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chapter 37
a monster, a ghost, and a witch
esmeralda
The temperature in Girona is much milder than what we left back in Hazel Creek, the brightly shining sun a welcomed interlude from all the rain and fog. At the rental car kiosk, Tei speaks fluent Catalan to retrieve us a vehicle.
As we speed down AP-7 the sun filters into the car’s interior, warming my legs and shining off Tei’s exposed forearm, making his pale skin glisten. Green as far as the eye can see, from grassy fields to conifers, gives way to rocky cliffside. We’re driving on the edge of the precipice, nothing but a thin guardrail keeping us away from a near-vertical plunge.
“You didn’t tell me you spoke Catalan,” I say in an attempt at conversation.
A muscle in his jaw ticks. “I speak many languages.”
“Do you pick them up in the places you live in?”
His hands move up and down the steering wheel. “For the most part, yes.”
He’s dosing information with an eyedropper, and it makes me itchy and squirmy. When he does that, he’s usually got something he’s trying not to say. Not a lie, per se, but an omission. I’m not letting him get away with it anymore. “So you lived out in Catalonia, then.”
“A lifetime ago,” he admits in a whisper. “I haven’t been back since. It truly does feel like it was a different life.”
I know he won’t give the information willingly, so I need to search for a way to wiggle myself in. “Was it before or after the curse?”
His lips twist in a scowl, and I feel like I’ve hit a sore spot. “Before.” I’m about to ask more questions when he adds, “and for a short while after.”
I sit with his words for a good few minutes. When they finally click in place, it’s like thunder striking on a clear day.
Tei was cursed here. No wonder he feels so uncomfortable. As much as I want to press the issue, I’m resigned to the fact that this isn’t a conversation he’s going to have in this car, at this time. And frankly, as we wind through another hairpin bend and our destination comes into view, I suddenly don’t have the bandwidth for any kind of conversation.
Cadaques appears from nowhere, playing peekaboo behind a mountain. One moment, we’re passing layers upon layers of olive trees and prickly pear-covered rocks, and another, little clusters of white stucco buildings with terracotta roofs make their presence known. They start off perched on the side of the mountain, hanging on for dear life, but trickle lower and lower like an avalanche until they meet the sparkling blue sea. As we make our way into town, the seagulls’ song greets us. I roll down my window to breathe in the brine of the Mediterranean Sea.
This is it, my ancestral home, the town my grandparents were born in. It feels like coming home in an entirely new way, and the churning in my stomach isn’t all bad.
We spend the rest of daylight hours dumping our car and checking into our hotel. We take to the cobblestone streets of Cadaques just as the setting sun paints the white canvas of its buildings shades of warm pink and orange. Despite the later hour, the town is anything but going to sleep; shops are still open, restaurants are barely getting started on the dinner rush. It’s like the day lasts longer here, as if the people don’t want to give up on living for the sake of sleep. As if they have too much to enjoy to confine it within twelve hours of sunlight.
By the time we make it to the cemetery, night has fully fallen. The tall iron wrought gates are shut, and a figure looms in front of them. As we get closer, I recognize the opalescent nature of its surface, the way it shimmers under moonlight. Then my gaze focuses on the tiny body, the sharp black bob, and recognition dawns.
“I was wondering when you two would finally show,” she says.
“How was your… trip? Can I call it a trip?” I ask.
Mei shrugs in a jerking, robotic motion. “Uneventful. One moment I’m present in a place, and the next thing I know, I’m present in another. The in-between isn’t really consciousness. So I can’t say much happened during it.”
That is extremely fascinating. I’m about to ask for more details when Tei joins us, hands draped casually in his pockets. “Shall we?”
He walks up to the gate, inspecting the lock. His glamour drops from his hand, which turns inky black and twice as large as it’d been, claws sharp like knives. He grasps the lock easily in his massive palm, as if it were a child’s toy, and snaps it off the chain.
The sight warms parts of me that should most definitely not be warm right now, but I can’t help it. Far from the fear and disgust I’d originally felt, imagining Tei is his true form now is just… exciting.
Maybe I’ve lost my ever loving mind.
Tei pushes the gates open, then sweeps his arm out, motioning for us to go through. Mei passes first. Before I can step past him, his hand reaches for my arm, tightening around it. One moment, it’s fully human, and the next, it looks monstrous again, large enough his fingers overlap on my bicep, and deep obsidian. I suck in a breath.
“Control those urges, little gem,” he whispers in my ear. “You smell absolutely delicious, and I’m not above fucking you over some random fool’s grave.”
I let out a pathetic squeak, but nod. With a deep breath, I try to focus on anything but the feelings swirling in my stomach.
“You good?” Mei asks when I join her again. The sound of assent I make is pitiful, and I’m sure she doesn’t buy it.
