Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 102166 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 511(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102166 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 511(@200wpm)___ 409(@250wpm)___ 341(@300wpm)
“Why is everyone looking at me?” Iris asked, brushing her sun-dried hair off of her neck.
They’d made their way off the beach and were heading toward the parking lot where their transportation was supposed to be waiting.
“Because you’re a mermaid, darling. Practically the stuff of legend.”
“What are you talking about? There are tons of us.”
“But never on land. And on land, you, my dear, are a ten out of ten.”
Iris had no idea what to say to that, so she turned her attention to the little glass box painted a vivid cerulean blue. “What is a ‘Modesty Box’?” she asked, reading the sign.
“That, my sweet sea fairy, is for the land shifters. They are full of cheap articles of clothing saved from landfills, washed, and stored inside for anyone who accidentally shifted and found themselves suddenly in desperate need of covering. Several shifter nonprofits set them up all around the city.”
There was so much Iris had to learn about the land, so many customs she was in the dark about. There was only so much she could learn from her textbooks, and she had almost no contact with any supernaturals outside of those who lived in the ocean.
“Princess?” a woman called, making Iris’s head whip over. She was tall and lithe, with a cat-like face and long golden-brown hair. Iris wasn’t entirely sure if she was human or another paranormal.
“Yes?” Iris called. A wave of uncertainty washed over her. She’d never really conversed with anyone except for fellow mermaids—and Monty, of course—before. She wasn’t sure how to interact with this stranger.
“My name is Maria. Your mother sent me to escort you. Who is this?” she asked, looking down at Monty.
“Montague Featherington,” Monty answered. “Head of Surface Affairs. It’s a very niche field. Highly specialized.”
If Maria thought a talking pelican was odd, she made no comment on it. Iris couldn’t help but wonder if talking animals were more common on the surface than she’d realized, if this woman seemed so unperturbed about Monty.
“Of course,” Maria said, opening the back door for the two of them to slide inside her car.
“Roomy,” Monty said, wiggling around on the seat.
Iris thought it was quite cramped, when she was used to the vastness of the ocean, but kept her opinions to herself. Once the car started moving, she was too busy trying not to get sick to make any sort of conversation. Not that Monty noticed. He kept a one-sided conversation going the whole drive. Iris stopped trying to listen when he kept throwing out words she didn’t understand.
She watched out the window as more and more cars started to flood the streets. They crossed over a giant bridge, and she watched the water slipping away behind them, replaced by hard, cold, solid concrete.
Her heart sank as her very blood screamed for her to turn back, to go home.
But she couldn’t do that.
They drove over the bridge, and Monty declared—with his usual enthusiasm—that they’d entered The Big Apple!
Though, from what Iris could see, there weren’t any apples anywhere.
Her gills might have vanished, but the instinct remained. The air felt too sharp in her lungs, too dry. Her skin itched under her new clothing, too warm in the places it clung, yet too bare in the places it didn’t.
Outside the windows, the streets pulsed with magic and metal. Glamours flickered on paranormals and humans alike, just the barest shimmer giving them away.
There were no currents here, no bioluminescent coral towers. Just concrete and strangers who didn’t even look at the cars as they passed by. The noise had her shoulders creeping up near her ears. The rumble of car engines, the shrieks of sirens, honks of horns, and the occasional thump of music. She was so used to the quiet calm of the ocean, interrupted only by the occasional whale sound and the soft whooshing of the water.
Iris pressed her hand against the cool glass window, longing for home.
They quickly pulled up in front of a towering building. Though in this city, it seemed as if each of the buildings was in some sort of competition over which one got to be tallest.
There were humans and creatures everywhere, their shoulders brushing as they moved through the congested, noisy streets. There was a chorus of horns, conversation, sirens, and music that had Iris wincing as pressure built across her temples.
“We’ll be brunching at Four Stars with A-listers in no time,” Monty declared, waving a feather at a restaurant as they passed. “I do hope Drach and Violetta bring the twins …”
Iris had no idea who those people were, but Monty’s enthusiasm was starting to become contagious, despite her previous plans to hate everything about this city.
She wanted to stop and take it all in, but Maria was in a hurry to get her to a room once they reached their first destination—the limestone and glass hotel.