Signs of Cupidity (Heart Hassle Book 1)

I’m laying propped up against the weapons shack with my arm slung over my eyes when a shadow crosses over my form, cutting out my sunlight. I move my arm down a smidge and peek one eye out to see who is disrupting my sun soak.

Not-First towers over me with his arms crossed, wearing his usual scowl. Although, maybe it just looks like he’s scowling. Maybe that’s just his face. Maybe I wouldn’t be able to tell if he was smiling, because of his crazy thick man-beard. “Can you shift two steps to the left? You’re blocking my sun.” He doesn’t move.

“What are you doing?”

I sigh and drop my arm, shifting so that I’m sitting up straighter as I tilt my head up to look at him. “I’m taking a break.”

“You said that twenty minutes ago.”

I blink at him. “Umm, yeah. That’s how breaks work. You just sit and…don’t move for an indeterminable amount of time.”

He shakes his head. “No. We train all day from now until we leave. That includes you.”

I laugh. “Yeah, no. That’s not happening.”

Quicker than I can flinch, he’s taken me by the arm and hauled me up. He settles me firmly on my feet before letting go. “You can’t fly more than few feet in the air and your endurance sucks. You have terrible balance, you drag your wings on the ground when you’re tired, and I’ve never seen someone so horrible at walking before you. You need training, and while you’re on my island, that’s what you’ll be doing.”

I kick the dirt between my toes, forming a divot. “Geez, I’m not that bad.”

“You are,” Evert says as he walks by us.

“Yeah, well, you just got yourself back into third place, buddy!”

“Training,” Ronak repeats, regaining my attention.

“Oh, come on, I can do super awesome bow and arrow stuff! Surely that gives me a pass. Or like a partial pass. Like half of a pass, at the very least.”

“Do you ever stop talking? Now come on,” Ronak says, turning on his heel.

     He doesn’t wait to see if I’ll follow him. Part of me wants to stand there obstinately, but the other part knows that he’ll probably just manhandle me.

          Not that manhandling would be a bad thing necessarily, but the guy has to earn stuff like that. I follow behind him, my steps as slow as I can possibly make them. He waits for me by the running track, rolling his eyes at my pace.

         When I finally make it to him, he says, “Glad you could join me.”

“I aim to please,” I say dryly. “Now what? My wings are already sore from practicing flying earlier. I’m telling you, I can’t do more. I have to practice in small bursts.  You might have a cute little kitty cat tail, but these bad boys are heavy and take a lot of work to use.”

He looks at me incredulously. “Cute little kitty cat tail?”

“Yeah. It’s adorable,” I say, watching it flit back and forth behind him. “Can I pet it?”

He makes a weird choking sound.

           “Whoa. Are you gonna have a fit or something?”

“I…you…”

“What? Is petting your tail like a no-go? I haven’t read the genfin rulebook. Is it off-limits? Too bad. It looks so soft. Maybe when I get out of here, I’ll find some other genfin who will let me pet his tail. Or I bet Evert will let me pet his.”

“Fucking hell.”

“What’s the big deal?”

He pinches the bridge of his nose with his fingers and takes a deep breath. “Just…stop talking.”

“Okie dokie kitty cat.”

He shakes his head at me while I try really hard not to smile. “Anyway. You need to push your wings more. That’s the only way you’ll build up your stamina and muscles. But for right now, you won’t be flying. You’ll be running.”

I stare at him and blink. I probably misheard him. When he says nothing more, I copy his stance and cross my arms. “I’m sorry, did you say run? I can’t run.”

“You told us you ran when you were in the fae palace,” he points out. “You ran from the beasts. And I’m pretty sure you nearly ran to the river when you were covered in shit.”

I scoff. “Well, yeah, those times it was out of pure necessity.”

He looks at me, unimpressed. “I could arrange a life or death scenario if you’d like. Would you like me to wrangle up some of those beasts in the forest and have them chase you? Or perhaps get a bucket from the outhouse?”

“I hate you.”

“Believe me, the feeling’s mutual, little demon. Now start running. You can stop when I say.”

I look down at my clothes. I’m still wearing Evert’s tunic and nothing else. It’s definitely not running material. “I’m not dressed for it,” I tell him. It’s hard enough trying to fly in it without showing off my lady bits. I’m gonna flash everyone for sure.

“You’ll be fine.”

I look down at my feet. “I don’t have shoes. I could get blisters.”

“It’s good to harden them up.”

I look around, trying to find another excuse I can pluck from the air. “Umm…I trip. I trip a lot. I could skin my knees or something. That would hurt.”

“I’m sure Evert would heal you. Now stop coming up with excuses and run.”

Dammit. I’m losing here. I look around at the other guys, but they’re too busy pretending to do their own thing than to rescue me from having to run. Chivalry is dead.

Then a thought pops in my head and I snap my head back to Ronak. “Boobs!” I shout loudly. He looks taken aback at my outburst. I’m pretty sure the other guys are looking over at me, too. That word has a lot of power.

Ronak sighs. “…What?”

I hold my boobs up with my hands like I’m putting them up on display for him. “Boobs. I have them. It’ll hurt if I run. They’ll be bouncing around like balls,” I explain, tilting my head in thought. “Well…not those balls,” I say, motioning toward his groin area. “But you get what I’m saying. Or maybe those do bounce around when you run, too? I have no idea. Do they?”

He looks at me like I’ve grown two heads. I hear Evert start laughing. I’m not embarrassed, I’m actually really curious. I mean, their pants don’t look tight enough to really hold everything together. But maybe I’m wrong? Or maybe Ronak has tiny balls so it doesn’t bother him? The way Ronak is watching me doesn’t bode well for me to get any answers, though.

He rubs his eyebrows like I’m giving him a headache. “Demon, just run before I wrap my hands around your neck and start shaking.”

I ignore the demon thing. I’m going to pretend it’s a term of endearment from now on. “Fine. But if my boobs hurt later, it’s your fault.”

“I can always massage them for you, Scratch,” Evert calls over. Such a gentleman.

“I’ll pass,” I say back. I totally wouldn’t pass.

Oh, and his nickname for me reminds me to scratch my arm again. I tackle the spot of my old itch with vigor. It’s incredibly satisfying knowing that itch stands no chance against my super awesome physical fingernails. “Take that,” I say to my arm.

“Stop scratching it, Scratch.”

I sigh and drop my hand.

I turn around and start walking along the track, because Ronak is still giving me a death glare and rubbing his eyebrows. I really have to pick my battles with this guy. Most of the dirt of the track is smoothed out, so at least I won’t have to worry about hurting my feet too much. I pretend to run by swinging my arms quickly at my sides, but my feet walk at a leisurely pace. Relaxing, even.

After about twenty steps, Ronak calls out, “Pick up the pace.”

I roll my eyes even though he can’t see and I start to lightly wog. You know, the way you pretend to jog but it’s really no faster than walking, just bouncier? Yeah, that’s my goal. Fake it. I’m super good at wogging.

“Faster!” Ronak shouts. Fucker.

I pick up the pace until I’m legitimately jogging. It’s horrible.

My sore wings bounce almost as much as my boobs do. Gravity fights me with every step. When I get to the end of the track, I turn around to jog back, but of course I get tangled up and trip. I try to find my footing before I fall, and just barely manage it.

“Ha! Didn’t fall!” I say triumphantly, already out of breath. Of course right as I’m congratulating myself on not falling, I trip again and go sprawling face first to the ground.

“Ugh,” I groan as I spit dirt out of my mouth. Evert is laughing again. He’s definitely not in first place anymore.

“You okay?” I look up to see Sylred hurrying toward me. He puts his hands under my arms and hauls me up.

“Yep, stupendous.”

He’s trying hard not to laugh at me, I can tell. He’s a nice guy like that. Still, his brown eyes are crinkled at the sides as he reaches up and wipes my cheek with the pad of his thumb to remove the dirt from my face. The touch sends flutters in my stomach.

“Okay?”

I nod and look down, checking myself for injuries. At least I didn’t manage to make myself bleed. Yet. “Better get back to it,” he says. “Be careful.”

“Right.”

I turn and start to jog/walk again. After I finish two laps, I have to hold my boobs up with my hands because they’re getting so sore, and my wings start dragging on the ground because I don’t have the strength to hold them up. Good thing they’re so pretty and soft, because they’re a pain in my ass. Or back.

The next time I trip, I stay down. My breathing is faster than a gale force wind. I see a pair of boots come into view, and they stop right in front of me where I’m sprawled on the ground. “Get up and keep running.”

I never noticed how annoying Ronak’s sexy voice was until this moment.

I mumble something that may or may not have been a string of curses damning him to the deepest layers of hell, but who really knows?

“I said, get up and keep running.”

I lick my dry lips and tilt my head up to look at him. “I can’t, it’s too hard. Why do people run? It’s awful. Did you know people actually do this for fun? I saw humans do it all the time. There must be something wrong with their brains,” I narrow my eyes at him and gasp. “Oh gods, you run for fun, don’t you?” I ask. “What am I saying, of course you do. That explains why you’re so unhappy all the time.”

He kneels down in front of me and levels me with a glare. “Listen to me, demon. You have less than three weeks before we leave this island. We don’t know what will happen to you. If you want a tiny chance of surviving this world, you need to be able to do basic shit. That includes running and flying. The prince is not going to stop looking for you, do you get that?”

I swallow. “Yeah.”

“Good. Because it’s true. I know him. He’ll hunt you down. He’ll kill you or use you. And if you can’t figure this shit out, he’s already won. If you can’t run twenty yards, he will catch you. If you can’t fly, he will catch you. If you can’t take care of yourself out there, he will catch you. So pull out whatever pathetic strength you have inside and use that shit before you get yourself, or us, killed.”

“Good gods, I hope you aren’t in charge of the pep talks,” I mumble. With great effort, I push myself to stand up. I sway a little bit and my wings ache in protest, but I stay standing.

I see Sylred standing nearby, looking worried. “Ronak, maybe you shouldn’t push…”

“No,” he says, cutting him off. “She’s weak and she has no discipline. If she wants to live, she needs to be better than this,” he says with disdain.

             I feel my wings ruffle, my hackles rising. Maybe I am weak, but he doesn’t have to throw it in my face like that. He’d be weak, too, if he hadn’t had a body for fifty years.

           “I don’t give a shit whether she lives or dies, but I’m not going to get caught harboring her, and I sure as shit don’t want her flapping her jaw when she gets caught and tortured. She needs to get control of herself before the prince captures her and she screws us over.”

I bite down my anger and harden my resolve. I’ll do this, just to prove him wrong. Even if it kills me, I’ll run just to shut his arrogant, bearded, stupid mouth.

Ronak stands beside me and tilts his head toward the track. “Get going.”

So I run.

And run.

And run.

And trip.

And run some more.

I run until my legs are shaking so badly that I can’t stay upright anymore. I run until my stomach starts heaving with over-exertion. I run until my lungs are screaming at me and my heart feels like it’s going to jitter right out of my chest.

I collapse in the sand. Again. I’m covered in sweat and dirt, and probably some blood. My mind is imagining all the slow and painful deaths I could bestow on Ronak. Every time he yelled at me to keep going, I came up with another colorful way to make him suffer. I particularly liked the one where I plucked every single strand of body hair from his body, one by one, starting with his beard and ending with his genitals.

I’m relieved when I see a pair of boots stop in front of my face that don’t belong to Ronak. “That’s enough. She’s done for the day.” Sylred says.

He casts me an apologetic look and scoops me up in his arms effortlessly, taking care not to crush my wings. I give him a groan of appreciation. I can’t really talk, because my tongue is too dry and my head is heavy with exhaustion.

Still, as much misery as I’m in right now, I feel proud, too. I met Ronak’s challenge and I didn’t give up.

I’ll probably want to die later, but for now, I feel alive.