26. Quell
Chapter twenty-six
Quell
W e've spent seven nights in Talon’s seaside house, and I haven’t screamed once.
I don’t know what that means, really. The dreams have always come; sharp, bloody, someone else’s last moments, seen through a killer’s eyes.
But something’s shifted since we came to the beach house.
The visions have gone quiet. Maybe because Talon, Mickey and the curly-haired lady aren't killing any more.
Two stopped because I watched them die; one stopped because I watched him live.
The nightmares' absence is calming. Like the tide pulling back, leaving only smooth, untouched sand.
I dab a little more orange into the gold on my palette and press it onto the canvas, watching the sunset turn the clouds into burning silk. The sky isn’t bleeding tonight. It’s burning gold.
My brush moves steadily and sure, each stroke building something I thought I’d lost, a kind of beauty that doesn’t come with warning, or with death.
Just color, just light. The sea stretches out in front of me, endless and alive, the waves tipped with amber as the sun fades.
Seven days of peace. Seven nights without waking up tangled in sweat-soaked sheets, my throat raw from screaming.
Only the ocean’s rhythm, and Talon’s warm body beside me, solid and certain.
I no longer spend my afternoons forcing myself to the coffee shop for air and human contact. Now I sit on the pier with my canvas and paints, putting the landscape on canvas like building new memories. Painting for no purpose other than enjoyment.
A couple stops behind me. I hear their voices, soft and admiring, but I don’t turn.
I just keep painting, letting their words drift over me like the surf.
This is still new. Being seen, being watched.
Making things people want instead of fear.
Earlier, I sold two small canvases to tourists: a sunrise over the pier, and waves breaking on the rocks at low tide.
Simple things. Beautiful things. Nothing to do with the last twitch of someone’s life.
I never signed my art before, so adding the initials of Talon’s grandmother instead of my own doesn’t bother me.
Rather than autographing my own work, it feels like the family seal of approval.
“That’s gorgeous,” the woman compliments, leaning in. “Do you sell your work?”
I nod, focused on getting the shade right where violet meets orange at the horizon. Her proximity doesn't bother me like it used to. “This one isn’t finished, but I have smaller pieces if you want to look.”
Her husband checks his watch. “We need to get dinner, honey.”
They move on, but others linger. A family with loud kids who point and ask questions.
An old man who stands in silence for ten minutes.
A teenager snapping a photo with her phone, thinking I won’t notice.
I don’t mind. There’s something freeing about painting here, out in the open, with nothing to hide.
No darkness leaking through my hands. Just color and light, and the honest work of turning what I see into something real.
The wind shifts, bringing the smell of salt and fried food from the boardwalk.
I push a strand of hair behind my ear, leaving a streak of gold on my temple.
I don’t bother wiping it off. My stomach growls, reminding me of the lunch Talon packed that I forgot to eat.
Jam sandwiches with the crusts cut off, even though I never told him I liked them that way, fruit in a sealed tub, and a thermos of tea that’s still warm hours later.
Talon packs my lunch like I’m someone worth fussing over.
Like keeping me fed is as crucial as keeping me breathing.
He never says it out loud, but I can feel it in the way he lines up my vitamins every morning, how he stashes water bottles where I’ll stumble over them, the way he watches to make sure I actually eat what he made.
I drop my brush and dig for the empty thermos in my bag, suddenly parched.
The tea is long gone, but Talon slipped in two bottles of water, because of course he has.
One’s already empty. I crack open the other and chug, remembering what he said this morning: “Hydrate. The sun’s stronger than you think.
” He said it while wrapping my sandwich in wax paper.
His hands, the same hands that have ended lives with the kind of precision you read about in crime novels, moving with ridiculous gentleness.
Sometimes the contrast still makes me pause. The killer who counted out my vitamins. The guy who once put a gun to someone’s head without blinking, now folds my laundry while it’s still warm. The precision never changes, just the mission.
I go back to my canvas, moving faster now as the light shifts, violet bleeding into indigo at the edges of the sky. The colors change every minute, each moment a one-off, impossible to redo. I’m painting futures now. Not endings. Every brush stroke is a maybe, not a period.
“That’s coming along well.”
I don’t jump at Talon’s voice behind me. I’ve been expecting him, even if I didn’t hear him coming. I can just feel him, the way you feel a storm rolling in before you see the clouds. I turn, grinning, taking in his casual lean, the way his eyes scan the promenade before landing on me.
“Hey,” I say, wiping my hands. “I sold two today.”
His mouth twitches up at the corner. “I know. I saw.”
Of course he did. Talon notices everything, even when I think he’s back at the house. He never really leaves me alone, not totally. Not yet. But he gives me enough room to breathe, to soak up the sun, to chat with strangers without his shadow looming over every word.
“Have you been lurking this whole time?” I ask, not really annoyed, just curious.
He shakes his head. “Just checking in. Perimeter’s clear.”
Always the security assessment. Always scanning for threats.
Even here, where the biggest danger is sunburn or maybe a splinter from the wooden promenade railings.
He’s dressed down for the beach in faded jeans, a plain navy T-shirt that makes his eyes almost blue in the right light.
No visible weapons, but I know better. He never goes without.
“I’m almost done,” I say, turning back to the canvas. “Just need to catch these last colors before they’re gone.”
He moves beside me, close, a solid warmth at my shoulder.
I feel his hand settle on my back, resting there, gentle and steady, heat seeping through my thin shirt.
He’s been touching me more this week. Less hesitation.
Little gestures, a hand at the small of my back, fingers brushing mine when he passes me coffee in the morning, his arm slung over me as we drift off at night.
The sky deepens, gold bleeding into embers.
I work faster, trying to catch the shift before it vanishes.
Kids run past, shrieking, sand flying from their feet.
From the restaurant across the promenade come the clink of cutlery, low voices blending together.
Just normal sounds. Just life, easy and ordinary.
“You’re getting faster,” Talon says, watching my hands. “More confident.”
I nod, not looking away from the canvas. “It’s easier when I’m not fighting the visions. When it’s just me and what I see.”
What I don’t say is how strange it feels, this freedom.
How I still wake up reaching for a pencil, certain I’ve seen something urgent, something I need to draw before it slips away.
How I still flinch at strangers on the beach, bracing to recognize them from dreams where I’ve watched them die.
How I keep waiting for the darkness to creep back in, for bloody images to claw their way through my hands onto the page.
“Are you hungry?” Talon asks, nodding at my bag with the empty lunch containers.
“I could eat,” I admit. I’ve been painting for hours and hadn’t even noticed.
He nods. “I’ll get us something. Finish up.”
He walks away, and I watch him go. That easy, controlled stride, always alert even when he looks relaxed. He still checks over his shoulder. I wish he’d stop. I want him to walk down this promenade one day and not scan for threats, not plot escape routes, not carry the weight of constant vigilance.
I turn back to my canvas, adding the last touches as the light fades. A woman stops to watch, her face softening as she takes in the scene I’ve made.
"That's beautiful," she says. "You have a real gift."
I mutter thanks, the words clumsy and strange on my tongue.
A gift. Is that what I have? For so long, it’s felt like a curse, the visions, the dreams, the knowledge of deaths I couldn’t prevent.
But here, now, maybe it’s something else.
Something I can control, instead of something that controls me.
She asks about prices, and I name a number that sounds reasonable. She doesn’t even blink. Just reaches for her wallet. A weird flutter goes through my chest. Pride maybe, or just the plain satisfaction of making something someone else wants to keep.
As I wrap the canvas, I see Talon coming back, paper bag in hand.
He pauses at the edge of the pier, watching me finish the sale with that quiet, intense focus he brings to everything.
When the woman walks away with my painting, he comes over, footsteps so soft on the wooden boards I barely hear him.
Just enough to know he’s there, and I’m not alone.
“That's three sales today,” he says, handing me the bag. “You’re going to need more supplies at this rate.”
The bag is warm. Inside is clam chowder and fresh sourdough, still hot. My stomach growls, and I realize how hungry I am, lost in the work.
“I can’t believe people actually want these,” I say, dropping onto a bench and opening the container. Steam rises up, thick and salty, making my mouth water.
Talon sits next to me, thigh pressed close, steady and warm as the air gets colder. “Why wouldn’t they? They’re good.”
I shrug, tearing bread. “They’re just… normal. Pretty things. Nothing special.”
He looks at me, serious in the fading light. “That is special, Quell. After everything.”
I can’t hold his gaze. He’s right. Creating something beautiful after years of recording death, it’s a kind of miracle. I just don’t know how to believe in it yet.
We eat in silence, easy and companionable, watching the last bit of light vanish from the horizon. The ocean turns black, with only the white edges of waves showing in the dark. Tourists drift off, heading for dinner or back to their rentals. The air gets colder, sharper, clean with salt.
“Did you take your medication today?” Talon asks, casual.
I nod, smiling a little. He always checks. Always steady. The anti-anxiety meds were his idea, a way to help with the panic attacks that still hit, even without the visions. I fought it at first, then gave in. They help. He noticed before I did.
“Yes, Daddy,” I say, teasing, using the name that’s somehow turned into both a joke and the truth.
His eyes darken, hand finding mine on the bench. “Good boy.”
The words settle in my chest, warm and familiar, like something I’ve carried for a long time.
This thing between us, it’s sharpened over the last week.
The care, the structure, the way he always seems to know what I need, sometimes before I do.
The way I catch myself wanting to please him, to chase that rare, quiet approval.
Night falls hard, and it’s time to pack up. Talon grabs the easel without a word while I stuff my brushes and paints into my bag. We start down the promenade, heading for the road that winds back to the house. My steps are light, even though my legs ache from standing all day.
A car rolls by, headlights sweeping over us.
I see how Talon tenses, just for a second, his body shifting so he stands between me and the road.
It’s the smallest thing. Most people wouldn’t catch it.
But I’ve learned to watch for those tiny tells, the constant edge, the vigilance that’s kept him alive. That’s kept me alive, too.
“Do you think they’ll ever find us?” It just slips out. I don’t mean to ask, but there it is.
He doesn’t play dumb. “Eventually. Yes.”
Brutal honesty. That’s Talon. No sugarcoating, not when it matters. Not when it comes to danger.
“How long?” I stare at the ocean, black and endless, with no line between water and sky.
“Months. Maybe a year, if we’re lucky.” His hand lands at the small of my back, steering me around a busted plank in the walkway. “We’ll know when it’s time to move.”
I should be scared. Maybe I am, a little. But mostly, I feel calm. Whatever happens, we’ll face it together. The killer and his artist. We found each other in blood and visions. No one’s going to tear us apart.
“I like it here,” I say, voice soft. “By the sea.”
“Then we’ll find another place by the sea,” he says, like it’s obvious. “Farther away. Safer.”
We turn up the path to the house, leaving the lights behind. Above us, the stars come out, way more than I’ve ever seen in the city. The air tastes of salt and pine, the breeze cool on my face.
Tomorrow I’ll start a new painting. Something different. No blood, no endings. Talon will keep watch, check the locks, and scan the beach for strangers. He’ll make coffee, fold laundry, remind me to eat. We’ll fall into that strange rhythm of ours: half domestic, half on guard.
For now, it’s enough. This peace, borrowed and fragile, but real. This connection, unlikely and unbreakable. This moment, walking side by side up the winding path, the waves behind us, and the house ahead, glowing with lights Talon left on for us.
I reach for his hand in the dark, not needing to look. His fingers close around mine, warm and steady and sure.