Chapters (79)
- Cover
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Fifty-Seven
- Fifty-Eight
- Fifty-Nine
- Sixty
- Sixty-One
- Sixty-Two
- Sixty-Three
- Sixty-Four
- Sixty-Five
- Sixty-Six
- Sixty-Seven
- Sixty-Eight
- Sixty-Nine
- Seventy
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Praise for Destroy All Monsters
- Books by Sam J. Miller
- Back Ad
- About the Publisher
Had I . . . changed its mood? Its mind?
Holy.
Shit.
Twenty-Five
Ash
“Tell me more,” I said, stroking Solomon’s hair. He lay on his back with his head in my lap, looking up at the stars.
“I don’t know where to start,” he said.
After we left the party, we’d gotten into my car and I’d driven us south. Parked by the river; walked out along the Germantown waterfront. A group was there cooking fish they’d caught that day, over a fire in a barrel. And drinking, apparently, and breaking beer bottles. After what I’d just been through, dumb drunk kids should have scared me, but I wasn’t afraid of them. With Solomon at my side, I wasn’t afraid of anything.
“But I’m a princess,” I said. “I want to be superclear about that part.”
He laughed. “You are.”
“And I have superpowerful magical abilities.”
“Probably. But no one knows what they are. Because you’ve been under an evil spell.”
I clapped my hands. “I always wanted to be under an evil spell.”
He turned over onto his side, so that the back of his head was against my stomach. Looked out across the river.
“How did you know?” I asked. “Where I was? That I was in danger?”
Solomon shrugged. “I don’t know how it works. I was . . . elsewhere. Over there, the Darkside. Wandering the streets. Drinking coffee. And then I was back, and standing by the bonfire.”
Of course, I wasn’t really a princess, and there were no brontosauruses blocking traffic anywhere that I knew of. But the spiders I’d seen, crawling into Bobby’s open, angry mouth; the guilt that had helped me connect him to the break-in at Jewel’s? The fact that Solomon found me, at precisely the right moment?
Something strange was happening.
I kept telling myself it was impossible, but it was harder and harder to deny. Something was changing in the very air around us, and I had to follow it to the end—whatever that was.
“Some lady with a clipboard was sniffing around the brakeman’s hut when I came back this afternoon. Luckily I saw her before she saw me. I could run away. And then the next thing you know, I was on that beach. . . .”
October wind made me shiver, which made him shiver. “Tell me more,” I said again. I could have listened to him for hours. Because it was fascinating, and because I could tell it made him happy to talk about it. And because when he stopped, I’d have to tell him that I was the one who called Child Protective Services.
“Darkside is the only place where monsters and humans can coexist. The queen’s great-great-great-grandmother brokered a magical truce among all the sentient species to create a safe place for everyone.”
And then there’s this—and I think once again that we’re just going crazy in tandem.