Page 12 of Demonic Cage
“You mean the reporters? Journalists?”
“However they call them in this century. They all have one goal.”
Now it’s my turn to ask how old he is. But he dismissively waves his hand, claiming he doesn’t count it anymore.
Darya slowly surveys my face, his gaze making the hairs on my neck stand on end. “Do you have siblings?”
My mouth goes dry, my stomach clenches. I press the straw of my pomegranate smoothie against my lips. I stare at him longer than necessary, then gulp hard.
“I had two,” I whisper.
It’s much more enjoyable to look at the red drink than anywhere else. The man sizes me up. “Had?”
I shrug, locking eyes with the smoothie. “I have a sister. I had a brother.”
“How did he die?”
I grip the edge of the table, staring in astonishment at the stranger. Who asks such a question? And yet… no one ever asks about it.
“He was sick,” I whisper, my voice trembling weakly. I don’t turn away from the man’s gray eyes. “He had cancer.”
The shadow turns its head to the side, as if sensing that this isn’t the whole truth.
“Actually, that’s what’s interesting,” Darya begins, resting his chin on his palm again. “For more than twenty years, neither side noticed anything. Neither the demons nor the angels. Why would this be, Lotte? What changed?”
I like the way he says my name. There’s a certain sharpness to it, a well-honed blade. He pronounces it differently from the French, yet it feels familiar. Unconsciously, I smile at the only normal thing to me seeming the only strange thing to him. Ithought an average girl could live peacefully until her twenties, surely not too much to ask. I feel a tingling under my skin as it becomes clear what the one thing that could have changed is, but I’m not sure if I should share it with a stranger. However, I need answers too.
“I haven’t taken my medication for two days,” I say cautiously, still focusing on my trembling left arm, which is being tossed around by withdrawal symptoms.
“Interesting.”
“For you, everything normal is interesting.”
“And how long have you been taking them?”
“Since I was very young.”
“And why?”
I hate this question. It always feels so humiliating.
“I have nightmares.”
“You take them for that?”
“Yes.”
“And do they help?”
“To some extent.”
Tilting his head to the side, he scrutinizes me, but I still refuse to look at him. Too much pain is tied to the medication, and I don’t want to talk about it.
“Tell me about your dreams,” he instructs softly, and I find myself complying.
“They’re similar. Monsters chase me, like the ones I saw today. That’s partly why I thought I was hallucinating,” I confess.
“Do they hurt you?”
