Chapter Two
Kara
Mom and I sat beside the bed as Dad slept. I paid close attention to the rise and fall of his chest. Fading wasn’t dying. Dad was about to disappear—as if he’d never existed—but I still waited for the moment his breathing stopped instead.
Mom laid her head down on the bed with her hand on his chest.
“You can rest,” I told her. “I can watch over him.”
She sat up, rubbing her face as I munched on my snack.
“How hungry are you? You need food, don’t you?”
My hunger pangs were insistent. The Slim Jims kept my curse calm, but there was a pressure niggling beneath the surface of my skin. Plus, I had a headache.
“If you can materialize something for me, that would be great,” I admitted.
“It’s getting harder to materialize food from the human world. I’ll make something while you stay with your father,” Mom said, standing.
“I can do it—”
“Nonsense.” Mom smiled. “More than anything, I could use the normalcy.” Her expression cracked, and worry pinched her brows. “You haven’t brought it up.”
She must have been referring to the bomb Nova dropped on us earlier about the Devil.
“What do you want me to say?” I asked.
“It’s going to be okay.” The words sounded like a lie.
I opened another Slim Jim. “Could it be true?”
Instead of lying again, she whispered, “Anything is possible.”
Mom walked around the bed and hugged me. “Let’s not think about the Devil. No matter what the curse made him to you, he can’t be your mate. He only wants one thing, and it’s the same thing Harvest wants.”
I swallowed disappointment. I had accepted, even anticipated, finally having a mate like my siblings.
The idea of someone out there meant for me had once been lovely.
Exciting. Thinking about being loved, cared for, and maybe having a bunch of kids running around the house always felt like a dream to me.
How could my marked mate be the creature who cursed us? Who hated my family?
Hades, what would the Devil think if he knew?
In my daydreams, I used to imagine planting a huge kiss on my lover’s lips when I finally met him. But now, I realized those hopes would remain exactly that—hopes. Dreams, not reality.
Instead, I’d make it my mission to see how far I could throw him when he tried to walk through that portal into the human world. If I didn’t get my happy ending, then he sure as hell wouldn’t get his.
He could rot in Hell.
But… there was no way, right? A person’s fate could be cruel—but this?
The idea of the Devil having a mate was ludicrous.
A paper floated onto my lap. I scooped it up.
“This is life. Goodbyes are a part of it.”
I crumbled the paper, ignoring Shadow’s cruel words. Not even my oldest companion knew how to be kind. Why would I expect fate to be fair to me?
“The Devil wants you dead.”
I jumped at my dad’s raspy voice.
Leaning forward in the chair, I said, “You’re awake.” I reached for his hand and squeezed it—more for my comfort than his.
“Listen to me, Kitty,” Dad said sternly.
“The Devil wanting us dead is old news,” I muttered. “He’d love to be rid of us.”
“No, you’re different.” Dad shook his head.
I smiled, arching a brow. “Because I’m his marked mate.”
Dad’s face pinched, and he looked pained by the idea.
“It would make sense,” he said.
“How so?”
“He’d rather see you dead than accept the idea—” Dad coughed.
I stood quickly and said, “Relax. We don’t need to talk about this.”
“We do,” he blurted. “You’re not safe. I can’t protect you when I’m gone.”
I rubbed my fingers across his forehead. “Then stay.”
“You know it doesn’t work that way.”
“I’m not weak. I know you think I am, but I’m your daughter.”
“Let your brothers keep you safe,” Dad said, his voice cracking as he closed his eyes. “It’s better if you don’t go near him. The Devil would waste no time in ending you when you’re mortal.”
“Dad, that’s all of us,” I pointed out. “Of course he’d want to end those in his way. I know how to be careful.”
Dad was the one making the least sense. If I was the Devil’s mate, so what? Nothing changed. He still wanted to destroy our family.
“I’ve feared what he might do to you for so many years,” Dad continued.
I frowned. “Huh? What do you mean?”
“More than once, he came to the woods after the curse. I’d always find him near you.
I never understood why, but I assumed it was to kill you.
The Devil must have figured out what you were to him long ago.
Knowing him, he probably wanted to end you out of spite.
The idea of having one of my daughters as a mate must torture him. ”
“You kept a closer watch on me all this time because of him?”
Suddenly, everything made more sense. That was why my dad hovered over me most of my life. Just another reason to despise the Devil.
Dad met my gaze, something hardening in the depths of his eyes. “If the Devil is your marked mate, it’s not the same for you as it is for your siblings. Do you understand?”
“I do,” I promised, as a pang shot through my heart. “Mine’s not a happy ending.”
“Kara…”
It was rare for my dad—or anyone in the family—to call me anything other than my childhood nickname, Kitty. My name whispered from his lips, sounded remorseful.
“I don’t need a mark to find love,” I said, reassuring him with a smile. “If the Devil truly is my marked mate, I refuse to accept it.”
The lamp in the corner toppled over. Shadows on the walls stretched as the light bulb shattered. I narrowed my eyes. I couldn’t see Shadow, but I knew it was there lingering in the darkest part of the room.
Dad sat up to inspect the falling lamp.
“I’ll take care of it,” I told him, waving my hand. As my power flowed through my fingertips, the lamp rose from the floor. The bulb reassembled itself, and light returned to the room.
Suddenly, a grinning Prudence materialized.
“So, you guys captured Harvest?” Dad guessed, noting her cheeky smile.
“You should visit the boys in the cellar,” Prudence said. “That’s where we took Harvest.”
She met my gaze. “And you need a good meal. Come on.”
“Go on, Kitty,” Dad urged. “Tell your mother I’m down in the cellar.”
???
I was on my third plate of soup when the shadows in the back corner of the kitchen, near the pantry doors, undulated.
Mom, Prudence, and Maureen stood around the kitchen island, never once noticing Shadow’s presence.
It didn’t seem to have one. Reapers could detect anything, could see straight through someone to decide whether they deserved a spot in Heaven.
But even Dad couldn’t sense the thing living within our walls.
I didn’t know what Shadow was. My parents might have been right insisting it really was just something that existed in my head. But I didn’t want to believe it was only my imagination.
Maureen placed a pack of Oreos in front of me. My mouth watered.
“I didn’t think I’d see these again.”
With the human world collapsing, our ability to materialize from their world had been affected.
“Enjoy them. They might be the last ones you ever find,” Maureen said.
“Don’t take from the humans,” Mom scolded. “They need things more than we do.”
“Has anyone peeked into the human world?” Prudence asked. “How much of civilization is going to recover once we end this?”
“Humans are very adaptable,” Maureen replied. “We just have to save something for them to hold onto.”
At least they were talking with certainty. We’d been showing so much vulnerability lately, and I was tired of the depression.
As I opened the pack of Oreos, Mom placed a glass of milk in front of me.
I smiled and said, “Thank you.”
“Spoiled,” Maureen muttered, as if she weren’t the one who stole the cookies for me.
“I’m the only one who can’t materialize food. I need all the help I can get,” I argued halfheartedly as I dunked a cookie, enjoying the normalcy. It wouldn’t last, but thankfully, I knew how to enjoy the good when it came.
“No more fast food or human goods for any of us,” Prudence announced with a sigh.
“I’m going back upstairs,” Mom said, kissing Prudence’s forehead before repeating the gesture with Maureen. “Your father should be back soon, and I want to spend all the time—”
She cut off abruptly, her eyes glistening.
“Well, you know where I’ll be if you need me. Hopefully, the others are taking time to eat and rest while watching Harvest.”
Mom kissed my forehead before fading out of the room.
Fading.
Funny that Dad called our way of transportation fading, knowing that it would also be his fate if the end of everything happened .
“What do we do?” Prudence’s trembling voice made my skin itch. The sad sound made a person want to disappear.
“We hold on,” I said, swallowing down a cookie. “Don’t be upset. Shepherd will sense your emotions and come running.”
Prudence’s shoulders relaxed. “Good. I need him.”
Maureen plopped into the seat beside me.
“More than Dad, I worry about you.”
I dunked another cookie into the milk and met her gaze. “Why?”
She narrowed her eyes. “You know why. If what Nova says is true, you’re in danger—especially as a mortal.”
“You know what’s nice about being mortal?” I said with a grin. “Not having these dang hunger pangs!”
“Kitty,” Maureen warned. “I’m serious. I won’t let the Devil hurt you.”
“If the Devil wanted to, he had years to go after me. I don’t see that changing. If anything, I’ll be his problem. I’m going to stick this size-nine boot in his—”
The glass of milk tipped over. Before I could jump from the stool, the liquid spilled into my lap, soaking me.
“How did you knock it over?” Maureen tsk-tsked me like I was a child.
Before I could answer, my eldest sister materialized a dry pair of jeans onto me.
“Would you go baby Jack instead?” I huffed.
A hunch told me Shadow had knocked over my glass. The pesky thing could make itself invisible, even to me. If it didn’t want to be seen, I didn’t see it.
Its mischievous behavior usually meant it was angry with me, which—honestly—was normal. I irritated it on purpose most of the time. But I had no idea why it was misbehaving now, of all times, when my family was falling apart.
An ungrateful little shade.
“I’m going to my room.” I needed to yell at Shadow.
Maureen grabbed my wrist. “Just be careful, okay? When things go crazy, they go crazy. We don’t always get to be near each other.”
I placed my hand over hers. “I love you, too.”
She rolled her eyes before pulling me in for a hug.
A few minutes later, I was in my room, glaring into the darkened corners.
“All right, you pest.”
It fluttered out like a damned queen, letting its man-shaped silhouette ripple as it crossed its arms.
"It's like you're glad my world is collapsing," I said, throwing myself on the bed. I closed my eyes and exhaled. .
Honestly, it was nice having something to take my frustrations out on. I’d never admit to Shadow that it had saved me from my thoughts more than once. Shadow might’ve stopped if it knew I enjoyed our arguments.
I heard the rustling of paper and opened my eyes. A sheet fluttered in the air above me. When it landed on my chest, I picked it up.
Shadow had written, “Are you afraid?”
Frowning, I sat up . “Why would I be?”
After a moment, it held up another note.
“The Devil,” I read aloud. “Oh, you mean my darling mate?”
Shadow’s form rippled wildly, shocking me with how unstable it looked—as if it had lost control and didn’t know how to reassemble the man-shaped silhouette.
It wrote something again and handed me the paper.
“You should be afraid.”
I shrugged. “The monster should be afraid of me. Look at these guns?.”
I held up my slender arm, fully aware that nothing about me looked tough. But appearances were deceiving. If I got the right grip, I could hold a small house over my head or at least throw a car at the Devil.
I grabbed a Slim Jim from my back pocket as Shadow wrote another note.
“He might not want you.”
I threw my head back and cackled.
“Thank Hades for that! But how would you know? What if he wants me so badly, he’s holding himself back?”
I was trying to make light of the situation. What else was I going to do? Cry? I had to save sorrow for everything else. Once I became sad, I might never dig myself out. I didn’t like the thought.
Another piece of paper landed in my lap.
“You’re not fooling me.”
My chest tightened before I could suppress the cold sweeping through my body. I laughed it off.
“What’s wrong? Are you sad you’re not my mate?”
I shouldn’t have said anything.
My thoughts drifted back to that day again. How could I still remember after all that time?
It wasn’t a man. It wasn’t a man.
Even if Shadow wanted me to believe it was, once.
Shadow stepped closer. As the darkness swept over my cheek, the cool sensation sent a pool of heat into my stomach. I turned my head.
I’d never understand the relationship I had with that blob of darkness ..
One thing was clear despite our confusing relationship. I was happy Shadow had come back, but forever resentful it had dared to leave in the first place.
Shadow wrote, “Go say bye to your father before it’s too late.” Rage flooded my veins. My temples throbbed as I scowled.
“Why do you talk as if I’m losing him?”
I knew exactly why. But I loathed Shadow for not letting me forget.
Shadow’s response came quickly.
“You won’t have anyone to cry to. I won’t be sad. I told you to accept it, but you’re not listening.”
I chucked a pillow at Shadow, and it sailed right through.
“Just go. I want to nap.”