The Demon Girl by Penelope Fletcher (each kindness read aloud TXT) 📕

so hard his blazer flapped back off his shoulder and I saw a flash of green and gold swinging from his neck, resting on his chest above his heart. He had a pendant like mine. It explained why he was so interested in the one I wore. His was different though, bigger and darker in colour. Huh, despite his interesting taste in jewellery, I was still pissed at him. I was raw and not fit for any other surprises. A girl can only handle so much crazy. I’d told him to leave me alone, but he didn’t seem to take subtle and even blatant hints. It was time to be rude. My shaking hand pushed the hair from my eyes so I could glare properly.

“Why do you keep popping up? Everywhere I go there you are.” As I said the words I realized how true they were. He was always nearby, lurking somewhere. I’d never seen it before then.

“So what if I am following you?”

I scowled. He wasn’t even going to try and deny it. “If you are then stop.”

“Of course, but I want you to give me something first.”

The door swept open again. My heart skipped a whole two thumps then pumped at double time. Because Breandan stepped into the room, his bare feet silent on the stone floor. He let the door of the library close with a dull click, and his gaze flicked between us. If I could have picked one person to never join the conversation I was having with Devlin, Breandan would be that person. Clearly the universe was out to get me.

Irritation twisted Devlin’s expression before it settled into overly pleasing handsome lines. His lips twitched and his attention locked solely on me.

My head swung from one to the other unsure of where to focus. As if one stupidly good-looking boy wasn’t hard enough to deal with, I now had two messing with my mind. I sat down heavily on the nearest bench I could find and put my head in my hands. I was beginning to think it possible for your head to explode from stress.

Breandan straddled the bench and settled close by me. He sighed. “You can’t help but find trouble,” he said.

My rude response caught in my throat. I stared at his guarded face and wanted to scream at him. I wanted to demand to know what he was doing exposing himself and me like this, and tell him to get lost.

All I whispered was, “You shouldn’t be here.”

Something shifted in his expression, and told me he knew how much I was freaking out, since he smiled.

He touched my cheek. “We are safe.”

“Am I interrupting?” Devlin asked icily.

His hands were fisted both sides of him, and his lips had a rigid set. Blazer hanging open, I glimpsed his impressive physique as he turned his gaze to Breandan. Impressive but odd, he didn’t have any marks. All boys had marks. Not as many as Breandan, who had enough tattoos for three, but Devlin’s skin was completely pure.

“Rae, aren’t you going to introduce us?” he asked and stared at Breandan.

Without looking at him, Breandan replied as he entwined his fingers with mine. “I’m no concern of yours.”

Fingers firm and warm rubbed against mine. I was hyper aware of the touch. It reminded me of the last time I had my hand in another’s, in a vampires. That thought pulled me up short. The vampire had touched me and I’d let him. Wow. I was seriously messed up. Years of being unable to interact with others, and I let demons drape themselves all over me. I tugged my hand away but it was a pitiful attempt. More for the sake of telling myself I had resisted, rather than actually wanting him to let me go.

“Interesting,” Devlin said. “I thought only Disciples, Clerics or Priests were allowed at Temple. I’m new here, but I’ve never seen you before. When did you enroll?”

They peered at each other warily. Backs straightening and necks stiffening, they became silent.

A pressing need to defend Breandan had me stuttering, “It’s no big, Devlin. He’s my, uhguest.” I shrank back as Devlin’s glare turned on me. The last thing I needed would be for him to run and spill Breandan was on Temple grounds. I did tug my hand away this time and fisted it on my lap. I felt annoyingly bereft that he had released me. “I want him here,” I added in a rush.

Breandan went still beside me, and I felt his focus shift to my face.

It grew cold. The lights flickered and ominous silence draped over me. A weird feeling crawled over my skin, so I tensed. The lights blacked out. The room temperature hit rock bottom, and an icy gust of air lapped at the back of my neck. I clutched Breandan’s hand tight in mine again. Was it him doing this? He needed to stop because he was making it a little too obvious that he didn’t belong. I squeezed the hand I held. The moisture in my eyes stung, and the pores on my skin shrank. Then ‘it’ passed and the lights came back up. The air warmed.

“Power outage,” I said tactfully.

My mind was not able to deal with the concept of anything other than that. It was an easy lie. Breandan snorted and rested an arm over my shoulder. He made soothing circles on my wrist. It was nice, the lazy soft brushes against my skin.

“Rae,” Devlin said slickly, “Would you like to come with me? Somewhere private.” He smiled, nice and slow. The kind of smile that suggested not much talking would be going on once he got me alone. “We could get to know one another some more?”

Confused at his sudden suggestive undertone, rejection was on the tip of my tongue. I had a vampire to get back to, so my plan was to extract myself from this conversation as soon as I could and leave. Who knew what Tomas would do if I was not there when he woke up. All of this had passed through my mind in a split second then flew out as quick. Breandan’s reaction to the invitation was explosive. Snarling, he moved startlingly fast and blurred into a dark streak, a shadow.

Chests heaving and eyes blazing the boys faced off nose to nose.

I was confused and stared at the vacant spot the fairy-boy was moments ago. My reactions caught up and I made a noise of alarm. I jumped up to push Breandan back a few paces, with difficulty since he packed a truck-load more muscle and height than me. I tugged his chin down to look him in the face. Tense seconds clicked by as I looked into the eyes of someone alien to me. Breandan glared at me with traces of disgust and disbelief. I felt bad and annoyed because I wanted answers from him, but I couldn’t have him butting heads with other Disciples. If Devlin told a Cleric I’d let a strange boy into Temple, I’d come under question. Hell, if Devlin threw in he knew I was hiding a vampire in my wardrobe, I would never see the light of day again. They would probably lock me away for the rest of my life. Or kill me if they could prove I was a demon and a threat.

“I think you should go,” I said wearily.

The horrible moment passed and Breandan’s face gentled into exasperation and impatience. The shift was so fast; I floundered, unable to account for the sudden change. Chuckling to himself, his arm propelled me towards the door picking up my bag as we went.

“Walk me out,” he said cheerfully, he even had a spring in his step.

Wasn’t I doing a dandy job of extracting myself from this situation? I was meant to be in my room by now, waiting for my guest to wake up so I could answer his questions and get rid of him. Instead, I was walking out a fairy that seemed happy to be in mortal peril, for that was the situation for any demon on Temple grounds.

“You have my word no harm will ever come to you that will be of my making,” a voice said in my ear. I turned to look Breandan in the eyes, sincere and warm. “I will always protect you. Even when you don’t me to,” he added after a small pause.

“I’m not afraid,” I said tartly and took a half step before drawing deep and taking another larger one. I lowered my voice, “And I can take care of myself. By doing what you did back there you’ve painted a big target on my back. I need to be careful after what happened this morning and you are putting me in danger by just being here, and throwing your weight around. Devlin is a Disciple, a popular one at that. He could get me into serious trouble. Besides, I think I’d be safer with him than I ever would with you.”

He raised an eyebrow then became thoughtful.

As we left Sanctuary, cool air blew into my face and the speckles of ash that floated by were comforting, familiar. It was tinged with smoke now the fires had been lit in preparation for the night. The days were short so close to winter.

Breandan moved ahead of me and took my hand. Before long I heard a group of Disciples nearby, their high and happy voices floating through the dark coming straight toward us. He turned so we no longer walked on the path to the main gate but out onto the lawn surrounding the Temple, into the darkness. Over my shoulder I saw Devlin followed silently and he didn’t look alarmed but rather annoyed. Rather than an all-dark figure, I made out his angular features and the green of his eyes. With a start I realized everything looked lighter, and then I saw why. Breandan’s tattooed skin glowed in the dark. It was like he wanted to get caught. Like he really didn’t care Devlin could name him as demon.

Said boy pushed between us, and grabbed my hand to pull me forward. My skin crawled. I tried to pull away but he held on firmly. Breandan held on and stopped moving. I was stuck between the two and Devlin was determined to keep going, so I squeaked when my arms nearly yanked out of their sockets. Brendan growled, literally hunched his back and bared his teeth. The sound was a low rumble, but resonated loud enough to be taken as a warning. Despite this display he had to let me go to avoid hurting me, but he was not happy about it.

Devlin barely broke stride as he half turned and smirked. Turning back to my puzzled face, he feigned innocence. “Possessive isn’t he?”

I looked over my shoulder and sent Breandan a wobbly smile. The reason known only to the complicated workings of my heart, I wanted to reassure him that I was okay. Jaw working soundlessly, he walked close behind us and kept his eyes locked on Devlin’s long fingers wrapped around mine.

Devlin let my hand go and I sighed in relief, we reached the Temple wall and I wondered what was coming next. Breandan seemed quite unconcerned at how this was turning out, and I was curious to see where this adventure was headed next. Seriously, where was it headed? There was no way through the barrier here unless you could jump higher than twenty feet like a vampire, or scale smooth, seamless concrete.

“Rae, place your hands over your eyes” Devlin said.

I planted my feet, ready to fight it out. Whatever these boys were planning would not go down as easy as they thought. “I will