Page 57
Story: A Strange Hymn
Self-consciously, I reach around and drag the edge of one of my wings forward, the dark iridescent feathers shimmering.
Releasing my wing, I sigh. “Is that so hard for you to believe?”
“You and I both know you can’t come back to earth looking like you do. Don’t you want to come home? You have a whole life waiting for you.”
A lonely, empty life. That’s not to say I want to abandon it, but I don’t also want to have to change myself to return to that life.
I open my mouth to tell her this, but then I stop. I’m not going to defend myself to her. We’ve always had each other’s backs, and I want her to be okay with this.
I shake my head. “Forget about it.” I turn to leave.
“Wait.” She heads back over to me and catches my wrist. “Callie, you know I only care if you care.” Her warm brown eyes search mine. “It’s just that I know how much you didn’t want to be a werewolf when you were with Eli, and now after being with another guy for three point five seconds, you look like a fairy.”
I give her an exasperated look. “I haven’t been with him for ‘three point five’ seconds.”
She squeezes my hand a little tighter, reading my features. “Fine,” she says, making some judgment call, “you have a long and sordid history with him. I only needed to make sure this is truly what you want.”
It might not have originally been what I wanted, but—
“This is truly what Iam.” A siren. A creature who can beguile humans, one who is not quite human herself. Karnon might have manifested my scales, claws, and wings, but now I’m starting to embrace them. I’m now starting to embrace it all.
Temper looks at me, really looks at me, and I swear the air turns heavy. The two of us are having one of those moments that come up every so often in our friendship, when we cannot just joke our way out of the reality of what we are. She sees the raw, harsh truth of my supernatural ability, and her eyes soften.
“You are perfect, Callie,” she admits. “Just like this.”
My throat swells at her absolute acceptance, and I pull my hand out of her grip so I can give her a hug. “Thank you,” I whisper. “I love you, Temper.”
Her arms come around me a second later. “I know. How could you not? I blew up a portal for you.”
Right there, in the middle of the hug, I begin to laugh. “I still can’t believe you did that. And the look on that fairy’s face…” I say, referring to the fairy she held hostage. That dude probably needed a change of pants after the experience.
“You mean my guide?” she says. “That’s what he gets for overcharging me.”
Now the both of us crack up, and it’s so messed up, but the two of us can be like that.
Temper pulls away, her laughter trailing off. “Okay, now where do these fairies keep the liquor?” she asks, glancing around the room. “I’m going to need a drink or three if I’m to stay here in the freaking Otherworld.”
“I thought you were all about fairies,” I say, moving deeper into her room.
“Yeah, back when I wasseventeen. I was also all about orange lipstick then too.” She shudders at the memory, kneeling in front of a hutch pressed to the side of the room. “At least I’m now a whole world away from that odious Leonard Fortuna,” she mutters under her breath.
I make a face at the name. Leo, a sorcerer whose notoriety is widely known in supernatural circles, has been relentlessly pursuing my friend for years, despite Temper making it clear she wants nothing to do with him. Leonard, however, seems to see her lack of interest as more of a minor hiccup than a nonstarter.
Seriously, the dude is odious. But, like Temper said, she’s a world away, so he’s shit out of luck for now.
“Aha!” she says, interrupting my thoughts as she opens the hutch’s doors. “Here we are.” She grabs a bottle with shimmery lettering. Uncorking it, she sniffs.
She winces a little. “Ugh, smells like leprechaun piss, but it’ll do.”
Not even going to ask about the leprechaun comment.
She takes a swig straight from the bottle before offering it to me. I wave it away.
“So”—she plops down on an ornate side chair—“Mal-a-ki.” She stretches out his name, waggling her eyebrows.
I groan, falling onto her bed. “Nooo.”
“No, what?” she says.
Table of Contents
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 4
- Page 5
- Page 6
- Page 7
- Page 8
- Page 9
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 16
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 29
- Page 30
- Page 31
- Page 32
- Page 33
- Page 34
- Page 35
- Page 36
- Page 37
- Page 38
- Page 39
- Page 40
- Page 41
- Page 42
- Page 43
- Page 44
- Page 45
- Page 46
- Page 47
- Page 48
- Page 49
- Page 50
- Page 51
- Page 52
- Page 53
- Page 54
- Page 55
- Page 56
- Page 57 (Reading here)
- Page 58
- Page 59
- Page 60
- Page 61
- Page 62
- Page 63
- Page 64
- Page 65
- Page 66
- Page 67
- Page 68
- Page 69
- Page 70
- Page 71
- Page 72
- Page 73
- Page 74
- Page 75
- Page 76
- Page 77
- Page 78
- Page 79
- Page 80
- Page 81
- Page 82
- Page 83
- Page 84
- Page 85
- Page 86
- Page 87
- Page 88
- Page 89
- Page 90
- Page 91
- Page 92
- Page 93
- Page 94
- Page 95
- Page 96
- Page 97
- Page 98
- Page 99
- Page 100
- Page 101
- Page 102
- Page 103
- Page 104
- Page 105
- Page 106
- Page 107
- Page 108
- Page 109
- Page 110
- Page 111
- Page 112
- Page 113
- Page 114
- Page 115
- Page 116
- Page 117
- Page 118
- Page 119
- Page 120
- Page 121
- Page 122
- Page 123
- Page 124
- Page 125
- Page 126
- Page 127
- Page 128
- Page 129
- Page 130
- Page 131
- Page 132
- Page 133
- Page 134
- Page 135
- Page 136
- Page 137
- Page 138
- Page 139
- Page 140
- Page 141
- Page 142
- Page 143
- Page 144
- Page 145
- Page 146
- Page 147
- Page 148
- Page 149
- Page 150
- Page 151
- Page 152
- Page 153
- Page 154
- Page 155
- Page 156
- Page 157
- Page 158
- Page 159
- Page 160