Chapter 10 Kai
Chapter ten
Kai
Dropping my notepad and unicorn pencil beside Apollo’s double-stacked mattress, I haul myself upright with a deep inhale only to slump against a wall plastered in punk posters.
“Morning,” Apollo calls from where he’s perched on the kitchen counter, balancing a cup on his knee and looking like a blackbird; all dark features in black ripped jeans and loose band tee, his hair fanning around his face and Forget-Me-Not tattoos scattered across his neck and arms.
“Morning, thanks for letting me crash last night,” I say, rubbing away the sleep blurring my vision so I can better take in my surroundings while nuzzling back into Apollo’s sheets.
Apollo’s flat is one large, open-plan room, showered in light from bare windows and a skylight.
The only division is the bathroom door and mismatched furniture shoved to the edges.
If it weren’t for the painting on his ceiling, sky-blue with the faintest impression of clouds—the skylight a replacement for the sun—it’d feel like an enclosed box.
A calm settles over my frayed nerves. Normally, after yesterday's chaos, I’d crave the order of my own space.
But in the messy, familiar charm of Apollo’s stacks of cassette tapes (which really should’ve been the giveaway he was a fifty-year-old vampire), and his haphazardly organised shoes, I’m finding it easier to breathe than if I’d been alone to ruminate on my thoughts.
“Don’t worry about it.” Apollo hops off the counter, his cup miraculously not breaking when he tosses it into the sink, with a red film clinging to the rim.
My friends casually drinking blood these days is…
well, I definitely didn’t bloody expect it, that’s for sure.
“And I’ve cancelled your clients for today. ”
“What?” I grumble. “You didn’t need to do that, mate. I’m fine. Really.”
Apollo cocks an eyebrow, and from the way my voice wavers, neither of us believes it.
“Yeah, I did, lad. Your head’s all over the place. Give yourself a breather, yeah? Besides,” Apollo grins as he strolls over, feet slapping against the white laminate flooring, “I’m your boss, so what I say goes.”
Anger rises, but I can’t stand against the wave of relief that follows. I love my job, but the idea of interacting with clients makes me want to crawl under the sheets and hide.
So instead of fighting it, I let my eyelids drop and get more comfortable. “Aye aye, Captain.”
“At ease, cadet.”
I drift in a hazy place while listening to Apollo grab his keys and rustling as he slips on his denim jacket. The clacking of cassettes as he searches through them. Soon, I’m not even in my body, or worrying about my stupid heart. Or dealing with the part of myself I want to hack off—the jealousy.
Golden didn’t even want his soulmate. Apollo pretends Rurik doesn’t exist. Why am I the sad sack that gets left behind?
I only realise I’ve been tugging at my hair when Apollo starts speaking again, and I have to force my hand down into my lap.
“I forgot to mention…”
My eyelids creak open to find Apollo hopping up and down, forcing his foot into a black Converse shoe.
“That creepy spellbook appeared outside my door this morning. I chucked it in the freezer,” he tells me, casual as if to let me know we’ve got milk.
“Urgh, so it really is following me. Sorry. Is the smell bad for you? Vidar, erm…Vidar said it stank.”
Vidar’s name is sharp as it leaves my lips, cutting deep enough to taste blood.
But fuck—how I crave every letter.
I avoid pain. I don't even have a tattoo. Yet I love the shape of it, and I’m angry at myself and Fate and Vidar and maybe the whole universe, that some part of me would take the pain every. Single. Fucking. Time.
How I wish I could cut this incessant pull I have towards the big vampire.
“Why do you think I’m going to work so early?” Apollo jokes.
Apollo shoves his keys into his pockets and heads for the door. But doesn’t leave, simply stands there, like he’s waiting for something.
“You alright, mate?”
He lifts a palm, playing with the dust motes trapped in a ray of smoky sunlight. “I’ve…got something to tell you.” His dark, feathery hair spills across his cheeks. “But I’ve forgotten, Kai…I forget a lot. But whatever it is won’t happen now, or for a while. I think, anyway.”
Frowning, I ask, “W-what do you mean?”
Apollo’s downcast gaze stays lost to the light across his fingers. “No idea, just be careful, yeah?”
“Apollo, I know your mind is…Well, I don’t have a clue about your mind. But…” I stand, the white covers pooling at my feet. “But Summer said something about light mages, and you—”
“Kai.”
Gone is Apollo’s normal happy, snarky voice; now it slices out like a cold wind, raising the hairs on my neck and shutting me up faster than if he’d shouted. When he looks at me, expression hard as a gravestone, I see the vampire that’s been lurking there all this time.
His fangs aren’t out, his posture hasn’t changed.
But…
There's a Serbian artist I admire called Dragan Bibin who painted a series of dogs. Watching dogs, waiting dogs, running dogs—always with an undercurrent that gave me pause. Like there’s something beyond the canvas. Something…unsettling.
But I don’t give a fuck if Apollo's barking at me. He’s my friend, and the world might be upside down, but some things don’t change.
I storm over and grab his forearm, shaking him from whatever stupor he’d fallen into. “It’s okay, Apollo. Whatever this is, it’s okay.”
Apollo doesn’t speak or move. Yet his eyes shine with something like guilt, and I wonder if he’s about to cry.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m sorry about the thing I’m forgetting, because I know—” he stops, like waking from sleepwalking and unsure of his next step. Then tilts his head and smiles. “What were we talking about?”
I try to return the smile, but it’s awkward, and I squeeze his hand before letting go. Shit, I have no clue what to do. Summer might know. Or maybe he’s happier this way.
“Not important, mate,” I assure. “I’ll clean up and then head home, thanks again.”
“Any time, Kai.” He grins, big and wide. Only for it to drop when he opens the door to find Rurik leaning against the frame in a poorly lit hallway outside Apollo’s flat. “For fuck sake, not you again.”
“Good morning, Apollo,” Rurik greets, voice soft as cotton. Nothing like the hard glare my friend levels at the man who is his soulmate. Even if Apollo denies it.
How does Apollo not feel the tug of connection towards Rurik like I do with Vidar? Like the moment I laid eyes on Vidar a wound opened in my heart, and the closer we are, the less it hurts. If anything, Apollo wants more distance from Rurik, not less.
“Listen, asshole,” Apollo snaps. “I don’t know you. I don’t wanna know you. So stop bloody following me.”
Rurik only steps away so the little vampire can walk past, faintly amused. “Whatever you want, my star.”
Apollo scoffs, gesturing at Rurik with his thumb as if to say, ‘Can you believe this guy?’ before tugging the door shut. But Rurik presses a hand to it so it stays open, leaning over a bristling Apollo.
“Vidar is sorry about what he said,” Rurik tells me. No hint whether I should forgive him or not.
Crossing my arms and shrugging, I bite out, “Vidar can go fuck himself.”
“Yeah, fuck soulmates!” Apollo cheers, flipping Rurik off with both hands.
“Fuck me, hmm?” Rurik raises a cool eyebrow at Apollo.
Apollo’s eyes widen until I can make out all the deep reds and ambers in his dark brown irises. For long seconds, the two who were separated by years connect, and seem to find each other when Apollo moves forward and whispers, “Rurik…?”
Stunned, Rurik lays an open palm on Apollo’s cheek. “Yes?” he replies, so hopeful even my chest hurts.
I gasp. Is my friend remembering something?
The veil drops, and Apollo rips himself away, hissing like a hostile cat. “I don’t fucking know you, leave me the hell alone! See you, Kai.” And with his head low and shoulders hunched, Apollo stomps away.
I expect to see Rurik hurt. But a smile remains, and while it’s small, the glow which emanates from him is anything but, as he follows behind his soulmate who rose from the grave.
***
I take my time using up all of Apollo’s hot water in his closet-sized bathroom. When I’m dry and dressed, I glance at the fridge, stomach grumbling. Then hesitate at the thought of what sits in the freezer, bile rising in my throat at the idea of food touching the spellbook inside.
“Actually, maybe I’m not that hungry…”
For something I’m apparently connected to, I don’t feel a damn thing for the blood mage tome, unlike with Vidar, where I feel too much, and with that thought my mind takes me back to last night at Vampire Manor.
Not at the stupid shit Vidar said, but to the fire blasting out of the painted purple symbols on my jacket.
I’ve only purposefully used my magic once—in the warehouse with Jace and his lunatic aunt, Emma.
Before that, it was about not burning shit and yet last night it was like I’d been controlling this strange magic my whole life.
Directed without thought but feeling, sure it lasted seconds, but the flames were hot as hell and all mine.
Fuck, it’d felt good.
But what do I do with it now? Learning control, probably. But to what end? At the moment, all it’s good for is the occasional Molotov cocktail and lighting candles to have a potentially dangerous wank.
My thoughts are interrupted by a light, but persistent continuous knocking. One that doesn’t stop even as I shout, “Alright, I’m coming!” I stomp to the door and all but rip the thing off its hinges; however, my annoyance fades the moment I see who’s there. “Teagan?”
“Yo,” Teagan replies. His calm voice is always on the edge of being too quiet, easy to mistake for shyness, which my little brother is anything but.
“What are you doing here?” I blurt. “How did you even know where I was?”