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It had been stupid of me to kiss Derrick.
Stupid of me to be lulled into his charms.
Stupid of me to believe Bess and Martin all this time.
There was movement behind me, footsteps distancing, and to my left I spied Sam leaving. He might have glanced at me once, but I was busy coaching myself into breathing properly, into shoving the tension and the tears somewhere else. I could unpack them later, at home in my bedroom with the door secure. For now they needed to go away, struggle as it was to do so.
“Is that really what you think of me?”
Derrick’s voice, though I could sense Cade was still there.
“It doesn’t matter what I think of you,” I said with another steadying breath. I almost believed the words myself. “You were doing your job.”
And your job was to manipulate me, curse you.
“Nora, I know your Aunt and Uncle taught you some skewed things, but we’re not monsters at the CEB.”
Cade muttered, low enough I could hear him, “Derrick’s behavior aside.”
“You’re not helping here,” Derrick growled. “Why don’t you…”
I cut him off, turning to face them and praying my face didn’t bely the confidence I tried to exhibit. The last thing I wanted was to be alone with Derrick, and there were important things I needed to tell them. Maybe I’d been betrayed, maybe Derrick was an ass who didn’t deserve my help, but there were warlock traffickers about, and I wasn’t going to let anyone else feel the terror of a runestone if I could help it. “I don’t know why Bess and Martin kept me from Fairy, Constable. I don’t know a lot of things anymore.”
Cade was scowling at the ground, no doubt debating the merits of leaving. His jaw flexed and his fists were bunched, and I could sense the fight brimming in him even without my magic. Derrick was in my peripheral view, shoulders rigid, but I refused to face him directly.
“But that’s not important.” I waited for Cade to look up at me. And, bless him, he did. There was conflict in his face, but he remained as he was, one arm bent, covering the side I knew to be wounded, his weight leaning into his right leg probably to alleviate pain. “The vines that attacked the safehouse, I’ve seen them before.”
At this, both men straightened. I fought not to look at Derrick, delivering my report to Cade as though the other man wasn’t there.
“When I was drugged, I thought I was dreaming, but now I’m not so sure.” I held my wounded hand to my chest, tested moving my fingers because it was good to have multiple things to do, to concentrate on. “In the dream, I was in the aether, outside Leslie manor. I could see the magic at its foundations, and I could sense something was happening to my physical body, even if I couldn’t see or hear where I was.”
“And the vines were there?” Cade asked, his frown sharpening.
I nodded. “Choking the whole of the third story. They seemed to be coming out of the balcony door.”
“Montgomery Leslie’s rooms.” Cade said, glancing at Derrick.
Derrick grunted.
I hesitated, uncertain if this next bit was important, but I’d already opened the door so I might as well give them everything. “There’s more…”
Cade’s eyebrow lifted in surprise. “More?”
“I wasn’t alone in the aether. Something was there with me.” I rubbed the back of my skull, the space where I’d felt claws digging into my scalp. “I couldn’t see it, whatever it was, it stayed out of my view. But it did something to me. I don’t know what. I honestly thought it was all a hallucination until a few moments ago.”
I explained, describing the pierce of claws, the strange sensation of my core being ripped into. Suppressing a shudder, I tried to give as much detail as I could, despite being unable to see the creature that attacked me. It had held me so firmly in place, I couldn’t have turned to look at it.
The expression on Cade’s face went from concern to dawning horror. He stepped to me, gripping my shoulders in both hands. His eyes filled into twilight, the whites disappearing as he accessed magic, and where he held me came a low thrum, like a tuning fork being struck.
My body tingled, the buzz running from the tips of my toes to the top of my head. I could sense him searching, though what he was searching for I couldn’t be sure. For a dazed moment I stood transfixed, staring at him while he surveyed my innermost being, and I realized with a start that I could see him. Not just see him within the physical world, but the light inside him, the core of his being was laid bare before me.
He was dusk: the last rays of sunlight thin on the horizon, the promise of a new day once the night had passed. He did not inhabit darkness, he staved it off, clinging to the hope of light. He was starlight blazing through the dark.
He was so much more than the son of a nymph and a selkie.
Cade inhaled sharply and I looked down, but whatever he could see in me, I was blind to, and in the next moment the magic cut off. He released me, his eyes flicking back to normal, his voice grim as he asked Derrick; “What did you say was the witch light’s message?”
Derrick looked a little stunned, but he answered, “He comes in the mouth of the night.”
