“There are no sides in this,” Kai said.He heard his own voice, barely more than a whisper, and he knew that few enough people would agree with him.He didn’t know what else to say.
“What’s that, Kai?”
Fian cleared his throat.“He said that there are no sides to this, which should be very obvious.And we don’t need anything sweet, thank you.We were leaving.”
“Leaving?”James said before cackling, his nicotine breath heavy on the air between them.
He’s so close.Too close, too fucking close.
“I want to go,” Kai said to Fian.
James had no trouble hearing that.“Go?I told him, cheap pieces of ass are always a problem.You’re not going anywhere.”
With more speed than Kai would have thought possible after that jog, James lunged forward and grabbed his arm.
As if a switch had been flipped, Kai felt cold and dull, the solid ground he’d only just stood on miles and miles away.He’d gotten very drunk once in college, and this was almost like that, only worse.
Fear was with him in this cold dull world.
“Nick wants you back,” Kai heard James saying.
“The barnacle man will not have him!”
Fian’s voice shattered the cold cocoon, and Kai could feel himself again.He could also feel the many tentacles and their suckers that held on to him, comforting in their tightness.
“Fuck me.Nick was right.You are a fucking demon.You’ll make us fuckingstrong.”
The greed in James’s eyes shocked Kai, but maybe it shouldn’t have.“This whole entire town is a sham.All you do is use people.”
James broke into a maniacal laugh, mouth opening wide as if he wanted to devour them.
“Kai, I think we should leave.”Fian had his tentacles out, but what drew Kai’s attention was the red hue of them and the way they looked spiky, almost angry.Almost scared.
“Okay.”
“You’re not going anywhere with what’s mine.”
The two of them spun—Kai tried to, but it wasn’t easy with all the tentacles covering him—to see Nick striding toward them.Green sparks were dancing around his fingers.
Oh, shit.Is that really what magic looks like?
There was no time to ask.Fian moved, running into the street where there was never any traffic and pulling Kai along.
The evil witches were following them.
16
“Wherearewerunning?”Kai asked.
“Away for now and—”
The cars, some of them with dust on their hoods, suddenly came to life, all of them all at once.
Fian slowed and looked around, looked at Kai.“Listen, that’s two witches.I can handle two witches, but I don’t want you to be scared of me.I don’t want you to have to see violent things when you have lived through them.”
The first car pulled into the street and accelerated.The two of them dove back onto the sidewalk, Fian’s tentacles making it so Kai was flying like an actor in a kung fu movie who was being pulled through the air by ropes.Fian himself jump-slithered over the hood and trunk of two cars that had rammed into each other just to close off their escape.
When Fian put him on the sidewalk, Kai huffed.
