Neon Blue E Frost (speld decodable readers .TXT) 📖

I swallow uncertainly. I don’t call him anything because he’s a demon. “Uh, I don’t know . . . how do you know what humans do anyway? I thought you had amnesia.”

“I just know. Like I know your language.” He slides one elbow into the pillows and props his head on his hand, continuing to look down at me. “Your head’s more mixed up than a windy day in Zolez. Why are you so afraid of me? If you’re my seggurach, you know I’d carve out my own spine before I’d hurt you. And why are you trying to hide all these questions you want to ask me, like how to send me back?”

I gape at him, completely at a loss. He can see all of that in my mind? Has he always known exactly what I’m thinking? Has he just been playing with me all this time?

“You already know how to send me back,” he says. His voice has gone quiet and low. “You just don’t have the balls to do it.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” I whisper.

“Bullshit. You’re afraid. You’re afraid of trying and failing and what I’d do to you.”

“You don’t remember it but you killed and ate a man in my dining room, so I have good reason—”

“Yeah, I see that in your head. I also see what he was. Entrapping fuck. You’re so desperate not to be like that. Not to become the monster.” His voice warms and he strokes my throat. “It’s eatin’ you up, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” I admit. I hear the edge of tears in my own voice and swallow hard, trying to hold on to stronger emotions, like anger. But I already know I’ve lost. He can see what I’m thinking and he’ll use my misery and uncertainty to manipulate me closer and closer to the edge. “You’re just pushing me to the point where I agree to give you my soul, aren’t you? That’s what this is all about. That’s where you’re going, isn’t it? You hurt me and hurt me until I agree to give you my soul just to escape the nightmare—”

He glances up at the damn wall and then at my bound wrists. For a moment, he’s the one who looks uncertain. “I think you’ve got the wrong end of the stick.”

“Wrong end of the stick?! This is my soul! It doesn’t mean anything to you—”

“You’re wrong about that, too. Listen to me for a second.” He puts his hand over my mouth, strokes my cheek with his thumb. “Shh, just listen. I don’t remember everything. And your mind is fucking confusing. But I don’t think I’d have done this—“ He touches the bindings on my wrist. “—if all I wanted was a soul-trade.”

“You want to make me a demon,” I say resentfully against his fingers.

“Seggurach, actually. And no, I’m not tellin’ you what that is. Not until I remember everything. Then ask me again. And ask me why I bound you instead of getting’ you drunk or high.” His teeth flash in the darkness. “I’ve done that already, haven’t I?”

“Yes.”

“Let yourself remember it for a moment. I want to see something.”

I scowl at him. “I don’t remember very much of it. Obviously.”

“Just lemme see what you do remember.” He’s silent for a moment and I can feel him ruffling through my mind, his thoughts as warm and gentle as his fingers through my hair. “Yeah, I gave you my seed—“

“You keep saying that.”

“And you still don’t understand what it means.” He leans over and kisses me. “I don’t just want your soul. I want a lot more. And you want to give it to me. You’re just afraid of what you don’t know—“

“I’m afraid of you!” I hiss against his mouth.

“Well, you don’t need to be.” He settles into the pillows and pulls me close, wrapping his arms around me, pushing my head down onto his shoulder. “Go to sleep.”

“As if I could.” I snort against his skin, but I’m already relaxing into his warmth. Exhaustion makes my eyelids too heavy to hold open. My mind too foggy to focus on fear or anger or anything but how nice it feels to be held against him.

“I like sleeping with you, too,” he whispers into my hair.

When I wake, it’s to darkness and the demon’s deep breathing. He’s curled warmly against my back, his arm around my waist, and it’s the pressure of his arm on my very full bladder that’s woken me.

I shift uncomfortably. I really need to pee. But I’m afraid of waking him. If I wake him and he’s still a stranger, will he let me go, or heed the goddamn wall and leave me for the rest of the night trying desperately not to wet the bed?

I shift again. I seriously need to pee. I should be dehydrated from dancing but my bladder somehow missed that message. God, I need to pee. I reach out and pick up his arm very gingerly and begin to slide out from under it.

That’s when I realize that my hands are free.

I stare at my wrists for a moment. In the faint light from the street, I can see dark marks where the cords cut into my skin. But the cords themselves are gone. I strain my head back to see the headboard. Nothing there. Maybe he ate them after he untied me.

I relish my freedom for a moment, rubbing my wrists, before turning back to more pressing business. I slither out from under the demon’s arm and bolt for the bathroom.

While I’m washing my hands afterward, I notice the strangeness. An odd sensation around my wrists. A spiderweb sense of constriction. I rub my wrists but there’s nothing under my fingers except skin.

I reach for a towel and, glancing up, meet the ghostly blue flames of the demon’s eyes in the mirror. “Hey,” he says.

I start. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“S’okay.” He leans against the door jam and watches