Eutopia ran her hands through her long, loose hair to push it out of her eyes. She sat perched on the edge of Theresa's bed in her small and neat bedroom. Theresa had insisted Eutopia take a shower and change into one of her dresses, since the two women were fairly close in size, after she had stormed up the stairs, shaking with anger and almost fit to burst. Eutopia smoothed the a-line skirt of the deep blue fabric over her knees. The light cotton dress fitted her better than Jinn's clothes had, but she had to admit she missed the warmth and scent of him that had permeated the folds of his hoodie and joggers he'd given her to wear back at his house.
The hot, heavy spray of the shower had beaten most of the tension out of her muscles and Eutopia had felt the hurt and confusion trickle out of her body with every rivulet of water that snaked a path down her skin to run away down the drain, leaving her empty of all emotion. It was a nice way to feel for the moment, a welcome break from the cocktail of feeling that had swirled non-stop inside her since she had first found herself semi-conscious on Jinn's sofa.
Theresa's room had at some point, perhaps in an effort to create the illusion of space, been painted a soft sunny yellow that reminded Eutopia of summer. The bedspread was white and embroidered with little daisies around the hem that matched the curtains swept back at the small window. Various family photos; ranging from a young Theresa O'Malley with very long red hair and a short green dress, clinging to the arm of a dark and extremely handsome Thomas O'Malley, to a cherubic rust-haired toddler that could only have been Mike, lined up in front of an oval mirror set upon the top of a spindly dressing table. Overall the bedroom felt warm and comforting, scented faintly with perfumed talc.
What the hell was Will doing with Nephilim? Hadn't Jinn previously told her that they were generally loners? Now that the initial euphoria at having finally laid eyes on her brother, after all these years of hoping and wishing had faded, Eutopia couldn't shake the feeling that there was something haunting about Will. Perhaps it was just her memory recall now the adrenaline that had initially flooded her system had abated, but there was something she found uncomfortable in that photo of her beloved brother. What she was sure of though was that she had to meet him. A gentle tap at the door made her start with a little gasp.
'Come in,' she called, feeling a bit stupid as it wasn't her bedroom to permit or deny entry to anyway. Jinn appeared in all his angelic beauty. The early afternoon sun flooded the bright room, diffused gently by the fine mesh of the net curtains at the little window and enhanced the subtle glow that seemed, almost imperceptibly, to surround him.
'I know you want to see him,' he said, immediately taking up most of the room as the space practically shrank around him to accommodate his inhuman size. 'I won't let you.' Eutopia stood up quickly, her long hair tumbling and swinging over one shoulder as she smoothed the skirt of her borrowed dress around her legs self-consciously. Although she and Theresa were the same dress-size Eutopia's legs were longer, which meant that the fabric skimmed her thigh a little higher than she was comfortable with. 'Wow, that colour really suits you,' Jinn added, blinking appreciatively as he completely ignored the frown she wore. 'It matches your eyes.'
'You won't let me?' she practically spluttered, incredulously. 'Last time I checked I didn't need your permission to do anything. You don't own me! Not in this lifetime anyway.' Jinn pulled the door closed behind him. Eutopia's cheeks were flushed and her eyes were bright with anger, her small fists clenched in that all too familiar gesture of frustration. 'In case you've forgotten, Jinn, you're the reason I'm in this mess. I never asked you to get involved, you took that upon yourself. But that still doesn't give you the right to let or not let me do anything.'
Jinn rolled his dark eyes and lounged back against the door in such a way that Eutopia was reminded of the day she woke up half-naked on his sofa, which caused the blush in her cheeks to deepen. 'Don't start that again,' he growled in a low tone. 'I saved your life. End of.' Eutopia turned from him, her dress flaring out in a whirl of sapphire as she crossed to the window and peered out at the street below. When she spun around to face him again determination had replaced the spark of anger in her eyes.
'This was the whole reason I'm here, the only thing that kept me sane for most of my life. I have to meet Will, he's the only one left in my family.' Jinn snatched her left wrist, his long arm easily closing the gap between them as he pulled her to him and extended Eutopia's arm, turning her palm up to expose the soft underside where her delicate, vulnerable veins ran. Neither of them looked down at the silvered scars that faintly criss-crossed her flesh.
'Yeah,' he said, almost bitterly, 'he really kept you sane.' Eutopia snatched her arm back from his loose grip, her eyes narrowed slightly in an attempt to hide the hurt that flashed in their blue depths. She could feel tears prickling as she raised her head but kept her eyes defiantly turned down, determined that he would not see her cry again.
'And if you deny me my brother,' she said, her tone thick and husky with the effort of holding back her tears, 'you may as well have not bothered to save my life. There is nothing left for me without him.' With her gaze still fixed on the bare, highly polished floorboards of Theresa's bedroom, Eutopia didn't catch the disappointment that crossed Jinn's beautiful features.
'He is Nephilim, Eutopia,' Jinn said quietly, evenly.
'He's my brother,' the girl insisted, through gritted teeth.
'The selfishness of his kind permeates his very being and there is no telling what danger he poses to you,' Jinn countered as he reached out to tip her head up, gripping her chin none too gently as he forced her to look at him. 'It's no coincidence that he's friends with the two that attacked you. He was there, Eutopia! He was there that night, the guy that got away. This is Petra's doing, I know it, and I refuse to let you out of my sight until I figure out why she's flinging herself back on the scene.' If Jinn had not got such an uncomfortably tight hold on her chin, Eutopia felt that her suddenly weak legs probably wouldn't hold her up as she absorbed that information.
'He was there?' she repeated.
'Yes.' She wrenched her face from Jinn's hand and stumbled to the bed. The echo of a drainpipe laugh resounded in her mind and she closed her eyes, gripping the bedspread either side of her. Her stomach, empty as Theresa was in the middle of making something for lunch, lurched painfully. She remembered Ash calling out for Jason, and Jason appearing in the shadows to laugh as she spat in the face of her attacker. Jason. Jason, Will's alias.
Fuck.
'He's my brother,' she muttered, weakly.
'Half-brother,' Jinn gently reminded her. She nodded, unable to dispute that.
'But I need him. I want to see him again.' Her tone was softly imploring, like a lost and bewildered child's plea. It cut Jinn to his very core, his strong shoulders slumped.
'He won't be the boy you remember. The Nephilim, they change. Their bitterness is drawn out with every year.'
'You can't stop me from seeing him,' Eutopia stated. Jinn sighed, his own frustration held in check which took tremendous effort, but she was right, he could deny her nothing. He loved her too much.
'I could.' He crossed his arms over his huge chest and Eutopia knew that was true. Physically, he could easily prevent her from anything. 'But I won't.' She stood up and saw the emotion deep in his eyes, the bright and fierce love that burned for her as wild as the love she felt she held for him. The intensity of what washed over her at that point alarmed her and she turned away. She knew that it hurt Jinn to let go of the control he longed to exert over her in a bid to protect her from what he deemed a threat, but equally, she felt as though she was ripping her heart in two by forcing herself to choose him and his wishes, or the brother she had longed so hard for. Why did it feel like such a detrimental and final decision? There was something in the emotion she had seen in his eyes that made Eutopia feel like she wouldn't get a second chance should she make the wrong choice.
'I can, however, ask you politely not to go,' Jinn said, his warm, strong arms slipping around her waist to pull her gently against him, her back resting against his chest as he lowered his beautiful face into the softness of her dark hair. Eutopia found herself leaning into his grasp, the fight leaving her as she closed her eyes.
'Why does everything I do have to be so complicated?' she asked, quietly, a tear slipping out from beneath her lowered lashes. Jinn turned her gently in his arms as his lips softly, softly kissed the tear tenderly from her warm cheek, fingertips lightly stroking the smoothness of her bare throat as his other hand cupped her upturned face.
'Nothing in life is ever easy, dear heart.' He kissed her lips and Eutopia felt all the pain and confusion that had built up inside her since their conversation had started melt away into nothingness. 'Just promise me you won't go,' he whispered. Eutopia said nothing.