“Can you trust me now?” he asked, and I nodded, unable to help wondering why he pushed me out so quickly. What was that warm, wonderful sensation that he didn’t want me to feel?
I drew away just a little because being so close to him, touching him, was overwhelming. “You remember what Clay said about me being marked by a demon and that they were going to cast a shadow over my future, sending it off course?”
Peter nodded, listening intently.
“My parents told me that a friend of theirs, an elf with clairvoyant abilities, saw a vision of my future when my mother was pregnant. She foretold that I’d become a ruler who would bring peace to the city.”
“But there’s already peace,” Peter replied.
“That’s what I said, but my father believes there are dissenters, people who wish to go back to the old ways of segregation. I’m fairly certain those vampires who attacked us tonight were some of them.” I paused, swallowing thickly at the memory of that vampire’s disgust when he looked at me. “I also spent some time speaking with my granddad, Martin.”
“Your human grandfather?” Peter asked, a trickle of dismay entering his features. He must’ve known the story about what happened to him.
“Yes. He’s the one your great-uncle Marcel kidnapped. Marcel performed a ceremony sending Granddad Martin to a dimension known as Oreylia in exchange for the sorcerer, Theodore, who I suppose you know is a distant relative of yours.”
“Yes, I’m aware of that,” Peter said, eyes downcast. Tension filled the air, but I soldiered on.
“Granddad Martin doesn’t like to talk about that period, but he spent a good deal of time in Oreylia, and he finally opened up about it to my mother and me. He suffered greatly in that place, said it was a brutal, dog-eat-dog world, where anyone who wasn’t a full-blooded demon was basically enslaved. My mother believes the demon who marked me has come from there.”
“Does she think it had something to do with your grandfather, or perhaps the sorcerer Theodore?”
“I don’t know. It was almost twenty years ago. If the events are linked, then I don’t understand why they’ve only come here now.”
“Time passes differently between dimensions. Perhaps in Oreylia, hardly any time has passed at all,” Peter suggested. “Or way more time has passed. There’s no way to tell.” He went quiet for a moment, a thoughtful look on his face before he continued, “Do you think that the attack on you tonight is connected, too?”
“Why would a bunch of vampires be doing a demon’s bidding?”
“Demons have the power to manipulate emotions, to bring out anger and dissent in people. They can cause a lot of chaos if they choose to. Don’t you find it odd that after nearly two decades of peace, suddenly there’s a bunch of prejudiced vampires attacking you? Supernaturals have been able to live safely in Tribane for a long time. Why would they want to mess with that?”
Something twisted in my gut because Peter’s theory rang true. “It would make sense, actually, given how Mr Williams was killed. If this demon is behind the murder, then he must’ve gotten a vampire to do the dirty work,” I said just as my phone vibrated yet again. I finally pulled it from my pocket to check my messages.
I want an explanation right now, Darya.
Hellooo?
Your parents are going to be here any minute. Where are you?!
I shot an anxious look Peter’s way. “Is there any chance you could teleport me back to my house? I wasn’t supposed to go out tonight, and my parents will be mad if they get back and I’m not there.”
“Of course,” he said, grabbing his shoes and throwing on a jacket. I realised that he’d been in such a hurry to rescue me earlier that he hadn’t even taken a moment to put his shoes on. A flurry of butterflies filled my stomach at the thought. I was also flying high on the fact that he’d let me see inside his head and that he didn’t dislike or resent me, not even a little bit.
“I still can’t believe you can teleport,” I said as he pulled on a shoe before reaching for the other one. “Why do you still take the bus? If I could teleport, I wouldn’t bother driving. I’d just disappear into a cloud of mist before arriving at my destination.”
Peter scratched the back of his neck. “I don’t like to overuse my magic. And if people didn’t see me on the bus, they’d start questioning how I was getting to school. I’d rather they didn’t know the full extent of my abilities. Members of the magical families can become very jealous when someone has more powers than they do.”
I couldn’t argue with that. “Seems smart to keep it to yourself, then.”
“Are you ready?” he asked, stepping close. I nodded. “Come here,” he said, voice low, and my belly quivered. I stepped close, and he wrapped his arms around me. I had just enough time to savour his warmth and inhale his smoky amber scent before I was whisked into a blur of motion. It only lasted a few brief seconds, but it still dizzied me like it always did. When I was standing on solid ground again, I was in my bedroom. Grace, who was sitting on my bed, leapt up in fright.