"Am I the first girl you've had in this bed?" Nix asked as she sat beside me on my bed?
She smirked at the question. I turned to face her, ignoring the pain. She was the first female to join me in this bed.Saying that to her felt wrong though.
"I didn't have you in my bed. If anything, you had me here," I said, reminding her she was the one that brought us here.
She giggled.
"You wish."
She smiled and gently shoved my shoulder. A thin streak of sunlight shone across her face and highlighted a loose strand of hair hanging in her face. I started to reach up and tuck it behind her ear the way she always did. Instead, I drummed my fingers on the blue comforter beneath me. Something between us had shifted in the last few days. I noticed things now that I didn't then, like her smile or the soft, spicy fragrance she wore.
"Anyway, I have something for you," she said and pulled a small vial of yellow liquid out of the pocket of her black hoodie.
She held it out for me to take from her as if I was supposed to know what it was. I frowned at her.
"What is that?"
She held the vial between her thumb and index finger and gave it a quick shake. Nothing about the liquid inside changed.
"It's a healing accelerator. Your body will heal on its own, which is why you can move now. I'm just offering you this because I'm assuming you don't want your parents to come home and see you like this," she said, gesturing to my current state.
Bruises covered most of my body. My clothes were tattered, and I smelled like a dirty alley. I nodded and took the vial from her. I examined it closely. It just looked like thick lemonade. I popped the lid off and gave it a sniff. It smelled the way I expected a medicine to.
"It doesn't taste as bad as it smells," she said with a smile.
A bright red light glowed from inside her hoodie. She unzipped it enough to pull out a necklace. The pendant on the necklace was an eye with a slash going through it from the top to the bottom. She snatched the glowing piece of metal off and crushed it in her palm.
"Fuck, I gotta go. I'll see you before the weekend ends."
She stood up and walked toward my window.
"Wait...," I called out to her.
She vanished, leaving behind only a faint wisp of black smoke. I dropped my hand onto my bed and let the vial roll out of it onto the bed.
"You cannot trust her. She probably reports your every move to Zeus," Typhon said.
I stared down at the vial. It was possible that she was playing me. It was also possible that she was the only person I could trust to help me. The perfect test was lying on the bed with me. I picked the vial up and popped it open. I took one deep breath and then another to calm my nerves. Then, I poured the liquid into my mouth and swallowed before I could psych myself out of it.
"I sincerely hope that was not poison," Typhon said.
I shrugged.
"Why would she poison me when she could've just let the Spartan finish me?" I asked aloud.
I was talking to myself as much as I was to Typhon. Part of me was extremely afraid my parents were going to come home and find my corpse. When my skin heated to the point I began to sweat, I really got nervous. I sat up in my bed and pulled off the damp, ruined t-shirt I wore. My normally pale skin had a red hue to it as I stared down at my chest and arms. The churning in my stomach started, and green acid bubbled from beneath my skin and covered a brush burn on my right forearm. It fizzled over the wound before absorbing back inside my skin. When it was gone, the spot on my arm was healed.
Over the next few minutes, that same process repeated with every injury I had. Within twenty minutes I was completely healed and pain-free. I stood up and stretched to make sure I didn't feel any pain. It was seriously gone. I was able to shower and get rid of my ruined clothes before my parents came home from work. I spent the rest of that night and most of the next day doing what I did on most weekends, sitting around the house wasting time until school started again on Monday. I was playing my game alone in my room when I suddenly smelled Nix's perfume.
"It's Saturday night, why aren't you out on a date, or hanging out with friends?" she asked as she appeared on the bed beside me.
Instead of being startled by her sudden appearance, I was delighted to see her. I smiled to myself and ignored her. Wondering how she would react to it until one of my pillows hit me on the side of my head.
"Don't pretend you didn't hear me, Stormie. I asked you why your life sucks so hard."
I fell sideways after the unexpected attack. She climbed onto the bed and leaned over me, pushing on my shoulder.
"Apparently, your wind shield doesn't block attacks you can't see," she said, pushing me as she spoke.
I had the bright idea of turning sideways and tossing her off me. I spun onto my back hoping the action would cause her to fall sideways off the bed. She jumped and landed straddling me. Her hands rested on either side of my head, caging me in. Our faces were less than a foot apart, and her hair spilled down around them like a black privacy curtain. I stared up into her sky-blue eyes, terrified.
"How did this happen?" I asked, genuinely surprised at the situation we had found ourselves in.
Nix smiled and shrugged.
"I think I asked you why you weren't on a date and then you pulled me on top of you. What do we do now?"
I could feel her lower body resting on mine and got the strongest urge to put my hands on her thighs. I laid my hands flat on the bed. This was a mix-up, nothing more.
"You're the one in control. You tell me," I said.
Being trapped beneath her this way gave me an odd thrill. There were so many what-ifs going through my mind that I was not only okay with happening, I was hoping for a few of them. Nix leaned forward. Close enough to kiss me. My breath caught in my throat as I awaited the feeling of her lips on mine. At the last second, her face moved sideways, and she whispered into my ear.
"Let's go for a walk."
She climbed off me, and I wanted to pull her back on top of me.
She opened the window and nodded her head toward the outside. I hated going out at night. I glanced over at the time displayed on the digital clock on my dresser. It was 10:42 pm. She was crazy if she thought I was going out this late.
"Do you see what time it is? My parents will kill me if they check on me and I'm not here."
Nix rubbed her chin and nodded thoughtfully.
"Okay, we could lie back down and talk until we both fall asleep. I'm sure they won't mind finding me in your bed. Oh, and also I'm an aggressive snuggler, so it will look worse than it is.
She stared at me with a look that dared me to test how willing she was to actually go through with her version of how things would play out. I imagined my mom's face when she opened the door and saw Nix lying beside me. I would never hear the end of it. My dad would either punch me in the face or congratulate me. It was hard to tell with him. I didn't wanna find out either way.
"What if we get attacked again?"
Nix giggled.
"How are you afraid of anything? I promise if another Greek soldier or anything else attacks you, I will handle it. Come on, Stormie, stop stalling."
Out of excuses, I ran and dove headfirst out the window. I wanted to try something. I imagined a tiny tornado forming around me and letting me descend to the ground peacefully. It worked.
"What was that, show-off?"
Nix asked as I landed on the ground beside her.
"Sounds like jealousy to me," I whispered as we started walking out of my backyard. Instead of responding to me, she touched her index finger to the side of my face.
Pzzt!
She zapped me. I pulled away, rubbing my face where her electric attack had left my skin tingling.
"How does it sound now?"
She pointed her finger at me as if it were a gun. I threw my hands up in surrender. A small bolt of black electricity traveled out of her index finger. A bolt of green electricity came out of my right palm, and the two met between us. We both stopped moving and watched as the two arcs met and intermingled into a small ball of swirling black and green light. It gradually got larger until it was the size of a golf ball. Nix pulled her finger away.
Pop!
The ball of energy exploded and took out a street light above us. I ducked as yellow sparks rained down on us.
"That was cool!" I said as we started walking again.
"I have something important I need to tell you."
She stuck her hands in her pockets and looked over at me as we walked along the dark, empty street. Whatever it was, it couldn't be worse than finding out I was the son of Typhon. I shrugged casually.
"Go for it."
She nodded and chewed on the inside of her bottom lip before speaking.
"Okay, well we didn't meet by chance," she said, her voice hesitant.
"I warned you!" Typhon said in my ear.
I ignored his outburst and stared at her, waiting for her to continue. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and went on.
"What are you talking about?"
She shook her head and sighed, but continued.
"I was raised in an organization that monitors awakenings."
I nodded. A cold feeling slowly settled over me. I cleared my throat and kept listening. This had started off shaky, but that didn't mean I couldn't trust her. We walked onto the playground.Empty swings creaked as they moved lazily on a soft breeze. I couldn't help thinking about how close we were to the street that Spartan had attacked me.
"Keep going," I said.
"My job was simple. I had to watch you until you had your awakening and make sure it didn't kill you or anyone else."
Okay, so she was there to ensure my safety. That wasn't a bad thing. It was actually pretty commendable. That experience was terrifying, I'm glad she was there. It didn't help Mike at all, though. I leaned against the side of a jungle gym.
"That doesn't sound too bad."
I folded my arms across my chest and kept listening.
"Well, that's only the first part of the job. Next, I had to confirm what bloodline you were a part of."
She chewed on the inside of her lip again. I wanted to reach forward and stop her even as the feeling of dread came over me.
"So, what happens after that?"
I reached out and touched my thumb to the side of her lip. She froze, staring me in the eye. Black lightning sparked in her eyes, and they changed from sky to midnight blue.
"Once I confirmed that you were of Typhon's bloodline, I was supposed to kill you."