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CHAPTER THIRTEEN

DEAL WITH THE DRUID DEVIL

It was the day of the meeting with Tianlong, and I took a quick trip to the shops downstairs to find something appropriate to wear.

Dom’s rooms were protected with an Arch’s power. I could sleep easy there, if I could just ignore the world of baggage and lust between me and the room’s other inhabitant. Those protected rooms were a short trip away from the elevators that led down to the shops. A very short window of opportunity, but one I still saw clearly.

I wouldn’t say I sought it out, but no one could say I avoided it, which even I knew amounted to the same thing at this point.

Perhaps I was just in the mood to make a deal with the druid devil.

I was walking alone from the protected quarters to the bank of elevators that led to the first floor of the mall.

I pushed the down button, my attention caught by a mirror against the wall. It hung above an ornate desk, heavy and thick with a strangely shaped frame that gave the impression it was expensive but very old.

It did not fit. In this sparse, contemporary space, it was garish, outlandish. Old-fashioned.

Ancient.

I wasn’t sure why I thought that last word. It had felt like it was put into my brain.

I took a step closer to it, then another, eyes glued to the mirror, though my instincts told me to do the opposite.

They were yelling at me, and what they were saying was very clear.

Run. Run like hell and don’t look back.

But I did not do that. I stepped closer.

It wasn’t that it was blank. Oh no. There was a reflection. I was there, and I seemed to be myself, normal, the same. But behind me was not the room I’d entered. Behind me was not a room at all.

It was The Grove. One as familiar as it was terrifying.

Such a very bad idea. I shouldn’t let it catch me, not again.

Well, perhaps, maybe just a taste. Just one more little memory to feed on.

I won’t gorge myself this time, I promised myself.

I held the secret of her like a precious, hidden gift for as long as I could. For years, in fact, I led that double life.

It always took a bit of maneuvering for me to sneak away from my school and friends without getting questioned, but I was managing quite often by this point.

I’d been in strong denial about it for months, but she was obviously seeing someone. Some guy named Tom.

I was sick about it even as I studied him at every opportunity. He was human. Nothing supernatural about him that I could detect. He was in the restaurant at least as often as I was, waiting for her to make an appearance, no matter how brief, just so I could bask in her presence.

I caught them sharing a certain kind of smile once. She’d leaned down and touched his shoulder as she said something to him, and it wrenched some beastly thing open inside of me that I didn’t recognize.

I wanted to murder him, and I even considered it. I could kill him so easily, and she would never smile at him again. It was frightening how tempted I was.

I couldn’t bring myself to ask her about it for a long time, but it consumed me.

One afternoon he was absent, and she had a little extra time for me. We played cards, and when it was time for me to leave I embraced her, and she let me, patting my back lightly. I lingered at it, pressing against her until she pushed me away.

“Are you dating that man that’s in here all the time?”

She looked uncomfortable, but she answered. “Yes, we’re seeing each other.”