Chapter 15
CHAPTER
“Next time—” Ashley muttered, kicking a demon’s blackened skull. “Next time, we vote against taking shortcuts through cursed forests.”
“You voted for it,” Nate said, sending a sharp stare at her. “Said something about paradise hiding here and wanting to see if we’d find it.”
Ashley glared at him. “That was a joke.”
“Right, just like your feelings for me,” he blurted, seemingly as surprised as the rest of us by his words.
Ashley froze, just for a second, but it was long enough for Jaden to take note and smirk.
“I don’t know, Nate,” Jaden snickered, brushing dust from his coat. “Maybe she’s taking your jokes for granted, or since she’s so reckless, she might need someone sharper.”
“Keep talking and I’ll show you sharp,” Ashley snapped.
I almost smiled, even as my chest still throbbed from another battle. It felt good to hear them bicker, it was normal, and after everything, normal was precious.
Behind them, Caleb spat into the grey sand. “We shouldn’t linger. Another one of those things will sniff us out soon enough.”
He wasn’t wrong. But his glare at Malakai told me the ‘thing’ he referred to was not only the dead demon.
Malakai lingered behind us a little longer, eyes dark and still. His hair was a wild mess as always, and his breath came slow and measured—maybe even too measured. I knew that look, the one of inner conflict. Was the hunger creeping up again?
I stepped closer. “You okay?”
His lips twitched in an almost smile. “Define okay.”
I reached out, brushing his arm. His skin burned hot even through the fabric, a feverish heat that called to my fire in a way that made my heart stumble. “You’re burning up.”
He leaned in, voice low as a slow smirk emerged. “Are you calling me hot?”
I could feel it then, the pulse of restrained magic under his skin, recognizing that feverish face of his. He was doing the same that I had long ago; holding back, and forcing his true nature to hide. He was fighting it, hard. The others didn’t see, or pretended not to.
Eve’s voice sliced through the quiet. “Lionel, next time you might want to save some of the demons for the rest of us.” She was smiling, but her eyes were on him, bold and playful.
Lionel chuckled softly. “You’ll have to keep up, then.”
Their banter drew a few half-hearted groans from the group. It was strange, how easily we’d fallen back into teasing after nearly dying. Maybe that was how we survived, laughing at the edge of the abyss.
Malakai’s fingers brushed mine, subtly. His eyes glowed faintly red in the fog.
“You should stay back, kitten,” he murmured, too quietly for the others to hear. “Before I forget which side I’m on.”
My heart clenched. “You won’t.”
He didn’t answer, but I saw his jaw tense. I reached my hand out to his, braiding our fingers together. “Malakai, you won’t.”
To think, there was a time when we had hated each other for reminding ourselves of our weaknesses. How we had tried to kill one another because of what the world labeled us.
The one thing I was supposed to keep away from, turned out to be what I needed more than the air in my lungs.
He was the stars that lit up my nights. He was the warmth that kept my flames alive, and it scared the living hells out of me.
“You’re staring,” Malakai said, his lips curling slightly as we walked.
“I’m simply admiring what’s mine,” I smiled.
He huffed, but I saw the corner of his mouth twitch, half a smile he didn’t want to give me.
“Dangerous thing, to claim a monster,” he murmured, voice low enough to make me melt right on the spot.
“Dangerous thing to think you are one,” I shot back, but he didn’t answer this time.
The fog had continued to thicken until the world felt like a bruise, dull grey bleeding into darker shadows.
Lionel took the lead, considering that I sucked at map-reading, and I had already lost track of which direction was back and which was forth. It was like instinct to him; after only a quick look around he continued forward and we followed.
When Lionel called for a stop, even the trees seemed relieved.
We made camp in a hollow where the roots were thick enough to sit on and the air smelled like damp ash.
The ground squelched underfoot, and the only light came from the flicker of my fire, hovering just above my palm.
It licked at the mist, which swallowed most of it, making the glow soft and small.
“Creepy place for dinner,” Ashley said, dropping her pack with a thud. “Ten out of ten ambience. Would picnic again.”
Nate grinned, shaking sand from his hair. “Oh good, I’ll pack sandwiches for next time.”
Eve rolled her eyes, already unpacking the rations. “If you two start flirting again, I’m throwing myself into the nearest abyss.”
“You’d miss me,” Nate said, stretching his arms dramatically.
“Not even a little,” she muttered, but there was a tiny smirk there, one she tried very hard to hide by turning towards Lionel.
Lionel seemed to be deep in thought, but when Eve stepped closer to hand him a can, his fingers brushed hers, just barely. I didn’t miss the way she paused, or how he cleared his throat and pretended not to notice.
The group settled into its usual rhythm, boots slipped off for brief airing, soft laughter, the clatter of metal cups. For a while, it almost felt normal again. Until Malakai tensed beside me.
He was sitting on a log, staring into the fire like it held secrets he longed to uncover. His hands were steady, but too still. The faint shimmer under his skin, that subtle pulse of red, was brighter now.
I leaned closer. “How bad?” I whispered.
He gave a rough sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. “Manageable.”
“That’s not an acceptable answer.”
“I’m managing.” His eyes flicked to mine. They were darker than before, the crimson bleeding through like cracks in glass.
“Can I help? Do you want a bite?” I asked, tugging at my shirt’s collar teasingly.
His mouth twitched, trying to hold back a smile. “I thought we were supposed to fight against it, not lean into it?”
“It’s about surviving,” I reminded him.
“I’ll survive without it a while longer,” he decided. “Don’t worry.”
“I’ll worry about my demon if I want to,” I shot back, and for the briefest moment his eyebrows rose as he looked at me genuinely surprised. Then an arrogant smile snuck in instead, evaporating all innocence on his face.
Before he could reply, Caleb’s voice cut through the silence. “Maybe the demon should sit a little farther from the rest of us if he’s that hungry.”
The warmth in the clearing disappeared instantly. Everyone froze.
Malakai didn’t move, didn’t even look up, but the air around him shifted, charged and sharp. I rose to my feet slowly, the flames in my palm trembling with my heartbeat.
“Caleb,” Lionel warned, low.
“I’m just saying what we’re all thinking,” Caleb said, resting his hand on his blade. “He’s been twitchy all day. You really think I haven’t noticed the red eyes? How long before he stops pretending to be human?”
“You’re not even in danger, ungifted one,” Faelin snapped at him, glaring.
“Enough,” I said coldly.
Caleb’s gaze met mine, hard and unflinching. “You would defend him even if he tore us apart.”
“I defend him because he hasn’t,” I snapped. “Because he’s fighting it. Something you’ve never had to do.”
The silence that followed was heavy and alive, stretching between us.
“I won’t break,” Malakai said, cutting through the thickening tension.
“Oh, how reassuring,” Caleb snorted.
“Pure curiosity, Malakai; are you just an arrogant bastard who refuses to have flaws?” Eve finally spoke up. “After all, their worries are valid, in this world people lie all the time and you have no proof that you won’t go mad and lose control…”
“I won’t break,” Malakai said, his voice firmer and sharp. “It’s because I’m flawed, it’s because of my mistakes that I know that I won’t allow it to happen again.”
I pressed my lips together.
Ashley shifted abruptly. “Hey, Ethalyn? Pinch me, I think I’m dreaming. Demon-boy is admitting to having flaws? Even his annoying hair refuses such things.”
“‘Again’?” Caleb furrowed his brows. “Meaning, you’ve already lost control once.”
“Just like what happened to my friend,” Faelin said cautiously, watching Malakai with worried eyes.
“It’s nothing like that,” Malakai said through his teeth, his eyes sparking into a glow as they set on Faelin. She jolted in return.
“People make bargains with demons to become stronger, to survive in when facing oblivion, right?” Malakai continued, his voice lower.
“I was born this way; I’ve never feared disappearing…
No, I would’ve happily died if it meant keeping loved ones alive instead.
” His eyes lowered to the ground, body shifting slightly.
“But someone forced me to make a promise to live at any cost. And I intend to keep it without turning into a monster, however selfish that might be.”
“We all know it’s Ethalyn—” Nate began, with a low chuckle.
“It’s not,” Malakai huffed.
“You have a secret friend?” Nate practically shouted in disbelief. Malakai shot him an annoyed eye roll, clearly telling him that he guessed wrong.
Ashley gasped. “Oh my Gods, did you have another lover before my girl?”
“Ashley!” Lionel and I echoed accusing. Me mostly because I didn’t want to know the answer.
“What? I just wanted to join the guessing game too,” she pouted and crossed her arms.
“Sorry to disappoint,” Malakai sneered. “It was my mother.”
I remembered what he had told me in the cell in Runora, and how she had helped him kill mages so he could feed. But I didn’t know the details of how she had died… and by the sound of this, I wasn’t sure I wanted to either.
Caleb snorted again, clearly not convinced and I was ready to start a physical fight, but Eve spoke up, quiet but firm. “Let’s all just… eat something before anyone gets gutted.”
Nate coughed. “Yeah, can’t fight on an empty stomach, right? Even demons.”
Ashley threw a piece of bread at him. “Read the room, genius.”
“I am reading it. It’s just… foggy.”
“Has he always been this witty?” Faelin complained with a low voice.
Ashley snorted despite herself and the tension cracked enough for the air to move again.
By the time the stew was bubbling, the fog had thinned to reveal the gnarled silhouettes of trees around us, their shapes leaning inward, like they were listening.
I tried not to think about what they might hear.
Eve crouched near the pot, sleeves rolled up, stirring with a stick that had clearly seen better days. “If this kills us,” she said, “I’d like it noted that I tried to feed us before we starved.”
Lionel knelt across from her, fixing a tear in his glove with the kind of focus only guilt could buy. “If it kills us, I’ll haunt you personally,” he said quietly.
“Please. You’d make a terrible ghost.” She smirked at him, tossing a small herb from her bag into the pot. “You’d spend eternity apologizing for bumping into people.”
“I’d try to make a good impression,” he said, lips twitching.
She looked at him for a moment too long, then quickly turned back to the stew. “Don’t.”
Across the fire, Ashley sprawled on her back, boots crossed at the ankles, humming a tune that didn’t match the rhythm of anything. Nate sat beside her, trying—and failing—to carve something out of wood.
“What is that supposed to be?” Ashley asked, peering over his shoulder.
“It’s a horse, maybe,” he said defensively.
“It’s a sad potato with legs.”
“Thank you, I was going for interpretive art.”
She snorted and turned away, pretending to be unimpressed, but her smile lingered, just for a second. That was, until Jaden slid in beside her, too close, and plucked the wooden creature from Nate’s hands.
“Not bad,” Jaden said, spinning it between his fingers. “Maybe next time, you can make one that actually looks like something.”
Nate narrowed his eyes. “Maybe next time you can find your own log to sit on.”
“Oh, come on,” Jaden drawled, grinning. “Don’t be jealous, man, I’m just making conversation.”
“With your face two inches from hers?” Nate shot back.
Ashley rolled her eyes. “Both of you, please, the forest is already cursed. We don’t need testosterone poisoning, too.”
Jaden laughed, leaning back on his elbows. “You wound me, precious.”
Nate muttered something that sounded suspiciously like ‘I could help with that’, earning a sharp elbow from Ashley.
Eve glanced up from the pot, smirking. “You three need to either walk away or talk it out.”
“Both,” I murmured, earning a quiet snicker from Lionel.
He and I locked eyes briefly, and I could see how tired he was, not just in body, but in heart. The way his shoulders stiffened when Eve teased him. The way he looked away a beat too fast.
She noticed it, too, I think. Because a moment later, she pushed the bowl of stew towards him. “Here, taste it before it gets cold.”
He hesitated, then took it, avoiding any other fingers touching. Something flickered across his face; surprise, maybe. Or hope, the kind you’re afraid to name out loud.
“I didn’t poison it,” she added, lips curving faintly. “Yet.”
“Generous of you.”
“It will keep us all warm at least,” Faelin added, taking her own serving.
For a while, the only sound was the faint bubbling of the pot and Ashley humming again, softer this time. The mist rolled and swayed around us, the forest felt like it could swallow us whole.
“Hey, Ethalyn,” Ashley called, sitting up suddenly. “Truth or dare?”
“Oh, Gods, not this,” I groaned.
“Too late, I’m bored, it’s foggy, and we’re probably going to die. Let me have this.”
Eve smirked. “You’re really committed to bad ideas, aren’t you?”
“That’s what makes me so lovable,” Ashley shrugged.
“Debatable,” Nate muttered, which earned him another elbow.
“Fine,” I said, exhaling a laugh. “Truth.”
Ashley grinned like a kid watching snow for the very first time. “If you had to pick one person here to be stuck in a cave with, no magic, no weapons, just—”
“Stop,” I said immediately, cheeks heating. “You already know the answer.”
“Yeah,” she said, glancing towards where Malakai sat on the edge of the campfire, still and quiet with his eyes closed. “But it’s fun to make you admit it.”
“Pass,” I said quickly, tossing a small flame at her. She dodged it easily, laughing.
“Coward.”
“Oh, you want to talk about cowardice?” I asked, arching a brow at her.
“Oh, go make a sad potato, Ethalyn,” Ashley snickered, hiding her white flag from the others.
The group’s laughter rippled through the fog, warm and fragile, and I let myself breathe it in.
Even the haunted forest couldn’t kill the sound of that little reminder that we were still us.
Maybe everything would fall apart again. But for now, in this brief and borrowed peace, it was enough.