Nightmare

HAZEL

What time is it? I can barely tell anymore. Maybe I had been drinking, but I can’t remember.

I feel a little euphoric as the cab opens outside the casino, and I run through the rain to make it into the front doors. I can’t wait to get lost in the lights.

I show my ID and head straight to the nearest bar, overlooking all the gamblers.

“Hey, pretty lady, you’re new.” A male bartender approaches to serve me. “What’s your name?”

“Hazel,” I answer politely, swinging side to side on my stool. I hold out my hand and fancy jewelry slips through my fingers onto the bar top—a bribe for information/

“Any cocktail with the word magic. Or anything full of spells and curses.” As I make my request, the young man loses his smile, looking me up and down, he refuses to take my offer.

“Sweety.” He speaks with concern.

“You look cursed to me—I recognize those shifty eyes. I’m trained as a mage. I can’t serve you, but you need to see a mage who can help you, pronto. I’m not that person.

“Do you want me to give you a number?” he asks. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“I’m not cursed,” I reply, narrowing my eyes. “You must be crazy.”

“If I were to believe you were anything but cursed, then yeah, I’d be crazy. I’m sorry, I can’t serve you alcohol like this—”

“I don’t need it to have fun, where is the nearest club, no lights so people don’t judge my tipsy stare,” I demand. “You don’t understand everything I’ve been through. I’m ~not~ cursed. I’m just—”

~Fucked up.~

My bartender polishes a glass, considering my request. “If you go up a few levels, you’ll find a boutique club for high rollers.”

He reaches into his uniform and pulls out a card and flicks it at me. “You can only get in with an invitation. I’m sending you up—because there you’ll find cocktails ~with magic~.” He raises a sympathetic brow.

I stand up, accepting the invitation.

I head to the nearest elevator, doors already open with a small crowd. I power walk over and slip in just before the doors shut, and I press for level three.

Up.

And up.

Level three is soon my way forward. I walk out into the exclusive boutique club, flashing my invitation to security.

I note the exclusive space is Club Emerald. It’s mostly empty because I’m so early, but there is one full table with a famous-looking trio.

Hael and Loch of Req Enterprise. And Madeline, their girlfriend. They’re discussing their rich lives over wine.

A sparse few others roam, staff and a couple of businessmen and women, waiting at their private booths.

This wasn’t just invitation only; this was executive in my opinion.

There is one booth, reserved.

The man sitting in it all alone is smoking a cigar like a gangster.

I blink. Wait. The handsome giant has distinct crimson eyes—he is very famous.

A very famous fighter, that is. Rex the “Blood King.”

The moment I lay eyes on him, I snap out of my trance.

I look down at my outfit, almost as if I’m seeing it for the first time. I had put on black thigh-high boots. A silver dress.

The nearest mirror of the polished walls shows my strange makeup. I painted on charcoal eyes so dark I smeared the makeup all over my forehead in some kind of tribal way.

It looks okay. A bit odd, but still.

When I look back to Rex, he is just looking at me…almost like he is waiting for me.

I’m a little unsettled by the clarity I now feel.

I stare boldly back at Rex, who is equally as bold. He knows—or assumes—that I’m about to approach.

“Don’t be shy.” A waitress appears right next to me, offering me a glass of champagne, “You have the invitation in your hand.” She lightly lifts my palm for me.

For the first time, I can read the card.

It’s an invitation with bloody ink, a genuine curse is written in the characters of madness within magic.

It’s the stuff I was writing on the walls. I had studied the language. When I lower the card and look to Rex again, this time he is patting his lap.

The audacity of this guy.

I finally approach him, standing at the edge of his booth without sitting, I ask him directly, “Are you some kind of mage ~and~ a fighter?”

“I’m just wicked…but I guess you could call me a Dragon by nature.” Rex’s voice is much deeper than I expect.

If I could lean in to hear that growl a little clearer, I would—but I am wary of his larger-than-life presence, while simultaneously waiting for me in the darkness of this booth.

There was something wrong with this situation.

“What kind of Dragon are you?” I ask.

“Dead,” Rex answers, cryptic and cold. “Sit with me, sweetheart.”

“~Sweetheart?~ Or what?” I ask. “What do you ~want~ from me?”

“I have a peculiar appetite,” Rex explains openly. “I don’t really mind if you run.”

E-excuse me?

“I heard strange things happen to mortals who enter this city—I am not a victim.” I shake my head, ready to scream for help if I need to.

“Not yet.” Rex talks so quietly, I can barely hear. I find myself sliding just a ~little~ into the seat opposite him. I have an ulterior motive.

“Excuse me, if you don’t mind me explaining—I just lost my husband, ~so go fuck yourself~.”

“I know,” Rex answers too calmly.

“~What?~”

“Nick lost his head.” Rex cuts me off. “I did it.” He smiles, showing all his teeth.

“You stalk widows as some sick kink,” I guess, not believing him for a second. This was just a sick, twisted game.

The bartender was right. I had been cursed. Apparently—by this ~twat~.

“It is sick,” he agrees, screwing up his face as he twirls his ice around in his glass of water. He drinks the clear liquid, plops down the empty glass, and looks me over.

“I own every part of you.” He shoos me off with a few fingers, as he snaps his fingers for another glass of water. A refill. “Go,” he urges me. “Please.”

I stand up from the booth. But I don’t walk away. I am intrigued. Did he actually kill my husband? Was he the monster who ruined my life?

“You want to stay,” he whispers, noting that I do not leave.

He stretches his arms across the table, like a languid cat, his shoulders all muscle and sinew are straining to break through his suit, as more water is placed in front of him.

This fighter isn’t lying to me.

I think he did it.

He was the one who ruined my life.

~I’m going to kill you.~ I think it, hoping he reads it in my eyes. I am not expecting a reply.

But still—somehow, he responds to me.

~I was hoping you’d try. Too bad it’s just a dream, butterfly.~

****

A door slams and I convulse awake in my apartment on the floor. I am now surrounded by fire spreading on the carpet—after I kicked over the candle.

“Shit!” I get up and run to the small fire extinguisher. I pull out the pin and, in my rush, I trip forward toward the fire.

One hand falls in the flame, while I push back onto my heels and grab the extinguisher with two hands—safely extinguishing the growing fire.

I wait for the adrenaline to subside and the pain in my hand to ignite, but…even as I run to the sink to turn on the water, as I wait for the pain, I’m simply confused because I feel nothing.

Just to be safe, I put my hand under the faucet anyway.

I just dreamed a whole ass nightmare.

Where I was cursed and almost owned by some famous fighter I had heard about a few times.

What the hell was all that about?

I decide I need to go to bed. I was sleep-deprived.

I was either concerned or the opposite that the fire alarm didn’t work. At least I wouldn’t get kicked out after just moving in. And I did extinguish the small fire rather quickly.

I pull myself under the sheets of my bed, staring toward the window, letting in the noise of the Skeleton Quarter.

I came here to investigate my husband’s death. Aside from dabbling in madness, hoping magic was real…I had to be real.

I had to go talk to people. Find out the truth. Listen in to conversations. Just…live. Outside this nightmare that had become my life.

I believed Nick’s death was the cause of a supernatural evil entity.

That is why I came to Requiem City.

I was looking for answers in a supernatural place. To find vengeance. For blood.

I close my eyes and I hold the sheets to my chest tightly.

Miraculously, this time my sleep is unperturbed.

DEVOREX

Sweet sorrow. She never locked her door. She didn’t even see me set her room alight when I knocked over the candle and whispered some threats into her ear.

She could survive fire. I was just disappointed she didn’t catch a glimpse of me when I left—to ~really~ scare her. Oh well, there was no rush for her sweet demise.

There would be many other times to torment my butterfly.

As I recline on my sofa, I get a call from my manager, Hoff.

I answer with an animalistic noise, and he tells me the latest update on my new contract.

“Req’s casino agreed to hold a fight night, but…they won’t go above three million,” he says. “I told them ten, or you’re out.”

“I’ll take three as long as I get a free room, no questions, no checks, no cleaning—“

“You know how suspicious that sounds, Rex. Do I really have to do this again?”

“Yes.” I chuckle. “Unless you want to die too.”

I hang up, still chuckling. This rat hole was a great killing ground.

Well, I didn’t really kill, though. Unless I really felt ~inclined~ too. I preferred when people responded to me. It was less lonely. Killing could be reserved for those who deserved it.

Or if I felt like it.

There was a fundamental difference between pummeling someone’s face in and ripping someone’s head off.

Hazel married a corrupt politician.

I freed her.

Devorex, the knight in shining fucking armor.

I lay down on the couch and get a text from Hoff.

Hoff

Done. Freak. Love you. Don’t hurt me, please.

He is so terrified of me.

I fall asleep with a smile.

I was terrible.