Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 99201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 496(@200wpm)___ 397(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99201 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 496(@200wpm)___ 397(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
There are loopholes, obviously, in this curse of hers. The human world. Which is not a place I belong. I tried with Lisa, I really did. If Pie had been useful, I might’ve even tried harder. But it didn’t shake out. And I haven’t been back to the human world since that door on the hill disappeared after Pie and Pell broke their curses and… well, went wherever they went.
Perhaps I should just give up. Stop trying. Fade away, the way I was supposed to, and… whatever, ya know? Whatever happens to gods when they fade.
And maybe, if I knew how to do that, I would. I’d… do the whole self-sacrifice thing for the betterment of mankind.
I’m still looking at myself in the mirror as I think this. But then I burst out laughing, my eyes shining bright green with the thought. Give up? Please. I laugh again.
No. Giving up just isn’t in my nature and I have a feeling that something is about to break. Now that could be a bad thing, but it could also be a good thing. Because—
A knock on my apartment door interrupts my self-reflection, which irritates me. “What?” I growl it loud enough to carry out of the bathroom and over to the door. “I’m busy.”
The doorknob jiggles and I turn, looking at it from all the way across the room, astounded that someone would dare to enter without permission.
But when the door swings open it’s just Callistina.
And, well—I’m not sure what’s happening with us right now, but technically, she doesn’t have to knock.
Still, I’m annoyed because she is actually the source of my annoyance. “Oh,” I say smarmily. “You’re back.” I put up my hands, palms out, pushing in her direction. “Let me guess. I shall call you queen.”
“Well.” She plants a hand on her hip. “Actually, I come with news.”
“And she’s talking too! Almost as if she’s sane and faking the crazy. Well, I must be someone special. Either that, or you need something from me. Hmm.” I tap my chin with my finger. “I wonder which one it is.”
“The news is,” Callistina continues without taking my bait, “people have arrived.”
I blink at her. “What?”
“People? You know, humans and such? The kind who live in the human realm and need to walk through a door to get here? That kind of people.”
I blink again. “What are you saying?”
“Oh, my gods,” she huffs. “There is a door on the hill and people have walked through it. They come from the Realm of Pittsburgh. Apparently, there were rumors that a town exists in the woods that contains monsters and two buffoons from that realm came to find us. They have succeeded and I have captured them for you and secured them to your throne downstairs with a chain. You’re welcome.”
“So you really are sane now? Or this is just another one-off?”
“One-off, Eros? One-off implies a singular time. It’s a good thing you’re pretty, because the brain you were born with is substandard.”
“Heh. Well, at least I don’t walk around with fake antlers strapped to my head and wooden blocks on my feet.”
“Do you know what I think?” she says.
“No. And I don’t want to know what you think. You were saying about the humans?”
“I think…” She pauses, maybe to make sure I’m listening. “I think that Pie was the lucky one. Not me.”
Rage bursts through me, but only for an instant. Callistina is playing a game. Perhaps the one where she’s the ‘crazy antler woman’ of Savage Falls is over now, but she’s still playing a game. And she said these words on purpose because she knows Pie had an awful life before she wandered into Saint Mark’s, and she knows this was my doing, and she knows I feel guilty about this, and she wants to make me react.
So I do not react. I do not say anything. I do not move. I stare at her as she sits down in a chair and unstraps her wooden blocks.
She’s still looking at me, though, when she continues talking. “Do you know why I think that? I’ll tell you why. Because she has people. She lost everything and came out the other side with people. I have no people, Eros. I lost my people. My people are all dead. So I’m going to find myself some new people.”
I let out a breath. “You had people at one time?”
She sneers out her words. “I had the entire city of Vinca, you insolent fadeaway.”
“Ooh.” I scoff. “Fadeaway? You bitch. What the fuck have I ever done to you? I didn’t bring you here, I haven’t forced you to stay here, and I sure as hell don’t want you here. And you stand here, in my town”—I pan my arms wide to illustrate the expanse of my realm—“like a fucking worthless layabout and call me a fadeaway?”