“Whatever you are, get out of my goddamn head,” Isaac snarled.
The door opened, revealing darkness beyond. Danny stepped through without looking back, and Isaac was left alone in an apartment that had stopped feeling real the moment he’d arrived. Yet, the walls breathed around him, expanding and contracting like living things. The floor beneath his feet felt unstable, tilting at angles that shouldn’t be possible.
His father’s voice echoed from somewhere Isaac couldn’t see. “Worthless. Always were, always will be.”
The apartment dissolved, walls melting into shadows that reached for him with fingers that felt like ice. Isaac tried to run, but his legs wouldn’t cooperate, feet rooted to a floor that was no longer there. Falling… He was falling through darkness that had no bottom, and every fear he’d ever harbored whispered in his ears with voices that sounded like everyone he’d ever known.
Alone. You’ll always be alone. No one stays. No one cares. You’re not worth the effort.
The darkness pressed in from all sides. Isaac couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t do anything except fall through an endless void while voices taunted him with every failure and shortcoming and reason why he didn’t deserve to be loved.
Then there was suddenly stone beneath him. Cold and solid and real in a way nothing else had been. Isaac’s cheek pressed against the rough surface, his body sprawled across a floor. An actual floor, not the dissolving nightmare he’d been trapped in moments ago.
“Isaac.” Whichello’s voice cut through the fog in his head, the deep timbre grounding and familiar. “Isaac, look at me.”
Every movement felt like wading through syrup. Whichello’s face came into focus slowly, those gray eyes wide with something Isaac had never seen there before. Fear. Actual terror etched into features that usually held nothing but control.
Not real. The apartment. Danny’s cruel words. None of it had been real. Isaac’s breath shuddered out in a rush, and the tears he’d been holding back finally spilled over. His body started shaking, tremors running through muscles that felt like they’d been wrung out and left to dry.
Whichello pulled him up and into strong arms, one hand cradling the back of Isaac’s head while the other wrapped around his back. The embrace was solid, real in a way nothing else had been since he’d heard that click and seen the wall panel open.
“I’ve got you, little panda.” There was a roughness to Whichello’s voice, a quiet weight that made the air seem heavier.
Isaac fisted Whichello’s shirt, holding on with strength he didn’t know he still possessed. His face pressed against the demon’s shoulder, breathing in a scent that grounded him in ways no words could. Cedar and winter and something uniquely Whichello that made Isaac cling harder.
The tears kept coming despite his attempts to stop them. Those had been his fears, the ones he kept buried deep where they couldn’t hurt him. But hearing them in Danny’s voice, seeing them reflected in his best friend’s eyes, made them impossible to ignore.
“The castle tried to eat me,” he said against Whichello’s shoulder. “I’m pretty sure we’re not going to be besties.” Isaac was still shaken to his core.
“You’re moving into my room until Dimitri is found and this nightmare is over.” Whichello kept moving. “Not debatable.”
Isaac wasn’t going to argue. Not when fake-Danny’s cruel words still echoed in his ears. Not when Whichello’s arms made him feel safe, regardless of what the castle tried to convince him of. He’d thought the place was haunted, but now he knew the truth.
Annunziata Castle was sentient and contained malevolent passages Isaac had been lucky to survive.
Chapter Eight
Reality TV was going to be the actual cause of Isaac’s death. Not the reality TV itself, though the fake drama between contestants made his eyes want to roll out of his skull. No, it was Whichello’s running commentary that was going to do him in.
“I could start a fire faster than that,” Whichello said, gesturing at the screen where some sunburned contestant struggled with flint and steel. “Without any tools. In a rainstorm.”
Isaac tried to shift on the couch, angling for a better view around Whichello’s broad shoulder, but the demon’s arm stayed draped over him like a weighted restraint. The leather couch creaked under their combined weight, worn soft from what must have been centuries of use.
“You know these people are regular humans, right?” Isaac pointed out, watching the contestant finally produce a spark that caught on dry grass. “They don’t have demonic powers or fourteen hundred years of survival experience.”
“Which is exactly my point.” Whichello’s fingers traced lazy patterns on Isaac’s shoulder, the touch casual but grounding. “If I were dropped in the middle of nowhere with nothing but the clothes on my back, I’d have shelter and food within an hour.”
“Congratulations on being an overachieving demon.” Isaac reached for the remote on the side table, trying to turn up the volume over Whichello’s critiques. “Some of us mere mortals have to struggle with basic survival skills.”
The contestant on screen had moved on to building a shelter, lashing together branches with strips of bark. Whichello made a derisive sound low in his throat.
“That’s not gonna hold up,” he said, leaning forward slightly. Isaac tried to use the momentum to slip out from under his arm, but Whichello’s grip tightened, pulling him back against the couch. “See how he’s angling the supports? First strong gust and the whole thing collapses.”
Isaac squirmed, testing the hold. Whichello’s arm might as well have been a steel bar for all the give it had. “You planning on letting me move anytime this century? Or am I just permanently attached to your gargantuan body now?”
Whichello’s mouth curved against the side of Isaac’s throat, warm breath ghosting over skin. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
Then Isaac felt teeth, not breaking skin but grazing with enough pressure to make his protest dissolve into something that wasn’t quite a gasp. Playful nips traced the line of his jaw, punctuated by the soft press of lips that felt too gentle for someone who’d spent centuries perfecting violence.
