Chapter 17: Feeding the Beast
The scent of Moonbeam—wildflowers and warm skin—still clung to him as he stepped out into the hallway. It was a ghost on his own body, a reminder of the miracle he’d just performed. The memory of her solid weight, her heartbeat, her sleep-softened breath, was a fire in his chest. He needed more of that. For her. For himself.
The house felt different. The usual oppressive silence was now a watchful, waiting thing. The shadows in the corridor seemed to lean in, curious. He could feel it, just as Moonbeam had said: a contented hum underlying the old bones of the mansion. He had fed it well. But one meal wasn’t enough.
He found Jezebel in the grand salon, though ‘found’ wasn’t quite right. She was a splash of violent color in the monochrome gloom, perched on the arm of a moth-eaten velvet sofa. She wasn’t looking at him. She was staring at her own reflection in the dark, grimy face of the grandfather clock, her expression unreadable.
“Couldn’t sleep?” Elias said, his voice echoing slightly in the vast space.
She didn’t startle. Her eyes, in the reflection, slid to meet his. The usual mischief was gone, replaced by a flat, weary acceptance. “Sleep is for the living, darling. And the thoroughly satisfied.” She turned to face him properly, forcing a bright, brittle smile. “So. How is our flower child?”
“She’s dreaming,” Elias said, taking a few steps into the room. The floorboards creaked under his weight. “She said the house is having good dreams.”
“Lucky house.” Jezebel’s smile tightened. She looked away, picking at a loose thread on the sofa. The silence stretched, thick and uncomfortable.
“You came to my door,” he prompted gently.
“A moment of weakness.” She waved a dismissive hand, the gesture too sharp to be casual. “Don’t trouble yourself over it. I’m fine.”
He moved closer, until he was standing right in front of her. He could see the fine, almost-invisible cracks in her façade, the way her bottom lip trembled just before she stilled it. “You didn’t look fine.”
“What do you want me to say, Elias?” she snapped, her green eyes flashing with sudden heat. “That I’m jealous? That I watched you walk away with her and felt like I’d been gutted? It’s pathetic.” She spat the last word, a condemnation of her own feelings. “I’m not built for this… this melancholy. It’s tedious.”
He reached out, not to touch her, but to let his hand hover near her arm. “Moonbeam said I could… that it would be okay if I…” He faltered, the words feeling clumsy.
Jezebel’s eyes narrowed, a spark of her old self returning. “If you what? Pitied me? Gave the poor, lonely flapper a consolation prize?” She let out a short, harsh laugh. “No, thank you.”
“That’s not what this is,” he said, his voice low and firm. He held her gaze. “I’m not my uncle. I don’t see you as a tool.”
Her defiance wavered. The anger bled out of her, leaving something raw and exposed. “Then what do you see?”
“I see you,” he said simply. It was the truth. He saw the vibrant, chaotic woman who reveled in sensation, who was now crumbling because she’d dared to want something more than just sensation. “And I want to make you feel good.”
The fight went out of her all at once. Her shoulders slumped. She looked young, terribly young. “Why?”
“Because you’re here,” he said. “And I’m here. And it doesn’t have to be complicated.”
A long, slow breath escaped her, a sigh that seemed to come from the depths of her. She uncurled from the sofa arm and stood before him, her head tilted back to look into his face. The challenge was gone, replaced by a hesitant, almost shy hope. “Alright, then,” she whispered. “Show me.”
He led her not to the bedroom, with its memories of Moonbeam, but to the large, threadbare Persian rug in the center of the room. Moonlight streamed through the tall, dirty windows, painting silver stripes across the floor. He sat, pulling her down with him, her flimsy silk dress pooling around her like spilled wine.
He started slowly, his hands cupping her face, his thumbs stroking the high arches of her cheekbones. He kissed her, and her mouth was nothing like Moonbeam’s. Where Moonbeam was cool rain and sweetness, Jezebel was heat and the faint, phantom taste of gin. She kissed him back with a desperate hunger, her hands fisting in his shirt.
When he guided her onto her back, the old rug rough against her bare shoulders, she went willingly, her eyes wide and watchful. He moved down her body, his mouth tracing a path over the silk covering her collarbone, the swell of her breasts. Her breath hitched, a sharp, musical little sound.
He hooked his fingers in the waistband of her delicate silk shorts and drew them down, along with her stockings. She was already wet, the scent of her—musky and intensely alive—rising to meet him. He didn’t hesitate. He buried his face between her legs.
Jezebel cried out, a sharp, surprised sound that echoed off the high ceiling. Her back arched, her hands flying to his hair, not to guide him, but to cling to him as if he were the only solid thing in a spinning world.
“Oh, god… Elias…”
Her hips began to move against his mouth, a frantic, rolling rhythm. There was no slow build, no gentle discovery. This was a conflagration. Every flick of his tongue, every soft suck, was met with a gasped curse or a broken plea. She was a live wire, and he was the ground.
He could feel the energy building in her, a wild, crackling charge that made the fine hairs on his arms stand up. The air in the room grew thick, heavy with the promise of a storm. The faded portraits on the walls seemed to lean in, their eyes glinting in the low light.
“Don’t stop, don’t you dare stop,” she chanted, her voice rising, losing its coquettish lilt and becoming something pure and primal.
He drove her relentlessly, fueled by her desperation, by his own need to give her this, to prove that he saw her, that she mattered. He felt the precise moment her control shattered. Her whole body stiffened, her thighs clamping around his head. A raw, guttural scream was torn from her throat, a sound of such profound release that it seemed to shake the very foundations of the house.
The wave of energy that burst from her was violent and brilliant. A flash of spectral green light illuminated the entire salon, throwing the shadows into sharp, dancing relief for a single, blinding second. A vase on the mantelpiece trembled and fell, shattering on the hearth in a burst of dusty porcelain.
Then, silence.
Jezebel lay beneath him, utterly spent, her chest heaving. The wild energy was gone, replaced by a profound, trembling stillness. He moved up beside her, lying on the rug, staring at the water-stained ceiling.
For a long time, neither of them spoke. The only sound was their ragged breathing slowly returning to normal.
Finally, she turned her head on the rug. Her green eyes were clear, the misery gone, replaced by a deep, wondering exhaustion. A single, shimmering tear escaped the corner of her eye and traced a path through the dust on her temple.
“No one’s ever…” she began, her voice hoarse. She swallowed and tried again. “It was never like that. It was always a performance. A party trick.” She looked at him, truly looked at him. “You made it real.”
He reached over and wiped the tear away with his thumb. Her skin was warm. Solid. The manifestation held. He felt a fierce surge of triumph.
She smiled then, a slow, genuine, devastating smile that reached her eyes. “You’re trouble, Elias Thorne.”
Before he could answer, a flicker at the edge of his vision caught his attention. He turned his head.
The grandfather clock. Its dusty face was still dark, its hands frozen at some forgotten hour. But as he watched, a tiny, luminous green bud pushed through the crack between the old wood and the glass face. It unfurled, one delicate leaf at a time, a single, perfect jasmine flower blooming in the impossible dark.
Jezebel followed his gaze. She let out a soft, breathy laugh of pure wonder. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
Elias looked from the flower to her, the connection thrumming between them, a new, vibrant thread in the house’s strange, hungry web. He had done that. The cost was becoming clear, but so was the reward. He had more to give. So much more.
So much more. The thought was a drumbeat in his tired blood as he left Jezebel tracing the phantom petals on the clock face. The grandeur of the salon faded behind him, the lingering charge in the air giving way to the deeper, older silence of the stairwell. Each step upward was a effort, a leaden weight in his limbs that felt earned, a satisfying depletion.
He pushed his bedroom door open, the groan of the hinges a familiar sound. Moonlight still silvered the room, but the energy had shifted entirely. The frantic, crackling charge he’d felt with Jezebel was gone, replaced by a deep, resonant calm. It was the difference between a lightning strike and the steady, glowing embers of a hearth.
And there she was. Moonbeam lay in the center of his large bed, curled on her side. She wasn’t the solid, warm woman he’d left, but she wasn't the faint echo she often was, either. She had a presence, a density to her form that cast a soft, moonlit shadow on the sheets. She was like a statue made of mist and memory, her edges softly blurred but her shape undeniable.
Her eyes were open, watching him. There was no accusation in them, only a deep, quiet knowing. A small, serene smile touched her lips. "The house is singing," she whispered, her voice the soft rustle of leaves. "A very different song now."
Elias just nodded, too drained for words. He shucked off his clothes, letting them fall to the floor in a heap, and slid into the bed beside her. The coolness of the sheets was a shock, then a relief. He turned onto his side, facing her.
He hesitated for a moment, then slowly reached out. His hand didn't pass through. It met a gentle resistance, a cool, silken firmness that held its shape. He let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. He curled his body around hers, fitting his knees behind hers, and draped his arm over her waist.
She felt like a concept given form, the idea of a body. She was solid enough to hold, yet he felt he could breathe her in. A scent of jasmine, fainter than before but unmistakable, clung to her hair. She sighed, a contented sound, and her form seemed to press back into his embrace, gaining a fraction more substance from his proximity.
"Jezebel..." he started, but she cut him off gently.
"Shhh," she murmured, her hand covering his where it rested on her stomach. "I felt it. It was what she needed. What the house needed." She laced her fingers with his. "You did good."
The simple absolution washed over him, cleansing the last remnants of tension from his muscles. He buried his face in the cool silk of her hair, inhaling the ghost of flowers. His eyes grew heavy, the weight of the night, of the energy given, pulling him down into the mattress.
He drifted, the line between the cool body in his arms and the warmth of the bed blurring. His dreams were not of darkness or haunted halls, but of sunlight. He dreamed of an overgrown garden, bursting with life, where jasmine vines heavy with white blossoms climbed the skeletal frames of old, rusted furniture. He dreamed of a heartbeat that was not his own, a steady, rhythmic pulse thrumming up from the very floorboards, a lullaby sung by the stones themselves. He held onto the feeling of her, this impossible, semi-corporeal anchor, and for the first time in years, Elias Thorne slept a deep and utterly peaceful sleep, with pleasant dreams.