Runes of Truth (A Demon's Fall #1)(3)
“Evie . . . protectors don’t come after me, but you know I will be hunted when I’m older. It’s why you teach me how to fight, it’s why we live in the middle of Scotland. I want to know why they come after you, as you already know why they will surely come after me,” she says, seeming much older than she should. I’ve always known why they will come after Hali one day, but I won’t let anyone touch her.
“I don’t know why they come after me, Hali, but I know they can find me because of my rune name. Protectors can always find another protector if they know their rune name,” I explain to her the little I actually know. I don’t even want to think about my asshole ex who told me all this stuff about my own kind.
“Like a tracker?” she asks, thinking about it. “Why don’t you remove the rune name off your skin? It doesn’t give you powers like your others.”
“The problem is, I don’t even know what my rune name says, and have no clue how anyone else could know it. I won’t remove it, not until I know. I was born with it, whether it’s a curse or not, it’s mine. It’s all the answers I have to my past, and one day I will find out what it says,” I explain to her, and her eyes cloud over in sadness. I often forget what she was born with herself, and why she lost everything because of it.
“Could it be your family that know? That send their people to kill you?” she asks.
“I don’t have any family, other than you,” I reply quickly.
“I mean blood family. You had to have had a mother and father, and it would make sense they would know your rune name,” she says.
“I don’t get why the person hunting me doesn’t just come after me, themself, but that’s not your problem,” I say. “Now let’s change the subject to something less depressing.”
“Like watching the new Catfish episodes?” she says, thankfully changing the subject despite the sadness I still see in her eyes. I smile at the big, fake grin on her face. She is addicted to these shows, and I can’t say I don’t find them funny and addictive.
“Go on, then,” I say, smiling at her overexcited face as she grabs the remote.
Evie
“Faster, you need to hit that quicker and jump a tad higher next time,” I warn Hali, and she nods, listening to me for once. That’s a surprise; since she became a teenager, she stopped listening like her ears fell off or something. I watch as she steps back, runs and jumps in the air, throwing her dagger at the same time at the moving targets, and she hits one dead in the centre. That’s my girl. I hold my hand up, high-fiving her before picking my own daggers up. “Perfect!”
“It only took five goes,” she says proudly, and I pat her shoulder. It would have been two goes if she’d listened to me the first time I offered her advice.
“How’s school?” I ask her as she sits down on the bench. I glance at the other five demons in the training room at a local private gym, each of them training their demon children. It’s the only safe place to train around here, even if the demons look scared of us. Well, more Hali. They know what she is, and that she shouldn’t be training with demons and me.
“Crap, as usual,” she rolls her eyes at me. I step onto the marked ‘x’ and hold my dagger up, watching the moving targets, and throwing one, hitting the head of the target perfectly.
“Come on, there must be more,” I push her for more of an answer, and she sighs.
“Fine, the human kids are crap to me because they know I’m not one of them and all of the supes ignore me. I basically just go to class, eat lunch alone, and then come home,” she says. I pause at her lost tone, putting the daggers down, and going to sit next to her. I bump her shoulder, making her look at me like I’m mad.
“You don’t need friends, you have me,” I say the only thing I can think of. I didn’t go to school, so I don’t have a clue what she is going through. I know she can’t leave that school, it’s the only place there are no witches and no one to notice her. It’s safe there for her, and I won’t be able to find another school like it. Its why we live in a sleepy town in Scotland, just outside of Inverness. Inverness is busy enough that no one notices me and Hali when we come here to train and buy stuff.
“But you’re too old to be my friend,” the cheeky little shit replies. I ruffle her hair, making her laugh as she pushes me away before putting my arm around her shoulder, and pulling her to me for a hug.
“I’m not old, so don’t try that with me, and I know it’s shit. People are like that, its best you learn it now and not later,” I say, and she sighs, hugging me tightly for a second before standing up.
“I know that, it still doesn’t change that I get lonely sometimes. I don’t really have a future to look forward to,” she says, turning around, and walking away quickly. I want to tell her she does, but lying to her never feels right. She is growing up, and it’s hard to accept. I pick two of the daggers up, and I hear a shout, and then a loud gunshot followed by a scream. I turn around, see an alleyway door open, and the noise is coming from there as another scream fills the training room. The demons all run away as I run straight towards the door, sliding out and see a dead demon man on the ground, there’s a gunshot hole where his heart should be. There are two men holding a young demon woman between them, pushing her into the wall, and ripping her clothes as she screams. Blood pours down from a cut on her forehead, and her scared eyes meet mine before she mouths “help”.