Mona Lisa Craving by Sunny

Author:Sunny
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2008-02-26T16:00:00+00:00

THIRTEEN

AS DAYLIGHT EBBED, the house finally stirred and I was freed from the prison of my room. Thaddeus hadn’t returned yet; the space where he normally parked his car was still empty. I wanted to talk to him, tell him what I’d learned. Perhaps comfort myself with his presence. He was not aware yet of the revelations of the night before because he ran on a different time schedule than the rest of us did. The normal human cycle: sleeping at night, going to school during the day.

After school, in deference to our flip-flopped habits, Thaddeus usually studied at the library, doing his homework there so as not to disturb the rest of the sleeping household. And probably not wanting to be inhibited by us either, restricted by the need to be quiet. He returned to the house when the brilliant hues of sunset began to paint the sky.

Chami, Thaddeus’s unofficial guardian, hadn’t liked the idea at all. If it were up to him and the other men, Thaddeus and I would have been guarded at all times, Thaddeus because he was the men’s hope for a different future. My brother was the only male who could call down the moon’s light, who could Bask, something before now only Queens could do. They had wanted to put a guard around him 24/7. Both Thaddeus and I had balked at the idea. Thaddeus had argued that instead of protecting him, it would point him out as a target. His greatest safety lay in secrecy, in letting no others know of his gift. In treating him like a normal Mixed Blood. And trust me, they were not guarded around the clock. Far from it.

I’d backed Thaddeus because I had promised to try to give my brother as normal a life as possible…and because had I allowed the men this twenty-four-hour watch, the next person they would have imposed it on would have been me. Same blood that we were, we both were used to our freedom, and did not wish it restricted so.

Chami had finally relented, agreeing that Thaddeus would probably be safer among humans. In general, humans were much more peaceful and civilized than Monères were. In general, though, as I found out, did not take into account the high school teenage subspecies homo sapien idiotae. Schoolyard bullies.

Thaddeus made himself scarce that evening after returning home. And I saw why in multihued blue-and-purple glory when he slid quietly into his chair at dinner that night. He was sporting not only a black eye, but a bloody nose—one that had stopped bleeding not too long ago. The faint iron-rich scent of fresh blood clinging to him was unmistakable.

“Thaddeus, what in Hellfire happened to you?” Chami demanded, beating me to the question by a nanosecond.

I repeated the question. My version of it. “Yeah, what the fuck happened to you?”

I’d invited the Morells to join us for dinner, with thoughts of having them get to know us better. All thoughts of polite table talk,

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