Epilogue
Some supernaturals weren’t meant to live among the others.
LUCA
My basilisk hisses as fire tears through my body.
Celine’s words were unnecessary. At least for me. My body knew where we were the second my feet touched the ground. Fear, primal and wretched, singes my nerve endings.
S-s-shift. Every muscle in my body shakes with the effort of holding back. I hit the ground, barely feeling the sting on my knees. P-protect them. Now. Shift.
The monster inside me is adamant, making all its earlier attempts to wrench control from me look like child’s play. Venom fills my mouth, pooling against my taste buds as my fangs tear through my gums, bigger than they’ve even been before.
“Get back,” I shout, cowering away from the unrecognizable sound of my own voice.
Celine shouts my name and reaches for me. She’s afraid but I can’t comfort her.
I’m losing control. Here, with all of them around me, my basilisk is forcing a full shift for the first time in my entire fucking life. I can’t stop it. Twenty-nine years of resisting the monster, and it’s removing my fragile illusion of control with one painful explosion of muscle and bone.
My spine cracks. The pain is worse than anything I’ve ever experienced.
My arms are next, absorbed into my body. I fall to my back—twitching—and stare at the sky. Any clouds I might see are blocked by the spiky bubble that surrounds the realm.
No arms. No legs anymore either. They’re gone.
Yellow. Everything is yellow.
I’m not cold anymore. The chilly air feels nice along my scales, and I blink, a strange, hungry excitement bubbling to life in my belly.
For the first time in my life, my monster isn’t curled up there.
We’ve switched places. My body belongs to the basilisk now, and Luca the man is confined to the small space in our gut.
Enraged and terrified, I scream to be set free. I’m a danger to everyone I care about, and I know exactly where we are. Every nerve in my body is shouting at me, telling me we’re home.
This is the motherfucking monster realm.