25. A Bond with the Dark
25
A BOND WITH THE DARK
SAYAH
T he following day, I wake to the sounds of pans banging around and no Dom in my bed.
Rising from the sheets as my heart rate quickens in a soft panic, the sound of Gauge’s giggle echoing up the stairs eases my fears immediately.
I dress and head down there to join them.
“Oh, hey, good morning,” Dominic says as I enter the dining room. “Sorry if we woke you. Little man woke up and wanted pancakes, so I got up and started making some.”
“That’s fine.” I smile, taking a seat on the barstool. “How did you sleep, love?” I ask Gauge.
He’s in the kitchen, helping Dom prepare the pancakes. He has flour on his cute chubby cheeks and is stirring the batter in a bowl on the top of his lap, clad in SpongeBob pajamas. “Good. How did you sleep, Mama?”
“I slept good, baby. Thanks.”
I’m totally in love with the sight of my man and son making pancakes together in the kitchen. Then it dawns on me that this is the first time I’ve ever seen Dom in natural light.
Even though the sun isn’t blazing into the windows yet, as my house is dark in the kitchen, I still wonder how he can stay out of the sunlight completely.
His perfectly sculpted jawline, his chiseled core, wearing nothing but his jeans and muscle shirt as he flips the pancakes. The tattoos that snake his body, his dark, spiky hair, the eyes that are green—for now. The secret that he was burdened with for so long used to drape him like a cloak, and now that I know his secret, his aura is lighter, and his eyes pick up on things that they used to linger on with sadness.
“All right, buddy, here, let me take that,” Dom says, taking the whisk from him and setting it in the sink. “Okay, now, carefully pour a small circle right here.”
Gauge obliges and carefully pours the mixture onto the hot griddle. “Like this?”
“Yes, that is perfect. You’re an amazing sous chef.”
Gauge smiles while pouring another circle, then wrinkles his nose. “What is a sous chef?”
“A sous chef is basically a chef’s assistant. The second in command.”
“Oh, cool, I like that.”
“Yeah, you’re an important pancake maker.” He leans down to whisper in Gauge’s ear, but I can hear him. “Your mom will be the final judge of our pancakes, though.”
Gauge sniggers and continues to pour the fluffy mix.
When the pancakes are done, I sit at the table, Gauge setting my plate down for me that beholds two fluffy golden pancakes with a perfect square of butter.
“Syrup, Mama?” Gauge asks, handing me the bottle.
“Yes, please, thank you, love. These look wonderful.”
“All him,” Dominic says, sitting down across from me.
Gauge remains in his chair.
“How are they?” Gauge asks as I take the first bite.
“Delicious! Perfect, love.”
Gauge smiles and cuts into his pancakes.
Watching Dom slice into his food, I realize that is one question I never asked him.
How is he able to eat real food?
Also, what does he think about when he’s around humans? Is the scent of blood always lingering, and when it is, how hard is it to fight?
I think there’s a section of me that will always be worried about him being so close to my innocent child. But the witchy sense in me tells me he’s safe. Although he’s ruled by dark and blood and danger, he has spent hundreds of years managing it and keeping it under control. From what he told me and what I have already come to realize, he punishes the people who are not worthy of human life, and that’s only when he’ll get his fill of the sweet nectar that gives him life, even though it means he takes it from someone else.
And, like he told me, he doesn’t have to kill to get his nourishment. He needs only to drain enough and veilweave them so he doesn’t have to take it.
After breakfast, I send Gauge upstairs to take a bath, which takes him longer than normal kids as he can’t walk, and it takes some time to get up the stairs.
I draw the bath for him, and when he’s in it, I bound down the stairs to try out the necklace we created.
Dom is ready in wait, still in the house’s shadows but staring out the window in longing.
“So how can you be in a house lit by the sun and not burn?”
“Direct sunlight is what does it. My car has tinted windows, and my house has tapered doubled panes, so the UV light doesn’t get in.”
“Ah. Gotcha. Okay, so how do you wanna do this?”
He caresses the necklace as though it’s his lifeline, his oxygen in an air-stricken environment. “I will have you open the front door, and then I’ll put my hand in. If we see smoke, shut it.”
“Okay. Ready?”
Inhaling deeply, he says, “Yeah, go!”
I put my hand on the door handle, hesitate, then turn and pull. The sunlight spills in and drenches me in its warmth. He walks up, stands behind me, and cautiously pulls up his hand, inching closer to the streak of sun. The tops of his fingers touch the light and don’t burn, then his fingers, then the back of his hand.
No smoke.
“Is it working?” I ask, not knowing what to expect.
Straight flames?
Smoldering?
Explosion?
Slow burning like a marshmallow on a campfire?
When nothing happens, he uses his other hand to move me and steps into the sunlight, one foot at a time.
Nothing.
He looks at me with childlike wonder in his eyes that I have never seen before. Something light and airy that reminds me of a deer in a clearing, eyeing a stream that hasn’t seen water in an eternity.
He puts his hand on the screen door handle and opens it.
Fresh air flows in and kisses us both, but to him, it’s as though the wind has kissed the sweat away after dying in a desert for ages. I can feel that from him, being the empath that I am.
I follow him calmly into the outdoors and watch as he steps into the sunlight for the first time in over two hundred and thirty-six years.
It’s as though I’m watching someone emerging from a dungeon they’ve been in for their entire lives. His eyes squint at first, not being able to handle the light. Although it’s a chilly morning, the apricity touches his skin and caresses it like saying hello to a friend one hasn’t seen after decades apart. At the start, he shields his eyes with his palm, takes his hand away, and looks up at the pale blue sky that’s still dusky with morning. His arms outstretch and he pulls the sunshine into him, the bond with the dark shattering before my eyes.
Pride is brimming within me, and although I haven’t known him for long, my love for him has grown in the past twenty-four hours. What should have made me hate him, leave him behind, and never look back is the very thing that pulls me to him as he’s pulling the sunlight. I am the sunlight in his dark, and while I was willing to be in darkness with him, I’m also willing to fight the darkness in his honor. I want to defend the sun and protect his soul against the moon, even if his soul is drenched with gloom.
Now that I know his secret and know that the entire time I felt the hesitation, the feeling that I was being drawn to him is now known that it’s part of his vampire power; the power to keep me calm, make me feel at ease and take away my worry. But there’s more to it than that. Something deeper draws me to him that’s stronger than hypnotic, but it isn’t him who’s bewitching me. It’s as if the very fibers of my being are pulling him to me instead of his alluring nature drawing me to him. The more I get to know and fall for him, the harder it is to fight, even if there is still an aching doubt that tells me there’s something dangerous about him.
As he basks in the daylight and reunites with the incandescence, I interlace his fingers with mine and share it with him. Even though some of my neighbors are out and about for their morning walks with their dogs, and we probably look pretty strange standing in the morning with our arms out, none of that matters to me.
What matters to me is that he’s embracing the radiant morning with all of him; every ounce of his flesh is reeling in it, and I hope it’s seeping into his soul. The dark clusters of evil circulating about him for hundreds of years are being chased away, and he will leave this moment feeling as refreshed as he could have ever imagined.
“What are you thinking?” I ask him as I turn him to face me.
The soft features of his face that had once been hardened and sad are now relieved with ease; soaking in the sun, he bends down so that he’s at eye level with me. He looks at me like I have brought him water in the desert. “I am thinking that I adore you, Sayah. More than I can explain. You have given me back the light. I cannot tell you what this means to me. You have no idea how many years I’ve spent in shadows.”
“I can’t imagine, Dom. I cannot fathom being without the sunlight.”
“So,” he breathes, taking a step back but still clutching my hands, “The first thing you thought of instead of running for your life was to help me meet the light again? You thought nothing of your life, the danger you are in now, or any of that?”
“I mean, it was all swirling around in there, but mostly, I wanted to help you.”
“You are something that is not of this world, Lasayah Thorne. I do believe you have angel blood mixed with the witch’s.”
The sound of my name on his lips makes it sound surreal. Within seconds, those lips are on mine, and I feel myself fall a little harder for him, a little deeper, even if there is an echo of a doubt that he is my one .
Despite the slight nagging feeling deep within my bones, he will still be an epic love.