House of Slide Hybrid (42 page)

Back at school. Back at home. Back doing tattoos like nothing had changed. Everything had changed. Ash, Smoke, Osmond, everyone looked different to me when I looked at them and couldn’t help but see the energy they exuded. When I closed my eyes I saw Lewis, wherever he was, could feel him in my fingertips, on my lips. He shimmered greener, darker than most Wilds, but it wasn’t his color that I knew him by; it was more than that, less than that.

He was always with me, calling to me the same way I called to him, my other half. Some things were easier, some things harder, everything more. I could see the sparks of life and soul in my Axel as I lay in my bed trying to sleep. It was hard to sleep when everything, the earth, the trees, the animals were waking up, stretching into a new spring, a new life.

I loved him. His gentleness and strength, his constancy and self-sacrifice, his smile and frown, the scar on his thumb and the smooth skin of his cheek. I loved his soul burning hot, or cold, always intense. My thoughts were consumed by him, the blood bond ache or the other, the thing that hadn’t been able to watch him burn out: love.

My father didn’t even bring me home, instead he took me straight to the spa for a session. Lewis stayed with me. I couldn’t tell him to leave. Instead, I held onto his hand until my knuckles turned white.

For better or worse, we were in this together. My pain belonged to him, just like his belonged to me. How strange to want someone’s pain, but I did.

He stayed in Sanders with me, in Old Peter’s House with my Trainer supposedly, but it didn’t seem like Lewis was ever there when I wasn’t.

Carve ignored Lewis while Lewis moved around the house, washing dishes, tightening screws, just being there while I asked Carve to teach me the shadow thing that Ash had done so well with the Wilds, making them see things that weren’t there.

“One of the things about leaning, is that the more creative you are, the less believable your leaning will be,” he explained easily before he rested thin fingers on my cheek until I knew more than Ash had done, saw different waves of energy that were possible until reality became completely bent and mangled. I preferred and hated that method of learning. I hated having Matthew’s thoughts cross through my thoughts, forcing my mind into his predetermined paths, but nothing beat it in speed and efficiency. I had too much to learn to be picky about how I learned it.

After my next three inches of tattoos I held Lewis’s hand all the way home then went straight to Snowy’s house after Lewis left to talk her into teaching me how to shoot a gun. After hours of standing in the cold, aiming at a target nailed to a tree, my ears were ringing but I wasn’t any better.

“You really suck with firearms. I think it has to do with your energy. I think you’re close to melting my beautiful 30mm. Why don’t you stick with knives?”

I sighed, but agreed. Matthew didn’t want to teach me about runes, said it was a difficult thing that should be approached after I had the stability of finished tattoos, but after I lit my curtains on fire, green fire with green flames, when I’d poured reckless Wild energy into making sparks, mother talked to him for me. He taught me more about what I shouldn’t do than what I should do, but I specifically asked to learn a trap rune for catching demons, so he took me to the woods, shaking his head the whole time he explained the rhythms and patterns. I focused, listening as much as I could. I didn’t have time to not know anything that would bring me closer to Lewis sooner.

Time slipped away, the days turning into weeks as I filled every waking moment either with Snowy criticizing my shooting technique or anything else I could get anyone to teach me. Osmond had become unapproachable, probably angry that I’d gone and done something stupid without inviting him again, but he didn’t belong between me and a demon man. He might be angry, but at least he wasn’t dead.

My tattoos didn’t last forever. One day I stared over my shoulder in the mirror at the long spiral of silver tattoos from the top of my neck nearly to my waist.

Finally, it was the day before my party, the big party my mother was throwing to celebrate the completion of my last tattoos for the first series, something involving a tent in my backyard and millions of lights. Snowy was kind of thrilled to death about it, although she was mad that my mother didn’t involve her in the planning.

I thrummed with excitement in spite of my charming artist informing me that with Life, what the first series was called, I wouldn’t die, but I wouldn’t heal either. I’d simply lie there suffering forever. I’d need the second series, called Healing to come back as mostly me. She smiled at me when she said that I wasn’t finished, that there was so much more pain ahead of me.

I would have been more irritated if I hadn’t seen a flash of soul sight that had me scrambling into my clothes to careen out the metal and wooden door, into the arms of Lewis where he stood, waiting for me.

“You made it,” he murmured as he cupped my head in his hands and took his time brushing back my hair, sliding his fingers over the tattoos on my neck. I shivered as the touch seemed to travel down my runes to the base of my spine, sinking through to my bones. His eyes would have glowed if he had a fury, but now they were soft, vulnerable as his hands tightened unconsciously around me. My mother came out of nowhere when she wrapped my coat around me, covering my neck with the collar while she separated us.

“We’ll see you tomorrow,” my mother said to him as she mostly carried me down the metal lined hall, away from Lewis and his gaze which had become hungry. The bond ache made me shake more than the tattoos did, but neither one of us struggled against my mother, even though I knew that he felt the pull as strongly as I did.

He would be at the party, along with the other one, Raoul, House of Grasse, who was apparently an alternate for Lewis as my Intended. At the party Lewis and I would dance together and my fingers would burn while he wrapped his hands around my waist.

That night I dreamed that Lewis held me in his arms, gazing into my eyes while he whispered to me, love, desire, and forever. I woke up with my heart pounding and threw the sheets back, trying to hang onto the dream. I couldn’t sleep after that, not when there was so much life stirring everywhere, stirring I could feel inside of me.

All day I found myself remembering my dream, at least as much of it as I could and missing Lewis. The sun shone brightly through the kitchen windows almost making the black and white room cheerful as I sat at the table with my mother and Satan. Everyone was so happy that it made me nervous, like we were about to run out of our happy streak. Yeah, because getting tattoos was so happy. I grinned at my mother as she announced that the caterers from the city would be there at three. I loved the caterers. I loved Satan and his big bald head with beautiful runes circling his skull. I loved my mother who seemed almost happy sitting in the kitchen drinking her tea with her long black hair falling over her shoulders.

After three there would only be a few more hours before I could see Lewis, could dance with him. I frowned as I thought about the dancing, well, the what-to-wear while I was dancing. Luckily, Snowy came over after breakfast to figure it out. After we discussed the pros and cons of various outfits the topic turned to Smoke. Snowy was resigned to the fact that they’d have to be there in the same place at the same time, but she still pouted about it.

“You don’t hate him,” I said, almost positive that she didn’t.

“He didn’t used to talk to me when I ignored him, now he talks even when I pretend he’s invisible. He used to pretend like I was invisible back at me. It worked. Now I feel like a completely odious witch for treating him like… well, anyway. It’ll be fine. It’ll pass. Smoke will get the idea eventually. I didn’t know he’d be so tenacious about me, but it’s like he’s getting a kick out of showing how nice he can be when I treat him like crap. Seriously. I had no idea he was so stubborn.” She sounded more dreamy than irritated about it.

“Remind me why you can’t see him again?”

She rolled her eyes. “If I break the Code with him then he’s toast. Demon fodder.” She wrinkled her nose. “Anything less dramatic wouldn’t be worth not kissing him. Did I tell you the time we were sitting in his basement watching some old Conan Barbarian thing—totally ridiculous by-the-way—and while we ate ice cream we…” her voice faded out and she scowled at my closet, like it was all its fault she couldn’t find anything awesome for me to wear.

“Demon fodder, huh? That would suck.” It would. Death by Samaliel was something I’d considered many times since I’d come home, safe, sort of, but still, feeling less safe the more I knew about what was out there and how easily it might come here if I didn’t have awesome protectors like Satan willing to live in my basement. Of course she didn’t know, she only knew what Devlin had told her. I had to wonder if Devlin really had seen Smoke go up in, well, smoke, or if he was playing a sick, you-can’t-date-other-guys-after-I’m-dead game.

After that Snowy took off, to pout alone probably so I spent the rest of the day mostly staying out of the way of the people who set up tents, tables, and metal pillars that didn’t seem to do anything besides look impressive. It was amazing to see that spring had a firm grip on the earth, that everything was so alive, growing like crazy, like it knew it had to rush and bloom before winter came again.

“Dari, why aren’t you dressed yet?” Snowy asked as I was innocently stealing a fruit cup from the elaborate display in the outside tent.

It scared me half to death, you know, since I was trying to be sneaky. “Nothing, just waiting to see Lewis.”

“Time for that later,” Snowy said, dragging me inside. “When Lewis comes you need to be cute. Believe me, you’re going to need the help of some serious cosmetics if you want to look half as good as your cousins.”

“Cousins?” I asked halfway up the stairs to my room.

“Everyone in Sanders who is acquainted with the dark side of nature is coming, as well as your multitude of relatives. This is a big deal.”

“What was I thinking of, getting tattoos yesterday when I was supposed to be preparing for this party instead,” I said wondering what cousins I’d never met. There could be hundreds of them, beautiful, perfect Wilds who would make me look normal without intervention. The thing is, I didn’t have a problem with looking normal, or even plain actually. Who cared about that when there was that silky soft grass coming up outside, when the trees were getting fuzzy with furled leaves, when the air smelled like life and joy, and when Lewis was coming?

Snowy sighed as she stood me in front of my mother’s awesome vanity. “All right, it is kind of lame that your recovery period is practically nil, but after a few dances in the arms of your soulmate I’m sure you’ll look great.” Her eyes gleamed slightly. “And I don’t think Valerie is going to be the only one seething with envy.”

“Let the jealousy begin,” I said, sitting down in my mother’s pristine all white bedroom and compared my face to Snowy’s. She was beautiful, pale, with wide eyes that shifted from green to hazel and back again. Her perfect heart face, the mouth that was like a rosebud in her nude lipstick, it was a face that proclaimed beauty, purity, desirability, and I wondered if she’d spent longer than usual on her makeup knowing that Smoke would be there. I sighed for her and shifted to my own face. My eyes were nice, slanted slightly thanks to my father. My mouth was too big, my skin had freckles from my time spent at camp, but what I liked most was my smile. I didn’t look gorgeous like Snowy, but I looked happier. Besides that was my blue hair, recently reblued that brought out the blue in my eyes.

Snowy turned her attention to the contents of the vanity and gasped when she saw my mother’s stash. I wasn’t exactly immune to the rows and rows of pretty sparkly powders and lipsticks either. Snowy was going to enjoy herself. When she was finished and I had on a diaphanous fairy skirt of various shades of pink and blue, that swooped down to my ankles while my heart shaped wrap blouse from my father’s house made me feel like a ballet dancer, I looked beautiful with perfect dewy skin, a mouth ripe and kissable, enormous eyes surrounded by thick lashes, really stunning, but I didn’t look Wild at all, particularly not with the hair.

I twirled in front of the mirror and laughed as the girl who belonged to the spring and the woods laughed with me.

I’d almost forgotten how long it took to get pretty. The musicians were playing the first chords of their electric guitars as I came downstairs. I hadn’t expected electric guitars at a Wild event. As far as I could tell, Wilds were strictly violin people. When I stepped outside with Snowy, she squeezed my arm while she squealed about the band. I looked in the fading light at the group on the low platform. Jackson was up there, adjusting a microphone nervously. When he finally picked up a guitar, I knew where I’d seen the rest of the band members, outside of the Slide House the first time I’d ever been there, in Satan’s car. They were snobs, the kind of Wilds that made me want to wear my shoes unlaced just to drive them crazy, and they were here at my party.

“I can’t get over the fact that you got the Screaming Monkeys to come here. I’ve been dying to go to a Screaming Monkey’s concert,” Snowy said, trying not to stare, but still totally staring. “Do you think they’d give me an autograph?”

“Um, those are Wilds,” I said lamely.

She stared at me with her large eyes. “They can’t help that, and they’re not all Wilds. I think one of them is a Hotblood and the other two are normal.” She turned away from me.