Nightbound

Chapter 6- Glimpse through the veil

We drove out of Ivy's mansion in stark quietness.

The ghoul gave us a hesitant wave and shut those thick iron doors, the sound transposing around the air for a few seconds before it died down. We left Garden District quickly and soon we were driving through the Bourbon Street. Contrasting last night's facade, the party had ended in the day and people busied themselves with the chores, preparing for the next night.

I had gone cold all over. That was the only feeling which could possibly describe my current state. My fingers were wrapped painfully around a glimmering old book which Ivy had shoved on my hands before parting. She had told, it was a gift from her side...for many adventures to live through memories and magic. Not to mention million of words written inside which would take me a months to finish. I wasn't an avid reader because I sincerely had no time. I woke up in the morning, worked till late 8 and came back, crashed and slept. Then woke up and repeated.

Sometimes my boss made me work on the weekends.

Sometimes I wanted to strangle my boss to death and the only reason I hadn't was because he was paying me a good sum...toned down to the amount of work I actually did. I will try to strangle him when I go back to Seattle. Or maybe that bloodwraith will strangle be prior.

Bloodwraith.

I was hunted by a bloodwraith.

Neither I have ever heard of it nor ever thought they existed. But hey, who was I kidding; after all, I had the first hand experience of how it looked and how it worked. More likely...what it could really inflict. But the bloodwraith was a minute problem compared to the question which was swirling in my mind. Ivy had said someone summoned a bloodwraith, like called it from whatever hellish dimension that fucker belonged. It meant...that bloodwraith wasn't the real danger. The one who had summoned was.

Nik drove tensely. His hands were holding the steering wheel in knuckle-white grip, eyes trained ahead and forehead stamped in a deep frown. His jaw was tight just like his state. He was deadly serious...and scared.

But then I noticed something which I of course had before but this time...it was adhere different.

His golden-blonde hair was straight; wild bangs which had fallen on his face just missing his lashes. His face was sharp and angular, a face which will instantly flash on a magazine cover. But it was marred with ardent solemnity which had gripped both of us. My anticipation of death and his prospect of protecting his job.

Feeling my gaze on him, he slowly turned and I found myself observing the silver swirling orbs carrying a burden which was forced upon him.

"What?"

I spoke in a languid voice, "Do you have a plan?"

"I do." He turned the car sharply and we bounded to a suddenly populous road.

I bit my lips and took my phone out, now fully functional and charged. I switch it on and immediately a torrent of messages and emails covered the notification bar. Most of the emails were work related, spam and a few from loan companies, offering me to take more credits as if I wasn't already in knee-deep clog of mom's sad musings.

Whenever I remembered about her and the things she did to me, a triggering rush of fury surrounded me and all I saw was my hands choking the life out of her thin throat. The only thing I got from her was the short built because I looked nothing like her. I had an inside joke regarding my parentage—my dad contributed for my appreciable genes while my mom carried me in her pre-booked womb.

How could my dad even like my mother?

I guess it was reason he left her as well.

My deepest fear which always haunted me was that my father wouldn't be aware of my existence, that there was somebody in the world he created and didn't know. And other than that, I was scared he might...not be alive at all. Since my mother never showed me a single picture, all I could imagine was a man with silver hair and light green eyes like me.