Page 120 of Pareidolia

I want everything he’s offering.

I want to understand what the man I killed felt.

I want to taste it.

My fingers twitch at my side, the color flaring brighter as my heartbeat picks up with the realization that a few simple promises from a monster are nearly making me forget a lifetime of discipline.

Nearly.

“No.”

“No?” I can’t tell if he’s angry or curious.

“I’m still not sure this is even real.”

“Real.” He echoes the word, another low, rumbling warning that I finally force myself to listen to.

“I’m not doing this.” It’s nearly impossible to make myself move, but I take one slow step back toward the door. The only thing that proves how much I don’t mean it is the way my fingers lift, glowing and pulsing with my thundering heartbeat as they reach toward him like I’m betraying them. “Fuck this.”

He snarls… but when I keep moving, I realize… he’s not moving. Not pouncing. Not tearing me apart.

I stare at him, and I notice something curious as I take another step back.

He’s not stopping me. He’s watching me with those glowing red eyes like he’s studying me more than anything. The claw marks on my arms are still bleeding, but they’re superficial in comparison to what he could have done to me, and I think we both know it.

“Don’t be cocky, Aspen.” I don’t understand how a creature saying my name can sound like he’s tasting it to see if he likes the flavor.

“You aren’t killing me,” I point out, because I’m apparently shit at taking advice.

“Yet.”

It’s a real threat, but I shrug, keeping my hand up between us. “I don’t know if it has something to do with this, but I’m going to take my chances and guess it does.”

When he doesn’t say anything, I know I’m right. Whatever happened, whatever he infected me with when I touched him, it’s stopping him from killing me now.

I take another step back, faintly aware that I’m leaving my laptop and my damn bag in the fire tower behind him. I might not be afraid, but I’m also not stupid. I’m not going to risk walking past him again, not when I can still feel the sting his claws left behind.

Not when there’s still a part of me that’s vibrating from how alive that pain, the possibility of being eaten by a fucking monster, made me feel.

The fluttering hum of his wings as they start to flicker again behind him nearly makes me pause, especially when the beating pulse under my skin starts to flare and throb in time with it. The brighter the red beneath my flesh burns, the more I can see little snaking tendrils of black pulsing and writhing beneath it. That darkness—those shadows—crawl beneath my flesh, and I can feel them slither against my bones, slinking and wrapping tighter as his wings beat faster.

Faster.

Faster, and he holds out his hand to me.

Faster, and I can feel myself sway again as the black liquid crawls beneath my skin and spills through my veins, up to the crook of my elbow.

“Stop.” It comes out faintly, because I can feel it—what he promised. I can hear it in the fucking flutter of his wings.

The man’s wide-eyed terror as he fell.

Rory’s broken cry as he plummeted to the ground.

And for just a moment, I can almost feel it. Something warm in my chest.

Wet.

Bitter.