17 | Dante
“Would you mind helping to carry everything back to The Spire?” Silver asks me with a hopeful little smile.
Her smiles always seem to loosen something in me. It’s been a long time since I stepped out of the city, but I’d liken it to the first breath of fresh sea air. Invigorating yet it soothes something inside me I didn’t realize needed to be pacified.
I agree without even thinking about it and we leave the magic supply store with a huge haul of items, along with a box of potions and herbs which Silver insisted on buying for her sister. I handed over my card to pay for it all, and it was about as much as I could do to be helpful. I’ve devolved into a money bank and a packhorse for this witch, and I don’t mind a bit.
I step inside the building without thought and only recognize too late that I’m in the middle of the mages’ domain, and then a few minutes later, I’m in their apartment. Their home.
Roscoe is here, along with Silver’s brother and sisters and some younger witches I haven’t met before who are still in their teens.
The over-exuberant mage whoops with excitement as soon as he sees Silver, scooping her up and spinning her around like he hasn’t seen her in weeks.
“Put me down, you lunatic!” she shrieks. “You’ll hurt yourself.”
“Nah, you’re light as a feather,” he replies before letting her down, not before he’s given her a long, slow kiss. “And I’m fine, sweetheart.”
“Really?”
The quieter one of Silver’s sisters nods. “Yep. He’s all healed up.”
“Good as new.” He swivels his hips and dances around, twirling one of the younger witches around while she giggles.
“All I’m saying is it stinks. Can’t you do it somewhere else? You’ve been at it all hours of the night all week and the smell is driving me crazy.” Silver’s louder sister seems to be in the middle of arguing with the quieter one. She turns to Silver, who pats Roscoe on the forearm as if asking him to release her.
“What’s the problem?”
“Luna’s making her potions in our kitchen at all hours. She should do it on the roof, right? That way she’d have fresh air, which she’s always going on about, and we wouldn’t get gassed out all the time.”
Silver cocks her head to one side. “You need some space to make potions, Luna?”
“It’s fine. I’m just trialing some stuff.” The quiet one flips her long hair back and makes a face at the shorter, scrappier sister. “I’m working on something for Seb that I’m hoping lasts longer than a couple of days.”
A twinge of guilt goes through me at her words. Just over a year ago, Fabian was purchasing blood regularly through vampires that frequented my club. After his father and Felix Nightshade started taking an even bigger cut of our profits, I shut the whole thing down.
I didn’t realize at the time that he was using the blood to treat his little brother’s undiagnosable medical condition. Maybe that’s somewhere I can make myself useful. That and continuing to research the vulnerabilities of my kind.
“It smells like she’s boiling old socks or something,” the other one complains.
“You can use the rooftop if you need the space, but it’s cold as hell at the moment,” Silver says.
“We could find heaters or something, if you want,” Zeph grunts, earning him a beaming smile from Silver.
My arms have started to ache from holding all the items from the magic supply store. I hesitate just inside the door of the apartment and then step inside, just far enough to place everything down. I then take a couple of steps backwards so I can make a smooth exit, not wanting to disturb the chattering and general noise.
“What happened to your family?” Zeph asks me quietly. He’s clearly been watching me take in the scene and my no doubt bemused obsession. It’s been a long time since I last witnessed a scene like this, something so chaotic yet normal. It sends a pang of longing through me and I fight to keep my expression impassive, not showing the wince that his words have hit a sore spot.
It’s been just over a week since the Solstice. Days cooped up in the cramped library, bent over books until our eyes have felt dry enough to bleed, spent almost entirely in the company of Silver and Zeph.
For someone like me that spends ninety-five percent of their life alone, it’s been an adjustment.
It’s also meant I’ve spent a great deal of time in the company of Zeph. While he started off the week snarling like a cornered dog, something changed over the past few days and ever since he’s been... not exactly pleasant, but not actively antagonistic. It’s like he’s trying not to be entirely unpleasant, but much of the time, it’s like talking to a person who was raised by wolves. He doesn’t seem to care for social graces. And I know I’m not one to judge when it comes to socializing. But this seemingly innocuous question is like one of many from Zeph. It’s as though he doesn’t mean to press on all the bruises in my psyche, but he unerringly seems to find them, anyway.
“They’re, uh, dead, or at least I assume so. I was thirty-three when I was Turned and that was just over a century ago.”
You would think in all that time, I would now be a smooth operator, able to talk to people. But I’ve rather gone the opposite way. After a while, the lethargy of life weighed me down and I stopped interacting with people unless strictly necessary.
Now it seems like I’m out of practice. The words swirl around and round in my head but don’t quite get as far as my tongue and I end up choking on them.
Somehow, I never had the same problem with Silver. Perhaps it’s because she caught me off-guard when we first met. Or because we were in my territory where I feel most comfortable. It might also be that we’ve spent months with brief interactions and, in that time, I’ve grown comfortable.
Or it could be the instant zing of connection I felt when we first met. That unexplainable tether that drew my attention and hasn”t been released.
“You don’t know what happened to them?” Zeph asks, reminding me we’re in the middle of a conversation, however unwanted the current topic might be.
I don’t think he means to continue poking my bruises. From the way he’s watching Silver from a few feet away, it seems only a small portion of his focus is on our conversation.
It’s odd, because until recently I think he would have relished in torturing me if he could.
My voice comes out quiet and raspier than I would like. “We lost touch. It was a... messy few years after I was first Turned. I barely knew which way was up. I’d liken it to having an addiction to something where it takes over all of your thoughts and actions. By the time I was back to myself, they’d moved. And several more years went by where I attempted to track them down. At the time, supernaturals weren’t so well integrated into society and my family wasn’t likely to accept my new status, so I stopped looking.”
He glances at me for a long moment, then nods before turning his attention back to Silver.
I’m grateful he doesn’t pry any further. Some wounds never fully heal and the guilt over what happened in those early years still haunts me.
Newly turned vamps should not be allowed anywhere near people they care about. That way leads to nightmares of torn out throats and lifeless eyes before the bloodlust is something that can be controlled.
The piece of me that was more than a blood-sucking creature of the night was shoved into a box deep down. I only resurfaced periodically and when I did, the things I saw were enough to leave me with flashbacks for years after.
It was something like being a soldier returning from war. Knowing my family wouldn’t understand the new me. Although in this scenario, during the war, I’d been rampaging like a wild animal and returned haunted by visions of the pain I’d caused along the way.
A whole five minutes pass with Zeph and I standing in silence, watching Silver work.
“Did you choose to be a vamp?” he asks.
The question is quiet but my spine stiffens, my already slow-beating heart almost grinding to a halt. I could act like I didn’t hear him, but for some reason, I find myself shaking my head.
“No.”
Once again, he doesn’t ask any follow-up questions, which is a surprise. He has some sense, after all.
He must do. He must also have more emotional depth than that of a puddle, or I don’t see how he could attract the attention and interest of someone like Silver. Someone remarkable.
Once sufficient time passes that I can convince myself he’s not going to continue to delve into the deeply traumatic events of my past, I force my shoulders to relax and my spine to loosen.
“You, uh, should stick around,” Zeph grunts at me. “For dinner, I mean. If you eat food, anyway. I’m not offering up my neck or my leg for you. Ro’s a really good cook.”
For a moment, it’s all I can do not to gape at him like he’s speaking a foreign language. He’s inviting me to stay. To be a part of this noise-filled chaos.
I glance at Silver, who has Roscoe wrapped around her back, and she laughs joyfully, trying to buck him off, the expression lighting up her face. Do I want to stay here or head back to my silent life? My quiet office, safely behind the tinted glass.
It’s a no-brainer.
I slip off my suit jacket and hand it carefully on a hook beside the door.
“You’re staying?” Silver asks, coming up close to me and linking our fingers together.
I lift her hand to my lips and press a gentle kiss to the inside of her wrist.
“I am.”
It’d be nice to be a part of this. To feel part of a family again for a while, even if it isn’t my own.