13. Asher
thirteen
Asher
I shoved the small brown bag into my pocket and returned to the shop. I wasn’t far, and if I ran, it would only take me a few minutes to get back.
How long have I been gone?
How long has he been at the shop?
The thought fuelled me forward, and my muscles rippled underneath my skin. My heart raced at the idea of Damien putting his hands on her. I round the corner to the shop, and the door handle is practically dripping with black smoke from where he touched it.
I swing the door open, and as I grab it, the metal handle cracks. I can taste him in the air—like liquid smoke.
“Close your eyes,” I speak out loud. It takes everything inside of me to hold my anger in, but the idea of his fingertips brushing against something that doesn’t belong to him, something that’s mine, makes my skin begin to crack with anger.
The air whips wildly as I walk past. It knocks down ingredients, tools, and more off the surrounding shelves. Maya’s cat sees me and scampers off to the furthest corner from me.
As I walk up the stairs, the wooden steps crack and splinter beneath me. The door to the apartment opens without me even having to touch it, and I step inside. What I saw before me made what little control I had left disappear.
I step inside, and the air around me rushes in, whipping plants off walls and shelves and knocking down Maya’s various trinkets that were scattered about. I looked to my right and saw Maya curled into a ball. Bruises were forming on her body, and she was trembling, but she didn’t dare disobey me. Her eyes remain sealed.
I glance over to Damien, who stands there frozen. His face was pale, but a smile still sitting on his lips.
“I can see why you keep her around,” he says with a bit of attitude. My hair hangs low and whips like hissing snakes around me. I take a step forward, and my foot comes down as a heavy black hoof that splinters the floor.
Damien steps back and stumbles into a chair, knocking it over and sending it crashing to the ground. The chains that hang around my waist and ankles clink loudly and scrape across the floor.
“I can smell your wretched fucking essence on her skin,” my voice booms like thunder and shakes the apartment.
“I barely touched her. I just came to see what all the fuss was about.” Damien‘s back is now against the wall, and he looks around anxiously.
I’m less than a few feet away from him, and my breath comes out in heavy and angry snorts.
“Come now, dear old friend. You can’t seriously be upset about me touching some fucking human,” he stutters, and a bead of sweat falls down his forehead. He swallows.
I can feel my anger rippling through my blood. My heart is beating slow, steady, and powerful, and my skin feels like fire as the ash-gray tone flickers over my skin like a fire. I can feel myself losing control.
“Asher,” Maya whispers. Her voice makes my heart ache. She sounds beaten and small.
“Not yet,” I say as gently as possible to her.
“I must say, friend, that is a good name choice. She could just call you by your true name. I mean, why hide it any further.” Suddenly, Damien whips out a hand towards me with a dagger, and it lodges into my shoulder. The blade feels like liquid hell being poured into an open wound, but I don’t move a muscle. I take another step toward him, sinking the blade further into my flesh.
I reach a clawed handout, grabbing him by the throat, just like last time.
“You dare disrespect my pity on you by showing your face again?” My voice wraps around him, stealing the air and strangling him slowly. The chains around me whip wildly as the wind grows stronger inside the small space.
“You didn’t let me live,” he choked.
“Your minuscule existence is even possible because I allow it,” my voice rumbles.
Suddenly, just like before, Damien is a puff of smoke falling between my feet. He snakes his way between my feet before taking form again and rushing to the door.
I swing a chain at him, and it wraps around his neck. I yank him back, and his back hits my chest, and I hold him there pressed against me. I can feel his heart racing at neck-breaking speeds, and the overpowering smell of fear surrounds him as he hyperventilates in my grasp.
“You fucking serpent,” I hissed. As the chain holds him around the throat, I reach for a monstrous hand and cover his mouth and nose.
“Look what you did to her,” I yanked his face, forcing him to look at Maya, still shaking on the floor. Dark bruises formed on her legs and her wrists. A clear handprint forms on her thigh, visible fingerprints painting her skin.
“Tell me what you did. Step by fucking step.” I close my hand tighter around his mouth, and he begins to claw at my hands due to lack of air. His body thrashes wildly, and his chest heaves with fear. I drop my tongue out of my mouth and taste the air. His fear slides over my tongue like honey, and the swirling ink etched into my skin takes on a dull glow.
“Speak human,” I demand. I reposition my hand, sliding it down to grip the bottom of his jaw. I grip his jaw tighter and can feel it crack underneath my grip. He cries out in pain, and I see Maya cover her ears with her hands.
Her fear sends a shock of pain through my heart, and I hesitate for a moment.
“I touched her hair,” Damien whimpers. His words come out strangled, and I grip his jaw tighter, sending another fracture through it.
“What else?”
“Touched her thigh and her wrists,” his voice is fighting to even escape. I tighten my grip and feel his back teeth shatter in his mouth and begin shredding their way down his throat.
“Go on.” The chain wrapped around his neck began to glow bright red, and the heat burned through his skin.
“I slapped-”
Not another word leaves his lips as I crush his jaw. He falls to the floor, gripping his face as his jaw hangs loosely in fragments beneath his face. I pick him up by his head, running my fingers through his hair. His eyes bulge out of his head, and he’s clawing at his throat as the heat slowly takes over his windpipe.
“I’ll see you on the other side, human.” I crush his skull, and his soul splits from his body, falling like sparkling glitter to the floor. His body disappears as a black cloud of smoke dissipates through the air.
I turn to look around the room. Images of him touching her, him slapping her, plays across my mind, and I feel myself slipping further. My skull begins to crack as horns push their way through the bone. I reach up and slide the knife out of my body.
Suddenly, a hand is on my ankle. Then, a second later, someone is hugging my leg. The familiar scent of vanilla dances up to me, and I immediately begin to reel myself in. I look down and see Maya, still with her eyes shut tight and holding onto my leg.
Her lip is busted, and tears stain her cheeks, but she holds onto me like I’m the last thing that she has.
I reached out my hand to her, taking her hair, now disheveled in my fingers. I crouch down to her, and the chains around my waist and ankles jingle slightly. Her body trembles at the sound.
The apartment around us is trashed. Plants spilled out of their pots and onto the floor. Shattered dishes lay on the floor, and things tipped over from the force of the chaos.
But Maya lay there all the same. Trembling and crying. But clinging to me.
“Are you afraid of me?” I whisper. Asking the question alone sent fear stabbing into my very core.
I knew that it would be safer for her to fear me. To cast me out of her home and heart and never utter my name again. It would be safer for both of us if she hated me, but the very thought made my mind real with insanity. The idea of never being able to touch her again or hear my name leave her lips was more than I could bear.
Maya sniffles and hugs me tighter before shaking her head gently.
I scooped her up in my arms, cradling her and running my fingers through her hair.
“I’m so sorry I left you here by yourself.”
Maya turns towards me, her eyes still closed. I grab a nearby handkerchief and wipe her lip off for her, cringing at the sight of her blood.
She slowly opens her eyes and looks at me.
“Are you afraid of me?” I ask again.
“No.” She whispers without hesitation. Her words send a death jolt through my heart, and I feel as though I might collapse. She stares at me wide-eyed.
She raises her hand and brushes her fingertips over my gray skin. My hair hangs loosely and tangles around my horns and body, partially falling over her like a blanket of ink.
I raised one of my hands to brush her cheek, where a slight bruise formed. She doesn’t recoil.
She ran her fingers over my lips, nose, and jaw as if feeling to see if it was really me. I lean into her touch, and after a moment, the fear disappears from her eyes.
“I will leave,” the words left my mouth like glass, stabbing me every inch of the way out.
She shakes her head at me before fully grasping my face in both of her hands. She leans up and presses her forehead against mine.
“You’re beautiful.”
It’s as if in that moment, all the stars that aligned for me to be saddled with this curse, all the hundreds of years that I had been trapped here, punishing people and sending them to my purgatory, all the torment that I had gone through, all the painful transformations, the beatings. I would do them all again if it meant I could be right here at this moment.
I would damn myself to purgatory every single time if it meant I could hear her voice.
"Were you ever going to tell me?" She asks quietly.
Maya sat on the bed as I cleaned up the apartment. It had been hours, and the apartment was mostly back to normal, aside from a few broken pots that held some larger plants. I made a mental note to get her new ones.
"I was worried that you would fear me." I can't bring myself to look at her.
The one thing in the apartment that I couldn't fix was the indent of a large hoof print by the door. As if reading my mind, I can feel Maya look at me.
"It's okay, you can leave it." She says softly.
"I'm sorry."
Maya stood and walked to me, grabbing my arm and hugging me close to her. The curse subsided, and I was left with hair that dragged on the floor behind me as I bustled through the apartment, cleaning up the remnants of the earlier chaos.
Maya takes my hand and leads me to a chair still on its side. She stands it up and motions for me to sit down.
"You left me here alone, knowing what was out there," she says suddenly. She doesn't look at me.
"Darling, I-" My blood feels like it's flowing toward her, and I want to reach out to her.
Maya puts her fingers to her lips, shushing me. She begins digging through a nearby drawer in the kitchen and pulls out a pair of scissors; she grabs her brush and returns to my side.
She gently brushes through my hair, and I lean against her touch without thinking. The feeling of her fingertips running over my scalp brings me a foreign feeling of comfort.
"He mentioned you," she says quietly.
"I know."
"Who is he?"
"He worked for an old friend of mine." I cringe as I remember those old times.
"Are you still friends with this person?"
"No, I'm not. And I haven't been for a very, very long time."
She continues to brush my hair before beginning to cut it shoulder length.
"Would you like me to cut it shorter?" She sounds tired. I reach up to grasp her hand.
"No, my dear. I like this length."
"That was you that one day, wasn't it?" Maya's energy is quiet and unreadable. "By the alley."
"Yes," I admit.
"How long have you been watching me?"
"Only the day that I met you. I saw you for the first time that day." Something about her drew me in, but I didn't know how to say that. She had already been through so much.
"I recognized your eyes," she begins twisting my hair into an intricate bun. "Were you afraid that I would reject you? Call you an ugly beast?"
Her words sting me, and I cringe.
Maya sighs and finishes. She picks up the mass of hair on the floor and walks it over to the trash before leaning against the kitchen counter, facing away from me.
I stand up and walk over to her, unsure if I should touch her.
"Don't leave my side again, please." She turns around to me, and tears slide down her cheeks.
"I know. I'm sorry. If I could take it back, I would," I reach out to her, and she flinches slightly before joining me and my arms.
I rest a hand on the back of her head, brushing my fingers slowly through her hair. She wraps her arms around me and buries her face in my chest.
"You're lucky I'm a dog person," she says.
"Are you?" I raise an eyebrow.
"I think. I've never had one. But I don't hate the idea."
I crouch down and grab her face in both my hands, grinning ear to ear.
"Is that so?" I smile warmly and kiss her forehead. "I guess I got lucky then."
She lifts her head and throws herself around my neck, burying her face in mine. I feel her breathe me in deeply, and I wrap my arms around her as if on instinct. I pick her up, resting her on one arm, reach into my pocket, and pull out the brown bag.
She looked at it confused for a moment before grabbing it and looking at me as if asking if she could open it.
"I picked it up while I was out this morning," I smile.
She opens the bag gently, and her eyes light up when she pulls out the small vial.
"You didn't have to replace it," she looked at me surprised.
"Well, you're now required to wear it. I've grown quite fond of the scent."
Her face washes red, and she looks down at the vile before opening it and smelling it.
"Yes, sir," she smiles.