Marching into the house, she reminded Zura to wash her hands before turning to see Ridhor sitting on the couch. His eyes met hers, and she nodded at him. The first time she acknowledged him since the others arrived. “Ridhor, can I talk to you?”
Nodding, he quickly got to his feet, following her from the room.
Moving down the hall, they stood outside the bathroom Zura disappeared in. She didn’t want her going to the living room where the others were while they spoke. “Do you know what a Nightmare is?”
“Typical creepy kid, in a long nightgown with long black hair. Not sure what the boys look like. They’re creatures of the dreamscape. I am sure if you wanted to know more about them, you could ask Orren.”
“I don’t trust Orren enough to ask him. He said the little girl Zura has been talking to was a Nightmare. How is that possible?”
A frown creased his brow. “It shouldn’t be. I didn’t know they could leave the dreamscape.”
“What does that mean?”
Shaking his head, he looked down the hall as the front door opened and Orren stepped inside. “I can find out for you.”
Zura opened the door, smiling lightly up at Ridhor. Nodding, Melas took her hand, leading her towards the stairs.
24
ORREN
His dislocated elbow felt heavy hanging beside him. He stepped into the cottage, looking down the hall to see Melas and Ridhor speaking in hushed whispers before she disappeared up the steps with Zura.
They were keeping their distance from the group. He wouldn’t have taken it so personally if Andrei didn’t tell him Ridhor had been cuddling up with them for movies, going for walks and even taking them fishing before they got here.
A longing was burning a hole through him. His mind fought against it, but there was something wrapped around his innards, tugging them wherever those two were. He wanted them to like him.
“What the hell happened to you?” Andrei smiled, walking out of the kitchen gesturing to Orren’s face.
His cheek was throbbing, his throat sore. Andrei wasn’t exaggerating when he said she could take them with minimal effort. He pulled his punches at the beginning, but she easily bested him. She hadn’t even used the knife, likely to prove a point.
She had.
Sighing, he gestured to his elbow. “Could you help me out?”
Putting his beer on the table, he crossed the distance. He moved his fingers along Orren’s arm before letting out a low whistle. “Dislocated your elbow. I don’t see any stab wounds.”
“She didn’t use her knife.” He bit down on his bottom lip as Andrei set his arm. “I think she was toying with me.”
He laughed. “I don’t doubt she was. She’s pissed at you.”
Taking Andrei’s beer, Orren got comfortable on the couch. “I don’t know why.”
Andrei strutted back into the kitchen, grabbing himself another beer before taking a seat. Cricket and Alette were out exploring, leaving the house to the three of them and the mysterious girls. “If I’m being honest, I think we’re all surprised you came with Cricket and Alette. Don’t get me wrong, you know I love Cricket. She is good people, but bringing them here while Melas and Zura are still in danger probably wasn’t your best move.”
He sipped his beer. “Yeah.”
“Their safety should trump anything else. Ridhor was finally getting Melas to believe it did. Then, you showed up and undo everything. If you showed up alone, which I’m surprised you didn’t sooner, I think she wouldn’t be so aggressive and evasive right now.”
It wasn’t until Melas asked him, point-blank, what his plan was he realized he made a mistake. By then, it was too late to undo it.
“Ridhor is pissed at you too. You should’ve seen the three of them when I showed up here. Practically playing house. Him waking her up from nightmares with kissing and heavy petting.”
Orren almost choked. “What?”
Andrei smirked. “It was hot as hell. Melas straddling Ridhor as she dry-humped him until he almost came in his pants. Hell, I don’t think I would have lasted.”
His eyes were wide as he turned to look at Andrei. “Are you fucking with me right now?”
Ridhor came into the room. He looked at them both for a moment before going to the kitchen to grab a beer. He sat across from them, taking a long slow sip.
Andrei took another sip. “I try to kiss her, she stabs me. Ridhor tells her he’s going to kiss her and she climbs into his lap. If I hadn’t interrupted, she would have had him on his back and rode him until he couldn’t remember his name.”
“That’s what we love about you, Andrei. Always appearing at the most inconvenient times.” Ridhor muttered.
Surprise took over Orren’s face. “What? He’s not just pulling my leg.”
Ridhor swallowed the beer in his mouth. “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”
Andrei was right, he was pissed at him.
Letting out a long breath, he ran his fingers through his short kinky hair. “Look, I realize now bringing the Pixies here was a mistake. I honestly can’t even tell you what I was thinking. I can’t think clearly since the two of them showed up. If I didn’t know any better I would think she were a Siren the way she has my mind all foggy and confused.”
“She’s got a way of getting under our skin.” Andrei sighed. “What I would do for a kiss. I don’t think I’ve been this desperate for a woman in the whole of my existence. I wanted her from the moment she stabbed me but once I saw her with Ridhor,” He growled low in his throat. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen something so hot. If only Ridhor would stop being such a prude, maybe we could all play a bit.” He wagged his brows.
Ridhor shook his head. “Hard to play when you are bleeding out on the floor. She stabbed you when you kissed her, what do you think she would do to you if you climbed into her bed? Can a Vampire grow back a penis?”
Wincing, he dropped his hands to cover his crotch. “Sweet Lucifer, I don’t think I want to find out.”
Orren looked at him. “You grew your hand back that one time. I imagine it’s the same.”
Pain flickered in his eyes, the memories bubbling to the surface of his mind. “Fuck me, that was painful. I don’t envy the guy who has to grow back a penis.”
Lifting his shoulders, Ridhor smiled. “At least you can grow it back.”
Andrei paled. “Lucifer help the poor soul whoever tries to take advantage of Melas.”
They all chuckled for a moment, sipping their beers.
It felt comfortable. Something they would do before Melas and Zura came into their lives. They were brothers once again, their relationship easy.
Resting the bottle on his knee, Ridhor looked at Orren. “Since when can Nightmares come out of the dreamscape.”
And just as easily, the comfort was gone. Letting out a breath, he shook his head. “I’ve never seen one outside of the dreamscape.” He admitted.
Running his hand along his forehead, Andrei frowned. “We have a woman and a child with no memory, show up in a realm where there are no children. The child with no scent, human or otherwise, the woman with a scent unlike any we’ve ever smelt before. The woman with some kind of unidentifiable magic on her that burned the barrier off an Oracle and marked her with a binding brand Alette, one of the Pixies with the most extensive magical knowledge, has never seen before. Both of them likely being hunted by the sociopath Thiriel with his delusions of grandeur. Now, we find out the child is luring Nightmares out of the dreamscape for playdates on the grassy hills of Iceland. Does that about cover it?”
Orren cleared his throat. “She just appeared in my room a while ago. I thought it was a dream but there should be no way for me to dream without going into the dreamscape. It was so real.”
Ridhor’s brow furrowed. “It was a sex dream, wasn’t it.”
Orren nodded.
“She asked me if an Incubus would leave any physical evidence he visited.”
He frowned. “Like what?”
He lifted his shoulders, jealousy clear in his eyes. “She wouldn’t say.”
Orren remembered the way he was slicked with her arousal. “That’s impossible.”
Running his hands across his face, Andrei downed the rest of his beer. “Everything with these two seems impossible.”
25
MELAS
Orren paced outside her bedroom all morning. He thought she didn’t know he was there, but he wasn’t as sneaky as he thought he was.
Ridhor’s heavy steps were downstairs along with Andrei’s lighter ones.
The Pixies went back to the Seelie Realm, assuring the guys they were just a portal away if needed. What they would be needed for, Melas wasn’t sure. Regardless, the promise seemed to set Orren at ease.
With the Pixies gone, Zura slowly let herself grow close to Ridhor again under Melas’ watchful eye. As much as she wanted to keep her walls up and act as though he were someone she needed to exercise caution with, she knew that wasn’t true.
He told her why Orren seemed to have his guard up with her.
Appearing in his dreams had thrown him. Appearing in his bedroom has shaken him as much as it did her. She was still reeling at the memory.
No one seemed to have any answers when it came to her and Zura. In this world surrounded by magic and different realms, she thought for sure one of them would know more about them.
The fact they didn’t was unsettling.
She sat with a book on her lap Ridhor brought her from the cabin. It was an intricate history of the Seven Realms. She scoured the pages in hopes of finding some hint as to what type of magic was at play here.
In the beginning, the Celestial Three existed. The chapters on the Celestial Three were similar to what people in the Mortal Realm believed of their gods and deities, only more logical in a way.
There was no one almighty god as a lot of the Christians believed. There was no band of gods like the Greeks or the Romans believed, or Hindu. Instead, there were three; Life, Death, and Time. She never was a religious person, but even Melas would admit that made sense. Life and Death were needed to balance everything out, and without Time both would be irrelevant.
Boom, enter the Celestial Three.
Unlike most history books, this one was captivating.
The Seven Realms was not their first try at this. First, there had been mankind and the Eternals. As much as she could understand they were kind of like what people thought angels were. They would guide the people while trying to protect what Life cared about most, the planets and other creatures. It seems actual humans were more of an afterthought and Life could care less about them.
True to form, mankind destroyed the world, she came back with a vengeance destroying most of them and banishing others to a rogue planet to be tortured by other beings punished there.
How the realms came to be was simple, the Celestial three gifted a reigning being with seven eggs. Within those eggs were the Seven.
The Seven are the rulers of the realms; The Unseelie Queen ruling over the Fae in the Seelie Realm. Lilith, the Shadow Realm. The Griffin King, the Realm of Beasts or Shifter Realm. Kraken ruling Aquar the water realm. Lucifer rules the Dark Realm. Fate, The Veil, and Eve the Mortal Realm.
The book listed all types of beings born in each realm.
It was fascinating. Some of the things she thought were the product of the imagination and couldn’t possibly exist were as real as the nose on her face. Yes, there were Boogeymen from the Shadow Realm. Mermaids, Sirens, and Kelpies existed in Aquar. Lucifer seemed elusive. The Dark Realm was commanded by Seven Sins; I guess that was another part one of the human religions got right, or maybe the Dark Realm did it to spite them. Centaurs and Minotaurs existed too. The list was endless.
She was about to start the chapter on prophets when Orren walked past her door again.
Letting out an exasperated sigh, she closed the heavy leather-bound book. “Can you come in already? You’re driving me crazy.”
Her door opened and Orren poked his head inside. “Sorry, I didn’t think you could hear me.”
“You didn’t think I could hear you pacing outside my bedroom door? Maybe you should have done it somewhere else then.”
Clearing his throat, he nodded. “In my defence, not a lot of beings can hear my footsteps. Just as not many can sense Andrei in his shadow form, or so easily read Ridhor’s moods.”
“I’m an enigma, I get it. No one knows what the hell I am or why I’m capable of any of the things I can do but you’ve settled on the fact that I fucked some deranged Elf and carried his child. Yeah, I got it.” She rubbed her hands over her forehead, pressing her fingers into her temple for a moment before gesturing to the chair across from the small loveseat she sat on.
Zura let out a long snore on the bed, rolling over to face the windows.
Orren smiled. “She is sweet.”
She agreed with him, but couldn’t help being confrontational. “You’re a bit biased with that whole obsession with children thing you all have going on.”
There was an openness to his face when he chuckled. So unlike the Orren she knew. “Maybe you’re right. What do I know about children? She’s a blessing either way.”
Melas slowly drummed her fingertips on the cover of the book, waiting for him to say whatever it was causing him to pace outside her room.
“History of the Seven Realms. That’s some heavy reading.”
It was odd to hear him talking to her casually, in a way she expected Andrei to talk to her. Not even Ridhor spoke to her like this. Like he was playing a part, it made her uncomfortable. Clearing her throat, she nodded. “Yeah. I mentioned to Ridhor how in the dark I feel about all this. I have to admit it’s very fascinating.”
He smiled. “It is, isn’t it. Like most history books, some of it is fabricated. You see, they say seven eggs hatched the original seven. Since this wasn’t the first run the Celestial Three had, I would wager it was originally four but they changed it because there are seven realms and they wanted their story to be neat and tidy.”
Intrigued, Melas leaned slightly forward. “Which three don’t belong?”
“Lucifer, as she is one of the Eternals. Everyone knows that but they go along with this anyway. There was no way she would bother herself with any of the realms. She could care less about us and tends to want to spend her time with Life, as she is the favourite.”
Ignoring the fact that Lucifer is Life’s favourite child, she moved on. It was a lot to unpack. She was still coming to terms with all the other mythical beings. “And?”
“Eve. If we are going to believe humans existed before, destroyed a world and were rounded up and punished, it would make more sense she just plopped a few of them back here. Since creating new humans would have been risking they relive their sins all over again, it would make more sense to put those in the Mortal Realm who already knew of the consequences of destroying worlds.”
She frowned. “Aren’t people destroying the Mortal Realm? All the plastic in the ocean, forests being burned down, that whole o-zone layer thing.”
Orren thought about it for a moment. “I never said they were smart.”
“And the third?”
He quirked a brow. “Fate. She seems to be a being with a heavy hand in existence. I would bet my life she’s also an Eternal.”
She thought about it. Fate an Eternal. She would ask Ridhor for a book on the Eternals when she got a chance. Her onyx eyes scanned over Orren. He leaned back slightly, but there was tension in his shoulders. “There is something specific you want to talk about.”
He nodded slowly.
“Am I supposed to guess, or are you going to tell me?” She asked.
Letting out a slow breath, he looked at her. His silver eyes always so sure wouldn’t meet hers. He looked embarrassed, or maybe guilty. It was hard to read the emotions he so often kept hidden. “Ridhor mentioned you asked him about what happens when you’re visited by an Incubus. I thought maybe tha
t had something to do with a dream I had where you appeared in my bedroom.”
Her eyes widened slightly as she felt a flush burning her cheeks.
That night surprised her. She left the cabin without a single sexual thought in her mind about Orren, regardless of how attractive she realized he was. That first night they were in a constant tug of war. Both needing to have all the control, all the power. His constant need to satisfy his curiosity left her feeling overprotective of Zura. She didn’t quite know how far he would go to get the answers he seemed desperate for.
The dream came when she was growing closer to Ridhor. If anything, she expected to have sexual dreams about the caring Berserker under the same roof who seemed to be going above and beyond to make sure they were both comfortable and felt safe. Not the testy Incubus who watched as all the drama unfolded like they were under a microscope. Something to merely be observed.
She was lying in her bed, a book in her hand, then she was climbing his legs.
The possibility of her being in Orren’s room seemed far-fetched. After spending her day reading through the history of the Seven Realms and all the magic living in this world, she knew it was a very real possibility. Somewhere between Unicorns and Boogeymen, she realized the impossible was possible. “I wasn’t sure what to think.” She admitted. “Waking with your cum between my legs erased any doubt of what happened. We had sex.”
Orren’s eyes widened. Her bluntness taking him by surprise as he cleared his throat, nodding slowly. “It didn’t make sense to me at the time. I kept telling myself there was no way it was real and I—” He cleared his throat again. “If I knew it was real I never would have—”
Melas nodded slowly. “You never would have slept with me if you knew we were really having sex?” She didn’t blame him for saying it. She remembered how she felt when she ran her fingers between her thighs. There was a moment when she felt violated. Unsure of how a visit by an Incubus worked but not liking that someone could just have their way with her without her expressed permission.
Hidden In Darkness (A Seven Realms Book Book 1) Page 18
