Angel Wings

Chapter 13.2

The rest of their time at Kalas Hem was unexpectedly pleasant after all the insanity before.  Evabelle hung around with Aza.  CJ had gone back to Patrick to see some of his experiments.  So the girls wandered through the party rooms without him. 

Aza talked to just about everyone.  She chatted with the pixies, which got excited and began telling them about all the sorts of technology they were creating.  But they said it would be several decades before they could release them to the humans. 

Aza challenged the satyrs to a game of darts, and flattened them.  They called her to a rematch, but Aza just laughed and took their bag of gold she had managed to weasel out of them if she won. 

Then the two of them went out where the pool was, that was now teeming with life.  Evabelle stared at the mermaids.  Their scales flickered with an inner glow, and their skin was eerily translucent.  It wasn't quite how Evabelle pictured them, but they were still strangely beautiful.

Shaundee had mentioned the sirens, and now Evabelle could hear their songs.  They were oddly alluring, but they really only seemed to affect men, mostly.  Unlike the mermaids, the sirens remained underwater, until a mesmerized creature got too close.   When that happened, a hand would shoot from the water and snatch the poor creature and drag him down.  That was the mermaids queue to rescue him.    Apparently Shaundee had it all figured out.  Sirens were minor demon borns and mermaids were their opposite.  To insure the sirens remained happy she would allow creatures to be taken, but would never allow them to be actually drowned, so the mermaids were on lifeguard duty as well as vacation, it seemed.

It all appeared fine, but the thought of Night children here, made Evabelle nervous.  The thought of the cloaked stranger popped into her head. Not all of us.  He had said.

Aza on the other hand didn't seem perturbed at all.  In fact she decided to turn it into a game.  She would pretend to be enchanted by the siren's song and walk zombie-like toward the pool, but right as the hand would burst from the water, Evabelle's friend would dance away with that grin on her face.  She continued this, ignoring Evabelle's warnings, until the siren's got fed up with her taunting, ganged up on her, and managed to catch Aza.  Evabelle gasped as she watched her friend being dragged under, but then one of the mermaids, who had been watching, rolled her eyes as if she had been anticipating it and dove under.  She popped back up a moment later with a laughing Aza, and placed her back on the pavement.

"That was awesome!"  Aza cheered.

Aza's rescuer shook her head.  "Now you've had your fun, so stop pestering them."

The girls returned inside.  "I thought all the opposites hated each other."  Aza commented, wringing out her hair.  Evabelle noted her friend check to make sure the charm was still there.  "I mean those guys seem to have a more mutual relationship than the others."

Evabelle thought a moment.  "Well maybe the hatred sort of lessens as it goes down the line."

Once they were indoors again, they met up with CJ, and the three of them headed to the main party room.  Aza decided to brave one of the more questionable drinks at the bar.  CJ and Evabelle watched in horror as she drank the glowing, neon blue liquid.  She guzzled it down and then ordered two more. 

For a moment, Evabelle almost felt like she was back at home with all the laughing and Aza getting into trouble, except for the fact that they were surrounded by all these creatures that weren't supposed to exist.  It felt the closest to normal that she could get, all things considered.  She wasn't worrying about saving anyone, just having fun with her friends.