Caspian managed to rub his two brain cells together and figure out what I was doing. He leaned down, pressing his forehead to hers.How freaking romantic.
“You’re a little warm,” he said. Ava pressed her hands to her cheeks but that must have reminded her of the body’smissingcheeks because she looked back at it silently.
“Don’t look at it,” Caspian said, reaching up to turn her face back to him. I smacked his hand away before he could. If she wanted to look, she could look. She was a grown woman and didn’t need to be infantilized. I got the feeling he was used to hiding things from her, trying to protect herdelicate sensibilities.
Yet he was fine enough fucking her all over the forest. Not that I minded. The possessive, exhibitionist seemed to enjoy me watching as much as I did.
“What the hell?” He growled at me. I put my hands on my hips and widened my stance, throwing my shoulders back at the same time. I glared down at him, trying to look threatening and no-nonsense. My hand moved down and patted my big gun through my coat, hoping he didn’t remember it was out of bullets.
“Are you posturing?” Caspian asked in distaste. He looked at the top of my head and snorted. “You don’t look very threatening with stupid feathers on your head. They're cute,” he said in a patronizing way. What a mouthy little fucker. Mystupid feathersstraightened towards the ceiling of the cave, stretching out. I could sense more with mystupid feathersthan he could with all of his senses.
If this was any other day I’d probably just laugh at him but I was irked and anxious.
“Fuck you,” I growled in his head. Caspian’s lips peeled back from his blunt, human teeth as he winced in pain. Ava shot a worried look between us.
“Thomas!” Brandon called out, startling me. I jumped a little and looked over at him calling out into the dark tunnel. He held up the lantern higher. The ragged rocks beside us glowed with flickering light.
I had to get used to being around others again. I was so used to running at the first sound of humans that I kept startling. I'd been alone for too long.
“I’m here! You must be close!” The climber called back. I rolled my eyes.Yeah, sure buddy, wemustbe close.Brandon swallowed and didn’t respond, instead, he turned back and looked at the dead body.
“Is there another obvious way in these caves? Could he have taken another route?” He asked quietly. This place was huge. There was likely another entrance somewhere but none that I noticed humans using. I shook my head. “So that means he walked past this body,” Brandon said, his eyes sweeping over us for reaction.
Ava looked up at him, her eyes widening.
“Why haven’t we found him yet?” Ava whispered. “He still sounds close but he never is. It’s always farther.”
The dead body began to move. Of course it did. At this point, I’d be more surprised if everything went according to plan.
Ava reared back in shock, gasping. She lost her balance and fell over, catching herself on her hurt hand and yelping in pain. She rolled on her side as a cold sweat broke out over her face. I nearly swallowed my tongue at her cry of pain.
Caspian flung himself towards her first so I decided to keep an eye on the body, stepping in front of them both. Brandon shuffled back, eyes wide but held up the lantern so we could see. The only place moving was under the shirt, near the stomach.
I grimaced, thinking I knew what was going on. I turned to look at the rest of them but they didn’t have a clue. They were watching the body like it would jump up and ask for a cigarette before biting into their face.
Brandon jerked forward suddenly. He gripped the body's shirt but as he began to tug it up, a shower of well-fed maggots shook loose. He reared back, barking out a sound of shock.
Well, that was fun.
I went next to Ava and Caspian, bending down to check on her. How sick was she? All I knew was her aura looked horrible and that her splinter was a curse. An unnatural illness. I could see it—a brown cloud surrounding her hand. It had been barely noticeable before but now it was growing. What the hell was I supposed to do about that?
“I’m fine,” she said. “We just need to find the climber. We’ve come too far now. It can’t be much farther.” I huffed and reached inside my jacket for my journal. Everyone suddenly got quiet like it was a big deal. I eyed them staring at me in awe as I dug around for my pen.
“You must know so much,” Ava mumbled. Caspian snorted in response and she turned to him. “He has to be wise. He’s been around so long.” Caspian gave her a disbelieving look. I straightened my shoulders a little. She thought I was wise. I liked that. I was her big, mysterious Mothman. I winked an eye at her as I flipped open my notebook.
“What the fuck!” Caspian barked out. I looked down and saw I was on a drawing of Ava, naked and hovering over my lap. Her legs were spread wide and she was descending towards my knobby cock. I jerked my attention back up and saw her staring at it with her eyes bugging.
Whoops. I flipped the page quickly. It was another sex act with her. Fuck. I flipped again… and again… and—
FUCK, how many drawings had I made! I began frantically flipping through more and more pages, everyone getting tenser and tenser until finally, I landed on a blank one. I gave an awkward cough as I smoothed out the page and began writing.
“That was disturbing,” Brandon said, thrusting his finger towards my journal. I sighed in annoyance.
“There’s a curse inside Ava,” I scrawled over the page. I showed them what I wrote and then pointed at the splinter. Ava didn’t look all that surprised. She probably had already sensed something was strange and wrong about the wound. Caspian looked hesitant to believe me and Brandon looked like he thought I was insane. Brandon sighed and stomped off a few feet down the cave, trying to look ahead.
“The haunted house in Williamsburg,” Ava started.
“That’s where you got the splinter?” Caspian asked her. That didn’t sound good. She nodded then looked back at me as if I had all the answers in the world. Unfortunately, I didn’t.
