He watched us through the glass. Despite everything in me wanting to hate him for what he was, I felt sorry for him. The way he studied each bite I took, I knew he was hungry. Why did I even care? I looked off toward the sun setting behind the trees. Because I wasn’t as heartless as I needed to be. What if he wasn’t like the others and I tortured him? Eight Ball wasn’t human, but I would kick it with him any day of the week.
“Shayla …” someone touched my hand, bringing me back to reality. “Are you ready to question him?” Savannah stared at me, waiting for my response. Everyone else had disappeared back inside, leaving us alone. “Lance can do it if you want.”
Hooking a finger around a piece of hair, I stared at the pink nail polish. “Nah. I can take care of it. There’s something that needs to be done before I start.” I pushed back against the chair, making it groan across the floor. Savannah cut me an unsettling stare. I paused, placing a hand on the back of my chair. “What?” I asked, flinging my arms out.
She sat back, crossing her arms, and pursed her lips. “Nothing.” She shook her head, looking down at the table while toying with a napkin. She frustrated me when she did stuff like this. Why not just go ahead and tell me what she was thinking? That would be the easiest way.
I bit the inside of my cheek to maintain a flawless façade. On the inside, I raged. There was no need to doubt me. “What is it?” I asked again, keeping my voice steady.
She finally looked back up to me. “Just be careful. Okay?” I nodded and headed into the house. The Snake Demon freaked out when I approached it. He looked at the others as if pleading with his eyes for anyone but me to take him. They continued doing their work, trying to ignore his grunts and howls.
“I’m going to untie you. If you run, you will hurt. Do you understand?” I asked as I kneeled in front of him. He nodded. After untying all the knots, he stood. I took him by the arm and pushed him through the side door. Outside, I paused at a toolbox near the back of the jeep and grabbed a pair of pliers. I waved them in front of his face, trying to frighten him. I wanted him to know I meant business. I needed him afraid. “Keep walking.” We made our way to the sandbar in front of the boats and stopped, taking a seat in the sand. I ripped the duct tape from his mouth. A second later the dirty rag shot out of his mouth, followed by several gagging sounds as he hunched forward. I hated to admit it to myself, but I was tingling with excitement. Please let him tell me something useful.
Embracing the adrenaline surge, I launched into my act. “That’s enough. Sit back.” He listened to me, sitting up and wiping his mouth with the sleeve of his shirt. “First off, I know how your kind works. Did you hear about that?” I pictured all of them getting a good laugh at my expense, the stupid human falling for their tricks. He shook his head. “A while back, I …” the words tasted bad. They were so hard to say. I was so ashamed of the memory I didn’t want to relive. “I became involved with one of you. He tricked me into thinking he cared about me when I was going through a lot.” Images of Casey and Jace popped into my mind. I could still see them together in bed. The pain it brought. My throat burned as I swallowed my emotions, fighting to keep them hidden. “He won me over, but he used somethin’ other than charm. He used poison.” I leaned in toward him and grabbed his shirt. “I’ve seen how your poison can blind people. So, I’m going to keep you from doing that to anyone here.” I pulled the pliers out, snapping them together a few times to get a feel. “Open up, I’m taking those fangs out.”
“Please. No. I won’t use them. I didn’t plan on it. I promise,” he rambled. He pulled his body away from me. I lunged at him, shoving him down onto the sand. Using my body, I pinned him against the ground. He shifted his head from side to side, trying to avoid me, but never once did he try to push me off. Forcefully, I pushed back on his upper lip, causing his mouth to open. Before I lost my opportunity, I ripped both fangs out and tossed them into the water. He spit a mouthful of blood out, tears rolling down his cheeks.
“Now. First things first. What’s your name?”
His tongue flicked in and out of his mouth. “Lyric,” he answered before hacking up more blood. His mouth moved around as if adjusting to not having those teeth anymore.
“What do you eat?”
He swallowed, staring me in the eyes. For a moment I thought he was going to attack me like I was his food. “I eat normal food. Animals sometimes. Most of my brothers though, they eat humans.” I pictured them tearing apart those girls, ripping them like they were nothing. My stomach churned at the memories.
“If you’re different than the others, why were you there at our training camp? The purpose of that attack was to kill us, right?”
He looked up toward the moon and sighed. “I was forced to go. They knew I was different. They were hoping I’d grow out of being the way I am.” He paused. “This was my last chance. It was either prove myself or be left.” He shifted toward me. “You know we can’t die unless weapons are dipped in Angel’s tears, I’m sure.” I nodded. “Not saying that people using weapons on us or killing us doesn’t hurt, but can you imagine being left in a dark place, trapped for eternity?” I tried to picture what that would be like. I freaked out just crawling through the tunnel.
“It must have been scary,” I said. “So how did they find us?” I asked, trying not to spend too much time getting personal with him. I didn’t want him thinking we would become friends off this. He was our prisoner, and he needed to remember that.
“The Magal that works with Dermetheus built these machines. They kind of look like these huge drills. It took months of watching once they found the location. The Magal figured out where they needed to penetrate to bring the place down. The plan was to destroy the place and go in to kill any survivors. They wanted to take all of you down, but Fuzzaran was the main target.”
My eyes tightened, shattering the nonchalant flow of our conversation. “Who?” My fingers knotted around the collar of his sweaty shirt, pulling him closer to me. That was a mistake. I could smell the sour odor of his breath. If only I had slits that could shield my nostrils like the chick from The Facility.
He blandly wrapped his fingers around my hands, trying to break the hold. “Let me go, and I’ll tell you.” His statement was less of a demand and more of a panicked request.
I scanned his face for any traces of dishonesty. “Tell me everything.” I released his shirt, taking a few deep breaths of fresh air, and mentally made a note that if he stuck around I needed to get him a toothbrush.
His eyes softened as he nodded, rubbing a quick hand across his shirt to smooth the ruffled fabric. “Well, first off, let me ask you a question … how well do you know your fearless leader?” He quirked his brow as if trying to be a smartass. That didn’t sit well with me.
I threw a punch, connecting with his cheekbone. “Ummm … I don’t know. Pretty good. I mean I didn’t know his name was Fuzz-ra-han. If that’s what you mean,” I said as if nothing had happened. He rubbed his jaw, starting at me with disbelief, but took the hit with stride.
“It’s Fuzzaran.” He said the name slowly, drawing out each syllable, like my comprehension wasn’t that of his. “He shortened it when he came here. That way he didn’t stick out so much since it was an odd name at the time. Fuzz sounds more like a nickname someone from the south would’ve come up with. Don’t you think?” I couldn’t disagree. I had heard my fair share of nicknames, and they were a lot crazier than Fuzz. Boosie, Rat, and Manny-Moo were just to name a few.
“Okay, so he wanted a nickname so he could stay on the down low, nothing wrong with that. Why should it bother me?” He shifted as if trying to get comfortable in the sand. The longer I sat there, the number my ass got, but I wasn’t about to let that be known. I was a hard-ass, which meant literally my ass needed to be hard, like stone. Okay not stone for every male, but for him, yeah. I couldn’t show any weakness. I shook my head, dissipating my random thoughts, and waited for him to continue.
“The name alone shouldn’t
bother you. I’m sure there are plenty of people who do it. It’s whatever. But I had to tell you that so you would know who I was talking about. For your sake, I’ll just call him Fuzz.” I nodded, annoyed at how long he was taking getting to the point. I didn’t want to spend my entire night out here with him.
“Hurry up with whatever it is you think you got to say.” There was a slight edge to my voice, clearly showing my annoyance.
He swept his arms to the sides. “Well answer the question. What do you know about Fuzz?”
I clenched my teeth and rolled my eyes. “Fuzz was Reese’s neighbor several years ago, that’s how we knew him. He kinda brought us all in on this and started having people train us. Boom! Here we are. All kinds of Rambo and Terminator combined to kill things.”
He chuckled, which sounded more like a gurgle. “I can see that. Did he tell you why he was getting you trained?”
I thought about it for a moment, puckering my lip out as I contemplated. “Ummm …” I started.
“You look like you’re constipated,” he said matter-of-factly. “It wasn’t that difficult of a question.” I couldn’t help it. I punched him again. “Gah! I wish you’d quit doing that.” He spat out a mouthful of blood dangerously close to my leg. I eyed the thick loogie with disgust. He better be glad that didn’t hit me, or I would put a bullet in his nuts.
“He just told us that there were monsters out there, and we needed to learn to protect ourselves from them. Then we started chasing after Derek. Fuzz didn’t know what he was, so that was our main mission.” It felt weird talking to him about all of this. He was the enemy, and here I was practically sharing bedtime stories with him. Hell, what next, the first time we had sex? God, I hope not. I didn’t want to visualize him doing anything like that.
“Oh, he knew what Derek was. He just didn’t want any of you to know he did.”
I scrunched my face in a perplexed manner. “What do you mean?” Surely Fuzz wouldn’t have let us go through everything we did if he already had answers. What would be the point of that? We lost lives!
“He knew his real name was Dermetheus. They’ve known each other a long time. They weren’t always enemies though. At one time they were best friends.” I sat back, my head spinning. He had to be lying. There wasn’t any other way. It just wasn’t possible.
“But – But that would mean …” I couldn’t get the rest of my sentence out. He leaned forward with a smug look, waiting for me to continue. My tongue felt thick, making the words stick in my mouth, rolling around in useless mumbles. “That would mean Fuzz wasn’t from here. He wasn’t human.”
Chapter Thirteen
Shayla
Once I said it out loud everything made sense. The day we watched Varcies and Derek talking, they kept referring to a warrior sent here. I didn’t think anything about it. It was Fuzz the entire time. He played us for fools, but there had to be a logical explanation. Lyric swept his hand across my face wiggling his fingers like a cheerleader. I blinked a few times trying to clear my vision. The outer walls were a black vignette. How could he train us this entire time and not tell us he was one of them? Sure, I knew Reese was different, but she didn’t know. This was something different. This was betrayal.
“Damn. Was it that big of a blow?” Lyric asked. He backed away, eyeing me like I would hit him again. I was too numb for violence, which was rare for me. Usually I could find any reason to use it … or an ass comment. “It’s not as bad as it sounds. I know you’re probably thinking the worst about him right now.”
I gaped at him, my emotions deflating. “How would you know what I’m feeling?” The words sounded lost, like they were coming from someone other than me. He reached for my hand, which I instinctively jerked away.
He threw his hands up in surrender. “Just trying to help.”
I clenched my jaw, while holding my hand close to my body. “Well, don’t.” It felt contaminated. I needed to wash his grimy Snake Demon germs off me as soon as possible. I had enough of those in my lifetime. I involuntarily shuddered at the unwanted memories of Zane.
“You have to get over this initial shock,” he said, looking troubled. “Otherwise, I won’t tell you everything else.”
I forgot about my hand. The cooties would just have to fester until I could clean it. “Everything else?” I swallowed a lump. “What else is there?”
He moved his legs out in front of him, stretching, and leaned back against his hands. “Fuzz isn’t this horrible person like you’re thinking. He’s actually quite the opposite. Now, everything I know is just from others talking, but the story has been consistent for the past several years. Years ago, Dermetheus was posed by the darkness. His sister tried to fight him, a sad attempt at killing him if you ask me.”
I rolled my eyes. “No one is.”
He puckered his lips, clearly annoyed, but continued. “She couldn’t do it, and he escaped. Only when he came here, he took a different form, so creatures from the other Realms didn’t know it was him. He was trapped that way until he found a remedy to change him back.”
“That’s why he changed that night …” I said more to myself than to him.
He nodded. “Since he has regained his true form, he now has all his powers back. But, back to Fuzz. After he escaped, his sister, Nabea, couldn’t come after him, so she sent her warrior. We didn’t know he was here for definite up until recently. He was very good with keeping his presence hidden, until he got careless with that girl.”
“Reese?”
“No. Casey.” The sound of her name boiled my blood. I wished she was still alive just so I could kill her all over again.
“It doesn’t make much difference now. Fuzz is dead.” I looked down at the ground, bitter.
“That doesn’t matter. You can’t let them win.”
“Why does it matter to you so much?” I cocked a brow, confused by this thing’s dire need for us to not stop fighting his kind.
“They will destroy this world and all humans. I personally like it here. And I like humans. They’re a lot more fun to be around.”
“Shayla … everything okay out here?” Abby asked, interrupting our conversation. She stood a few feet back, her eyes darting between the two of us in an uneasy manner.
“Yeah. We’re coming in. Can you get Lyric some food?”
“Ummm … sure.” She walked away mumbling to herself.
I stood, dusting the sand from my clothes. “Looks like we got some work to do then.” I took a few feet toward the house, and stopped to look back. “You coming?” He jumped to his feet, jogging to catch up. “Don’t take this the wrong way. I still don’t trust you, but you might be helpful.”
“Anyway I can be.” He held a hand across his heart. “By the way, the redhead in there … is she single?”
“Masey?” I couldn’t hide the amusement from my voice. “Yeah, as single as they come.” He smiled, his walk seeming to increase in pep.
His plate was on the counter when we got back in. He sat, eagerly looking over his food. I walked to the back corner of the living room. A small table was set up with lab equipment Masey had taken from the high school for her work. Across from it wires stretched out, making a chaotic mess on the floor connecting to Dax’s computers. He pounded against the old keyboard, his eyes never leaving the screen. Masey focused a microscope in on the dirt specimen I’d found in the abandoned room.
“Any luck?” I asked the two of them. They never acknowledged me. It was what I liked to see. Hard work. Mainly because there was no way I could ever figure that shit out. I was glad I didn’t have to kill either of them. Casey. My teeth grinded thinking about her again.
“They haven’t stopped since you’ve been outside,” Abby said from the table. “Give it time. We’ll get something to go on.”
“I hate waiting. I feel like every minute we lose is gonna make us too late.” I pulled out a chair and sat across from her. Her face was still swollen from the blow she’d taken by the hole puncher I chunked at her.
I bit the insides of my cheeks to keep from smiling. She’d deserved it. Although I was psycho bitch at the time. Maybe she did deserve an apology. “Look … about me kind of throwing that thing at your face,” I started.
“Kind of? I think you threw it. There was no kind of.” She watched my face, waiting for my reaction like I was going to pick up something else and do it again.
“You had it coming. You have to admit that,” I said, pointing it out with an eye roll.
Her eyes went wide before sitting back and crossing her arms. “Yeah. I guess I’ve been giving you a lot of shit lately.”
My brows rose. “Lately? Try ever since I’ve known you. I know me and you aren’t as close, but that’s no reason to be a smartass all the time,” I countered.
There was silence a few moments, and somewhere in the middle of it, we seemed to come to a mental understanding. “I’ll try to be better if you try to control your anger. I haven’t had a serious boyfriend, so I really don’t know what you’re going through.” She looped her fingers through the coffee mug sitting in front of her as if embarrassed by her confession.
“Well, be glad. It hurts more than anything.” I wiped away a small tear with the back of my hand before she could see.
“Learn anything from our new friend over there?” she asked, nudging her head in Lyric’s direction, watching him gobble his food. Several pieces had been tossed to the floor and littered the counter. If he was going to stay, he needed to learn how humans ate. Being this messy was only acceptable if we were in an eating contest.
Torment Page 11
