Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
Andrew
I’m still pondering whether Noah would actually try to kill me or just maim me, which wouldn’t be that bad, when the gift giving winds down and Sam goes to get the cake.
Noah is carefully packing his presents back into their bags.
Aside from the tablet, Sam got him some new clothes, books, and gift cards to a variety of stores and entertainment sites.
Noah’s excitement didn’t dim at all, not even when he saw the very awful cotton T-shirts. In fact, he even seemed to like them.
Although, thinking about it, that’s not really surprising.
Still, it’s a new side of Noah—a happy side. I could get used to seeing it, although I wouldn’t like him to become nice or anything. There are enough nice people in the world, and let’s face it, they’re not that interesting.
I join him as he scoops up an armful of bags and pick up those remaining.
“Oh. Thank you.” He smiles tentatively at me. It’s nice, but a little weird.
“Where do you want to put them?” I ask.
“In the entryway, against the wall? That way they’re not in the way, I guess.”
I nod and follow him out of the living room, and we stack the bags neatly to one side. “It’s a pretty good haul.”
His head whips around, and he glares at me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Ah, there he is! You know what, I think it would be best if we kept sweet, smiling Noah for special occasions. I like the asshole so much better.
I shrug. “Nothing. Just that you made out well tonight. Especially for someone who never wanted a party to begin with.”
He narrows his eyes. “You’re being a dick on purpose, aren’t you? Screw you. I’m going to have cake.”
Oh, that’s right—there’s cake! I half turn back toward the living room, but Noah grabs my arm.
“You know what? I think I’m going to tell Sam you don’t get any cake. It’s my birthday, and I bet he’ll agree if I say that’s what I want.”
I gasp. “You’re a monster.” Honestly, I didn’t intend for it to come out sounding impressed and admiring, but I’ve got to give credit where it’s due. He knows how to cause maximum pain.
He sneers. “I’m going to enjoy this so much.”
Think quick! What can I offer in exchange for cake? What does he want?
“Want to learn how to do wards?” I blurt.
He stills.
Fuck. I shouldn’t have said that. There’s no guarantee he’d be able to learn.
But… cake. It’s chocolate with chocolate-raspberry buttercream. I asked.
“What do you mean?” he asks, and I mentally kick myself a few times.
“No promises,” I begin, because yeah, I like to tease, but this is clearly important to him.
And I can’t blame him—I never thought before how vulnerable he must feel.
“Wards as we use them in the community are woven by sorcerers with their innate power, but there are humans who have been able to replicate the effects using existential magic.”
He frowns and shakes his head. “What? There are humans who can use existential magic? What does that even mean?”
Wait…
“Has nobody mentioned that to you before? That humans who dedicate effort are able to use the magic?” From the stunned stare, I’m going to guess no.
“Oh. I guess I assumed someone had told you… although Sam didn’t find out for five years, so why would you know after six months?
Uh… we should go talk to Sam. And David.
David will be able to answer your questions. ” I might have just put my foot in it.
Noah follows me back into the living room, a confused expression on his face, and I’m about to lead him straight to David and dump this whole mess in his lap, when Sam calls out from over by the food table. The cake is there, and Sam’s in the process of lighting some candles.
“Cake,” I declare. “David can wait.”
Noah seems like he’s going to protest, but I give him a little shove in the direction of the cake, and he goes along with it.
Possibly because Gideon has stepped up to Sam’s side with a knife in his hand.
I’m guessing that’s to cut the cake with, but part of Noah is probably telling him it’s actually to chase him down with if he dares to upset Sam.
I take advantage of the distraction and dash over to David.
“I might have done something I shouldn’t,” I murmur, leaning close to him.
He sighs. “Of course you did. What is it? Maybe I can fix it.”
That right there tells you everything you need to know about David. If the community had Boy Scouts, he would have been one—and he’d be the adult still volunteering with the organization. You can always count on David.
“I didn’t realize nobody had told Noah humans could use the magic, and I may have let it slip. Accidentally. In a totally unrelated conversation.” That had nothing to do with me bartering for cake.
David scoffs, clearly not believing me, and I’d be hurt, except who are we kidding?
“It’s fine,” he says. “Percy and I have already talked about this. We wanted to make sure he didn’t have any dormant vampire traits first, but then I was going to work with him and see if he could master human magic.
Given the way the magic reacts to him, I think he’s going to find it easier than most. I actually have a theory that he’s already used it without knowing. ”
“What? When? And how?” Is that even possible?
“You forgot where and why,” David teases.
“In the bunker. You’ve heard his story—nobody’s that lucky, Andrew.
The lab tech and guards getting distracted right before it was his turn to get injected?
And then seconds later forgetting that they hadn’t injected him and not noticing he was still alive?
The guards deciding to wait until they’d brought all the bodies down before loading them into the incinerator—and then not realizing one was missing?
And then a year dodging around an enclosed space and never being discovered?
He’s precocious, but trained operatives would struggle to do that.
I think he was so desperate that he formed some kind of bond with the magic and it helped him. ”
Hmmm.
“Why are you frowning?” he asks. “I thought you’d be pleased to know you hadn’t fucked up.”
“I never fuck up,” I declare indignantly. “Sometimes my genius just gets distracted.”
He snorts, and I open my mouth to ask more questions—because I have many—but the singing starts.
We turn toward the cake table, where Noah stands awkwardly holding a knife while Sam beams at him and takes pictures—fuck, nobody had better tell him when my birthday is—and I sedately join in the singing.
Okay, that’s a lie. I sing with gusto. When you get to my age, you realize that embarrassment is stupid.
There are some things I’d still get embarrassed about, but hamming it up while singing “Happy Birthday” is not one of them.
In fact, it’s possible that Alistair and I are unofficially competing right now for the title of most annoying singing friend.
He has the benefit of being a hellhound—howling really lets you hit that high note on “yooooouuuuu”—but I have many more years of experience in annoying people with song.
Ask me one day about my years in Venice as a gondolier.
The two of us are on our third round of the song and have hit a really great rhythm, if I do say so myself, when party-pooper Gideon growls, picks up two of the plates from the stack beside the cake, and frisbees them, one each in our directions.
In case you’re wondering, they’re not paper or plastic.
Sam shrieks. He’s been doing that a lot tonight. My guess is that he’s finding being a host more stressful than he thought. “Those are the plates your grandmother sent! She’s going to hate me forever!”
I sigh, and instead of just ducking, I reach up to catch the plate.
It hurts. A lot. I don’t know if you’ve ever caught a bone china plate frisbeed by a supremely strong demon, but there was a lot of force behind it, and the edge smacked into my palm painfully. That’s going to take a while to heal, and in the meantime, I won’t be using my right hand.
To eat cake, I mean. I’m ambidextrous when it comes to other things I might want to use my right hand for.
Across the room, Alistair howls, and I glance over to see he’s caught his plate too.
He’s not handling it with stoic dignity like me, though.
No, he’s a pitiful crybaby hellhound, whimpering and letting people fuss over him.
I sometimes wonder what went wrong with hellhounds.
Any subspecies that thinks it’s funny to adopt a slur as their species name has a few screws loose. Or lost completely.
On the other hand, they’re great fun at parties. I can pretty much guarantee that Alistair and Elinor and the other two hellhounds here will start a conga line in a while, no matter how low-key Sam thinks he can keep the night.
Speaking of Sam, he smiles gratefully at me while he scolds Gideon for throwing plates around, and Noah takes advantage of the distraction to put the knife down and edge slowly away from the table. Most of the candles on the cake have given up, but there are still two valiantly burning.
“Speech!” I call, switching my plate—which is soon going to hold cake—to my good hand. The right one is already swelling. “Speeeeeeeech!”
The look Noah gives me could incinerate entire cities. I’m actually proud—he’s mastered it.
Sam instantly turns back to Noah—who’s only made it a couple of feet away in his attempt to escape—and proves that he’s a lot smarter than people think. “Uh, maybe we’ll give the speech a miss, but Noah, could you blow out the candles and cut the cake?”
The relief on Noah’s face makes me laugh out loud.
“Crap, Andrew, do you want him to murder you? Stop being an asshole for five minutes before he spits in your cake,” David hisses. If he’d said anything else, I would have ignored him, but there is a very real possibility that Noah would spit in my cake, so…
“He tried to maim me today,” I confess, and damned if there isn’t a note of pride in my voice.