Why was it tingling now?
Have u found my bonus gift? Clue? Knock, knock… :) Ste X
I grimaced. Why were Stella’s surprises such an agonizing mixture of danger and thrill?
I inched my shaking hand towards the knocker.
Harder, big boy.
My blush deepened.
Gift? I mean GIFTED *wink* U do like bad boys…? :) Ste X
Unless, you know, I didn’t like bad boy angels hidden in my attic…but it didn’t look like I had a choice about that now.
“How do I…?” I hesitated.
“Knock, and it shall be opened unto you,” Mischief intoned.
I nodded.
Mischief snorted. “That was a joke, witch girl. I guess you simply shove it. How should I know? It’s you witches who keep Addict angels locked up and cruelly train them as if they need saving simply because they’ve become addicted to the joys of humanity. Although, admittedly, that risks them joining the ranks of the Fallen.”
I blinked. “Imagine that I understand nothing.”
“Ridiculously simple to do.” Mischief snatched my hair, at the same moment that he slammed my hand onto the door. “Behind here, lies an angel who has done nothing worse than love humans. Merely by being on Earth, however, and outside Angel World, we angels slowly become Fallen angels. If I were to step outside the spelled protection of this house, it would also be my fate. Witches believe it to be their duty to save and break us.” He cocked his head. “Do you?”
“Nope, I’m a Wolf Charmer. It’s my duty to save everybody from the crimson tide of the werewolves…and to take three wolves as Tributes, possibly to save and break them.”
“Not quite as reassuring as I’d hoped for, but I’ll take it,” Mischief pouted, although his fingers unwound from my hair. “A werewolf in your wardrobe, a magic wolf in your pocket, and now an angel in your attic. Are you certain that you don’t want to tell me about an elf stashed in your knicker drawer? Or a baby dragon in your cauldron?”
“I don’t have a cauldron,” I gritted out, “and if there’s an elf fondling my panties, you’ll never find out.”
Harder, big boy.
This time Mischief snickered.
Your sexy bad boy is on his last chance. Save him before we meet, or I’ll break him. Sorry if he kills u :) Ste X
I froze, flicking my gaze back up to Mischief’s. “You know what I said about my duty…? I might’ve spoken too soon. My aunt says that if I don’t save him—”
Mischief rolled his eyes. “Charming witch speak for control.”
“Don’t get preachy on me Mr I’m the son of an emperor, so watch me rule over the lowly witch.” I poked Mischief in his pale chest. “The angel behind that door’s not like you; he’s bad—"
“Silence your tongue. One of the best angels that I’ve ever been privileged to know is an Addict.” Mischief’s smile was fragile and bitter. “Or did you believe it quite the disease? I promise, this angel will not need saving or controlling, except from this deplorable aunt of yours.” When I bristled, he lowered his head until our noses almost touched; I gasped at the furious intensity of his gaze. “Never call him bad again.”
I nodded, as my heart beat too rapidly and my throat felt too tight to speak. When I pushed my phone into my pocket and raised both hands onto the backs of the golden wings, my crimson shadows shoved on the door, until it slipped open.
I stepped into the gloom of the attic room beyond.
Light filtered in dusty streams through the window and onto a thin mattress, where a lean angel in nothing but indigo silk harem pants sprawled. He curled his pale violet wings around himself like the blanket and pillow that he didn’t have. His fairy tale pink hair hung over his face, as he reached out and turned the page of the poetry book that was propped in front of him, so intent on his reading that he didn’t even notice us.
Yep, bad boy to the bone this one…and so freaking hot that I flushed, stepping backwards in my immediate fluster and crushing Mischief’s foot.
Mischief howled, hopping up and down. The Addict looked up startled, just as Mischief elbowed me in the back, thrusting me further into the room.
The Addict scrambled to the back of the mattress, staring at me with his large violet eyes like I was there to eat him up. His wings quivered, sending out scented waves of sweet nutmeg, and I had the sudden urge to suck one of his feathers and see if it tasted of it as well. Hey, that was my excuse. If angels smelled edible, it wasn’t my fault that I hungered to devour them. Wait, delete that naughty image, before I overloaded with blushes.
Say something, Crimson…
When the acoustic guitar and yearning romance of Ed Sheeran’s “Kiss Me” whispered through the walls, I groaned. The Addict’s eyes widened further, and he hid behind his pink hair, peeking at me shyly.
Behind me, Mischief sighed, before he strode past. “Why, we are most certainly all saved.”
When the Addict saw Mischief, he gasped, pushing himself onto his knees and breaking into a wide grin. “Zophia,” his voice was as soft and warm as his nutmeg scented wings, “I believed that someone would come for me, yet I’d never dared hope that you should be the one.”
Why did my red curl with a sudden dangerous jealousy?
“Zophia is my angelic name,” Mischief muttered without looking around at me. I guess that I had him well trained on the I know nothing. “I go by Mischief now.”
Mischief grasped the Addict’s arm, swinging him to his feet and then in a wide arc. The angels’ wings wrapped around each other, as they slow danced to the song that had been played for me, close and intimate. Then the Addict purred.
I blinked. Angels purred when they were happy…? Or maybe only when they were hard-on happy…?
Either way, that was hot.
“Zophia or Mischief, I care only that you’re here,” the Addict murmured. “The witch—”
“Is right here,” I crossed my arms. I was used to being the charity invite at parties who the rich boys ignored, but this was my home, and now I was the Lady of the Manor there were going to be some changes, starting with not being ignored by my own angels. “I take it that you two know each other?”
“Not in the slightest, this is simply an ancient angelic greeting.” Mischief licked down the Addict’s neck, and the Addict shuddered. Mischief snorted. “Of course I know him. This is Ramiel. He was one of the mightiest and cleverest warriors in Angel World.”
Ramiel rested his head on Mischief’s shoulder, hunching his shoulders. “I would not be trapped here if that were true.”
“Hush,” Mischief chided, stroking his fingers through Ramiel’s hair (and I’d have given anything just then to be the one to comfort him), “do not be ashamed of curiosity or the desire for freedom. Do you remember how we met? We were sneaking into Harahel’s library on Angel World, both trying to read the same book, and you fought me for it, which of course woke up just about everybody…”
Ramiel laughed; it was light and joyful in a way that lit me up. Holy hell, did I want to hear him laugh for me. “Although I never stole any of Harahel’s books. I’d never have been brave enough to risk the spanking.”
My mouth dried, as my pulse fluttered in my throat. I skimmed my hand across my jaw; the skin pulsed with heat, just as my mind was never going to be able to get rid of that image…
I cleared my throat. “Guys,” I waved my hand, “Wolf Charmer over here.”
Ramiel disentangled himself from Mischief, casting me a wary glance.
Mischief, however, curled his lip. “Wolf Charmer,” he mimicked, “a god who doesn’t care over here.”
A god?
I stumbled backwards, catching myself against the wall. I trembled as I rubbed Okami in my pocket.
The Realm of the Seraphim was a realm of gods? Huh, that really did explain the ego…and the sarcasm.
A werewolf, an angel, and a god all living in the House of Silver with me: it was like the start of a bad joke.
When
a shadow fell over me, I looked up into the gentle gaze of Ramiel. “May I take your hand?” He asked, tenderly.
I nodded. My tongue felt too heavy to speak, whilst my heart beat too rapidly.
Ramiel clasped my hand, raising it gently. Then he traced circles on the back, and I jolted, quivering at the exquisite touch that lit every nerve on fire, as well as drawing out my crimson in its wake and coiling it in pretty patterns. I shivered, as he turned my hand, caressing down the palm and along my fingers and then my thumb. I could feel his touch down my arm, spine, and into my core…until I longed to squeeze my legs together, except that would hardly be Lady of the Manor like behavior.
Who was I kidding?
I sighed, sprawling against the wall and arching my neck. I was being ravished, and yet Ramiel had done no more than touch my hand. What would it feel like to be touched — kissed — anywhere else?
Ramiel leaned closer. My breath quickened, and my fingers curled around his, as our gazes met.
Would he kiss me?
Please…
“You don’t have Wolf Charmer eyes.” Ramiel frowned. “You have the inheritance and yet there’s something different, if your eyes are emerald…”
I snatched my hand away from him. “One hand hold and we’re onto the personal questions? I don’t know why my eyes aren’t silver. Maybe I’m a reject.”
“In my experience,” Mischief sidled closer, “it’s rarely a bad thing to be considered a reject, different, or bastard. We become the strongest and most dangerous because we’re underestimated.” He hesitated, catching Ramiel’s eye. “And it is equally rarely a bad thing not to walk in the footsteps of our mothers.”
“You don’t get to talk about my mom,” I hissed.
Ramiel shrank back with a whimper, before dropping to the floor at my feet and spreading out his wings. I stared down in shock at his shaking back. It was as if he was waiting for me to punish him…
Wait, it was seriously like he was waiting for that.
“Who’s been hurting him?” Mischief’s wings spread in warrior stance; silver sparked in crackling waves. “Pretty lies are your poison, are they not? I apologize for my naivety in trusting that this could be any different to other witches’ houses. I should’ve known better than to drink your venomous lies, no matter how honeyed. Am I to be shut away up here as well? Is this my new prison?”
I gaped at Mischief, even whilst the crimson in me snaked in coiling whips, readying my defense.
What terrible things had been done to Mischief to make him so frightened? How could Stella have hurt an angel who was as gentle and well behaved as Ramiel? Right now, I was even starting to distrust myself.
“Whoa, what’s with the paranoia? I’m not playing some kind of sick game. Last week, I was painting in my art studio, drinking lattes, and trying to work out how to not date the cute guy who’s been asking me out because you know what? Hiding your magic isn’t easy and neither is never being honest, so I get it…pretty lies. But not about this and not about…” I nudged the quaking angel at my feet with the toe of my boot.
Mischief’s eyes narrowed. “I only trust one woman, and she’s back in the Realm of the Seraphim. She’s also most certainly not a witch.”
When Mischief’s wings beat, silver sparks shot towards me.
I yelped, but then a sharp wind blasted me backwards, slamming me against the wall and safe from the shower of silver. I closed my eyes against the cutting breeze, which shrieked through the attic like a banshee. At last, it died down, and I carefully opened my eyes, only to shriek again as I found myself staring into silvery gray eyes.
The nectar aroma of honeysuckle wound around me, making me feel safe and loved. I gasped, as my knees buckled, and I hit the floorboards with a crack.
Mom smiled down at me, tucking a strand of her short curly red hair behind her ear. She wore the scarlet ball gown that I remembered her wearing on the night that she’d been murdered.
“Mom,” I whispered like a prayer, as tears streamed down my cheeks, and I didn’t even have the strength to lift my hand to wipe them away. Okami slid out of my pocket, whining softly and nosing at them.
Mom shrugged her elegant shoulder. “Mom makes me feel old and like I should be cheering a soccer match. Why not call me Zetta?” She held out her hand to me.
“Don’t touch…whatever that is.” When Mischief stepped forward, Zetta glanced over her shoulder at him coyly.
“You and I, little god, are going to have so much fun.” She waggled her eyebrows.
“Little?” Mischief clenched his jaw.
Mom — Zetta — turned back to me and looked significantly down at her hand. “We have a wolf to rescue, Crimson Tide.”
I jolted at the familiar nickname that I hadn’t been called in a decade, not since my mom had dressed me in my white lace ball gown and led me to my first ball in the one room of this mansion that I was determined never to step foot into, even if the house tried to drag me there.
Just like I’d never wear white again.
Yet now here was my mom like she’d never been killed that night. But it couldn’t be her — I knew that it wasn’t — but seeing her, smelling the honeysuckle, and hearing Crimson Tide, I couldn’t help the desperation to touch her again.
When I reached out my hand, my fingers went straight through Zetta’s like she didn’t exist…or was a ghost.
I sobbed, even as Zetta’s lips curled into a wicked smile because despite the fact that she’d been insubstantial, sparks had burst at the swipe of my hand through hers as if it had somehow connected our magic.
Ramiel hurled himself up from punishment position, snatching at Zetta’s legs, but there was nothing there but thin air. Mischief hollered a warning, but Zetta merely leaned over me, until her honeysuckle scent was as intoxicating as a narcotic. Then she snapped her fingers — click — and I was sucked into her, whilst I howled.
CHAPTER FOUR
Zetta spat me out of her in a horrific second birthing with added static, which frizzed my hair like I’d been balancing balloons on my head. Only, this wasn’t my birth or my birthday, and I choked on the sobs catching in my throat because she’d dropped me bouncing onto the crimson satin of the four-poster bed in my parent’s bedroom, which had now become mine.
My fingers clutched at a white wolf pelt that covered the bed; its softness was soothing, whilst I stared around at the shimmering walls of the opulent room with its beamed roof and Narnia style wardrobe. Stone wolf gargoyles stared down from the corners, and I’d never thought that I’d find it less frightening to study them than to look back at my own mom.
Unless, you know, it wasn’t my mom.
“What’s up with the Hermione hair? Is that an ironic modern witch statement?” Zetta rested her hand on her hip, and I self-consciously brushed my hand through my hair to flatten the frizz. Even after all this time, my hair still couldn’t lie straight enough for her high expectations. “What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” When I blinked at her, she snorted. “Come on, the joke was just lying there, like I was going to leave it?”
“You’re not my mom,” I sat up, wrapping the wolf fur around my waist as if that was some sort of defense, “are you?”
Zetta wound one of her short curls around her finger, whilst the walls glittered like fairy wings. My heart beat painfully fast, as she floated closer to me. “Then what do I look like, Crimson Tide? Joan of Arc? Because I can see me battling and doing the whole saint shtick,” she swished her dress and winked at me, even as she attempted to look angelic, “but I draw the line at being burned at the stake.”
I closed my eyes. “Jesus, Mischief was right. All I was missing was a ghost and now I seriously need to check my panties for an elf, although maybe I’d better buy a cauldron before I choose my baby dragon…”
Zetta sighed. “Ah, so you’re crazy then?” She attempted to pat me on the head, but her hand whooshed straight through me. I opened my eyes, shuddering at the sensation of the co
ol breeze and fruity aroma of honeysuckle. “I blame the American schooling system, combined with a lack of my loving guidance…”
“Stop acting like you’re her,” I hissed.
Zetta’s lips pursed in a moue of protest. “But look at all the fun we’re having!”
I howled, hurling a barrage of silk pillows off the bed at her. She laughed, as the pillows flew straight through her, thwacking against the wall behind.
“Calm down,” Zetta smirked, “you shouldn’t get excited in your condition.”
I gasped, hopping across the bed, but before I could shoot my shadows at Zetta, the gargoyles’ mouths opened and began to sing a disturbingly beautiful but chilling rendition of Queen’s “I’m Going Slightly Mad.” I shivered at the Gothic grandeur of the song out of the mouths of the wolves, before twisting to Zetta, who was staring out of the window as if I was the only one who could hear the song.
And that was Hitchcock’s Tricks for Dummies.
I squared my shoulders. “You’re not my mom, and I don’t think that you’re a ghost either. So, what are you?”
The wolves stopped singing like their throats had been slit.
Zetta turned back to me, fluttering her eyelashes. “I’m the essence of the House of Silver: an echo of every Wolf Charmer, memory, and despicably debauched sin or virtue that has occurred here. I was created, whether you like this or not, to be the extra special ward to help you. I’m your suckable treat from your oh so suckable aunt.”
I gagged. “You’re as bad as her. I don’t need to be hearing that.”
Zetta preened. “Why? Stella was always the hottest sister. I could eat her with a helping of whipped cream and sprinkles, although your mum was almost as hot.”
Only Perfect Omegas: A Reverse Harem Fantasy Romance Series (Rebel Werewolves Book 1) Page 4