Page 40 of Incubus
“Yes. Yes, they’re good guys, and you can sleep a little easier knowing I’m not out here alone. But that doesn’t mean I don’t—” He cut off abruptly, making a sharp turn to the wall that gave Nathan and Jim a view of his stiff profile.
Sasha’s face was almost as red as his hair.
Nathan grabbed Jim by the arm and pulled him tight to the wall around the corner to keep them hidden.
Sasha’s voice filtered over to them. “Shi…if there had been any other way…” he said, trailing. “I just…I can’t accept this. I didn’t do anything wrong. I’m out here trying to help people!”
A tug on Nathan’s sleeve made him glance up to find a very concerned Jim. Nathan just shrugged and shook his head. He missed whatever Sasha said next, but a moment later he heard Sasha spout some angry goodbyes and there was the sharp click of a cell phone flipping closed too fast.
The silence that followed was thick. Nathan risked peering around the corner and saw that Sasha was still facing the wall. He had his cell phone in his left hand, but his right was pulled into a tight fist.
Reelingback with something of an inhuman roar, Sasha punched the brick in front of him so hard that there was a definite crack, and, by the look of the aftermath, the blow did more damage to the wall. Sasha’s right hand had become that of his incubus self, black and taloned. Nathan saw a snarl on Sasha’s face that showed the hint of fangs, and when Sasha turned, finally sensing that he was no longer alone, his eyes were red.
“You keep being this sloppy and someone’s gonna cry incubus,” Nathan said, not trying to hide that he and Jim were there. He tossed Sasha a grin as he walked over.
The redhead's features immediately morphed into his human disguise. “Yeah…I swear I’m not usually so stupid,” he said, and turned with a grimace to look at the dent left in the bricks.
“You okay?” Jim asked. “I’m guessing your aunt didn’t take the news too well.”
“No, it’s not that,” Sasha said. “She understood. The Council of Elders told her about the body right away, so…she already knew. She’s disappointed, but…in Sabine, not me. She’s not angry with me.”
“Then if that argument wasn’t about her reaction to the hunt…” Nathan said, waiting for Sasha to fill in the blanks.
Blue eyes looked up, a little too bright-looking, like maybe Sasha was trying too hard to make them look human after losing control. “The Council…knows it was me,” he said. “I don’t know what I thought they’d do, how I thought they’d react. I knew they wouldn’t retaliate by coming after us. Sabine had to be stopped. But now…I’m just akinslayerto them. I’ve been a seal for years, but I…I’ve never killed my own.”
Jim moved closer to Sasha, placing a hand on his arm like he had that night in the alley, a simple ‘I’m here for you’ gesture and accompanying expression of empathy that Nathan could never quite get the hang of.
Nathan wanted to do something too, but he couldn’t think of anything that wouldn’t seem completely inadequate. He looked to Walter, who had remained visible during their trek to the back of the building, and thought he understood what it must be like for Walter all the time, only capable of little more than watching.
“They…they told my aunt to tell me…” Sasha said, clenching his eyes shut as if to stay tears. “I’m not…allowed to go back. Ever. They won’t let me go home.”
Jim’s hand gave an instinctive squeeze as a stray tear escaped down Sasha’s face. Sasha was managing rather nobly to keep from crying outright, so Nathan wasn’t about to grudge him that.
Nathan didn’t know what it was like to have a home anymore. He and Jim had been transients since before they were teenagers. But, although Sasha lived a similar life to theirs being a seal, he also lived another one. He was an incubus. He had family. Even if he rarely got the chance to go home to that part of the Veil, he had always been able to go back when he wanted to.
“I can’t believe they banished you just like that,” Jim said. “How can they do that if they understand it needed to be done? It isn’t right. You did what they couldn’t so they punish you? And you didn’t even do it, I mean…I struck the blow. Maybe…maybe you can tell them—”
“It won’t matter. It was my hunt. My responsibility,” Sasha said. “It’s all the same to the Council. They’d probably say I should have…caught her and brought her home for rehabilitation. Right,” he huffed. “You can’t change hundreds of years of psychological progression. She didn’t give me a choice.”
“No. She didn’t,” Nathan said, and he said it with more finality than Sasha had, because he figured Sasha needed a little convincing. “She would have killed that girl. In the fight, might have killed any one of us. It was our hunt and we did what we had to. If those elders want to think differently, let ‘em. You’re not getting kicked to the curb by us. You’d be more likely to run away after putting up with us for a while longer.”
Sasha laughed at Nathan’s try for humor, even despite his drying tears, but he didn’t look truly soothed. “Come on,” he said, wiping quickly at his eyes before forcing a smile. “We have another stakeout to get to, remember? We should go.”
Nathan could tell Jim wanted to say more, convince Sasha to talk to them, as was his nature, but sometimes it was best to let things settle. Nathan nodded and let Sasha move past him, giving Jim as severe a look as he could manage to leave things alone for now. Jim didn’t contradict him.
There was a heaviness in the air as they returned to the hotel and, while it grew lighter with each step back to their rooms, a shadow of it lingered well into the night.
Whenthesunstartedto dip below the horizon and Nathan and the others were ready to head to the house on 4thstreet, they walked the few blocks from the hotel.
The house was a well-kept beige and white split-level surrounded by neighbors. It was everything a suburban home should be, complete with neatly cut grass, somewhat eerie looking lawn gnomes, and wouldn’t have been worth much note at all if they didn’t know there was a fae inside.
“What if she’s not home?” Jim asked.
“Then we stick around until she gets back,” Sasha said. “If she is inside, we need to wait for some sign or cue that she really is a dark fae before we act. Right now I can’t sense anything enough to be sure. Can you, Jim?”
Jim shook his head.
“We’ll take things slow then. I’ll go to the back. Nate, you go around to the other side, and Jim, you stay on this one. Keep your eyes open. We’ll get her.”
