The Thief

“Okay,” I say, “is it just me, or is this guy totally hitting on your grandma?”

I glance at Jul, expecting her to be embarrassed or something, but she’s gone pale, staring at the page.

“I mean, if it’s creepy or whatever, I understand - ”

A shadow looms from the doorframe, and I look up, expecting Destin. “Dude, where have you - ”

But this is not my best friend. This is Meredith, the so-called Ender.

The lanky tattooed woman leans lazily against the doorframe, a bottle swinging loose in her other hand. She blinks at us, as if not entirely sure we’re there, and upends the last of whatever’s in the bottle. Apparently satisfied we’re real, she gives us an unsteady, suspicious glare.

This time I really take a good look at her. The red tattoos I’d thought were blocky look more like flames on second inspection, covering one side of her throat and down one arm. Bits also seem to peek from around her hairline, though her dark, tangled hair obscures it. She has a wide, small-featured face with grey eyes that seem over-large by comparison. About Jul’s height, but not quite as thin. She wears a sleeveless shirt and pants made of weathered, scorched brown leather.

Pointing a finger at us, the woman says, “You shouldn’t be here.” She tosses the bottle into a corner where it shatters against the wall, and advances on Jul and I. We both take steps back, hearing the floor crack loudly. The timber beneath us buckles and collapses. My stomach sinks as we fall; then, a hard yank on my arm as it nearly comes out of the socket. The woman has a firm grip on my wrist, and on Jul’s, who’s dangling next to me, staring up in shock. The arsonist saved us?

“That’s why you shouldn’t be here,” she says, chuckling. “You know this rat pit is condemned, don’t you?”

I feel my wrist start to scorch. “Ow, ow, ow!” I yelp, almost wishing she’d just drop me, even though I can’t see what’s in the darkness below.

“Minor burns or rocky death, your choice. Don’t be a pansy, reach up and help yourself,” Meredith says, slurring. “My hands are full and I don’t have super strength, you know.”

Wincing, I reach up with my free hand and lever myself back onto the floor. I start to get up to help Jul, but Meredith is already pulling her over.

“Are you okay?” I demand, as Jul gets to her feet, but she’s looking in confusion at the hand-shaped burn around my wrist. Her arms are unmarked.

Meredith is intrigued, eyes roving over Jul. “Well now,” she says, running a finger under Jul’s chin. “That is a new development.”

I take Jul’s hand and pull her away. There’s a fine tremor in her fingers and I grip tighter. We edge toward the wall.

Meredith is still scrutinizing her every feature. “You seem familiar. Is it you? Several shades too pretty for the Wolf, if you ask me, but what do I know?” She laughs, as if at a private joke. She reaches a hand out for Jul, grinning widely.

I hear a shriek and a tailed shadow falls from the rafters, tangling up in Meredith’s hair. The imp scratches at her face, leaving smoking red lines. Weaving as she tries to pull it off her, she bellows curses at the thing; long, impressive strings of profanity, some in languages I’d never heard. She stumbles, losing her footing, and falls over the edge. The imp leaps free, gliding to land on the edge of the sinkhole. It blinks its wide, yellow eyes at me, posture smug.

Still in shock, I edge closer to peer into the hole. There’s a faint glow coming from what must be two stories down. Is there some sort of cave underneath this place? No wonder it’s condemned.

In the yellowish glow, I can make out the shape of Meredith impaled on a stalagmite, the calcified rock poking up through her midsection. She groans, lifting her head, looking at the injury. “Son of a bitch,” she swears, but sounding more annoyed than anything else.

That’s when I notice the glow is coming from her wounds. Magma seeps out around the hole in her chest, melting through the stalagmite. She wrenches the spike away, tossing it aside and standing with a groan.

“That was my last shirt!” she yells up, a ragged circle showing just below her ribs where her flesh is reforming.

Holy. Crap.

I look at Jul. “Um, make a break for it?” I suggest.

She nods frantically, snatching up the velvet box where it had fallen.

“Blighting mortals, can’t you at least toss down my other bottle!” Meredith’s petulant voice follows us as we hurry out to find Destin and Camille.

“I didn’t hear her,” Camille bemoans. “What’s wrong with me?”

“Well the good news is, you saw how freaked Dez was and look! Not a single feather,” I say, thumping him on the back. “Mind over matter, right buddy?”

“Huh? I wasn’t thinking about that at all,” he admits.

We’d agreed that we needed to be long gone before Meredith found her way out of the cave, and Jul’s house was closest, and empty. Ms. Bea was working at the library again today and Jul insisted that she was going to find something to bandage my arm.

A light rustle in the dead leaves makes me glance back, and for the first time I’m relieved to see those unnatural yellow eyes instead of something else.

“Why is it following us?” Destin asks, unnerved, looking over his shoulder at the imp. It darts between the barren trees, keeping mostly out of sight and about twenty feet back, but it’s definitely following us.

“I don’t know, maybe it’s checking to see if we run into any more fire-breathing immortals on the way to grandmother’s house. And speaking of, what was she talking about, the wolf?”

“Wolf?” Camille repeats.

“Yeah, she wanted to know if Jul was a wolf. Is that like a metaphor, or...?”

“Monster,” Camille says.

I raise my eyebrows at her, my surprise almost masking the steady throb of pain in my wrist. “Oh yeah? What do you know about it?”

“Story Gabriel tells. Once upon a time,” she says slowly, as if trying to remember the words, “there were seven heroes. They fought many monsters and saved many kingdoms. Won treasure, fame, love - even some kingdoms for themselves. With time, they became arrogant. Lazy. Selfish. It was...nan no itta...” she mutters to herself, “they ah, ‘bought into their own hype.’ So, the gods cursed them, making them into the same monsters they once swore to destroy. Cursed them to return always, to remind all mortals.” Her gaze is distant as she looks up at the roof of Jul’s house rising above the treeline.

“Remind them what?” Destin prompts.

Back to earth, she glances at him. “This is what happens when you waste a gift,” she says.

I scrape my shoes on the doormat at the back door, certain that Ms. Bea will murder me if I track anything into her house. I leave my mud-spackled jacket outside for the same reason. The interior looks no different from before Jul got there - same peeling floral wallpaper, same faded decorative china hung on the walls. Same little old lady smell of dusty porcelain and regular baking.

“There’s got to be a medicine cabinet somewhere,” Jul says, pulling open drawers in the kitchen. “I’m sure I can find something for your arm.”

“I’m totally fine, don’t worry about it,” I say, but it’s a blatant lie. Meredith’s handprint around my wrist is a blistered, angry red. I hold the arm gingerly, trying not to wince.

“There’s nothing here,” Jul frowns into the last drawer. “It’s all ladles and potholders.”

“Check the bathroom?” Destin suggests.

“There aren’t any cabinets in the half-bath on this floor,” Jul says, then hesitantly, “but there is a bathroom attached to Bea’s room.” She looks down the hall, as if the idea of going in there is sacrilege.

“Really, I’m fine,” I say again.

“You’re not,” she insists. “I’ll...I’ll be right back.”

I glance around the kitchen, lifting the lid on a jar. “Think she’s got cookies stashed somewhere?”

“We’re not supposed to be here,” Destin reminds me. “That means leaving things the way we found