Crescent

14.2

In silence, Vera sat on the far end of the small couch, keeping herself as small as possible. When Zeno didn't volunteer anything else, she chewed her lip to ease the growing frustration inside her. It was like pulling teeth any time she tried to get him to answer anything, a struggle she thought would be eased by their newfound method of communication. His undefined hand signals weren't the problem, nor was his playful nature. Something heavier was wedged between them, an unspoken, haunting agreement that he held with the house. The truth was there, laid out at her feet as plainly as the pool of blood in the once-sterile room above the basement, as stark as the writing on the wall upstairs.

The other creations... Zeno shifted after a long pause, speaking slowly through her mind and with his shaking hands as well. They were more like the unseelie than the fae that Orion and Elizabeth wanted to mimic. They tried to create something that could wield magic without a primal source so that no matter what destruction the monster created, their creature would always be able to harness magic. But as long as they had no connection to a source, the homunculus could never be a seelie. Orion hated and feared what he had created.

"What happened to the other researchers, Zeno?" Vera cut in. If she let him off on a tirade unguided, she would never learn what she wished to know. "The other experiments? You cursed Orion, that much I know, but why are you the only one left?" Why does this house cry in your presence?

He sat up, his jaw set tight though his eyes glittered with a sliver of amusement, his memories taunting her again. When I learned that I was going to be turned over to the Council as the success of Orion's project, that he was going to be praised for what he had done, I couldn't let it end that way. Not when his final act as head researcher was to hunt down and kill his pitiful failures that had escaped into the woods to get away from his cruel hand. He was going to be awarded and accepted by his people, forever renowned for his achievements, known as the one who brought an end to the terror of the unseelie. With a scoff, he pushed to his feet and crossed to the window, slipping into a pale beam of faint moonlight that washed his alabaster skin to ghostly white. He dragged aside the tattered curtains to expose the thin slit of a silver moon in the sky. It was even smaller than the crescent she had seen above the Moon Court.

Meanwhile, Zeno continued as he gazed out the window, his hands still as his words flowed to her. I would be chained until my duty was done, and I wasn't foolish enough to believe my life would continue once I had served my purpose. I am just as much of a monster to your people as the unseelie is.

Vera wet her lips, suddenly frozen as the weight of his words pressed against her. "So... you killed all of them?"

No. He dropped the curtain and snapped his gaze back to her so quickly that she flinched under his scrutiny. This time, his hands spoke as well. Orion gathered his strongest men and left to hunt the dangerous experiments that had escaped. I cursed them, twisted their bodies and darkened their souls so that they became the same as the monsters they sought to hunt, and I doomed them to roam the forest forever under the watch of the unseelie. As for the other researchers, I pulled their minds apart piece by piece until they could no longer determine what was real and what was the result of their insanity. Many killed themselves, but there were some that turned on each other. Researchers tore apart researchers. My claws tasted no blood. But Elizabeth...

Vera shot up from the couch. The world rocked beneath her, and she stumbled, her mind reeling. Horror seized her by the throat—as vicious as any beast, it sank its teeth deep into her flesh. He regarded her calmly, but the look only made her blood boil. Her hand settled against her sword, ready to strike as soon as he made a move, but he never did. Nor did he have to, it seemed. He dealt in curses and evil magic that turned the mind on itself. If he willed it so, he could kill her with the wave of his hand—or worse, make her take her own life.