Page 36 of Below the Shadow of the City

“Can I kiss you?” He asks. The question is so delicate I nearly forget that he fucked me so hard I saw stars last night. It’s like he knows that a sweet kiss and a dinner date are much more intimate than the animalistic instincts we both seemed to lean into. This prospect has now become that much more frightening.

“Yes,” I say before I can stop myself. A piece of me buried deep within is reaching for this, yearning for it, even. I can’t let logic slip too far away. I can’t let tonight turn into something it shouldn’t. We’ll get dinner, we’ll have a pleasant date, and then we’ll sleep together. I’ll slip out and he’ll booty call me whenever he wants to sleep with a human again. I can use his presence as stress relief while I try to find the gumption to develop eight recipes from scratch.

As he moves closer to me, a deep growl rumbles out of him. On instinct my thighs press together from the bolt of electricity the sound sends straight to my core.

“Wait—” he tilts his head.

“Ugh, what?” I groan.

“That did a little something for you didn’t it?” His eyes darken as he stares me down. Does he not realize how he sounds when he does that? Any growl that exits him vibrates so deeply in my chest and blooms throughout my entire body. I can chalk it up to a strange subconscious biological reaction, that’s entirely involuntary. I can pretend that it’s not him in particular making that sound that gets me squirming for his touch. I don’t answer and he growls again with a laugh.

His fingers make their way across the small of my back and he pulls me in close against his body. He has the same pine scent, now coupled with a musky cologne that smells expensive. Another thick, clawed hand tangles itself in my hair and tilts my head towards his. I steady myself by gripping onto his waist. Maddox tugs gently on my hair, firmly enough to direct my head up towards his. The heat of his breath spreads across the bridge of my nose. My lips crash into his and we both exhale at the meeting. His hands track up and down my body in a way that makes me upgrade from a tremble into a complete shiver.

I push further into him, seeking heat, seeking sensation, seeking him. When he’d asked if he could kiss me, he severely undersold how incredible a simple kiss could be. Finally, he pulls back and brushes his thumb along my swollen lips.

His eyes are hooded in a daze, “we should get to our reservation.” In a flash of motion, he pulls me down the hallway while I’m still processing the kiss.

Our reservations are at an upscale Italian restaurant owned by the family of the minotaur from the pizza shop. Which, sure, makes sense in this world. I truly think I’m still in a state of shock regarding the existence of this realm below and all who inhabit it. On my list of priorities to mentally parse through, it’s lower on the list. I’ll take in this information as it comes otherwise I might go completely mad.

“Orion,” Maddox says warmly to the tawny furred guy before us who has swapped his grease stained t-shirt from last night for a blue oxford button down.

The minotaur looks at me as curiously as I’m looking at him, we didn’t have a proper introduction last night and it’s clear neither of us are familiar with the other’s species.

“This is Sigrid,” Maddox breaks up the staredown. “Sigrid, this is Orion, one of my dearest, oldest friends.” He makes a gesturing motion between the two of us, I reach out my hand towards the minotaur’s and he tentatively shakes it.

“Pleasure, Sigrid. And dude, no need to make me sound like I’m some old man,” Orion huffs with an obvious New York accent, and a piece of fur that was hanging over his eyes flutters in the air. They chat casually while he leads us to our seats, a quiet booth in the corner of the restaurant.

An older minotaur darts around the kitchen barking out orders to a menagerie of chefs who are also very much not human. I glance around the kitchen and the rest of the restaurant.

There are humanoid individuals with horns and features unique enough to catch my attention, creatures that I’d only recognized from folklore like mothmen, orcs, trolls, and others, and then people that look fully human and can only assume are shifters, witches, vampires, or maybe guests like myself. It is remarkably bizarre. I bounce my knee up and down.

I peruse the menu, and despite not wanting to be here, both in this underground realm and on an actual date, my stomach roars looking over the selection of pastas and dishes to choose from. The menu is really the only thing I can look at, because staring at the variety of creatures surrounding me would be incredibly rude.

Maddox is reviewing the menu himself. He’d ordered us a bottle of wine to split, which given the state of my physical being after the wine last night, makes me chow down a few more pieces of bread to hopefully absorb the incoming alcohol. The reading material before me is engaging enough to keep me distracted, and everything looks incredible. Save for a few menu items that make me pause entirely in my tracks.

I lean over the crisp white tablecloth. “This is going to be a terrible question—” Maddox looks up towards me and says nothing.

Assuming his silence is an invitation to continue, I start. “There’s beef on this menu, and the owners of the restaurant…”

“You’re asking if it’s cannibalism,” he replies matter-of-factly.

“Is it?” I nervously laugh, the flavored chips, mystery meat cubes, and blood bottles in the bodega were one thing. The acceptance of blatant cannibalism? Not a line I care to cross.

“No,” he laughs, “most Minotaurs don’t eat beef themselves, but it’s not cannibalism. Just…weird.” I nod at his straightforward answer, as content with it as I can be. I could ask dozens of other questions, many of them some variation of “what is their species?” Except I truly can’t think of anything more insensitive. Instead, I rub my fingers along the velvet appliques of my dress as a self-soothing mechanism.

“I’m usually the kind of person that says ‘Google is free’ with those sorts of questions but I think most of what happens down here far surpasses Google,” I’m rambling in a way that makes me feel so ashamed to be the one doing it.

It’s like when I came out to my parents and they asked me the weirdest, most invasive questions about bisexuality. “Why can’t you choose? What happens if you’re with someone and change your mind? You still like boys, why not date only them and keep the women to yourself?” I hate being at the receiving end, so I can only imagine how Maddox feels. He straightens himself in his chair and pushes his glasses up.

“Don’t feel bad for asking questions, it’s not your fault you’ve spent your entire life in the dark about it,” he reaches his hand across the table and places it over mine as I stare at the condensation on my glass of water. “And by the way, your efforts to not stare at me or anyone here look truly pained,” he laughs. I feel my cheeks grow hot at the horrible realization that I’m nowhere near as coy as I’d hoped. I can only imagine how our poor waiter, a tall male that looks like a dragon of sorts, feels about my stiffness and awkward formal mannerisms.

My eyes flick up at him and he smiles. “Much better.” We place our orders, and I grow more comfortable in the space. As time passes, I forget I’m not in a “normal” restaurant with “normal” guests. We talk and talk while I eat an obscene amount of bread. Though it’s not entirely my fault that the focaccia topped with rosemary and sea salt is among the best I’ve had. It’s done an incredible job at absorbing the wine I’ve gulped down.

“Is there something magic with this bread? Why is it so addictive?” I pluck another piece from the basket the moment it’s set down in front of us.

Maddox grabs a piece for himself. “No magic, in-house recipe. I actually think Orion was the one who developed it.”

“I could eat this all day, every day.”