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"Okay ..." This conversation suddenly feels strangely familiar.
"Are you ready?" he asks.
I nod. "Yeah, I think so."
He rubs his hands together. "Okay, so there are a couple of things you must do to really get a Forbidden to fall for you. Because, let's face it, our steel hearts are quite cold." He winks at me. "No pun intended."
I smile, but confusion fogs my mind.
"So, the first thing is to let them rescue you. Perhaps once or twice, because we love playing the hero. Although, some of us might not admit that." He casts a fleeting look over his shoulder at Blaise, who's glaring at us with impatience, then returns his focus back to me. "And the second is to never be afraid of them. I know we might seem really scary, especially when we have our scary faces on, but deep down, we're just as afraid as you."
"I don't think you're scary," I say, wiping off a water droplet rolling down my cheek.
Zander gives a subtle nod in Blaise's direction. "What about that one over there?"
I bite back a smile, remembering the first time I met Blaise. For a split second, he frightened me, but then I realized he was as scared of me as I was of him, and then I just became fascinated. "No, not at all."
He chuckles. "Well, you might be the first."
"Oh, my God, will you get in here?" Blaise interrupts with a shake of his head. "I'd like to get this taken care of before Fredrick returns and our cover is blown."
Cover is blown? Blaise is working undercover?
Zander holds up his hand at Blaise, his gaze fixed on me. "And third is to not call us Forbiddens."
"But you call yourself Forbiddens?" I point out, feeling lost.
"Yes, but we're all hypocrites," he says amusedly. "We like to shame ourselves, but secretly, we wish for people to see us as much more than an abomination."
I nod, sort of understanding where he's coming from. "So, what should I call you?"
His eyes light up like firecrackers. "Greystelies."
Chapter 13
Poppy's Wonderful Poison
My eyes are huge as I stare at Zander in shock. "I should call them what?"
"Greystelie," he says a little slower. "I know the word is a little weird, but I assure you that we like it better than Forbidden. Greystelie is our word, while Forbidden was created by the Grim to show us that man and machine aren't supposed to combine into one form."
"Oh." I try to carry a neutral tone, but my perplexity shows.
"You don't like the word?" he asks, starting to frown.
I shake my head. "No ... That's not it." I sigh. "I just think I've heard it before." In my head, while I was in the Oblivion, right when the Orders first spoke of the Forbidden. I didn't know what the word meant at the time, but ... How do I know the word?
"Really?" Surprise flashes across Zander's face. "That's strange."
"Why?"
"Because the word is rarely spoken."
"I'm not even sure where I heard it from ... I might be getting it confused with something else."
"Like Heystelie?" he jokes then sighs. "Sorry. I'm terrible at jokes."
"Yes, you are." Blaise steps through the doorway, snags the back of Zander's vest, and tows him backward. "And you're great at procrastinating."
"Yeah, yeah, if I had a trinket for every time you said that, I'd be an entire robot." Zander wiggles out of Blaise's grasp and offers me an apologetic smile. "We'll continue this conversation later, after we get Blaise's panties out of a bunch."
Blaise rolls his eyes as Zander grins and wanders through the doorway. I start to follow, but Blaise sidesteps and blocks by path.
"Wait a second ..." His eyes roam across my neck, shoulders, arms, waist, legs, and then return to my face, his gaze flittering from my eyes to my lips to my eyes.
I instinctively bring my fingers to my mouth as images of Blaise and I standing in the street with our lips pressed together tickle the back of my mind. The kiss was brief, but I wonder how long it would've lasted if the time traveler hadn't interrupted us. Minutes? Hours? Or would I have lost control of my hunger and devoured Blaise to death ...?
A thought registers out of nowhere. Can I even kill Blaise that way? Isn't that why he dared to kiss me?
"That's funny ... I thought I ..." Blaise forcefully blinks his gaze off my lips, and then he hastily clears his throat. "Zander, come here for a second."
Zander pokes his head out of the doorway. "What's up?"
Blaise moves back and gestures at me, without saying anything.
"Yeah, I know. She's lovely, right?" Zander tosses me a wink and a smile then looks back at Blaise. "Maybe we could take her back with us after we're all done here?"
Blaise curtly shakes his head. "We can't take her to the station."
"Why not?" Zander asks. "That's what the station's partly for--to take people in who need a home."
"And how do we know she even needs a home?" Blaise gives me a hard stare, is if trying to scare me into confirming.
"Um, I already have a home." Which technically is the truth. That is, if I ever get out of this place.
"Now look what you've done." Zander scowls at Blaise. "You scared her so badly she's lying."
"Is that true?" Blaise asks, his withering stare making me squirrelly. "Are you lying?"
I shake my head, trying to appear more confident this time. "No, I'm not."
"Well, I'll be damned," Zander says with a goofy grin on his face. "She's not afraid of you."
Blaise seems torn on what to say next. "Well, she should be."
"Well, she's not." Zander steps forward with his arm extended toward me. "Now come on, let's go to the library so you can show Blaise where the channels are and steal a little bit more of his heart."
Blaise's jaw ticks as he shakes his head. "We can't go into the library." He shoots a pressing look at me. "Not with her dressed like that. They'll immediately know something's up."
Zander takes in my outfit then nods. "You're completely right." He snags ahold of my hand.
My instinct is to pull away, but before I get the chance, he's yanking me through the doorway and into a room made of all dirt except for the logs bordering the corners and roof.
At the back of the room is a long, dirt tunnel that stretches to the unknown. Zander steers me toward it.
"Where are you going?" Blaise hisses as he rushes after us.
"To see Poppy," Zander says, staring straight ahead as he marches down the tunnel lit with torches.
Blaise's footsteps thunder against the ground as he catches up. "You think you can trust Poppy with this?"
"Of course." Zander shakes his head as he takes longer strides. "You never trust anyone."
"And for a good reason," Blaise mumbles from behind me.
I want to reach back and take his hand like I used to do, but even when Blaise knew me, he always tensed whenever our fingers entangled. This untrusting Blaise ... Well, I'm fairly positive he might break my hand if I touched him.
We sink into silence as Zander leads us through the tunnel and into a room on the other side. Like the room we entered the tunnel through, this place is made of all dirt and log beams. Instead of being empty and plain, though, sheer curtains are strung about, glittering beads dangling from the ceiling, and tons of shirts, pants, dresses, and shorts hang from metal rods sticking out of the walls.
When Zander releases my hand, I turn in a circle and look around. "Is this a closet?"
"What's a closet?" Zander and Blaise ask in unison.
I think of Blaise's list of words I know that he doesn't, but that probably doesn't apply here.
"It's a tiny room attached to a bigger bedroom," I try to explain. "Where people keep clothes and shoes and stuff."
"This is definitely a closet, then," Zander says, tracing his finger along the clothes as he wanders around. "I've never heard of the word before, though."
"I come from a strange place," I
say absentmindedly.
"Oh, yeah?" Zander faces me, his hand drifting to his side. "From where?"
His question hits me hard. Where am I from? I really don't know. Somewhere? Everywhere? Anywhere?
I struggle for an answer, a lie to give him, but my brain has shut down. Luckily, a tall, slender woman sweeps into the room and distracts everyone. Not just with her presence, but her appearance.
Her chin-length blue hair is as bright as the sky, her teal eyes are lined heavily with maroon, and her glittery maroon lips match her bunched-up silky skirt. Her thigh-high, lace-up leather boots go in sync with her corset; black metal cuffs decorate her wrists and neck; and her skin sparkles everywhere.
Pretty is the first word that pops into my mind. This woman is very pretty.
"Zander, darling, how are you?" She greets Zander with a kiss on each cheek.
Zander blushes sheepishly. "I'm great, Poppy. Just great. How are you?"
"Just lovely." She strokes his cheek with the back of her hand, and Zander practically purrs, leaning into her touch. "You know, out of all my clients, you're my favorite."
"I bet you say that to all of them," Zander retorts, a flush still creeping across his cheeks.
Poppy smiles sweetly but the look vanishes as she turns to Blaise. "Blaise, how are you?"
"Fine," Blaise bites out. "Or I will be if you keep your distance."
I glance from a tense Poppy to a stiff Blaise, curious to know what's going on.
"She poisons people's minds with her Witches Potion," Blaise explains to me tightly, as if reading my confusion. "Zander's a fan of the high. Me, not so much. That doesn't really matter to her."
"I didn't realize you wouldn't like it," Poppy replies, sticking her nose in the air. "I've never had any complaints before."
"That's because everyone's always too doped up to speak for themselves." Blaise sidesteps toward me and crosses his arms over his chest. "You will not use that shit on her, got it?"
Poppy's eyes flitter from me to Blaise. "I never thought I'd see the day when you possessed such protectiveness."
Blaise's brows bunch together. "I'm not."
"If you say so." She turns toward me, rolling her eyes, but then plasters on a smile. "So, my dear, who are you?"
"I'm Allura," I reply tentatively, the entire situation making me nervous.
