Love & Exorcisms | 18+ | COMPLETE |

- Chapter 52 -

Damian

Damian had never shared a bed for more than a night. But now, when he had drank his whiskey and read until his eyes ached and was ready to retire, it was to find Samara waiting in his bed. Wide-eyed, eager, insatiable. A woman after his own heart and so much more. She challenged him just as much in his own bed as she did in every other aspect of his life - but instead of sassy words her tongue brought him pleasures and her body was a haven into which he gladly entered. And when she woke before him in the morning, she did not let him sleep long - he woke to her beneath the covers, that tongue of hers seeking an early breakfast.

He almost could have forgotten why she was even there. He could have forgotten that she was dangerous, and that things lurked within her that could make the most stoic man tremble. Almost...

If it weren't for Kiiji.

The reaper remained strangely absent as the days went on, until a week had passed and Damian had not heard even a whisper from him. He still felt him now and then when he was at work - a chill would go over him as he shelved books or looked over papers, and he could feel eyes on him in the college halls. When he sat with Asylum patients in his office, taking careful notes as they spoke, he'd catch glimpses of red hair out of the corner of his eye. But the reaper would not make a full appearance, and seemed altogether gone from the house. At first Damian didn't mind - the silence was refreshing. But a question still nagged at him that he hadn't had to the opportunity to ask:

Why had Kiiji told Samara not to rely on him for safety?

The woman was in a fragile enough mental state as it was: she didn't need Kiiji giving her some strange ideas that she couldn't trust Damian. Yet he had a feeling there was more to it than that. That perhaps Kiiji had let slip something he had not intended, a clue to the things he knew about but was forbidden to tell.

Damian was determined to find out.

He put Samara to bed, lay with her until her breath had grown steady and she was limp and warm in the blankets. Then he crept away, through silent dark halls, to the dim library. It was frigidly cold in there, curtains pulled back to let the moonlight stream in. He meandered along the shelves, but there was no particular volume he was seeking.

"Looking for me?"

Kiiji's voice drifted to him from the far corner. He sat in the chair by the window, his legs folded and splayed, lounging in his seat like an undignified child. Damian approached, hands in his pockets to fend off the cold.

"Aye," he said. "Been looking for you for a week now. You're avoiding me."

Kiiji scoffed. "I can hardly avoid you, Damian, I'm tethered to you. I couldn't avoid you if I wanted to."

Damian rolled his eyes. "Well then you're avoiding speaking with me."

Kiiji closed the book he'd been reading and set it aside. "You act as if I'm some jealous wife skirting around her husband. You have plenty on your plate and I've had nothing to talk about."

"You talked with Samara."

Kiiji's expression immediately became careful, guarded. He sucked his teeth and said, "I did. Someone had to. All you'll do is baby her and Iscariot couldn't give advice to save his life." He shrugged. "Besides, you and Iscariot can't see them when they come. I can. I understand how they look...I understand when they're harmless...and when they aren't. She needs to be able to differentiate when there is a threat and when it's only an illusion. You can't tell her that difference. I can."

"And what about your Treatise?" Damian said. "All your rules, they don't include anything about not helping a victim of possession?"

Kiiji huffed in exasperation, and floated up from his chair and to his feet. "Oh they include plenty, Damian. I'm bound left and right by that damned Treatise! I know you just love to act as if I don't give it all away because it's a funny little game to speak in riddles and withhold crucial information, but I'm trying to survive. I'm trying to fly under the Council's radar because its damned suspicious enough that I've followed you about for nigh on 17 years without claiming your soul. As it is, if they ever found out what I did when you were child to save your life, my existence would eradicated."