Persie Merlin and the Witch Hunters - Bella Forrest Page 0,57
for? You’re the one who brought coffee.”
She chuckled, her laughter catching in her throat. “For listening. I can get a bit ranty when Persie’s having a hard time. I usually scream into a pillow or something, so this is a refreshing change.” Her walls had gone back up.
“My ears are all yours, whenever you need.” I wiggled them backward and forward like a hippo. It was something I’d always been able to do, though I’d discovered as a kid that not all people could, like curling your tongue.
She laughed, as I’d hoped she would. “How are you doing that?”
“A family secret.” I grinned and gestured toward the orbs. “So, what brought you back here? I know you didn’t want to rest, but surely there are more exciting things to do on a Saturday afternoon?”
“After last night’s adventures, I just want peace and quiet,” she replied. “I thought I could help you out. Feeding, taking notes, whatever. Otherwise I’ll get stuck watching reruns of crappy TV shows in my room, and the whole weekend will disappear. It’s my best magic trick.”
I frowned. “No, I think tha would be your invisibility trick. I still haven’t recovered.”
“So a little pixie keeps telling me.” She winked, and my stomach plummeted. It was my job to watch the monsters, but evidently they’d been watching me in return. Oh, the absolute shame of being caught by a trio of naughty pixies.
“It seems like you’re gaining more interest in the monsters.” I glossed over the embarrassing subject, hoping she wouldn’t stick with it.
Thankfully, she nodded. “Between you and Persie, I didn’t have much choice but to learn to like them.” She reached out for her coffee. “I swear I won’t crush it and spill all over your lovely clean floors.”
I handed it back. “Thank you. They might look easy to wipe clean, but it’s a pain in the arse to get stains out.”
“You’re a man of many domestic layers, Nathan O’Hara.” She wandered to the Grendel enclosure, peering down at him. “Why does he look so miserable? Do you think Charlotte secretly beat the crap out of him?”
I joined her by his glass. “Grendels are actually very sensitive creatures. In mythology, they’re described as creatures of darkness who were exiled from happiness, doomed to live a cursed existence as the destroyers and devourers of humankind. But that was actually a mistranslation from the Anglo-Saxon epic—or, rather, a misinterpretation. Either that, or Beowulf used it as an excuse to kill one of them.” I laughed, but Genie looked at me as though I’d grown a second head. That joke usually went over better in literary circles. As such, I quickly carried on. “They’re essentially empaths, and they devour human emotion, not flesh. Not unless they’re particularly peckish.”
This time, she laughed. “I love that word. Peckish. You almost get a British accent when you use colloquialisms.”
“I hope not. My mum would go mad.”
She arched a curious eyebrow. “Why?”
“Well, ‘British’ tends to refer to Great Britain, which is Scotland, England, and Wales. The UK is all of those plus Northern Ireland. Ireland is Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, and the British Isles encompasses all of those places, but don’t call us Republic of Ireland lot British, and never call a Scot English,” I explained. If anyone referred to Marcel as English, he’d have them in a chokehold in two seconds flat. I shrugged. “The make-up of which countries belong to the UK, Great Britain, and the British Isles is… complex, and people can be sensitive about it.”
She grinned. “And I thought Atlantis had problems.”
“Anyway, where was I?” I ran an anxious hand through my hair. “Ah, that’s right. Grendels don’t devour emotions in the sense that they leave nothing behind. They relieve humans of their most painful emotions by taking them into themselves. I imagine that has something to do with this Grendel’s sadness. That, and not being able to get close to Persie,” I explained. “As for the destroyer part, they struck deals in the olden days to protect the borderlands of different regions and settlements, such as Mercia, Northumbria, and Mrazonnia, during the Anglo-Saxon period. I guess that, given their size, they were a good deterrent, even though they’re not natural-born killers. If you’re a pig, you might disagree, though. Grendels like pork.”
She snickered. “Have you got a whole side of pork hidden in your study?”
“I’m afraid it’s just protein cubes.” I gestured to a stack of cardboard boxes stacked at the back of the Repository.