A Guardian Angel-in-training. A soul-eating djinn. A werewolf ex-convict torn between love and vengeance. More than a heart hangs in the balance.
Season 1 of Into the Wild Dark
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Wrongfully-convicted Jack Slobodnik wants his life back. Four years...
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Ch. 9: Mal's Reasons
August 12 | Night
I peered from the office window as the waxing gibbous moon played hide and seek with fast-moving purple clouds. A spray of stars cast lots on the world. The circular drive of Ashivant Estate boasted a queue of lavish cars, each with the golden disc mirrored city skyline sigil of the Council of Overlay Affairs. It was representative of the maxim, "Quod est superius est sicut inferius," as above, so below.
There was someone standing at the open gate. Cherie. She basked in the silent drizzle, her fair skin, white dress, wind-swept hair floating around a face that was turned away from me. The trees that swallowed the departing road framed her in midnight, and she incandesced like some ephemeral creature, barely there.
With the oversized wolf LouLou by her side, the pair studied the route as if they might escape. But from within the hourglass case at my right hand, the black kingsnake lifted its angular head as if he knew their plan. Then my sister pivoted toward the manor, returning.
I collected what I had come for and hurried from the office.
A hush blanketed the house, broken only by my carmine stilettos connecting with the hardwood floor. Select members of the Council were waiting for me in the smoking room. When I entered, a coiffed and suited delegate ogled me from heels to side-parted hair and smiled the smile of a predator very used to chasing, but unwise in its pursuit. I hardly spared him a glance.
These were guests of Darcy's. Three men and a woman arranged themselves on parallel tufted scarlet davenports in front of the fireplace. With various and sundry spells of obscuration, they appeared to be ordinary people, but they were not. They were Supernaturals. The fifth person, Overlay Affairs President Richter Distefano, had positioned himself in a separate chair.
Darcy took up the center of the room, resplendent in a blue cashmere sweater and gray slacks. He was backlit by mock windows that bracketed the hearth. The neon lights embedded behind the glass mimicked the sunlight he could no longer endure. As I navigated past him, I struggled not to roll my eyes at his posturing. "Ravishing, as usual, poppet," he murmured. I dredged up a faux smile.
Ava beckoned from the edge of the room. I slipped into the seat beside her and resettled the stiff fabric of my dress. Her cool look of appraisal told me I had done well with the claret evening gown she had suggested for me.
"Where's Cherie?" Ava whispered.
"On the way," I replied.
Distefano was speaking: "No evidence, Darcy. You've sworn on all things holy that the property exists, but none of us has been able to account for it. Franky, I don't see the point of your obsession."
The other council members nodded. Distefano's stout frame was crammed into a leather armchair. He had a half-empty bottle of absinthe on the Moorish occasion table at his elbow. A Cuban cigar wafted smoke as he talked with his hands. A delicate onyx scented oil lamp warred with the odor with a melange of vanilla, sandalwood, and amber, undernotes of Turkish rose.
