“I also can’t have people touching them, so wearing clothes that just covers them is easier.”
He’s staring at me but he’s stone still and there’s been no fluctuations in his blood flow or his heartbeat. I have no idea what he’s thinking, but at least he walks over to sit in the chair. It’s directly across from me and his eyes only leave mine for a moment to look at my legs.
“You said can’t,” he finally says. “Not that you don’t want them to, but people can’t touch them. Why? I have never felt pain like that, Mavyn.”
He relaxes into the chair as his eyes come back to meet mine. I’ve always found it interesting how some people will look you straight in the eyes and some people won’t. So many scientific and psychological studies. Then you have the magical aspects, about finding your fated and souls being bound to others. The closest a person can see another person’s soul is through their eyes.
“Did Professor Asier tell you about me coming to him a month ago? Did he say anything at all about the interaction?”
I will not tell him about my menstruating if he doesn’t already know about it, and I shouldn’t be telling him about this but. . .
He shakes his head and I release a breath I had held in for a second longer than normal. Setting my drink between my legs, I lean back and put weight on my hands behind me before look off to the side.
“Well I went to his office to ask if he knew anything about runic magic and curses. I had asked him if he knew how to break a runic curse.”
I should not be telling him this. This guy who I don’t even actually know except for what the basics are and what Jullia has told me. This guy who is so close with the celestials who have nothing more than hatred towards me.
But I want to. Because at the end of the day all anyone ever wants is to be seen. To be known. Acknowledgement is a necessity people forget about. To be forgotten is a fate worse than death, so of course everyone wants to be remembered.
“I lied to Professor Asier and D’etre. I said I was cursed because I had been turned into a vampire, but the truth is that the devil had placed an actual runic curse on me a long time ago. A type of curse where it feels like I’m burning whenever there’s skin on skin contact with my scars. Which,” I look down at my legs, “is everywhere except my feet, hands, and neck.”
I was always surprised when the devil never bit my neck. And either Callahan has learned, or it still hasn’t fully processed with him because he still doesn’t move.
“Feet, hands, and neck,” he repeats slowly. “But what about your face?”
Tension thrums through the room with an electricity to it that sparks like tender touches.
He must be paying better attention to my words then. Understanding that like some of the fae, I speak certain words or leave out select information. As much as possible, I try to not –technically– lie. What people assume or gather or infer is their fault. Instead of paying attention to my words they try to read between the lines to what I’m trying to mean.
I shrug a shoulder and glance away as I try to remember that night. It’s been a long time and so much has happened since then. Bits and pieces and sometimes I don’t even think it’s real.
“The devil placed the rune on my face when he cursed me.” At least one of the runes. The most important one that cemented the curse.
Callahan’s voice is just as calm as it has been. He’s either in complete control right now, or he doesn’t care.
“What about the skin between your scars? Have you ever tried finding a spell or enchantment to make it so no one does touch your scars? If it was possible to place small, individual barriers just over them, that way someone could touch you without touching your scars?”
Keeping my body relaxed and my tone neutral, I answer, “I’ve never tried it. There was never a reason I needed to before.”
That tension thickens in the room and I have to actually try to keep my heart steady and my blood flow even. Yet his stays the same as before. A constant, solid beat from his heart.
Leaning in, he rests his forearms on his knees as his eyes glance down at my legs again. The white scars and bite marks looking exceptionally stark right now.
“Would you want to?” he asks, quieter than he’s spoken before. It makes me shiver and I dig my fingertips into the bed to try and keep myself grounded. It doesn’t do much.
Why?” I whisper.
And when he looks back up at me the full force of his aura hits me. Like there was a shield over it containing what it was. So clear that I can see it perfectly just as much as I can now feel it. Ribbons of transparent black with threads of white and gold lit through them. Wisping threads of stark black flutter around him too, but they’re as thin as actual thread.
So much contradiction, yet so much beauty. And there’s no war with it. The darkness is not trying to devour the light, just as the light isn’t trying to dimmish the dark. They balance each other perfectly, an equal of harmony.
“Because I want to touch you without harming you.”
My mind empties out. For a moment everything is silent.
He says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. Like I should have already known that. Like. . .
I’m saved from responding because the sound of footsteps echo right outside the door before there’s a click and the door opens. Jullia and Asher come in, both of them with worried and conflicted expressions but Jullia smiles at me. That is, of course, before she realizes Callahan is sitting before me.
