Page 25 of Mated to the Monster God
I glance at my hands. The scales have hardened into plates across the backs of my knuckles. My fingers end in subtle talons—retractable now. Smoothed by intention. My skin can mimic human tones if I focus hard enough, but the shimmer beneath it always returns when I relax. My pupils can narrow or round out, but they’ll never lose that incandescent orange flare.
And why should they?
I was never meant to be human.
Butshemakes me want to be.
I don’t know what love is, not completely. I only know that I would die to hear her laugh again. That I crave her voice not because of what she says, but because she’s saying itto me.That I feel hollow when she’s not near, and whole when she brushes my skin with hers—however briefly.
That matters.
More than survival and instinct.
More than the old life crawling through blood and slime at the edge of existence.
I want to beseenby her. Not as a parasite. Not as a mutation. But as something worth keeping close. Worth touching. Worth trusting.
The boy’s voice echoes again. Monster.
I close my eyes and push that word away.
There’s only one voice I care to hear.
When she says my name, it sounds nothing like fear.
The stone at my back has warmed from the residual heat of the day. It bleeds into my skin, grounding me. I’ve been sitting here for hours, silent, still. A predator pretending at peace. My thoughts coil and uncoil in loops, too complex for comfort but too raw to ignore. I keep revisiting that boy’s scream—the one who ran from me like I was death itself. He may not have been wrong. But it doesn't sit easy in my chest.
The wind shifts.
I smell her before I hear her. That wild blend of sweat, citrus shampoo, and jungle—utterly, infuriatingly hers. I catch the sound of footfalls. Soft, precise. She’s trying not to wake the whole planet sneaking through these ridges, but I could pick out that rhythm anywhere.
“Did you think I wouldn’t find you?” Her voice slices through the quiet, wry and unmistakably smug.
I look up. She stands outlined against the sky, a bundle slung over her shoulder and another in her arms. Her hair’s tied up in a haphazard knot, strands sticking to her forehead with humidity. She's flushed, annoyed, and slightly out of breath.
“Honestly,” she huffs, dropping the larger bundle at my feet, “you really are the worst at being low-profile for a seven-foot neon godzilla lizard man.”
“I was not hiding from you,” I say, watching her drop into a crouch beside me.
“No, you were just brooding dramatically on a rock like some tragic antihero from a trashy netserial.”
I blink. “I do not know that word.”
“Which one?”
“Trashy.”
She snorts, pulls out a wrapped bundle, and shoves it into my hands. “Eat. Then we’ll discuss pop culture.”
The parcel is warm. Something wrapped in flatbread, the scent of spiced root vegetables and seared protein. My mouth waters even though I have no biological need for sustenance at the moment. She watches me expectantly, arms crossed over her knees.
“I’m not sure I know how to...” I trail off, examining the fabric. It’s tied in a way I don’t immediately understand.
She groans and reaches over, her fingers brushing mine as she unties the knot. “You were doing so well until opposable thumbs became your boss fight.”
“You mock me.”
“Relentlessly.” She peels open the flatbread, folding it expertly. “Now open your mouth.”
