for the whole truth, but he wasn’t going to get it.
“It’s nothing personal.”
“Damn it, you drew my blood?!” He let go of me and turned to walk across my stone porch and started... laughing? “What the fuck are you, running around ramming needles into people’s necks?” He laughed like he was the maniac and not me. “And don’t tell me you’re human.”
Great, Quentin. Really great. When had I become so careless and negligent?
“If I tell you my reasons, you have to keep it to yourself,” I said impatiently, putting my hand back on my injured shoulder.
I felt pathetic.
“I wouldn’t make demands in your position,” Miles laughed and leaned against the support of the canopy, continuing to polish his knife.
I sighed and suppressed a pained groan.
“I’ll get you a drink.”
Miles looked up. And the grin returned.
“Now we speak the same language.”
Fire
Two Feet
I blamed it on the dizziness the pain had caused in me that I’d let the guy bandage my arm. I hadn’t been able to use Umbra in front of him, so I’d been forced to put myself through this torture.
He hadn’t been merciful, and I had been forced to resist taking him out from ambush.
You couldn’t get rid of a DeLoughrey. I would have to forget about all my chances of scientific discovery through the DLSC, maybe even leave town. And even then, some crazy immortal would probably find me and have his fun with me.
And so, I was forced to come up with something, maybe a contract?
I emptied the whiskey glass and grimaced at all the unpleasantness of the last few weeks.
Miles scrutinized me.
We were sitting in my living room area.
“So, you’re the epitome of a mad scientist who does forbidden things, all in the name of science,” Miles laughed, amused, as if this were a game.
I had told him about the genetic experiments.
At least it was half the truth.
“Let me guess, it’s still not working out with the love life?”
I raised my eyebrows.
“I didn’t invite you in to talk about that,” I murmured.
“All right, Romeo,” he laughed, raising both hands before he rose to his feet with his half-filled whiskey glass and strode past the fireplace to one of the arched windows. “Then watch your Juliet escape.”
I grimaced.
Juliet.
“Please don’t call her that,” I sighed, realizing with a sense of disappointment that my glass was empty. I resisted the urge to pour myself a refill. “Her name is J.”
“J...” Miles thought aloud and turned to me with a wink. “Well, then maybe I’m not completely wrong.”
I had often thought that her name might not be J at all. But Julia? God damn me if she shared even a hint of a name with someone who was a thorn in my side.
“Listen,” Miles said, turning back to me. “I’ll forget about that unfortunate incident.” He let his fingers wander over the old vintage globe in the corner of the room, letting it spin, and I tried for the twentieth time to block out the fact that this guy was touching everything here. “But not just like that.”
I leaned back, resting my head on the back of the couch, the strands of my light matte blonde hair slipping out of my forehead.
“What do you want, Miles?”
I didn’t even try to hide my frustration.
I had thought the DeLoughreys were responsible. David, I was sure, would have already reported me to the DUIO at the DLSC and probably the DUIO, with Bastien DeLoughrey in the lead, would have personally dragged me out of here.
But this young man here didn’t seem to be acting in the interest of his family.
“The Copelands don’t want me on their football team.”
I raised my head and looked at him in surprise.
“I’ll get you in,” I said.
If that was his demand, I wouldn’t say no .
I hadn’t missed that contest between him and the Copelands on the big campus lawn. And I was still fascinated by how that Senseque girl had managed to knock him down. I would pay a fortune to be able to do research on a female Senseque.
“And...”
I sighed.
Of course he had a list. Did I look like fucking Santa Claus?
I leaned forward, propping myself up on my knees.
“I want to be your partner.”
I raised my head.
“My what?”
“Life on this campus is boring. You seem like a cool guy, even if you are a bit weird.” Miles spread his arms as if the offer of a lifetime was about to come. “Listen.” He came back to the couch and squatted down in front of me. “This partnership is mutual.” I stared at him grimly. “That means you can expect things from me, too.” He rose and began pacing the area again. “It’s always good to know a DeLoughrey.”
“Of course...” I murmured unenthusiastically.
How could I have thought it was exhausting to have a puppy on your hands when there was Miles DeLoughrey, who seemed to have a lot of growing up to do.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” Miles said, strolling toward the front door.
I jumped up.
“Wait! You can’t just…”
“Yes, I can,” he interrupted me and opened the door. “After all, you want me to keep your little secret from both DUIO and the Quatura, and to forget that you’re using my blood for your shady little experiments.”
He smiled mischievously, and I suppressed the urge to smack him, but ran a hand over my face.
He couldn’t be fucking serious. I wasn’t working with anyone because I couldn’t trust anyone...
I eyed him and some naive voice inside me, telling me that I might need the advantages of such a partnership sooner or later, made me nod.
Remorsefully, I pursed my lips.
“Nah,” Miles laughed and slapped me on the shoulder. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to say No .” A hell of a pain twitched through my arm and I groaned. “Sorry, mate.” He slapped my other shoulder. “I forgot there was something.”
“I’m not your mate!” I gritted out, but he was already strutting, light-footed, down the stone steps and moving away.
“Have a nice evening!” On the sidewalk, he turned to me one last time. “Oh, by the way, there’s a package at your door.”
Who We Are
Hozier
There really had been a package on my doorstep.
Now I sat in the armchair in front of my fireplace, staring at the beautifully chosen hardcover collection of legends about Medusa.
My hands trembled as I pulled the letter out of the first page.
She had written one to me.
My heart pounded wildly against my chest, hungry for her words, for a sign that she existed out there and was not just a hallucination.
Dear Erik,
I’m sorry.
These are the words that go through my mind every night when I bury my head in my pillow and can’t text you because I destroyed our friendship.
I’m sorry I ran away, that I toyed with your feelings, and I hope you suffer less from it than I do.
You mean a lot to me, so much that I can’t bear you to waste your time on someone like me, because I can’t give you what you deserve.
I don’t deserve your attention, I don’t deserve that your words, your smile, and your affection give my heart the warmth that I lost some time ago.
You deserve someone who can give you everything back. Everything.
You will always have a place in my heart. But never one in my broken world.
Thinking of you,
J
Not until a tear dripped onto the page did I realize I was crying.
“No...” I whispered hoarsely and squeezed my eyes and lips together, holding on to her letter as if someone could take it away from me, as if it could slowly vanish into thin air, just like J’s presence did.
The pain became more and more unbearable until I jumped up and threw the damn whiskey glass into the fireplace.
The glass shattered, the flames flared up, and I stormed across the first floor, pacing back and forth. “No!”
She was suffering. She was fucking suffering! And yet she gave up on us just like that! Damn it, she hadn’t broken anything. Me... It was me! I had destroyed this by asking her. It was my fault, and it was my world that was broken!
Cursing, I stopped myself from tearing the piles of books off the commode and throwing the Trojan horse into the fireplace as well.
She was suffering, damn it! And it was all my fault. I didn’t deserve to wear a ring with her initial engraved in it...
With a face contorted in pain, I slid down the bookshelf with my back.
Damn it, why was she suffering!? Why was she doing this to herself? Why did she blame herself? What was it that was making her life a living hell?
I just let the tears come, let myself be overcome by the overwhelm and despair.
All my pain was deserved. But not hers.
I wanted to take her pain, wanted to be there for her, to hold her and take her into my arms, to protect her from the darkness of this world.
I slammed my head against the shelf behind me, as if all worldly pain would silence the one in my chest.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out J’s silver bracelet, clasping it with shaky fingers, trying to focus on it instead of focusing on all these grueling thoughts.
My gaze lingered on the tiny silver plate on the bracelet.
Silvers & Golds
My breath caught in my throat.
That was the name of a jewelry store in Blairville.