Chapter Twenty- Two
Nico
My first clue that something was amiss was when I tried to give him a hug and fell right through him.
I shudder. That is a feeling that I do not like at all.
It’s all kinds of weird.
I forgot that I was dead. I’m still only remembering things in bits and pieces, and I haven’t remembered anything else for a while, which makes me think that I’ve remembered what I am allowed to remember.
Of course, even if I had remembered that I was dead, I probably still would have tried to hug him. Before the realm went dark, you could still hug people as a soul. The living, I mean.
That’s when the knowledge that I was a ghost hit me.
I glance at Rast as I walk beside him, and he has absolutely no fucking idea that I’m next to him.
He looked for me.
He put himself in extreme danger to find me, and if I could, then I would fucking smack him for it. Unfortunately, he can’t see, hear, or feel it when I try to smack him, and I have tried.
No one can.
Apart from maybe Farren. Now she’s intriguing, and Rast’s reaction to her is even more intriguing.
He’s smitten.
Whether he realises it or not, and I would wager that he doesn’t, he is absolutely gone for her. Rast is not great with feelings. He never has been, but he hugged her back, and that’s a big step in the right direction.
I have to admit that I can’t blame him. Not only is she beautiful, but she’s strong and fierce and definitely not afraid of him, and he likes that. I’ve been with them since they entered the warlocks' home, only to find that it was enchanted inside.
It was all going relatively okay until Rast decided to offer them a safe place to rest at the compound.
I could see even he was hesitant to offer it, hell, the others even picked up on it, but what else was he supposed to do?
That’s all he’s known, that’s where it’s supposedly safe. That’s what they told him to do if he succeeded.
Admittedly, I panicked, he can’t go back there.
Fuck knows what they would do to him, or the others, for that matter, and for some reason I really care about what happens to them.
So I tried to say something. Obviously, he didn’t hear me, but he did feel that I was standing close to him.
The hairs on his arms stood up, and he glanced at the door as if he was cold, maybe?
So, I mean, that’s progress.
He still didn’t get the message or understand my warning though, which was making me panic more until Storm suggested that they stay the night in the house, and then Laikynn told them pretty firmly that they can’t go back to the compound and said that it wasn’t safe for him to go back there.
The way that he said it did make me wonder whether he heard me, but that’s impossible, and not once did he look at me or make any other indication that he had heard me other than the fact that he warned Rast.
Plus, I’ve been around their kind before, and none of them have seen me, if they had, they would have eaten me or laughed at me. I probably looked ridiculous trying to help fight them off and having no physical effect on anything at all.
Besides, I don’t want to fight them anymore. As I’m coming to learn, which happens a lot with the compound, what the compound has told us about them is a lie.
Rast looked so relieved when Laikynn pretty much took the decision out of his hands that he even explained about the compound and some of the shit that he suspects that he doesn’t realise he’s right about. It feels right that he’s shared with them, they needed to know.
When Ricollio and his team found them, they immediately distrusted them, and that gave me enough reassurance.
Finding Rast has given me the opportunity to observe these people that he seems to have found. They’re interesting.
I’ve been listening.
I mean, what the fuck else am I supposed to do?
I’ve learned a lot.
No one in that group is what they seem. They’re all incredibly strong and, quite frankly, watching their dynamics with each other is quite interesting, especially watching one of them try to tell Farren that she couldn’t do something.
That was brilliant and made me like her and them actually even more.
I know things that could really help them out, and Rast needs to know that he can never go back to the compound. Not only would they most likely try to end him regardless of the consequences.
If the others went with him, like they offered to do in order to help Rast figure out what was going on with them, then there’s a good chance that the compound leaders would try to end them as well.
I’m not saying that they would likely succeed in ending them, but they most likely would take casualties at least.
The compound leaders are strong and pretty much all of the people that live in the compounds are incredibly loyal, just like Ricollio was, and they would fight for them if the compound leaders ordered them to, which would mean that Rast, Farren, and the guys would be severely outnumbered.
There are other things that I have found out about the compound since I’ve been able to observe without being invisible, and I really need to find a way to get Rast to fucking hear me, even though he’s never fucking heard me before.
“Come on dickhead, I know if you tried hard enough, you’d realise that I’m here,” I start, brushing against his arm.
He shifts, so I know that he felt something, but he does that a lot, and he still doesn’t hear me.
As usual, I start off with the important stuff, things that he should know.
The things that I have been practically screaming at him ever since I first found him.
But as it becomes increasingly clear that he’s not going to reply, because he can’t hear me, I start to hurl creative insults at him, peppered in with embarrassing stories that he would hate for me to repeat. For no other reason than it makes me feel a bit better about this shitty situation.
I pause for a second as I swear that the ground under my feet shocks me. When it doesn’t happen again, I catch back up to Rast and carry on my one-way conversation.
Farren
I frown.
That flicker that I kept seeing on Rast’s left side gradually got more and more frequent as we carried on walking down the dirt road. I paid attention to it, obviously.
Now the stress of the situation may have finally got to me, but the flicker is now in the shape of a man.
I don’t know why, but pretty soon after we started walking again after we found Ricollio, the flicker gradually increased in speed, and then it kept staying long enough that I could swear that I could see someone standing next to Rast, but it wouldn’t stay long enough for me to be sure until suddenly it did, and it hasn’t disappeared yet.
There is a man standing next to Rast.
The guy has clearly been following us for a while, because I’ve been seeing the flicker pretty much since we left Ignatius’ place, and the flicker is obviously actually this man.
I know I should have said something as soon as I was sure that he was solid and not going to disappear again, but something stopped me.
Well, the realm stopped me.
He’s not really doing anything except walking next to Rast, and it looks like he’s talking to him, but I can’t hear what he’s saying despite the fact that I’m not that far away.
My instincts, or rather the ground beneath my feet, is telling me that I need to observe before I do anything, and that it’s really important that I watch, so that’s what I’ve been doing.
Watching.
He’s only been solid for a short amount of time.
It’s confusing, but the Void has never steered me wrong, and now that it's actually communicating with me, you bet your arse I’m going to fucking listen to it.
It’s strange, he kind of reminds me of the ghost in the castle from my dream when we found Ignatius and the others, but unlike then, no one else has spotted him.
I glance over at Zev, and he doesn’t appear to see anything at all, and he’s talking to Rast, so he should be able to see the man next to him who has suddenly appeared.
Clearly, I am the only one who seems to have noticed that he’s there.
The thing that is confusing me the most is that Rast hasn’t acknowledged him.
He hasn’t looked at him, he hasn’t said anything, and the guy is glancing over at him every few minutes. He’s muttering things too quiet for me to hear and smirking every now and then.
He’s clearly trying to get some sort of reaction out of Rast, and yet, Rast doesn’t even twitch.
I can’t see much because he’s that shrouded in shadows, but I can see that his eyes are sad and filled with pain despite the teasing twist to his lips. I want to ask him what’s wrong, but again, something stops me.
After twenty more minutes of walking the guys still haven’t noticed him, and while at first I found that amusing, it’s starting to become concerning, and I’m wondering if the stress of the last few days, hell, years, if we’re really going to get into it, really has finally broken something in my brain, and now I’m seeing things that aren’t really there.
Taking a deep breath, I remind myself that I’m following the directions of the realm, and it has been incredibly helpful so far.
It helps, but I still feel a little bit uneasy.
I carry on, following the guys but keeping a close eye on the mysterious guy as he continues to talk to Rast, even going so far as to poke him.
Rast bats at his arm where the guy poked him, and it makes me wonder if he is actually aware that the guy is there and is just ignoring him for some reason.
Finally, I can’t take it anymore, and there’s one way to find out if Rast can see the guy or not.
“Rast, are you going to answer him, or are you planning on ignoring him forever?” I ask casually.
“Excuse me?” Rast asks, looking confused.
He’s not the only one. The guys are all giving me the same look.
I gesture to the guy next to him, just to double-check that he’s not messing with me or testing me.
The guy in question is now staring at me in shock, which can’t be a good thing.
“Ren, what guy?” Khaos asks, with a note of concern in his voice.
I open my mouth to answer him, but quickly snap it closed. The guy who was still standing by Rast suddenly appears in front of me, and I stop so I don’t walk into him.
The others all stop and look at me with concern, but my focus is on the quite frankly gorgeous man in front of me. I look up.
“Are you talking about me?” He asks, a sliver of hope in his whisky coloured eyes.
“Of course I am, I know everyone else here,” I reply with a slight smile.
“What?” Khaos asks.
“Farren, that made no sense. Are you okay?” Mayhem asks with concern etched in his brow.
“They can’t see me,” the guy replies. His head tilts to the side slightly as he studies me, “But you know that, don’t you?”
“I had my suspicions,” I admit. Then I ask, “Even Rast can’t see you?”
“Nope,” the guy says, his smile widening as he doesn’t take his eyes off me, and puts his hands in his pockets, rocking back and forth on his heels.
Rast’s eyebrows hit his hairline. “She’s talking to someone that we can’t see.”
“Apparently,” I sigh, although I can’t stop the smile on my face. There’s just something about him.
I should probably be freaking out more than I actually am, but at this point, what’s one more thing that makes me odd?
“Does the person you’re speaking to have a name?” Mayhem asks.
I love that he’s not calling me crazy.
I probably would be calling me crazy.
“Nicodemus Quillian Rhodextus, tell them my full name.” He immediately tells me, and then his lips tilt up, “You can call me Nico, pretty girl.”
I snort.
“What?” Loki asks.
“He’s a flirt,” I reply. “His name is Nicodemus Quillian Rhodextus.”
Nico side-steps, and I’m confused for a moment before Rast is suddenly in my face, his anger practically palpable as his eyes glow with flames and his pupils become slits.
“Don’t you dare say his name,” he practically spits, but behind the anger, the devastation and grief are clear to see.