64. Rafe
Chapter Sixty-Four
Rafe
I am sitting on the floor of our living room, every muscle in my body screaming as I try to finish my workout. Screeching agony makes my back spasm, interrupting my efforts. I gasp a string of curses, feeling the still-healing wounds tear open.
It was an achievement to make it downstairs without Alice and Summer hovering over me, clucking like hens around a broken chick.
I know it’s because they care and are worried about me, but it can be a little overwhelming.
It’s improved a bit since I have been able to move around by myself, though I still catch both of them watching me from the corner of their eyes.
Rolling onto my side, I struggle through the worst of the pain, my breathing ragged and short. The front door swings open, and I curse. I don’t have to look to know it’s Summer. The demon sensed her as she approached the house.
Exploit the darkness. Malevolence lurks. Feed it, let it consume.
My hands curl into a fist, and I dig my claws into my palms, forcing the voice back into the box I keep it in.
She still has stitches in her arm from the demon’s attention.
I have to get strong so I can keep him under control.
I can’t hurt her or Alice. Honestly, I don’t want to hurt anyone.
Even if I’m a demon now, I won’t be a monster.
“Rafe,” Summer calls, panic lacing her voice at seeing me on the floor. I grind my teeth, resentment churning in my stomach at being so weak.
“Could be strong. Demons belong in Hell,” the demon whispers.
No. I don’t know when the demon started whispering to me, but once I healed enough to walk around, I started to hear its voice in my head.
Its silky voice whispers instructions, commands, and demands horrors from me that I refuse to provide.
Just another way I was changed from the Fall.
It doesn’t matter. It can whisper all it wants.
I’ve heard my own voice in my head for years, demanding far worse things of me.
Just die. No one would miss you.
“It’s fine,” I lie badly.
She ignores me, just as I knew she would. She rushes to my side, helping me into a sitting position. Blood and sweat drip down my back, and I can’t stop my shudder of pain.
“Can you draw a rune on it?” I pant, my vision flashing white.
Summer nods and lunges to her feet. She sprints upstairs to my room, coming back with the obsidian dagger. She gathers some of the blood dripping down my back on the edge of the blade.
Fuck, being a demon is a pain in the ass.
For anyone else, the runes could be drawn with the caster’s blood, and Summer could use any runic language.
But not for me, not demons. She has to use my blood, and only Infernal runes have any impact.
It’s a language I cannot even begin to make sense of.
If it weren’t for Summer and the doom master, I would be completely fucked with healing.
Summer concentrates, silently drawing the rune on my back.
The pain lessens immediately, and I blink back tears of relief.
As messed up as Summer is, her rune work is flawless.
Maybe it’s the realms attempting to even the scales for her.
Great power equals great trauma. You can’t have one without the other. I would know.
“Thanks,” I whisper, my voice strained. “I miss when it was easier to do a sit-up.”
Summer sits back on her heels next to me, her hand resting lightly on my shoulder.
I tense slightly, preparing myself for the lecture I am sure is coming.
I know I deserve it. Alice and Summer have been warning me for days that I am pushing too hard, but I hate being so weak.
It makes me feel defenseless and stranded?. .?. not stranded. Trapped .
Just the thought makes my throat tighten. Sweat beads on my brow, and it’s not from the pathetic excuse of a sit-up I’d attempted.
“So listen?.?.?.” she begins. “I think you should come to the gym with me.”
I recoil. She wants to take me around other people ?
Devour. Feed. Consume.
“No,” I say, turning away from her, not wanting her to see the demon behind my eyes. “It’s not safe.”
“It is,” she insists. “It will just be us.”
She gently rests her hand on my arm, and my eyes dart to the ugly, jagged stitches that are peeking out from the top of the bandage, marring her skin with my anger.
My fault. If I had control?.?.?. I wouldn’t have hurt her.
In the past, fighting was the only thing that helped me think clearly.
But I couldn’t travel to Hell anymore. Ironic, since angels are supposedly banned from it, unless they are one of Aunt Azrael’s messengers, her angels of death.
Demons are supposed to be welcome. I am supposed to be welcome, but if I step foot in Hell now, I’ll never be able to leave.
Trapped. Again. Just like back then.
“No one?” I ask. “On the Al—” The name gets strangled in my throat, and I cough.
“Swear?” I choke out instead. Guess I can no longer invoke her name as a demon.
I don’t even know what demons use in its place.
Though I can imagine Uncle Lu demanding they use his name.
Sorry, Uncle Lu, not going to happen with me. Too weird.
“On Con?” she asks, cupping my cheek. My chest aches at how much she reminds me of Mom.
I doubt she even realizes how often she mimics her, how often Connor used to mimic her.
She’s left little marks on all of us, enough for me to feel her even if I can’t sit with her like this anymore.
She would never again be the one to cup my cheek, not anymore.
“Do you swear it on Con?” I ask, my voice heavy with grief.
“I swear on Con that it’ll be safe,” she assures me.
Unease shoots through me. This might be a terrible idea, but I would be lying if I said that leaving the house and working out properly doesn’t appeal to me.
“If you don’t feel safe at any point, we’ll leave,” she promises, and I know she means it.
Her pale eyes glint with fierceness, and I feel the demon go on alert, watching her carefully.
I nod, silently agreeing.
“Great! We will go early tomorrow morning. I’ll go make us some protein shakes,” she says, smiling brightly.
“Beware,” the demon warns as we watch her walk away .
I blink. Beware? Beware of Summer?
She is exceptionally bright and has a natural affinity for runes that outclasses not only other students, but even the professors.
Even the fae professors. In the beginning, I thought she just really liked school and learning, but then I noticed the way her eyes glowed when she learned, when she was feeding her power with more knowledge.
There has always been a presence around Summer, something that I’ve always wondered about.
She seemed to open up to Connor, but I still feel like we’ve only seen the surface of her, and my instincts tell me that Summer is dangerous.
Even as an angel, I was wary of her. She sees too much and says too little, and now that I have Fallen, I can see her power more clearly.
The darkness she harbors is more apparent, and even though the demon may crave it, he still eyes her with caution.
I think at our core, we are too alike. The difference is, I wear my bruises and scars on the outside as much as possible. Summer carries them on her soul. Knowledge may feed her power, but her pain and trauma nurture the darkness.
She is an ocean, perfectly peaceful when the weather is fair, but the moment the sky darkens with a storm, she turns deadly.
She can easily wipe clean the entire island of Avalon if she feels like it.
We are all just lucky she has yet to feel like it.
If the realms only knew what they had been spared when her grief at losing Connor turned inward, they would kneel at her feet.
Because if she ever set her will toward destruction?. .?.
No one would survive.
True to her word, Summer wakes me up early the next morning for the gym.
I keep my doubts to myself about going, especially considering she looked so happy when I agreed to go, but my stomach twists at the thought of leaving the house.
There might be other people on the way to the gym.
Would I launch myself at them? Would I tear into their flesh with my fangs and try to devour their souls in a single gulp?
Up until now, I’ve prevailed over the demon’s desires, but my instincts are new and often overpowering.
Summer sprinkles a little more brimstone in my shake before screwing the lid onto the tumbler and handing it to me.
She looks better. Her eyes aren’t as empty, and some of the weight she lost is back, but there is a new hardness to her.
It is a sharp, brittle edge, like jagged glass, with the potential to bleed both herself and her foes.
“Ready?” she asks, her hair swinging in a high ponytail.
I nod silently, and despite the twisting in my stomach, I try to hide my discomfort behind a chug of the protein shake.
The first step out of the house feels like Falling again, as if the ground beneath me will vanish, and I’ll be sent tumbling down to the next realm.
Summer senses my unease as we start across campus and reaches out to slip her arm into mine.
She holds tight, probably worried I’ll bolt back to the house.
Her fear isn’t wholly unfounded because, as trapped as I felt inside the house, I miss the security and familiarity of home.
Or maybe she can sense the battle I am fighting against the demon.
He is hungry, alert, and prowling, searching for a nearby victim to devour.
Hungry. Starved. Need to feed.
A sharp breath escapes me when we arrive at the gym to find it empty as promised. Summer taps my arm reassuringly before letting go of me, but she stays at my side as I relax a little. After all the changes in the last few months, I welcome the familiarity. At least this place has stayed the same.
“You okay?”
I glance at her. “You sure this is a good idea?”
She nods stubbornly, her eyes flashing with determination.
Fine, let’s get this over with. I head toward the weight racks, starting with something familiar to me almost by rote.
Summer’s eyes follow me even as she heads toward the cardio machines, practically boring holes into me with her concern.
Is she going to do that the whole time we’re here?
Feed, devour, consume.
I jump at the way the demon’s voice echoes in my mind. My head snaps up, my eyes scanning the gym to find who has caught his interest. A berserker with a buzz cut is closing the distance to us. I slam my back against the wall, sliding along it as he continues to stride toward me.
“Back off,” I warn.
I recognize him as he gets closer, but it does nothing to assuage my panic or the demon’s bloodlust. Romulus. Prick.
“Rafe! It’s okay.” Summer jumps between us, holding her hands up reassuringly .
“You said it would be just us.” She swore it.
I scoot along the wall, digging my claws into the wall at my back as the demon’s voice grows louder and more insistent.
“He runs the gym,” she says.
“I need to go now!” But my claws burrow deeper into the stone, anchoring me even more.
“Rafe,” Max says, greeting me calmly as he moves closer.
Sweat drips down my neck with the effort of resisting the need to devour him.
“Sum, why don’t you do some cardio, and I’ll work with Rafe,” the berserker says to Summer, never taking his dark eyes off me.
No. No, no, this is all wrong. I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t be here.
Summer waits a long moment, glancing between the two of us before she slowly moves toward a treadmill.
“Listen, dick?—”
The fist comes out of nowhere, hitting me square in the face.
I vaguely hear Summer shouting and the berserker’s reply, but the violence and sudden pain have unleashed the demon completely.
My claws rip from the wall, and I launch at Max, my body weight sending us into a stack of free weights.
The floor trembles as they fall, our bodies following.
We roll, each of us seeking purchase. My fangs snap, and claws grasp as the demon howls.
Devour. Devour. Devour.
Max grabs one of the free weights and hits me across the face with it, sending me soaring into the wall.
Feed. Feed. Feed.
The berserker is on me in a flash. He yanks me away from the wall and spins me to face Summer, his meaty arm collaring my neck. I slash and bite at him, to no avail. Gods, are all berserkers this strong?
“Now, calm down, you’re distressing your sister,” Max admonishes. His voice is amused, and he barely sounds winded.
My sister. Summer. Focus on Summer. Her eyes are filled with worry, and she doesn’t move closer. Is she afraid of me? The thought makes even my demon pause, giving me the chance to grapple some control back from him. I thrash in Max’s iron grip, trying to force myself free, but he’s immovable.
“Show her you’ve got this,” he whispers, squeezing my throat tighter .
He wants me to prove that I can control the demon. I can control myself. I can do this. My ragged breaths become less labored and start to even out. I don’t want Summer to think this is her fault. That I’m an out-of-control monster because I gave her a moment to say goodbye to Con.
Connor. Think of Connor. A sense of calm begins to suffuse my body as my claws and fangs retract. Max finally releases me, pushing me away from him.
“You’re a dick,” I cough, spinning to glare at him.
“Sum.” The berserker ignores me. “What color were my eyes during the fight?”
The fuck does his eye color have to do with anything? What a weirdo.
“Brown?.?.?.” she breathes. She’s furious, her stormy blue eyes impaling him with her glare. “He didn’t touch the berserker.”
The fuck? That was just his strength? Not even anything extraordinary?
“I am stronger than you. You can lose it here,” Max says smugly. “And if necessary, I can take you out.”
That’s what that was about? He knew I needed a safeguard, so he proved to me that if I went completely Fallen, he could kill me.
His eyes never turned green, and even as he strangled me, I don’t remember feeling his body grow bigger or his strength suddenly increase.
Romulus strangled me with completely ordinary strength. Me. A demon. A Fallen.
If it comes down to it, Romulus will take me out to keep others safe. I can’t hurt others if he is around. He can and will stop me. Easily so. I should feel humiliated by the way the berserker has so thoroughly thrashed me, but I can’t bring myself to care through this flood of relief.
He read me so easily and maneuvered me so I could feel safe by fighting me.
“You’re still a dick.”