The house quieted down about ten minutes later. Lochlynn brought me downstairs, saying that dinner had been served. He took me to a completely different part of the house that I hadn’t even noticed before. We ended up in a dining room that looked to be the size of my apartment, with a table that could easily hold two dozen people. The rest of Lochlynn’s family waited there and didn’t that just have a heart fluttering.
Landers sat at the head of the table, with his wife to his right and Llewellyn to his left. Danielle sat next to her mother, and she smiled as Lochlynn brought me in. The entire family and situation itself seemed odd. It felt like they played at being a normal, happy family, but couldn’t quite pull it off.
Lochlynn brought me around the table, toward his brother. Considering everything Lochlynn said about the guy, I didn’t know what to think of his seating choice. He pulled my chair out for me, and I slid into it without fuss. I wanted to get through this entire meal without having to say a goddamned word.
His father cocked his head, brushed nearly white hair out of his eyes in the same movement. “Who’s your friend, Lochlynn?” he asked, watching me. “Don’t be rude, introduce her.”
Lochlynn put a hand on my shoulder, and said, “This is Tomorrow. She’ll be staying with us for a few days.”
Landers watched me, his eye scanning my face. It took all my willpower not to turn away, start shaking. “Is there a reason that you decided to bring her to this family dinner?” he asked, a sharp smile turning the corners of his mouth up. “Even your brother leaves his human pets upstairs.”
Llewellyn laughed. “They have to be kept upstairs, because they don’t usually have any clothes on.”
Danette tsked, shaking her head.
“We just got here,” Lochlynn said. “I didn’t want to leave her upstairs by herself so soon.”
“Ah, so it’s hospitality that has you bringing this girl to my table?” Landers leaned forward, taking a glass. It had demon water in it. I could smell it from where I sat, and remembered the way it burned down my throat, the one taste that I’d had. Landers sipped his, clearly not being affected by the drink at all. He set the glass back down. “Here I thought you just wanted to disrespect me, again.”
Lochlynn didn’t say anything to that.
Danielle stepped in. “Actually, Daddy, it was me. I told him that he should bring her down. I thought it would be fun.”
“Fun is not for the dinner table,” Danette said, and her voice sounded as dead as her eyes looked. She glanced at her daughter and made a small hmm sound. “But I suppose that we can’t fault your brother for your poor judgement.”
Danielle smiled, her white teeth looking predatory. “No, you really shouldn’t. When else are we going to have fun, though? All we do is work, work, work. Why not bring our pets to dinner?”
The whole ‘pet’ thing started to bother me, but I didn’t say anything, remembering what Lochlynn told me. I shouldn’t be interesting around his father. I didn’t know what that meant, but I wouldn’t risk my life on finding out, either. Seamus’ horror at what demons did to humans felt too fresh for that.
Even if I had to bite my tongue nearly in half.
Llewellyn laughed and shook his head. “I’m afraid I have to agree with Dad. Pets aren’t meant for dinner, but you’re right too, Danielle. It could be a lot of fun to have one at the table.” He smiled in a way that had my stomach turning.
“What did you say her name was?” Landers asked, turning back to his son.
“Tomorrow.”
Landers looked at me, cocking his head slightly to the side. “You’re awful quiet, Tomorrow,” he said. “Don’t you want to say something to me?”
I glanced at Lochlynn, which had been the wrong thing to do, apparently.
“Looking for permission?” Landers asked, taking another sip of his demon water. “You’re a rude girl, aren’t you?”
“Pets don’t have to be polite,” Llewellyn said. “They certainly don’t have to open their mouths, unless that’s something you want. They really just need to know how to open their—”
“Hush,” Danette said. “We aren’t going to talk about such things at the dinner table. It’s not proper.”
“Proper is boring,” Danielle said.
“I agree,” Llewellyn threw out, smiling wickedly. “Let me be something else, something interesting than proper, Mother. Don’t you think that would be more entertaining.”
“I said hush,” Danette barked, some life coming to her voice for the first time since we entered the room. She rose from her chair as she shouted it, and I noticed the iridescent quality of her skin started to grow. It shone so brightly for a second that looking just hurt my eyes. The power in her voice seemed to boom off every wall in the entire dining room.
Llewellyn stared at his mother, daring her to attack him. Danielle smiled; her eyes so bright that they looked like stars. She sat forward in her seat, her hands curled around the arms of her chair, like she needed to remind herself to stay sitting. Her eyes looked too bright, too ready.
Lochlynn cleared his throat. “You’re scaring our guest, and that is the rudest thing that you could do. I brought her down here so that you could meet her, since she’ll be staying here for a few days.” His eyes lifted to look at his father, practically daring the man to contradict his own words.
Landers started to smile. “Quite right, son. Darling, my love, please sit down. You can discipline the children later.”
The smile that stretched across Danette’s face had that block of ice in my stomach hardening even more. I thought she could’ve killed any of the people in that room, and it wouldn’t have bothered her. She could do away with her husband, slaughter her son, murder her daughter, and have me for dessert, and she’d do it all with a smile. When she lowered herself into the seat, though, she unfolded her napkin, and turned to me. Those icy eyes pierced right through my chest.
“My son and husband are quite right. Allow me to apologize for my behavior just now, and that of my children. I’m sure they’ll be more careful from now on.”
“Doubtful,” Danielle said, smiling.
Lochlynn touched my leg under the table, and I took that to mean I had to answer. “It’s fine,” I said, my voice squeezed out from my throat. “Don’t think anything of it.”
Danette smiled, and my heart thundered.
People wearing white uniforms came into the room, carrying plates with cloches over them. One plate got set down in front of me. A chef came out of a room I couldn’t see. He looked nervous and very human. He offered a little bow, as if that he stood before royalty. “Good evening, I’m Chef—”
“What are we eating?” Danette asked, cutting the chef off.
He blinked but started talking anyway. He described the appetizer with words that I couldn’t follow. Partially because I didn’t know food all that well and partially because I could barely hear anything over the sound of my own heart beating. I felt it in my ears, taking up all the room in my head.
I did catch the word ‘fish,’ and wanted to slit my own throat.
The waiter behind me leaned over and removed the cloche with a flourish. Two fish cakes sat on a plate with greens that I couldn’t identify, with some kind of dressing over them. It all looked very neat, carefully put together, and I couldn’t take a single bite unless I wanted to put on a show for the demons.
The waiters and chef all bustled out of the room, moving with the efficiency of people that new they didn’t matter in the long run. While the demons started to dig in, I debated with myself. Should I pretend to eat, or sit there with a completely full plate of food, not touching it?
I waited too long to decide.
“Something wrong with the food, Tomorrow?” Landers asked, his voice silky. He put a special emphasis on my name, making me think he would be saying it an awful lot during this dinner, probably just to bother me.
Lochlynn didn’t look at me, or touch my knee, so I decided that I had to speak. It would’ve been odd otherwise. Clearing my throat, I said, “I’m allergic to fish.”
Llewellyn laughed.
“What is funny about that?” Landers asked. “We’ve brought this girl into our house, and we can’t provide her with a proper meal. It says something about us, doesn’t it?”
“How could we have known that someone with special eating requirements would be joining us for dinner, when our own son didn’t tell us first?” Danette asked, putting a delicate bite of her fish cake into her mouth. She chewed thoughtfully, her cold eyes flashing over to me.
“It’s fine, really,” I said.
“No,” Landers said, shaking his head. “But I’ll make it up to you, later.”
What the hell did that mean?
The first course passed in complete silence, while everyone ate their food. Lochlynn seemed about as interested in his fish as I did, but he ate the entire thing. Every now and then, I would catch one of the demons watching me, but the moment would pass quickly, and then we’d go back to the awkward moment.
The waiters came and took the first course away, while a second set walked in with glasses filled with some kind of liquid. It smelled like wine, but I didn’t trust it for a second. If it turned out that demon water had been added, I’d get drunk off my ass with one glass. I’d had drinks before, though nothing powerful. Seamus and Seanan’s parents had left beer in the fridge once, and we had some. We’d gotten drunk, and I didn’t particularly like the way it made me feel. So, I hadn’t done it a second time.
Demon water would stay out of my life.
Of course, that brought up another issue.
“Don’t care for wine, either?” Danette asked, sipping from her own glass. The red liquid touched her lips for a second before disappearing.
“She’s not old enough to drink,” Lochlynn said, though he was only eighteen and that didn’t stop him from sipping on the alcohol that had been provided to him.
“Oh, yes!” Danielle said. “Humans have all those pesky laws, dictating what their citizens can and cannot do. Don’t drink before you’re twenty-one. Don’t smoke before you’re eighteen.” She laughed and drained her glass. Standing up, she leaned across the table, getting closer to me, a smile pulling at her lips. “I was eight the first time I got drunk on demon water, and I’ve never been happier than that day.”
“Danielle,” Lochlynn warned.
His sister rolled her eyes, and then eased back into her seat. “You should try some wine. It’ll make all your troubles go away.”
Landers sighed. “Forgive my daughter. She gets overzealous sometimes. Do you not want to drink, Tomorrow? Because you could.”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I’m all right. I’ll just have water.”
“I thought that human children always wanted to imbibe,” Danette said. “Are you trying to prove something?”
“No,” I said again. “I, uh, I just don’t like drinking.”
“Interesting,” Landers said.
“Boring,” Llewellyn said, rolling his eyes. “You couldn’t even pick a fun girl to run around with, Loch?”
“Shut up,” Lochlynn said, not with any hostility. In fact, he said it in such a dead voice, that it took me a second to notice the icy way he stared at his brother.
“Boys,” Danette said.
“Why should I?” Llewellyn asked, leaning closer to his brother. “You spend your whole life trying to be good and decent, knowing that you will fail. It’s boring. And you finally do something that isn’t boring, but you do it in the most boring way. Your little pet is just like you, isn’t she? Doesn’t want to get any dirt on her hands, right? Where did you find her anyway? Strolling down the street, looking for the plainest, dullest little girl that you could find. One that didn’t even have a good body, just because you knew she wouldn’t be trouble?”
“I said shut up,” Lochlynn repeated, and his voice still sounded dead, like every ounce of personality had been drained from his body. It actually scared me, to hear him talk like that, because he didn’t sound like that boy that I had gotten to know. He sounded like his mother.
“Now, boys,” Danette tried again.
“Or am I wrong?” Llewellyn asked and leaned forward so that he could look at me. Even in my baggy sweater, I felt violated as his eyes raked down my body. “Yeah, I’m probably wrong. Girl like her, she would want nothing more than to do the crazy stuff, right? What kind of things does she let you do to her, when you’re all alone?”
“You are starting to piss me off,” Lochlynn said, though he didn’t sound angry in the least.
“Am I? Good. Maybe you’ll finally do something other than waste our time. Go ahead, tell me what your girl does to you when the lights are out because I bet she’s the kind that can’t do anything with the lights on. Too shy and too—”
Lochlynn stood up from the table, the power in the air rising until I felt it popping all along my skin. His brother rose as well, a huge smile spreading across his face, like he had finally gotten something that he wanted.
Landers rose as well, but much faster than either of his sons. He waved his hand, and the power didn’t just rise in the room. It punched through the air like something had angered it. That power slammed right into Lochlynn and Llewellyn. The two of them slammed into the wall together, screams ripping from their throats. Their heads thrown back. I felt the electricity of the power all throughout my body, like someone had thrown me onto a live wire.
I watched the brothers writhe, rising from my feet like I could do something. My heart slammed against my ribs.
Llewellyn went limp first, and I thought that Landers had had stop the magic, but he hadn’t. It still felt as strong as it had earlier. Llewellyn had passed out.
Landers waved his hand, and magic cut off so suddenly, I stumbled forward, almost hitting the table. Lochlynn went limp, his chest rising and fallen rapidly, the sound of his panting filling the entire room. Landers took another sip of his wine and glanced away from his children. “I’ve told you a thousand times, don’t upset your mother. Lochlynn, the score as been settled. You’ve beaten your brother. Sit down, and let’s finish eating.”
Danielle started to laugh and clapped her hands together once. “Oh, I knew this would be so much fun!”
Lochlynn rose to his feet like an old man. When he finally managed to get there, he looked drained of everything. I thought he had sounded dead before, but when he spoke this time, the words had even less life to them. “Thank you, Father.”
He took his seat, which left me standing there, breathing hard, eyes wide. I slid into my own seat, unsure of what else to do. They left Llewellyn on the floor, unconscious as the waiters brought in the next dish. They pulled the cloches off, ignoring the unconscious man, and I stared down at some kind of red meat wrapped in a pastry that I had never seen before. It looked decent, and I didn’t spot any fish on the plate. Potatoes rested underneath the meat.
“I trust that you aren’t allergic to beef as well?” Danette asked, sliding her fork into her entrée. She began to cut it with precise, mechanical movements that cut through the meat quickly.
“No,” I said, recovering from the shock. My voice even sounded normal. I turned around in my seat and began to cut through the beef. I probably tasted wonderful, but nothing had flavor for me right then. I felt too afraid to enjoy my food.
“I’m glad,” Danette said. “This is marvelous, and I wouldn’t want you to miss out on it. Marvelous, right?”
I finished chewing, swallowed, and nodded. “Yes. It tastes amazing.”
She offered a small smile and turned back to her food.
Danielle continued to grin.
***
An excruciating hour later, Lochlynn and I got back up to his room. The second he closed the door, he slumped against it. I rushed over, but he had already started to slide down, and I couldn’t stop it. The best I could do was touch his shoulder so that he didn’t feel alone. Only, when my hands landed on him, he groaned.
“I’m sorry,” I said, frantic. “Did that hurt you?”
“Everything hurts right now. Don’t worry about it.”
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen.”
“I’ve lived through this before,” Lochlynn said. “Don’t worry about it.” He took my hand, even though it supposedly hurt him, and hauled himself up. I helped, dragging him to his feet. It felt like a group effort, at any rate. When he got to a standing position again, he had to lean against the wall.
My shoulders slumped. “Why would you get into a fight with your brother if you knew your father would do this to you?”
“Because he needed to shut up,” Lochlynn said, glaring at nothing. “He can’t think of you like that. If he does, then you’ll become this interesting project that he has to work on. We don’t want that. Trust me.”
I still thought he should have kept his mouth shut. I couldn’t imagine what the hell it felt like to have his father working him over like that.
“No offense, but that might’ve been the scariest thing that I’ve ever lived through.”
“Dinner with my family can do that to a person,” Lochlynn said. He seemed ready to try moving again. He pushed away from the wall, and I helped him over to the nearest couch. He fell onto it with another groan, rolling onto his back. Once he had gotten here, Lochlynn stared up at the ceiling, looking exhausted.
“Do you need anything?” I asked.
He shook his head.
I shuffled my feet. “What about a wet washcloth?” I asked.
Lochlynn lifted his hand ups o that he could look at me. “Would it make you feel better if you could get me a washcloth?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Then sure.”
I dashed out of the room, heading into his bathroom. The space felt even bigger than I thought before. He had a separate shower, that could fit four people easily, a bathtub, a little room with a toilet in it, and a linen closet in there. The linen closet had a pocket door that I didn’t notice immediately, and I blamed that for why it took me nearly five minutes to find the wash clothes. I wetted one down with cool water and rushed back out to Lochlynn.
As I came out of the room, I heard voices. I looked up to find Lochlynn’s father standing in front of the couch. Lochlynn had managed to sit up, but he couldn’t stand because of how close his father stood. “Your brother has always been weak, and that’s why he passed out first. However, you’ve never been weak, but I felt how little energy you had.”
“I’m fine,” Lochlynn said.
“No,” he said. “You have allowed yourself to grow weaker, because you insist on defying me, on denying your nature. I’m getting sick of it, and you need to remember who you are and what you are.”
“I already know those things,” Lochlynn said, lifting his face so that he could stare his father in the eyes.
The tension rose in the room.
Landers shook his head. “I had some hope when you brought that human pet to dinner. I thought perhaps you were starting to realize your own nature, but then that fight with your brother. You care about the speck, don’t you? You care about her enough to risk my own anger.”
“You’re seeing things,” Lochlynn said, and it shouldn’t have sent a knife through my chest.
Landers smiled. “No. I see clearly. You are the one who is blind. I will fix that, even if you don’t want me to.”
“Please…” Lochlynn said. “Don’t.” He sounded so tired, more tired than I had ever heard him. The kind of exhaustion that came not from working your body and your mind, but the kind that came from ripping out chunks of your heart, too. I had been there, with Derrick. I knew that kind of exhaustion.
“You will live up to what I know you can be,” Landers said, and lashed out. His hand slammed into Lochlynn’s chest, throwing him backward. He hit the wall with a thud that had the entire suite shaking. Lochlynn fell to the ground, and Landers wrapped his hand around the back of Lochlynn’s neck. He slammed his son into the ground, and I felt that rise of power again. It was different this time. Instead of electricity and pressure, it felt like feathers and silk. Landers pulled something from his pocket. It looked cylindrical and glowed with a soft pinkish-purple light. I took one look at it and knew beyond a doubt that I stared at a soul, captured in box.
Lochlynn struggled, but his father held him down with ease, as if Lochlynn were nothing more than a child.
Landers slammed the cylinder into Lochlynn’s back, hard enough that it pierced through his shirt and into his skin. I jumped back, slamming a hand over my mouth to keep from screaming. Not that anyone would’ve heard me over Lochlynn’s own screams. They ripped from his mouth with the kind of pain that I couldn’t imagine.
That soft pastel glow filled the room, brightening the space, but Lochlynn’s screams didn’t match the beautiful light. I couldn’t imagine the pain that he felt, and or why his father had done this. I’d never thought much about a demon taking a soul, but it couldn’t have looked like this. Landers made it hurt. He had to have.
The glow started to diminish as that soul began to sink into Lochlynn’s body. Its light poured over his skin, working its way through his hair, down into his soul, and I stayed where I stood, watching it. His screams started to dissipate as the soul pushed its way through his being.
Landers released his hold on the back of Lochlynn’s neck and grabbed the cylinder with his other hand. He ripped it right out, and I watched the blood spew and then the stop as the wound healed.
I thought that Landers would say something after that. Some parting comment as he walked out. Instead, he stared down at his son with no love in his eyes, no compassion. Just disappointment. He tucked the cylinder into his pocket, and then threw a kick into Lochlynn’s side, so hard that it rolled him over. I saw his expression, the look of misery so strong on his face that it hurt me to see. I thought it might’ve been the first time he really showed his face, his true feelings.
Landers pulled back for another kick, and my body became untethered. I rushed forward, slamming into the demon. “Stop it!” I shouted, getting between Lochlynn and his father.
It wasn’t until Landers turned to stare at me that I realized what I had done.