by Amy Sumida
Contents
Half Bad
More Books by Amy Sumida
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
A Special Look
Chapter One
About the Author
Pronunciation Guide
Half Bad
Amy Sumida
Copyright © 2019 Amy Sumida
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 9798665336183
Legal Notice
This book is copyright protected. It is only for personal use. You cannot amend, distribute, sell, use, quote, or paraphrase any part of the content within this book without the consent of the author or copyright owner. Legal action will be pursued if this is breached.
More Books by Amy Sumida
The Godhunter Series (in order)
Godhunter
Of Gods and Wolves
Oathbreaker
Marked by Death
Green Tea and Black Death
A Taste for Blood
The Tainted Web
Series Split:
These books can be read together or separately
Harvest of the Gods & A Fey Harvest
Into the Void & Out of the Darkness
Perchance to Die
Tracing Thunder
Light as a Feather
Rain or Monkeyshine
Blood Bound
Eye of Re
My Soul to Take
As the Crow Flies
Cry Werewolf
Pride Before a Fall
Monsoons and Monsters
Blessed Death
In the Nyx of Time
Let Sleeping Demons Lie
The Lion, the Witch, and the Werewolf
Hear No Evil
Dark Star
Destiny Descending
The Black Lion
(Half Bad)
Beyond the Godhunter
A Darker Element
Out of the Blue
The Twilight Court Series
Fairy-Struck
Pixie-Led
Raven-Mocking
Here There Be Dragons
Witchbane
Elf-Shot
Fairy Rings and Dragon Kings
Black-Market Magic
Etched in Stone
Careless Wishes
The Spellsinger Series
The Last Lullaby
A Symphony of Sirens
A Harmony of Hearts
Primeval Prelude
Ballad of Blood
A Deadly Duet
Macabre Melody
Aria of the Gods
Anthem of Ashes
A Chorus of Cats
Doppelganger Dirge
Out of Tune
The Spectra Series
Spectra
A Gray Area
A Compression of Colors
Blue Murder
Code Red
With Flying Colors
Green With Envy
Fairy Tales
Happily Harem After Vol 1
Including:
The Four Clever Brothers
Wild Wonderland
Beauty and the Beasts
Pan's Promise
The Little Glass Slipper
Happily Harem After Vol 2
Including:
Codename: Goldilocks
White as Snow
Twisted
Awakened Beauty
Erotica
An Unseelie Understanding
Historical Romance
Enchantress
Pronunciation Guide at the back of the book.
Chapter One
“Lesya, I didn't make you a princess bed so you could leave it unmade every day.” I waved at the ultra-feminine bed most little girls would love to have. Lavender silk hung from a golden, half-crown teester set high on the wall above the gilded, rose headboard, matching the comforter that was bunched up at the foot of the bed, flowing over the purple, padded bench there.
“Can't you just Mary Poppins it?” Lesya whined and bobbed her shoulders up and down in that way children do when they're frustrated.
“First of all, points for the movie reference and bonus points for making it into a verb,” I growled. “Second, no, I cannot Mary Poppins it. There are many things I can do, but magically making a bed isn't one of them. I mean, I can make a leaf into a bed, but I can't twirl my fingers and set your linens to rights. And even if I could, I would not make yours.”
“Why not?” She blinked her big blue eyes at me. “I'm your favorite daughter.”
“You're my only daughter—points for using that too. But you need to learn responsibility.” I bent over her. “If you want nice things, you have to take care of them. That includes putting away all of these toys after you play with them.”
I did another wave at the scattered dolls and their tiny plastic furniture. Dear Gods, I hate little plastic furniture. It always seems to wind up beneath my bare feet.
Lesya slouched and pouted.
“You're staying in this room until it's clean!” I stalked out of her bedroom and slammed the door behind me, locking it for bad measure.
Bad measure is a new expression I'm trying to make popular, just go with it.
I stomped down the tower stairs and took the door to my right that led out onto the balcony, instead of the one straight ahead of me that led into the bedroom. I needed a breath of fresh air or the next breath I let out would be fiery. I took that breath as I approached the railing, then leaned against the stone and let the sight of the Pride Lands soothe me. Above my head, I heard a little lioness pounding around her room ferociously. I maliciously hoped that she stepped on a tiny plastic chair or even worse, one of those awful Barbie shoes. Then I felt bad and hoped that didn't happen.
“Vhat has Lesya done now?” Kirill asked with a smile tinging his Russian accent.
“It's what she hasn't done and that would be clean her room.” I looked over at my husband—the rebellious lioness' father—as he came up beside me.
Sunlight caught in Kirill's eyes and flashed sapphire. I wasn't sure if it was just the light, though. Kirill had recently become a full god, as opposed to the demigod he was previously. He now—in addition to his Intare magic—held the magics of Death and Winter, all thanks to a connection he'd had with a goddess who he'd once been sacrificed to
. Marena, AKA Marzana, had tried to kill Kirill to get to my Trinity Star but, in a fortunate twist of fate, he had killed her instead and taken her magic. Yeah, it was a case of the human turning things around on the god, and I was all for it. Especially since the human—or ex-human, rather—was my husband.
“How's the magic, O' Lion God of Death and Winter?” I asked him.
“Calm.” Kirill leaned over and kissed my forehead. “Did you vorry zis much about Trevor ven he became god?”
“I gave Trevor his god magic,” I countered. “I knew what it could and couldn't do to him.”
“And still, it surprised us.”
Kirill was referring to the change that godhood had made in Trevor. A change we hadn't realized was tied to his godhood until Kirill went through his own changes. The god magic had made Kirill his own power source—the fount of his magic and therefore his immortal life—and that had altered the Intare magic that was already inside him. Now, Kirill can take a half form, shifting parts of his body into lion parts or becoming a werelion, as opposed to the full lion that the rest of the Intare—myself included—are limited to. Trevor, who already had a werewolf form, changed in a different way.
All Froekn have wolves inside them—animal aspects that only emerge when they're in full wolf form—but sometimes, when a Froekn is threatened, the wolf will take over to protect the man. It's called an eclipse and it happened to Trevor. Except we didn't realize that Trevor's wolf had also been strengthened by the god magic I'd given him, that of Dark Dominion: control over night creatures. The magic had made Trevor's wolf into more than an aspect of himself; it had become a sort of split personality that Trevor could shift into at will. And another thing we hadn't considered was that Trevor was now also his own source of magic—a part of the Froekn and yet separate, no longer reliant on Fenrir, their god and his father—just like Kirill with the Intare and me.
“Yes, it surprised us, but it didn't hurt Trevor. Your magic is more powerful, honey, and more volatile.”
“More volatile zan volf?” Kirill lifted a teasing brow at me.
I stared him down.
“Stop vorrying, Tima.” He moved behind me, wrapped his body around mine, and nestled his face into the curve of my neck. “All is vell. I know Death and I know Vinter. Zey cannot surprise me. Just relax and enjoy zis peace.”
That's when my phone rang.
I tensed. Kirill swore in Russian but let me go.
“You had to go and tempt the Fates,” I growled at him.
“Who vould call?” He asked as I ran for my cellphone. “Everyone knows it's hard to take calls in God Realm.”
“I don't know but I'm pretty damn sure I'm not going to like what they have to say.” I picked up the phone and answered it warily, “Hello?”
“Ver... Austin... I...” a voice with a Texan drawl crackled into gibberish.
“Austin?” I grimaced. “Austin, I'm sorry, I forgot to tell you that it's hard to receive calls here. Text me.”
“Vervain... help. Ec... the...”
“Austin?” I didn't like the sound of that. “Text me, Austin. Text!”
The phone went dead.
The text didn't come. I texted him. He didn't respond.
“Aw, sugar puffs,” I cursed.
Chapter Two
“Austin?” I pounded frantically on the front door of Lieutenant Austin Wright's Lincoln Logs house in Lexington, Texas. “Austin, are you home? Austin!”
It had been morning at Pride Palace but Texas was a good seven hours behind us so that made it a few hours after midnight there. The hour of his call worried me even more.
“I'm coming! Hold your horses.” Austin shouted as the sound of his boots hitting the hardwood floors carried out to us.
“Thank goodness,” I muttered.
Austin yanked open the door and panted, “Sheesh, Vervain, take my door off, why don't ya?” He had a flannel shirt on, unbuttoned (very nice abs, by the way), with his usual jeans and cowboy boots. His short, sandy-blond hair looked as if he had run his hands through it but not in a grooming sort of way, and there were shadows under his pale blue eyes. Still, those eyes were sharp—despite the alcohol on his breath—when they skittered over the group I'd brought with me. “You here for battle or what?”
“I wasn't sure what we'd be facing,” I huffed irritably. “I tried to text you but you didn't text me back.”
“Oh?” He pulled out his phone and peered at it. “Huh. Yeah, my text tone isn't as loud as my ringtone. I didn't hear it.”
“Unbelievable.” I turned to tell the gang of Intare I'd brought with me, “You guys can head home, it looks as if it was a false alarm.”
“Tima,” the lion-shifters murmured as they gave me a respectful head bow, then traced back to Pride Palace.
The rest of my group—Trevor, Kirill, Azrael, and Viper—stayed behind. I would have brought my other husbands—Odin, Re, and Arach—but Odin and Re were taking care of some business in their territories and Arach was in Faerie. And yes, I have multiple husbands—six, to be exact, and one boyfriend—it's a lioness magic thing.
“I don't think I'll ever get used to that.” Austin stared at the space the Intare had been standing in. Then he shook it off and waved us inside. “Come on in. Y'all want somethin' to drink?”
We filed into Austin's living room and over to the living room, where a couch and chairs with wooden frames and cotton-covered cushions sat atop the only rug in the room—a braided rag rug. An antler floor lamp stood at one end of the couch and an old trunk served as the coffee table. It was... rustic.
“I'll take a beer,” Viper said as he plopped down on a chair, his muscular body taking up most of the space even though the chair was a wide one.
The other men and I asked for sodas instead, and I went with Austin through his dining room and into the kitchen to help him carry the beverages. His kitchen was tidy, only two glasses in the sink, and his fridge was mostly bare except for condiments and beverages.
“Don't do a lot of cooking?” I asked as I took some cans of soda from him.
“I've been as busy as a one-legged man at an ass-kicking contest. Not much time left for cookin'.” He shut the fridge and looked at me. “Hey, thanks for comin' over. I didn't know what to do after that botched phone call. I thought I'd try ya again in the mornin'. I was fixin' to go to bed when you showed up.”
“I figured you didn't hear me tell you to text me.” I grimaced. “Phone calls don't travel through the Aether well. In the future, always text.”
“Copy that,” he said as we made it back to the living room.
We passed out the drinks, then I sat down between Trevor and Azrael, all of us looking pointedly at Austin.
“Okay, lookee here,” Austin finally began. “I dunno if this is one of your people or not.”
“One of my people?” I asked with a grin.
“Well, Gods are like another species, right?”
I thought about it. “I suppose they are,” I conceded. “But technically the term species refers to a group of related organisms that can interbreed and then races would be those individual groups within the species. That works well enough for Faeries, who have races within their species, but Gods were all Atlanteans and could possibly be categorized as another type of human.”
“We are not human,” Azrael said decidedly. “I just read about this.”
“Az has been studying at the Angel University,” I said to Austin.
“Angels have a university?” Austin widened his eyes at me, then at Az.
“Yes,” Azrael answered. “And everything I've found on Atlanteans refers to us a separate species. However, my wife is correct that it's not the best term, either for us or the Fey. Races within a species shouldn't be able to breed with races from another species. It would be like a dog breeding with a cat. But, as has been proven many times, both Gods and Faeries can breed with humans, they have even, on the rare occasion, bred with each other. The only problem is the soul.”
“Oh, I know this one.” I lifted my hand as if I were in class, then dropped it when I saw everyone smiling at me.
“Yes, Vervain?” Austin pointed at me.
“When a human and a god have a baby, the god soul dominates and the child gets a god soul as well as the magic that comes with it. When a faerie and a human have a baby, the faerie essence—which is like a soul—dominates but it's more flexible than a soul and the human soul will settle spiritually while the Fey essence gives it some magic, which is how you get human witches. In the case of most witches, the faerie essence has been so diluted that they're closer to humans than faeries. But if a god and a faerie have a child, the soul and essence coexist and the baby gets them both. In other words, they get two souls.”
“Forget I asked,” Austin said dryly.
“Vhy did you call my vife?” Kirill pointedly interrupted.
“There's been an alarmin' amount of snake attacks of late,” Austin said grimly. “Now, we got snakes here and sometimes people get bit, but what's been goin' on lately ain't normal. We've got people who've been bit multiple times, gettin' so much damn venom in 'em that they die before they can get medical attention. You know how many people die from snake bites in Texas?”
We looked at him blankly.