Home for Horny Monsters Ch. 076

"Big sister!" he cried, then zoomed down to hover in front of her face. "You've been injured!"

"I'll be fine," she replied, a little surprised that the imp could tell she had been hurt.

"Where is Miss Velvet?" he asked. "Did you catch up to her?"

"She didn't make it."

The little imp let out a pained cry and simply fell out of the sky, clutching his chest and landing on the ground with his wings outstretched. Dana picked him up and held him to her chest as they went into the cabin.

Despite the warmth of the fire, the space felt lonely, as if the building itself knew that something had changed. Abella took Mike to his room and placed him on the bed. Yuki helped cover him up with blankets as Quetzalli pulled his shoes off.

"What happened to his arm?" Quetzalli asked, staring at the purple mass.

"I'm not sure." They had walked back in silence, so she hadn't bothered asking. However, Abella had noticed that everything from his right elbow down to his fingers had turned a mottled purple color, like one giant bruise.

"He channeled a massive spell through it," Yuki replied softly. "Essentially used living tissue as a magic wand. His fingers are all cut up, we may need to stitch the wounds."

"On it." Dana walked in carrying the suture kit Eulalie had made for her last year.

Mike groaned in his sleep as Dana and Yuki started working on his arm. The kitsune was fairly certain that there were broken bones, and Dana stitched up the worst wounds on his hands, licking her fingers off when she was done. Yuki created some ice compresses to help mitigate swelling in his arms, then used a tarot card and a kitchen knife to fashion him a makeshift brace.

Abella watched them in silence. When they were done, they tucked him in. Yuki transformed into a fox and took her place at the foot of the bed. Dana and Quetzalli left, leaving Abella to watch over him.

Almost an hour passed before she took off the dog tags and set them on the bedside table. Trying to move silently, she walked out of the room and shut the door behind her.

Emery sat on the kitchen table across from Dana, the little imp was staring forlornly at nothing. Quetzalli was scrounging up food for a proper meal, which consisted solely of soup cans that hadn't gotten consumed earlier.

Despite Abella's phenomenal hearing, the house was eerily quiet.

Unable to do anything of use, she went outside. The air was crisp, and the forest around the cabin was actively shaking off snow. It was surreal to see trees moving their own branches, and the animals of the forest seemed to pay their movement no attention.

Abella walked over to the remains of the barn. The fire had burned hot, and there wasn't much of anything to go through. Still, she picked her way through the scorched timbers until she found the melted remains of the jeep.

"Merde," she muttered, then spent several minutes clearing debris off the top of it. Once the cabin was revealed, she dug her talons into the dashboard and ripped it away to reveal the contents of the glovebox. Inside there were chunks of melted plastic and what looked like melted wax from a box of crayons. She dug through the mess, grumbling to herself as she paused every couple of minutes to wipe her fingers off on a nearby piece of metal.

"Big sister?"

Abella turned around and saw Emery sitting on the burnt remains of a stud. He was hugging his knees to his chest.

"Hey." She wiped her fingers off again, then turned to face the little imp. "How are you feeling?"

"Miserable." He hunched forward, looking almost like he would disappear into his wings. "It feels like there's a pressure inside my body, like I'm going to explode if I can't let it out. I don't know what to do with myself."

"That is called grief." She moved closer to him and crouched so that they were eye level. "Have you never experienced it before?"

He shrugged. "I don't think so," he informed her. "When I was created, my job was to take care of this place and any who were welcome here. I'm an elemental, I'm only happy when I'm doing my job. It's really the only thing I've ever known for sure. I learned about sadness when Darren and Ana died, but it never felt anything like this."

She nodded, then touched his foot with a finger. "You have lived more in the last few decades than you have in all the rest of your life, haven't you?"

He pondered this for a moment, his eyes widening at the revelation.

"It is something I have come to realize myself," she added. "Creatures like us can live for centuries, not realizing the joy and warmth that can come from a loving home. Darren and Ana, they got a chance to live full lives here. I think maybe you understand that an entire lifetime was stolen from Velvet, a life that should have been full of laughter and happiness. Now that we know how much joy can be crammed into such a short time, we recognize the true tragedy of a life cut short. My own heart feels broken, and I was not as close to her as you were."

The imp let out a sigh, then shook out his wings.

"I feel like I can't fly anymore," he told her. "I feel too heavy now. Like I'm carrying a giant weight in my chest."

She patted him on the head. "It may take some time, but you will know the joy of the sky once again."

"But is that okay?" He tilted his head to one side, considering her words. "I feel guilty wanting to feel better. It feels so wrong."

"Wanting to feel better doesn't betray those we have lost. After all, our time here is still limited." She looked up at the sun, squinting into its harsh rays. Knowing now that it was a sight that she might not have seen if not for Velvet, she closed her eyes and cherished the warmth. "No matter how long you think you have, death has a way of sneaking up on you."

"My kind doesn't have souls," he told her. "When I die, I just become rocks and sand once again."

"Perhaps that is true," she told him. "But I am starting to learn that nothing is as simple as we believe it to be."

"You are hurt." He cleared his throat and stood. "I can tell by the way you hold your wing. I almost lost a wing myself, one time. Velvet..." Emery choked on her name. "She got into an argument with her mom and slammed the front door as I was coming in."

Abella winced. "I am indeed damaged," she told him. What she didn't tell him was that she was afraid to look closer at the damage. She was still in shock from discovering Velvet's body, and may have lied to herself about how bad her wing actually was.

"I may be able to help," he told her, standing to his full height.

"I'm not sure you can." She smiled at him. "But thank you for offering."

"You misunderstand." He stomped his foot in indignation. "I am an earth elemental. In the same way that they are stitching together the master's wounds, I may be able to assist you with yours."

"You can do that?" she asked, incredulous.

Emery nodded. "I can. It would give me something to do," he told her with confidence. "I could use something to do right now."

Shrugging, she unfurled her wings. The look of shock on Emery's face when he saw what was left of her damaged wing almost made her walk away, but he demanded that she hold still while he inspected her joints. The little imp's wings fluttered as he checked her body, pausing every now and then to mutter under his breath.

"The structure is good," he declared after landing on her shoulder. "The joint here is the most important, and it remains undamaged." He kicked at the base of her wing where it met her shoulder blade for emphasis. "These holes that you have will not close on their own. They are too ragged, and the wound will become like a human scar. Useless for flying."

"So you can't help me."

"I never said that." He leapt off her shoulder and flew toward the house. When he was about twenty feet away, he turned around. "Come, I have just the thing."

Figuring she had nothing to lose, she followed him. He took her back inside the cabin, where Quetzalli greeted them with a ladle in her hand. The cabin was still quiet, but felt less like a tomb.

"Can you keep a secret?' he asked.

Abella nodded.

Emery looked over her shoulder. She turned around and saw that Quetzalli was busy in the kitchen while Dana sat on the couch with a pair of earbuds in. The imp held a finger to his lips and led her beneath the stairs and into a small storage area.

"Down here," he whispered, then put his hands on the wall. Green light surrounded his fingers and a section of wood paneling slid to one side. Inside, she could see light glittering off of a stash of silver coins.

"I don't understand," she said as he pulled several out and handed them over to her. "What are we doing?"

"We need this," he informed her. "You need to have silver for powerful earth magic. It's why my kind love it so much, it's a powerful catalyst. Same applies to dragons, especially of the earth variety. With enough of it, I can help you fix your wing."

"You really think so?" She looked at the coins in her hand, afraid to let herself hope.

"I know so," he stated matter-of-factly. "My leg got broken off once by a hunter who shot me. I used a silver dollar from the late eighteen hundreds, and...oh no!"

Emery's wings flapped frantically as he dug deeper into his stash. The little imp was making choking sounds as he tossed coins onto the ground. Abella picked one up and saw that the silver on it was tarnished badly. The profile on the coin was almost nonexistent, as if it had been rubbed away.

"What's wrong?" she asked, but he threw a few more coins out. These ones weren't just tarnished, but looked as if acid had etched away their features, leaving behind dark pits.

"It's all gone bad!" he declared, then crawled into the hole and grunted. When he scooted back out, he threw a blackened stone on the ground. Abella picked it up and recognized it immediately. She had pulled it out of the head of the serpent from the lake.

"Silver tarnishes, but it doesn't go bad," she said, then held the stone up to the light. It felt like weeks ago that she had pulled it from the serpent's head. She could have sworn that the stone had been a ruby.

"Something happened, it's..." Emery went quiet, his gaze locked on something in the hole. "Oh. Oh my."

Curious what had his attention, Abella flattened her body to the floor to see what he was looking at. The inside panel of the wall went further back than she realized, revealing the size of Emery's secret stash. The coins inside looked as if the silver had been stripped away from them, and she could see where it had gone.

In the middle of the stash, as if sitting in a nest, was a metallic blue egg with silver swirls running along its outside edges.

"Where did you find this?" she asked.

Emery folded his hands between his legs and sat down. "After you destroyed the others," he whispered. "I was there when Velvet was laying them, in case she needed help. Sometimes her mom needed help. She hid this one in the glove box, and I snuck it out when Dana started working on the car."

"I see." She reached toward the egg, but Emery blocked her hand.

"Please." He shook his head fervently. "Don't break it. I was only going to grab enough coins to help you, you weren't supposed to see it. It's all that I have left of her, I--"

"Emery." She touched him calmly on the head, her eyes on the egg. It looked vastly different from the clutch she had shattered. "I owe Velvet my life. The least I can do is ensure that her legacy lives on."

He bit his lip, then let out a sigh and stepped aside.

Abella reached into the stash and picked the egg up and held it gently in both hands. Pain blossomed in her chest as she held the egg against her chest and mourned once more for the dead.

🏠🏠🏠

Mike sat on the shore of the Dreamscape, his eyes out on the horizon. Spectral arms clutched him from behind as Tink sat on his lap. He had wrapped his arms around the goblin and was using her as a head rest while Cecilia hugged him tight.

The others sat on the beach with him, but nobody spoke. A gloom had settled over the island, one that pressed down so hard that it threatened to squeeze out any remaining joy. The technicolors were all gray now, and moved about sluggishly where the ocean gripped the sand.

His right arm was smoky. The few times he had contemplated it, it kept blurring itself out as if being censored on a show.

Dark shadows watched him with angry eyes from beneath the waves. He wasn't entirely certain what they were, but he could feel their anger whenever they breached the surface and hissed. Were they a manifestation of his wrath? Or perhaps something far more sinister that had been waiting to catch him if he fell from grace?

"That's a good way to think of them."

The voice startled him, and he looked over his shoulder to see the woman from the cabin standing a few yards away. She was barefoot in the sand, but he noticed that she wasn't leaving any footprints.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

"Mourning, like you." She smiled sadly and he noticed that she was wearing black. Her hair flowed behind her, blowing by a non-existent breeze. "The forest grieves for its fallen child."

"So you're the forest."

"Nope." She winked. "It's far more complicated than that."

"Dare I ask?"

"You really shouldn't." She squinted at the creatures below the water. "If you hadn't heeded my advice when you did, you would probably be dead. Or worse, with them."

"What are they?"

"Trouble." She summoned a bow from the air and pulled back on its string. A golden arrow appeared moments before she fired. It streaked through the air and pierced one of the creatures the moment it surfaced. It let out a screech of pain, causing the water around it to turn black and then freeze. "There isn't a word for them. They're scavengers, hovering at the boundaries of reality while patiently waiting for their next meal. Most of the time they feed on fear, sustaining themselves on sheer terror alone. But you? You're not just a meal, not anymore. You may be a means for them to cross over into this realm, which is something you must never allow to happen."

He frowned. "That sounds very much like the kind of warning you gave me earlier. Did you know that Velvet was going to die?" He tried to muster some anger to go along with his words, but he had given it all to the forest.

"I didn't, but I've been part of the game for a very long time, Caretaker. There are certain patterns that repeat themselves, and all I did was warn you about a potential threat." She nocked another arrow and let it fly, piercing another creature. When this one shrieked, the water exploded and sent a geyser of steam into the air.

"Is that even hurting them?" he asked.

"It breaks their connection, albeit temporarily. They shouldn't even be here, but your misery has allowed them in. As long as you don't hand yourself over to them, they can't hurt you. They are a natural consequence of becoming a bigger player in the game."

"I don't want to play the game," he said, then lowered his gaze. "Not if it means losing people I love."

"We're always playing someone's game, Caretaker." She dismissed the bow and sat down next to him. "Order and chaos. Life or death. Some games can't ever be won, you're simply playing until you lose."

"Sounds grim." He sighed, squeezing Tink so tight that she let out a squeak. "I know that you can't tell me your name, but what do I call you, anyway? Cabin? Forest? Autumn? Meadow?"

When she didn't respond, he turned to see that she had vanished.

"Figures," he muttered. Out in the water, he saw something briefly surface and then disappear. It was roughly between the two creatures that had been shot, a black mass that moved toward the shore.

Suddenly worried, Mike stood up as the black creature rode a sudden wave up onto the shore and then crawled its way through the surf until it stood on its back legs. it regarded him from beneath a thick layer of seaweed before yanking it off.

"Kisa?" He turned around and saw that Kisa still stood behind him on the beach. There were two of them.

"That was way harder than I thought it would be," she said, then coughed up a bunch of water. "I feel so loopy, it's from all that swimming."

"What are you doing here?" he moved toward the water and then hesitated. Was this a trap of some kind?

"Being a messenger girl, apparently." She tilted her head to one side and smacked it. Water splooshed free of her ears, followed by a small fish. "You've got to be fucking kidding me," she mumbled. "This place is weirder than I thought."

Mike remained silent, waiting for an answer.

"Things have gone from bad to worse," Kisa explained. "Lily knocked me out with her venom and is doing some sort of trick to try and bridge the gap between us because I need to talk to you. No questions until the end, I don't know how long I'll be in here."

She then told him all about how an ancient priestess had taken over Murray's body, and that the horsemen were back and hitching a ride to Earth. As heartbreaking as his own situation was, the one at the house had become dire.

Once Kisa finished, she let out her breath in a rush. "We need you to figure out how to help us. It's just Beth and I, and we're out of food and water. Beth thinks she can cause a diversion using the Grimoire, but it's risky."

Mike groaned and then flopped over on the sand. He was exhausted, both physically and spiritually, but the house needed him. Even here, in the Dreamscape, he could feel the dull ache in his shattered arm. He needed a plan, and he needed it yesterday. The stress of the situation had him staring blankly at the sky as his mind struggled to function.

"Oh, and one more thing." Kisa knelt down and pinched Mike's nipple through his shirt, giving it a twist.

"Ouch, what the hell?" He rubbed at it with his left hand, wincing.

"That's from Lily. She says to tell you that--" Kisa's mouth kept moving, but it was like someone had muted her. She scrunched up her face in concentration, then tried to speak again and failed. Mike was fairly certain she was trying to tell him to quit being a little bitch and come help them.

"Tell the others I'm on my way," he said. "The barrier is down, so I'll be there soon."

Kisa nodded, relief spreading across her face in a wave that turned into a smile. She blew him a kiss and then evaporated into smoke that drifted away into the Dreamscape.

He opened his eyes and sat up in bed. Yuki lifted her head and yawned, revealing all of her teeth.

"We need to go home," he said, then turned to slide out of bed. The splint on his arm caught the blankets, sending a painful twinge up his shoulder.

Yuki transformed, her hands on her hips. "Hold it right there. The last time you tried to bolt, you almost tore yourself apart with magic."

Mike knelt down, looking for his shoes. "This is different. Things at the house have gotten worse. If we don't figure out how to stop them, it might be the end of the world."

"Shit." Yuki reached under the bed and pulled his shoes out. She coaxed him back onto the bed and then helped him tie the laces while he told her what Kisa had said. As he spoke, he saw Velvet's dog tags sitting on the nightstand. Doing his best to maintain his composure, he stuck them in his pocket.

Minutes later, they were outside the bedroom. Quetzalli was ready with a bowl of hot soup that she had been keeping warm on the stove while Dana stood at the window, her gaze locked on something he couldn't see.

"Where's Abella?" he asked. "We need to head home."

"She's been outside with Emery," Dana replied. "He thinks he can fix her wing, but they need plenty of room to do it."

Yuki explained the severity of the situation as Mike devoured the soup Quetzalli had made. Abella appeared a few minutes later, her wings wrapped tight around her body as Mike got his things together.