November 8th, 1849
There was mud in my mouth. my knees dripped blood onto the uneven pavement--little spatters of crimson rain.
I can make it. I will change before they catch me.
I bit down on my fist. I wouldn’t cry, it would only distract me from running.
I wasn’t sure if that was true but it sounded good in my mind. Ahead of me a little girl is sleeping in the alley, her hand clenched around a bundle of forget-menots. The moonlight spilling on her pale skin turns her from innocence to wraith.
Two days ago I was her--a forgotten face in a sea of the living dead--yet I was different. At night I would shed my human skin and go back to my own kind, go back to my world with wings of light to carry me through the sky where no element or weapon forged could claim my life. Tonight I am human and if they catch me I will die.
Chapter One: November 6th, 1849
London, Oxford
Bodies everywhere. Warm human bodies, pressing up against me, making me stumble. I loved it. The icy November wind felt good against my bare fingertips and nose. Faeries don’t feel the cold, not the way humans do, we feel it like sunlight or a warm evening breeze. Cold isn’t harmful to us--just another experience in an eternity of them.
He flicks me a shilling and bustles off, his greatcoat swaying out behind him, grey and patchy like the London sky.
I spin around. It is rare to hear my faerie name during daylight hours. I wave wildly when I see who it is. Genivie, Gen we call her--we have known each other practically since birth. Her ceremony is two nights from now. Mine is tonight.
I made my way to the pavement, surprisingly still in possession of my stack of newspapers I would peddle during the day. I didn’t need the money or the work. I did it just to pass the day. I have done many things in my lifetimes--or should I say lifetime? You decide. Today I am a hundred human years old and today is the day I have been dreading for just that long.
The man’s voice is gruff, his nose hairs are so long they brush his upper lip. He smells like cheap wine. his cheeks are red from more than the cold. I hand him one. His fingers brush against mine.
His touch is so warm, firelike.
Humans.
Always I have loved them, and always I have dreaded the day I must become one.
Gimme a paper girl.
Selyara!
You should be getting ready.
Gen doesn’t change much when she sunwalks--that’s what we call it when we use a human form to enter their society. It’s only a glamour, just a picture they see, inside we remain ourselves. I have always used my own face and hair. I look so much younger than all my ages.
Kindness soaks her eyes clinging to her long spiked blue lashes.
I rolled my eyes up into my hairline.
Moons are aligning, planets are forming and all that.
But you are heir to the twined throne -- I am only a filthy UnSeele girl.
You know our ceremonies will be exactly the same.
We have to go Sel!
I stuffed my stack of papers in the little wood casket I once stashed behind the drain pipe here on Creighton street standing over one the of the main entrances to our world.
Gen tugged on my sleeve.
Go...yes we had to go. Go to my possible death with a wreath of flowers on my head and the fear of the Blood Hunters in my heart.
Branches clung to the wet bricks like afternoon shadows. Autumn leaves dotted across clean chunks of white snow and patches of fragrant grass. It bloomed all the seasons down here.
Faeries of the Seele Court would have it no other way. Flowers of every size and colors were in full bloom on the ground and wilting in the folds of the branches. Water Lilies and Forget-me-nots twined together, their faces dusted with mud and ice. It smelled like cinnamon spiced wine and rosemary stuffed birds.
my feet were bare. I felt nothing. When I was human I would feel it all. Eyes of the entire court on me I kept mine trained on the ground. Snow squished between my cherry painted toes and dry branches cracked under my heels.
White marble lined the stairs leading to the dais on which I would stand and willingly give up my immortality. I loved the humans but to all the gods that ruled the earth and sky...I never desired to be one.
Lavara...Gen and I think her name sounds like Larva. A poser if there ever was one. She is queen in my place until I am old enough to take the Seele throne. If I survive three mortal days I will be crowned. Petals fall from the bundle of white orchids in my hands and flutter to the ground.
If I survive...if...
