Paranoia, Pixies and Prophecies Read online

  “So, where do you suppose these nymphs hide out?” Hunter asked, turning a wary eye back toward the little lagoon.

  “Not a freaking clue,” I replied. “Do you think they’ll come if we just start yelling?”

  “I do not think that would be a wise idea,” a smooth, feminine voice said suddenly from high above.

  What is it with people just appearing around me today? I thought in exasperation. This would be the third time someone had spoken without showing me their face first, and I was getting extremely tired of just how on edge it put me.

  “Do not move, if you know what is good for you,” the voice ordered, still as smooth as butter.

  Hunter and I glanced at each other out of the corners of our eyes, telepathically decided that it was absolutely in our best interest to keep as still as possible.

  But that didn’t mean I wasn’t planning to roll my eyes around to try and catch a glimpse of whatever I could. And what I saw absolutely shocked me.

  Tall, lithe, beautiful women with woody, dark blonde and brown hair and golden skin that reminded me of Magda’s were crawling down from the massive trunks of the tall, striped trees. They emerged from branches and dropped down, and I could see others coming up from the underbrush as if they had caves and holes down in the ground below us.

  Which, come to think of it, was absolutely possible considering what I’d seen of this world so far.

  Finally, a woman dropped down right in front of us, cat-like, landing gracefully on her feet with her fingertips just touching the ground.

  She was absolutely gorgeous. Tall and lean with golden skin and light green eyes. She had a long curtain of dark auburn hair that swung around her shoulders with every single breath she took, and when she rose to her feet, I could see that she wore a cropped top and a pair of shorts that looked as if they were made out of leaves.

  Her gaze, though, was not so beautiful. As a matter of fact, it was downright terrifying, and it was focused directly on me. The woman looked murderous like she wanted to rip my throat out with her bare hands and then feast on it for dessert.

  I kept still, clamping my mouth shut so hard I was surprised I didn’t crack a tooth. I was terrified to do something that might make this beautiful woman angry, and set off that murderous gleam in her eyes.

  “You are part elf,” she finally hissed, pointing an accusing finger in my direction. When she spoke, I could see that she had razor-sharp teeth that appeared to have been filed into points like a shark’s tooth.

  I definitely didn’t want those teeth ripping my throat out, so I decided that right now, honesty was the best policy.

  “I am,” I replied. “But my magic’s pretty strong if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  I discovered that was precisely the wrong thing to say because the nymph hissed and flew forward, getting right up in my face and baring her teeth menacingly. I could feel someone behind me, too, pressing a hand to my back and forcing me to stay standing there.

  That was the moment I truly began to fear for my life. And Hunter’s. He didn’t have any sort of powers anymore, and mine was so unpredictable that I had no idea if they’d be able to protect me from nearly fifty angry nymphs.

  “Uh, I mean, weak,” I tried to cover, but I could see in her angry green eyes that it was doing me absolutely no good.

  “I think what my friend here is trying to say is that she’s only elven by blood,” Hunter piped up, trying to save both of our butts. It was only because I knew him so well that I could hear the hint of desperation in his voice.

  The nymph, thankfully, turned toward him and backed up a few steps to look him over.

  “We do not care about that,” she hissed. “We hate elves. All of them. The king has forced us to live here in the forest, without interacting with the rest of our world. We have been reduced to nothing more than hermits, living out here in the dirt, left to forage and hunt like animals. Left to be eaten by animals.”

  “Oh my God, that’s horrible,” I gasped before I could even manage to stop myself. I put a hand to my mouth, nervously remembering that I wasn’t supposed to be speaking just then.

  The nymph turned to me, and terror leaped into my throat. This was probably it. She’d murder me right then and there, so terrified that I’d dared to speak. I tried to call up my magic but, whether it was fear or the fact that I was in a different world with different rules, it refused to come. I was completely powerless against this nymph. Whatever she wanted to happen would happen.

  But, thankfully, she must have heard the true empathy in my tone, because her brow slowly unfurrowed and she pulled back from me, far enough away that she couldn’t just rip my throat out with no warning.

  “It is horrible,” she nodded. “And you are one of them.”

  “We should kill her,” one of the nymphs announced. “This elf was brave enough to wander into our part of the forest, knowing that this is our domain. She should also be brave enough to face death.”

  A rousing cheer of agreement followed this announcement, and I did everything I possibly could to swallow my fear. If I didn’t show it, maybe they would reconsider attempting to put me to death.

  “Do you really think that’s wise?” Hunter asked, his deep voice booming out over the crowd and putting an end to the wave of whispers that had kicked up. “You don’t even know her. Why would you just kill her on the spot?”

  “Because her kind has been doing the same to us for centuries,” another nymph called out. “It is only fair we do the same.”

  “Yes!” The nymph who had her hand on my back shouted this time. I could feel her nails digging into the soft flesh there, cutting it open. It stung, but that wasn’t enough to distract me from the conversation at hand.

  I cast a fervent glance toward Hunter, desperately praying for him to come up with some sort of plan to save me. Even though I could see in his eyes that he had nothing, he opened his mouth and turned toward the first nymph who had confronted us, the one that both of us assumed was the leader.

  “We’re here to help one of your own,” Hunter replied. “And if you kill my friend, that will never happen. She is the only one who can see the veil, and I have it on good authority that your fellow nymph was very interested in that.”

  The leader narrowed her eyes, trying to decide whether or not she thought Hunter was lying. Then, she turned to me, stepping closer. My body wanted to stumble backward and out of danger, but I forced myself to remain still, even as the nymph leaned in, right to my neck, so close I could feel the tip of her nose touching my skin.

  And then she sniffed me.

  An actual, long sniff, like the kind a dog gives a new piece of food before he eats it. She inhaled my scent like it was a favorite perfume, and I had to just stand there, for fear that if I moved even an inch, she’d open her mouth and dig those razor-sharp teeth right into my artery.

  That was not a fun thought.

  Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the nymph stepped back, tilting her head to the side and raising a brow, making it clear that she had the upper hand even as she motioned for the nymph behind me to step away.

  “Who is it that you are looking for?” She asked.

  Before I could even open my mouth to give her a proper answer, another nymph stepped out from behind one of the massive rocks that surrounded the lagoon. She had golden skin just like the rest of them, but her hair was cut much shorter, and I could see the remnants of makeup streaking her face. In fact, without the harsh lights of the hotel hallway and the dim reality of my world, she looked much younger than the woman I had seen in my vision.

  “Me,” Magda said, her voice wavering just a little bit. “They’re looking for me.”

  “Magda—” the leader, started, throwing a hand out to try and halt Magda’s progress. But the blonde just shook her head and continued to come forward.

  “No, Amelie, it is alright,” she said. “I appreciate your protection, sister, but these two are not enemies of ours.”<
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  Magda came to stand in front of Hunter and me, clasping her hands in front of her. I glanced over the ripped dark jeans and tattered red t-shirt she wore, a little surprised that a woman like her was still wearing those clothes.

  “I’ve been running from the king’s cavalry,” she explained. “I didn’t want to take these off. They reminded me too much of home.”

  “I understand,” I murmured, looking over her face. There was something a little bit strange about it. The edge of it seemed to glimmer just slightly, and the lines on her forehead and next to her eyes seemed off somehow.

  “Oh,” Magda gasped, touching her fingertips to her cheeks. “This probably looks strange to you. Here.”

  She waved a hand across her face, and instantly, the wrinkles disappeared. The slight glow went with it and, within seconds, she seemed like a much younger, more vibrant version of herself.

  “I had to make Bruce think I was again like a normal person,” she shrugged. “It would look a bit strange if I still looked like the woman he married twenty years down the road.”

  “I suppose it would,” I nodded, trying to shake off my obvious awe at her use of magic.

  “Was it him who hired you?” She asked. “That would be such a Bruce thing to do. Hire a magic investigator to… to…”

  In the blink of an eye, Magda broke down crying. Tears slipped over her cheeks, relentless, even as she tried to wipe them away and center herself.

  “It was him,” I nodded. “But you don’t have to go home if you don’t want to.”

  “No, I do!” She gasped. “I do! Take me back to him, please! I need to explain everything. I just want him to know I didn’t run away.”

  “So what happened?” Hunter asked curiously, producing a packet of tissues from somewhere within his jacket and handing it to her.

  “Thank you,” Magda replied gratefully, pulling out a tissue and blowing her nose. “A bounty hunter happened, actually. I was so angry at Bruce for lying to me and mad at myself for lying to him, and even madder that I had planned to leave him, as I’m sure you know. So I pulled off the road to get some air, and then the next second, I’m here. Back in the world, I left behind so long ago. I never even saw a person’s face. I took one look at my surroundings and just started running. And I didn’t stop until I got here.”

  “Why were you in our world in the first place?” I asked curiously.

  “That’s a long story,” Magda sighed, rubbing a delicate hand over her brow. “Let’s just say that our king is not the true king, and I just so happen to know where our true ruler lives. But, I never got the chance to find her. The king would have killed me, but not before he used me for information on her location. I couldn’t risk it. So I had to leave.”

  I could tell from Magda’s face that she didn’t want me to press the matter, so I shoved down the curiosity inside of me and just nodded. Much like the world of witches when I’d first learned about it, it had grown more and more clear to me that the world of the fae was a layered, complex one that would take me a very long time to truly figure out.

  “Are they still after you?” Hunter demanded, managing, as usual, to be the first of the two of us to come back to logic.

  “Yes,” Magda nodded fearfully. “That’s why I’ve been hiding out here, with the other nymphs. But the cavalry is looking for me now. We have word from some people in town that they’ve been searching up and down for me on the orders of the king.”

  “He sounds like a jerk,” I commented in annoyance.

  Why did it always have to be evil kings? Why couldn’t a world just be peaceful, for once?

  “He’s a massive jerk,” Magda chuckled. “I’d even go so far as to call him the d-word.”

  “Oh really?” I laughed, half out of surprise at the insult, and half out of mirth at the fact that Magda, a refined woman, by all means, refused to say the actual d-word.

  “Magda, I want to ask you something,” Hunter said, bringing the conversation around to a more serious note once again. “Would you like to return home?”

  “More than anything,” Magda sighed.

  “You do not want to stay here?” Amelie gasped, practically vibrating with anger.

  The woman could use a morning meditation practice if you asked me.

  “This isn’t my home anymore,” Magda explained sadly, turning to press her palms to Amelie’s cheeks. “I have a life in the human world, with a husband, and a boyfriend, and… oh gosh, what am I going to do about that?”

  Magda turned around, and it only took me half a second to realize that she was genuinely asking me what to do.

  “Uh, I don’t know,” I replied hesitantly. “I think that’s something you should figure out for yourself.”

  Even though the biggest part of me wanted to scream and tell her that cheating was disgusting and wrong, I couldn’t help but think of Aaron.

  He loved her with everything he had. I knew because the look in his eyes when he spoke about her was the exact same one he’d had when talking about me in high school. There was no way I could take that away from him. And if he ever found out that I had, there was no way he’d ever forgive me then.

  “Great,” Magda sighed glumly, pouting at the ground.

  “You don’t have to make that decision now,” Hunter reassured her. “But we do need to know if you want to go home. Do you?”

  Magda looked into his eyes for a moment before turning around to gaze at the rest of the nymphs. Most of them were silent and stone-faced, allowing Magda to make her own decision. But a few of them nodded their heads tearfully, seeming to understand that this world, the world of the fae, was no longer Magda’s world.

  “Yes,” she finally sighed. “My answer’s not changing. I want to go home.”

  “Great,” I replied, clapping my hands together. “Now that we’re all on the same page, how, exactly, are we going to get there?”

  17

  “You mean to tell me you have traveled all of this way to rescue Magda, and you do not know how to return to your world?” Amelie demanded with about a thousand times more attitude than was necessary.

  “Listen, it wasn’t exactly a choice,” I told her. “I leaped through a portal without even thinking about it, and then Hunter just sort of followed me, and before we knew it, here we were, stuck in your world with no way to get out.”

  I fully expected Amelie to come back with some sort of biting, snide remark about how stupid we were to do such a thing, but instead, she just stared, slack-jawed.

  “So it really is true,” she breathed.

  “What’s true?” I asked, trying to figure out what on earth- or, uh, fae world- this woman was now talking about.

  “You can see the veil.”

  “Didn’t Hunter say something about that earlier?” I asked.

  “Well, yes, but I was not completely sure that I believed it.” Amelie shrugged. “But now that you are saying it a second time, I can tell that it is the truth. That is wondrous.”

  “Now you’re going to tell me most people can’t see the veil, huh?” I sighed, already knowing which direction this conversation was headed in. I’d had the same on far too many times over the last six months. Every time, I had some sort of special power or even just a freaking cell in my body that was highly unusual and very special.

  Truth be told, I had started to grow fairly tired of it all. I didn’t want to be normal, necessarily, but I didn’t want to be this special, either.

  “Yes, I am,” Amelie nodded, clearly not picking up on the obvious sarcasm in my tone. Magda hid a laugh behind her hand, and Hunter kicked at the dirt as he looked up toward the sky, pretending not to notice.

  “Of course you are,” I sighed. “So, what is it? Am I crazy for seeing these things?”

  “No, of course not,” Amelie rolled her eyes. “But you will recall I mentioned you are descended from elf.”

  “Yep, that I knew,” I nodded.

  “There was a single line of elves, one family, that was
able to see the thread that connected our world with the human world,” Amelie explained. “Long ago, they were the first ones to cross over, going through the veil to make our very first contact with the witches and humans of the other realm. It was thought that they had no more living relatives but, well, clearly that is incorrect.”

  “Huh,” I mulled over this newfound tidbit about my own history, wondering how much of it I actually believed.

  Well, I believed all of it. Really, it was a matter of how much weight I wanted to give these words. The truth was that it didn’t matter where these powers came from. They were here, and I needed to learn to control them so I could use them for something positive.

  “You do not have control over them, do you?” Amelie asked.

  “Trust me, if I did, we wouldn’t be standing here,” I sighed. “I would have found us a veil to cross through already.”

  Amelie appraised me again in absolute silence. I was pretty sure that she was trying to decipher whether or not I was actually serious. Eventually, she nodded, clearly deciding that I must have been telling the truth.

  “We know the location of one veil,” Amelie finally said.

  “What?” Magda demanded. “Amelie, why didn’t you tell me this before? I could have been home by now!”

  “Because you would not have been allowed through on your own,” Amelie replied matter-of-factly. “The veil would have stopped you from returning because there is a bounty on your head. Now, the magic that is coursing through her veins will hide you from the portal, and you do not need to worry.”

  I couldn’t even pretend to follow along with what she was saying. I wasn’t sure if it was just complex magic or my utter lack of understanding of the fae world, but the pieces were not falling into place right then.

  “Okay, great, so Magda can get through the veil now,” I said. “Let’s go.”