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Prologue
In the beginning, monsters didn’t exist. They were tales that were told around the campfire to scare us, and the reason we checked under the bed for creatures at night. Well, at least that’s what I believed. The monsters we ran from in the darkness did not exist.
Then everything changed.
They used to be invisible.
They hunt us at night, and we are entirely oblivious to them in the world around us.
When the clock struck midnight on October 24th, signaling the start of my 21st birthday, it was like a switch flipped. I could suddenly see the demons hiding in the dark that everyone else was unaware of.
I was lying in bed reading my favorite book about a red-haired foxy girl and her men when the scorpion-like creature came out from under my bed. I sat up paralyzed, not knowing what to do as the creature looked my way. Its eyes scanned the bed, but they never stopped on me; it looked like it was staring right through me. It had huge black pincers and a long segmented tail curling around its back, dripping a green goo from the tip. The death-curdling scream I let out was enough to shatter windows.
My boyfriend, Chad, darted into view in the open doorway to the bedroom. He looked around, clueless to the scary as fuck scorpion creature coming right toward him.
“Chad, get down. Move, it’s coming for you!” I screamed as I jumped out of bed, but he just looked at me like I was crazy as the monster jammed its telson into his heart.
“Diana,” he croaked out as he started sweating and taking short sporadic breaths. My boyfriend of only a few weeks clutched his chest, dropping to his knees, opening and closing his mouth, gasping for a breath. No words were escaping past his silent lips.
The scorpion then turned to me as Chad dropped to the floor in the hallway. It looked around the room, cocking its head to the side like a damn German Shepherd, like it couldn’t see me standing stunned in the middle of the room.
The big black thing started crawling back under my bed to wherever the hell it came from.
I rushed to Chad’s side, but it was too late. He was already gone. I hung my head, closed his eyes, and packed my bag. There was no way I was staying another minute in this apartment with that thing crawling around.
I learned two things that night: all the myths and ghost stories we were told as kids are real; we just cannot see them, and I don’t know what happened the moment my 21st birthday hit, but I think I might be invisible to the demons I could now see, that are very real in the world.
Chapter 1
Diana
Islammed through the front door to the apartment with nothing but the essentials in the pack slung over my shoulder. There was no way in hell I would be going back in there; nothing could ever get me to step anywhere near it again. I pushed through the door that led to the stairs, taking two at a time till I broke through the exit door at the bottom.
The chilly night air hit me like a slap in the face. My thoughts were racing as I ran from the disaster that just unfolded.
We lived in Tennessee. I moved here to go to college, then I met Chad, and we decided to get a small apartment off campus. Some eye contact here, a touch there, and it was easy enough to have him on his knees begging for me. It was fun, but I’m not heartbroken. Any loss of life is upsetting, but now wasn’t the time to think about it while I was running for mine. He was just a plaything while I finished school anyway. I never intended to settle down, and Chad was just there to scratch an itch from time to time. He felt the same way; it was a mutually convenient relationship, and neither planned on it lasting past college.
I’m lost in my thoughts as I walk toward my friend’s apartment building; I run straight into a wall. Pain shot through my skull from the impact.
“What the fuck,” I yelled, rubbing my forehead.
I looked up to see what I ran into. I was watching my feet and not where I was going, and I knew there shouldn’t have been anything in my way. I was on the damn sidewalk, after all. So unless someone decided to put a building on it, there was no way I should have hit anything.
My mouth falls open at probably the most breathtaking people I’ve ever seen. Close your mouth; you look like a fish out of water.
I clamp my mouth shut in reply to my mind screaming at me. It wasn’t a damn wall I ran into, it was a person. She looked like a goddess. Had armor strapped against her chest, a bow slung over her shoulder, and the deadliest sword I’ve ever seen strapped at her waist. She had mid-length curly brown hair, way shorter than my long red locks. Piercing blue eyes that looked almost white with a dark ring of black around the outside of her iris. Soft facial features that made her look almost elegant, like a porcelain doll.
You're still staring. Introduce yourself instead of being a creep—stupid Diana.
“Fuck I’m so sorry. My name is Diana Nephus,” I mumbled while thrusting my hand in front of the beautiful stranger.
There’s no need to be rude and not politely offer my hand, even if she did come out of nowhere. She stares at my outstretched arm for a long moment. When I start to pull back, she grabs it with hers. Her hand is so soft and a bit cold to the touch.
Fuck your staring again, Diana. Snap out of it. She’s speaking to you; pay attention.
“I’m sorry, what?” I sputtered as I only caught half of her sentence.
I yanked my hand back so I could focus and not be distracted by how cold her hand felt in mine.
