“No.No!” I furrow my brows. “I’m just confused about who you are. Nightwalkers aren’t like this.” I gesture to the dead nightwalker on the floor. “Thisis what I know…”
The shadows surrounding the nightwalker still at my words, the aura unsettling. “Fables carry a grain of truth. Nightwalkers who dwell topside are far more perilous than those from the Undercity.” The shadows tremble. “We uphold order and consent to ensure this world flourishes.”
The Undercity.Jax was right. This nightwalker must work for Serun.
Silence sits heavily between us. My breaths are shallow, while he takes none. The fabric wrapped around me rustles as I move, but the shadows are soundless.
“I’ll ask you once more: may I bite you to uncover your truth? It won’t be painful, and I won’t take more than you can handle. All I’m doing is tasting your past.”
My…past? He will see everything. He will know?—
“I know, kamai. I have already seen what you fear to reveal—Your fangs, that is. You are, strangely, a part of us, and I would like to know how that came to be, if you will let me.”
My frown deepens, and I curl my lip inward to hide my fangs. “My mum told me never to trust nightwalkers.”
“Even yourself?”
An aching flutter stirs in my chest at the memory of the way my mum looked at me, like I didn’t belong. As though I never came from her womb but was somethingshe found and wished she had killed before I grew intothis.
“I won’t tell anyone of our encounter if that is why you’re hesitating. You are a…curiosity.”
For some reason, I believe he speaks the truth, but is it because he’s a true nightwalker with the power to make me feel this way? An enchantment. An allure.
“What do you mean by a curiosity?”
“I haven’t seen someone like you before…Someone balancing between life and death.”
He hasn’t seen a half-nightwalker, half-human before? That can’t be true. I can’t be the only one in Naylen.
“You are wrong,” I whisper.
“Am I?”
My fingers tighten around the sheet, and I stare down at the blood seeping on the ground. “Do you see everything if you bite me? All of my memories, even the ones I can’t remember?”
“I see what you have seen.”
This could give me the answers I need. There might be something I’ve seen that I don’t remember now. Who my dad is, maybe.
“Not a drop more than I can spare,” I say, loosening my grip on the silken sheet to bare my shoulders.
“Understood,” he says. “Close your eyes if you don’t want to be tempted. Some humans become overwhelmed with desire, and it’s…a nuisance…to handle.”
I almost laugh. After the nightwalker before him, I doubt this very much.
The shadow moves, and as it does, I scrunch my eyesshut. My heartbeat thuds in a chaotic rhythm, and there is a ringing in my ear that almost hurts.
“I’m going to touch you now,” he whispers, the words icy against the shell of my ear. “But only my bite. Expose your neck for me and remain still. Movement will drive my fangs deeper and can tear the skin.”
“Alright…” I tilt my head to the side, exposing the shoulder partly inked with moonflowers.
Then it is as though time comes to a complete halt. Each moment seems like an eternity spent waiting for something to happen, and every breath feels like a thousand in this liminal space.
A sharp prick of pain pierces my neck. It’s like a shard of ice pressing inside me, sinking through my skin and muscle, the venom weaving into my bones. The ache is as painful as it is blissful, and a deep craving settles in my chest, yearning for more of this divine suffering.
My eyes fly open at the intensity of the sensation, and I take a deep breath, reflexively arching my back, only to feel his hands grip my shoulders firmly. Cold fingers tighten, but unlike the nightwalker earlier, this touch is tender and soft.
Shadows surround me, swirling in a rhythmic pattern like ribbons woven from twilight. White ribbons seem to bleed from my exposed flesh and join the dance, entwining with the darkness and sprouting moonflowers. A black snake slithers between the blooms as they spin an intricate design of beautiful fear.
