Chapter 9
Ilie on the bed, listening to the creaks and groans of the old house.
The days have blurred together, marked only by the cycle of light filtering through my window.
Hunger gnaws at my empty stomach, but I can’t seem to care.
The only reason I’ve gotten up is to use the restroom and sip water from the bathroom faucet.
Sleep comes in nebulous fragments. Sometimes I jolt awake certain I've heard footsteps outside my door. Other times I drift in that space between consciousness and dreams, half-expecting to see Joel standing over me, ready to drag me home.
Which would be worse? The devil I know or the one I don't?
I've thought of escaping, of course. The window overlooks a short drop to a sloped section of roof, then a manageable jump to the ground.
But beyond that lies the forest that, according to my captor, is filled with things more dangerous than him.
It could be a lie, but knowing the supernatural apparently does exist is enough to keep me from taking my chances.
I've traded one prison for another.
At some point yesterday—or was it this morning?—I thought I heard the bedroom door open. Gentle footsteps approached the bed. I kept my eyes closed, my breathing steady. What was the point in facing him? If he'd decided it was time to kill me, there was nothing I could do to stop it.
But the footsteps had retreated, and the door closed again.
Tonight, the hunger finally forces me out of bed and downstairs as the smell of garlic and onions wafts upstairs.
I’ll have to face him, but his offer of making a bargain has been tugging at my mind, making me wonder what he could possibly want from me. I have nothing to offer except my soul, and that’s already damned, I’m sure.
The stairs creak under my feet, and I pause once I reach the landing to take in the space.
To my right is the living room. A brick fireplace flickers with low flames, surrounded by plush armchairs and a leather sofa, and a massive picture window stretches along the facade wall.
Beyond that is another room with an open door, though I can’t see what’s inside from here, and there’s a hallway parallel to the staircase leading toward the back of the house.
To my left is a small dining room with a simple circular table.
I take a deep breath and walk that way, toward the sound of something sizzling in a pan.
The kitchen is to my left, in the same space as the dining room, though there’s an L-shaped countertop that serves as a partial separator for the rooms.
He—I still don’t know his name—stands at the stove, stirring something in a pan. As soon as I step into view, he glances up.
“I was wondering when hunger would finally drive you downstairs,” he says casually, as if I haven’t been wasting away in that bedroom for days.
I remain still, uncertain whether to advance or retreat. My heart pounds in the same way it would when I was confronting Joel, but at least I knew what to expect from Joel. This man is a complete mystery.
“Your food’s going to get cold if you stand there all night.”
I realize he’s plating food for both of us, and I’m still frozen in place.
“Why would you cook for me?” I ask.
“People are generally easier to deal with when they’re not starving.”
I want to ask him why it matters if I’m starving or not, but when he brings the two plates from the kitchen to the dining room table, I can’t help but salivate.
“Sit,” he says.
I hate myself for obeying.
But the plate of pasta with a thick, red sauce is too tempting to refuse. I stare at it for a moment with suspicion as he walks back to the kitchen and returns with a glass of water for me.
“It's not poisoned,” he says, seemingly reading my thoughts. “That would rather defeat the purpose of keeping you around.”
I lift the fork but hesitate. His lips quirk into that unsettling half-smile. “Don’t worry. If I wanted you dead, I would’ve killed you already.”
Asshole.
I take a tentative bite. The flavors are incredible, a combination of basil, garlic, onion, and a handful of Italian spices that I can’t quite identify. Before I know it, I'm devouring the food, barely pausing between bites.
I don’t know if it tastes so amazing because I’m so hungry, or if he really is that good of a cook.
He eats as well, sitting across the table from me and studying me with curiosity. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I’m grateful for proof that he’s not some blood-drinking vampire.
“My name is Ambrose, by the way,” he says suddenly.
I look up from my nearly empty plate, stare at him for a second, then take a sip of water. I’d tell him my name, but he obviously already knows it. He probably knows everything about me.
“I’m sure you have some questions,” he says when I don’t respond.
I nod.
“Ask away.” He waves his hand casually, as if he’s preparing to tell me about his favorite color and what his hobbies are.
Questions whirl through my mind, but one sticks out above the rest.
My pulse hammers through my veins.
“You said you’d let me live if we made a deal. Have you decided what you want?”
His lips stretch into a smile.
“Actually, I have.”
Panic sets in, even as Ambrose leans back with his arm draped across the back of the chair, like this is some sort of casual business negotiation rather than a supernatural bargain for my life.
“Well?” I ask in a shaky voice. “What is it?”
Despite his nonchalant posture, he stares at me with unnerving intensity. “You're going to help me live longer.”
My brow furrows. “What do you mean? How?”
He takes a sip of water, forcing me to wait for his response.
“I told you before that taking humans’ lives adds to my lifespan. So, you’ll be taking lives for me.”
I recoil from the insinuation. “You want me to kill people?”
“Not exactly.”
My confusion only increases as I wait impatiently for him to explain.
“It doesn’t technically require you to kill. Only to be near someone at the moment of their death.”
“How does that even work?”
He reaches into the collar of his shirt and pulls out a necklace. It’s a thick, silver chain with an onyx pendant that’s carved in the shape of a raven. The small object carries an energy that ebbs with invisible power, seeming to absorb the light around it.
“This is what allows me to channel the ability to take someone’s remaining years. It’s a sort of conduit for my power. This pendant will absorb what remains of one’s natural lifespan when they die.”
“What do you mean by ‘natural lifespan?’” I ask, making air quotes with my fingers.
My hands shake slightly, and I quickly lower them when Ambrose’s gaze catches on the gashes along my forearms. I had taken off the bandages earlier today to examine the healing, but I’d forgotten about needing to have the stitches removed next week. But that’s a problem for future me.
“That’s where it gets complicated. I’ve had to figure it out the hard way, but I’ve had a lot of time to do so.
Essentially, it’s dependent on how long a person would have lived before dying a ‘natural’ death.
For example, if you decided to kill a thirty-year-old with a terminal illness who’s on hospice care, you’d likely get a few months, maybe a year at most, because the illness is his ‘natural’ death. ”
“However, if you have a thirty-year-old who just got in a car wreck, but otherwise would have naturally lived until he was one hundred, you'd get about seventy years out of him. Does that make sense?”
I swallow around the knot in my throat. “Yes.”
He takes another bite of his pasta as my stomach turns.
“Next question?” he prompts, like we’re playing a trivial game of twenty questions.
What kind of cruel monster can talk so flippantly about murder like this?
He may not call himself a demon, but I’m still not fully convinced he isn’t.
His presence charges the air like a brewing storm, and his detached demeanor only heightens the unease weighing on my shoulders.
My curiosity spurs me on despite the horror welling inside of me. “How do you know how much time someone has left?”
“You don’t.” He shrugs, rolling the small black pendant between his thumb and forefinger.
“I don’t have the ability to predict a person’s lifespan any more than a normal human would.
It’s generally a bit of a guessing game.
I do, however, get a general sense of it once they’ve died and I gain the remaining years. ”
“That’s terrible.” I don’t bother to hide my disgust.
“It’s the way things go.”
“So what keeps you from just sitting in a hospital or nursing home all the time? People die in those places constantly.”
“If someone dies of old age, then I won’t get any life from them, so visiting nursing homes is usually pointless. And hospitals are terribly depressing.”
“Oh, so you’d just rather stalk suicidal women instead?
I’m sure that gives you all the warm, fuzzy feelings,” I scoff.
But alongside my sudden outburst, my stomach twists with immediate fear and regret.
I haven’t spoken to anyone like that in years, and, on autopilot, my body tenses, waiting for the inevitable disproportionate retaliation to me speaking out of turn.
But Ambrose doesn’t yell or threaten me. He simply raises an eyebrow and studies my expression before saying, “I didn’t kill you, yet I easily could have. I gave you an escape, didn’t I?”
“You tricked me!” I argue, emboldened to speak up for myself now that I know his anger isn’t so easily triggered. “You made me think I was losing my mind, then gave me hope when I was at rock bottom.”
“All of which came from assumptions that you made. I simply watched you then provided you with an alternative place to go. You seem to be the one assigning frivolous meaning to those things.”
I hate him. I fucking hate him. I know I can’t possibly make him understand how devastating all of this has been for me, but his total indifference stings all the same.