Page 78 of Incubus
"You think?" Nathan sputtered.
"Well...what about sending in Walter?" Jim said.
Nathan looked around, waiting for Walter to appear after being mentioned. When he didn't, Nathan called out. "Walt! Can you head down there? Walter?"
The stillness of the area was eerie, so quiet and devoid of motion that it was almost like a painting, like they had stepped into a captured moment that would never move again. Nathan called a few more times, but Walter did not appear.
"Nothing," Nathan admitted to the others. "That can't be a good sign."
"Sidhe?" Jim prompted.
"Again?" Sasha said. "The Muses I was almost ready to pass off as a fluke, but if there are some here too..." He shook his head and dropped the supply bag heavily to the ground. "Looks like we're setting up camp. The golem is in that tunnel, and somewhere nearby is its dark sidhe master. This is where we want to be."
"I think that might be a matter of opinion," Nathan said, shifting uncomfortably.
Not being able to hear or see anything did not reassure Nathan that he would know when something was there. He had to wonder if what was lurking nearby would suddenly swoop upon them in the dark, unnoticed.
Afewhourslater,Nathan couldn't remember the last time he had sneezed so much. It didn't help that an hour before sunset the sky broke open with another downpour of rain and showed no signs of stopping. The rain brought at least some sense of life to the otherwise deathly still area around the cave, but without any real shelter, they were caught in the storm without even the comfort of a fire.
"I can feel it in there," Jim said while they were passing the hours, trying to work out their best plan of attack, whenever that time finally came, "but I can't sense anything else. If it's like the Muses, this sidhe controller could be anywhere."
Trying his hardest not to shiver as the rain continued to pour down around them, Nathan glared at Sasha when the incubus looked at him with a clear offer of body heat. Thankfully, that was the moment when Jim announced he was going to stake out the other side of the hill in case the golem’s master appeared from another direction.
Nathan scooted unconsciously closer to the incubus after only a few moments alone.
"Aren't the shotguns going to be too wet when we need them?" Nathan asked.
"They'll fire. I have them enchanted." Sasha scooted closer too. "You know...you're actually kind of cute with this whole covert relationship thing."
Nathan glanced behind them, just in case Jim was still within hearing distance, but the rain was falling hard enough to mask any other sound. "Yeah, well...I'm working on it." He scooted the last bit closer so that his and Sasha's sides were flush. The warmth from the incubus was strong even through their clothing.
"Can I...ask you something about Walter?"
Nathan started a little, unprepared for the question. "Uhh, sure. What did you want to know?"
"Well...have you ever asked him the big questions?"
"You mean like 'what happens after we die?' and 'is there a God?'"
"Yeah."
"When I was a kid." Nathan shrugged.
Sasha sat up straighter. "And?"
Nathan had to laugh at the redhead’s eagerness, but he shook his head. "He said it wasn't his place to say. Sort of his typical response with things like that."
"Oh," Sasha deflated. "Figures."
"He did tell me one thing though," Nathan added, pleased to see a spark of hope return to Sasha's expression. "He said that not every human who dies becomes a Spirit Guide, but the ones who do choose to be one, and they choose the person they watch over. I've asked him a million times why he chose me, and he always says the same thing: because I was the one that needed him."
The day Walter first said that to Nathan was clear in his mind, during Nathan and Jim's first year without their parents. As he remembered that night, he also remembered a similar night not too long ago.
"You're the only other person who's ever said something like that to me," Nathan said, turning his head to look at Sasha and realizing just how close they were.
Their eyes met with only rain between them, and there was something very potent in Sasha’s shadowed expression.
"I know you were saying that you like to choose people to feed from who need you, not that you werechoosingme, but..."
