Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

"All is a riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle." - Emerson

Ronnie

It’s been a week.  A week since I’ve last killed a demon.  That night, I killed Aggie, the demoness.  The night I got home was a little awkward.  No one was home except for Andie.  Whom of which had Trick over for the night.  They were in her bedroom for a few hours after I got home.  That’s all I needed to know.

A week since I’ve last seen that guy from the club.

I don’t remember his name.  I don’t even remember his voice.  I only remember what he looked like.  Kind of.  I couldn’t even remember what his sister looked like and she was the most beautiful girl anyone’s probably ever seen.  She was practically flawless.  No woman would be able to compete against her; she’d make them take a hit on their self esteem.

A week since Corin was last here.

He was, of course, a complete gentleman.  He didn’t even touch me; just kept his hands to himself.  Not that I wanted him to do anything, but it doesn’t erase the fact that he’s overly polite.  Corin hasn’t even kissed me yet, or tried to, since our parents set us up.  Not even on the cheek.  Nor the hand.  It’s just kind of…odd that he hasn’t even tried to.  The only time he’s probably actually touched me, other than my tattoo, was the occasional hug he gave me when he was relieved I got back from a one on one fight okay.  Although that’s typically when he’d give me a hug other than being relieved.  When he was going to touch my tattoo.  It was kind of annoying too.

A week since I’ve done research on my aunt.

That’s what brings me to where I am today.  I’m sitting at a bar in the city, sitting at a table with books, from our shelves, cluttering the table surface.  There was music on the loudspeakers playing, people smoking, people drinking, and people doing both as they played pool.  All the surrounding noises were pretty distracting as I tried to focus on the books and papers in front of me, but I’m used to it.  The clanging of the cue ball with the others, the yelling and laughing, and the slamming of shot glasses signaling a refill were mild compared to the distraction of a fight that I’ve been put through.  One demon getting in your way while you’re trying to defend your own life against another demon; backing up another slayer while fighting a demon after you…it’s all a distraction.

The books weren’t telling me what I haven’t already read.  So far, all they were saying was the significance behind each slayer’s markings, the way the markings work, and the purpose of the parents choosing the children’s match.  That’s all in the introductory pages.  After that started the important, historical figures.  Most of them were males, but that’s obviously not what I was looking for.  I looked away from the first book and at another one, one with more of an antique look to it.  The binding to it was soft and slightly frayed, the normal black color faded into a dark grey.  On the front, there were gold strips coming from each corner and meeting in the middle.  The one and only book I haven’t gotten to.  Ever.  I was always interrupted when I got to it, but not this time.

The pages were thin.  Their edges felt like they’d been ripped out of a book; the ink slightly smudged.  Still legible.  There was only one colored picture in the book, and that was on the very first page: a gold tattoo of trailing stars.  The next three pages were blank.  The fourth one had a black and white drawn profile of a woman who looked in her early twenties, but my guess…she was over ninety at least.  She was killed in the 1800s.  There was a trail of stars going down the side of her face, ending at her jaw.  I skimmed down the page and found two interesting sections on the bottom of the page:

Degraded Rank? Yes; Disgrace to family.

Regained honor? Yes

I turned the page and found another black and white sketch of a profile.  A female slayer again.  A picture below her profile showed the trail of stars was on the outside of her thigh.  I looked at the bottom of the page on the other side:

Degraded Rank? Yes; Disgrace to family.

Regained honor? Yes

I turned the page.  The picture was of another female with the same trail of stars tattoo, hers around her wrist, wrapping around her thumb.  Again, I looked on the bottom of the page:

Degraded Rank? Yes; Disgrace to family.

Regained honor? Yes

The next few pages had different female slayers’ profiles drawn, each with the same tattoo and each with the same thing written on the bottom of the page as the first three.  Then I came across a few male slayers that had the tattoo, and each with the same thing written at the bottom of the page as the females had.  Everyone I’ve come across has been killed in the early 1900s or earlier, but neither of them was alive while another with the star tattoo was.  And neither of them came from the same bloodline within two generations.  Then there was the sketched picture of my aunt, smack dab in the middle of the book.  I looked on the bottom of the page on the other side of her picture:

Degraded Rank? Yes; Disgrace to family.

Regained honor? Yes

I grabbed a few pages at a time and flipped through them, each with someone else’s picture, each with the same thing written at the bottom of the page.  There were over two more dozen pages like that, and the last three stopped the pattern.  The last three, that had wording on it, were filled, picture less.  My guess was that they were the pages that explained the reasoning behind these slayers’ disgraces.  I looked up and sighed in relief, glad that I finally found what I was looking for, but looking up at the door, I grunted in surprise and smiled to myself.

The guy from last week was just walking in the door, looking around casually, looking like he was kind of looking for someone.  His expression was bored yet thoughtful at the same time.  His hair was kept in a messy style, same as last week, and he hasn’t shaved the soul patch he had last week as well.  The silver cross was still around his neck, hanging in the middle of his chest again.  Black T-shirt and dark denim jeans, black studded belt and skull bracelet made him look like he had last time I saw him.  He saw me, grinned, and walked up to me with his hands in his pockets and cocky stance.

“Hey there,” he said through a smile.  Satisfaction filled his expression.  He was hoping he was going to see me again.  Taking the stool next to me, he sat down and stared at all the papers and books in front of me, looking pretty taken back. “I see you have a little homework here…”

“It’s not homework,” I laughed. “It’s just some…um…family history I’m going through.” I closed the book, marking the page with a pen I brought along, and looked at him.  He was glancing around at the papers, not seeming to figure out what I was getting at with anything.  Of course he wouldn’t.  He’s human.  He doesn’t know anything about slayers existing.

“It looks like you’ve been here for a while…how ‘bout a drink and maybe a few rounds of pool?” His smile was cocky and persuasive, his dark eyes staring into mine gently.  He was confident.  That much I could tell about him.  He had a high level of self esteem and pride.  My guess is that he probably didn’t have very many boundaries for things.  Good thing in a guy.  Well…in my opinion it was…but that might’ve been because Corin was full of boundaries.

“Um…I don’t know…I was maybe thinking of just…”

“Aw c’mon.  My sister isn’t with me today so we won’t have any distractions or anything.” He winked at me and leaned towards me a little bit with a hopeful, cocky grin forming on his perfect lips.  I smiled and bowed my head, breaking eye contact for a few seconds.

“Alright,” I sighed, trying not to give him the satisfactory of me laughing.  I looked at my books and started straightening them up as he got up and walked towards the bar to get us a drink.  Positive his back was completely to me, I looked over my shoulder and watched him go, impressed at how smooth he was walking.  His shirt was loose, but still slightly tight enough to be able to see his back muscle a little bit; he wasn’t even flexing and it was still toned.  I noticed he started to turn, so I turned back around and started to put my books back in the book bag I had on the table.  The black book I recently closed was the last one I put in, keeping it on top so I remembered to get back to it.

Meeting me at the pool table, the last free one, he handed me one of the two beers he had.  Instead of taking the one he held out to me, I took the other one, the one he was holding closer to his chest.  It earned me an amused yet confused look in his eyes, making me grin as I set my book bag down.

“I don’t know you well enough to trust you; how do I know you didn’t slip something in my drink?” I took a swig as I turned my back to him and walked over to the cue sticks. “Don’t take it personal,” I added quickly.  Turning around, I pointed at him with my beer bottle a little bit, pulling a cue stick off the rack as I stepped towards the table.

“Don’t worry about it,” he chuckled.  As if to prove that he didn’t slip anything in it, he took a drink from his bottle before setting up the pool balls on the table, rolling the cue ball to me.  The cross around his neck hung down, reflecting the light off of it as it remained stable and not swinging.  It caught my attention almost instantaneously. “Ladies first.”

“Oh how sweet,” I said sweetly and walked up to him, leaning on the cue stick when I was standing just inches from him. “I’m sorry but I don’t break; wouldn’t want to make you lose before the game even starts.”

“Cocky little thing, aren’t we?” He leaned down towards me and cocked a brow, grabbing the stick with one hand just above mine as he stepped around me, straightening up.  He set his beer down on the side of the table and leaned over the edge, aiming at the white cue ball.  The cross was lying on the table surface upside down, giving me a view of the inverted pentagram on the back.  Odd.  The two symbols, the cross and inverted pentagram, conflicted against each other.  Complete opposite meanings.

The sound of the rack breaking snapped my attention away from his necklace and to the table, making me watch as a stripe ball went in.  He stood up straight and grinned at me, making me stick my tongue out at him.  His perfect smile showed his perfectly white teeth and made my smile grow.  His was charming.  Heart stopping almost.  Probably not something often seen by others.

“Lucky shot.”

“Ha!  Luck has nothing to do with it.” He took a quick drink of beer as he stepped around me, not turning his back to me.  His long frame bent over the table again, his eyes focusing on the white cue ball. “So…about your number…”

“We’ll see how things go while we’re here; don’t get your hopes up.  I’m not all that easy to impress.  You’ve got one pool game to try and get me to find reason to give you my number,” I warned.  I leaned against the table and took a drink from my bottle, keeping my eyes on him.  He didn’t have his smile on his face anymore; instead it was pure focus: his mouth in a straight line, eyes on nothing but the white cue ball, jaw clenched and body stiff.  He had long legs which were attractive with his build, but his torso was what had got my attention as well.  Long, lean, and slightly muscular.  His T-shirt pulled over his back and just a couple inches above the waistline of his jeans, which showed me just a little bit of his boxers.  Black.  The front of his shirt remained loose, the V-cut hanging away from his chest. “I have to know you a little better before I give my number out.”

“Good plan.” He hit the cue ball at a stripe ball, looking away from the table and at me.  The ball hit off of the side and stopped just short of a hole. “What’s your last name?”