“I didn’t say that,” he snapped, but then his expression softened. “I’m a water elemental. Some refer to us as the Strigoi.”
Earth elementals, water elementals…there had to be others, but the more I learned, the more I thought I’d be better off not knowing. I recalled the mythology books I’d read in high school, but I didn’t remember them referring to the Strigoi as elementals.
“You turn into an owl and prey on infants?” I asked. “Their internal organs or whatever?”
Same thing, right?
“Sometimes we turn into owls, though it’s the Stryx who transform into owls exclusively,” he said. “Unfortunately, the Strigoi have somehow been tied in with the Stryx legends.”
“So you prey on infants or not?”
“No. Not infants.”
“Then what?”
“Animals.”
“Infant animals?”
His gaze hardened. “Is this what you want to know?”
No. I wanted to know what happened to my ancestor and how to cure the whispering curse. Instead, I’d been thrown into a world of elementals.
I added several creamers to my mug until the coffee thinned and clouded. I swirled my spoon in the mug. Click. Clank. Swirl. Click. Clank. Swirl. I’m not sitting in this booth I’ve wiped a hundred times, listening to a strange man tell me he can morph into an animal.
I found my voice. “What else?”
Charles leaned back and gave the edge of the table a tap of his fingers. “What do you mean…what else?”
“I mean, what else exists? Santa Claus, the Easter bunny?”
He smiled from behind his mug and took another sip. “You’re taking this better than I expected.”
“I get that a lot. My ‘time to panic’ meter has always been out of whack.” I stared into his eyes, but his gaze never wavered. “This doesn’t explain why you left.”
“I thought I could return in time, but when I got back, you were gone.” He looked out the diner window and frowned. “You’ve asked enough questions now. It’s not safe to know these things.”
“It’s not safe for me to not know, either,” I said. The last moments of the attack whisked through my mind. “The…eagle?”
“If I had chased him off in time, we wouldn’t be in this predicament.”
“But a bird?”
“In our animal form, our attacks are more potent to their kind.”
“So what took so long?” I asked.
“Shifting can take a while. Then I had to find you again.” His jaw tightened. “You didn’t stay where I left you.”
“Forgive me for wanting to stay alive.”
He nodded solemnly. “Everything happened quite quickly.”
As my trembling hand stirred my coffee, I stared at the milky swirls. “I don’t know what to say.”
My logical mind didn’t want to accept the revelation, but I would worry about making sense of everything later. Charles took the final sip of his coffee, then he reached across the table to still my hand. The clanking stopped. I lifted my gaze to meet his, and my nerves settled.
“I’m not going to say anything,” I promised. Not that anyone would believe me anyway.
“I wouldn’t have told you if I thought you would.”
“So you trust me?” I asked. “Why? I don’t trust you.” I bit my lip, immediately regretting my blurted sentiments.
His grin slipped, and he shook his head. “You’re a good person. You deserved to know.”
“You don’t know what kind of person I am.” Why was I arguing? It’s not like I wanted to convince him I was horrible.
“Sophia,” he said, leveling his gaze at me. “This is part of who I am. As a Strigoi, I can read auras. You will not leave me quickly fooled.”
“I don’t have an aura, re-mem-ber?”
Charles raised his eyebrows at my immature over-enunciation. “All elementals have their gifts,” he said. “The Strigoi’s ability to read auras was intended to detect and hunt the corrupt Cruor. It’s said those who don’t have an aura come from a pure soul.”
Seriously? I was a liar and a thief. How was that ‘pure’? “If that’s the case, then why did you think I was following you?”
“You could have been under Marcus’ influence. Or starting down a bad path. I gave you the benefit of the doubt.”
“So your kind hunts the corrupt Cruor. Does this mean you can get rid of Marcus?”
“We’re intended to hunt them. We’re not mindless robots. We haven’t all become hunters.”
“Can you get rid of him or not?”
“I understand your concerns, but no, I cannot ‘get rid of him’. While it was inexcusable for him to break into your house, I have no authority to intervene. As it stands, the Cruor can’t afford to draw any attention to themselves with menial tampering in humans’ lives, and if I went after him, it would only make things worse for us both.”
“I can’t risk it,” I said. “I need to do something. What can I do?”
“I suppose you will stay with me.” He sighed wearily.
Gee, don’t sound too enthused.