He got up and made his way to the doorway, but passing by Cam, she caught his hand.
“Is everything all right?” she asked.This belongs to N?velDrama.Org - ?.
He smiled down at her and Sigrid who were seated next to each other at the dining table. “Yes, I’m ok. I’m just feeling a little tired, so I thought I’d get a little more fresh air before I went to bed.” He kissed Cam’s hand then lifted Sigrid’s to kiss hers as well. Their eyes happily twinkled as he turned to head towards the back of the house.
When he opened the back door, he noticed the air temp had dropped, so he pulled a hooded cloak from a nearby closet. While he didn’t feel the cold, he knew he had to keep up appearances. Not that there was any expectation of being seen in the private backyard. Still, a good habit to build. He pulled it on but wore it open as he walked outside and followed the path once more to the gazebo. It was quickly bing his favorite ce on the property.
He sat next to the railing this time so he could look up at the stars. There were so many!
After a short time, he heard the door open and close and footsteps approaching the gazebo. He sighed as, this time, he didn’t need someone tocheer him up.
He nced to the gazebo steps and saw another hooded figure climbing up to join him. He paused as he couldn’t tell who it was and it was very dark. When the figure stood before him, a little light from the house shone into the hood’s opening, and Henry finally saw it was Tish.
“They informed me I shouldn’t go outside without a disguise in ce, but here, I could get away with a cloak,” she said quietly.
Once more the guilt settled on Henry’s shoulders. “I’m so sorry-” he began. Soft fingers touched his lips to stop his words. She sat down on the cushioned bench next to him and pulled her fingers away to look into his eyes.
“Henry, you don’t have to apologize for this. I’m ok with it, I truly am!” she said earnestly. “As gifts go, it waspletely unexpected, absolutely astonishing, and intensely exciting. It’s also so much better than the alternative I was facing. I don’t hold you responsible for what the Fae did to me either, so park that guilt somece else as well,” she finished with a grin.
“The words thate to my mind areplicated, unwee, and dangerous. From the time I first discovered magic is real and how tightly it’s integrated into my life, I’ve been struggling to avoid its interference.”
Tish grinned at him. “How’s that been working out for you?”
He snorted in surprise and shared a smile with her. “Obviously, not as well as I’d intended. I’ve been told that my link to the magic is much stronger than it should be. I don’t know what Baba intended. I’m not a wielder, so I can’t use the magic to make it do things. So… why is my link so strong?”
“Did you ever ask her?” Tish asked.
Henry gave Tish a wry grin. “Yeah, she’s not big on the questionwhy. She refuses to answer any question beginning with that word.”
“Then maybe you could phrase your question another way, like, for what purpose was I given this strong magic link?” Tish offered with a cheeky smile.
He snorted quietly in amusement. “The next time I see her, if I ever do, I’ll give that a try.”
Tish yed with the edge of his cloak as she let her eyes roam over his chest. “Have you… ever seen thisother world?” she asked quietly as her eyes came up to look into his.
Henry could see she was almost trembling with excitement. When he nodded, she squeaked a little then looked embarrassed by it, but her enthusiasm won out.
“How? When? What’s it like?” she gushed with wide eyes and a bright smile as she clung to his cloak.
He chuckled and tilted his head towards her. “That’s the thing. I can’t exin thehowof it without breaking the oath I made to the Hidden Races council to keep certain information secret-”
At her sudden pout he rushed to continue. “Icantell you about the other world.”
She eyed him then nodded. “Could… could you tell me about it as your… real self.”
He paused to look at her in surprise then nodded slowly. He nced around then pulled the hood up to cover his head. Then he dropped his mor. The cloak immediately filled with hisrger muscles and the hood popped backward tond on his back. He scrambled to tug it back over his horns as he nced around but they were alone. He also closed it over hisp. He turned his eyes to the delighted expression on Tish’s face and sighed.
“First off, I should tell you what I was told about the realms of magic. They exist in the same space as our world but are offset slightly, like… different frequencies on the radio dial. With a radio you can adjust the tuning to listen to different stations but,” He gestured to the air around them. “They’re all already here in the same space. In this case, eachyer, or realm, vibrates at a different frequency allowing it to upy the same space and not be seen or felt. Most arepletely separate from each other and don’t interact in any way. There was one that bled its energy through to our…yer and this energy affected the creatures living here. Some can use the energy to do things, wielders. Some are changed by the energy, conduits, like us. The rest aren’t affected at all, humans.” He saw she was following so he continued.
“Baba somehow discovered a new realm which began to bleed its energy through to ouryer. She bound me to it, and Nate I guess. The energy is stronger than the original realm, but its frequency is notpatible with the old realm. For wielders, it’s toxic.”
“If theseyers are here but invisible, how did you see it?” Tish asked breathlessly.
“Through a breach. A tear between theyers. It looks like crooked, jagged rainbows and they move oddly. Things can pass through from oneyer to the next. Things like… fighter jets.”
“OH MY GOD! I saw that on the news! That’s what happened?” Tish gushed.
Henry nodded.
“So, the pilot’s ranting about seeing another world is the truth?” she asked.
“Yes, it’s quite spectacr too. Huge red sun, red-tinted nt life, and volcanic activity all under a yellow sky. Weird but beautiful in a raw way. Strange creatures live there, but from that, far up in the sky, we didn’t see any signs of what we’d call civilization,” Henry agreed. Then he noticed Tish was staring at him with wide eyes. “What?”
“From that far up in the sky? Henry, what does that mean?” she asked quietly.
His smile dropped, and he fidgeted next to her as her grip tightened on his arm. “I was having an out of body experience at the time. I kind of… hitched a ride with the pilot.”
“Henry! You were the guardian angel the pilot was talking about?!?”
“I never watched the news stories on him, so I don’t know what he said. He was about to be blown out of the sky so I… helped him through to the other side then we found a way to get back just before he ran out of fuel. I returned to my body, and hended… somewhere in Canada,” he exined.
Her mouth was open, but she wasn’t saying anything. “You… that’s…”
“Completely top secret! You can’t talk about that to anyone. Well, no one outside of our immediate group and they’ll need to be warned not to tell anyone. We can’t even tell the Hidden Races Council, and definitely no human can know,” he insisted.
“The pilot is being treated like a mental case. He’s going to be out of a job, and he’ll never fly again!” Tish eximed.
Henry gave Tish a sad look. “I know. It’s so unfair. But if I hadn’t intervened, he’d just be dead. Being considered a nut means he won’t besilenced. I’m not kidding when I say secrecy is critical. The Hidden Races Security Division doesn’t mess around. They don’t need any more excuses to target me. They already want me… contained. That wouldn’t be good for me.”
“These people sound frightening!” she said quietly.
Henry took her hands. “I’m sorry if I’m painting a grim picture. Day to day, life really won’t be any different than it was before. Behave like a human, and we know how to do that, and everything is the same. They leave us alone unless we be a threat to the secret. It’s one of the best-kept secrets, ever. Of course, the threat of genocide by fearful humans makes it easier to keep.”
Tish thought about that then pulled her hands free to reach up to run her fingers over his horns. “When do we get to be who we truly are?”
He held her eyes with his. “In the privacy of our homes. We can’t go out in public without our mors engaged. There won’t be any prancing through Central Park as Satyr and Faun.”
She grinned as her mind took her back to the previous morning when she was thinking of asking Henry to go running with her. Now the idea of running with him in their new states sent a thrill through her. “Is there nowhere in the world we could go running freely in our natural states?”
He shook his head. “I think humans are pretty much everywhere these days and those ces where they’re not; their satellite-based cameras are watching. From what I understand it’s getting more and more difficult to hide from human intrusion. Maybe one day the secret will get out. It just can’t be because of something one of us does.”
“What about the world of Wild Magic? Can we go there?” she asked.
“There are some really dangerous creatures living there. One of them got through a breach and killed some army people before they managed to take it down. It’s apletely unknown world. I don’t think it would be safe to pop over to visit and go for a run. Sorry.” He gave her an apologetic smile, and she nodded her eptance.
“It was just a silly idea.” She took his hand in hers once more and felt a little thrill to feel how well their fingers fit together even in this newrger size. Henry’s big hands felt… powerful. That sent a different kind of tingle through her. “Maybe once I get my mor you coulde running with me one morning?” she asked hopefully.
“Sure, but I’ve never gone running before. I’ll try not to slow you down.”
She smiled impishly. “We should work on your endurance,” she said as she flipped the sides of his cloak open to expose his nakedness and swung a leg over his to sit on hisp. Before he could do more than blink in surprise, she was kissing him, and his need for her surged. His hands automatically went to her ass, and he pulled her tighter against himself.
Tish purred happily at the feel of his firm grip and rolled her hips to grind against his hardening shaft.