Salt & Venom (Blood, Bloom, & Water Book 2)

by Amy McNulty

  Salt & Venom

  Blood, Bloom, & Water Book Two

  Amy McNulty

  Salt & Venom by Amy McNulty

  © 2018 by Amy McNulty. All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, including written, electronic, recording, or photocopying, without written permission of the author. The exception would be in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Published by Snowy Wings Publishing and Amy McNulty

  Cover design by Najla Qamber Designs.

  The characters and events appearing in this work are fictitious. Existing brands and businesses are used in a fictitious manner, and the author claims no ownership of or affiliation with trademarked properties. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental, and not intended by the author.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  More YA Books by Amy McNulty

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  The Battle Continues in Iron & Aqua

  About the Author

  Look for More YA Speculative Fiction Reads from Snowy Wings Publishing

  Deception So Deadly

  Phoenix Descending

  Read More from Amy McNulty

  The Never Veil Series

  Fall Far from the Tree Duology

  Ballad of the Beanstalk

  More YA Books by Amy McNulty

  The Never Veil Series:

  Nobody’s Goddess

  Nobody’s Lady

  Nobody’s Pawn

  The Fall Far from the Tree Duology:

  Fall Far from the Tree

  Turn to Dust and Ashes

  Ballad of the Beanstalk

  Josie’s Coat

  Chapter One

  Blossom didn’t often have time for me when Autumn was around. Though the cat was no spring chicken, she still had a youthful spring in her step, and only an eight-year-old with mountains of extra energy was up to the task of satiating the calico’s thirst for prey. Usually in the form of a shoestring or curled-up ball of paper.

  But Blossom poked her head up beside my bed and mewed, tapping her paw against my shoulder until I couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle. As I lifted the comforter higher, Blossom snuggled right in against my side.

  “At least someone won’t ask what’s wrong with me,” I whispered. “She just knows something is.” My fingers traced circles around one of her soft ears.

  Why couldn’t I just tell everyone the truth? Hashtag ImAMermaid. Jokes aside, I was seventeen—albeit almost eighteen—and I didn’t know how to handle this on my own.

  I had three parents. Why couldn’t I kick and scream and have a tantrum and wind up coddled in my mom’s or dad’s arms?

  My phone buzzed on the nightstand. Shifting so as not to bother Blossom, I grabbed it and saw the message from Calder:

  Feeling better? I know last night was… A lot. I’ve got you, though. I promise. I need you more than I’ve ever needed anyone. I’ll try to be a worthy prince, my champion.

  A tear slipped down one cheek as I felt my face warming. I put down the phone and wiped the moisture away. Why was I crying? It wasn’t like I was madly in love with the guy.

  But apparently, the champion of water was kind of the prince’s fiancée. So I had a boyfriend now. I’d never had one who’d lasted more than a few dates.

  Now I was tied to one—cute, kind of shy though he might be—possibly for the rest of my life. We could one day lay our merbaby eggs in the blood of my fallen step-sister.

  No and no. I still wasn’t planning on either happening.

  My phone buzzed again and I swiped away another notification from Paisley. The bits of messages I’d read from her and Lyric asked everything I expected them to, like what in the world had happened last night, was it true that Calder had lost his pants in the Homecoming fire, was I feeling all right and how was Ember, and also, back to the second point, was it true Calder had walked around brazenly with his elephant trunk swinging freely?

  I tried not to think about that part. My face was flushing at the memory. I bet the vampires didn’t have cause to go pantsless around their champion. At least not a supernatural one. I wasn’t sure if that was a pro or a con, honestly. Dirty Ivy.

  Blossom’s purrs grew louder and louder as she snuggled up beside my cheek, nudging the top of her head against my chin.

  “I love you too, Furbaby,” I said, rubbing the back of her neck and being reminded how different the cat at my new place was—Ember’s cat was a scaredy-cat if ever there was one.

  The thought of going back there now with how things stood between Ember and me… I couldn’t. But I couldn’t very well explain why I couldn’t to Mom and Dad.

  Even if Mom apparently had been hypnotized into accepting Orin as a family friend.

  That traitorous faery.

  “There she is!” screeched a voice from my partially-open door. Autumn came trotting in—the girl had yet to learn boundaries. Thankfully for her, I was an amazing big sister. If I do say so myself.

  “Leave us alone,” I said, just a touch of my grumpy side evident in my voice. Okay, not always an amazing sister.

  Autumn flicked on the light switch and padded over to the side of my bed. “Are you cramping?” she asked, twirling a strand of her long, brown hair around her finger. She had on a tie-dyed T-shirt and bright purple zebra pants. The girl could clearly not dress herself, but she was too old for my parents to be picking out outfits for her regardless.

  I pushed at her gently, my arm jostling and upsetting the cat. “I’m not on my period every time I’m feeling tired,” I said, grunting. “Geez, you’d have me bleeding twenty-nine days out of thirty.”

  “Gross.” She scooped the cat out from beside me, carrying her in her arms like a big, fragile bag of groceries. My sister bounced her up and down and Blossom dug her claws into her human captor’s shoulders, her yellow irises like saucers, but Autumn didn’t even flinch. “Are you still sick from last night?”

  “Yes,” I muttered, pulling the cover over my head entirely. “Now go away. And don’t forget to shut off the light.”

  “How did you create steam?” she asked. “When you touched that warm blanket they gave you, your hand glowed blue and steam rose out—”

  “You were seeing things,” I mumbled. “Now go away.”

  “Fine,” she snapped. The pounding of her bare feet against the floor was loud even muffled by the threadbare carpet that ran most of the length of Mom’s townhouse. “Keep your secrets.”

  “And stay away from Orin!” I snapped.

  “Who?”

  “Orin! My boss. My date to Homecoming.” I poked my head out from under the blanket. Mom was hovering behind Autumn in the doorway. Great.

  Autumn grinned and Blossom saw her chance to jump down, scattering off into the hallway, my little sister
hot on her literal tail.

  “How are you feeling?” asked Mom, her fist hovering over the open bedroom door as if it weren’t too late to knock and not be invited in at this point.

  “Fine,” I lied, burying my head underneath the blanket once more.

  She took that as an invitation because I felt her sit down on the edge of the bed. Her hand touched my shoulder through my barrier of cotton and synthetic fibers keeping me from facing reality and the fact that said reality included faeries, vampires, and merpeople. “Do you want to talk about it?” she asked.

  Yes. “No.”

  She kept stroking my shoulder in silence.

  “Don’t you have work today?” I asked. She always had work and it was supposed to be a Dad day anyway. She’d been a homemaker when she and Dad had been together and though she got some “maintenance,” as they called alimony for some reason, she’d had to take on a minimum-wage job at a superstore to make ends meet. Luckily, she and Dad got along well enough that he pretty much paid any and everything related to Autumn’s or my expenses.

  I just didn’t get why they couldn’t have gotten along while they’d been married, then.

  Sighing, I buried myself deeper in the blankets, barely hearing Mom’s response. Something about swapping shifts.

  She tugged the blanket off my head and I groaned. “Hey, listen to me,” she said.

  “I am.” Not true.

  She stared hard at me until I was forced to look away.

  “Did anyone hurt you last night?”

  “No,” I lied again. Not like she was thinking. Not who she was thinking.

  “Or Ember?”

  “No,” I said again, my nails digging into my palm beneath the blanket. Well, I had hurt her. “Things just got hectic in the chaos.”

  “So hectic that boy lost his pants?” Her eyebrow arched.

  “They were wet,” I said. “And on fire,” I added. I supposed the latter would excuse it where the former wouldn’t. Even if that was just a little white lie to add to the mountain of them.

  “Wet… and on fire?” Mom asked, her neck bending forward even more.

  Don’t test me, woman, I thought. You have no idea… “Wet after being on fire.”

  Mom took in a deep, audible breath. “Who was that boy, Ivy?”

  “Calder Poole,” I said, the name coming out like a petulant toddler forced to reveal the fact that she’d dug her hand into the cookie jar. “He’s on the swim team. Or he was… He just transferred.”

  “Okay…” Mom said. “And is he… Do you know him well? I don’t remember you ever hanging out with him before.”

  “That’s because I hang with the baseball team, owing to Paisley’s boyfriend being captain of it. Doesn’t mean I don’t know him.” An itch took over the tip of my nose and I rubbed it into my pillow.

  Mom kept patting my shoulder. “He was there with someone else and he just happened to help you and Ember—after his pants caught on fire?”

  “He was there with me,” I said, not wanting to get into the debate about why someone from a different school was there without a date from Union High. It wasn’t like he’d transferred that long ago anyway.

  “But I thought you and Orin…?” Normally, Mom would be having a fit that I’d dated an “older” guy. Ha, try older than dirt, not a couple of years older. But Orin had made her think he was a dear friend of ours somehow. For some reason.

  “He’s just a friend,” I said. “Was a friend. And I’m not working for him anymore.”

  Not the right thing to say. “Ivy, I know you might need time off, but I told you it’s important to start working as soon as possible. Look at what happened to me. When your father left—” Her phone rang, playing the Jurassic Park theme song, which I knew meant Dad. They’d gone on their first date to see that movie as freshmen in high school. I didn’t know why Mom would want to be reminded of that.

  “Take some time off,” she said, letting the phone continue to ring a moment. “Just keep… what happened to me… in mind. A part-time job would be good for you even throughout college.” Her lips pinched as she stared straight at me, and I flinched. She turned away and answered the call. “Yes?”

  I ran a finger over the edge of my nightstand, ignoring the buzz that came from my own phone as I picked up half a conversation between my parents.

  “That’s great!” said Mom, a smile on her face. She lowered the phone to whisper to me, “Ember got the all-clear. She’s home and feels fine.”

  I flinched. Not that I wanted her to be ill, of course, but… But… She was the enemy now. She’d sealed the deal before I had.

  I’d missed some of Mom’s side of the conversation. “He wants you and Autumn to still come over tonight,” she told me, Dad clearly on hold. “They’re going to order in.”

  “No!” I shouted, sitting up and practically whapping my poor mother across the face with my blankets.

  I could hear the muffled sound of Dad’s voice—he’d probably heard that.

  Mom shrank back. “Sunday is usually spent with your dad—”

  “Right. Oh, right.” Covering my face with my hands, I winced. My throat was dry. “It’s just… Mom, I barely feel like moving. Maybe Autumn can go and I…” I didn’t say anything more.

  Mom turned back to her conversation and spoke in a hushed voice. Then she held the phone out to me. “Your father wants to speak to you.”

  “Tell him I’m sick or something,” I said.

  “I heard that, young lady,” came Dad’s voice from the speaker.

  “Ugh,” I said, bringing my knees up and resting my forehead atop them.

  Mom spoke to him again and then hung up a few moments later. “We agreed both you and Autumn can stay here an extra night,” she said. “Ember’s dad is in town anyway. I get the feeling things are… tense between him and Noelle. They thought maybe having a crowd would make things less awkward.”

  “They’re inviting him to dinner with them?” I asked. All the more reason not to bother going. Like I needed another awkward thing happening inside my own home when all I wanted to do was sleep for the rest of my life.

  “He’s staying at a motel, but yes, he’s coming over for dinner.” Mom sighed as a crash echoed from downstairs—the townhouse was cramped, but there was a kitchen, living room, and half-bath on the first floor. “Autumn?” she called out.

  Autumn’s giggling rang out even from a floor and several rooms away.

  “We’ll talk more later,” said Mom, patting my shoulder again. She stopped when she reached the hallway, looking back at me over her shoulder. “And you’re at least eating dinner with your sister and me,” she said sternly. “I’m not letting you sleep the whole day away.” She flicked the lights off.

  Groaning, I rolled onto my side, nestling myself beneath the covers again. My phone buzzed on the stand beside my head and I reached over, holding the power button and confirming I wanted it turned off so the thing would finally go quiet.

  Chapter Two

  Don’t ask me to explain, but ditch with me? I texted to both Paisley and Lyric.

  It took half a minute for a response. First period? asked Paisley.

  We haven’t ditched since sophomore year, added Lyric. I think? Not this early in the day anyway.

  All day, I answered.

  Yeah, I knew I was asking for trouble with the truancy officers, but they weren’t known for being the most skilled at their jobs. And frankly, merpeople and vampires and all that made me care a lot less about getting grounded.

  Heck, if I could convince them to let me “serve my sentence” at Mom’s house, I’d never even have to see Ember.

  I guess? typed Paisley.

  I’m in, said Lyric. Just let me inform my bae. She paused a moment or two. No, actually, she’d bite my head off for this. We don’t have a class together until seventh anyway. I’ll just get my mom to call me out sick.

  It’s not playing hooky if you have permission, added Paisley, but I didn’t care
whether they got permission or not. I just needed a ride and a distraction, away from the venom-soaked halls of Union High.

  “Don’t be surprised if your father has a few things to say,” said Mom as she turned the corner and Union High came into sight a few blocks away. We’d already dropped Autumn off at her school and it was a Dad day, which meant Ember picking up Autumn after school… I bit my lip. I’d have to convince one of my friends to do it. Not that I thought Ember would hurt Autumn, per se, but if this was war and the vampires were still butthurt over what had gone down during Homecoming, who was to say what they would stoop to with or without their champion?

  Calder had insisted this was to be a proxy battle between human representatives of each species. But Ember hadn’t exactly been going it alone at the pool. My guess was the final blow had to be struck by the champion, but almost anything else was fair game. Almost. The one guy—faery—who might have cared about the rules had already overstepped his bounds.

  Mom must have taken my sullen silence for a response because she continued unabated. “He called again to check in last night and wanted to talk about that Calvin—”

  “Calder,” I corrected.

  “—and Orin, but I told him it was ridiculous to punish you over dating Orin when he was such a good family friend.” Her face lit up and I cringed. “He said he had no idea I’d known the guy and asked why I hadn’t mentioned that before and I…” Her tongue ran over her front teeth as she focused intently on the road. “In any case, he wants to talk to you.”