“He hurts you?”
“Just a searing headache for a few moments after he’s gone.” I shook my head once more and looked up at him, attempting a smile. “See? Better already.”
“What was he saying?”
“Oh, nothing. More assortments of insults.”
Schwint’s eyes narrowed. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah, totally! I’m sorry. Let’s get to that party.”
“Are you sure? We can go home”—the glint in his eyes returned—“take a bath or something relaxing.”
“After the process of getting out here? Hell, no. If I let that voice ruin anything, it will just get worse.” I motioned into the woods. “Lead on!”
“Well, it’s good to know you think a bath with me would qualify as ruining something.” He jutted his lower lip out in mock misery.
I laughed. “Shut up! You know what I mean.”
Twenty-Two
FINN DE MORISCO
“Oh myGod!” I couldn’t make my feet take another step. “Oh my God!” My eyes couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Of its own accord, my hand rose and covered my mouth in awe.
Hardly able to tear my eyes away, I looked over at Schwint. He didn’t look at the scene before us. He stared at me, the biggest grin I’d ever seen on his face. “You like it?”
My mouth fell open further. “Oh my God! Schwint, how in the hell could I not like it? It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
His grin got impossibly bigger. His voice grew softer and deeper, almost like he was singing again. “Good. I hoped you would.”
In an act of will, I forced my hand down to my side as I turned back to the wonder in front of me. I felt Schwint’s fingers intertwine with mine.
Stars filled the sky, with only the faintest hint of the moon’s silver visible through the thick branches crisscrossing overhead. Underneath the interlocking expanse, the wide clearing glowed, as if ten thousand candles floated through the air, lazily drifted up through the trees, floated down to weave between the grass and fallen leaves, then levitated upward once more. Most of the lights glowed a warm yellow, but here and there orbs of color cut through the sea of amber—flashes of red, violet, and azure. Occasionally, glittering flames cascaded from the trees and showered the guests below. I gasped, at first thinking they were going to burst into flames themselves, but they just raised their hands and splashed through the fire, sending it jutting out in a sparkling spray of glitter, like rhinestones scattering through the air.
The music was unlike anything I’d ever heard. An arbitrary mix of notes and harmonies—twinkling of flute, vibrations of violin riffs, hum of an oboe, chirping of songbirds, mournful scream of an elk, and soaring hum of a harp—each sound at odds with the rest filling the space, yet somehow it all combined into an unearthly harmonious cacophony.
Guests milled about through it all, some walking or lying on the ground, others lounging over the tree branches, still others zooming or floating in the air. Oh, the guests. It was Shakespeare’sMidsummer Night’s Dreamcome to life, only more extravagant than even that old queen could fathom, and without any hint of his tragedy. Beautiful women, willowy and ethereal like the nymphs. Men, equally as lithe and equally as beautiful. Both sexes clothed in flowing, airy material, leaves and flowers, or resplendent in their state of undress, their jeweled wings maintaining their splendor in the presence of the otherworldly light around them. Figures clothed in finery walked among the young and beautiful, their shoulders giving way to antlered faces of deer and moose. Female bodies preening with the head and erupting tail feathers of peacocks. Human forms with the monstrous, scaled faces of horned demons from Dante’s nightmares, their cloven hooves prancing over the ground in exhilaration as the music filled the air. Every so often, one of the gruesome creatures melted away to reveal the sultry form of a voluptuous female, only to have one of the men transform into a writhing serpent, undulating under the caresses of the many gathered around. In every space, the fairies flew, danced, sang, and ate. None were still. None were like anything or anyone I’d ever seen. Couples copulated everywhere, the combinations of gender and creature and number, much like the seeming force of gravity, holding no consequence. It was the essence of hedonism—at once beautifully repulsive and disturbingly seductive.
I turned to Schwint again, ready to state my wonder, only to be caught up in an entirely new marvel. He hovered beside me. His silvery-blue dragonfly wings beat so quickly they scattered the reflection of the meadow like shards of gems across the expanse. His handsome face lost the human qualities that hid his true form. His golden eyes were huge as they gazed into mine. His salt-and-pepper hair curled ever so slightly over the points of his ears. Full lips spread wide in a smile—his teeth sparkled white against the darkness of his closely shorn beard. At first, I thought he was naked, but then realized his body was covered in a nearly transparent gossamer-like fabric. I stepped back. He was too much up close. Too much to really take in.
Even under his daily disguise, how could I have ever mistaken him for human, or even witchlike? He was so close to us but so completely other. He wasn’t gorgeous in the same way Brett’s demonic blood had gifted him, but he was equally as beautiful. Beautiful in a strange and rather alarming way. I looked down at his body, lithe and taut with long, healthy muscle. Again, at first glance his body could nearly appear feminine, but after that briefest of moments there was no question of its masculinity. Broad shoulders and chest tapered down to a strong, narrow waist and hips. Long, sculpted legs, mostly bare of the flowing material. I stared at the shadow of his sex. I couldn’t help it. Easily visible behind the illusion of covering, his cock hung, long and thick, resting curved over heavy testicles. I instantly hardened, and it took all my will to continue to stare at him instead of taking his balls into my hands and cupping their weight.
His laugh caught my attention and brought my gaze back up to his eyes. “Do you like what you see?” As different as he appeared to me, his voice was still his. Unchanged, convincing me he was the same Schwint I’d started this date with.
I looked him over once more, from head to foot, glanced over the mass of fairies in the clearing, then back at him. “Is this really you? Your true form, I mean? Or are you transforming into something else, like some of them over there?” I motioned toward the trees.
“Do you like this form?” He smiled seductively, but I thought I could read a bit of uncertainty behind the suggested invitation.
I stepped a foot closer. “I just want to know. I’m fine with either. Is this your true form? If you don’t use any power and you are just being you, the way you were born, is this your form?”
He paused, his smile beginning to falter. “Does it matter?”
I looked him over again, then returned to his face. Did it matter? “No. Not in terms of if I want to be on this date with you. Whether you look like this, like you did in the car, or somewhere in the middle. I just want to know.”
“Why?”
I thought again. Did I care what he looked like? Did he need to look a certain way for me to care about him? Had I fallen in love with Brett because he was beautiful? I didn’t even need to let the thought finish forming before the truth of my answer hit me. “It has nothing to do with what I may feel for you, or what I might feel for you. I just want to know. I want to know who I’m talking to when we’re together. Even if you have to hide your real form so you can be out in the world. Like you’d like to know what I truly looked like if I wore a mask every time we’re together.”
