“Almost as creative as the name Allison is for the Alice,” the cat says, his striped ears swiveling around on top of his head. He folds one back in irritation, and I hate that his voice is a Lucullan feast for the ears, far too rich and sumptuous for his own good. I can already see that he's an arrogant prick like all the rest of them.
“It's not like my parents knew I was some magical Mary Sue, now did they?”
“I'd hardly call you a Mary Sue,” Rab adds, drawing my attention over to him. One of his long white ears flops it half as he picks up a small teapot and pours himself a generous cup. Great. Here we go again. I push my teacup and saucer away, picking up a clear pitcher of what I assume is water. “To be a Mary Sue, everyone has to like you. I'm not sure that everyone at this table does.”
I glare at Rab as I give the pitcher a quick sniff; I can tell it's anything but water.
No, it's vodka.
“Isn't there anything to drink around here that won't give me a hangover?” I ask as Lar gives me another one of his sardonic little smiles.
“Why does it matter if you have a hangover?” he asks, his wings curling gently at the edges. I wonder what they feel like, if they're soft to the touch? If I were to touch them, would I get powder on my fingers the way you do with real butterflies? “Even if the rain did let up, we wouldn't leave until morning. And when we did, we just might take a carriage. So a hangover would hardly preclude you from participating in any of your previous plans.”
“If you think you're being clever,” I start, searching through the various other pitchers until I find one with something that looks, smells and … with a lick from the swipe of a single finger, tastes like iced tea, I pour myself a generous glass. “You're really just annoying.”
“Am I?” Lar asks as I glance his way and try not to compare him to Howl from the movie Howl's Moving Castle. But like, that's sort of what he looks like. And although I'm not normally one to have a 2-D crush on a Japanese anime character, Howl is fucking hot. And so is Lar. Plus, he's like, basically a faerie. That's one of my absolute favorite sub-genres to read, too. Ugh. “Are you sure about that?”
“Am I sure that I find you annoying? Yes, absolutely.”
“That's your problem then,” Lar says as he accepts the teapot from Rab and pours himself a generous cup. “Nothing in this world or any other is absolute.”
I roll my eyes and glance over at the twins. After spending even a small amount of time with these other assholes, they're starting to feel almost normal. I notice that Dee passes on the tea tonight and I smile.
I'd rather not have him high when he could … you know, be doing other things.
Things that involve me … and naked bodies … and beds.
After I'm finished eating, I head upstairs to change into my silk dressing gown, intending to stir up some drama with Dee … or Tee … or like both?
But as soon as my head hits the pillow, I'm out.
Several hours later, I wake from another one of my usual nightmares, soaked in sweat and trying not to think too hard about my part in Frederick's murder.
If I hadn't dated Liam … If I hadn't broken up with him … If I hadn't gone to that party to tell him off.
But I know none of those things are my fault—Liam and his scummy friends are the ones to blame. For the rest of my life, though, I'll have to live with the awful knowledge that my mom's in jail because she was the only one willing to make the punishment fit the crime.
Throwing my feet over the edge of the bed, I find both twins asleep on their sides, facing in opposite directions, their tattoos backs pressed close together. For a moment, I just look at them, their handsome faces soft in sleep, and I consider waking them up. Hell, I consider climbing between them and trying to fall back asleep.
But let's be honest there—I don't know these fuckers from Adam.
With a sigh, I dig my Alice's Adventures in Wonderland book from my satchel and quietly let myself into the hallway. A few torches burn on the walls, enough to light my way but not enough to banish the shadows in the duke's manor. It's a beautiful house, but at night … with its bloodred walls and checkerboard floor, its crooked paintings, and grinning stone statues? It's a little creepy.
At some point during dinner, North started bragging about his library but for the life of me, I can't remember where it is for shit. The only place I think I can safely navigate to and from is the solarium.
Heading down the stairs, I snag a short, fat candle from a nearby table and let myself into the dampness of the glass-walled room. I'm going to sit here and try my best to read as much of this damn book as I can. And then tomorrow, I'll let Tee and Dee recite the prophecy for me—but for intellectual reasons only, of course. Because as soon as I get to that goddamn Looking-Glass, I'm going home.
I find a bench buried in the foliage and wedge the candle into a nook of a nearby tree, turning and leaning my back against its trunk, the dancing orange flame just enough light to read by. The first few pages alone are enlightening—and eerily similar to what I've been through since falling down the Rabbit-Hole.
Running a thumb across one of John Tenniel's illustrations, I take a deep breath and lean my head back, closing my eyes for a moment and trying to remember how to breathe.
Oh come on, shock, you can't set in now, I think, not after I've fucked one of these men who shouldn't rightfully exist. That'd be really weird, wouldn't it? Waking up and finding out that what happened between me and Dee as all a figment of my imagination? Well, it's not so much the idea of of a sex dream or fantasy that weirds me out—I have those all the time—it's the idea that this guy that … kind of like, enough to say the word crush deep inside the recesses of my own mind … could be fake.
There's no way.
I sigh and close the book, listening to the rain batter the glass walls and ceiling.
It takes me a moment to figure out what it is that's bothering me, but when I do, I find myself frowning and setting the book aside, my heart starting to race inside my chest.
The rain sounds a little different now than it did before, like … there's a window open somewhere.
Grabbing the stub of red candle from the tree, I make my way over to the wall and pause in front of a sea of shattered glass and water, a breeze from outside blowing into the room and making me shiver.
I'm not stupid enough to stand there and wonder what it could be—there's so much about this world I don't know. It could be fucking anything. Hell, it could be another jubjub bird or a wild bandersnatch female come to steal Rab away in the night. Not that I'd mind that last one so much. The guy's a right proper asshole, for real.
Turning toward the stairs, I start to run when the damn candle goes out and plunges me into blackness. Cursing, I dig the match out from behind my ear—practice makes perfect, so I've decided to start carrying one with me at all times while I'm here—and try to light it by striking it against the rough wood of the bridge.
Before I can get it lit, lightning flashes outside and highlights a man standing not two feet in front of me.
Before I can open my mouth to scream, a hand clamps over my face, the palm warm and dry, the voice at my ear making me shiver.
“Hello, Alice,” the second man says as the lightning flashes again and I get a good look at the other guy. He has ears like Rab, only his are brown, his eyes indistinguishable shadows in the dark. “If I let you go, you'll need to give me your most sincere fucking promise not to scream.” I hear the distinct clicking sound of a hammer as he lets go of my mouth and replaces his hand with the metal barrel of a gun against my temple. “I'd hate to have to blow the savior's pretty blonde head clean off. Wouldn't that be a terrific shame, March?”
“Terrific, yes. A shame, not so much,” the first man says, glancing over his shoulder at the sound of the solarium doors swinging open. “That you, Dor?” he asks just before a third man comes into view, dragging a body.
In the next flicker of white-hot light outside, I see North being drag
ged across the floor, a red trail of blood, thick and viscous and sticky behind him. I'm about ninety-five percent that he's fucking dead. The side of his head, right above his horn … is missing a chunk.
My stomach twists and bile fills my throat as I glance over my shoulder and find a hulking beast of a man, covered in tattoos and wearing a massive top hat. It lilts to one side like it's diseased.
“Night to meet you, Alice,” he says, lifting his gun up to his head and tapping at his own temple with the barrel. I don't need the light outside to know who these men are. Dor is the Dormouse, the man with the ears is the March Hare, and this … this is the Mad Matter.
He grins at me, teeth flashing white in the darkness.
“You ready to take a little trip to see the King of Clubs?” he asks, but I can't answer. I don't answer. I doubt he'll be taking a simple no as an answer.
But underneath my dressing gown, tucked into a leather sheath that North gave me after practice, is the Vorpal Blade.
I might be ignorant of this world, but I'm not stupid.
“Good,” he says, reaching for me with a tattooed arm and pulling me against the hard warmth of his body. The Mad Hatter leans down and puts his lips against my ear, making me shiver. “Because it's time for a tea party, Alice, and you … are the guest of honor.”
To Be Continued …
Harem of Hearts, Book #2. Preorder Now.
The Seven Mates of Zara Wolf, Book #3. Preorder Now.
Deep in the Louisiana bayou, The Wild Hunt rides.
Epic Kitsune Urban Fantasy.
An academy dedicated to magic; a girl with six ghostly lovers.
Flip the page for an excerpt of chapter one.
Chapter One
Brynn
The instrument of my own destruction loomed above me, casting a long shadow in the bloodred rays of a dying sun. Its crumbling facade was decorated with a morbid metaphor of a face—soulless eyes, a gaping mouth, tangled green locks. Okay, so I was exaggerating the broken windows, the front entrance with its missing doors, and the cluster of wild blackberries that had morphed into a monster of their own making, but come on: the former Grandberg Manor was bust.
“This is the place?” I asked, hoisting my equipment up on one shoulder and eyeing the crumbling old house with a raised brow. “It looks half-ready to collapse. You know me—if there's an even the slightest opportunity that I might trip, I will. Just be honest: am I going to fall straight through the floor?”
“Probably,” Jasinda said, moving around me and over the twisted, rusted remains of the front gate. Once upon a time, this place was crawling with nobility from around the world, and its gardens … even the drawings were enough to make my mother's green thumb well, green with envy. “Air and I have a bet going on whether or not you'll make it out of here alive.”
She thew a smirk over her shoulder at me and I pursed my lips.
Jasinda and Air were always making bets about me despite the fact that Air was the flubbing prince and shouldn't be making bets with anyone, let alone my handler. I had to admit though: if there was anyone around that was worth betting on, it was me.
First off, I was a half-angel which meant I could see spirits. And second, I was a half-human which meant those spirits actually deigned to communicate with me. A full-blooded angel was too haughty and highbrow to give any ghost the time of day, and a full-blooded human couldn't see one if they tried.
This special ability of mine did end up getting me into heaps of trouble. For example, there was that one time I followed a ghost straight into the queen's chambers and found her, um, indisposed with the head of the royal guard who, you know, also just happened to be my mother.
Then of course, there was the fact that I had the small, slight frame of my mother's desert dwelling ancestors but the wide, heavy span of wings from my father's side. Let's just be frank and say I toppled over a lot. Oh, and I ended up having long, in-depth conversations with people who weren't really people but were, in fact, very tricky ghosts. Even my first kiss had been with a spirit.
I took a deep breath of the cool, lavender scented air and followed after Jas, tripping and cursing in my own made up language.
“Go flub yourself,” I growled at a thick tangle of blackberry that had gotten wrapped around my ankle. “You bleeding blatherer.”
“Are you making words up again?” Jas said, parking her hands on her hips and sighing at me. “Can't you just say you bleeding bastard like everyone else? And don't even get me started on you using the work flub instead of fuc—”
“Hey!” I snapped, putting my palm over her lips with one hand and pointing at myself with the other. “Half-angel over here. Just hearing somebody use a word with an extreme negative connotation makes me lose a feather.”
“Oh, please,” Jas said, pushing my hand away from her full red lips and smirking at me as I tried to rub her makeup off on my breeches. “That's a myth and you know it. Air told me that when you were kids, he used to chase you around the castle saying damn and bastard and the like, just to see if you'd lose any feathers—you didn't.”
I narrowed my eyes on her as she turned and headed up what was once an impressive flight of marble steps, now cracked and chipped like an old beggar's teeth. I shivered and followed after her, examining the red stain on my palm that stunk like copperberries. A lot of women painted their mouths with the stuff, but to me that fragrant floral scent was tinged with a metallic sting, like copper. Like blood. Thus, the name—copperberries.
As I hurried up the steps, I kept my eyes on the decaying black facade of the manor, all its intricate moldings and details stripped away by time and rain, the harsh winds that curled across this part of the kingdom in summer.
“Let's do a quick walkthrough and see if you can't sense any residual energies,” Jas suggested as I set my black leather satchel on the floor and knelt beside it. The ground around me was littered with debris—leaves, twigs, bits of crumbling plaster, a dead mouse.
“Oh, that's flubbing sick,” I whispered as I caught sight of the creature's spirit hovering nearby, its furred sides almost completely translucent as it took long, heaving breaths. Of course, the mouse didn't need to breathe anymore, but it didn't know that.
I pulled a dagger from the sheath on my belt—please Goddess, don't actually ask me to use this thing in combat—and prodded at the mouse's body with the jeweled hilt.
Fresh blood stained the white leather pommel and made me shiver.
“Jas,” I started, because a long dead carcass was one thing, but a fresh one? Hell's bells—since Hell was an actual place it didn't count as a curse word so no lost feathers for me—but I hoped it was just a cat that had taken the rodent's life and not … something else.
“Brynn, you need to see this!” Jas shouted and I sighed, wiping the mouse's blood on the already dirty leg of my breeches and tucking it away. Before I stood up, I clasped the silver star hanging around my neck with one hand and reached out to touch the mouse's spirt with the other. The poor thing was too scared to even shy away, its soul becoming briefly corporeal as my fingers made contact with its fur.
“Goddess-speed and happy endings,” I whispered as the image of the mouse morphed and shivered, turning as silver as a beam of moonlight and fading away until there was nothing there but the warped and rotted boards of the old floor.
I stood up, leaving my satchel where it was on the ground and rubbing my shoulder as I followed the sound of Jasinda's voice. The road up to the manor was riddled with broken cobblestones, weeds, and the skeletons of long abandoned carriages. It was too rough for any sort of pack animal to make the trek, so we'd had to carry ourselves on foot, lugging all the equipment that a spirit whisperer—that's me—might need to exorcise a ghost or two or ten.
“Jassy?” I asked as I moved past the formal foyer with its double staircases, and down a long receiving hall that would've been used by servants in times past. The wallpaper was peeling like old skin, leaving behind water stained walls and fl
aky plaster. At some point, thieves had come in and stripped the old place of its wood moldings, sconces and chandeliers; they'd left nothing but a skeleton behind.
“In here!” she called out, drawing me through an empty archway where a swinging door might've once stood and into the kitchen. As I moved, I was conscious of keeping my wings tucked tightly against my back. My clumsiness was not limited to my feet. I was notorious among the castle staff for breaking things with the feathered black wings that graced my back. As a kid, they used to call me Pigeon Girl because I caused ten times as much damage to the royal halls as the flying rats that plagued the old stone building.
“What is it?” I asked as I leaned against the wall outside a small servant's room—a tiny square that would've belonged to the head cook. “Jas, there was a mouse—”
“Flub mice,” she said, only she didn't actually say flub but I wouldn't lose a feather even thinking about the F-word that famously rhymes with duck. As a half-angel, my powers were bound to the light goddess and she was a serious stickler for avoiding words with negative connotations. I supposed I couldn't blame her; the very words I spoke held power. The more positivity and light I imbued those words with, the more powerful I was. “Look at this, Brynn. There's a distinct spiritual signature written all over this room.”
The room itself was so small that with the collapsed remains of a small bed and a sagging dresser, there wasn't space for us both. I waited for Jas to step out, pushing her long dark hair over her shoulder, sapphire blue eyes sparkling with a scholar's excitement.
“Brynn, this could be it,” she said as I took a deep breath and stepped into the room. “Our big break.”
Jas was always looking for that one case, that one unique spirit that we could exorcise that would prove our worth to the scholars at the Royal College. In just two weeks, I'd be turning twenty-one and that'd be it; that was the cut off date for acceptance into the prestigious training facility. It wasn't that Jas cared about the status of being a student there, or the potential for a high-ranking position after graduation, it was the library. Only students of the Royal College were permitted to use the vast, twisting hallways of the catacombs. There were books there that couldn't be found anywhere else—not to mention ancient artifacts, exemplary professors, and vast resources that could be used for research.
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