I was so distracted, however, that I didn’t hear our visitor enter until she spoke.
“You two have spent far too long in the mortal realm.”
I turned at the sound of the melodic feminine voice to see the most beautiful woman I had ever laid eyes on. She was tall and slim, her frame looming even higher in the black stilettos she wore on her feet, open-toed, nails painted a deep purple. Her legs were smooth and toned and went all the way up to her short black skirt and sparkling, drooping top. Her lips were painted plum and her eyes were like starlight as she turned her megawatt smile on me, tossing her dark, wavy locks over a shoulder.
“Is this her?” she asked. Her voice was like honey, sweet and genuine.
I just blinked at her, understanding for the first time why my ancestors might have believed themselves standing before a goddess so long ago. Maybe that had even been this woman herself.
“Cass, this is Professor Seren Belling. She prefers to be called Ren,” Lark introduced, tossing a dishtowel over his shoulder as he strode across the kitchen and leaned against the counter I was sitting at to make the introductions. “Ren, this is my sister, Casseiopia.”
“Cass,” she corrected, sticking out a hand.
I shook it and she grinned from cheek to cheek.
“You’re half Fae,” she blurted.
“Cass,” Lark muttered a low warning.
“I’m sorry,” she said to me. “It’s just, these two haven’t told me hardly anything at all about you. Tell me what you do. Something with the rifts?”
She was moving quickly, already settling onto the bar stool beside mine as she leaned forward, interested. She placed a hand on my knee and Lark’s gaze shot to the contact.
“Oh, yes,” I answered, caught off guard by her overwhelming friendliness.
Something about Casseiopia put me at ease. She was bright eyed and friendly, teeth gleaming white in her radiant smile that seemed permanently affixed to her face. She came across as someone I could actually talk to. Someone who might tell me something about her world instead of keeping me in the dark until it was convenient for her, instead of grumbling or growling at me any time I asked a question, instead of commanding me all the time.
“I work for Hadley University,” I told her. “It’s a prestigious university in the mortal plane. Well, in my country at least. My uncle and I make up the entire astrophysics department. Anyway, when the rifts started popping up around the globe, the DAA, that’s the Department of Astrophysical Anomalies, hired us as consultants to help their agents close them.”
She just listened intently, nodding from time to time and showing genuine interest. She didn’t snap at me to inform me she already knew what the DAA was. She didn’t interrupt me with an observation or a question that she deemed more important. Was she entirely certain that she and her brother were genetically related?
“Fascinating,” she breathed and it didn’t feel condescending. It almost seemed like she truly found it fascinating. “How do they treat you there? Mortals. Do they know what you are?”
I frowned. What I was.
“Most don’t,” I confessed. “It only… causes trouble to tell people.”
She nodded, giving my knee a squeeze where she still held it. Lark cleared his throat and she released me.
“Well, welcome to the Court of Wanderers,” she said jovially, raising both hands before dropping them to her sides.
“Is that where we are?” I asked, raising a brow as I glanced over at the Fae males who were suddenly very interested in their plating. “No one bothered to tell me.”
“Oh yes, the Court of Wanderers is the only one you can travel into from the mortal realm. All the other courts have wards and protections to keep travelers from the other side out.”
“So none of you are from here.”
Lark tensed. Rook frowned. Casseiopia looked away from me for the first time, glancing to her brother for guidance.
“What makes you say that?” Lark asked in challenge, turning toward us. He stepped forward and braced his powerful arms on the counter in front of us in a way that flexed the muscles in his forearms and waited.
“The distinct lack of orange in your wardrobe,” I said. “And the overwhelming use of black.”
Cass snorted at that. Rook couldn’t contain his grin.
“I’m assuming color is a strong indicator of where you’re from here, which, what did you call it? Court?”
“Yes,” Cass answered, nodding. “They are called Courts. And they are all color coded, as weird as that is.”
