The stupid things girls did for love.
I sighed and slumped onto the couch. I glanced at the clock. It was already two in the morning. I’d delayed heading home, and for good reason. It was lonelier back here, without passersby to distract me. The silence suffocated me, so I turned on the television and let some cooking show that didn’t matter play. Max and I were supposed to watch the next episode of Superhero High together. I guessed that was not going to happen now.
I hadn’t finished the beer that Hansel gave me. I popped it open and brought the Heineken to my mouth. I’d always hated beer—it tasted bitter—but maybe it’d help me sleep. Sipping the beer made it impossible for me to stop thinking about Hansel. I was drawn to him, but which girl wouldn’t be?
I felt my phone vibrating in my pocket. I’d put it on silent earlier. Glancing at the screen, I saw thirty missed calls. All from Max. He was probably freaking out about the video that I’d taken earlier. I didn’t post it, but videoing him did the job of scaring him. I doubted he was actually concerned about me. The red flags had all been there since the beginning of the relationship. Lydia, my foster mother, had told me he seemed like a player, but I ignored her because I wanted to believe love could happen to me. He was hot. That was probably what blinded me in the first place. Golden hair, blue eyes. He looked like the typical prince even though he refused to get a proper job. He was too busy pursuing his dreams.
No use moping about it.
I downed the beer in one gulp, which was probably a bad idea, then strode to my room. Tomorrow morning, I was going to suffer both a heartbreak and a real hangover.
I’d stayed in this town because of Max. He’d wanted to start a business with his sister selling graphic tees, and he thought his designs would sync with the locals here more. I’d always wanted to go to New York to pursue music. Maybe I should go to New York. Being single was great. I could do what I want, hang with whomever I wished. I got to make my own decisions as a grown-ass woman. I pulled open my wardrobe and began dragging clothes out. I had a shit-ton of clothes, which Max always complained about. Now, there wasn’t anybody to complain about them anymore.
Freedom tasted sweeter than cake.
A whooshing sound interrupted my attempt at cheering myself up. My window flew open. A huge gust of wind blew the curtains inward, and the clothes I’d left over the bed were tossed in all directions. Fear sputtered through me, and I reached for the nearest weapon—a hanger. A hanger? What was a hanger going to do against the wind?
“Hello?” I asked. I rolled my eyes at myself. How original. I was being thrown straight into a horror movie and that was the first thing I could come up with? I held the hanger out in front of me and inched closer to the window. “Is this a prank? TV show? If you intend to put me on some gag reel then you should know that I don’t fall for things—”
I screamed and almost tripped over myself when somebody tapped me on my shoulder. I swatted the intruder with the hanger. Unsurprisingly, it did little to hurt my assailant. When my attacker came into the picture more clearly, I thought I might die.
He had horns and a goat’s face.
I wanted to scream again, but that sight was so horrific that I froze on the spot, not even managing a light whimper. At first, I thought the assailant might be wearing a mask. But then the creature’s mouth moved in a too-realistic manner. Spittle landed on my cheeks when it said, “Caramel Valencia. Your days as a human are over.”
“Over?” I squeaked. “Are you going to kill me?”
“No,” it responded matter-of-factly. “I am a brightling, meant to escort you. You are to be brought to the Sanctuary.”
“Is that where they put all the dead bodies?” My fingers quivered. “Does Santa hate me? Was I too naughty last Christmas?”
“I do not know this Santa you speak of, but the Sanctuary is where the goddesses are sent to. It exists in the realm of Haven. There are many who await you there.”
“Goddesses?” This had to be some sort of trick. I finally found the courage to move and used the hanger to hit the goat man again. He caught my wrist. I attempted to struggle out of his grasp, but his grip was insanely strong, and if I struggled any harder, I might break my own arm.
“Please don’t struggle,” he said. “It makes transporting you more difficult.”
“Leave me alone!” I lifted my leg and kneed his thigh, missing his groin by a fraction of an inch.
I’d failed to hurt the creature with my weak-ass kung fu moves. The brightling narrowed its beady, goatlike eyes at me. I couldn’t even get a proper look at its pupils because its eyes were pointed at different directions. “Note that the councilors in the academy don’t take well to disobedience. I have no right to punish you, but I think you deserve a fair warning.”
I was gathering a healthy amount of spit in my mouth, ready to use it against the creature, when the wind swirled about us. I felt my body disintegrating and pulling away into the surrounding air.
“Transferring between realms is an uncomfortable sensation,” the creature said. “It is the strangest the first time, but trust me, you’ll get used to it.”
“Trust you?” I asked. “You’re a goat man who looks like he eats babies for breakfast.”
“I do not eat babies for breakfast.”
“I didn’t mean it that—”
“Enough. We have to return to the Sanctuary soon. It is not good for brightlings to be wandering the human world for too long.”
The brightling took out a wand and made a swishing motion with it.
A wand? Was this goat man a wizard, too? This had to be a dream.
Glitter and sparkles snapped through my vision, and the magic the brightling used tugged me away from my room, transferring me into an unknown, foreign realm.
I was too afraid to open my eyes after the brightling spirited me away. I still couldn’t wrap my mind around the situation. Just minutes ago, I’d been overthinking what had happened to Max and trying to plan my life, since it didn’t involve him anymore.
My concerns had escalated into not being eaten alive by some goat-headed monster.
“You don’t have to keep your eyes closed,” the brightling said. “The time has come to open them.”
Time has come? “Do you always speak in such fancy and vague terms?”
“That question is worthy of my corroboration.”
“Corrobo-what?” I should have done my readings during English class. I knew that my command of language was subpar. At least I was fluent in ukulele. That made it so I wasn’t completely useless. During a zombie apocalypse, maybe I could serenade the zombies to sleep. Either that, or scare them away by playing the wrong chords.
Around me, I heard chatter. The voices belonged to girls. They too were confused about their surroundings. The brightling tapped my back with his finger. He had sharp claws that would cut my skin if he put any more pressure. That made him even more intimidating.
“You must open your eyes eventually,” the brightling said. “Your visual attention is needed should you want to pass your classes.”
“Classes?” I asked, peeking one eye open. “Like school?” I’d flunked out of high school at the age of seventeen. Me and academics never went along very well. Music had always been my passion and was the only thing I could imagine myself doing, but my school never really allowed me to develop it. “I don’t want to go to school.” It was only after uttering that sentence that I realized I sounded like some whiny child.
“You must. That is the process of becoming a goddess.”
“So, I’m not one yet?” I asked, not bothering to hide my sarcasm. I still couldn’t believe that any of this was real. None of it probably was.
“You have to graduate.” The brightling nodded to itself, satisfied, as if it’d just solved all the problems of the universe. “I must go and fetch more students here. There will be a big feast before you all commence school.”
The feast sounded like free food, and I loved free food. Never
mind it came from some questionable place with a cryptic name like “the Sanctuary.”
The brightling tipped its head down. “I shall take my leave. Enjoy your stay here, Ms. Valencia.”
“Call me Cara.” I opened both eyes to look at the brightling more clearly, ignoring some of the fear boiling in my gut. If he’d wanted to skin and cook me alive, he would have done so long ago. Maybe he really was just weird and friendly.
Oh, and also a kidnapper. I had to take a hundred points off the Does Cara Like You scoreboard for that, which put him in a deep negative. It didn’t help that he was ugly. Not that I hated ugly people, but the sad truth was that they were harder to like, which was why Disney animators always had to make their princesses pretty with perfectly curled eyelashes. Hell, maybe I was ugly, which was probably why I didn’t have any friends.
But never mind about me being ugly. I needed to focus on the brightling. He wasn’t just butt ugly. He was next-level—goat-butt-ugly.
“I do not appreciate that comment,” the brightling said.
“What comment?”
“Calling me ugly.”
“Ah.” I looked up at the ceiling, pretending I hadn’t just insulted him. I had this horrible habit of voicing my thoughts. I needed to take control of that before I blurted out my social security number—actually, did my social security number even matter anymore in this strange place?
The brightling cleared his throat and narrowed his eyes at me. “As mentioned earlier, I must go. I wanted to wish you a pleasant stay, but you have offended me greatly, and thus I shall curse you to a horrible experience in the Sanctuary. Goodbye, Ms. Valencia. I hope we never cross paths again.”
I cocked my head. “That is the most formal way I’ve ever heard anybody insult anyone. Well, fuck you too, ugly goat man.”
The brightling bowed and saluted me, before stalking away. I flipped the finger at him. He was acting polite, but that didn’t change the fact that he’d just torn me from my room screaming and transported me to a place I didn’t want to be in. Now that my attention had slipped from him, I could focus on my surroundings.
Grand couldn’t even begin to describe the place.
We were in a courtyard of some sort, with flowers that spanned the scenery. A huge waterfall poured from above us, misting into existence as if from nothing at all. Its waters played like a melodic tune as it gushed, and the sound of birds chirping mixed together with the chatter of the girls that surrounded me. I didn’t know any of them. They looked about the same age as me—teenage girls, some older, some younger. Some dressed in PJs, others in other kinds of casual clothes. One looked like she’d just come from prom. Some of them were accompanied by brightlings, too, but just like the one who brought me here, those took their leave quickly.
Pillars, made of rustic orange stones, enclosed us in the space we gathered in. Golden vines twirled around those pillars. I walked up to one of them and plucked a leaf, expecting to touch a foil-like texture, like one of those fake leaves you found in the craft store. When I sniffed the leaf, I smelled a dewy, fresh scent. The vines were alive. And golden? Nothing about this place made sense.
That dude from earlier—Hansel—must have drugged my Heineken. Was I on LSD? This couldn’t be real.
I pinched then bit myself. I was tempted to walk up to one of the girls to ask them to slap me, but that wasn’t a good way to make introductions. I wasn’t sure how long I might be stuck in this dream with these girls for.
“I demand to speak to your supervisor!”
I whipped my head to face the shrill voice nearby. It belonged to a girl with pigtails and a cheerleader outfit. She had glitter all over her. Her figure was banging. Unlike this chick, I had a couple of extra pounds around my waist (I blamed it on having too much love to handle), so I never would be able to carry off that crop top she flaunted her toned abs with.
“This is unacceptable,” the girl said, wagging her finger back and forth. “I’m supposed to lead the competition, like, five minutes ago. My team needs me. Send me back home, you stupid monster.” Her pigtails bounced back and forth as she spoke. They were decorated with pink ribbons.
The brightling she was verbally assaulting had a duck head and was four heads taller than her. It blinked stupidly and didn’t answer her query. It opened its beak in a silly gesture, then closed it again.
She slapped him across the face. The brightling didn’t even flinch. I could tell the action hurt her, because she shook her hand as if trying to shake off the pain after that. “Where is this place? I’ve asked you that so many times, but I have yet to receive a proper answer.”
“The Sanctuary, ma’am,” the brightling replied.
“That doesn’t tell me anything!”
I crinkled my brow when I saw the girl do a full spin. She’d tried karate-kicking the brightling. I cracked a smile at that, secretly supporting her. I had to hold myself back from shouting, “You can do it!” Was it too dumb to be cheering on a cheerleader?
Her violent attempts at demanding freedom failed to work out. The brightling caught her ankle and swept her off her other foot. The next moment, the girl was hanging upside down. She shrieked. My goosebumps rose at her high-pitched scream. The girl belonged in a choir. Her skirt fell over her abdomen, revealing her pink pair of safety shorts underneath. She had a nice ass. Round and perky. A blush reddened her cheeks. I wasn’t sure if it was due to her being embarrassed or mad.
My instincts to save this girl kicked in. I’d been so invested in that display that I just didn’t want her to lose. I ran up to the creature and did the first thing I could think of.
I grabbed him by the balls.
Why the balls? Because people usually had two vulnerable spots—their faces and their crotches. His face obviously wouldn’t react to any assaults. The balls were the only other possible option. I should have kicked him, but I had a tendency to fall on my face, and I couldn’t be sure if my right leg would trip over my left if I’d tried something that drastic.
The creature jolted and dropped the cheerleader to the ground. She sounded a soft “oomph,” then pulled herself to her feet. Scowling at the brightling, she said, “That was entirely unnecessary! Now I really need to speak with your supervisor. Who leads things around here?”
He spun around and tipped its head at me, ignoring the cheerleader. “I have been molested by a half-blood.”
“Half-blood?” I said.
“That is what we call the goddesses in training.”
“I see. Can I step out of this program? I’m not sure if such a convoluted plot will do well for television. You’re allowed to stop training me now.”
“Television is not something we have.”
“What are you talking about? Everywhere has television.”
The cheerleader punched the duck man’s back, then, stealing my idea, she kicked the brightling’s crotch.
The brightling stilled. Did this creature have the sensory receptors of a rock? Then, proving my assumptions wrong, the brightling knocked its knees together and cupped its crotch.
“Ouch,” it said, with absolutely no emotion in its voice whatsoever.
“That’ll teach you!” the cheerleader shouted. She jumped into the air and elbowed the brightling’s neck. Should I do something about this? For some reason, I began feeling sorry for the brightling. I shouldn’t. All of them were scary, horrific kidnappers who should be charged by the police for harassment, then maybe dissected by NASA in case they were aliens.
The cheerleader wrestled the brightling to the ground. The other brightlings in the area didn’t help their companion. Instead, they stared, dumbfounded, just like I did. This cheerleader was crazy. She moved like a chipmunk on steroids.
“Stop!” Another woman was shouting. She sounded assertive, her voice filled with command.
The cheerleader slapped the brightling’s chest. “Send me home.” She wrung its collar.
“Stop!”
The other woman shouting came from a
carpeted staircase that was right up front. She walked gracefully, her hips sashaying back and forth. She was taller than the rest of the girls here, and with her slim figure, she reminded me of a svelte swan. Long, glowing blonde locks fell from her head and neatly around her shoulders. The lady dressed casually in a cashmere tunic and jeans, but she carried herself so effortlessly that for a second I thought she might be wearing a gown. In her hand was a wand.
She lifted the wand and pointed it at the cheerleader. Golden vines shot from the ground and circled the cheerleader, wrapping around her arms. The cheerleader was yanked backward, then fastened into an awkward position. The vines held her steady and stopped her from assaulting the brightling.
The woman, in her six-inch heels, halted in front of the scene. She placed her hands on her hips. Her mouth was pressed into a thin line. “Danna Banks and Caramel Valencia. Troublemakers, I see.”
“Good evening,” I said. Why try to fight a woman who could control nature? I didn’t even have my hanger with me anymore, which made me defenseless.
“The both of you will be the first to be sent to detention.”
“But you said something about a feast later?” I asked. I hadn’t forgotten about the free food.
“None for you whatsoever. Your time will be better served learning how to grow up.”
I scowled at Danna. I knew it wasn’t her fault, because I’d decided to butt in on my own, but I wanted someone to direct my anger at, because this place looked like it might provide a good feast.
Three
“Detention?” I asked. “I thought I’d be done and over with shit like that after high school.” I was nineteen, for goodness’ sake. That meant I was an adult. I should be able to do what I want and not be sent to detention.
Danna nodded. She and I had made introductions while following the brightling to the detention room. Danna, apparently, wasn’t an adult by the legal definition of the word. She’d just turned seventeen last May. Still, her spunk would make most grown-ups shy away. “I am tempted to attack that brightling.”
Goddess Academy: The Complete Reverse Harem Collection Page 2