Ember chuckled as she wandered toward the jewelry. “He always makes the best costumes.”
Clenching his teeth, Nyte followed her, but he couldn’t quite make out what Maggie was saying through the cellphone even from immediately behind Ember.
She didn’t seem to notice his nearness. All her focus was on her conversation with her friend.
With a growl, he dematerialized and reformed himself directly in front of her.
Ember gasped, stopping abruptly as her eyes widened. “Nyte!”
“Who is Levi?”
She lowered the cellphone to her stomach and pressed it there. “He’s Maggie’s husband.” Smiling, she brushed aside the locks of hair that had fallen over Nyte’s forehead, her fingertips grazing the base of his horn. “He’s taken. Don’t worry.”
A calm settled over him at her touch, which soothed him even more than her words. He recalled one of the pictures in the box Ember had unpacked in her living room a couple days ago, when he’d helped her hang some of the images. Maggie’s wedding picture. The man beside the bride must’ve been this Levi.
Ember returned the phone to her ear. “Sorry. A friend was asking about Levi.” There was a pause as Maggie spoke before Ember chuckled. “Yes, it’s a guy. Can you meet him? Uh…”
Her eyes flicked to Nyte’s before she combed her fingers through her hair. “Maybe? He’s pretty busy… Oh! He also usually works nights. What does he do? He, um… He’s a bodyguard.”
Ember squeezed her eyes shut and pinched the bridge of her nose as she grimaced.
My little witch is lying for me.
And it’s adorable.
He grinned as he stepped away to lean his shoulder against the wall, watching Ember resume tidying the shop. Perhaps she wasn’t quite lying; Nyte had been there to defend her from the dangerous pizza delivery man, after all. And he’d caught her when she’d fallen off a stepstool yesterday. Knowing how fragile mortals could be, he’d likely spared her serious injury.
His grin died as those thoughts reminded him of something she’d said during their slumber party four days ago.
There’s only so much we mortals can do to keep our skin looking youthful before the inevitable.
Nyte was neither so foolish nor so disconnected from her kind to believethe inevitablereferred to anything but death. His mind had returned to those words repeatedly in the time since she’d spoken them. For her, it had been an offhand remark, a mild jest.
But what she’d said had forced him to face a difficult truth. There would come a time—very soon by his perception—when Ember was simply…no more. The moon cycle for which he was bound to her was but a single drop of rain during a torrential storm. It would pass, and he would endure while she grew old and died.
And then he would exist in a world that no longer had Ember in it.
That shouldn’t have bothered him. Mortals died every moment of every day. That was their lot, that was the naturalterminus of their lives. But the thought of it happening to his witch left Nyte unsettled, left his chest tight and his heart frigid.
Despite everything, he was enjoying his time with her. He’d enjoyed the self-pampering night, enjoyed cooking and eating with her, enjoyed walking with her, talking with her, watching movies together, watching her sleep. He’d even taken pleasure in the quiet moments they’d spent together, when she’d read a book beside him while he continued learning about her world on the laptop.
He was enjoying…everythingwith her.
It seemed a heinous injustice that one day, she’d simply run out of time. That she’d be gone and beyond his reach.
The door opened, and raucous laughter filled the store as a group of five men entered. They appeared to be around the same age as Ember, and all of them were dressed in casual wear.
Nyte had seen many people of varied appearances visit this establishment. Ember had called them tourists—people who’d traveled to visit Salem, see the sights, and browse the shops. Most had been friendly, a few had been a bit careless in their handling of the goods but ultimately harmless, and only a couple had been rude. But there was something about these men and their demeanors that set Nyte on edge.
From what he’d seen over his long years of watching, human males, especially the younger ones, were more likely to be emboldened and antagonistic when they gathered in groups.
A blond man with a red hoodie picked up a handbag that was shaped like a coffin. “Yo, look at this!” He held it up and bared his flat teeth with a hiss, causing the others to laugh.
“This shit is so tacky,” one of the other men said.
Rather than return the bag to its place, the blond mantossed it onto one of the lower tables where bottles of perfume were on display, knocking them out of alignment.
“I have visitors, so I’ll talk to you later, Maggie,” Ember said, her eyes on the men. “Love you too. Bye bye.”
