Dusk Avenger (Flirting with Monsters #3) - Eva Chase Page 0,75
morning to grab breakfast, Gloam was drooping over the table like a plant that had wilted with too much sun. The downcast nature that consumed him by day made it hard to believe he’d been gleefully discussing favorite mortal desserts with Snap yesterday night.
Antic perched on the counter across from him, holding the new map book Ruse had picked up for her. A vibrant pink sticky note poked from the top of the cover announcing This Way Up. I wasn’t sure trusting her to give directions even with that safeguard was the best idea.
She looked up from the book to stick out her tongue at the night elf. Her skinny legs swung against the cabinets. “I keep telling him he should take that sour face into the shadows where at least we won’t have to look at it.”
Gloam sighed. “I know it isn’t pleasant to observe my dejection. I can remove myself if that’s what you’d all prefer.”
I shot a warning look at Antic and sat down across from him with the muffin I’d picked up. “Don’t be silly. You are the way you are, and if you’d rather stay in physical form, that’s up to you. Anyone who doesn’t like looking at you can just point their eyes in another direction.”
The imp huffed and hopped down from the counter to stand closer to Ruse, who was back on driving duty. “In another, I’d say, ten miles we’re taking an exit south.” She turned the book sideways and then her head sideways to match, which didn’t exactly add to my confidence.
Even with shadowkind drivers who had no need for sleep, we weren’t going to make it to the Golden Gate City until tonight. At least we had our lovely home on wheels to enjoy for the journey. And we hadn’t even stolen it or conned it out of anyone—legitimate rides for the win!
As I bit into the doughy sweetness of my muffin, Gloam raised his head enough to peer at me from beneath his thin eyebrows. “There’s so much more Luna was hiding from me than I ever could have guessed. You came from a human and an ifrit…” He stopped there, just staring, as if the impossibility of it had rendered him mute.
“Hey, no one’s more surprised than me,” I said. “She raised me for thirteen years and never made a peep about me potentially having voodoo skills or anything like that.” Really, a warning would have been nice. What if I’d accidentally set one of my high school teachers up in flames for disparaging my essay-writing attempts or what have you? Not that I was thinking of anyone in particular who might have deserved it…
“I never thought such a thing could have happened. I suppose that just shows how little I truly understand this world.”
I had to restrain myself from rolling my eyes at his insistence in making the insanity of my existence all about his failings. “I’m sure it wasn’t easy. Omen has been around for, like, a thousand years or something and he’s never heard of anyone managing it.”
Somehow my reassurance only turned Gloam gloomier. He looked down at his hands. “They must have wanted you an incredible amount to try so hard to bring you into being. I can’t imagine anyone will ever care that much about my being.”
No wonder Luna had only hung out with this guy during the night. I was starting to rethink my rebuke to Antic. But his comment stirred up a trickle of warmth too, one that spread through my chest as I soaked it in. For the first time since Ellen had texted to say she and the rest of that part of the Fund were out, my nerves completely settled.
“They did,” I said. “Love me a lot. I remember…” My recollections of my parents were vague, but every impression I had of my mother’s face framed by her ruddy hair was beaming with affection. In the note they’d left for me, they’d called me their “treasure.” And Luna had believed in their commitment to each other and to having a child enough to not only help them with their search for a solution but to devote her life to me for more than a decade after their deaths.
So what if I was an impossibility? Yeah, I was a freak of nature who still had a lot of work to do when it came to controlling her hocus pocus. But I’d also been born out of the most immense