Page 61 of Fae Farewells

“Right,” my demon agreed. “That’s where I would have put them, too.”

Friday, June 18th

Evening

Even though Sloane wasn’t in the room, her scent clung to everything. Or it could have been my imagination.

She smelled like the ripest peaches, warmed by the sun and ready to eat. Her scent overpowered everyone else’s, despite them being in here as much as she was.

It had taken me a couple of weeks to connect the dots, but now I knew why that scent was so familiar and welcoming.

When we were kids, Blaire and I spent summers in France with our grandparents. They owned a white peach orchard, but my favorite fruits weren’t what he grew and sold.

They were the sweet yellow peaches that my grandmother doted upon. The neatly pruned trees were staples in her pristine yard, the baby pink blooms proudly oozing the love and tenderness she put into them. Petals would litter the ground as they died, but a few months later, golden perfection would take their place.

Nostalgia was a cruel thing, though. My grandparents were gone. And while my mother held onto their property, she didn’t care for it in the same way.

Much like Sloane’s story of Ferdinand.

I wondered if there was a connection between the stories, or their promises, but I doubted I could find out. I was simply grasping at things and trying to fit them together, even if they didn’t belong.

“I can’t believe they left me here with you two,” I grouched, sounding too much like Briggs for comfort. “I’m the best at being nosy.”

“That’s not really a compliment,” Stone informed me.

“It is what you make of it,” I told the demon.

He rolled his eyes. “Find something to occupy yourself with.”

“Like what?” I glanced around the empty room. “A book perhaps? Find me one. Technology? Not in this fucking realm. Magic? Yeah. No. I don’t want to catch anything on fire or spontaneously sprout a tail.”

“Take a shower,” he suggested.

“I just had one.”

“Jerk off.”

I huffed. “That gets boring. And I’m not in the mood.”

“You?” he asked for clarification, as if I was making decisions for someone else. “You’re not in the mood?”

“Me. There’s too much going on. This place makes me itchy.”

He snorted. “What?”

“Don’t you feel like there’s some weird shit happening here? I mean, weirder than usual.”

“What is usual, Novak? I’ve never been here.”

I leaned against the wall, sliding down to the floor. “Me either.”

“Take a nap.”

“Ha. Ha. You’re fucking hilarious.”

He stopped talking to me, closing his eyes as he leaned his head back.

“How many square feet do you think a palace is? And how do they have lighting and indoor plumbing with no other technology? What do these people do for fun?”