I yanked my arm free and stumbled a few steps away from him. The unimpressed look on his face stung something fierce.
“You can’t even stand,” he said in a disapproving tone.
“I said put me down, not drop me like a freaking potato sack!” I exclaimed, outraged. “So of course, I almost fell again.”
I swiftly grabbed the towel on the floor and wrapped it around me as I took a couple more steps back. Although my mind kept telling me to run the hell out of here, the initial terrified panic had subsided. If he wanted to eat me and use my bones as toothpicks, he would have already done so by now. But he immediately complied when I asked him to put me down. So maybe he wasn’t all that bad?
He pursed his lips with clear disappointment as he stared at the towel.
“What a pity to obstruct such a nice view,” he said in that same disapproving tone.
“What the fuck?!” I whispered incomplete disbelief. “Who are you? And what the hell are you?”
“I am Vazul, and I am your Liderc.”
“You’re my what, now?” I asked, stunned.
“Your Liderc,” he repeated with a frown as if wondering if I was hearing impaired.
“What the heck is aleedurts?” I asked, even more confused.
To my shock, my question seemed to genuinely offend him.
“It’s Liderc, notleedurts. And you should know. You hatched me,” he said, sounding annoyed.
“I did no such thing!” I exclaimed. “Your egg started cracking all over the place, scaring the bejeezus out of me. I mean, fine, I did drop it. But it was already almost open. I justbrought my ex-roommate’s weird stone-egg-thingy home and put it in a bowl.”
“You held me under your armpit for a couple of hours,” he countered, crossing his muscular arms over his broad chest in a defying fashion.
“Well, yeah…” I replied hesitantly while adjusting the towel a bit more securely around me. “I had to carry you out of our old place, and all my bags were full. It was the only spot left for me to carry you. I mean, what else was I supposed to do? Stick your egg into my vagina?”
Far from being offended by my increasingly aggravated pitch the more I spoke, Vazul seemed amused and also quite dubious. He pursed his lips and appeared to give my last comment a serious thought.
“Sheltering my egg inside your vagina is quite an interesting thought. Sadly, that wouldn’t have allowed you to summon me. A Liderc must be held under your armpit in order to hatch.”
“What the hell kind of crazy shit is this?!” I exclaimed, flabbergasted.
“Don’t play coy,” Vazul replied, this time appearing to be losing patience with what he clearly seemed to think was me pretending ignorance. “No one holds a black egg under their armpit for hours just for fun. There’s nothing wrong with wanting your own sex demon and obedient servant. Why are you playing these games?”
“A sex demon?!” I exclaimed, taking another involuntary step backward. “Whoa! Are you an incubus?!”
He huffed and glared at me as if I had said something offensive. “I’m far superior to an incubus. As I’ve said multiple times now, I am a Liderc.”
“And what the hell is that?” I insisted, also starting to get irritated.
He opened his mouth to answer only to be interrupted by the sound of my phone ringing. Startled, I yelped and pressed mypalm to my chest. I wasn’t normally this jumpy, but there was nothing normal about my current situation.
And yet, that ring was the biggest blessing. It was Sophia’s ringtone. If anyone could help guide me with this current mess, it was her.
“Stay put!” I ordered while pointing a menacing finger at Vazul. “Don’t do anything demonic while I answer my call. Just stay right where you are.”
He gave me that unimpressed look again as I slowly backed away before running up the stairs to grab my phone. The whole time, I kept glancing over my shoulder, relieved that he obediently stayed right in front of the door, his red eyes never straying from me.
Chapter 2
Coral
Inearly broke my neck dashing into the bathroom to retrieve my phone before I missed the call. I answered and made a beeline for my closet to pull out some clothes.
