The sound of the piano playing, causes my ears to perk up. My feet begin to move, leading me toward her. I stand behind the doorway, watching as her fingertips touch the piano keyboards. Claire takes a deep breath before she stops playing. "Natasha I know you're staring." She says with a small smile on her face. She turns around a bit, her chin touching her shoulder. I stay still, making sure to stand behind the door. "Fine, don't come out, but you know you can't resist me." Claire turns around and continues to play.
I smile, shaking my head before walking up close to her. My arms wrap themselves around her waist and my head rests on her back. "You're right, I can't resist you." I mummer.
She shrugs. "I'm always right. Even when I'm wrong, I'm always right."
"That's not a good logic Claire," I said sitting beside her, on the piano chair. "Only little girls say that."
Claire rolls her eyes. "That's not true."
"Yes, it is."
She stands up, suddenly looking worried. "Can I ask you a question Nat, without you getting mad?"
My brows raise. "Sure. You can always ask me questions." I tell her. "Especially the nasty ones," I say trying to ease up the mood, but her facial expression stays the same. "What is it, Claire? You're starting to freak me out."
Claire bites down on her lips, before turning to the window. The moonlight brightens her features, and for a second I wanted so badly to take a picture. "Do... do you think we'll last?" I frown at her question and she quickly begins to speak again. "I'm just saying I don't see how this is working out. Yes, we're both immortal and love each other, but only one of us can walk out when it's daytime."
"What does that have to do with anything Claire? The same things we do in the dark is the same things we can do when the sun is out. What more could you possibly want?"
Claire fiddles with her finger. "I want to be like you. So we can be just alike."
I frown at her. "You know I can't do that. And even if I could, I wouldn't. It's too dangerous."
She looks up at me with teary eyes. "So you deny me this?" She asks sadly.
"Yes Claire, I deny you this. We've been together for almost two years now, how dare you ask me of this. I've given you everything, yet you still aren't satisfied. It's always something with you, nothing I do satisfies you."
Claire frowns. "That's not true Natasha and you know it. Everything you ask of me to do, I do it. Even if it makes me uncomfortable or scared. So don't act like you're the only one doing things in this relationship, because you're not. Nothing I do ever satisfies you Natasha and you're so full of yourself to see that."
I stand to my feet. "Claire name one thing that you've done for me that's ever made you uncomfortable."
"Agreeing to have kids with you!" She blurts out. "I don't want kids, I hate them and I hate the process of having them. But I agreed to it because it makes you happy and I didn't want to hurt you."
Blood rushes to my ear as I'm having an inner battle with myself. My beast side wants to come out and rip her throat out, but it's taking everything in me to keep it down. I look at her, my blood eyes boring into hers. "Get out!" Claire looks at me for a second, before finally walking out. I sink to the floor, breathing heavily.
I can't believe this was our first fight.
-
"Stop staring, you're scaring the kids." The sound of Torrin's husky voice snaps me out of my daydreaming. He stands beside me, keeping a good distance. "I don't need their parents giving us trouble."
"They're cute little buggers," I whisper, to myself. Children have always been something I wanted, but that's just a dream that'll never come true. Shrugging my shoulders and pretending not to care. "Look, if the kids are freaked out, then that's their problem it's not my fault that my Halloween costume looks so realistic. And if they're parents have a problem with it, then they can go su---."
"Natasha." Torrin cuts me off, yelling my name out in a warning tone. "Control yourself, we're around a bunch of kids." He shakes his head. "And idiot your costume is real."
I smirk at that comment. Torrin was being cheap and didn't want to buy us any costumes, therefore I had to wear my wolf form as a costume. Well, half wolf form, which consists of my face being hairy, glowing red eyes and my canes sticking out. "Oh yeah, I forgot about that. At least my costume looks better than yours." Torrin's custom looks horrible if you ask me. He wasn't wearing a shirt, but he was wearing an all black cape with some black jeans and shoes. His face is covered with a black and white mask. I look at all the mothers drooling at him and fathers shaking their heads. "If anything Torrin, the parents will be giving us trouble because of you."
Torrin looks at the women watching him and rolls his. "Can we get on with this, I just wanna get the stone and go." He says, glaring at everyone.
"Alright, alright. Let's go." We begin walking, watching as the kids begin knocking on doors and ask for candy. It's been two weeks since the fire on Zulford, and I'm still currently healing. If it wasn't for the blood binding from Torrin, I'd still be in bed. Right now we are in the town Dewharbor, looking for the Envy stone. The people in this town seem so nice, so it confuses me why the stone would be hidden here. "When we find the stone, can I go trick or treating afterward?" I ask Torrin. I like a lot of holidays, but Halloween is what I look forward to the most. If I was at home right now, Yiska and Raine would most likely be helping me throw a party.
The candy wrappers blow over the leaf-strewn sidewalk and Torrin turns my way. "No. After we find the stone we're getting in the car and driving away to find the next stone." He says sternly.
I glare at him. "You're no fun," I mumble. The smell of pumpkin pie wafts throughout the street. My face scrunched up, seeing groups of teenager's in their costume. They look great, which sucks because my costume is the only one that's supposed to look out of this world. Literally. There are darkly brooding vampires cloaked in black, fangs oozing with blood. Brain devouring zombies that moan and grope. Some girl is dressed as Little Dead Riding Hood and stalks with a carving knife.
They see me and Torrin and begin walking towards us. "Hey, nice costumes. Where'd you get it?" The girl dressed as Little Dead Riding Hood asks. Her eyes are on Torrin's bare chest.
"We made them," I say, causing her eyes to finally snap to me. She backs up a bit and blushes, looking at my face.
"That's cool. Maybe you can make my costume for the next year." One of the guys dressed as vampires say.
"Not happening," Torrin says, before grabbing a hold of my arm and pulls me away.
"Wait." Little red yells, running after us. Torrin stops walking and we look back at the little girl. She sticks her hands out, holding a piece of paper. "Here, just in case you ever wanna talk." The girl says. I smirk expecting Torrin to turn her down, but to my surprise, he lifts his hand up to take it.
"Adolebitque." I chant lowly. Before Torrin can take the paper from the girl, it catches on fire. The girl scream, quickly dropping the paper on the ground. Everyone looks at the paper with wide eyes, speechless. "Woah, that was so creepy," I say, smirking to myself. "Someone surely didn't want you giving him that paper. Maybe it's isn't meant to be." The girl says nothing, still shocked at what just happen. Grabbing a hold of Torrin's cape, we turn and walk away.
Torrin takes off his mask, once we're a few feet away. "Did you seriously have to do that?" He asks, referring to the burning note.
I turn to him and frown. "Do what Torrin?" I ask, pretending to be clueless. "I didn't do anything."
"You're a bad liar Natasha and it doesn't take a fool to notice that," Torrin says. He pulls out the map from his pocket and opens it. "Come on, the stone is this way." I sigh as we continue to walk in silence. As we walk past a dark house, the air fills with shrieks and the sounds of chains. Then from the open garage comes a stooped figure that drags one leg. He drags something behind him. A corpse. "Come if you dare," He says in a voice that suggests he smokes fifty a day.
I smile watching the little children hesitate before they, go up and get their candy. I feel eyes on me and bite my lips already knowing who the eyes belong to. "What is it Scarface?" I ask, looking at the tall thick grass.
"You like kids." He states. "Why don't you just have some?" Torrin ask.
"That's a personal question scarface. I don't do personal questions, especially when I don't know anything useful about that person."
Torrin only hums. "You wanna know what that sounds like Natasha?"
I look up at him. "What does it sound like Torrin?"
Torrin looks me dead in the eyes. "It sounds like a personal problem." He tells me. I glare at him and watches as he smirks. Shrugging his shoulders at me, Torrin licks his lips. "You're the one that wanted to know."
I flick him off, before snatching the map from his hands. "Where the hell are we going?" I turn the map in different angles trying to read it, but I couldn't. "How the hell do you read this thing?
He snatches the map away from me. "You have to be from the heavens to read it."
"But you've been kicked out the heavens, how are you still able to read it?"
Torrin glares at me. "It doesn't matter, I can still do every I use to do as a regular angel. Everything is still the same, except for the color of my wings." He looks down for a second. "That and some other things." He mumbles to himself, but I heard it.
"What do you mean by other things?" I ask. "You piss differently or something?"
Torrin pinches the bridge of his nose, sighing. "You're a useless bitch."
I glare at him. "I'm gonna need you to quit with this bitch word. I'd hate for my feet to get stuck in your ass." I threaten him. "It'll really be a hard time taking it out."
"Your foot wouldn't even make it in my ass darling." He says, his accent coming out. "I'd punch you in the face before you'd even decide to do it."
Glancing at him, I only shake my head. "Whatever Torrin, that's why you're accent is fake." Torrin looks like he's about to say something, but he pauses. His eyebrows lifting up in confusion. "What are you looking at?" My eyes find his line of vision and I back away. "Oh hell no, I'm not going in there!" I screech. "The stone better not be in there."
"It is," Torrin says, as we look up at the big sign on the gate doors. The sign is written in cursive, with a big white font that reads, "Dewharbor Cemetery." Torrin reaches into his bag, pulling out two flashlights. He passes one to me, but I shake my head rapidly. Torrin looks at me annoyed. "You're a freakin hybrid. For God sakes, man up!"
"It's easy for you to say, you don't have to deal with the evil souls of the dead!" I yell at him. "The good souls, they leave and go to heaven, but the evil ones they stay and do a lot of damage. Do you know what's it like to have visions of how someone died? It's fuckin terrifying, but I have to deal with it because it comes with the job."
Torrin narrows his eyes at me. "I didn't ask for a speech!" He yells. "Now come on, let's go." He grabs my hands and opens the gate, walking in with me. When the gate opens it is with an announcing creak. The hair on my body stands up. We walk past the cold stones, each marking a dwelling place in which no-one is home. The cemetery is cold and the grass is wet. The other mourners are a little way off yet as we round the top of the hill.
Torrin comes to an abrupt stop, looking down at a gravestone. "W... why'd we stop here?" I ask nervously.
"According to the map, the stone is buried with the person who found it." Torrin states. "William B. Madison,"
My eyes widen. "Torrin, I'm black. Black people don't do digging, especially when it involves the dead." I say, meaning each word. "Isn't there some other way we can get the stone out. Wait, how do we even know if the stone is really down there?"
"No there isn't any other way, don't you think I'd know if there was. And the stone has to be here, the map wouldn't lie." Torrin stops speaking for a moment and quickly backs away.
"You hear that?" We both ask at the same time.
I nod my head, looking in the direction the noise is coming from. "It sounds like a horse." The thundering of hooves split the silence as a lone stallion gallows through the cemetery, something dark riding on it's back. "What the hell is that?" I ask, trying to get a good look. The horse runs towards us, causing me and Torrin to quickly duck down into the dirt.
Turning my head to the side to get a better look, Torrin pulls at my hand. "I know what it is." Torrin whispers. "It's the headless horseman."
"The headless horseman?" I repeat. "What kind of name is that? Matter of fact, how do we get rid of it?"
"We can't," Torrin says, with all seriousness. "It's Halloween, which means we can't get rid of him. He stays until it's morning, cutting off the heads of the people who's done him wrong." I try rising to my feet, but Torrin pulls me down. "Just because you've never done him wrong, doesn't mean he won't cut off your head. He's very unpredictable, so it's in our best interest to stay down."
"Why am I just hearing about this creature?"
"It's not a creature, it's a ghost. The ghost of a Hessian trooper who had his head blown off by a cannonball during the Revolutionary War. He was buried in a graveyard outside an Old Dutch Church of a town called Sleepy Hollow." Torrin informs. "Thereafter he appears as a ghost, who presents to nightly travelers an actual danger (rather than the largely harmless fright produced by the majority of ghosts), presumably of decapitation. He carries his own head on his horse and uses it as a weapon, though he also carries a sword."
Breathing heavily, I close my eyes for a second. "A threat is coming they say. Find the stone's they say. You're the only one powerful enough to use it, they say." I mock. "Why the hell didn't the Gods come and do this themselves!?"
"Calm down, now's not a time to go on a rant!" Torrin snaps.
"Fuck you!" I snap back. "I'm lying on the cold grass, my freaking head hurts and quite frankly I'm tired of looking for stone's." Throwing my hands up, I stand to my feet. "I don't get paid enough for this shit! You know what? I don't get paid at all!"
"Natasha," Torrin calls.
"No, don't Natasha me. I'm tired and all I want to do is sleep!"
"Natasha," Torrin calls again, this time sounding annoyed.
"Shut up Torrin, I'm venting right now. Let me vent." I pause for a second, before letting out a sigh in realization. "He's behind me isn't he?" I ask, pointing behind me.
Torrin nods. "Yes, Natasha." Pinching the bridge of my nose, I slowly turn around facing the dark ghost and horse before me.
"Shit..."