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All Creatures on Earth - Volume 1

Hey, guys! That's my book here, I decided to post a few chapters (or maybe more) after translating it from Brazilian Portuguese to English. I really wanted to share this work and hope you enjoy it.

Buy the entire work on Amazon through this link!

Here's a quick summary of the book:

Title: All Angels from Heaven Above

Series: All Creatures on Earth

Tags: Dark Academia, Murder Mystery, Fantast, witches, demons, angels, colonialism, imperialism, political intrigue, hate to love, friends to lovers, friends to enemies, hurt without comfort;

If you liked... you're gonna like this: Vicious, The Atlas Six, The Shadowhunters Chronicles, Stalking Jack the Ripper, etc.

Trigger Warning: the story deals with themes of grief and also mentions child neglect, physical and psychological abuse, as well as a few gory depictions of murder, and mentions addiction, though barely.

Add: The book didn't have a Sensitive Editor, so any problems with how people of color, disabilities, or queer people are portrayed can be discussed directly with the author.

Synopsis: Adra is a witch in a world of demons, which means problems all on its own, but when your father is murdered by the same person who is killing teenagers inside the mysterious Lethe Academy, she won't hesitate in the face of hardship to enter the school and hunt down the person responsible for it.

With Damian Kolasi, a cheating demon who's also charming as Hell, and his friends' help, Adra is prepared to take revenge on her father's killer. But what seems to be a simple case of assassination becomes embedded into a political web Adra didn't expect to fall into, just like she never expected her body to react to Damian as intensely as it does whenever he's near.

Sometimes, we can't get everything we want. And Darkness conquers all.

Summary (with links):

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4 - Coming Soon...

All Angels from Heaven Above - Chapter 1

Summary - find more chapters, read the synopsis, and trigger warnings here!

Buy the whole book through this link!

The walls of Lethe Academy carried its ghosts the same way blood stained the walls of Jerusalem: just because it was impossible to see them, it didn’t mean they weren’t there. But, just like any dark past, they’d always come back to haunt innocent generations, which were ignorant of the crimes committed before their existence in the world. 

So, when all the papers in the city of Agraés published that Death had visited the Academy, none of their elders were surprised; but the young ones, anxious to hold the world in their hands and naively believing apt to do such inconceivable feat, watched it all with attentive and morbid curiosity, very little moved by the death of one of them.

Not that it mattered now that she was already dead, though Adra Anoixi while walking through the dark wooden floor of the store, her steps producing a hollow sound on the floor while her black dress rustled against the surface. She faced the three girls, as dazzling as goddesses, who waited for her in front of the counter, facing the entry. All of them wore the most expensive dresses money could buy and had their hair done in a way Adra would never use on a day-to-day basis.

Or to a funeral, like the one they were going to.

“Here it is,” she gave them the incense as it was asked.

The girls looked at Adra for a second longer than necessary before one of them — the taller one, with black dark skin — took the incense from her hand with a last look of contempt. 

Without any more words or thanks, they left the store, imperious as just demons could be, leaving her payment on the counter to not have to touch her. Adra looked to the ceiling with an impatient sigh.

“I should’ve given them the fake incense” she murmured to herself, remembering the terrible smell of that specific product. “It’d be deserved if they whisk away everyone with that stink.

But since the death at the Academy, the sales were low. The city hadn’t been receiving as many travelers as it used to every week and that was worrisome: if the tourists started to avoid the city because of superstition, a lot of stores would be forced to close.

If Witches & Daughters were one of them, that would break her mother’s heart. And that wasn’t acceptable, not when the store was a gift from her father, Kia’s only love.

Despite the lack of humans visiting Witches & Daughters, demons were interested enough in her to buy some cheap trinkets that humans made the mistake of thinking were magic. If they did it for mockery or because they believed the same as humans, it didn’t matter to her. What did matter was that the store would survive another month's savings from debts and debt collectors.

Many hours passed until the bell above the door rang again with the presence of other people in the dusty store, full of dried herbs, crystals, and other natural products. Happy to have something to do, Adra got up from the small chair behind the counter and raised her eyes to her new client.

The man in front of her wasn’t older than Adra herself and watched her with his black eyes full of glow — like a star —, there was a silver earring in his right ear and his brownish lips were curved in an arrogant smile. A demon, but not any demon: Adra could feel his power making her shiver, even two meters away from him. 

Powerful and handsome as Death: that was a dangerous combination, especially when talking about a fallen angel.

Adra was immediately suspicious and curious, and that made her frown: it wasn’t common for such a powerful demon to enter her store and Adra didn’t like what it could mean.

“It was way too easy to find you, miss Anoixi,” he said, his voice calm as a breeze.

Every single one of Adra’s instincts were alert at his words, the coldness in his expression. Carefully, she slipped her hand to the slit of her dress, just below the carpet, feeling the dagger’s hilt her father had given her.

“I wasn’t hiding,” Adra said, raising her chin proudly. “So, I’d imagine that finding me wouldn’t be a problem.”

She was, after all, one of the best witches in Agráes and people would look for her often, but never a powerful demon like that one in front of her. The shadows whispered to Adra as if feeling her uneasy with the demon’s power, even though he didn’t seem menacing.

“How can I help you?” Adra asked then, her voice professional, but the warning in them was unmistakable.

She didn’t think he’d do something bad, but being alert near demons was already an instinct for a long time now, especially those ridiculously handsome.

Her words made the corner of his lips tremble up as if he was finding all that quite funny for reasons Adra could only imagine, his dark eyes shining mysteriously.

Adra didn’t smile back, even though the amusement was taunting the corner of her own lips too.

The demon wore a dark gray overcoat, black social pants, shirt, and shoes — Lethe Academy’s uniform, she easily recognized. He walked to the counter, watching Adra carefully before saying anything else.

She didn’t move, uneasy under his scrutiny, but didn’t recoil from the slow and interested eyes of the demon, choosing to hold the dagger tighter instead, just in case. Finally, he smiled, still politely, and said:

"I am looking for you, Adra."

She didn’t ask how he knew her name. Most demons knew her because of her father, as was expected, but the fact that he had that little bit of advantage over her bothered Adra.

Despite her grip on the hidden dagger, Adra trusted that the demon wouldn’t dare to attack her. She knew that, in a power match, she couldn’t defeat him, but demons knew witches didn’t fight with their powers only. So Adra just arched an eyebrow while calmly asking:

“And what do you want?”

“Damian Kolasi” the demon introduced himself and held out his hand. Adra looked at it for a couple of seconds before shaking it.

Fortunately, her free hand got to keep holding the dagger.

“And do you know how to answer a direct question, Damian Kolasi?” Adra asked slowly.

The man laughed lowly and Adra was forced to suppress a shiver so he couldn’t notice the impact he had on her. The demon, however, looked at her like he knew exactly his effect.

“I want to make a deal with you.”

Absently, he walked away from her, examining the store. Damian gripped and shook a jar full of eyes. All of them false, of course — the eyes. Despite the gossip going around between the humans, no witch had the need to use anything but their own minds to yield their powers.

Adra watched him, expressionless, while he roamed through the place, picking up random products and crouching down to get a look at what interested him. She wouldn’t admit it, but she was disappointed. That demon looked dangerous enough to be interesting, but it looked like Adra was wrong.

“Any witch with common sense knows she shouldn’t make deals with demons, mister Kolasi,” she said, her voice stable and unperturbed. “So, your answer is no.”

“I don’t want... favors, Adra,” said Damian, and there was an edge of tension in his voice, something dark and gloomy that made Adra shiver. “I want you to join Lethe Academy as a student. The first witch student. I think you heard that there’s a place available.”

A rude way of saying that one of the students died, no doubt. Adra raised an eyebrow to him, but the demon just crouched to analyze the crow’s feathers in one of the lower shelves, without realizing his own lack of empathy.

Meanwhile, Adra’s mind was like a scorching cauldron about to overflow. The Lethe Academy had never had a witch among its students, since all the vacancies were destined to legitimate children of demons. 

As she was possibly the only witch who was the legit daughter of a demon, maybe she could enter, but it would have consequences for her father, so Adra never asked this of him, even when her fascination for the school was evident every time she got near it.

The fact that that unknown demon had entered her store and simply handed her oldest dream to Adra could only be some fucked up kind of prank.

“What do you want in return?” she asked this time, knowing very well how tricky the words of a demon could be. 

Damian smiled at her as if pleased with her question and got up from where he had crouched to look at the crow’s feathers, walking towards her again.

“I knew you’d be more intelligent than your friends,” he said and Adra rolled her eyes.

She filled in the information that Damian had already spoken to other witched about that ridiculous idea, however. It’d be useful to ask about that to her coven later. For now, she had to deal with a demon.

“Answer my question.”

“I already told you,” he said quietly, trying to judge her skills in detecting his bullshit. “I want to help you to become the first witch student in Lethe Academy.”

“I heard you the first time,” Adra said, raising her chin. “But I want to know why you want me at the Academy. I’m not stupid enough to think it doesn’t come with a price.”

“You’re the first witch I found that thought about indulging me,” Damian said with a satisfied smile.

“That’s because no other witch is interested in going to that place,” she said in an explanation tone of voice, but impatient nonetheless: “Far too many demons.”

“You don’t like us, do you?” he didn’t expect an answer so Adra didn’t give him one. The hate between their species was obvious and had good motives to exist, and yet, there he was, searching for a witch to help him in whatever it was he wanted help with. Even so, it was intriguing and Adra couldn’t deny to herself the shadow of curiosity present at the back of her mind. Damian analyzed her again and clicked his tongue. “I wonder what’s different about you.”

That was a dangerous question and the way he tilted his head to the side, looking at her, intrigued, was even more so.

“What do you want in exchange for the available place?” Adra asked again, tired of walking in circles with that annoying man.

“I need a witch to do a job for me,” said the demon with a dangerous smile forming on his face while his dark eyes made Adra want to recoil because of their intensity. She stood stubbornly still. “You see, I have a hunch about the murder of my... colleague.”

“You don’t know if it was murder,” Adra said, frowning.

All the papers had said was that the cause of death was a mystery and no one could say for certain if it was murder, suicide, or just an accident. No other detail. It was that, among other things, that made people so nervous about that situation.

“Oh, but I know,” he said, walking toward her again with that damned smile on his face. 

Adra had her dagger in his neck before Damian Kolasi could lean over the counter and the demon froze. She would rather go to prison for his murder than allow him to do something to her, thought Adra, alert to his every move.

Instead of being annoyed, however, Damian Kolasi laughed, looking even more amused by Adra. He looked at her like a cat would at a bird whose efforts to escape its claws were useless, even when she was the one holding the blade.

“Oh, you really are sweet, aren’t you?” he asked as if there was not a dagger about to slit his throat.

“I wouldn’t say that about someone who could kill me,” she said and he smiled, gloomy.

Adra frowned, allowing Damian Kolasi to lean over to her a bit, leveling their eyes, his face near enough that she could see the cracks of his lips.

“You’re so dangerous, candy” he smiled as the sweetest of the poisons when he said that as if he was satisfied with that. “Anyway, there is no motive for violence, I’m not going to attack you.”

Adra didn’t lower her dagger. She knew better than to trust a demon.

“How can you know that was a murder?”

He looked at her, incredulous.

“Do you really think that a completely healthy, right-handed young adult would stab herself in the ribs with her left hand, even in an accident?” Asked Damian as if Adra was stupid and she hissed at him, her shadows gathering around her, reacting to her feelings before she could control them. 

Damian’s black eyes followed that power, showing a little bit of preoccupation for the very first time.

And admiration.

Adra frowned — it was the first time a demon that wasn’t her dad looked like he was awed by what she could do. The shadows retreated, reacting with confusion to Adra’s control and shock. No one had seen her power without fearing it, not even other witches, because unlike them, Adra controlled them as easily as she breathed.

“And how do you know all that?” she asked.

“Oh, I found the body,” he said as if it wasn’t a big thing while shaking his hand to dismiss further explanations. “Criminalistics classes did the rest.”

Adra’s grip on the dagger relaxed a bit. Lethe Academy for Demonic Arts trull offered criminalistics classes, just like anatomy and necromancy lessons, each one depending on the year one was. It made sense that, if Damian Kolasi had found the body, he’d know all that. It would also make sense, however, if he was the murderer.

“And why, exactly, do you want me to enter in the place of your colleague?” she asked again, watching while the smile crept back to Damian’s perfect face.

“I have a hunch.”

“A hunch,” she repeated.

“I think the murderer at Lethe Academy is just at the beginning and you’re the only one that can help me to catch them, candy,” said Damian.

With a quick move, he took Adra’s dagger from her, twisting her wrist slightly before nailing the blade to the wood of the counter with a yellowish paper and backing away from her, smiling before pulling the doorknob.

“Meet me at this address in a week at six pm if you want to know more about it, Adra Anoixi. I’ll be waiting.”

Damian Kolasi laughed when Adra threw the dagger at him, missing by a few centimeters before he closed the door behind him.

She watched as he walked away through the street as if he had just had a nice afternoon tea, incredulous with the nerve of him. Then she circled the counter to catch her dagger from the doorframe.

When she turned, a simple letter had appeared at the side of Damian Kolasi’s address. Adra groaned when she recognized the letter’s handwriting.

Go to Chapter 2

My Books!

Hey, guys! Welcome to my profile, here you'll find my books (which are partially available here on Tumblr).

My books are self-translated, so my English might fail me sometimes, so I'd thank you if you could spare some minutes to critique my work if you decide to read it (I hope you do!)

Besides that, just enjoy the ride, I hope you love my stories and my characters as much as I do <3

All Creatures on Earth - Summary

The series will follow Adra, a witch born in a world of demons who has to navigate this world to get revenge for her father's murder. A murder mystery filled with political intrigue and a bit of Dark Academia vibes.

To Decadent Poets - Summary

The series is a coming-of-age type of story and will follow Chris, Annie, Oliver, and Noah as they grow up together in the north of Scotland as World War II devastates the world. A historical fiction with some mystery, a lot of comfort vibes, and Light Academia aesthetics!

The Freak Show Series - Summary

The series is based on two independent books but both are focused on heroines leaving abusive relationships with their families and discovering a whole new world ahead of them (and falling in love, of course). Ah, and there is a circus of horrors (running away with the circus was never more appealing haha).

Freedom Girl - Summary

Hey, guys! That's my book here, I decided to post a few chapters (or maybe more) after translating it from Brazilian Portuguese to English. I really wanted to share this work and hope you enjoy it.

Here's a quick summary of the book:

Title: Freedom Girl

Series: The Freak Show Series

Tags: contemporary romance, hurt and comfort, BAFM women, a horror circus, charming love interest;

If you liked... you're gonna like this: It Happened One Summer, The Roommate, Book Lovers, etc.

Trigger Warning: the story deals with themes of abusive relationships with family, emotional and psychological abuse, as well as a few gory depictions of wounds.

Add: The book didn't have a Sensitive Editor, so any problems with how people of color, disabilities, or queer people are portrayed can be discussed directly with the author.

Synopsis: Lana is tired of playing her grandfather's good girl. She wants more, she wishes for a fulfilling and intense life, she wishes to be free. The arrival of her grandfather's new wife, Cinara, might be exactly what she needs, Lana rapidly realizes when her family knocks on the door. Cinara's family are nothing short of itinerant workers who own a circus of horrors, something she'd never seen before, and yet, it seemed to call for Lana with their world of mystery and fantasy.

Cam, on the other hand, is not a fan of the world his godmother, Cinara, is entering. And he'll do anything he can to understand better the venomous pit that is Henrique Vidal's life, even if he needs to use his granddaughter for that. To protect his family, Cam would do anything, even the unthinkable. But what to do when Lana becomes a part of his family?

Summary (with links):

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2 - Coming soon...

Prologue - A Broken Heart, Like a Clock

Summary - find more chapters, read the synopsis, and trigger warnings here!

Part 1 – Shall be Lifted… Nevermore “And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted… Nevermore.” The Raven, Edgar Allan Poe

To make it right, Cinara needed to break two hearts that afternoon and conquer another one by night time.

If she couldn’t, lives would be ruined, all because of a failed-before-it-even-began engagement. At that moment, Cinara would pay to have her own head struck by something heavy, anything to get the hell away from that familiar campsite, full of motorcycles and motorhomes.

Full of freedom.

How the hell, Cinara asked herself, could she have the courage to break her own heart?

Go to Chapter 1

Chapter 1 - The Demon’s Castle Horror Circus

Summary - find more chapters, read the synopsis, and trigger warnings here!

Lana felt the cold wind passing through the corridor, making her shiver while she kept her eyes wide open, trying to absorb all the details of that dark place she couldn't see the end of. Lana could feel her heart beating rapidly with the anxiety and the tension that accumulated in her body with each step she took. The mist that covered the ground was just slightly illuminated and she couldn't even see her own feet.

She could feel Gal's hands on her back. It was the only thing stopping her from turning back and leave that quiet, terrifying place and it was the slight push of her friend that made Lana put herself back together to continue to the first part of what promised to be a bloody night. Hesitating and feeling her body already trembling with excitation, she made herself move despite her loud heart in her chest, the sickness in her stomach and her sweating hands.

Then, two steps ahead, it happened. It was horrible and walked out the black wall as if was only made of mist. It had its eyes gushing thick blood and half of its disfigured face seemed like it was ripped out.

“Help me!” begged the creature from out of the shadows while grabbing Lana’s arm with his raw nail-less fingers, which sent a terrifying shiver through the girl’s body. “Please! He’s coming, help me!”

Lana stumbled forward, getting free of the man’s grip who continued to shout behind her, maddened. Not even two seconds passed when a little girl slipped right in front of her and stopped. Lana screamed, terrified of the little girl’s appearance, who wore a children’s dress. The little girl shouldn’t be more than ten and her eyelids had been pushed grotesquely to the sides, fixated with a wire that surrounded her head like a crown, highlighting the diamond-shaped raw meat around her eyes while her mouth was sewed shut.

Her silence, even with the other creature screaming in agony and despair behind Lana, was completely disturbing, and, staring at her green that didn’t blink, she felt her dinner coming up her throat for a moment. Lana almost couldn’t contain her gag, even though she couldn’t stop staring at the neon green eyes that made her panicking.

The girl slowly retreated from her way and Lana hurried, having to get away from that creature, but she was pushed back rudely at her third step and turned to see why. She felt she could pass out from the fear as she stared up at a man full of scars that had his mouth and skin looking like it was rotting, he smiled at her, his teeth all rotten as well, making her stop breathing for a second.

“Mine,” the creature growled with a maniac stare at Lana. “You’re mine.”

“No,” she mumbled weakly, stumbling backwards when another voice started to sound, yelling:

“Course she’s not yours, animal.” The demon appeared from the wall, just like the first creature, and still managed to surprise Lana. His eyes were totally white, he’s eyelids seemed to be in raw meat and he had horns on his forehead that had blood dripping from the torn skin. “She belongs to the Master.

“Yes, Master’s,” a whispered voice agreed but it didn’t embody anything and Lana couldn’t identify where it was coming from, which only made her more nervous as the whispers became louder. She ran to the exit, feeling her legs shaking. “Yes, she belongs to Mater, Master’s pet, Master’s, yes...”

And finally, finally, she reached the end of the corridor, but what Lana saw didn’t help her calm down. A clown was waiting in front of the wall that delimited the place and it was smiling to her with a smile that exposed its sharp and stained blood teeth from one ear to another. The white makeup on the clown’s face was stained with a blood-red color and the white wild eyes stared at her as if it could attack her at any given moment.

“Here, ma’am,” it spoke in a thin, grotesque voice that made her shiver while it pointed the passage to his side, for which she should go through. “The Master awaits you.”

Lana swallowed, but continued her way, making sure she was passing as far away as she could from the clown that kept staring at her with the wildness of a psycho. And maybe it is one, Lana thought while entering the place where the corridor led her. Maybe all people here are psychopaths for working in a place like the Demon’s Castle Horror Circus.

The circus surely was committed to fulfill their mission: terrorizing innocent people. Lana looked at the same mist of the corridor accumulating throughout the bleachers that lined up to the oval stage that seemed more like a black abyss than anything.

“I loved it!” Gal’s excited voice sounded behind her, making Lana scream from the scare, still tense because of what had happened in the corridor. Her scream echoed in the totally empty place, making it even louder. Lana looked at her only best friend with severity, scolding her while they walked to the middle of the bleachers.

“Don’t do that again.”

Gal just smiled, knowing that Lana loved to be scared and that, despite the panic, she loved the place. They sat in the third row, not far away from the stage, listening to the people screaming when passing through the corridor of torture, as Lana fondly had named it. The two friends felt the anxiety and expectations burning up with their blood running through their veins and looked at each other, excited, from time to time, while the audience filled up the bleachers, all of them seeming a little bit sick from the panic.

All the lights were turned off as soon as the last person sat. Lana could hear people yelling, scared, but she limited herself to holding Gal’s hand, smiling a little bit when feeling her heart in her throat. A single spotlight was lit up in the center of the stage, revealing a macabre figure.

The man's vest was all black, from his Victorian tailcoat and shoes to his cane, that was resting on his shoulder. His skin was pale as a corpse and his long thick beard was blue. The disturbingly white eyes were visible and penetrating even from afar. He stared at his audience with a serious expression, walking slowly to the border of the stage. His cane, now tapping on the wood floor, was the only thing was the only thing that made noise. The people, eager for the show to start soon, started to murmur between each other, impatient.

Lana knew that out there, the night was clear because of the new moon and the reality was way much gentler, but inside the circus the tension seemed to crush her and push her attention to the rhythmic movement of the presenting man’s cane, preventing her from thinking about her problems and how much she’d like her life was different.

“Silence!” Shouted the man to hear the crowd and all of them silenced again when they heard his voice tone down to a hoarse murmur that cursed all of them.  “The Master is getting closer.”

The echo of the steps could be heard from afar. The voice of the figure that was present on the stage was thick and echoed in the circus’s long black tarpaulins. He said again:

“Few little people know the Master personally, but those who do...,” he paused and delayed his look to the audience, “shout.”

And, for a fact, the screams were heard, all of them from the entry’s corridor. Turning back, like all the others when she heard the screams of agony and despair, Lana felt her heart, which was behaving while the cane was tapping the floor, speeding again and she had to take a deep breath to contain the sensation.

Then, he appeared. It was exactly the same man who had appeared in the middle of the stage: there was no difference between the two of them in their clothes, makeup, and appearance. They even seemed like the same person. Lana frowned, trying to find something in the second man’s height or weight that could differentiate them from the first one, but they looked alike even in those things. A laughter behind her made her jump and turned back to look at the stage, where the first man was no more.

“You, my slaves,” said the second man, turning back everyone’s attention to himself while he climbed down the stairs to the stage. The voice, which had a narrative tone, became a growl of contempt when Blue Beard mentioned the wife who defeated him, “have heard my story a lot of times, I guarantee. You heard about how I was feared and respected by women that belong to me and how they were punished when went to my basement. Until she came. My eighth wife.”

The man reached the middle of the stage and stood there, looking to the public as his doppelganger. He only stood there in silence until, not much time later, a new voice came and neutral, and it involved the audience in its soft plot, like a spiderweb, making them forget that it had a spider.

The man who was speaking now wore a modern and elegant, black and golden suit and a mask in the same colors. His way of walking, just like his voice, was calm and paced. He appeared from behind the black curtain from that was on the back of the stage and was smiling calmly while he spoke. His hair was caramel-blond, his face had sharp masculine edges and his stubble, but his eyes, weren’t visible because of the mask: there were black holes in her place.

 The witch Mágissa was Blue Beard’s eighth wife, also the smarter of them all,” he said and the man with the blue beard smiled with cruelty. “Mágissa was the most powerful among all of the witches and had a friend who she could rely on. This friend that always despised Blue Beard and was always despised by him.”

“Erick Soleir,” Blue Beard growled on his side, looking furious at the mention of Mágissa and Erick. “The cause of my destruction. I could easily rip off a man at that moment, but I’m gonna be content with yours for now.”

Before the public could process what, he was saying, Blue Beard ripped the man’s head off, making the audience gasp, shocked. It really seemed that he had decapitated the man: the body had fallen on the floor with a muffled noise and was immobile since then while his head was dripping blood between Blue Beard’s hands.

To Lana’s total despair and horror, the man smiled to the head that he ripped off and drank the dripping blood, leaking to his face with the deep red blood. She could have thrown up right there if not for her utter fascination for that revoltingly grotesque show. Blue Beard looked at the shocked or disgusted audience with a maniac satisfaction, the blood dripping through his neck and staining his tailcoat’s collar.

“He was the first one this night to lose his life,” Blue Beard announced while smiling and his teeth were reddish. “And I swear to Satan that I will take Erick Soleir’s blood tonight. If not, may the demons drag me to eternal damnation!”

 And like an explosion, the light was turned off again just the right amount of time to allow the actor to leave the stage. When they lit up again, the spotlights focused on a couple: a woman and a man who looked at each other with affection. The woman was dressed in a 19th-century dress that was ornate from the neckline to her waist with lace and the skirt was plain, covering her feet. The dress adapted to her body perfectly, highlighting her curves and making her look like a powerful woman. She was wearing a mask that made Lana touch her own face, uncomfortable with the sensation of looking at the woman’s face: the mask was made of skin and the impression Lana had been that it was stuck to her face with wire, but the woman was actually holding it by a thin stick.

         The man, that looked at the woman with a smile, also wore old black and red clothes. It wasn’t hard to guess that he was playing a vampire when Lana considered the pale skin from the makeup or the rose teeth from drinking blood. He looked like the man who was decapitated by Blue Beard with his blond hair and muscular body, but the difference was in his face: he had a thin face, not as sharp. The fangs that made part of his characterization, together with the blood, didn’t bother Lana, who was stretching to see his eyes. She felt an absurd necessity of looking at them.

By the corner of her eyes, she noticed that the dark characters she had encountered in the entry corridor had spread out through the bleachers and the audience avoided them as the devil ran from the cross. This made Lana distracted for a moment and she smiled at the people who were averted, and anxious when they saw a disfigured face between them. Or a killer clown. But soon her attention was once more attracted to the vampire.

He was fascinating in an almost analytical way for Lana. The smile he was showing off was real — he enjoyed what he was doing —, but it had a bit of irreverence and sarcasm. What could he possibly be thinking so that his smile would look like this?

His posture was impeccable and just like his smile, it showed an aura of rebellion around him. Lana felt jealous for a moment. Everything she could show with her own posture was that she was being sold in the marriage market. She tried to look at his eyes one more time and sighed in frustration when she realized he was wearing red lenses.

There was something in this character that irrevocably attracted her and Lana just came down from her thoughts' imaginary island when his voice was heard. It was low and hoarse, but somehow it could echo for the how arena, including through her body, which tingled softly, making her frown, confused with that sensation.

“Well, my dearest Mágissa, take off your mask for me. You know I’m your slave and your king and between us, there are no barriers nor secrets,” he said in a solemn tone and the witch smiled before taking off her mask, revealing its shape in her face in raw meat. The vampire murmured, looking delighted. “Your blood smells like a banquet just for me.”

“Come taste it, Erick,” said Mágissa in a low, passionate, and amused tone, all at the same time. She stayed still when the vampire’s expression turned almost predatory and got close to her slowly, leaning to her face as if he would kiss her.

Lana was close enough to see the vampire’s tongue as he tasted the fake blood of the raw meat of Mágissa’s cheekbone. The view sent a shiver that had absolutely nothing to do with fear through her body and she felt like everything around her was suddenly silencing. At that moment, she was completely hooked. She couldn’t even hear Gal whispering her sarcastic comments in her ear or the audience yelling in disgust or repulse.

“Your taste is sweet, my Mágissa,” said Erick while stopping and moving away from the witch with a satisfied smile. Lana felt her face heating up because of the double meaning of his words. She carefully looked while a conversation about Erick’s preoccupations started between him and her while also paying attention to the creatures walking through the bleachers so that she wouldn’t be caught by surprise by them.

Lana felt tense when she saw Blue Beard entering the scene and catching Mágissa and Erick together. The man with the blue beard had a cruel expression on his face and he raged about being the owner of everything that surrounded his castle, like the forest in which the witches lived, and about how Erick could never see his friend again if she didn’t marry him.

The vampire hated the proposal, he even thought about staying away to prevent that from happening while Mágissa insisted on becoming Blue Beard’s wife and that made them fight pretty badly. Lana watched, biting her lips, while the vampire went away, leaving Mágissa alone and obviously upset. But she was consoled by other witches who entered the stage and, just like her, wore black dresses and had parts of their skin missing out for everyone to see. It should be a characteristic of the witches, Lana considered, shrugging it off unlike the audience, who looked sick. She, on the other hand, was loving every bit of it, the macabre seeming even more appealing to her at every passing second, once it was the complete opposite of everything she was used to in her real life.

Lana smiled at the friendship the witches had, calling themselves sisters and being caring about Mágissa’s grief over the loss of her best friend and lover because of the fight they had earlier. Lana really liked to see how bad the witches treated Blue Beard, even on his own wedding day, and how they made up a plan for her to kill him.

While the play went on, the grotesque creatures that certainly would visit her nightmares circled the stage and spread out again throughout the bleachers, like they were expecting something. When they saw their Master, they would make a lot of noise and racket, but the rest of the time, they only walked along the bleachers, scaring those who were talking or too concentrated on the show, which made screams sound every now and then. Lana smiled when she saw one of them reach for her and then move away, disappointed that she was so attentive. She even considered letting herself get carried away to allow them to scare her, but decided against it. She was much more interested in the story and didn’t want to lose the details of it because of an unnecessary scare.

“Fascinating,” Lana heard Gal murmur when they watched Mágissa and Blue Beard’s wedding. She knew her friend was focused on the amount of research that would allow them to make that scene and she could almost already hear her discourse about that subject for the rest of the week after spending entire nights searching about it.

When she was already trapped in Blue Beard’s castle, Mágissa went into a stubborn mood and, as punishment, she had to watch as sacred animals were killed in front of her. The public, who looked already appalled by the macabre costumes and makeup, decided that it would be wise to leave the popcorn for later when they watched Blue Beard slicing owls and wolves in the middle.

Mágissa cried blood seeing the innocent animals being sliced open and screamed like she was the one being murdered. Lana felt her agony deep in her core, feeling extremely uncomfortable seeing those animals’ deaths in so much detail. In the moment Blue Beard was preparing himself to slice a living owl, Gal leaned into her and murmured:

“I found out that they show Blue Beard torturing Mágissa when she discovers the basement.” Lana frowned, wondering how her friend knew that, something that Gal clarified quickly, looking suspiciously innocent. “The city’s newspaper doesn’t have a loyal journalist.”

“Gabriel again, Gal?” Lana asked, forgetting about the play and turning to look at her best friend, preoccupied, even while remembering to keep her voice down. The girl, who had a careful disinterested expression on her face, shrugged.

“He’s good at what he does,” she murmured as an explanation and Lana rolled her eyes while pretending to pay attention in the play. “Plus, it’s not like I had accepted going back with him, Lana.”

“I know, but this doesn’t mean I don’t have to worry about it,” Lana said in an annoyed whisper. “Do you know how many abusive relationships start and how your relationship with Gabriel ends?”

Gal rolled her eyes, mad with her friend’s reaction, and said:

“Lana, you need to live in the real world and not in this bubble of fear and glass that Henrique has put you in since you were a kid. Then you’d be able to say what’s an abusive relationship.”

“Henrique doesn’t put me in...” Lana began to protest but they were interrupted by a thump of their bodies, as if they were on the bumper cars and had hit each other unknowingly. The yaw was caused by a man that was holding them by their shoulders.

“Silence, girls,” the reprimand was made in a funny tone, and the man, who was actually about their age, smiled at them naughtily. He, just like Erick Soleir, wore just a little makeup, just enough so that Lana could identify him as spirit because of the neck injury, and his skin, darker than hers, were dimmed to a grayish brown.

He had chocolate-colored eyes, an unshaven beard, and a sharp jawline, really masculine. His white shirt was open, allowing them to see his muscular chest. Gal arched her eyebrows to Lana, approving him, and had the audacity to whistle at him.

“Hey, Asher,” said Gal in a low voice, renewing Lana’s ulterior suspicions: her friend had already watched the play and they were here again just because of her. Lana squinted at Gal, but she was too concentrated on her flirt and ignored her.

As if he had just recognized Gal, the guy’s eyes shimmered with malice, but he didn’t say anything, just moved away from them and continued to do his job. Not wanting to be a victim of any more scares, they looked at each other, silently communicating, and turned their attention to the play. Lana rolled her eyes and snorted.

To this point, Blue Beard had already caught Mágissa in his basement and he had imprisoned the witch in a wood table fit for the torture of women in the Inquisition. Lana felt a shiver down her body when she thought about the torture she was about to see. Blue Beard had an almost calm voice when he said:

“What did you do, Mágissa?” he asked while turning her mask in his hand and looking at her fighting to be free from the chains that locked her and her magic up. “You betrayed your husband, Mágissa. Me, when I love you so much. What a horrible thing to do.”

“You don’t know what love is, Blue Beard,” the witch spat those words to her husband and stared at him like an equal despite her position at the table. Lana felt her admiration for that character increase and smiled a bit. “Don’t be a hypocrite, you bastard.”

The man just smiled softly and said in a smooth and dangerous voice that promised violence:

“Let’s see after that if you’ll be as naughty as you are now.”

Then he showed her mask and ripped it in two before ripping it again in four parts. Mágissa gasped from the pain and more blood dripped off her face, staining the white dress she was wearing. Amused by the witch’s suffering, Blue Beard smiled even more, his eyes shimmering with maniac while he grabbed a sharp knife.

“I want to know who the hell is responsible for their visual effects,” Gal said in resolution when the man stabbed Mágissa's arm without any hesitation or care, making her scream and cry while blood dripped down, dark red and thick. Mágissa's screams got higher and more disturbing while the torture went on and her sounds of despair were able to make Lana shiver in anguish. Some people paled and couldn’t watch as the show went on, looking away from what was happening.

Lana couldn’t avoid the gasp when she watched as Blue Beard slowly ripped the skin off Mágissa’s arm, revealing the raw muscle underneath it. Slowly, he also removed ir, leaving the nerves, bones, and veins exposed. Lana shivered as she saw it, holding her own arm tightly to placate the feeling crawling under her skin.

When she thought she couldn’t take the screams and Blue Beard’s slow torture, the witches, Mágissas’ sisters, broke in the cellar furiously, her skirts fling around them magically. None of them seemed happy and Lana shuddered with the rageful stares they were giving Blue Beard.

One of them, the oldest Lana could see, pointed her long thin finger at Blue Beard, who looked downright chilled and let his knife fall to the ground. Lana couldn’t hold back a smile as she noticed the fear in that horrible man’s eyes and expression.

“You abused our sisters before Mágissa, Blue Beard,” said the oldest witch with a warning voice. “Today you went too far. You tried to abuse the strongest among us and it won’t go unpunished, because you won’t defeat her. Mágissa will rise and get her revenge because no witch will ever forget the cruelty of men. You’ll meet your punishment by the hands of her who is our sister.”

With a wave of her hand, the oldest witch opened the cuffs locking Mágissa up and the young witch hurried to get up, almost falling over the table in which she had been tied up. She was grimacing in pain while she stood side by side with the other witches and cradled her injured arm. The oldest said to her:

“Erick told us you needed help.”

Mágissa smiled as she heard that, but her smile quickly faded as she turned to face Blue Beard, who stepped back.

“I really wanna know how they made this amputation look so real,” Gal murmured, intensely watching Mágissa as if she could read the answer inside the actress’ mind. Lana frowned.

“The skin of her hand was fake and the bones, veins, and nerves are body painted,” she explained, and Gal sighed after a few seconds in silence.

“I’ll never get how you can see this kind of thing,” she announced, putting an end to the matter and Lana didn’t bother to hide the smile growing on her lips.

“Seven times you maimed and tortured us, Blue Beard,” Mágissa said in an echoing voice that surprised Lana. She wasn’t expecting the special effect in the witch’s voice. “Therefore, seven times worse will be your punishment. You, Blue Beard, are doomed to suffer at the hands of the creatures you’ve imprisoned and enslaved. You’ll be hurt as you hurt others until the High Priestess says otherwise.”

“From now on,” the oldest witch, who was the High Priestess, announced: “This punishment will be forever and no power on Earth or underneath it will be able to stop it.”

A thunder rumbled and all of the creatures who were surrounding the audience gathered in a circle around Blue Beard, who had now a panicked expression that seemed to satisfy the audience. The lights flickered throughout Blue Beard’s demise, showing his face in flashes of despair as he was engulfed by the creatures and dragged out of the stage. The witches hugged and soon Erick appeared with a soft smile towards Mágissa. Slowly, the witches left the stage, leaving them alone.

Erick closed the distance between him and Mágissa, who smiled softly, her amputated hand long forgotten, probably because they didn’t seem to feel pain so intensely, seen as several parts of their bodies were skinless, Lana absently thought. The vampire and the witch held each other in silence and the lights went out, ending the show.

Lana felt the bleachers under her shaking as the other actors went downstairs to the stage and the lights went up again. All of the audience rose to applaud the group, who were all smiling, a lot less threatening than during the show. At some point in the middle of it all, Lana’s eyes traveled to Erick, who was openly smiling, just like his colleagues. His eyes, still with the red lenses, danced through the people in the crowd, who was applauding profusely, then stopped on her.

Erick’s intense stare made Lana’s body heat up and her lips tingled uncomfortably. He stared at her for a couple seconds, but it felt like years to her, who felt increasingly unable to avert her eyes from the vampire. So he was the one who did it first, ending the tremendous applauses and whistles with a final smile and disappearing behind the curtains with the other actors.

Gal, who was smiling beside her, was the first to pull her to the exit while people passed by them, talking about how much they liked the show.

“It’s a phenomenal review of Blue Beard,” the girl was saying, mesmerized as she side-hugged, Gal’s arm around her neck. “I got shivers in most of the scenes!”

“Me too and it was amazing,” Lana agreed with a smile.

“This city lives in the past centuries, I swear,” Gal suddenly said, cutting the conversation short.

Lana turned to where her friend was watching just to see a considerable amount of people protesting against the Circus with moralist and religious phrases in banners right at the place’s entryway; the workers trying to gently push people away. Both of them stood still for a few minutes, watching as the horde of revolted people tried to enter the circus by force. Gal didn’t hesitate to push Lana:

“These people are exactly like your grandfather; it isn’t a surprise he’s so idolized in the city.”

“My grandpa doesn’t live in the past century,” Lana defended him, feeling a bitter taste filling her mouth as she talked about Henrique. “He’s just conservative.”

Gal just snorted and pointed the obvious:

“He tried to scare my parents away from the city when we moved in, Lana. And look at what you’re wearing because of him! It looks like a seven-year-old's, for God’s sake.”

         Lana pictured the clothes she was wearing that night as she avoided looking down. It was one of the shortest dresses she could find and yet, it still went just a bit above her knee and probably had been bought to her when she was way younger. With her height, barely changed since she was twelve, it was hard to know if whether her clothes were from when she was a kid or not. The dress was yellow and its orange fall leaves were painted all around it and it had fall-themed drawings on the bottom. The cleavage covered her collarbone and it was sleeveless. As the night was cold, Lana had put on a thin yellow sweater and brown shoes. As she thought of it, Lana blushed.

“Okay, maybe this isn’t exactly the adequate attire to wear to a Horror Circus,” she admitted, blushing even harder when Gal let out a sarcastic laugh. “It’s not funny, Gal, you know I have no other thing to wear!”

         “If you were my size, I’d give you my clothes for when we hang out, but you’re too short, Lana,” Gal said in a kind mocking tone, then she grew serious: “And you only have these clothes because you’re too afraid to buy something your grandfather doesn’t approve of. You need to stand up for yourself, Lana, your grandfather can’t control you forever.”

 “He doesn’t control me,” Lana protested, but it lacked conviction as she knew that was a joke or a lie, and she felt the same bitter taste again. Lana just miserably added: “He just wants what’s best for me, Gal.”

“But he doesn’t trust you enough to let you decide what’s good for yourself,” Gal countered in a hard tone and Lana shut up, swallowing her own unpolite response and not commenting further. Gal, who still had her arm around Lana’s neck, noticed her reaction and sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be harsh. It’s not your fault.”

“Alright,” Lana mumbled back, her eyes on the grass under their feet. To break the ice, Lana brought back their earlier subject. “So you didn’t hang out with Gabriel, then.”

Gal gave her an apologetic smile.

“Does it help if I say I liked it so much I wanted to watch it again?” Asked her friend.

Lana sighed, her suspicion confirmed beyond any doubt: Gal had lied about not watching the show just to get her out of her house and bring her there. And, on the first time she came to the circus, she hooked up with the ghost who had scared them.

“No, but thank you for the effort,” Lana said.

Gal knew Lana couldn’t leave her house very often — it was too dangerous for Henrique to notice her absence —, but she couldn’t help but feel grateful for her friend’s effort in taking her out of the house and making her live a little. Something Lana didn’t do very often.

“Well, someone has to do it, since your grandfather was born in the Middle Ages,” Gal grumbled, probably not wanting to be heard.

Lana sighed. She was tired of that conversation, so she preferred to stay silent about it, knowing Gal wouldn’t instigate it also.

They walked through the wet grass to the parking lot, where Oman’s car was parked. Lana knew that what Gal had spoken back in their discussion was the truth, but even if the strongest desire in Lana’s heart was freedom, she couldn’t give up her relationship with her grandpa because of it.

It wasn’t a big sacrifice to give up her freedom when she never had any to begin with, or when she experienced it so little, she could barely feel its taste. Lana didn’t care enough about it if it’d make Henrique happy.

“What’s up?” Gal suddenly asked, waking Lana from her depressed thoughts about her life and making her look up to where the two young men stood near their motorcycles.

Gal obviously needed to stop and flirt with one of them, who Lana recognized as the ghost who had scared them during the show — Asher. He had chocolate brown eyes and a sexy aura Around him as he smirked: exactly the kind of guy who attracted her friend’s ferocious eyes.

Just like Gal, he had an unwavering malicious smile.

“We’re fine,” Asher answered. “This is Cam, the friend I mentioned last time.”

He gestured at his friend and Lana, as she looked at him for the first time, recognized him immediately. It was the vampire, Erick Soleir. With a curious look, she openly analyzed him, not worrying — as she always did — about being rude.

He had hazel eyes and smiled at Lana in a disdainful way that, even though it deeply annoyed her, just made him look even hotter. Cam had a thin face and his face without makeup was so sunburnt that his cheekbones and lips were reddish, something Lana considered a crime. Like, how could anyone keep their sanity seeing those slightly swollen, shining, rosy lips?

She certainly couldn’t, because she had to stop herself to bite her own lips when she noticed his. Cam was fit and both he and Ashe still wore their show costumes.

“This is Lana,” Gal said, smiling at Asher, her dark green hair shining under the full moon’s and the circus’ lights, which flickered rhythmically. “I also told you about her.”

If there was something Lana envied about her friend’s appearance, it was her hair. Usually, Gal always painted it dark green, which fit her skin tone, an olive tone that shone under golden light. Her hair, always voluminous, was shorter on the back, longer up front, and had bangs that fitted her. Gal’s face was oval and her lips attracted the attention, especially when she wore her favorite brown lipstick.

She had broad hips and big breasts, which always made her think she was fat, in consequence making Lana roll her eyes a lot, not because being fat was a problem, but because Gal was most certainly not.

She greeted the two men with a shy wave of her hand before turning to face the ground, silently asking to be left alone as she always did in the tedious parties her grandfather took her, all of them organized by her grandfather’s friends — or his children, which didn’t help.

“Are you two together now?” Asher asked without any embarrassment in his tone.

Amused, Lana smirked and lifted her eyes back to him.

“No,” she said with that small smile and Gal just explained:

“We’re just friends.”

Asher smiled, satisfied with his response, and hurried to invite them, his eyes never leaving Gal’s:

 “So do you want to go grab something to eat with us?”

Lana frowned, her smile fading when Gal turned to her, excited with the invitation and fighting not to let it too obvious. She checked the hours on her wristwatch, groaning softly as she saw it was already midnight, and showed it to Gal, who sighed.

“We can’t,” Gal said with another heavy sigh and Lana bit her lip, feeling guilty for depriving her friend of some fun. “I have to take Lana home in fifteen minutes, maybe twenty.”

“I can do it,” Cam offered in a calm and collected tone, the exact opposite of what Lana was feeling as she heard his offer. “She just has to give me the address.”

Gal looked at Lana, who, with her friend’s excitement at the prospect of hanging out with Asher in mind, couldn’t help but to nod, accepting a lift from the blond man. Gal smiled, satisfied, but quickly turned to Cam, a finger in his face as her expression grew dangerous:

“I’ll trust you because you’re an employee here and a friend of Asher’s, but touch a strand of her hair and I’ll hunt you down and destroy everything you love in your life.”

Lana laughed when Cam’s eyes got wide and he rose his hands as a peace sign, shaking his head while Gal and Asher walked away and got on his bike, which had a pretty dark green painting. Lana kept smiling as she watched the bike pulling away but became serious quickly as she turned to Cam, who watched her with amusement, although there was something in his expression, something she couldn’t quite place.

“Calm down, princess,” he said with that annoying smirk. “Even if your friend doesn’t trust me, I won’t bite unless you ask.”

Lana rolled her eyes — something she wasn’t used to do, but that man annoyed her in a way few people could. She refrained from commenting on how cliché that phrase was and said in an irritated tone:

“Just hurry up, vampire boy.”

He raised his eyebrows as if he was surprised and smiled a little bit more truthfully before pointing to his own bike.

“Your dress will go up too high if you get on the bike,” he warned in a provoking tone, smirking just because he knew it would annoy her.

Ignoring him with an angry look, Lana analyzed the bike, a black Yamaha YZF-R1 that made her frown in surprise. That was one of the most beautiful bikes she’d ever seen and its design had won the German Design Award. She suppressed the desire to whistle at the bike and just answered him:

“As long I get home quickly, it doesn’t really matter.”

“Since the princess is in such a hurry,” Cam said with a shrug, grabbing two leather jackets. Lana took one of them, even if it looked ridiculously big on her. Generally, most clothes looked ridiculously big on her, so Lana was used to it. Cam, however, said: “Maybe I can get the keys to the jeep if I can find my dad.”

She ignored him and got upon the bike behind him with some struggle as she tried to keep the dress down, but Cam’s mocking laughter made her give up and allow her dress to go up to the Middle of her thighs, hidden under the leather jacket. It doesn’t look so bad, she considered as she looked down to herself. It also shut Cam the hell up and he just started the engine and told her to hold onto him — passing her the helmet meanwhile — before asking her address.

Riding on a motorcycle, Lana considered, was definitely for few people, but she was most certainly included on the list. The feeling of the cold wind in her skin and hair, or at last the parts of her body that could feel it, was enough to make her heart beat faster in excitement. Although she was holding onto Cam’s middle strongly, Lana stretched out to let her face be hit by the wind through the helmet and smiled silly as she felt it cold.

Lana was so focused on the feelings running through her body, that she began to notice the feeling of Cam’s masculine body against her, the fact that her hands could feel his hard-defined abdomen against her fingers, how warm he was despite the cold night, and how close he was to her.

Before Lana could stop her own body from being inappropriate, the bike slowed down and stopped in front of Gal’s parent’s house, who were talking on the front porch while they waited for their children to come home in a piece and busied themselves with eating cookies and drinking hot cocoa, as usual. Mino and Sam Oman, who were Syrian refugees, had five children, of which three were adopted from everywhere in the world and two were biological.

The oldest of them was Sara, who was twenty-five; she had already moved out and lived in Rio de Janeiro, she was Mino’s biological daughter. The second was Jonie, who was twenty-two, was Sam’s biological son and hadn’t leave home yet, but had a stable job while he was majoring in International Relations; he said he was saving up to move to Brasília permanently. The middle child was Gal, who was eighteen and hadn’t left yet because of Lana. The fourth, who was fifteen, was Vichi (pronounced Viki), was quite shy, but a good friend to Lana as well. The youngest was little Ania, who was just five years old and loved to play with Lana every time she could.

When they saw him, Mino and Sam waved in a silent greeting, knowing they couldn’t warn Henrique about her presence. It was easy for them to be quiet, actually, once Sam was deaf. Lana had learned sign language with Gal and her younger siblings, which helped a lot When she snuck out. Ignoring Cam, she gestured at the two parents, warning them:

“Gal is fine, but she’s gonna be late.”

Sam seemed satisfied with that explanation and gestured back at her:

“Your granpa is in the office, careful with the noise of the bike.”

She thanked them with an adequate gesture and turned to Cam, who was watching their interaction with an amused and intrigued expression.

“You’ll have to wait until I get to my room before leaving,” Lana said in a professional tone and pointed at the window of her bedroom. “Can you see that window? The lights will go on, but you can only leave when I switch them off, okay?”

“You needed to sneak out of your house to go to a circus?” He asked as if he hadn’t heard a word she’d said, but Lana could reprehend him. She was too busy blushing, embarrassed for the fact that he’d understood too well what was happening.

Of course, she was embarrassed: she was eighteen and still needed to sneak out of her house to go to a damned circus. How could Lana justify that without sounding like a childish fool? The answer was clear: she couldn’t, so she didn’t, suppressing the feeling of humiliation and the will to cry in anger.

“Did you hear what I said?” She asked, clenching her teeth without looking at him.

Cam smiled at her, provocatively, but just nodded, leaving her feeling relieved with the change of subject. Trusting his response, Lana walked through the side corridor to the back entrance, entering the kitchen of beige tiles where Dinda, the chef, was at, waiting for her to come back home. Lana gave Dinda a thank you kiss and followed to the corridor, tiptoeing, struggling to keep silent as she passed in front of her grandfather’s office. Fortunately, she managed to pass without any problem and went to her room.

After she cleaned the make-up on her face and put on comfortable pajamas, Lana switched off the lights and paid attention to the almost imperceptible noise of Cam’s bike, which seemed to be taking away all of the freedom she tasted that night.

Chapter 2 - Coming Soon...

All Angels From Heaven Above - Chapter 2

Summary - find more chapters, read the synopsis, and trigger warnings here!

Buy the whole book through this link!

The address Damian Kolasi gave her was public and known enough so no one would find it strange seeing them together. On the other hand, it was also dangerously close to her coven’s headquarters, where witches gathered every time they could, which could mean that, if she decided to go, she’d have to explain herself to some curious wizards and witches. 

All those thoughts swirled in Adra’s mind while she closed the store and walked through the cobblestone street without a hurry, positioning her keys between her fingers. She wasn’t especially worried that someone could try to attack her — she had her powers to defend herself — but it was always good to be alert.

As if in mockery of Adra’s lack of fear, a thick fog filled Agraés, making her steps a mystery that should reveal itself in each corner while the old and imposing buildings loomed before her like ancient giants. She liked the city, despite the constant gloomy weather and the silent streets, full of danger waiting for her in every block.

Damian Kolasi’s deal, vastly different from the path she was taking because of the posteriors letter she had received, was intriguing and mysterious enough to make her suspicious. Adra didn’t like to be in that position, mainly because the demon knew her curiosity would be louder than her caution. He knew Adra would meet him even before she made her decision and that was utterly annoying.

Even so, that was a unique opportunity. Lethe Academy for Demonic Arts — a name she’d rather change — was quite literally the best school in all Nikaés, teaching demons from all over the world for dozens, if not hundreds, of generations. 

It didn’t even have a foundation date because no one knew how old was the school. It had five different libraries for each main subject of teaching, plus one for recreation, more than fifty classrooms, and a faculty with the best of the best teachers: the Academy was the most wonderful and intriguing place Adra had ever seen in her life.

And there she was, on the edge of getting in, if only she could dare to be the first witch to do so. Even if it hurt, even if it was going to be difficult as hell, even if she had to crawl her way onwards, that would be her only chance to get in.

Deciding she’d think about it, Adra sighed and hurried, in haste to get to the Coven. 

She heard footsteps behind her and tensed, unable to avoid them, even knowing that whoever it was would probably go away once they noticed she was a witch. And indeed it didn’t take long for that to happen, letting her relax again.

The city where Adra had grown up, Agraés, was in the south of Níkaes and it boiled down to a set of old-structured buildings, almost all of them beige or grayish, narrow streets and silent alleys between buildings, with a central river called Thanatos, which divided the city in two. Quite often, that was the description of tourists and uninterested visitors whose final destination was the capital, Mávros.

But to the residents and the Academy’s students who were brave enough, Agraés had its own magic inside its ancient structure and its alleys that would only wake up at dawn. At the main avenues, like the one where Kia and Adra’s apartment and store were located, the nights were monotonous and quiet, like no living soul lived there, but one just had to walk a couple of blocks to see the first evidence that Agraés wasn’t like any other city.

Adra turned at the familiar alley three blocks up from her apartment and smiled when she saw the awnings of the little underground pubs with their golden round lights spread through their metallic structures. 

As she crossed the alley, Adra saw young demons — probably local children, as the Academy didn’t allow its younger students to go out of its walls — walking through the place, amazed as a young human man did magic tricks that in reality had no magic at all, but were impressive enough so that they could cheat and delight others.

It took some minutes more and several other alleys for Adra to finally reach the Coven. Unlike other passages, the place where wizards and witches gathered didn’t look especially cozy or inviting. With a simple used wooden door, the only sign that there was some kind of life inside the cold gray building was the soft light pouring through the crescent moon-shaped hole in the door, which led to the underground saloon of peeled-off walls and hard capable of conserving a corpse — something Adra had already witnessed happening there.

The letter she’d received — sent through the Shadows — had been adamant that her presence at the Coven that night was required, something that intrigued Adra. Therefore, she entered the underground building, climbing down quickly the few steps that led to the door.

As soon as Adra entered, every other witch — and the few wizards that existed in the city — looked at her, none of them happy to see her. Adra just smirked, sarcastic: she wasn’t exactly happy to be summoned to attend the meeting tonight. But the Coven did what its matron witch determined and, as a witch, Adra owed obedience to her. 

Not that she respected Eupraxia Skourleti, the matron witch of her coven, very often. Adra just knew which fights to choose. Most of the time, at least.

Some witches smiled at Adra, not for affection, but purely for politeness. They never tried to make any conversation, however. 

To most, their coven was a refuge from a world that wasn’t made for them and didn’t make any effort to understand them. A world that was dominated by demons that believed themselves to be superior to any other species and whose oppressed — the humans — were too bitter and suspicious of any demonic thing to embrace them, considering that witches were the offspring of demons with humans. So, to the witches, their coven was the family most of them didn’t have and a refuge from the cruelty all of them endured.

But Adra was different and all of them knew that. Some few people didn’t resent what she had, but most hated her for having something they could only dream of: parents who were in love with each other. Most witches were born because of a meaningless seduction of human women by demons who would abandon them without hesitation with a bastard child in their arms.

Or worse.

Adra’s parents’ union wasn’t usual — in fact, she could easily affirm she was the only legitimate daughter of a demon and a human in all Nikaés.

That should include the Nephilim, children of angels and humans, and the ouralasi, children of angels and demons: they were too few, considering the country didn’t allow the entry of angels into its territory.

Like the witches, however, they had a lot of power: while the witches could control the Darkness, the Nephilim had a powerful affinity with at least one of the natural elements, and the ouralasi had ways to transform the matter if needed.

“Adra,” the known voice called her from one of the corners of the room. The shadows of that dreary place, however full, carried the call for her alone to hear. 

The voice had the shy tone that Adra knew very well and she turned to Thalassa Stathi at the other side of the room, sustaining the relieved look of her friend and ex-girlfriend. 

Well, Adra thought while walking towards her, maybe she was a friend. The things between them were complicated since Thassie had broken up with her months ago, but the relief was undeniable, and the gratitude both of them to see a familiar face in the crowd.

Adra looked at Thalassa’s black skin, which shone under the soft, golden light of the saloon, making her a queen of gold and shadows while she leaned in the gray stone wall.

“I’m surprised you came,” said Thassie before Adra could think of something to start a small talk. “You hate all of this.”

Adra tried not to sigh when she heard the slight accusation underlying the casualty of her tone. It wasn’t her fault that the Coven wasn’t exactly welcoming.

“Oh, you know, I have to make an appearance from time to time so that they remember I exist,” she said trying to sound excited despite the insistent looks from those who couldn’t tolerate her cutting her back without remorse. Thalassa snorted. “Actually, Eupraxia called me here today. Do you have any idea of what’s going to happen?”

“Well, she called all of us, but she doesn’t seem happy to see you,” said Thalassa, pointing her head in the direction of the Coven’s matron witch. “I guess she thought you’d disobey her again.”

Fearless, Adra turned to stare at Eupraxia Skourleti. The witch, who had curly voluminous hair and emerald green eyes, was one of the oldest witches of the coven and she simply hated Adra with all her might. The feeling was surely mutual. Their motives, however, were always unknown by all, including the two of them.

But behind that obvious rivalry, Eupraxia was a talented witch, powerful and full of ambition, something that made her dangerous and admirable in the same measure. If she had said that something big would happen, it was probably true.

When their eyes met, the witch showed her teeth, deeply displeased with Adra’s presence at the Coven that night, which was ironic, considering that it was Eupraxia who had sent the letter that called her, to begin with.

The dim golden lights of the saloon flickered when Adra smiled at her, the shadows fighting to fill the place like they did when Adra was mad at Damian Kolasi just a couple of hours ago. This time, however, the anger came from Eupraxia to Adra, who became immediately alert to any possible attack. 

But Eupraxia could control herself with as much ease as it escaped her and the witch went back to her always sober expression to murmur what was probably an excuse to the older witches that stood around her and walked towards Adra and Thassie, who straightened up in her place, locking her hands behind her back in a sign of respect for the matron witch.

Adra didn’t bother to do the same.

“Hello, Mrs. Skourleti,” greeted Thassie with a nervous half smile, receiving a polite and professorial nod in exchange.

“Miss Stathi,” said Eupraxia in a murmur before turning to Adra, the emerald green in her irises shining with hatred when the girl raised her chin. “Miss Anoixi, it’s a surprise to see you here.”

Adra smiled with the displeasure she found in the matron’s voice, perfectly delighted with that.

“Well, it’s your letter's fault, ma’am,” said Adra, just to see her squirm with anger. “It sounded important to be here tonight.”

“Yes, well...” Eupraxia looked like she sucked the sourest lemon, but didn’t have the chance to answer, because one of her apprentices, a girl with an innocent complexion and reverent eyes at her tutor, whispered in her ear. “I hope you enjoy the night, ladies. It’s about to begin.”

With that mysterious declaration, Eupraxia slipped to the other side of the saloon, leaving Thassie and Adra alone again. Adra frowned, resisting the curious desire to follow the woman and discover what the hell was happening under all of that secrecy.

“You shouldn’t treat her like this, Adra,” said Thalassa when they were sure they couldn’t be overheard by the matron, frowning in frustration when her blue-ice eyes went back to Adra. “It’ll come a day when you’ll need her and, with this kind of behavior, she’ll deny you.”

“She’s the adult here,” Adra retorted, looking at the place where Eupraxia had gone. “I’m eighteen, and she’s the one who should overlook my bad behavior.”

“And this was one of the reasons why I broke up with you.”

Thalassa took a deep breath, annoyed, and Adra felt a pang of guilt. She knew that she was a hard person to deal with, but that didn’t take away the merit of her point.

“It doesn’t matter,” Adra decided quickly, brushing off the subject by pressing Thalassa’s arm to catch the girl’s attention. “I need to tell you something.”

And just like that, with a preoccupied nod from Thassie, she told her about what had happened at the store that afternoon: Damian Kolasi, his proposal, and the meeting next week. At Adra’s every word, the girl looked even more preoccupied.

“You aren’t really thinking of going, are you?” she asked immediately when Adra finished and widened her eyes when she saw her hesitating. “Adra!”

“Shh,” Adra hissed, recoiling while the looks turned to them again. Both of them got silent for a couple of seconds. “And yes, I’m thinking of going. It’s a unique chance, Thassie. I could be the first witch to study at Lethe’s. The chances I could have...”

“Of getting yourself killed?” Thassie filled in sharply. “Adra, of all the crazy, dangerous things you did in your life, to think of believing that demon...”

But she never got to finish what she had to say, because powerful knocks sounded throughout the saloon, making all of them turn to the frail wooden door which looked ready to give in. Eupraxia appeared to shine while bouncing towards the door and opening it, allowing a big group of demons dressed in graffiti black to enter the saloon, as disciplined as an army.

The first reaction was a complete stupor of shock and incredulity, which spread through all of them like storm clouds. The Royal Guard of Agraés was there, in a weekly meeting of witches at the saloon of a decrepit building that was falling apart.

“My brothers and sisters,” Eupraxia’s voice sounded louder. Adra perceived she was using the darkness to spread her voice to all corners of the room. “Don’t be disturbed by our current company. The Royal Guard is here because we have something to do.”

Tempers flared — as was to be expected — while the witches looked around with suspicion. None of them trusted the Royal Guard at all. Authorities were full of self-importance and thought they could do anything and not be held accountable, especially when it came to witches.

The worst thing about, it was that they were right: they could easily escape from any harm done to any of them.

Adra frowned when the Guard’s lead detective entered at last, his black hair shining in the soft lighting and his lips pressed tight together in dissatisfaction. She looked away, however, when his eyes scanned the room, analyzing it with his violet irises.

Whatever it was the motive of the Royal Guard’s officers at the Coven at that moment, Adra knew that it was going to end badly: a lot of demons, with their sense of superiority, against the witches and wizard, who were feeling defensive, ready to strike like trapped animals and feeling like their safe harbor was being invaded. It was the perfect combination for chaos.

“Explain why you brought the Royal Guard, Eupraxia,” ordered Spiridon Louganis, one of the few wizards who were part of the coven for more years than Adra had spent on Earth, his guttural voice impossible to ignore. 

Eupraxia didn’t seem bothered by the veiled reprimand in Spiridon’s words and smiled at her brother.

“The Royal Guard of Agraés asked for our help in the mystery of Aglie Kalliergei’s death, the girl who died at Lethe Academy a couple of weeks ago.”

Eupraxia didn’t seem sorrowful for the death of a young woman while smiling to the group in front of her, all those wizards and witches surrounded by officers that would kill them all without thinking twice over it for the slightest sign — made up or real, it didn’t matter — of a threat in their part. None of them dared to breathe too heavily and Adra felt Thalassa squeezing her hand tightly enough to hurt.

“And what can we do?” asked Spiridon, hesitant, but directed his questions to the leading detective instead of Eupraxia. Adra and the others were even more careful and the climate around them was so tense that even that cold underground room was starting to feel stuffy.

“We want to know if the young woman was really murdered like our centers of investigation and criminalistics seem to indicate, or if it was an accident,” said the detective with an unaltered voice, looking the wizard in the eyes without any expression, be it disgust or respect. Damian Kolasi’s words echoed in Adra’s memories. A stab wound in the middle of her ribs. It couldn't be an accident, not if Damian was telling the truth. And, judging by the underlying tension on the detective’s shoulders, he was.

Go to Chapter 3

All Angels from Heaven Above on Amazon!

Hi, luvs!

So, for those of you who don't know, I posted here on Tumblr this past week a few chapters of my book, All Angels in Heaven Above, so that y'all could know it better.

It happens that I finished its translation and editing today and I managed to upload it on Amazon for you guys in its entirety, so here is the link to know more about it and read the preview on Tumblr...

And here is the link to Amazon (BR)

Just an addition: I know not everyone who reads in English is paying in American dollars, so if it's too expensive in your currency, let me know and I'll lower the prices for you!

All Angels from Heaven Above - Chapter 3

Summary - find more chapters, read the synopsis, and trigger warnings here!

Buy the whole book through this link!

“I offered help to one of Detective Carino’s superiors and found a memory ritual that could answer the Royal Guard’s question regarding that… unpleasant situation,” explained Eupraxia before Spiridon could talk again, ignoring the strong tension in the saloon. 

A memory ritual demanded a lot of a group of witches and it was done in extremely delicate steps. The first part consisted of letting the shadows take their magic to where the situation had happened, which wasn’t so difficult. The second part, a bit more complicated, depended on the witch’s ability to weave a thin, intricated web of their own power so that memory could be trapped in it. 

The third one, the most dangerous of them, occurred when the other witches joined in the ritual: all of them, together, would build a bridge that would pull the memory from inside the mind of the witch responsible for the first two steps and project it into an open space, like a shadow theater.

Adra looked around, to the officers with equally disdainful and fearful expressions, and then to the nervous and cautious witches and wizards. She didn’t like the idea of doing such a difficult ritual with so much tension around her at all but the Guard would hardly accept leaving without it being done or giving them privacy.

To those demons, they needed to see to believe it. And they wouldn’t accept anything less because demons didn’t trust witches and vice-versa. The simple fact that they had accepted Eupraxia’s offer to one of her high-ranking lovers was a surprise, considering how the Royal Guard treated witches: pitiful beggars in the best-case scenario, prostitutes whose bodies and dignity were free-for-all in the worst case.

“Very well then,” Spiridon agreed begrudgingly. Not even he could deny such an important favor to the Royal Guard. “But if we’re going to do it, I want our most powerful witch doing the first two steps.”

Of course, you do, though Adra, frustrated when every pair of eyes turned to her. She didn’t like that attention and didn’t want it but didn’t have a lot of choice in it. 

Regardless of her power, the memory of the ritual would only indicate the culprit if the witch who was doing the ritual knew them. The most they would see were shadow figures and that was making her worry. Adra hoped they didn’t have too much hope about that, despite Eupraxia’s presumption.

Sighed in resignation, she stepped forward, letting Thalassa’s hand slip from her own, and stared at Eupraxia, who seemed ready to kick her. Adra ignored the lead detective’s stare when she spoke:

“Let’s go on then if no one is opposed.”

Despite Thalassa’s last warning, the woman didn’t interfere in the clash, probably too shocked by Eupraxia’s lack of prudence. That was big but it surely wasn’t good, especially considering that the chances of it going wrong were too high.

The witches seemed calmer now that Adra was chosen to do that task — she was the one in danger after all — and accepted her request, positioning herself. Spiridon nodded towards Adra when passing by her. His dark eyes didn’t apologize but Adra didn’t want apologies, so she only nodded back, walking towards the north side of the circle the other had opened in the middle of the room.

Eupraxia took to herself the task of moving the officers to a place where they could see what was happening but couldn’t interfere with the shadows. When everyone got silent, Adra closed her eyes, focusing on the Darkness, on the points of the room filled with it.

For witches, the Darkness was its own language that sang to them like old friends, as mermaids would sing to unsuspecting sailors. It could be good and bad and, especially, it could be controlled. Adra knew each song and each pun, therefore she let It flow around her, like the breath of a night breeze, cold and humid, making her hair flutter and trying to mix up with her soul.

It wasn’t so difficult to go through the city she was born into the Academy, even in the shadows, jumping from shadow to shadow quickly. And, when she entered the walls she had never entered, Adra followed to where the shadows came together more tightly, attracted by evil and Death.

She followed that still energy and, when she reached the place where Aglaie Kalliergei had died — even if she didn’t know which room was it because everything around her was just an echo of her power —, Adra focused on reviewing the dark memories, just like one would leaf through a book to see what was it about.

It wasn’t hard for her web to catch the memory she needed like a fly in a spiderweb. As soon as she got it, all the other witches felt the threads that connected them in that ritual being bound tighter, thus completing the ritual.

It was hard, however, to try not to be offended when they began to pull out the memory from her head: the feeling of being invaded was like strong dizziness and, for a moment, Adra couldn’t tell where she was or what she could see as she opened her eyes. With a deep breath, her sight adjusted to the scene that played in front of her.

The first figure appeared and Adra guessed it was the victim, even when all she could see was a black shadow like ink and water mixing up in the form of a manikin, with no sign of their own identity.

As a consequence of the successful ritual, Adra felt more than saw the restlessness of everyone in the saloon while her powers projected that image. 

If Aglaie’s death had really been a murder, the Royal Guard would have had serious problems to deal with, especially with King Stavros, since the prince had been studying at the Academy for a few years now. A piece of news like that wouldn’t be kept from the media for much longer, especially when there were other people involved in that ritual, which could chase away the usual clients of Agraés and would bring serious economic problems to the city.

Then, a second figure appeared and Adra frowned. Different from the first one, the second silhouette was diffuse, almost transparent, and she could see Thalassa’s blurred face through it.

It worried her.

Darkness called Darkness, and every kind of It — shadows made by the lights, inner evil, bad and/or too intense feelings — answered to the witches in the same way. It didn’t make sense the second figure was so different from the first one.

Confused, Adra followed the way through her own powers, trying to find something wrong in the web in which she captured the memory but there wasn’t anything. The silhouette just seemed to not have an inner darkness, which was quite literally impossible: every single one of them — demons, witches, and humans — had something bad that forced them to respond to a witch’s power, and that’s why they were so feared.

The two figures looked like they were talking but the Darkness didn’t speak the language of people and couldn’t hold on to words, that had their own power, therefore all they could hear was the cold silence of a possible fight. Then, like a snake, the blurred figure attacked the first one and a searing light blinded Adra for a second, cutting her powers off like one would cut the strings of a puppet, sending a sudden ray of pain through her throat and her chest. 

By the shocked gasps that Adra could hear through her own surprise, she could understand she wasn’t the only one who had felt it.

When all seemed back to normal and the room adjusted back to how it always was — the shadows slipping back to their rightful places — the witches looked at each other, all surprised and fearing. The ritual wasn’t supposed to end up like this, the memory should have continued.

But they still had an answer. 

“Murder,” Spiridon announced in a low tone of voice while the rest of the witches whispered among themselves, unease with what had just happened. 

Adra observed with caution when the officers walked as far away from the witches as they could while they moved but looking convinced enough to not cause trouble — or maybe they were a little more preoccupied with getting the hell out of there. She turned to Eupraxia, whose green eyes shone with presumption while facing the lead detective.

“As I said it would be,” she said.

Adra had the desire to recoil back at the danger those words could mean. By what she knew about the woman, Eupraxia was ambitious but rarely a fool. That was one of the few moments when the matron was purely stupid.

Detective Carino’s jawline was tense when he stared at Adra, ignoring Eupraxia and Spiridon’s verdict. It was just when she nodded that he turned to the woman and said:

“I’m going to send this information to my superiors, madam Skourleti, and I thank you for the help, just like I would for the discretion,” he said formally, his voice tight and rigid, his eyes sharp with an authority that seemed to come to him naturally, not from empty threats.

Eupraxia looked pleased with that answer and nodded, quickly moving away to join the fool group of women who admired her when the rest of the coven stared at her with caution. Spiridon, taking the reins of the situation, announced to the rest of the room, his voice echoing through the shadows this time:

“Well, this night was surprising to us all and I’m sure we’re all tired. Therefore, I think going home and having a good night's sleep.”

The witches grumbled their agreement, all ready to get rid of the officers, even when none of them were really planning to go home.

“Adra,” the lead detective’s voice caught her attention and Adra looked at the soft violet eyes they both shared. “We should go together.”

“Fine, Dad,” she agreed with a sigh, knowing that Carino would want to talk about what had happened that night in one way or another, so it would be better to be done with it.

Ignoring the equally disgusted looks from witches and officers, Adra took the overcoat her father gave her and put it on, sighing happily when she felt the warm flannel from the lining under the black fabric, pleased to verify that the garment was from her own wardrobe and it went all the way down the end of her equally black dress, hugging her waist like a bodice.

“Thank you for doing this,” she said, smiling at Carino, who returned the smile, still tense but caring.

“I thought you’d be here, with all this happening,” was his answer.

He sighed, looking tired, and Adra just pressed her lips together, without voicing her preoccupation. They would have time to talk while walking home.

In silence, both climbed up the stairs, emerging to the cold night air and the mist, the golden lights of the poles were the only thing they could see in the distance. Other officers from the Guard were there too, no doubt waiting to get company for the night and Adra tried not to frown at them when their eyes locked.

All of them knew she was the boss’ daughter, the only untouchable witch in that city. And not because Carino protected her but because she was the only one who had the chance to attack them back and not face the consequences of it. It was enough that they feared her even more than they feared other witches.

“Adra!” Thassie’s voice came to her ears, making her turn in time to see her friend climbing up the Coven’s stairs, her expression preoccupied but Thalassa’s arm was pulled by one of the officers, a heart-shaped man that was probably useless. 

Adra saw the panic growing in Thalassa’s eyes from afar and made her way back to her without thinking twice, in time to hear the officer saying:

“You’re a pretty piece, huh?” he sniveled, tightening his grip on her arm when Thalassa tried to escape. “Maybe you could show me what you can do, witch.”

Thassie tried to escape once again, looking scared but he just raised his hand to grip her hair. Adra caught his wrist before he could, however, making the unknown officer let go of Thalassa to face her.

“It’ll be better for your health if you don’t touch her,” Adra just said, her voice whispering the danger in the Darkness but it was the dagger in her hand, hidden from the other Guard officers, that posed the biggest threat.

The man’s eyes widened with fear when he felt the blade against his stomach.

“You little whore...”

“Careful, Gregório,” Carino said, appearing behind Adra, his voice soft, like his daughter’s, just a ruse to hide the promise of violence underneath his words. “My daughter is a bigger threat than I need to be. And I’m still your boss. Go home.”

The man looked from Adra to Carino, doubtless recognizing the semblance between them, and made his way back, whining his protests as the filthy pig he was. Letting him go, Adra turned to Thalassa, using the shield of her father’s broad shoulders to hide her dagger back in its place.

“Are you okay?” she asked and Thalassa just nodded, embracing herself. Adra’s voice got softer than she was used to when she spoke the next words: “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Thalassa said, staring at Carino, who sighed and walked away just enough so that they could talk without being heard. When she got comfortable, Thassie grabbed Adra’s hand and said, her blue eyes shining brightly. “Promise me you’re not going to hear that demon, Adra.”

She hesitated, caught by surprise by the gravity in Thalassa’s expression, and then pressed her lips together in a tight line, incapable of promising something she wasn’t able to uphold. When Thalassa saw that, her blue eyes shone with her frustration and she let go abruptly of her hand.

“Fine, and then,” she said, already climbing down the stairs, back to the Coven, no doubt to alert the other witches to use the alternative exit that night.

Adra watched her walking away, wanting to ask her friend to come back and promise her whatever she wanted but she knew she couldn’t. That was her only chance of getting into the Academy, of being the first witch to ever do such a thing. And Adra knew the importance of being the first. But she also couldn’t promise something to Thalassa because at the back of her mind, around a thin web, shone a part of the memory that wasn’t seen. 

And in it, Damian Kolasi entered the room where Aglaie Kalliergei had died just a couple of minutes after the killer.

Chapter 4 - Coming soon...

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To Decadent Poets - Chapter 5

Summary - find more chapters, read the synopsis, and trigger warnings here!

Once upon a time, there was a girl no one called for. No one uttered her name. (She didn’t have one) - Isabela Penov, The Impossible Lullaby.

Annie Wood was filled with expectation to meet the boys who’d be her company in Taigh Hill during the years of war but none of them seemed comfortable enough to start a conversation. Despite the terrible situation, she couldn’t say she hadn’t been expecting anxiously for the arrival of her uncle’s godson and the children of his two closest employees.

She was tired of walking around Taigh Hill alone like a too-colorful ghost haunting the sunny mansion, considering her sister, Ellen, seemed to be too busy with the clothes and jewelry she could lend from her mother to go to the city balls — and with her fiancée, of course.

Even Annie’s mother was more worried about the balls than her own youngest daughter, so Annie spent her days passing from one adult to the other. Sometimes she’d stay with her uncle Elijah in his office or the library but it wasn’t healthy for a teenager to be always inside the house, so it wasn’t rare that he ended up making her get out. Other times her father could spare some time with her but those were rare and, therefore, very loved also.

She didn’t think there was a human being she liked more than her dad.

Jamie Turner, however, was a close second. When he wasn’t working as a butler in Taigh Hill, he usually distracted Annie with his magic tricks and taught her to play poker (under the condition that she’d never bet, of course). But his obligations to the huge mansion usually didn’t allow Jamie to elongate those moments.

So, anyone could imagine how much Annie was excited to have some company her age to shake things up a bit. However, the boys didn’t seem at all comfortable and two of them didn’t even seem to be trustworthy.

She liked Noah and his shy, and calm manners. It didn’t take long for him to grab a book from the suitcase he’d brought, burying his face in it through the rest of the journey. Judging by the cover, Annie could see it was a book of poems and she got curious, just like the other two boys, Oliver and Christian.

She noticed when Evans poked Krause, pointing at Noah reading, and they exchanged a look like they were laughing at the fact the boy was reading. Annie frowned almost immediately, guessing the two were mocking the poor third boy.

Annie hated that kind of boy, who mocked everyone else because they thought so highly of themselves. But at least she already knew who she was gonna befriend: uncle’s godson wasn’t as interesting as she thought he’d be.

“Miss Wood, please!” Marjorie, her housekeeper, took Annie from her stream of thoughts and she soon realized why: while she was thinking, her body had been slowly sliding until she was seated at the edge of her seat, not even a bit worried about her posture.

Annie didn’t care that much but Marjorie, although loving, had always been very rigid regarding “christian” morals. Which basically meant Annie simply needed to, in the older woman’s mind, be a virginal lady at fourteen (almost fifteen) years old.

Which was obviously just a delusion. Teenagers were stupid and they’d always be stupid. This was the premise of being one, after all: making a lot of idiotic mistakes and regret bitterly, having their hearts broken by someone who wasn’t even worth it, fighting with their families, slamming their bedroom doors when they were made… things like that.

It was simply Annie’s purpose to be anything by a well-behaved lady.

But, of course, to her mother, whatever Annie firmly believed (or didn’t believe in) at her young age wasn’t important. So, she was tossed aside to etiquette lessons and to catechism with Marjorie during at least one-third of her week. Which was very, very boring.

Lest you misunderstood her, she knew it was important to learn about Jesus’ story and how he cared for the poor and vulnerable but there was just something in the way Marjorie spoke about it Annie couldn’t bear. She meant, how did the same man who preached about loving thy neighbor could dictate she couldn’t wear pants and more, punish her for it?

Uncle Elijah used to say Marjory had too much religion and too little faith but Annie wasn’t sure about that either. She’d seen the housekeeper getting emotional while she prayed, she’d seen her feeling God. Annie thought Marjorie let religion dictate her faith and that was dangerous: the Woman trusted more on others than herself — that was the problem.

At least, that was what Annie thought.

“We’re not far now,” said Marjorie suddenly, looking at the lawn that surrounded Taigh Hill. Annie followed the woman’s eyes when she grimaced and smiled as she saw Jack with his giant case on his back entering the property.

She couldn’t wait to get to know him but she needed to distract Marjorie first, since she thought the wanderer wasn’t a good influence on her. He mom as well didn’t think it was right of Annie to talk to someone from a lower social class. Elliott, on the other hand, was always making conversation with the man and Annie simply adored Jack.

Fortunately, Marjorie was too busy with the boy’s arrival and guiding them through the mansion, so Annie could manage to escape an run around. The first thing she did was run to Jack, who was ringing a little bell.

“Jack, I’m so glad you came!” She greeted him joyfully, watching as the man with a gray, thick beard, smiled at her, good-humored as always. “Do you have another quatrain for me?”

“Oh, Wood girl,” he greeted her with the same enthusiasm as she did even though he was almost thirty years older, his discreetly toothless smile illuminating his face through the thick beard. “Of course, I always have a quatrain for such a smart girl like yourself!”

“Declaim it, please!” She asked as he took off the bag from his shoulders, putting it on the ground. He opened the bag to reveal at least a dozen leather books, all of them about different matters, and the letters of their titles shining in gold on the covers.

She got to her knees to look at the volumes, listening intently as the vendor’s voice got deeper as he declaimed the small, funny little quatrain:

I’ll put your portrait On the pig stall So when me pigs need aid I’ll remember your love conquers all.

Annie laughed at the little rhyme, which Jack declaimed with an improvised and funny performance, throwing his arms around as he acted what he was declaiming.

“This was the worst love quatrain I’ve ever heard, Jack,” she said as her laughter died, and the old man, who was already laughing with her, laughed even more. He had a loud laughter, as happy as an adult could have.

Annie smiled at the books in the bag but soon the old salesman squeezed the tip of her nose between two curved fingers, daring her:

“I bet you can’t come up with one better right here and now, Wood girl.”

Annie smiled and looked around, watching the gardens of Taigh Hill’s property attentively, the quatrain rolling off of her tongue with scary ease:

Don’t give me yellow flowers For desperation is yet to come Give me little pink flowers So, I may yet return home

Jack, who always wore a black hat, took it off from his balding head and saluted her quatrain, clapping like a proud grandfather. It warmed Annie’s heart immediately and she didn’t hesitate to get up and thank her small, loved audience.

It was at that moment she saw Noah walking through the lawn. Annie didn’t know exactly what Marjorie had said or where she went with the boys but it seemed it didn’t take much time after all. Noah had a book in his hand and he was walking towards one of the huge willow trees next to the maze’s bush wall.

According to the map Annie had seen at the library, the maze on Taigh Hill’s property was gigantic and it even had a small stone fort in the Middle — a reminder of its feudal times, forgotten now — but she never managed to find it for real. On the other side of the mansion, there was a long set of lawn and a lake, in which Annie loved to swim when it was warm enough, which didn’t occur often.

Impulsively, Annie called, raising her voice:

“Kurtz!” The boy looked around, seemingly confused for being called by anyone.

When his eyes found Jack, who watched curiously, and Annie, the girl gestured for him to get closer.

Hesitant, Noah went to them, his skinny body seemed to shake in the breeze, which had gotten the tip of Annie’s nose cold and the joints of her fingers hurt. He was really pale, enough for the wind to make his cheeks blush, and he was tall. Annie reached just his chest, as she realized when he got close enough.

Noah also had bright brown eyes like those Annie had seen when she did charity work with underprivileged kids. It didn’t make sense but that wasn’t a matter to ask about in a casual conversation. He didn’t say anything as he got close, maybe too shy to strike up a conversation, so Annie turned back to Jack, smiling.

“Jack, this is Noah Kurtz, he’ll live with us for a while.”

“Oh, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Master Noah,” said Jack, taking off his hat once more as he smiled in a friendly manner. “Why don’t you pick a book from my magic bag, huh?”

“I’m grateful, but...” the boy began to say, biting his lower lip hard. Je kept one hand in the pocket of his old tweed jacket while holding the same book from the carriage with the other. In general, Noah seemed hesitant, as if afraid of being himself. Annie could almost see his stiffened back through the fabric of his jacket. “I don’t have money to buy any of them.”

“Well, good thing my books are not for sale, then, Master Noah,” said the salesman as he’d once said to Annie the first time they’d met in the nearest city. “I’m a dream-sower, an enemy of the ignorance that plagues our lands. All of my books are a gift, not a product.”

“He lives off of selling antiques,” Annie kindly explained to Noah, smiling when she noticed the boy’s brown eyes shining in excitement. “You can choose one.”

“Just one per month,” Jack warned as he often did, and then he turned to Annie. “Oh, Wood girl here is quick as a little mouse at her reading. No doubt she already finished the one she got last week.”

Innocently, Annie smiled, knowing Jack’s accusation was right on track. The book (which had been great, by the way) was already tucked away in the small library she was slowly building for herself.

As she saw the timid smile on Noah’s face, however, all Annie could think of was that she might actually gain a friend from all of this.

Go to Chapter 6

Know more books from the Author

To Decadent Poets - Chapter 6

Summary - find more chapters, read the synopsis, and trigger warnings here!

The man, the beast and the insect, at its shadow Live, away from hunger and fatigue: In its branches take shelter the ditties And the loves of the mockingbird. — Olavo Bilac, Old Trees

Although he was used to a comfortable life, Chris wasn’t prepared for Taigh Hill: that wasn’t any mansion, it was a manor. Just the entry hall could encapsulate his entire house with space to spare, and he didn’t even talk about the decoration.

If anyone told Chris a king had lived there, he wouldn’t hesitate to believe it. The stairs to the second and third floors, which began across the hall, formed the shape of a tree, splitting into branches to reach each side of the two floors up. In the middle of the first store, a huge tapestry that had a story sewn into it was laid on the wall above a fireplace.

The housekeeper, however, didn’t allow any of them to take in their initial surprise, walking towards the stairs as if the place was nothing at all. For her, who took care of the place every day and all day long, it might not be, but fuck, Chris thought while the three of them jogged side by side to keep up with the rigid woman while still trying to take in everything, wishing they had a thousand eyes just so they could see it all.

There was a huge chandelier hanging from the high ceiling of the entry hall and the sounds spread, sounded, echoed throughout the place, especially because Miss Turner couldn’t stop talking, the echoes heightening the annoying tone of her voice. Chris was an inch away from telling her off when the echoes faded away and they entered a closeted corridor.

“You mustn’t make much noise because Mister Elliott’s wife has regular migraines and, if you do make noise, you’ll go to bed without dinner,” said Miss Turner severely without turning, as if she was sure she’d be heard, it didn’t matter by who. Chris considered some old people really sounded like that, shrugging to his thoughts while exchanging an exasperated look with Oliver. The boy smirked a bit, sarcastic, just like Chris had seen a couple of times during their trip together. “Oh, and I was warned that Mister Elliott’s eldest, Miss Ellen, doesn’t want you going inside her saloon. I ask that you respect it.”

“She has a saloon?” Chris asked the only one of the three there who seemed akin to breaking a couple of rules. Of course, he was the only one who could question them: he was somewhat akin to family, after all.

“Yes, she has, Mister Evans,” said the housekeeper, turning a bit, her voice polite. “It was a request from Miss Ellen herself to her father and uncle she matured.”

Although Chris thought the idea of giving a saloon to a nineteen-year-old girl was ridiculous, he didn’t say anything, shrinking back to the horizontal line, which was formed by him, Oliver, and Noah Kurtz, not realizing his shoulder brushing the second’s for a moment.

When Noah seemed to shrink, however, Chris looked at him. The boy, however, didn’t look back, making it clear as day he had no interest in speaking with Chris. The boy, for once, just shrugged internally and stopped so as not to bum pinto Miss Turner. She, on the other hand, had stopped in front of the fourth door to the right in the corridor.

“Your room is here. Mister Elijah wanted to put you in separate rooms but Mister Elliott thought it’d be best if you were sleeping in the same room so you could socialize and not being stuck in your own worlds.”

The woman obviously respected the two men she was speaking about and that made Chris feel a little less apprehensive about the godfather he never met and his family. If their employees liked them, that was enough to say they were likable enough. The housekeeper let them pass by her and scan the room while she kept speaking:

“Dinner will be ready at six pm and I’ll come get you when the time has come for you to go downstair today. For now, I’d suggest you use your time correctly and unpack or go explore the garden before it’s dark. And don’t forget to be quiet around the library!”

“Why do we have to...” but Chris didn’t have the chance to make his question, once the housekeeper closed the door behind her as she left before he could speak. The red-haired boy frowned, then whistled. “Is it me, or she doesn’t seem to like us very much?”

He was left to laugh alone and, when he turned to know the reason why at least Oliver didn’t comment, he found the boy turned to the bed he’d chosen, the one nearest the window. Meanwhile, Noah put his bag on the bed nearest to the door, leaving Chris with the bed by the wall. Even weirded out by the silence, Chris resigned himself to unpacking just like Miss Turner had suggested.

The beds in the room he’d share with the Other two boys could accommodate him and the others, plus at least more nine people put side by side. Chris didn’t doubt they could sleep the three of them in the same one with space to spare. It seemed the bed of a king, just like everything about that manor seemed to reek of royalty. There were even curtains on the beds: they were golden, just like the sheets and the blankets.

Chris wanted to say something to break the ice he felt around the two boys behind him but, before he could think of something, Noah left the room leaving his suitcase on the bed without unpacking it or saying anything.

“Kinda rude,” Chris commented quietly, raising an eyebrow at Oliver, who was still in the same position, silent as a crypt. Weirded out by this behavior, Chris went to his friend, brushing his shoulder gently with his own. “Hey, is there a problem? You can talk to me if you want.”

“It’s nothing, it’s just…” Oliver said, no doubt trying to lie because it was obvious there was something wrong. The boy sighed mourningfully, and said: “I miss my dad.”

There was more about it Oliver wasn’t telling him but Chris didn’t pressure him for more information. He couldn’t forget that, as much as it didn’t seem like it, he had met the other boy just some hours ago and there were limits Chris didn’t really know whether he could cross or not.

Therefore, all he did was sigh while sitting in his bed and smiled at his joined hands and separated knees.

“I also miss my mom.” Chris scrunched his nose at the reminder of Maxwell but didn’t say anything out loud. Instead, Chris talked about Jane and how amazing she was. Oliver looked over at him for the moment Chris began to describe his mother, his blank eyes making him look more German than ever but the boy still took a seat by his side, listening silently: “My mom loves to paint. She’s great and has always dreamed of being a painter but she gave up this dream when she married my dad, considering my grandpa wanted her to stay home to take care of me. My dad… I’ve never seen him agreeing with my grandpa but he also doesn’t disagree with him. My mom has the prettiest, softest hair I’ve ever seen and she smells like rosemary.”

Chris closed his eyes to imagine Jeane by his side, smiling at him the way just a mother could do. Looking at him the same way she smiled when Chris was younger and his biggest worry was whether or not she had made ginger biscuits.

Oliver stayed quiet for a long time after that, allowing Chris to recover from the onslaught of feelings after he talked about Jeane. He gulped, swallowing down the tears.

“My mother’s name was Liora,” the blond boy said in a murmur, so low it seemed like a whisper, his eyes staring at something Chris couldn’t see. Then, hesitating, as if he feared Chris was going to start yelling at him or something, Oliver added: “She was taken by the Führer before we left Germany.”

Chris knew “Führer” was a word they used to refer to Hitler. So the magnitude of it all hit him like a punch, comprehension making his heart beat painfully, cutting his airways. He couldn’t help but look at Oliver with pity, although he knew that was certainly not the desired reaction. It was just that Chris couldn’t help it: it was like Oliver’s pain had spread to him, because, after all, wasn’t it his own as well in a certain way?

All of those crimes committed against the Jews, the black people, Romanis, different peoples… wasn’t it his pain as well? They were humans. They were people, they could’ve been people he passed by on his way to school, they could be his professor, his friend’s parents, and relatives, they could’ve been his relatives. It could’ve been him.

Chris saw the pain as his duty. He had to feel the pain for all of the families destroyed by Hitler and by the war that was happening. He had to feel pain because it was the least, he could do if it really mattered for him.

But Chris didn’t say any of that. He didn’t ramble about how concentration camps or did a monologue stating the obvious — all human beings should be respected. No, Oliver knew all of that, he didn’t need anyone to talk his ear off about it. He needed to be heard, or his privacy respected, whichever he preferred.

“Do you want to talk about her?” Chris asked then, as delicately as he could even though he could still feel his disgust for Hitler leaving his tongue heavy and sticky, making it hard to swallow.

In his nape, there was a shiver being born. Oliver kept silent for longer this time; his lips half-open in almost words.

“No,” he finally exhaled, getting more comfortable in Chris’ bed, his back straight. “I was just worried because it’s my first time away from my dad since they took her and I don’t want him to… spiral because of it again.”

The worry in Oliver’s tone was palpable and, for a moment, Chris felt a bit envious about his relationship with his dad. He wanted Max to care enough about him and Jeane to actually mourn if something happened to them. He wanted his father to care.

Admitting that even to himself was like a Punch to his stomach. Chris knew trying not to care would be useless someday but until then, making these mistakes wouldn’t be allowed. He shouldn’t have to beg to have his Father in his life, he shouldn’t have to beg for anyone’s love. Love was something to be freely given, selflessly and happily given. Love was something to be offered, not something to be stolen.

After all, that was the reason why Chris thought it was ridiculous when one of his friends said he’d stolen a girl’s heart. It was ridiculous because they really thought that trying and trying and trying the same way everytime would give them a different outcome. If a girl wasn’t interested in giving him a chance, Chris just moved on to the next girl to interest him: it wasn’t so hard to hear a no after you got used to it.

Anyhow, he was digressing, Chris realized when Oliver shook his hand in front of his face, catching his attention back.

“Did I daydream for a bit?” Chris asked, embarrassed, and Oliver chuckled.

“For quite some time, actually,” he just said.

“I’m sorry”, said Chris with a sigh, turning in the bed to look straight at his friend. “I didn’t know what to say and ended up thinking about my own dad.”

“It’s okay, I can’t expect people to know what to say to something like that.” Oliver smiled, clearly embarrassed and a bit worried. “What did you think of Miss Turner?”

“I think she looks like a Woman from the last century, but who knows? She could surprise us.” Chris answered and shrugged as he laid on the bed, supporting his head with his fingers crossed under it, looking at the ceiling.

“She seems a bit nicer than those women.” Oliver also shrugged but didn’t lay down: he preferred to stay seated on the soft mattress. “What about the other boy... Noah?”

“He’s... quiet.” Chris shrugged again. “I still don’t know what to think of him, actually. I didn’t have the time to get to know him.”

Oliver made no comments, nor did he disagree about anything in regards to Noah. The two boys stayed quiet for a while, the silence of people that had nothing to talk about. So, to break the ice, or maybe to get some alone time, Oliver got up and said:

“I should write to my dad and tell him we arrived and it all went well. I promised him I would.

“Hm, I need to write to my mom as well, although I didn’t promise anything,” Chris said, closing his eyes as the Journey began to take a toll on him. He could feel his body getting heavier and his mind slower. — I’ll just sleep for a bit. Wake me up in an hour, please.

He didn’t even hear Oliver’s agreement before he was out.

Chapter 7 - Coming Soon...

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Help me decide or I'll go mad

My current dilemma as a writer is whether I write...

A. A gay romance between Romeo and Mercutio with Juliet as Romeo's beard and best friend, the fight of both houses their most terrible enemy and a lot of angst because of compulsory heterosexuality

OR

B. A poly romance between Romeo, Mercutio, and Juliet with enemies to lovers Romeo and Juliet, a very-tired-of-the-fight-let's-make-them-kiss Mercutio, secret relationships, a side romance between Rosalina and Paris, and a mystery in fair Verona that Mercutio is obsessing over.

I just love my ocs relationship

I mean, I'm always down for enemies to lovers but whatever profound hatred and honest disdain they have for each other's very being that will eventually turn to the sweetest, most kind type of love Amalie and Khaos have going on?

That shit is making me go FERAL

I've been in the Peaky Blinders fandom since I started watching it in April and since then I have been working really hard working on this story which I am thinking of publishing sometime this month because I have a majority of it finished!! FINALLY!

That being said, thank you all for being so patient with me while I get this done. But I know my fellow writers will agree that there are certain challenges and pressures which come up that we must endure, but nonetheless, we never give up, because in the end, when you're sitting there with our fully, or even partially-published work, all those days, hours, weeks, and months writing, deleting, doubting, planning, reconstructing will be worth it!

Keep writing, my friends!

MOOD!!

tagging those who might relate to this: @zablife @runnning-outof-time @eternalstrigoii

me, staring at the same blank document for 5+ hours: writing is my passion✨🔥🗣️🔥✨🔥🗣️

If I am not, my characters must be. Someone must always be.

"Why is ur writing so sad all the time-??" I am constantly in anguish

Going to a banquet tonight and I feel a bit bougie about it lol

Things like this, especially thinking about the atmosphere and overall vibe, makes me want to write.

I really need to get on that more. I would like to get a whole notebook and just dedicate that to things like that. That makes me feel like writing. One day lol.

So, the place I work at changed owners, hence my sudden rise in positions.

But in the beginning, the new owner had me fill out an eleven page packet, front to back, on getting to know me.

I looked at my coworkers and confidently said, “I’m gonna write about Bigfoot.”

And I was dead ass serious.

I wrote about Bigfoot, Ufology, paranormal investigating, conspiracy theories as well as other pseudosciences and my passion for writing. I also wrote about my enjoyment to become an actor, director, and create other projects. I wrote all of this partly because it’s all true and I hold dear but also because I half assed it. Thinking they would think it was ridiculous.

They approached me days later after I filled that thing front to back and told me how much they appreciated my authenticity.

So, long story short and the message of this story is to always write about Bigfoot.✨

I’m a mix of 4 and 5

Writer 1: Needs to know everything about the story before you can begin

Writer 2: Wings everything. Hardly knows anything about the story. Doesn’t know what’s supposed to happen next

Writer 3: Makes detailed outlines but never follows them

Writer 4: Is a mix of Writer 1 and 2

Writer 5: The sleep doesn’t exist writer

So which one are you?