Page 35 of This Ravenous Fate
Layla laughed sharply. “Even if it was, ghosts are no threat to us.”
Shirley’s eyes darkened. Sometimes Layla forgot how long of an adjustment period there was between being turned and finding some sense of normalcy. So she settled on the end of the bed and sighed. “Rogue reapers ruined the Clarice in its first year of being open. Dead bodies kept turning up in hotel rooms and the ownersspread rumors about the place being haunted because that’s easier to get past than actual bloodthirsty reapers roaming the hallways. Still, people refused to stay here. And when the owners tried to sell, no one wanted to buy the building. Valeriya ended up taking it over many years ago. She swears the moonlight guided her here, but no one really believes that. Mei and I like to think that she was the one lurking in the walls during the hotel’s working days, slitting throats and feeding on unlucky bodies at night.”
Shirley frowned. “Is this supposed to make me feel better?”
“I was never good at telling stories. I just want you to feel better. Valeriya has much worse stories,” Layla said.
“What exactly is she?” Shirley asked.
“She is one of the first reapers. Hundreds of years old. She could tell you all about the god-awful experiments they ran on her and her family that made her turn. I refuse to hear them because I have enough to keep me up at night already.” Layla sighed, falling against her pillows.
Moonlight streaked across Shirley’s face and somehow she looked even younger than before. The girl was all round cheeks and hopeful eyes. “What happened to her family?” she asked.
Though she spoke gently, the words pierced Layla’s heart. She shrugged, her eyes growing distant. “She never talks about them.” Layla patted the bed and waited for Shirley to sit before she continued. “You don’t have to be afraid of her. Valeriya can be cold, but deep down she cares. She’s the reason I’m still here.”
Shirley’s brows lifted. “She helped you survive reaperhood?”
“Something like that,” Layla said. Her voice was so soft, it came out like a whisper. A memory flashed through her mind of a Saint gun in her hand and Valeriya’s fingers closing around her wrist. The memory was soaked with Layla’s tears, and thinking of it almost always brought them back. She sniffed, blinking hard. “Again, nothing to be scared of. You are one of us now, and you must understand that we respect humans here. We’re not allowed to kill humans because of our agreement with the Saints now, but if Valeriya never killed humans, she would not be the reaper she is today. She would be very, very ugly,” Layla said.
A gasp left Shirley. “So it’s true? Reapers who don’t drink human blood lose their humanity as they age?”
Layla nodded. “The true number of years that Valeriya has lived as a reaper is a holy secret.”
Shirley sat up straighter. “I heard reapers have been here since the seventeenth century.”
“Not enough people know that, but it’s true.” As Layla understood it, the reaper population began to grow in the 1800s, from just one that had survived for centuries.
“My grandparents were raised to believe reapers were myths,” Shirley went on. “But then… So many came to be after the Civil War, right?”
“Right.” According to some old stories, reapers came from the rot and ruin of the battlefields, but reapers had been around for far longer. Valeriya certainly had.
Shirley’s voice wavered. “My mother actually wanted to leaveNew York because reaperhood is like an epidemic here. They’re much less rampant in the countryside. But it’s spreading, isn’t it? Since they’re getting difficult to distinguish from humans. Europe has gotten good at hiding them, but they’re still there. My friend went abroad for a year and she said they only come out at night in Italy. In France, they’re given a curfew.” Shirley tucked her knees up to her chest, her brown eyes growing dark. “It’s scary to think that just one experiment caused such worldly horrors.”
A soft sigh left Layla. “It wasn’t just one experiment.”
Shirley’s lips parted. “No?”
Silence filled the room as Layla carefully considered her next words. “I could tell you more about the early origins of reaperhood, but it’s an abomination that is certain to give you nightmares.”
After a brief pause, Shirley nodded. “Okay. Maybe I can hear about it later?”
Layla stood and gave Shirley a stern look. “We’ll talk more tomorrow. For now, get some sleep.” Layla left the room, closing the door after her. But the sound of Shirley stirring behind the door made her pause. She leaned closer to the door and heard sniffles between heavy sobs.
“I’m sorry, Mama. I’m so sorry, Daddy.”
Layla’s heart dropped. Just five years ago, that had been her. Grieving for the ones she lost and the life that was taken from her. Her hand fell away from the door as if she had been shocked. Then Layla hurried down the hallway and kept going until she could no longer hear Shirley’s cries.
***
Giana Taylor returned to the lair at dawn. Her dance costume was gone, and she now wore her fur coat over a plain blue dress and stockings. Stage makeup still painted her face, but it was slightly smudged from sweat. Layla met her in the sitting room and chose the love seat beside her, setting a glass of blood down on the side table. “Thank you for coming,” she told her.
Giana pulled her coat off and laid it neatly across the back of her chair. “Of course. I figured she would want to see a familiar face.”
“She’s so young. I don’t think she should return to work at the club.”
“Most new girls there are around sixteen. Shirley is almost that age.” Giana shrugged.
“Right. But the performers are getting younger and younger. The manager, Calhoun, is a predator. You’ve said so yourself. Shirley is already going to face new hell just by being a reaper. Her life will only get harder from here on out.” Layla wished she’d had someone to fight for her at her age. Sixteen being a typical age for club girls didn’t make it okay.
