Secret of The Night

I opened my eyes, uncertain of why I was still breathing. With no pain. I fell backwards on my butt and scooted backwards quickly. Yoru had stuck his arm between the eunuch’s teeth and my neck, and now those creepily long incisors punctured Yoru’s pale pale skin.

But there was no blood. Just Yoru screaming silently, and the eunuch realizing he made a critical mistake, but too deep in to withdraw. I looked around, all those years of playing paintball kicking in. Frantically, I grabbed a garden shovel and smacked the eunuch’s head with it, as hard as I could.

Unfortunately, this did not play out like a bad movie. Hence, the eunuch did not drop to the floor dead and Yoru did not look at me dreamily for saving his life.

The smack actually did not work. By that, I mean there was absolutely no effect whatsoever. He didn’t even turn around. I forgot that the demons have the strength of a hundred men.

I didn’t have anything else I could smack the guy with, and Yoru was getting even more pale, if that was possible, so I did the only thing I could think of.

This portion may elicit undesirable emotions due to the graphic horror of the words. Read on at your own risk.

I gripped my garden shovel, faced its metal point up, crouched down, and jammed it between the eunuch’s legs. Now, I wasn’t even sure if demons had penises, but it looks like they do, and that it’s just as sensitive as a human’s, because the eunuch screeched and let go immediately. I winced as blood, which was actually red, came spurting out of the wound I had created.

The eunuch fell back on the concrete pavement and hit his head on the fragile wooden pillar supporting the climbing Arum Lily. For a second, nothing happened. Then the pillar broke and the entire left side of the arch of toxic blooms came crashing down over the eunuch. I sucked in air through my teeth and whistled.

I looked back at Yoru, expecting him to laugh with me.

“Holy crap! Yoru!” I rushed to his side, where he was unconscious on the pavement. The wound in his arm was enormous and ugly, two clean puncture wounds so deep I could see his bone. I shook his shoulders, willing him to wake up and be ok.

I felt his hand grab mine and pull. I fell on his chest, and the heat rushed to my face. I pushed myself up with my free hand. “What’s wrong? Yoru, do you need help?”

Without opening his eyes, he said, “That was. Bad. Ass.” And then his hand went slack.

Crap. What the fuck do I do now?

“Help!!” I shouted, running out the door of the greenhouse and finding Erik. “Yoru-Yoru got bitten by the head eunuch! And now he’s dead or something!”

“Jaden did that? Ok, take me there,” Erik didn’t really look fazed at all, which kind of made me speculate just what kind of mischief Jaden had done in the past.

I nodded and ran back, Erik’s footsteps a step behind me. Yoru remained prone on the pavement floor, and Jaden (head eunuch guy that tried to kill me) was still partially buried under nearly 500 deadly, coma-inducing, and fragrant Arum lilies.

I turned around, ready to point out the patient (Yoru) to Erik, but he had already rushed to the prince’s side. I kneeled down next to him. “Uh, so Jaden tried to kill me for some reason; I don’t know why, and then Yoru stuck his arm in and Jaden ended up biting Yoru. And then I grabbed a shovel and stuck it up his, um, yeah. And then he fell back, hit the pillar, and all the flowers fell on him.” I forced a sheepish smile, even though my palms were sweating and I kept praying for Yoru to open his eyes.

“Okay, I’m going to take him to the Royal Physician.” Erik scooped Yoru up like he was a sack of flour, although I’m guessing he weighed about 65 kg. He ran out of the room and up the stairs with astonishing speed, leaving me gaping in the room and then scurrying after him.

We ran up the stairs to the third floor, where all the guest and royal chambers were located. Erik princess carried the demon prince to about the 5th room left from the grand spiraling staircase, unceremoniously kicked down the door (even though there was a perfectly functioning doorknob), and laid His Highness down carefully on one of five sheet-covered cots in the corner of the room. There were paper butterflies hung from the ceiling every foot apart.

“Physician!” Erik yelled into the adjoining room, whose door was ajar.

“How many times, Erik, have I told you? I have a name. Use it.” A middle-aged woman came strolling out, pushing her bright pink glasses up on her pointy nose. She wore an authentic white lab coat and had on outlandish makeup, with deep violet eyeshadow and hot pink lipstick. Her hair had been styled into the beehive fashion that had so popular in the 60s. Erik nudged me discreetly, and I stopped staring, ashamed.

“I know you do. It just seems a little strange to use it, Doctor Strawberry,” Erik grimaced as he said the words. I turned around to the wall, hastily forced myself to sober up, and turned back.

Dr. Strawberry glared at Erik from the top of her disturbingly pink glasses. “Alright then, what seems to be the problem?”

Erik put on his Royal Guard face again and said in a low voice, “It’s His Highness. It seems that one of our own has bitten him and drawn blood.”

Strawberry nodded and proceeded to prod the unconscious Yoru with a plethora of different medical tools, most of which I was pretty sure only existed in this realm. Or maybe I was just uninformed about the variety of human surgical equipment.

After a few moments of prodding, Dr. Strawberry announced, “I need to start an transfusion line. Bring me some blood, Erik. Hurry up; they’re in the back room.”

Erik rushed away and I inched forward. “Don’t you need his blood type?”

The woman stared at me over her glasses and pursed her lips. “Seems like you’re new in these parts. We don’t have blood types. Any kind of human blood will do.”

I shivered and moved back a few steps. Erik came out from the back room and handed the red bags to the doctor, who then hung the bags onto a pole and inserted a needle into Yoru’s left arm, the arm that hadn’t been marred by Jaden’s teeth.

“Alright, it’s all set. Erik and the girl, you can leave now. Go do your own thing. Prince Yoru will be up and about in a few hours, maybe a day.” Dr. Strawberry made a shooing motion at us and went into her office, then closed and presumably locked the door.

“I’ll stay and watch. It’s my fault he got hurt anyway. You go,” I told Erik. He nodded stoically and left. I heard his footsteps retreat down the stairs and back to his position at the bottom of the stairwell.

I pulled up a small wooden stool next to Yoru’s cot and sat down. I looked at his face and sighed.

He looks like he’s sleeping.

“I’m so sorry, Yoru. But why did you even try to protect me? Because you have my blood?” I whispered. I folded my arms down on the side of his cot and laid my head to rest there, closing my eyes and trying to fall asleep so I could let my worries wash away, like the tide and the sand.

I woke up to somebody gently stroking my hair. My face was turned away from Yoru, so I just held still, pretending I was still asleep.

When his hand fell to his side again, I lifted my head. He was awake, staring at the ceiling.

“Yoru?” I said quietly. “You’re awake?”

“Mm,” he mumbled.

“How are you feeling? The doctor said that you will be fine, since she gave you blood and everything.”

He looked at the crimson bags hanging from his patient’s pole and closed his eyes. “Why are you still here? Aren’t you disgusted? We got that blood from a human!”

I grimaced. I was hoping he wouldn’t bring that up. “Yeah, but it’s keeping you alive. So, I’m grateful for this human. Whoever he or she was, I’m thankful.”

Yoru stared at me, uncomprehending.

I sighed. “Ok, that was a lie. Or partially, at least. Of course I’m disgusted. But what I said before is also somewhat true. I am grateful.”

That must have sounded sincere enough for him, because he smiled softly at me. And then my stupid heart started racing, and I don’t even know why. Plus it was terribly annoying, so I got up from my chair and made a circle around the small area. Yoru’s eyes watched my every move, which made me nervous, so I sat down again.

“Do you even know why I did it?” He looked at me, his blue eyes turning more blue, if that was a thing.

Did what? Oh, the protecting thing. Cuz he has my blood.

“Duty? Guilt?” I wasn’t sure, but I said it anyway.

He shook his head. “Not entirely. I mean, yeah, somewhat. But not entirely.”

“Oh. Okay.” I tilted my head to the right about 25 degrees. “So....... why?”

“Because,” Yoru sat up slowly and slid a hand behind my neck, parting my hair. Then he leaned in and pressed his lips to mine. And we were kissing. And it was different than Loki’s kiss. But I didn’t know how, exactly.

Wait. Waittttttt. This isn’t right. Not right at all. Better push this jerk back. Who does he think he is, anyway?

I put my hands on his shoulders, ready to forcefully remove the connection between the two of us. Ready to listen to my reason.

And then I stopped.

But. Doesn’t this mean I broke the spell? I made him love me. I can get my life-blood back now. I’m good! Oh my god!

I looped the hands that were about to push him away around his neck and kissed him back. I felt so happy. I was going back! Our mouths melded together and I felt a rush of heat traveling down my chest. My face and ears were on fire, but I didn’t care. I was going back! Finally!

My chest blazed and my eyes flew open, staring at the wall behind Yoru’s head. The thing that used to be a small green dot got bigger and bigger until it spread across the entire wall and moved on to encompass our bodies. And then Yoru and the hospital bed and the cheerful butterflies hanging from the ceiling all faded away.