Chapter 61: Malric
Malric stayed quiet for a long moment after speaking. The city lights stretched beyond the apartment windows while Jess stood a few feet away watching him carefully, arms crossed tight enough to hide the uncertainty underneath them. For once, she wasn’t filling the silence with sarcasm or questions.
That alone unsettled him more than it should have.
“You’re serious,” she said finally.
“Yes.”
Jess blinked once.
Then again.
“Well,” she muttered, “that feels aggressively unfair.”
Despite himself, amusement flickered briefly through him.
“You’re taking this surprisingly well.”
“I think I passed my emotional breaking point like three supernatural disasters ago.”
She walked past him toward the kitchen, opening cabinets like she expected answers to be hidden somewhere between expensive glassware and bottled water.
“What exactly does half angel even mean?” she asked. “Because honestly, I was still trying to process the fact I apparently count as magical ancestry.”
Malric leaned one shoulder against the wall and watched her move through the apartment.
“You really were raised completely human.”
Jess pulled a bottle of water from the fridge before pointing it at him.
“My parents tried very hard to give me a normal life.”
“And did it work?”
She thought about that for a second before shrugging lightly.
“For a while.”
The honesty in the answer settled strangely between them.
Jess unscrewed the bottle cap slowly before continuing.
“I spent most of my life pretending weird things were coincidence.” A faint smile touched the corner of her mouth. “Which gets harder when you accidentally fly in front of somebody.”
“That would complicate things.”
“Thank you for the groundbreaking insight.”
Malric smiled despite himself.
Jess noticed immediately.
“Oh no,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “You’re getting emotionally attached to the conversation. That feels dangerous.”
“You assume I’m capable of emotional attachment.”
“I’ve met you for longer than ten minutes. Obviously you are.”
The statement landed harder than she intended. Malric looked away briefly toward the windows. Dangerous. Not because she was wrong. Because she said things too honestly.
Jess leaned against the kitchen counter and studied him more carefully now.
“You already knew something felt off about me, didn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“But not what.”
“No.”
She nodded slowly like that confirmed something for her.
“That explains the staring.”
“I wasn’t staring.”
“You absolutely were.”
“It’s possible I was observing.”
“That is somehow creepier.”
A laugh almost escaped him before he stopped it. Almost.
Jess pointed at him immediately.
“There. Again. That thing where you pretend you’re not amused.”
“You notice too much.”
“Apparently that’s genetic.”
The pressure beneath the joke lingered quietly between them afterward. Malric watched her carefully. Most celestial bloodlines carried themselves with sharp control from an early age. Awareness usually hardened them long before adulthood ever could. Jess still moved through the world like someone who believed people were mostly good. Which made her feel dangerously out of place in this world already. And somehow she had survived anyway.
“You keep looking at me like you’re solving math problems emotionally,” she said.
“That sentence barely makes sense.”
“You understood it.”
Unfortunately, he had.
Jess took another drink from the water bottle before looking toward the windows overlooking the city.
“So what happens now?”
The question shifted the atmosphere immediately.
Not playful anymore. Real.
Malric crossed slowly toward the windows beside her.
“Now things become more complicated.”
“That’s been your answer to literally everything.”
“Because it keeps being accurate.”
Jess sighed softly.
“Okay, fair.”
The city below them pulsed with movement and distant light while silence settled more naturally between them this time.
Jess broke it first.
“Do you ever get used to it?”
“To what.”
“Feeling different from everyone around you.”
The question caught him off guard hard enough that he answered honestly before thinking about it.
“No.”
Jess looked at him then. Really looked at him. Not the sarcasm. Not the demon blood. Not the dangerous reputation everybody reacted to before he even entered a room. Just him. That awareness unsettled him more than any Council threat had in years.
“My parents used to tell me different didn’t automatically mean alone,” she said quietly.
Something tightened unexpectedly in his chest.
Malric looked away first.
“Your parents sound unusually wise.”
Jess smiled faintly.
“They mostly just made things up confidently and hoped for the best.”
“That explains your personality.”
“That was definitely an insult.”
“Partially.”
She laughed softly under her breath, and the sound lingered warmly through the apartment for half a second longer than it should have.
Malric studied the skyline again, trying very hard not to notice how easily her presence settled into the room around him.
“You should get some rest,” he said eventually. “Tomorrow will be difficult.”
Jess groaned immediately.
“That sentence somehow made me more tired.”
“It was meant to.”
She turned toward the hallway before stopping suddenly.
“Wait.”
Malric looked back toward her.
Jess hesitated briefly before speaking again.
“You said half demon.” She frowned slightly. “What’s the connection.”
For the first time in the conversation, Malric looked genuinely uncertain how much to say.
Jess noticed immediately.
“Oh no.”
A faint breath escaped him.
“That reaction seems unfair.”
“No, that reaction means you’re hiding something.” She pointed at him immediately. “And considering the current topic, I’m probably about to hate whatever it is.”
Silence stretched for half a second too long. Then realization hit her.
Jess straightened slowly.
“…Wait.”
Malric looked away toward the city lights beyond the windows.
Jess stared at him.
“There’s absolutely no way.”
“You’re reacting dramatically.”
“You’re already half demon.”
“Yes.”
“And now you’re telling me you’re half angel too?”
The silence confirmed it before he even answered.
Jess blinked hard once.
“Well,” she muttered, “that explains an upsetting amount.”
A faint smile pulled briefly at the corner of his mouth. Jess narrowed her eyes immediately.
“Oh my God. You knew something felt familiar.”
“I suspected something.”
“And now?”
Malric’s gaze settled back on hers steadily.
“Now I understand why being near you feels different.”
That answer landed softer than she expected. Jess looked away first, suddenly far too aware of how quiet the apartment had become around them.
“Well,” she said finally, “this feels emotionally dangerous.”
“Probably.”