Page 121 of Shroom for Improvement

I had two wolves inside me. Except, well, they were fae, not wolves. And I had betrayed both of them.

I fucked up.

Big time.

I shouldn’t have lied.

I could have explained to Claude from the very beginning what the rhizome ritual involved. But I panicked.

I’d thought if I told him outright, he’d fuck off until the solstice and only come back for the ritual. Then he’d fuck off again.

I was afraid he was his father.

So, I claimed ancient mushroom law prevented me from telling him, just like it prevented everyone else. Those rules didn’t apply to me, though. I wasn’t a living being with organs or veins or even a fucking mouth.

I led the heir to believe the lightning magic would work, because I knew it would keep him here, occupied, with me,practicing a form of glamour he wouldn’t need. I’d been stupid and selfish and now I was paying the price.

I had planned all along to tell him the truth when the time got closer, yet before my energy had entirely depleted. But I didn’t.

Because I liked having him around, and not only because he was the only person who could hear me.

But because I likedhim.

He was patient, though he pretended not to be. He didn’t mind my constant yapping or questions. His humour was dry and dirty, like my own. With Claude I felt like I had finally found a friend. Someone who appreciated my company for once and didn’t see the ritual as a chore—a six-monthly burden.

He had a happy, bright soul, and I enjoyed basking in it.

It was brighter still when the mycologist was around, so instead of telling him what the ritual really involved, I wasted all my energy on designing places for them to be physically intimate together.

Because the afterglow from both of their souls after they’d been together was the headiest high I’d ever been exposed to. I’d become addicted to both of their happiness.

But I hadn’t considered the consequences enough. Creating all that glamour had sapped my reserves. More so than was usual for this time of year.

I always felt drained just before the ritual, when the vestiges of the previous injection of magic were waning. This time, I’d messed it up completely. I’d wasted the last of my energy, and now I didn’t have enough of it left to tell Claude the truth.

We were all fucked because I was a selfish, reckless, asshole house.

I could only hope Sonny would figure it out before the solstice.

There were only a few days remaining.

The Further Adventures of a Grouchy Fae

Sonny

“I haven’t heard Jenny in almost two days now,” Claude said to me during breakfast.

It was the seventeenth of June. Only a few days left until the solstice ritual needed performing and even fewer until I had to leave for my meeting with Dr Sorrel.

My heart was aching. I didn’t want to go. I wanted to stay here forever with Claude. Wake up with him every morning. Get gently fucked into the mattress as he stroked my hair and told me how pretty my asshole was as he came apart above me. Head down for breakfast, watch him eat three portions of eggs royale while I stuffed my face with vegetarian bacon and glazed doughnuts. Mess about all day in the library, and the lab, and the allotment. Have the most amazing meals cooked for me eachevening by two wonderful sentry fae. And then at night, get tied up, eaten out, and fucked furiously before falling asleep in Claude’s arms.

I didn’t want to leave, but I didn’t have a choice. Right?

“Hmm?” I poked at my pancakes. My breakfast was lighter on fresh fruit than previous breakfasts, which was strange, because my body was craving fruit—watermelon and pineapple in particular—and Oggy and Willow hadn’t yet failed to sate my cravings.

Claude cleared his throat. “I said, Jenny’s been silent. I haven’t heard the house say anything since the night before last.”

“Oh, that is odd,” I said.

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