by Emma Savant
I was still staring when Lorinda found me again. She leaned into my cubicle.
“Phenomenal news!” she said. “Apparently Lily Pacifica has been trying to contact you all day but couldn’t reach you.”
I pulled my phone out of my pocket. Four texts were there, along with three missed calls. My phone was on vibrate, but I hadn’t felt it go off once.
“She’s officially engaged!” Lorinda trilled.
The sick feeling that had been with me since last night churned in my stomach. It was almost starting to feel normal.
“Evan proposed to her this morning down at the river by where they first met. And King Pacifica has given his full blessing to the union, though we’ve all agreed it’s best not to let Evan know his bride’s full history until they’ve known each other a bit longer.”
“Because nothing says love like dishonesty,” I said, finishing the words a split second before I realized they probably should have stayed in my head.
Lorinda’s eyebrows drew together for a moment, but she looked more confused than upset.
“You’ve just done a fabulous job, Olivia,” she said, brushing it off. “Really phenomenal. It’s been a long time since we’ve had an intern who showed your kind of initiative and out-of-the-box thinking. Not only is your client happily engaged as the best possible ending to her Story, you also managed to create an alliance between two important Glimmering figures. I am so glad to have you on our team.”
I had literally no idea what to say to any of that. I finally managed a smile and a “thanks,” and then she was being interrupted by yet one more kink in my afternoon, this one in the form of Lucas coming up behind her, shadowed by a cautious Tabitha.
He was taller than both of them, but still managed to seem small and awkward next to Tabitha’s alert gaze. Lorinda looked at him, opened her mouth, looked at me, looked back at him, and frowned.
“This gentleman is here to see you,” Tabitha said.
She was behind Lucas and shot me a questioning look over his shoulder. He’s Humdrum, she mouthed, her red lipstick framing the words in fire-engine urgency.
I closed the computer window and stood up. “What are you doing here?” I said.
“I thought I’d take you out to lunch,” he said. His eyes darted toward Tabitha. “If that’s okay.”
What? Tabitha mouthed.
“Olivia,” Lorinda said, a careful hint of caution in her voice.
“He’s fine,” I said.
“He’s—” Lorinda started, then seemed unsure how to continue.
“He’s a Humdrum,” I said. “And I have no idea how he got here.”
“Olivia?” Tabitha said.
I lowered my glasses and eyed him, trying to match his floppy dark hair and pleasant smile with any excuse for him to be here. But he was the only person in this room who didn’t have magic rising from their skin.
“The Oracle has decided that Lucas is part of our world,” I said. “I have no clue why.”
“But,” Lorinda said, then couldn’t seem to figure out how to finish.
I folded my arms across my chest.
“But he’s a Humdrum,” I said. “I know. Through and through.”
“I’m a what?” he said, one eyebrow quirking down.
“Humdrum,” I said. A note of irritation crept into my tone that I couldn’t figure out how to stifle. “It means you’re not magical. Obviously.”
He frowned at me, and I took a deep breath. Focus on your breathing, I ordered.
I counted out two breaths and then said, “Could Lucas and I have a minute, please?”
Lorinda looked between us, her curiosity making it hard for her to let it go, but they left. I had a feeling the other godparents were doing everything they could to listen in. Lucas shoved his hands into his pockets.
“So,” he said. He rocked forward onto the balls of his feet. “You want to go get lunch?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Do you get a lunch?” he said. He flushed. The pale pink was gone as soon as it had appeared. “Sorry, I should have thought this out first. I should have texted you.”
“Wouldn’t have mattered,” I said.
“Oh,” he said. His face fell. “Okay. Yeah, that’s cool.”
“No,” I said. “I mean I haven’t been checking my phone today. I have a ton of missed messages. I wouldn’t have seen yours.”
“Oh,” he said. Something in his expression seemed to lift again. “So, can you? Do you want to?”
“I don’t know,” I said again.
Why did people keep asking questions and saying things? I just wanted to sit alone where it was quiet and think.
“Or I could bring you something? We could eat here, maybe?”
He glanced around my little cubicle, his eyes taking in what little there was to see. If he’d been expecting something spectacular, the gray walls and five-year-old computer were guaranteed to disappoint.
He seemed sweet. And that was the problem.
“I’m a little confused about you,” I said.
I couldn’t tell where the balance between truth and politeness was, so I forged ahead and hoped it didn’t matter.
“You’re not supposed to know about me, and you kind of ruined the longest friendship of my life.”
No, that was wrong.
I let out a big sigh.
“Correction: I ruined the longest friendship of my life,” I said. “But you were involved. I know it’s not your fault, but you came between us and I haven’t quite figured out how to deal with that.”
He held up his hands.
“That’s cool,” he said. “I get that. I mean, I wish I’d known you liked me sooner, because I think you’re—” He met my eyes and then, another pink flush rising to his face, looked down at the floor. “What I mean is, I’m sorry. I just want to talk about all this stuff.” He waved a hand vaguely around.
His eyes darted back up to mine as if to scope out whether it was safe. I forced a small smile onto my lips, then realized it didn’t feel that forced.
“I’ll bet this is a lot to take in,” I said.
“I’m trying to roll with it.”
I put a hand on the back of my chair and tapped it. “Let’s go get food,” I said. “At least I can answer your questions.”
He brushed a lock of hair off his forehead with a nervous hand.
“That’d be really helpful.”
I picked up my purse. I’d just arrived, but I knew Lorinda would let it slip. She only smiled at me as I left the building, though I could feel her curious gaze on us as we walked out of Wishes Fulfilled together and into the hall.
We stepped into the elevator together, and the doors slid shut. Instantly, as always happened in elevators, I was abruptly and acutely aware of his presence. He loomed in the corner, his Humdrum energy sparking and spiking every few seconds. His nerves felt about as frazzled as mine, but he hid it better.
We didn’t look at each other or say anything during the whole ride down. When the elevator dinged and the doors slid open, he waited for me to get out first and then followed, his tennis shoes barely audible against the polished floor.
The theater we shared the building with had a lot of employees running around even during the day, and it wasn’t unusual to run into a custodian or stagehand in the lobby in the afternoons. But the vaguely familiar woman standing in the lobby wasn’t like the people I usually saw here. She stared at us, and over my glasses, a nebula of rose-pink swirls spun around her like a nervous tornado.
Her full lips and large black eyes made her seem larger than life and twice as beautiful. If I had to go on instinct alone, I’d say she had to be a Scheherazade Archetype, or someone from the Arabian Nights stories.
At the same time, she looked like the kind of person you might want for an older sister. Tufts of soft dark hair fell out of the loose braid slung over her shoulder. I kind of got the impression that, despite her stunning beauty and flawless posture, she jus
t didn’t care that much about how she looked.
I smiled, and her smile back was nothing more than a soft curve at the corner of her lips, though it managed to warm her whole face.
She had to be a client.
“We’re upstairs,” I said, and gestured toward the elevator.
I walked across the lobby toward the doors, trusting Lucas would follow.
My hand fell on the door.
“Wait,” she said.
I turned. “Are you looking for Wishes Fulfilled?”
Usually, godparents came downstairs to meet their clients. Getting to our office was a challenge without help. I still wasn’t sure how Lucas had managed it, seeing as how he wasn’t supposed to even be able to see the glamoured top floor, let alone take an elevator up to it. But then, Lucas wasn’t supposed to be involved in a lot of things.
The woman pursed her rosy lips and stared even more intently at me.
“I think I’m looking for you, actually,” she said. “Are you Olivia Feye?”
The hair on my arms prickled. She seemed nice. But appearances weren’t everything. Imogen had seemed nice, too. The Oracle had seemed sane. I knew better by now than to believe what was in front of me.
“I am,” I said cautiously.
She glanced out the glass doors. I followed her gaze. The Oracle’s Fountain sat there, quiet and ordinary in the morning sunlight. Humdrums walked past it, most of them not even glancing to where she lay in wait.
The woman came closer. Lucas’ curiosity swelled beside me.
“I’m so glad to meet you,” she said.
She held out a hand. I took it, and as I touched her warm skin, I caught a whiff of something that smelled like soil in spring.
“You know Evan Costner?” she said.
I pulled my hand back. This was not good news.
“My name is Isabelle Sheridan. I was Evan’s fiancée,” she said. “Until yesterday.”
I lowered my glasses to look at her. Instantly, she settled into place in my memory. She’d been one of the models on Evan’s website, and I’d seen a tiny version of her face in the comment she’d left.
Isabelle Sheridan.
The rose tornado rotated around her body.
Her face and energy seemed calm, not like she was about to curse me or sue me or do whatever scorned ex-lovers usually did in situations like this.
Still, I could barely stand under the weight of guilt.
“I’m so sorry,” I said. “I tried to stop her.”
“No,” she said, holding up a hand. “I’m not here for that. You don’t need to apologize.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Um, don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re Glimmering.”
“I’m a hedge witch,” she said. “Have been all my life.”
“He didn’t know?”
“No, of course not,” she said. “But listen, I don’t really want to talk about Evan. He’s not why I’m here. I heard a rumor from a friend of mine. She’s a water sprite.”
Distaste rose up in me. The only water sprites I’d been hearing about lately were under the Oracle’s thumb. I normally hated people who got all racist about magical subgroups, but today, prejudice rose up in me like thick, unwilling tar. I waited, and the woman stepped closer until she could speak in a low voice and still be heard.
“I work with roses,” she said. “My sprite friend does, too. We were talking this morning and she said she heard you and I may be two of a kind.” Her voice lowered until I had to strain to hear.
“I’ve been keeping an eye on this city for a while,” she whispered.
That could mean anything. I frowned and waited. Lucas shifted beside me.
“Word among the sprites is that you had a little run-in with the Oracle,” she said. “I heard all about it, and I liked what I heard.”
“Yeah?” I said. I folded my arms. “How so?”
She leaned in. Her voice was soft as a rose petal against my ear.
“I think you’re like me,” she said. “I think you want to take the Oracle down.”
I stepped back, stared at her, and waited for something to clue me in that this was a trick. If it was, though, Isabelle was a good enough actor to fool all my faerie senses. Sincerity flared off her like heat from a flame.
I glanced through the windows and at the Fountain, then back to her blazing black eyes. She was angry, I realized.
Almost as angry as me.
I leaned forward.
“How can I help?”
About the Author
Emma Savant lives with her gorgeous husband and adorable cat in a small town in Oregon, where she spends way too much time watching Star Trek and eating nachos.
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Thanks for reading Glimmers of Scales!
Glimmers of Thorns
coming November 2016
Ever since Imogen walked into the Oracle’s Fountain and out of Olivia’s life, nothing has been right in the city of Portland. Attacks against the Humdrums have escalated, fear is creeping through the city like a poison, and Queen Amani seems to have disappeared off the face of the planet.
But Olivia isn’t alone. Together with her allies, including an angry hedge witch named Isabelle and Isabelle’s beastly boss, she sets out on a quest to save the Glimmering world.
But no quest is meant to be easy, and Olivia’s courage will be tested as she’s thrown into the path of the one enemy she can’t bear to face. As the city begins to spiral into war, Olivia must make a devastating choice—one that will forever redefine what it means to live happily ever after.
