Page 85 of Heart of Dawn
“By the stars…”
“I know. I know.”
“What is it about watery creatures?”
“It’s said the power comes from a lost underwater realm or city destroyed by some ignorant fuckers. Those who didn’t like the idea of, well, creatures like me spying on the bigger picture. At least, that’s what I’ve come to understand. The details are hazy, coming in the odd dream. No one really knows.”
Something was in the water, for sure. And I wondered if that human who’d told Miko about the oracle had a splash of watery magic inside him. Because he had been magically touched, apparently.
Wow. This was more of the universe’s string pulling to help our journey, and maybe even the stars themselves had a hand in this.
I sent my thanks, keeping myself from spinning into overthinking.
Stay grateful.
Stay strong.
Clearing the last of the horde, Tilda zipped across the muddy green space of Finsbury Park, the wheels practically gliding across it.
“Where are we going?” she asked. “Haven’t see any details on that, I’m afraid.”
Should I tell her?
The answer was a resounding yes.
“Dunstable. Bedfordshire.”
“On it. Mind if I take you?”
“Not at all. Thanks so much.”
She turned into a street, navigating the overturned vehicles and slowies without a care in the world.
“Happy to help. I saw the king in my head this morning. Fragments of a plan to move Faery or something. I don’t know. But I kept on seeing you, a voice whispering the plight of the fae and the queen of the replicating bees. Blew my mind. Made me want to help. I couldn’t believe it when I saw you in the flesh.”
It was incredible how the threads of destiny intertwined. You think you’re heading in one direction and then you discover a new, unexpected strand. The good kind.
“A lot to handle, right?” Tilda said, turning into a small side street.
“It’s fine. I’m lucky to have met you.”
“Sweet of you. Now, then. Let’s get out of this city.”
“Do you know the way?”
“I lived on Earth with my ex human girlfriend for ten years. Her family lived in Houghton Regis.”
“Where’s that?”
After a dicey maneuver to avoid a pack of speedies, my stomach somersaulting, she answered with, “A town neighboring Dunstable.”
“Oh.”
“You’re in good hands, Orion.”
“Thanks.”
We reached the M25 motorway in no time, which only made me more tense than before. Vehicles choked the road, cracks everywhere, weeds sprouting from those gouges in the asphalt. Overgrown fields lined the motorway, bodies and bones littering the spaces between the vehicles, rainwater sluicing past them.
