Chapter Thirteen Page Nine, Dave and Elys, Eventide Manor

PREVIOUS PAGE

“Maybe I followed the path,” Elys said, “The one we took. And then I just followed your trail. It was pretty easy to find. I didn’t have to be a fucking eagle scout to notice all the broken branches and dried blood that you left behind.”

“What you’re saying is it’d be pretty easy for the police to find me here,” Dave said, “Whoopee.”

“But they haven’t,” Elys said, “Which means they probably won’t for quite some time, if at all.”

“I mean, where the hell am I? What’s this place even called?”

“The Red Door is a dead giveaway,” Elys said, “This place is one of the Red Keys’ houses. Eventide Manor I think. They probably planned explorations from inside of here and shit. It’s weird thinking about how at one point this house must have been swarming with people who believed they could pass into other worlds.”

“Sure, all of that made sense,” Dave said, “We can skip the exposition if you want and get straight to not understanding anything.”

“Good,” Elys said. She smiled.

“What?” Dave asked.

“Nothing,” she said, “This is just so fucking awesome. Hiding out in a house in the woods, on the run from the police, and you’re about to join me in the Bricklayers. All of this is too good to be true. You don’t understand, guy, I don’t have any friends in the society. In fact, I’m pretty sure most of them don’t like me. They think I’m only given any positions because my dad is the Mason’s Son and so I’m the Mason’s Son’s daughter.”

“Like you get unfair treatment or something?” Dave asked.

“Yeah,” she said, “I mean, they think I do. But they don’t know how much work I have to do all the time. So much fucking work, Dave. I have to get into skirmishes, usually with Grays. Do you have any idea how hard it is to fight a Pyreweaver? Or a Strifepalm? They get to use magic and all we’ve got are our own damn selves and whatever weapons we managed to bring along.”

“Are the Pyreweavers an organization?” Dave asked.

“Stop asking stupid questions,” Elys said.

“Oh ok,” he said, “From context I’ll have to assume Pyreweavers are members of the Grays. Which just makes so much sense. What are aliens doing here?”

“They’re not aliens,” Elys said, “Just freaks.”

“Freaks?” Dave asked.

“Yeah, totally,” Elys said, “Why would you question that? Has anything I’ve told you ended up being wrong?”

“Yeah,” Dave said, “I can think of a few things.”

“Like what?”

“For one you said we wouldn’t be killing a kid, just wrecking his car, which in retrospect was a pretty bad idea too,” he said, “But whatever, I don’t know why I’d question your assessment of the Grays. I guess I don’t know anything about them so I questioned you in order to find out who they are.”

“They’re a bunch of kids,” Elys said, “The elders have been vanishing lately, and so the kids are running things now. They’re running it like a gang.”

“A gang?”

“You ever see a bunch of kids hanging out at the mall with red or blue hair? Wearing gray clothes? Maybe those’re Grays.”

“Oh,” Dave said, “Now that you mention it, yeah, I’ve seen ‘em around. Why do you call them freaks?”

“Because Grays can…” she sighed, “Do magic, I guess.”

“Magic?” Dave asked.

“Yeah,” she said, “So can the Strifepalms.”

NEXT PAGE (?)