Five to Love Him (Phoenix Immortal: Hive #1)

5. LEOPOLD

five

I ’d paced myself, had only had two drinks, and the way the night was shaping up, that hadn’t been enough.

To get back up to St. Auguste, we took a set of escalators, and the hivelings stood close to me, one on my step next to me, one above, two below. They looked identical, which shouldn’t have come as a surprise, but of course it was borderline uncanny. At least their clothes differed, though all of it was well worn.

“Uh, do I have something on my face?”

“No,” one of them said. “You look handsome,” said another.

“Okay. It’s just that you’re staring.”

Tate and Ezra were staring too, but not to admire my face. They were above us on the escalator and both of them observed with unabashed curiosity.

Finally, the escalator arrived, and we stepped off.

“You go to school here?” one of the hivelings asked. He was looking around at the arrival room. It had benches like a bus station and information screens that showed school news and student announcements—a digital student newspaper of sorts.

While the one hiveling looked, the three remaining ones stared at me expectantly.

“I’m in the Cultural Awareness Program. I accidentally saw a salinian getting it on in the back seat of a cab.”

“Ah,” the four of them echoed. “They venture far on land when the mating instinct takes them, and Newstaten is a popular spot for it.”

“We should probably head home,” Ezra said. “Come on, Tate.”

“What? No, of course we should stay,” Tate said, and I was glad to have befriended him. Tate was definitely the kind of guy who would make sure everyone got home okay, who’d take off your shoes before dumping your drunk ass in bed. Not that I was anywhere near that drunk, although maybe that would have made everything easier.

“No. Nope, we should leave. I mean, sorry, hive, we really don’t want to interrupt you getting to know your…can I say mate?”

I saw the one closest to Ezra shrug. “We have no preference. We don’t mind you staying. Whichever Leo prefers.”

“Okay, cool, then—” Tate started, but Ezra, the fucking traitor, clamped a hand over Tate’s mouth.

“Oh, no. We wouldn’t want to be in the way like that. I mean, we’re friends of Leo’s. Friends, nothing more, you know. Tate here attends class with him, that’s how they first met.” Tate grumbled and glared at Ezra, who was keeping his hand in place. “We’re heading out now, but you guys should definitely talk at the Moonlight Diner. Ow! Fuck, stop biting me, Tate.”

“But—”

“Shut it and move. Trust me. It’s a hive, Leo’s good. Leo, bye! See you around!”

Ezra was practically dragging Tate out of there, which left me awkwardly getting stared at by four identical sets of eyes.

“They’re weird, huh.”

“The oceanic wanted to make sure we understand you are not involved with them,” one of them said. “He might be afraid we’d get jealous.”

I nodded. “Right. Sure. Sure. Oh, fuck, you mean involved as in fucking, and jealous as in murder them?”

At least two of them took a step toward me. “We would murder for you, but only if someone meant to hurt you.”

“Hah! That’s funny.” Not a one of them laughed. “Right?” Not a one. “So, the Moonlight Diner. I could really go for food. You know, food after a few drinks is so nice, and I haven’t really had dinner, just Principal Farrow’s fucking scones, and I ask of you, who eats scones in this day and age?”

“We’ve never had scones,” one of them said. He stepped up on my left as the lot of us moved toward the exit, or rather, the hallways of St. Auguste. “We don’t bake much, but we are a decent cook,” said another one who came up on my right. That one smiled, sort of looking shy doing it, and looked at my hand. “Can we touch you?”

“You mean you want to hold my hand?”

“Yes,” it echoed from four mouths.

“I mean—” Yeah, I’d been about to give them the go-ahead, but then it hit me. I stopped in the middle of the hallway, close to the cafeteria, which was still open for some unfathomable reason, except no, not unfathomable. This was a school for supernatural creatures, and some were exclusively nocturnal. In fact, out of the corner of my eye, I caught a kind of wispy glimmer from the outside, a tendril-fine limb of someone who was bioluminescent and enjoying the night air. Distracted by all these wonders, I had become complacent. “You know what? No, no thank you. And also, I’m not up to going out again tonight. I think I need my beauty sleep.”

“But, Leo,” one of them said though all of them were suddenly there, right in my face.

“Don’t even try.” I heaved a sigh. “Look, I’m not trying to be an asshole, okay? I had a few drinks, and I’m wondering whether I’m set up to make good decisions. I don’t understand what is happening here. Like, at all.”

“You are gleaming,” one of them said. “That’s the way in which we know. In which our kind has always known,” said another. “We see the one we are meant to be with, and they shine. It’s something only we can see, and when we see it, everything becomes clear,” said a third. The one on my left tapped my shoulder lightly. “You shine, Leo.”

“Yeah, okay,” I said. “I shine. That makes total sense. We should talk about this some other time though. I need—I can’t deal with this now.” I pointed at them all. “It’s like seeing double, and I really didn’t have that much to drink, you know? And I don’t mean there’s anything wrong with you being you. It’s just that I wasn’t prepared for this. I need a hot second.”

A crestfallen expression washed over their faces, the black fringes of their hair falling into their eyes as they stood there like puppies drenched in ice water.

“That’s not unreasonable,” one of them finally said. Another one nodded. “We know singulars see the world differently. We look forward to learning more about that, but we understand.” The first one looked outside at that shimmering tentacle thing. “It’s said night anglers are beautiful, as beautiful as they are terrifying. We were always terrified to see our gleaming one, right until the moment we actually did.”

“Thanks. That’s really nice. I mean, nicest thing anyone said to me in a while. I’m still going to go home now.”

All of them looked up and as one, they said, “We should take you.”

“Cab. I’ll take a cab. And it’s not that far.”

The third one on the right pulled a phone from his pocket. “We’ll order one, and we’ll walk you outside. Would you let us invite you to breakfast? It would be our treat of course. And we can take you to the Moonlight Diner so that you feel safe.”

I scratched my head. Yeah, I remembered Instructor Arick’s lessons all too well, how fighting any type of mate bond was frowned upon because of all the friction and despair that led to. It had seemed like over the top, verging on propaganda, even at the time, and Tate and I had joked that the Cultural Awareness Program was probably the name of the thing because they couldn’t call it Mate Recruitment Program, but even so, I never thought anything like this would happen to me in a million years.

Then again, I was unemployed, and a free breakfast was a free breakfast.

I looked them in the eyes, at least two of them. “You can’t come like this, with this many people.”

I could tell that confused them. One of them gave a tentative nod. “You mean you don’t want all of us there.”

“Right. Also to draw less attention, you know.”

They nodded. “Yes. The Moonlight Diner is for mixed company. We know. It opens at six in the morning. Should we meet then?”

I snorted. “Dude. Beauty sleep. I can do maybe ten.”

Two of them said yes, and two nodded along. “We can do ten. We’ll be there. Should we pick you up while we wait?”

“While you…” My half-drunk brain needed a moment to realize there were several of them, and yeah, that meant they could wait and pick me up at the same time. A concept that needed getting used to. “I’m fine. I’ve been there once before.”

The third from the right looked at his phone when the device pinged. “Your cab is here.” Two of them looked around, and one of them said, “We’ve never been here, but let us walk you out. Through there?” Another one pointed at the glass doors that led to the main courtyard, the one primarily used by the students and boarders.

“Actually, it’s that way for the general and mostly human crowd. I can find my own way.”

All of them shook their heads. “We insist.” I saw some fidgeting. “But we will accompany you with one. Is that okay?”

“Fine. It’s only a five-minute walk through creepy hallways, and I’ve seen enough horror movies to know what not to do, but knock yourself out.”

“Show us those creepy hallways,” the one on my left said.

He and I turned toward the foyer while the other three remained standing there, doppelg?ngers waiting for their cue.

“How long have you been studying here?” the hive asked.

“Oh, about a year.”

He looked at me. “Other places have no classes like these. We’re really happy that St. Auguste exists.”

I looked around. The lights were dimmed, but there was enough illumination here for it not to feel too creepy. “What would you have done if I’d just been walking down the street and passing one of you?”

“Hmm. Chased after you. Maybe we would have followed you. Or asked you for your phone number.”

“And what if I’m straight? Did you ever consider that?” I felt somewhat like a hypocrite because I’d never really considered that. People of any gender could be kind of hot. Or not hot at all. I’d always felt like the odd one out because these things just didn’t matter as much to me as they did to everyone else.

The hive stared at me as if I’d grown a second demon head, just like Instructor Arick. “That would make no sense. Why would you gleam if you were not prepared to desire what we have to offer?”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s supernatural logic for you all over again.”

“Are we wrong?”

I scratched my head. “I don’t think so. I mean, I’m probably pan? I haven’t dated much. Or at all. I kissed someone in college, and I’ve considered having one-night stands. I was really busy until I found this world though, and I couldn’t fathom explaining my obsession to someone else. I mean… Let’s just say I didn’t want to deal with that.” There. I could describe myself with words that weren’t basement-dwelling college dropout who’d never lived in a place of his own. Easy.

We arrived at the foyer, and the hive just looked at me. Three steps away from the door, he said, “We don’t really understand, but we would love for you to explain it. Ten o’clock tomorrow?”

“Ten,” I said.

He stayed inside, but I could feel his eyes on me as the automatic glass door opened and I walked into the warm September evening and to the 47 cab waiting at the curb.