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5

Fantasy

Mother fuck. I didn’t have time for this.

“Wait,” I called. “Punk, wait!”

My breasts kept getting in the way. Being assembled with sturdy parts kept them from doing a full jiggle, but having endowments still made for an awkward and destructive sprint through the bushes. Leaves and twigs flew everywhere. Debris shook from the boughs. Mashing the hat atop my head so that it wouldn’t fall, I crashed through the birches and raced into the highborn cemetery.

Punk swerved ahead of me.

Fine. I’d have to say the magic word.

“Please,” I growled.

My friend flipped around and hovered, her wings swatting the air. Her pellet eyes narrowed as I skidded up to her. She didn’t move, didn’t give back the feather either, so I swiped for it, my fingers grasping at nothing as the bird disappeared and reappeared behind me.

I turned. She scolded, complaining around a mouthful of plumage.

“I swear,” I said. “I didn’t pluck that feather off some unsuspecting bird.”

Because the kestrel had seen me coming.

“I didn’t rob any creature.”

Because the kestrel had sensed my intentions and got riled up, losing quills on its own. Technically, finders-keepers.

“Satisfied?” I asked.

Not satisfied. Punk hadn’t become the first member of my circle for being a dummy. She used to let me get away with fibs, especially since the effect it had on my nose was punishment enough. But she also got tired of pecking my nostrils back to their original size.

Being with her had forced me to get creative, concocting alternative ways to lie to people. Still, she knew me too well.

I endured her lecture, nodding until she set the plume back onto my hat.

Sighing, I ran a finger over the bird’s pleated razor head and joked, “You little prick.” When she pecked my wrist, I jerked back. “Hey, I was only teasing—what?”

Punk’s beak stabbed the air, aiming toward the ground. I glanced down and felt my eyes pop. I stood upon a grave, my boots crushing the straw flowers that had been planted there.

“Shit.” I plunked to my knees and fumbled in the soil, trying to scoop up as much of the carnage as I could. “Oh, shit.”

I couldn’t leave evidence of a disturbance in my wake. And I had to hurry.

Punk tweeted, but I flicked my fingers in her direction, not bothering to look up. “Not now, Punk. Be useful and help me.”

Tchur...tchur...TCHUR!

I twisted around. “Wha—”

The flash of silver. The whir of a blade.

A sword stabbed the ground before me. I froze on hands and knees, the weapon halting my movements as it stopped a hair’s breadth from my nose. I gaped at the length of steel, aware that I’d gone cross-eyed.

“Looking for something?” asked a male voice.

An ethereal tone, like silk with a honed edge.

The voice also sounded mature. Not old, but not a lad.