A Strange Hymn
Page 16

“What is?” I ask.
“Waking up to you each morning.” He taps a finger to my nose. “Especially when you’re sleepy and adorable.”
I suppress a yawn. “How are you so ... awake?”
Rather than answering, he slides out from under me. I plop back against the mattress, my eyes already beginning to close.
Once again I’m roused by his touch, his hand warm on my back. And then I smell it.
Deliverance—a.k.a., coffee.
I pry my eyes open, and there it is; the steaming mug of coffee is only inches from my face.
I reach for it.
“Ah, ah,” Des says, moving it just out of my grasp. “If you want it, you’re going to have to get out of bed.”
As if to encourage me further, my covers slide off my shoulders of their own accord, slipping down to my ankles.
I grab the edges of them and haul them back up.
They slide off again.
More forcefully this time, I yank the covers back up.
You know what? Screw Des and his coffee.
Just as I’m tucking the blankets under my arm, they begin to slip away once more. I grapple with them, playing some ridiculous game of tug-of-war with an inanimate object.
“Oh my God, Des, seriously?”
He leans against one of the bedposts, taking a sip of what’s supposed to be my coffee. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
That lying bastard.
“Fine,” I growl, rolling myself off the bed. “I’m up.”
I stomp over to him. Studiously ignoring the fact that he’s gloriously shirtless and his hair is tied back in a stupidly sexy manbun, I snatch the mug of coffee from his hand and head out onto the balcony that branches off from our room.
“A thank you would be nice,” he says, following me out.
“So would an apology,” I retort over my shoulder.
Big surprise, he has nothing to say about that.
Breakfast is already laid out on the tiny mosaic table that takes up a good portion of the balcony, and it smells so good.
I take a seat, leaning back in my chair to sip my coffee. Lord, does it taste good. It’s almost worth losing sleep over.
Across from me, Des sits, his large frame dominating the little bistro chair. He picks up his espresso cup, sipping delicately from it.
Normally the sight of that tiny cup in his hands would make me laugh. Right now, however, I just glower at him over the rim of my mug. It doesn’t help that he has a painfully pretty face. Or that his massive chest and corded arms are on display.
Why does he have to always look so goddamn good? Especially when I’m pretty sure I look like roadkill.
This is just one more reason why the world isn’t fair.
Des stares pointedly at my plate, where a steaming breakfast burrito sits. “Aren’t you going to eat?”
“Why did you make me breakfast?” I ask suspiciously.
He sets down his espresso, his eyes guarded. “Is this a trick question?”
“It seems unusually nice,” I say.
“Now you’re just trying to be mean.”
Maybe I am. In the past, Des would take me out to breakfast, and there were never any strings attached.
So why do I feel as though this time there are, indeed, strings attached?
I take another gulp of my coffee before placing it on the table. “Did you seriously wake me up early just to feed me?”
“It’s not that early,” Des says, sidestepping the question.
He might be right. The stars twinkle above us just as they did last night when we fell asleep.
“Why did you make me breakfast?” I repeat.
“Because I love you,” he says. “Does everything have to come with a price?”
My gooey heart melts a little at his admission, but I’ve known him just a little too long and a little too deeply to trust those wide silver eyes of his.
I look at him skeptically. “With normal people, no. With you? Absolutely.”
He smirks over the rim of his espresso, the first sign that I am right. He does have something up his sleeve.
“So what is it?”
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
I do find out soon enough. The moment we re-enter our suite, my training leathers appear on our bed.
I groan. “But I thought we were on vacation?”
“Your enemies don’t care about your vacation.”
He does have a point.
It’s no use fighting him on this; I can already feel Des’s magic compelling me onwards. Grumbling, I don the clothes, and the two of us head out of the room.
The two of us leave the hotel and trek towards the dark wilderness that borders the city center. And it is wilderness, pretty though it is. I trip over loose roots and have to push ferns and exotic, flowering plants out of the way as we bushwhack a path through the overgrowth.
The farther we walk, the more sluggish my movements become. I think it’s just simple exhaustion from last night until the sensation becomes so extreme that it feels like I’m in a slow motion action sequence. Des, meanwhile, seems to be moving just fine.
The wilderness opens to a clearing, and Des stops, turning towards me. He tosses me a sword, and it takes a ridiculous amount of effort to lift my arm up and snatch it out of the air.
Mirth dances in his eyes. “Sword up, Callie.”
I tug the weapon from its sheath, my limbs heavy.
It takes forever for me to lift my sword, and by the time I do lift it he’s already coming at me. It’s all I can do to duck and dodge his blows. And he’s going easy on me. So pathetically easy.
“Faster, Callie.”
There is no way in heaven or earth that I can move any faster. I can barely move as is. It’s like trying to swim through honey. Not even the kick-ass leather outfit I wear makes up for the particular torture of training today.
Des, meanwhile, doesn’t seem to be afflicted with the same issue I’m having. Whether it’s because the place doesn’t affect him, or he’s using magic to counteract its effects, he moves swiftly, coming at me so much faster than I can defend myself.
I don’t know how he does it with such accuracy, but each time Des nicks me with the sword, he strategically slices into my outfit, making little cut-outs in the leather. I now have dozens of tiny triangles speckling my upper chest and my outer thighs. And not once have I landed so much as a blow on him.
Not once.
Finally, after what feels like an eternity, Des announces that training’s over for the day.
I fall into a heap, the sword clattering to the ground next to me.
From the ends of my hair to the tips of my toes I’m tired, my outfit looks like a cut-out snowflake, and right now, I don’t give a damn about pretty much anything.
Day: 1, Callie: 0.
“You did good,” Des says, coming over to me. “This place is enchanted to move slower than the rest of the world—it’s said to mimic a slow-motion dream.”
That would’ve been helpful to know beforehand.
Of course, I notice it didn’t affect Des the same way it did me.
Sneaky fairy.
I lay my cheek on my knees, exhausted from the training.
He crouches next to me, his knuckles stroking my face. “We can’t rest just yet. We’ve got to move on to the next island.” His voice sounds half apologetic.
There’s just no way I’m dragging my butt off this patch of grass.
Des must see that because rather than trying to coax me back to my feet, his arms slip under my wings and the backs of my knees.