Summer Plays Hardball

HAEL

“Ready!” I told Loch as the last piston swelled open and the lock was finally set.

With that, he rotated the massive metal handle and effortfully opened the door of the vault.

The six-factor unlocking process took Loch and me nearly ten minutes to complete, but it was worth it.

I sighed happily as I strode into the vault, taking in the gorgeous pile of gold and gems.

“Mmmm,” I said as I picked up a bar of gold, feeling its weight in my hands. “Nothing beats this feeling.”

“Nothing but sex ~and~ gold,” Loch replied.

“Right you are, brother.”

We shared a knowing smile. We were both thinking about the steamy encounter that had gone down yesterday.

“So…about Maddie,” I said. “She must have been bluffing, right, about stealing from here?”

Loch snorted.

“Brother, are you kidding? Have you gone soft?”

I frowned, not appreciating his condescending tone.

“No, Maddie’s a fuckin’ criminal, man. Don’t you remember? The reason we met is because she stole from Adara.”

I rolled my eyes.

“That was a ~petty crime~. And ~this~ is the strongest, ~best~ vault in all of Requiem City.” I gestured to the black metallic walls around me.

Loch still seemed unsure, so I held out the gold bar to him and he took it. Sometimes just ~holding~ money could make you feel better.

“Nobody can penetrate this,” I reminded him.

Loch sighed as he stared at the gold in his hands. Finally he looked back up at me.

“Not even a mouse?” he asked.

SUMMER

I let myself into the Xander U lab with the key I had convinced Zayda to let me duplicate.

Having it made me feel a little bit better about her staying there alone. A ~little~. Because in truth, the whole thing made me quite uneasy.

Everything about the lab made me nervous. The chipping paint, the failing light bulbs… It was like a horror movie.

Not to mention the literal ~Frankenstein~ living in the laboratory. Or the monster baby.

I paused in the hallway and took a deep breath. I needed to pull myself together before I saw Zayda.

I didn’t come here to judge her. I came to help.

She had enough negativity in her life. The last thing she needed was more from me.

Thor was wailing in his nursery.

~At least he sounds just like any other child,~ I thought to myself.

I continued down the hall, fresh-baked bread and market vegetables swinging from a bag on my shoulder.

On my other arm I held my doctor’s bag, hoping something inside might help Zayda’s situation.

“Zayda!” I called.

She didn’t reply, but I heard the clattering of metal—like she was rushing to hide something.

I peeked into Thor’s room, where the baby was holding on to the bars of his crib, his face red. I raced over and picked him up, bouncing him up and down until his cries gurgled to a stop.

“Let’s go find Mama,” I cooed, touching his little nose as he fluttered his dragon wings.

But as we entered the next room, I immediately knew this was no place for a child.

Xythor was propped up on the bed, looking slightly more cognizant than I had seen him in a week.

He blinked at me and Thor, as if registering our existence. His chest was open and there was a vial of blood inside.

And hanging from Xythor’s arm was a long IV…

The other end had fallen and leaked a small red puddle onto the ground.

Zayda was rushing to hopelessly hide the evidence of her blood magic, a red drop trailing down her own forearm.

“Stop!” I shouted, and Thor began to cry again.

Zayda turned to me with fire in her sunken eyes. She stalked over and ripped the crying child from my arms, then charged out of the room.

“Look what you’ve done,” she shrieked from the nursery, “by coming here unannounced.”

I stood there for a moment, alone in the room with Xythor, feeling deeply sad.

Zayda would never stop the blood magic. The harmful effects on her body I had known all along…but now I worried it had affected her mind too.

It wasn’t worth it to wonder what Zayda saw in Xythor, because I understood that she was not saving the half-alive robot before me.

She couldn’t give up on the man she had fallen for, because if she did, then she would have to face the awful reality of raising a nonhuman child all alone.

She refused to see that Xythor was no longer there…

I walked into the nursery, where Thor was crying in his crib and Zayda had turned away from him, her head in her hands.

I touched her shoulder gently.

“I didn’t need to catch you in the act to know you were still using blood magic.”

She nodded sadly.

“And it has to stop, okay?” I pressed. I knew I had to be harsh with her, but not too harsh.

“I know,” Zayda admitted. “I know it isn’t good for me…or for Thor. I just need it to buy a little more time.”

“Before what, Z? I don’t know if you can afford any more of this.”

“I can,” she countered, her eyes fiery once again. “I just… I can’t let Thor’s father die. I need to do everything I can.”

I reached for her hand.

“Xythor isn’t here anymore, Zayda. You’re preserving his body, but his spirit has been gone for awhile now.”

I waited for my words to sink in. Tears pooled in Zayda’s eyes, and I knew she was taking this to heart.

Though the blood magic, the absence of natural light, and the dismal nature of her condition had clearly affected her state of mind, I knew my friend was still in there.

“I know that,” Zayda said in a small voice. “But there might still be a way.”

“What is it?” I asked.

She stared at me, debating whether or not she should tell me.

“Follow me,” she said finally.

I took off after her as she rushed through the winding maze of halls and lab rooms until she ducked inside an office.

I looked around and saw that Zayda had made the dilapidated space her own.

On the desk stood a small photo of her and Xythor, haphazardly placed on top of another photo from the professor who had worked there.

She had burned fat white candles, and their wax spilled over onto the hardwood.

Zayda opened a drawer and pulled out a leather book, which she immediately hugged tightly to her chest.

She took a deep breath, then held it out to me.

My intuition told me exactly what the volume was, and in that instant, my blood ran cold.

“This,” Zayda said shakily, “is Freesia’s spell book.”

I feared I’d been right about Zayda’s crumbling mind… ~Is she too far gone?~

***

Maddie

Hey orphans

Maddie

Got plans tonight?

Darshan

Orphans -____-

Darshan

No

Harry

Kind of

Maddie

cancel your plans, lover boy

Maddie

because we’re visiting our old haunt

Maddie

Greensward. Meet me there at 9

Maddie

I’ll bring party favors 😏

MADDIE

I pulled up to my old home with a cooler full of beers and a large pizza.

Though I told myself I would never return here, this was just for fun.

And since all the orphans of Requiem City had been relocated to the Dobrzycka country mansion, Greensward was just an old abandoned building.

I quickly picked the lock on the front door with a bobby pin and headed up the stairs to the top floor, and then to the roof.

From our usual spot, I gazed out at the hazy polluted sunset while sipping a cold one and munching on a slice of pizza.

Sure, I had a few things to feel down about. My mates were controlling and yet ~again~, they had underestimated me.

But here I was. Life gave me lemons, and I was going to make some fuckin’ lemonade.

Harry and Darshan arrived and sat down next to me, helping themselves to pizza and beer.

“Dar, has Harry told you the big news?” I asked.

“Um…no. WTF, Harry?” Darshan demanded.

“Oh, yeah… So I’m, like, mated to a dragon too.”

Darshan snorted beer through his nose and proceeded to have a coughing fit.

“We’re all wifed up now!” I shouted as I whacked Darshan’s back, you know, to help him.

“Is that why we’re here?” Darshan asked.

“No. I just missed you guys. Isn’t that enough of a reason to get together in our favorite shithole?”

Harry stared at me blankly.

“Not really. You only buy us beer when you want something.”

I chose to ignore Harry’s stab, and continued on.

“In fact, I do have an ~opportunity~ that I thought you guys might want a piece of.” I smiled deviously.

“I can always smell when Maddie’s hatching a scheme…,” Darshan said.

I leaned in close, keeping my voice low and enticing, sure to appeal to the hustler in each of them…

“What do you guys think about pulling one more heist, for old times’ sake?”

Darshan furrowed his brow and Harry bit his lip. But even though they looked hesitant, I knew the call of adventure had wormed its way into their heads.

“I can’t do it without your help. Because this one is going to be ~big~.”