Chapter 8
Iris
“Do you smell that?” she asked a few minutes later as they walked down the street, and she could have sworn she caught the scent of salt water washing down the streets.
“Huh? Oh, it’s probably the sewers,” Monty said. He was too busy gawking at everyone he passed in the hopes of brushing shoulders with someone who ‘was someone.’
Whatever that meant.
Iris was okay with his distraction, though. It allowed her to really start to absorb the city and its people without getting distracted by Monty’s monologues.
She felt it all in her bones—how alive everything was here. The hum of traffic, the pulse of magic tucked between shop doors, the messy tangle of human and paranormal life bumping elbows on the sidewalk.
It wasn’t the cage she’d seen it as at first blush. It was chaos. Freedom. The opposite of court formality.
And for the first time since she stepped on land, she didn’t feel like she was drowning.
They passed by vendors on the street corners.
Some sold food—much to Monty’s delight and never-empty stomach—but others specialized in premade spells from the witches and wizards or sticky rollers for the werewolf professionals who didn’t want to show up to important meetings covered in fur from roaming around their homes in their wolf form, shedding everywhere.
“Oh!” she gasped. Up ahead, she saw a small woman with bright pink hair and a rainbow dress and a basket overflowing with flowers, shiny gemstones, and bits of stained glass.
“Is that a fairy?” Her voice was full of the same wonder she heard people use when asking others if she was a mermaid as they passed.
“Let’s see. Bright hair and clothes. Bits and bobs. Big eyes. Mischievous smirk. Yes, I’d venture a guess that she is of the fair folk.”
“Wait, where did she go?”
“Subway.” At her blank look, the bird shook his head. “Remember the bus that passed us a few blocks ago?”
“Yes.”
“Under our feet, there is a giant, very fast bus that runs along the city to take people where they need to go without all the traffic.
“There are also all the tunnels down there for the vampires and wraiths to travel during the day without fear of bursting into flame or becoming completely powerless. Come on, stop gawking. Still lots to see. I’d bet my third flight feather that we could run into some celebrities up at the café on the corner—”
“Actually,” Iris said, spying a sign just a few doors down that had her heart leaping. “Would you mind if I hung out at the bookstore instead? I won’t leave. Or cause a scandal. I promise.”
“Bookstores don’t have shirtless celebrities or reality stars crying into their salads. Priorities, Iris!”
“I’ll tag along tomorrow, I promise.”
After a lifetime of only having a few books to read, she was giddy at the prospect of a whole store full of them.
“Fine. Go sniff binding glue and ink. But just remember, no one in a bookstore has ever been invited to an impromptu yacht party with a billionaire!”
He reached into his bag that he must have packed along with the sunglasses he currently had perched on his beak.
“What’s this for?” she asked, folding the paper in her hands.
“Money, my sweet sea spawn. We had the money talk, remember?”
“Right. Of course.” Though she was reasonably sure she still didn’t quite understand the math involved.
“Keep it hidden in a pocket. The human pickpockets have nothing on some of the paranormals and their quick fingers.”
“I’ll be fine, Monty,” she promised the bird, leaning down to plant a kiss on his giant beak.
“Lucky,” a man passing murmured.
Monty shot the man a hard look. “Stay away from the men.”
“I have no plans on being near any men.” Least of all her fake fiancé.
“I will be back in a few hours to pick you up,” Monty said as they moved in front of the bookstore doors. “Feel that?”
“Feel what?”
“The wards,” he said, doing a full-body shiver. “A witch owns that bookstore. Be careful around her.”
“I’m literally just trying to buy some books,” she reminded him.
“Where did I go wrong with her?” Monty asked the universe, making Iris smile before he waddled off.
Turning, Iris looked at the glass door and the funny charms hanging from it. When she reached forward, she could feel a certain pulsing in the air around them. Perhaps that was what Monty had mentioned. She found the sensation kind of comforting instead of shiver-inducing.
Weird.
She pushed the door inward, hearing a pretty tinkling noise as it moved.
The air smelled like ink and chamomile tea, with a faint trace of nag champa clinging to the rafters.
Books were crammed into every possible space—on shelves, stacked in windowsills, even teetering on chairs.
Fat candles flickered near a display labeled Curses & Cures, and tiny glowing runes danced across the spine of a book that growled as she walked by.
A few customers milled about. A tall, lithe woman with waist-length locks browsed the table featuring new queer romance reads, her hands shimmering with subtle magic.
A stooped older human leaned heavily on his cane as he perused the bookmark sections.
Two college-aged fae giggled at something in one of the books, their rapid-fire Spanish drifting over toward Iris.
“Please don’t tell me you came all the way to the surface to look for true love,” a voice called as the door closed behind Iris.
“Not at all,” she said, glancing over to where the voice was coming from behind a tall wooden counter. Was this witch a mind reader of some sort? Or was it a common occurrence for other paranormals to leave their homelands behind in the hopes of finding love?
“Thank the goddess. Well, if you’re here for a romance book, note I have them shelved under: Emotional Propaganda. Right next to the Unverified Folklore shelf.”
The owner of the store popped up then, a huge pile of books in her arms.
The proprietress was a short woman with long, straight, royal purple hair framing a heart-shaped face with sharp cheekbones, pretty honey-brown eyes, and a smattering of freckles in an unnatural shade of purple to match her hair.
Glamour magic.
Iris had read about it before but had never seen it up close.
“How did you know I was a mermaid before you saw me?”
Of all the creatures on the surface, Iris was most -fascinated by the witches and warlocks—who practiced nature-based and ‘lower’ magics—and sorcerers and -sorceresses—who performed higher ceremonial magics.
“Your smell.”
“My smell?” Iris yelped, leaning down to sniff her arm.
“It’s not a bad smell. You just have a salty, lightly citrus scent.”
“Oh, that’s the soap.”
“It’s not,” the witch corrected. “All mermaids have a citrus scent. Sometimes it’s more grapefruit, lemon, or lime. But you are definitely a lemon-lime mixture. Are you royal?”
“Wow,” Iris said. Did all paranormals have a signature scent? As far as Iris could tell, most humans smelled like whatever scented products they slathered all over their bodies. “Yes. I’m Iris.”
“Princess?”
“Second born.”
“Obviously.”
“Why obviously?”
“Your older sister would be next on the throne. Your younger sister would be kept for an important political placement. Which leaves you. On land. So, the question is … why are you here?”
Iris immediately liked this woman and her bluntness. It was refreshing. Nothing fake about her. What she thought, she said. It was night and day to Finn’s carefully constructed mask.
“I am being married off.”
“Ah, yes, nothing says ‘romance’ like contractual obligation.”
“Right?” Iris said, shaking her head.
“I’m Selene. Witch, obviously. If you didn’t feel the wards.”
“Yeah, speaking of, what are you warding against? It felt okay to me, but my companion shivered.”
“It’s warded against superficiality and optimism.”
Well, that explained Monty perfectly, didn’t it?
“Shallow and positive people can still come in, but they don’t feel encouraged to.”
“Well, I’m certainly not feeling very positive right now.”
“What woman being traded like chattel would?” Selene asked. “So, who are you getting shacked up with?”
She probably wasn’t supposed to admit to who it was. She wasn’t supposed to be creating any scandals. That said, she could claim ignorance if it somehow got back to her mother.
“Don’t worry,” Selene said, shooting Iris a knowing smirk. “I don’t have any friends to tell. Unless Gerty counts.”
She waved into the shop, but when Iris looked, she saw no one. “Is Gerty here?”
“In spirit. Literally. She’s the former owner. She refuses to leave.”
“She’s a ghost?” Iris asked, whispering. She’d read about them in books, of course. But she’d kind of always imagined they were figments of the writers’ imaginations. She wasn’t sure if she was intrigued or unnerved by their existence.
“No need to lower your voice. She knows she’s dead.
Right, Gerty, you obsessive-compulsive kook?
” she asked. “She must have been suffering from memory loss near the end there. Every single night, she takes all the books off the shelves to, I guess, do inventory. Guess who gets to put them all back every morning?”
“Can you use your magic to help?”
“Sometimes I do. So, spill. Who is the groom?”
“Finn Westrock.”
“Finn Westrock? The man who has starch in his soul?”
“That’s the one.” Though she wasn’t sure she knew what starch was.
“Huh. When one thinks of romantic chemistry, one definitely thinks of a sea goddess and a sentient campaign poster. But who am I to judge? Maybe you’re into guys who use spreadsheets to plan foreplay.”
Iris couldn’t stop the laugh from bubbling up and bursting out.
“You have him pegged perfectly. I’ve known him for all of two days and have yet to find anything genuine about him.”
But then again … she’d seen a crack in his mask. Just the once. That look in his eyes when she’d worn the cami-sole. She’d tried to convince herself it was just lust. But maybe it was something more.