Hopelessly Broken

44. Underground Streets

6.06.20

Oliver lead me into what appears to be their town, and people were definitely staring at us. It probably isn't every day that the prince parades a human around, so I should probably be honored. No one dared give me a dirty look out of fear they would get shanked, but I could see that some people were excited at my presence. Kids were pointing at us while we walked, and I was really tempted to go talk to them. I listened as Oliver showed me proudly around his home, but something caught my eye. There's a girl in the crowd that I've seen before, but I can't remember where for my life. She was smiling brightly with an arm curled around a smaller demon girl, and it made my heart warm up to see their relationship.

Suddenly, a little kid ran towards us. The young boy was adorable, and I easily dropped onto my knees to catch the child. Oliver looked down at me, but all he had was a smile on his face. Not one of those fake things, but a genuine grin. A frantic parent came after their child, and I lifted the young boy into her arm. She gratefully nodded her head before evaporating into the crowd once more, and Oliver continued dragging me around. I can tell how much pride he takes in his home, but that was pretty normal seeing as it was a very nice town.

"And now we're back where we started!"

"It's very nice; I'm shocked that it all came up in just 17 years."

"We've all worked very hard, and it's going to be hard going back once we take down my father." In that moment, my stomach growled rather loudly, and I turned beet red at the sound. "Oh! Sorry, I forgot that mortals have to eat."

"It's alright, I honestly forgot I had to eat temporarily, too."

"Come on, let's find you something. I can't promise that it'll be good, but we can probably get some from Pana's soulmate."

***

We were in the residential part of the underground, but this time we had teleported so that we didn't have as much attention on us. Oliver knocked on the front door, and I recognized the person who answered from earlier. She was the demon girl hanging off the one I remembered from somewhere. "Hppe npsojoh qsjodf Pmjwfs." Yeah, their language makes no sense to me. The girl had bowed down while speaking, so I assumed it was some kind of greeting.

"J'n mppljoh gps gppe. Efwpo offet ju, boe J epo'u gbuf ju." While Oliver spoke, he gestured towards me, and the demon seemed to understand.

We were lead into the house, and I was left with the demon girl's soulmate. "Hi. It's nice to meet you, I'm Devon. I feel like I recognize you from... Somewhere?"

"I've never met you before today, but my name is Maggie."

Maggie... Maggie... God where have I heard that before!? I know her, but she's never seen me... What could yield that result? Social media? No, I've never touched that garbage in my life. Maybe it was in passing at the orphanage? She doesn't strike me as someone I would have met there. This is going to mess with me all night. Speaking of nights, what happened between me and Jack last night? All I remember is Blake telling me about being a science experiment.

Wait a second, I remember now! Jack tried to kiss me... New record; two guys trying to kiss me in less that 24 hours. My reaction was absolutely horrible, but it's the same thing as I told Oliver; I want to be sure that I'm giving away my first kiss to the right person. My actions must have hurt Jack a lot, though. First his sister, now me, how many other people is he going to lose? Sister... Oh shit this is Jack's sister! How do I say that in a conversation? I can't just be like, 'oh by the way, your parents replaced you with me!'

Oliver came back into the room, and he grabbed my arm tightly before teleporting me back. We landed in his bedroom, and I took the bread he offered. It wasn't much, but it was strangely good. "Apparently Pana's soulmate is very good at baking, so it's fresh."

"Interesting."

"You must be tired, I'll let you get some rest."

"I actually don't sleep... I'm part vampire." Oliver cringed at my words, and I assumed that there's history between demons and vampires that I don't know. "I don't know exactly how much; my family is complicated. I'm mostly werewolf."

Oliver calmed down a bit, and he smiled brightly at me. "Sorry, there's just tension."

"I figured. I don't really know much about supernatural history since I didn't even know my identity until a week ago, so I don't exactly know what happened."

"Just major territory wars since we share the same prey."

"Prey?"

"Innocent humans taste the best as both blood and souls. The thing is that once a vampire takes blood from someone, their souls are off limits, or we'll end up getting ill. Once their numbers got too large, it was rare to find a good soul to eat, and we ended up with the meager pickings."

"I'm sorry that happened to you all."

"It isn't your fault. You don't even seem to drink blood."

"I can't say I've tried; I never had a reason. Anyways, it's good that I only have one of your necessities to remember because I find it hard to think about it. Even though I need souls to survive, I try to keep myself satisfied enough to not lose my control."

"You say you eat souls... What does that do to a person?"

"We only take from dead bodies, and it's actually necessary for the health of the universe. When a demon eats, that's when the soul can be transferred to the afterlife. Ghosts are just those who's souls are still trapped on the earth, and that's why a lot are violent. We don't really like taking the souls off of bad people because of the foul taste, but sometimes they wreak enough trouble on the humans that we have to. Anyone that dies from a vampire bite is forever stuck unless they get sent on by a medium or cause enough problems to make it worth the death of a low ranking demon. Although if they're really bad, we get the reward of torturing them!"

"So really you're helpful to the universe? You get a really bad wrap from everyone on earth."

"It's just prejudice, but my father did nothing to help. Most of us only have good intentions, but he is genuinely evil. Taking souls from the living, taking the living from their homes. We've only ever taken one– well two, counting you– mortals directly from the earth ourselves. The other was only taken because she was originally being taken to my father, but their party was intercepted. She happened to be the soulmate to one of my demons, so she stayed."

"Maggie, right?"

"Mhm."

"Her family really misses her."

"She knows, but she has a home here now. She doesn't want to go back just to leave again to hang around with Pana. That would hurt them more."

"It would."

"We should probably be staying in the castle for the rest of the night; it can get a bit... Frisky on the streets. I don't think someone as innocent as you would appreciate it."

"Yeah, let's stay here. I'm sure there's something fun to do."