by Giger, S. L.
“Do you now also agree this dress hadn’t just been washed up on the beach?”
“Okay, I do see a magical connection there. So, that’s what it feels like to work in Hollywood and see those things happen all day.”
“That wasn’t a movie trick.”
“I know but I can’t help it that my head is thinking feverishly to find out how this worked. Who do you think sent it to you?”
I pulled up my shoulders which was surprisingly easy given the fact that my upper body armor had been so heavy before. But the dress had found a way to fit my body perfectly and now moved with me like a second skin. Except for the braid which was more like an annoying shadow that moved a bit too slow. “I guess I’ll find out at the dance. Too bad you are not allowed to come.” I lay my arms around his neck and frowned. “If they want to award me with something, you have to be there as well. You did just as much as me.”
He sighed, for real this time. “Not really. I just put you under pressure. I’d love to come but if it’s a magical festival and no humans are allowed, that’s how it is. I imagine there are even wilder things attending who might eat humans and it’s better for my life if I pass on the opportunity to sneak in with you.” He winked at me and added. “This time.”
I bit my lip. “True. Next time, too. There’s no rush in changing you into a Siren. I love hearing your heartbeat.”
Alex straightened up and posed like a bodybuilder. “I know, quite something special, right?” He flashed a smile at me with his little gap in between his front teeth and I couldn’t help but fall for him all over again.
The event was still five days away. Enough time to make plans with Melissa and Luke. Their eyes grew to the size of saucers when I showed up in my dress.
“It was gifted to me.” I shrugged. “When someone opens the bow on my back it all goes back to normal.”
They hadn’t received any gifts. Luke had bought a skeleton suit and Melissa was his dead bride and would wear a white dress and put on white make up all over her skin. Compared to theirs, my dress indeed was much more special, and I hoped I’d find out who gave it to me.
Four days later, Melissa, Luke, and I ran across the Atlantic Ocean already in our full attire and my braid followed me in a 90-degree angle. We picked up Claire on our way who wore a long fur coat and two bunny ears. We made a funny picture zigzagging from city to city which was easier again without the fences along the borders. Night had fallen upon the Emirates once we reached them and we spotted the golden halos of the city lights from far away. However, we stayed in the desert, now running on the course which had been shown to me on the ocean and to the others in a cup of tea and a wet sink.
We must have passed an invisible frontier because all of a sudden, an entirely different city appeared in front of us. It took me a moment to realize that it was something substantial. At first, I only saw curtains of northern lights beaming from the ground in green, blue, yellow, red, purple and other colors. We all slowed down at once a bit awestruck from approaching this magical vision. I feared it would disappear like a mirage once we got closer, but it stayed there. Now, I also noticed that the desert was populated with all kinds of other funnily dressed creatures. They walked, galloped or crawled at their own pace toward the luminescence.
We slowed down even further, going at almost human speed now, taking in the odd body shapes. A group of thin wooden sticks hopped to the right of me, growing out from the top were two round human heads with a lot of facial hair. I turned my head to the other side because the ground vibrated since a herd of white horses trotted past me. I sharply exhaled. Not only were they unnaturally white that it almost hurt my eyes, but they also had small wings like fins attached to their sides which were humming like a swarm of bees. I couldn’t suppress a jump of joy on the spot. What else would I discover? Of course, I had already lost the others and hoped I’d find them again in that gush out of a fantasy story. Then, I spotted something in the air. People in long and colorful robes and capes hovering above the ground. Some of them were passing me right now like colorful kites but in fact, it was people flying! Did I imagine this or were they deliberately changing their course to pass closer by me?
“Is it her?” I heard someone say.
“It’s her, it’s her,” a few whispered excited enough that I could hear. Two of those flying capes landed beside me and now I saw they had normal human faces and the rest of their bodies were covered in long, dark green robes. It was a woman and a man.
“You are Nathalie, right?” the woman asked with a bright smile.
“I am,” I said hesitatingly, asking myself whether I should remember her as well.
“Sorry, for flying in on you like that.” The woman noticed my hesitation and rolled back her sleeve. “I’m Gerta and this is Don. We work for the ministry of magic. Samantha told us that she had sent you this costume, so we would recognize our savior.”
I was thankful for the darkness which covered my reddening cheeks. “Oh, that’s a long time ago already and I didn’t really do much,” I murmured.
“No need for false modesty.” Don shook my hand. “This year, we are all here to thank you because without you and your family none of this would be happening right now.” Before I could think about a way to overcome my restraint he continued, “Can we bring you to the entrance?”
“You mean fly?” I managed to breathe.
“Yes,” Gerta smiled. “Just let us loop into your arms.“
I held out my elbows and before I knew it, my legs were dangling in the air. My short skirt clearly was not made for this but only drew more attention to us with the glittering leaves.
“Oh my...,” my words were caught in the wind. The distance to the ground got bigger and my field of vision over the desert with this big circus grew. Fluorescent colors, the volcano I had seen in the Puddle and a promiscuity of creatures. Before I could really appreciate the flying sensation, we were already descending again, landing in front of a big green arch made of vines. Hanging down from the top was a curtain consisting of a thousand butterflies. Only on second glance, I realized they were real and just flying on the same spot. Whenever someone wanted to pass, they flew to the side and created an opening. A few hundred meters to the side I spotted another arch and to the other side as well. Probably each time section of the huge clock shaped festival grounds had one.
“See you later. Be sure to look out for Samantha, she wanted to talk to you.” Gerta waved before they also walked through the butterflies.
“Thanks for the ride,” I called after them.
“There you are.” The white figure of Melissa approached me.
“My goodness, you didn’t tell me it was as insane as this!” I couldn’t keep my voice down because of my excitement.
“Wait until you see all the animated sections.” Melissa’s eyes sparkled.
We marched through the butterfly curtain and I felt an agreeable tingle from the thousand small winds created by the tiny wings of the butterflies. We had entered the lush jungle section with trees which were tall as skyscrapers. They were shaped like broccoli and flowers that shone in all colors even now in the dark. My eyes were wandering from one discovery to the next almost becoming over saturated with new impressions. We walked below a tree with silver apples. They came to life and a melody of hundred small bells rained down on us.
“Applejings,” Luke remarked at my marveling ‘aw’. “They are the forest fairies favorite Christmas decorations.”
“It’s a shame we can’t see any of this all year,” I said.
“Some of it would make life so much easier, too,” Claire stated. “But it would take away part of the magic. Just look at this red flower that is glowing in the dark.” She pointed at a rosebud the size of a pumpkin. “Already by the second day, you wouldn’t notice it the way you look at it now. It would become normality.”
Luke nodded in agreement. “The wizards compete against each other in coming up with newer and better spells. It seems like th
ey are never satisfied with what they know already.”
“So, by only showing the full splendor of magic every three years, it even is a surprise to us each time, how wonderful the supernatural world can be,” Melissa said.
Even though I swore to myself at that moment that I’d never take anything magical for granted, I knew they were right. Already, I couldn’t even remember how it felt to be tired and long for sleep. Or, that I used to crave all kinds of food as a human and now food didn’t interest me anymore. It was good to keep magic breathtaking and it was our duty that it stayed that way.
“Roisin,” Melissa called when she had discovered her and sprinted a few meters ahead. They threw their arms around each other and I joined them, the three of us finding each other in a warm embrace. Roisin planted a kiss on each of our cheeks. She, Themba, and a handful of other Sirens from their tribe waited in a line to enter a carriage pulled by unicorns.
“Incredible. Are those real unicorns?” I couldn’t help but stare at the beautiful horses. The others only laughed.
“Good timing,” Roisin said who wore an Amazonian leather outfit, just like the rest of the Sirens from Brazil. “They will bring us to the high plateau. A stage where they have special presentations. We want to hear Samantha’s opening speech, now that we personally know her.”
“Themba,” I smiled at him after I let go of Roisin. I hope my eyes showed the gratuity I felt toward him. He had risked his life for all of us without anyone having to force him. Simply because he felt it was the right thing to do. Yet, being two heads taller than me and the muscles in his arm as thick as twice my thigh, I was reluctant to show the warmth I felt toward him with a hug. “So nice that you came as well.”
He enclosed my white hand with his dark ones as he always did. “Of course, now that I received an invitation because the first time in history, male Sirens aren’t regarded as deadly machines.” He stuck his chin out in pride. I turned to Luke, my eyes moistening a little more than before. Yes, here we had done well. Perhaps, that’s why the Orbiters wanted us to create more male Sirens in the first place, but I didn’t want to give them any credit for that. Alex and Cathy were the ones to thank and Luke, Themba, and Eddie had shown the world how it was very much possible to live a normal life as a male Siren.
“There’s a first time for everything, right?” I quickly wiped away the tear that had escaped my eye. It could have been a fake eyelash which was bothering me. “I can appreciate magic much more since I worked against the person who wanted to destroy it.” Only now I realized that the others in his tribe had watched me and Themba closely. I took a step back, remembering again how different I looked from my usual self.
“So, you are the girl with the Siren’s song.” One of Themba’s companions stepped forward and took my cold hand into her warm and soft one. Her skin was the color of olives and her long brown hair braided into a hundred small braids. She looked more dashing than any woman I had ever seen, and I could only respond to her question with a nod, my mouth open.
“Thank you so much for saving our world.” She placed her hands on her chest to enforce the depth of her gratefulness. The rest of the tribe nodded, their eyes fixed on me.
“Oh, it wasn’t much,” I mumbled and then gave a short laugh. “I had a lot of help from Themba and my family.”
“Yet, without you, it wouldn’t have been possible.” A woman almost as dark as Themba said and I gave her a friendly smile.
Roisin placed her arm around my shoulders. “You are a star now, Nathalie.” She laughed and spun me around to face the carriages. “Get used to more people thanking you, especially tonight. You have to enjoy it because you deserve it.” She squeezed my shoulders.
I nodded, taking a deep breath and then marveled at the scenery around us. I chuckled because of the funny picture a group of dwarfs gave. They were dressed up as clowns. I couldn’t help eavesdropping on two talking cats who were standing on their rear legs. They were raving about the delicious skewers they had at the dance three years ago. It could have been a normal line waiting to enter a Halloween party but the fact that all this was real made it so much better.
Then, it was our turn to enter the magical carriage. “Ready to start the best night of your life?” Roisin laughed as she climbed aboard the pearl white coach.
A butler with a white wig, tied to a ponytail held out his hand to help me climb aboard. “Thank you for joining us tonight, Miss Nathalie.” I returned his smile, wondering whether he knew the name of every guest or whether he’d recognized me as something special as well. I sunk back into the soft red plush seat. Roisin, Melissa, and Luke also making themselves comfortable. The butler closed the door and our carriage tottered ahead. I had my eyes glued to the window, the scenery once more taking my breath away.
Acknowledgment
Wow, we’ve made it! Writing and developing this story has been an incredibly fun and sometimes also tiring journey. The Heart of Power series wouldn’t be what it is without the help of James, my editor, Marina and my mom who always read and correct what I write, and I am very thankful for their quick responses. I’m also glad that they tell me what they don’t like about a story so that I can change it before the whole world reads it :).
A big thank to my beta readers, above all Cath and Lisa, who detect the last errors or flaws in the story. Thanks to Les, who does my covers and to my love, Kevin, who still doesn’t read fantasy books but helps me finding ideas during our many interesting talks and who takes good care of me when I don’t have the time to cook.
Thank you to my readers who have been with me from book one through book three. It’s you who motivate me to continue writing even if I receive a bad review or stare at a blank page which doesn’t fill up on its own. Thank you for buying and reading my books! This is a dream come true for me.
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About the Author
S.L. Giger grew up in Gossau, SG in Switzerland and attended school there all the way through her master’s degree in becoming a high school teacher. At 16, she was able to spend an enriching exchange year in Rhinebeck, New York, where her love for the English language fully caught fire. Since then, she always writes in English and later translates her books into German.
S. L. Giger loves traveling, salsa dancing, surfing, scuba diving and chocolate. At the moment, she really enjoys living in Zurich. It’s beautiful in the summertime; there is a lot of chocolate, and it’s only a 7-minute train ride from the airport ;)
Contact S. L. Giger
Do you have a feedback for my book? I’d very much like to hear it. You can contact me through the following channels:
(b) www.swissmissontour.com
(i) @swissmissontour
(f) SwissMissOnTour
(w) www.slgigerbooks.wordpress.com
More books by S. L. Giger
As moving as the fault in our stars? Read the romance novel A Sketch of What You Mean to Me.
Kevin is a popular high school boy who doesn't believe in love until he falls head over heels for Fiona. She believes she has found the guy of her dreams until he ends their relationship out of the blue. Can Kevin reverse the worst mistake of his life or will his dark secret catch up with him first?
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Copyright
Copyright © 2020 Seraina Giger
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author. Self-published. Contact:
Seraina Giger/ Kolbenacker 30/ 8052 Zürich
[email protected]
Cover design: Germancreative from Fiverr and S. L. Giger
