She gave me a kind smile and a nod, which I appreciated since I knew she'd just lost her mentor because of me. Well, technically because of those asshole mages, but still. The guys gave their thanks and we made our way to the exit, although not without me noticing all the lustful looks that were being shot at each of the men around me. It made me want to laugh.
They led me to a car, which was fascinating since I'd never been able to ride in one before even though I'd come through a rear view mirror once or twice. We all squished in, Ellis driving with Alastair next to him, and me sandwiched between Hunter and Grim. Would it be bad if I said I liked it?
After barely any human contact I just wanted to rub up against them, not to mention get back in bed with Hunter. I tried to slyly look at Grim as I pretended to look out of the window, but I had a feeling he wasn’t falling for it. The man was massive. All bulk in comparison to Hunter's lean form. His hair was a bit longer than the others and was pulled back into a small ponytail, one that made me want to pull the hair tie from binding it just so I could watch it come loose over his shoulders. His dark eyes met mine for a moment and I felt the warmth of his gaze ghost over my skin as he took me in. Part of me expected him to be disgusted with me, to turn away from my scars, but it was like he was tracing them with his eyes, seeing every faint line that marked my skin.
I wrenched my gaze away from him with no small amount of effort and sat back in my seat before looking at Hunter. His grey eyes weren't just warm, they were sizzling hot and made me want to strip naked and tempt him back to bed. Not that I had the energy for that. Apparently saving a realm and breaking through the curse that had imprisoned me had used up what little I had and I was ready for a nap.
"Where are we going?" I asked, fighting the growing need I felt to fall asleep. The steady rumble of the car was more soothing than I expected.
"Back to our place. You can stay with us for a while until we figure out what to do and what the hell those visions meant," Alastair said, surprising me. I had expected a response from Hunter or even an insult from Ellis, but so far Alastair had been quiet, along with Grim.
I needed to thank the mage. I knew he had been injured while trying to save me, but I didn't particularly want an audience. I mean how do you properly thank someone for saving your life? I wasn't very good at thanking people, or apologies, or really anything any more. The enormity of the shift that had just occurred in my life was finally starting to hit and it felt like someone was putting stones in my pockets and telling me to swim. I wasn't sure how long stones could keep being added before I drowned. As the car rumbled along I couldn't help but succumb to the sleep that had been pulling at me. Maybe when I woke up everything would be clearer.
3
Ellis
I was fucking grateful that Mae went to take a nap in Hunter’s room. Super fucking grateful. My knuckles pounded into the punching bag on our back patio over and over again. Sweat ran down my chest and my back, but I didn't even care. I beat the hell out of the bag until my heartbeat started to calm and I felt more in control of my emotions. And then, I stopped, panting, pressing my head against the bag.
People always thought unicorns were rainbow farts and horse asses running around with glitter. No one wanted to think about the truth. They didn’t want to remember the dark years when unicorns were hunted, their parts sold in dark magic shops, their horns on the mantles of every lord with a tiny dick. To survive, unicorns had to adapt. They had to change. They couldn’t just be the epitome of goodness and light, they had to let in the dark.
Maybe I’d let in too much of the dark.
A lifetime ago, I would have just been grateful that Mae was alive, that our mission was a success, and we’d saved another life, but I don’t feel that way now. The banshees’ vision hadn’t surprised me. The second Mae had been released into our world, I’d felt something change, like a rush of dark power had come over me. I wasn’t sure if it’d actually come from Mae, the mirror realm, or something else, but I didn’t like it.
Or maybe I didn’t like the rush of dark magic, along with the way the other guys were looking at the beautiful red-head. Yeah, I had a dick too. Yeah, I wasn’t oblivious to the perfect curves of her body or how it was hard to catch a breath when she looked at me, but I also scented trouble all over her.
And I wanted to be done with her.
Did that make me a dick? Was I an asshole for wanting to protect my friends? Hunter had been through hell and back; the last thing he needed was to finally give his heart to a woman and see it torn out. And Grim and Alastair? Fuck, I was mad at them. Weren’t they supposed to be all cool and calm?
If they were thinking with their heads, there was no way they would’ve taken Mae to our home. They would have walked away from her, just like we walked away from hundreds of other people we’d saved, and we’d already be on to our next case. The fact that we weren’t… that meant none of them were thinking clearly.
Was the goddamn unicorn supposed to be the bad guy then? Hell, I’d rather start farting glitter, or whatever the hell my kind are supposed to do.
Suddenly, my phone rang. I released the punching bag and scowled as I crossed to where my phone sat beside an open beer on the little table outside. Using a towel to mop myself off, I answered the unknown number with a, “Yello?”
For one second there was just heaving breathing, and then, “Ellis?”
I stiffened. “Frank?”
The old guy never called. Not unless there was an emergency. And I wasn’t talking a-demon-eating-out-some-man’s-brain emergency, I meant the kind where the shit had hit the fan and there were splattered bodies everywhere.
“Something happened.”
“What?” I snapped.
I heard him curse, but there was a raggedness to his voice I’ve never heard before. “You ever heard of the purple people eater?”
Did I hear him wrong? “Purple people eater?”
“That’s what I said, boy!”
An old song came to my mind. “A creature with one eye and one horn and eats people?”
“It eats children. The Powobawa is supposed to only live in Zanzibar, and it’s only supposed to come out after a storm. The legend goes that since it lost its child in a storm, it goes out in storms and kills any children it finds.”
“Okay…”
“Well, one of the damned creatures just snatched three kids in broad daylight.”
“Maybe it was a shifter or a--”
“I fucking saw it, Ellis. It was a damned Powobawa.”
I frowned. “I thought the one thing about monsters was that they obeyed their own damned rules.”
“That’s not the only thing,” he continued, and I didn’t think I’d ever heard him sound more tired. “There’s a horned demon-cat in the Rainbow Trees Park.”
“A horned--”
“Stop repeating every damn thing I say! Yeah, a horned demon-cat attacked some lady. The only reason it let her go was because some skaters scared it back into the bushes, but everyone reported seeing the same large, horned cat. And just like the legend said, the lady’s injuries don’t seem to be healing.”
“What the fuck?”