Abandonment is one word to describe Evelyn Ward's childhood.
Known as an orphan freak and paranoid schizophrenic, she was dragged through years of therapy after admitting to hearing whispering voices and seeing creatures and living shadows.
...
My tongue was ash in my mouth, and a deep ache pulsed in my head, spiking as I opened my eyes to the morning sun. Snuggling deeper into the sheets, I pulled my pillow over my face to block out the harsh light, savoring the feel of the silk against my skin.
Alarm bells rang in my head as I jolted upright, letting the dark sheets fall from my half-dressed body. I didn't have silk sheets, and my bed sure as hell wasn't this soft or large. Uncertainty wormed it's way into my mind, fear wrapping me in its cold clutches as I stared around the unfamiliar room. The warm rust-colored walls reminded me of dried blood.
Rolling off the bed, I crept across the light hardwood floor toward my dress draped across the back of a wooden framed chair, tucked away in the corner.
What the hell happened last night? My memories were a jumbled mess I couldn't decipher and nothing led me to know how I had ended up in my predicament.
"Evelyn?"
The masculine voice from the doorway scared the skin off me, causing me to yelp as I whirled around to face Zev, wrapping my arms around myself like a shield to ward off his gaze. Not that he was staring, or even glancing for that matter. His green eyes were glued to my face, not budging even an inch lower.
Seeing him standing there, tall and dark-haired in all his perfection brought back flashes from the night before. I remembered a fiery desire burning through me as I kissed him, our lips crushed together, his hands tangled in my hair. But it was blurred by the alcohol, and everything that had happened escaped me.
"Why am I here? What did we do?"
"Relax, nothing happened."
Strangely enough, my panic ebbed, giving way to trust, though I wasn't out of questions. "Then why do I remember us kissing, and why am I half naked?" My eyebrow lifted, demanding an honest answer.
"You kissed me, true, but nothing else happened. You were drunk on faerie wine, so I brought you here so you could sleep it off, and to keep you safe from anyone who might try to take advantage of you. But trust me, nothing happened between us and if it had, you would know, because if I'd taken advantage of you, you wouldn't be half dressed, you'd be completely naked, and we'd both still be in bed, not standing here having this conversation." His lips twisted into a wry smile but his humor was lost on me.
"Faerie wine? I thought it was champagne. Why would humans have faerie wine?"
He shook his head. "They wouldn't. But you weren't in the human realm -- you must have passed between the veil without even noticing."
My jaw dropped. If I wasn't already so convinced he spoke the truth, I'd swear us both insane. "So you're telling me I'm not even on Earth anymore?"
"Well no, you're still on Earth -- sort of." He paused as if considering how to best explain. "There's a veil between the realm of Humans, Faeries, and Demons. All these places, they exist fundamentally in the same space and time, but it's a different plane of existence. So technically, this is Earth, just not the same as you know it. We call this realm Terradstrum, though human mythology and lore might refer to it as Fairyland or Elfhame."
Cool. So I was an interdimensional traveling faerie. Nothing about that sounded unusual at all. Nothing. "Okieee, so can I go back to New York then?"
"You can."
My pale eyes flicked around the room, awkward in the sudden quiet. "Are you going to leave so I can get dressed?"
His cheeks flushed and he ducked his head in an abashed manner. "Right. I'll, uh, I'll be outside if you need me. Not that you can't dress yourself." He eased the door shut behind him.
I stood, staring at the door, confounded by his behavior. How was it that he had gone from having a conversation -- albeit a strange one -- to being a blushing, stuttering mess -- though still considerably sexy and alluring.
It took several minutes to struggle my way into the mass of black fabric. Maybe Zev was wrong, and I really couldn't dress myself. I didn't bother with the corset, for one thing, getting it on without help would be impossible, and if I could get it on, breathing would become an issue. There were already enough problems in my life without adding 'passing out from lack of oxygen' to the list.
Stepping out the door into the living room where Zev was stretched out on a large sofa, surprise wormed its way into my head at how modern my surroundings looked. A flat-screen T.V. was mounted on the wall, and sunlight illuminated the room, streaming in through the wall of windows and the skylight above my head.
For some reason, my brain associated the word 'faerie' with a little wooden hut built into a tree. Though his house wasn't large, it was by no means a 'little wooden hut'.
Catching me staring, he stood up to approach me. "Problem?"
"Everything's so modern."
He furrowed his eyebrows in a look of bemusement. "This isn't the stone ages. Faeries are just as capable as humans in technological advancement... I could show you around, you know. Tell you the things you would know had you grown up here."
His words stirred something inside me. So what if New York was my home? So what if I had a life there -- as pitiful as it may have been? This was where I belonged. It was where I had come from, and I'd be damned if I passed up my chance to find out everything I could. "I guess New York can wait." A smile crept across my face, lighting up my eyes.
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So what do you think of Zev? What happened and can Evelyn trust him?
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