Chapter 70 - Sixty-Eight

I slept fine for some time, the chilly wind brushing comfortably against my hot skin, relaxing my body as a cold drink in the summer.

However something disturbed my sleep in the middle of night, making me feel bothered, turning and rolling, in a half-awake haft-asleep state that made me take my time to finally open my eyes, brushing the sleep from them and yawning, only to notice two things: that it was still dark outside, and that my brother was nowhere to be seen.

What the…

I half-sit in place supporting myself on my elbows, frowning as I turn my head around and don't find him anywhere, including his makeshift bed on the floor beside me.

He wouldn't have defied me, would he?

But he has never disobeyed me before… not this way, only fighting to get what he wants sometimes, but not hidden, not…in secrecy.

No, no, maybe I'm just overthinking, he could have just gone to the bathroom, that's all, right?

Yet I could not shake off the dreading feeling growing inside me…

I stop speculating, however, once I smell a strange yet familiar scent in the air. I look towards the dark hall, my eyes narrowing as I felt unease, watched.

I was not alone.

A scratching sound against the wood resonates in the silent night, very vague, difficult to pinpoint, like a single nail slowly brushing against the lumber.

That's when I realized I could not move.

With my eyes open wide I stare down the dark, my night vision oddly inexistent as the door from the outside opens to the hall, still out of sight but close enough so I could almost feel the presence behind the second door, waiting in the hall where the noises stop.

I gulp down, feeling my heart race as I shudder, almost incapable of controlling my body at this point as the door finally opens sideways… but nothing comes out of it, instead the hall was covered by a blackness that spread like a black hole, swallowing all the objects, walls and ceiling like a living thing, slowing growing as it moves closer, a massive black mass disseminating.

Still somewhat calm I manage to remember using appraisal on the thing, but the information that came seemed to be… corrupted?

%$F234o%$U¨$6n12$*d^}@Y%&(o-09¨%[email protected]

It expanded once it gets out of the hall and enters the room I'm in, making it impossible to see the walls anymore, taking away my bearings as the only thing that kept me grounded was the still visible floor that I laid on.

I start to hyperventilate once it reaches my feet, consuming them into its massive void of nothingness as it went up and up, my paralyzed body unable to resist as a black goopy hand came out of it, reaching out for my head, a pair of shining white eyes appearing amidst the darkness and sucking me in, his hand going to cover my vision as blackness overtook everything and I pass out.

And then…

I shot out of my makeshift bed on the floor, sweating and panting, eyes wide scanning the place up, moving to the walls, windows, and staying over the hall where the door stood open sideways, making the presence of the creature still vivid in my eyes.

The only thing that took me out of it was the fact that it was starting to get bright outside, with chirping birds singing about.

Was that… a dream? And yet the door remained open… I think, passing my hand over my hair, trying to calm down.

Wait, I look beside me and find out that my brother was not there, and not even in this room, which makes me shudder as the nightmare came back stronger, making that I could still feel the coldness of the creature's presence spreading.

I jump up when I feel some movement beside me, oddly scared until I see a white-green face pop up from the blankets, looking at me with sleepy eyes as if asking what was wrong.

"Oh, h-hey Shu, sorry, go back to sleep, sorry to have wakened you…" I say, stroking his fur as he puts his belly up for me to scratch, making me notice his plump tummy.

"You ate well last night uhm? Haha, I know the feeling, Leo will get us fat that way…"

The moment the words come out of my mouth my expression freezes when a chuckle sounds beside us from the hall, making me look up only to see Leo standing there.

"Well, glad to hear you like my food that much, though I can argue that it is hardly my fault if you eat too much. Up so early?"

"I could ask you the same."

"Well, I need to make food for the starved ones here." He says, moving his chin in our direction and going to the kitchen, starting a fire and separating the tools he needed.

I stay down on my bed, enjoying Shu's company by stroking behind his ear, finding oddly pleasing the texture of the green leafy fur.

"What's up for lunch today?"

"Uhm, I'm thinking of something sweet because we found a beehive in the back, just not sure which drink to put together with honey…"

If he doesn't know I'm even more clueless.

In the end he makes a mixture of cheese, honey and black and red berries, more like a dessert than a breakfast; but I definitely wasn't complaining, anything he makes is divine, even soup goddamnit.

It ended being a warm plate so I drank some water afterwards as I sat on the hall, looking outside towards the garden as finally the slowpokes start to arrive.

Did I really wake up that early? Hm… Worse even, does Leo wakes this early every day?

Uf, definitely not a morning person, actually most of my kind hunts at night, so…

My brother is one of the last to appear, and immediately I could tell that something was different, he had a bright glint in his eyes and a goofy smile on his face as he came trotting beside me.

"Brother, brother! I got something to tell you~~!"

Sigh. "What is it? Is not like last time that you got all excited about how the flour grows into bread right?"

"No! And stop bringing that up all the time, ok? "As if, it was too funny to tease him with it all the time." Is about… that! The… the a.d.u.l.t game we talked about! I played it last night and it was so-"

Wait… the what…?

My eyes twitch for a second as he finishes talking, but before I jump to any conclusions I keep a stiff smile on my face and ask:

"What a.d.u.l.t game, Hunthor?"

He, who was blabbering by now, stops once he hears his name. I never called him by his name, only once, and in just one type of occasion only.

When I was livid with him.

"T-that is…"

"Is not that a.d.u.l.t game I told you when we meet the red streets of the human's city right? Not that one that I told to be very, very careful and play only with someone you loved very very much, right? Not that one that I told you we should talk before you tried with anyone, right?" I wanted to keep going, but I could feel the fury boiling up when he did not deny, instead his fear only increased as he starts backing up, making me stand and take two steps closer.

"It is not, is it?" He doesn't answer, his eyes wide and bulging out, for the first time really fearing me.

"ANSWER ME!" I say, taking my anger on the wall and punching a hole in it, the impact shaking the building up.

"I-I-"

"Who was it? Who was the f.u.c.k.i.n.g bastard that dared to touch you? TELL ME!"

At that I hear another set of footsteps coming closer, hearing the commotion, as Aeglos comes to view with a messy hair from someone that came rushing in from the bed.

Then it dawned on me.

It's him.

My eyes narrow dangerously, focusing on him as I bared my teeth, growling his name and my fists close on my sides:

"A-E-GLOS… you dirty, sneaky f.u.c.k.i.n.g pervert…" My anger was consuming me, making me unable to speak as all I could see was red. My hair gains life, becoming a black fire and burning with fury on top of my head as my shadow did the same, like an entity of its own, twisting and biting on his own accord.

Aeglos froze in place, giving me enough time to spread my legs apart so I could jump up right at his face... Only that Leo had run beside me and acted fast, aware of my intention as he hooks his arms on my armpits from the back, immobilizing me for enough time to turn to Aeglos and scream:

"Run!"

My brother gets out of his stunned state as he turns and grabs Aeglos's hand and turns him around to sprint for the back and out of sight.

That was the last drop of water to make me overflow with anger.

I simply change back and forth from my shadow form to escape Leo's grasp only to sprint forward, the path they took far to clear for my nose as I went banging the doors open only to find an empty hall. I growl lowly, annoyed that my prey was not on sight, but soon enough start tracking them down, Leo beside me ready to intervene again, making me give him a nasty look as if saying: Don't you dare interfere.

He only looked at me blankly, no emotion escaping his features, which made me lose interest as I take a sniff of their smell close enough.

My silver eyes scanned the place as I could not see the dup, but pity for them I specialized on stealth and tracking, so once I use my third eye is was a piece of cake to locate their magic in that river of color, making me dash forward and break the wall with my body in a surprise attack that ended with my hand on Aeglos's neck as I push him all the way into the next room, banging him on the wall.

It did not matter that he was taller than me, or older than me, because, in the end, I was a magical creature, a beast in human skin.

And my eyes were locked on him like the blade of a knife on his neck.

"Brother, STOP! YOU ARE HURTING HIM!" My brother screams on the side, trying to pull my hand off from Aeglos, but I had always been the stronger one of the pair.

That when things go down even further, when Aeglos starts wheezing for air, turning purple as his body loses strength, aimlessly hitting my arm without any power anymore.

Its when my brother does something unspeakable, is when he bites my hand hard until it bleeds.

***

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