It has to be at least seven in the morning, maybe even somewhere in the hour of six, but the sun is already high in the sky. Gael, still not untangled from sleep, is complaining about being up so early, his head on the café's table and his eyes only half-open. Damien is idly stirring the mug of warm cow's blood he ordered, looking apathetic but not tired. Earlier, he requested the curtains be drawn closed ("I'm sure you don't want anyone burning alive in your restaurant; I don't imagine that would be good for marketing"), and the shadows slip ominously around us.

    While I'm trying to be cheery, since it was my idea that we go out to breakfast to celebrate Gael's first official mission yesterday, it's hard to when everyone around you seems to have somewhere else they'd rather be. I lean across the table towards Dame, the silky black strands of my hair falling to shade my face; annoyed, I push them back behind my ears. "Please say something. The silence is killing me."

    "What do you want me to say?" Damien replies, ceasing his stirring and folding his fingers across the table instead. His eyes flick to Gael, who, after realizing he has fallen asleep, I have to shake to wake up. Gael grumbles more complaints, his gaze meeting Damien's. "I would like to make a toast to my dear friend, Gael, for doing a great job at...his job, while I was stuck outside trying not to be incinerated."

    Gael's eyes roll. "Thank you, dear friend."

    Both of them look at me, and Damien goes back to stirring. "Good enough for you, my love?"

     No, it was pathetic, so I stray from the subject, taking a bite of the omelette on my plate and setting my fork down again, done for now. A quick survey of my surroundings tells me I have to keep my voice down. "When are we going to talk about what else happened yesterday?"

    "Hm," Gael says. "How about never?"

    This earns him a hit in the shoulder from me, and he groans. "No, seriously. This is a big deal...bigger than just a poorly organized hitman business. This is"—I drop my voice as low as it will bear to go— "the Commission. The Commission involved with an illegal witch, which makes almost no sense."

    "You're not wrong, Gemma," Damien tells me, sitting back in his seat with a sigh. The darkness streaking across our booth makes his eyes stand out like precious rubies. "You're right that it's a big deal, but it's a big deal we should leave alone. I don't want to be in trouble with the Commission—"

    "But you're a vampire," Gael interjects. "Why would they want to hurt you? You're one of them—"

    "Daylights, Gael, they don't care. They are old and powerful, all kinds of old and powerful, and all they want to make sure Maris is flourishing at their hands. If that means taking out people that question them..." Damien shakes his head, downs his whole mug, then wipes at his mouth and starts again. "They don't care if I'm the same species as them. They'll drive a stake through me if they want to."

    "That's ridiculous," I say. "They only give death penalties to those who deserve it. Murderers and sex offenders, etcetera."   

    "Maybe so," Damien says, rubbing his temples, "but it's obvious the Commission has something to hide, is it not? Who knows what they'll do to protect that dirty little secret."

    "So we know too much," Gael says, tapping the table with nervous hands. "But no one knows we know too much."

    "See? The human gets it," Damien says then, his eyes intense on me. He offers Gael a high-five, and he takes it, looking childishly pleased. "We don't tell anyone, we don't get punished. Life is good! Let's embrace it, not threaten it, Gemma."

    "This is another thing we're not telling Sloane," I mourn, dropping my gaze to the tabletop. I don't only hate lying, but I'm horrible at it, which magnifies my hatred. Just the thought of looking into someone's eyes, someone that I trust and someone that trusts me, and lying through my teeth makes me want to puke. I've lost my appetite. "Another thing we're lying to her about."

    "Not telling her isn't lying," Gael offers, his arm sliding around my shoulders. The weight of his arm against me is comforting, and I feel myself blush, not daring to look up. You...you are perfect, he'd said to me, in the basement of my home. Somehow, I still can't shake the feeling of being so close to him, of breathing his air, of wanting something...wanting what, I can't be sure. All I know is that everything inside of me is liquid when he's this close, when he touches me as he does now. "We're endangering ourselves enough; to put Sloane in the same situation as us would be unthoughtful."

    "Oh, I know," I groan, drawing circles on the wood with the nail of my thumb, then stopping when I realize it's property destruction. "Sometimes we have to do things we don't like to protect who we care about—yadda, yadda, I get it."

    "Hey," Gael says, voice dripping concern. His grip on me tightens. "Listen, Gem—"

    "Uh...Gael Echeart, is it?"

    The three of us look up, Gael's arm slipping from around me, which is both a good and a bad thing—now I can breathe, but there's something off now that we've lost contact. A waitress clothed in black slacks and a golden polo stares down at us, her eyes—the red of Damien's—gleaming with obvious naiveté. Her smile is much too wide, her fingers twitching at her sides. To anyone else, she might look like any other overexcited teenager (that is most likely much older than she looks), but I see something more peculiar...mechanic, almost.

    At the mention of his name, Dame and I both look at Gael. He shrugs, then looks up to the vampire girl, still lingering awkwardly beside our booth. "That would be me...do I know you, perhaps?"

    "No, you don't," says the waitress. "I, um, I was just...at your ceremony..." She blinks, as if confused by her own words. "Hearing that director talk about you...oh, wow. How are you so brave?"

    Gael looks very lost, blinking. "Practice...?"

    Damien mutters something—an insult, most likely—under his breath, hiding his face in his palm. The waitress just giggles pleasantly, then thrusts her pen and pad at Gael, over me. "Could I have your autograph?"

    Now, Gael is quite lost. He just shrugs and takes the items in his face, signing it quickly and returning it to her. Damien lifts his head from his hand, looking up at the girl. "He signed it. Can you go now?"

    "You..." The waitress narrows her eyes at Damien now, Gael's signature clutched to her useless heart. "You're the one who dragged him off stage. What was that all about?"

    Damien's expression flashes from scorn to worry, his eyes darting towards me for a second. Promptly turning back towards the girl, he opens his mouth in a smile and says, "Gael here has got stage fright, just the worst. I felt like I was doing him a favor by getting him out of there as soon as I could."

    "Oh," the waitress says, "well, that—"

    "—was very nice of me. Yes, I know. Goodbye, honey. Mhmm. Bye-bye, now," Dame says, the fake smile still plastered on his face. He shoos the girl away like a fly, and with one last obsessed glimpse at Gael, she disappears from our view. For a moment, we all look after her, stunned.

    "I don't know what just happened," Gael comments. "I'm...I'm famous now?"

    "She seems to think so," I say. "But something...was wrong about her."

    "More wrong than most lovestruck fangirls?" Damien murmurs, and rolls his eyes when I tell him to stop being rude. "Honestly, Gemma, I didn't see anything that I thought was strange. Let Gael enjoy his few moments of fame..."

    "You guys didn't see how dazed she was?"

    Now the boys are both looking at me as if I'm the strange one; their scrutiny makes me uncomfortable. Sitting back against the crimson booth seat, Gael folds his legs underneath him. "She was dazed because she was seeing her idol—"

    "I just don't think so," I say, my eyebrows drawing in as I recall my recent experience. The blinking, the drifting feeling of her tone...that was more than being in awe. It's almost as if she had been mentally toyed with. How can I explain that to Gael and Damien, who are so content on ignoring the things right in front of them? "The way she was acting, guys...it's as if there was something wrong with her head—"

    "You don't think that maybe, just maybe, she wanted a signature from her favorite hunter?"

    At the hurt in Gael's tone, I force my eyes up to his, which are burning with displeasure. His lips are in a frown, cheeks flushed, eyebrows furrowed. I don't remember ever seeing him this upset, this troubled, and wonder if there's something wrong with him. "Gael, that's not what I said."

    "It's what I'm hearing," he combats, shaking his head. "You can't believe that someone is getting more attention than you, can you? So you make up a story—"

    "I'm not making anything up!" I yell, attracting attention from others dining in the café. I notice Damien has fallen silent, but I don't plan to, not when Gael's being this ridiculous. "I'm concerned, and you're going to let your pride get in the way of that? Gael, I can't believe you!"

    "It's not my pride, Gemma, it's yours."
    
     Anger bubbling beneath my skin, I fold my arms, meeting Gael's eyes with my own; I've forgotten, right now, what it feels like to look into them and feel some sort of pull, for all I see now is greed. "What the hell, Gael—"

    "Your ego is so huge that you won't let anyone else be successful, not even for a second. I thought you wanted to see me at my best, but, no, I see your true character now—"

    "My true—whatever. You know what, maybe you're right. Maybe it doesn't make sense that she'd want your autograph because you're not even a good hunter!" My voice rises, and I get up, leaning over the booth and jabbing an accusing finger at Gael. The flush along his cheeks has grown, spreading over his nose, his frown softening. "You didn't train for years, like I did, and you haven't watched the ones you love die. You march in here, hunt one time, and all of a sudden you're the center of everyone's goddamn attention. I just don't get it. You're inexperienced and naïve."

    Gael opens his mouth. "Gem—"

    "Don't 'Gem' me, right now, you privileged bastard. You don't deserve to call me that. You don't deserve...you don't deserve anything. Nothing!"

    My chest heaving, I wipe tears that I didn't notice had fallen, my hands shaking. I can't remember the last time I've felt so enraged, so much like I need to punch something, someone. Damien reaches out, his fingers brushing my arm. "Gemma, please—"

    "Dame, not right now. Just not right now," I mutter, and flee the café in record speed.

I avoided Gael for the rest of the day.

    If we passed in the halls of the headquarters, we averted our eyes, not exchanging a word. I ate lunch beside Damien on the steps outside to the headquarters entrance; clothed in his protective cloak, he sat awkwardly next to me, trying to get me to talk. I made it clear that I had long since decided my feelings and had shut the lid on the subject for now. Unless Gael was going to apologize for calling me egotistical earlier, I wanted nothing to do with him.

    The wall between the two of us survived even as we headed home. We sat in separate cars on the subway, even walked numerous feet from each other to the house. Once there, I shut myself up in my room, where I am now.

    I have been lying in bed for what must be hours now, a book under my nose.  In truth, I'm not much of a reader, but I need some sort of distraction from my frustration. At one point, Mother came in, demanding I tell her what was up and that I leave my room, but I assured her it was nothing and politely asked her out. She left, but was skeptical.

    Gael is out there, in the kitchen and living room area, and I can't bear to look at him. I know I'll do something stupid if I do; why Gael even deserves my sanity, I don't know, but I gift it to him anyway. Our couch is now his domain. I'm staying away from it.

    Bored to the precipice of delirium, I throw the book down and sit up, clutching my blankets around myself. Being stuck in here is killing me, and my stomach is growling. Can't one rummage in the fridge without seeing the one person they don't want to see?

    It takes a second for me to conjure up enough courage to get up and feed myself, but just as I've reached my bedroom door, it opens.

    Startled, I take a step back, and Damien enters the room. A frown on his face, he shuts the door behind him, peering down at me with curious rose-red eyes. "Are you alright? Sorry to barge in, but you've been kind of resigned all day."

    "If this is an attempt to get me on speaking terms with Gael," I reply, folding my arms and huffing in defiance, "it is not happening."

    Damien's frown deepens. "You see," he begins, "even if that was the plan, I can't attempt that. Gael's not here."

    I pause, anxiety beginning to form a lump in my throat. My pulse begins a steady ascent, cold washing through me. "He's...not...here?" Oh, God. It's not like he knows Maris by heart as Damien and I do; he's never been anywhere without us. If anything were to happen to him...

    "He's not in the house, Gemma. Your mother said she heard noise in the basement, but there's no sign of him," Damien tells me, wringing his hands. I may be imagining it, but he appears paler than usual.

    Realization floods me, along with gut-wrenching guilt. "Oh," I say, my voice as small as I feel. I stare blankly at the wall, my eyes wide. "Oh, no, no, no, no, no..."

    "Gemma?"

    I just shake my head, grabbing Damien's arm and bursting out of my bedroom. Tugging at Dame's arm, I hurry to the basement, throwing open the doors to the arena. In the darkness of night, the arena is eerie, everything inside of it bathed in black. All is still and quiet. Too quiet.

    "Damien, open the curtains," I order, beginning to cross the padded flooring. When Damien just looks at me, bewildered, I reiterate. "Damien. Curtains. Now!"

    As he hurries off to do what I asked, I make my way to the workshop table, where I grab up a flashlight and switch it on with trembling fingers. Aiming its beam at the wall where I mount weapons, I confirm that spaces once occupied by knives and guns are now empty. Suddenly, all I want to do is throw up.

    "The glass is broken over here, Gemma," calls Damien, and as I try to shake my head clear, I approach the window, standing beside him. The curtains have been drawn back, as I told him to, and one of the bottom panes of it has been shattered, save for a few shards. My pulse is reaching a point where I begin to worry if my heart will explode; I direct my eyes up. A lambent, alluring, and quite full moon beams its light down on us as my own words echo in my head: You're inexperienced and naïve. "That idiot!" I exclaim, not sure who I'm more frustrated with. "That freaking idiot!"

    Damien's expression of confusion settles into horror. "He's going to get himself killed," he says, his words practically an exhale.

    Turning away from the window with renewed dignity, I begin to arm myself with as many silver weapons as I can carry without weighing myself down.

    "No," I contradict. "Not on my watch, he isn't."