Chapter Text
Deb was having a decent day. She’d snuck out of camp with no problem, gotten a shit cup of coffee, ogled a cute girl in a pink sweater and flattering black skirt tapping away at her laptop, and met up with her old mortal friends for the first ‘smoke club’ meeting she’d been able to attend in months. Sure, she’d had to leave the coffee shop in a hurry when the girl’s eyes turned to her, and not smoking anything mortal in ages had left her coughing for a good few minutes, but all in all, it hadn’t been bad.
She capitalized on her luck by walking the main street of the town she had grown up in, glancing at the nondescript buildings and admiring the occasional quaint storefront. Frankly, not much had changed since she’d left. Hatchetfield never was a town that seemed inclined to evolve. Hell, wasn’t Abstinence Camp a thing here? Camp Half-Blood had rules against two campers being alone in cabins, but the campers took it more as a suggestion. Chiron really didn’t care as long as they were safe and, naturally, old enough. The entire camp had a betting pool of when the old centaur would just give up on the ‘rule’ and leave it at ‘Use your common sense’. “Get with the times,” she muttered under her breath, watching Grace Chastity flounce over to a homeless man and begin to lecture him on the dangers of drug use. That was the Hatchetfield she knew and loved: half pretentious assholes and half spineless yes-men. At least the weed was good.
She reached the Starlight Theatre and, on instinct, rested a hand on the old wooden double doors. The sensation brought her back years, to the sight of stage lights and sound of singing voices alongside hers, and she let out a smile in spite of herself. If there was one part of Hatchetfield that she really missed, it was the Starlight, old as it was. Deb stood there for a moment, letting the memory overwhelm her with the feeling of rough wood beneath her fingers. She closed her eyes.
Then the door vanished, and her eyes flew open. She stumbled back with a gasp, closing her hand around the hilt of her sword and preparing to fight before realizing that it was just a person trying to leave. She flushed, embarrassed.
“Sorry, I…” Her voice died when she looked up. The first thing she registered was the pink sweater, and she lost the ability to think for a moment. Of fucking course.
The girl from the coffee shop hugged her laptop to her chest and brushed a stray lock of curly brown hair from her face. “Don’t worry about it,” she said, and Deb almost swooned. Her voice was soft, melodic, and even in a camp surrounded by children of Apollo and various Muses, it was probably the most beautiful thing Deb had ever heard. “Are you…” The girl’s words trailed off, and Deb watched as her eyes travelled to Deb’s waist, where her hand still gripped the hilt of her sword. Apparently, whatever the girl saw was something she felt the need to remark on, because she looked back up at Deb with a slight frown. “Is that -”
“Alice! Honey!” Deb turned to see a man, likely in his late thirties, approaching them, waving excitedly. The girl sighed, turning toward him and rolling her eyes. “We need to go, I need to drive you to -”
“Okay, one, Dad, I can drive myself,” the girl said. She seemed completely unimpressed, but Deb could see the affection hidden behind her eyes. It was written in the way she stood, the way she tilted her head to the side while addressing him. “Two, I was talking to someone, and three -”
“No, no, it’s fine!” Deb wanted to get out of this situation as soon as possible, and the Fates had seen fit to send this girl’s father to save her. She said a quick prayer of thanks to them, as well as the theoretical god of well-meaning dads. “I have to go anyway. See ya!”
She turned and ran. Monsters, she could face. Embarrassing herself in front of gorgeous people? Damn it all to Hades, she would prefer a trip to the underworld.
Having successfully escaped her harrowing event of the day, she walked through Hatchetfield’s streets for a while longer, enjoying the freedom of the open world. Camp Half-Blood was great, but there was a certain gritty realism missing that her hometown had in abundance.
Eventually, though, she found herself at the edge of town. Before her, the Witchwood loomed, as dark and mysterious as the day she had left. A lot of the intimidation was lost, however. After facing literal monsters and playing capture the flag in a forest not too dissimilar to this one, the woods weren’t as scary as they once were. Still, rumors bounced around her head, remnants of her childhood horror stories. The Hatchetfield Apeman, the Axeman, people planted in trees, witches - she’d hit up the Athena cabin at some point and looked for some possible explanation, mythological or otherwise. Nothing had quite matched the legends.
She stared at the mocking darkness, wondering just what lurked in there.
—-
As it turned out, nothing good.
Deb walked through the forest for a good five minutes, getting progressively more and more confident. It really seemed like the woods were nothing but a normal, creepy bunch of trees. Maybe there were some dryads - that would explain the people in trees thing - but Deb saw nothing mythological whatsoever.
“Come on, Bitchwood,” she says aloud. Her voice, contrary to what she expected, didn’t echo at all, instead sounding almost muted, as if the foliage swallowed the sound. “What else you got?”
She smirked and pushed forward through a curtain of branches and leaves, stepping into a clearing, and instantly froze. Two dracaenae and two empousai’s heads turned to her, and for a second, the five of them just stared at each other. Deb’s mind raced, and she mentally kicked herself for basically tempting the Fates and whatever else lived in this damn forest.
“Hi,” she said. Always a good start.
One dracaena sprang at Deb, sword in hand, and she lunged to the side. Her hand leapt to the sword hilt at her waist, and she whipped it free from its scabbard, slicing the dracaena in half. The monster disintegrated into dust, and Deb flourished the sword, its bronze glow casting shadows across the trees. For a second, Deb could swear that the sudden light formed the shape of faces against the bark, crying out in pain. She gulped.
The other dracaena unsheathed a dagger from its belt. The empousai flexed their hands, their nails extending into talons, and snarled, their hair bursting into flames. “Okay, bye!” Deb about-faced and sprinted, slipping for a second in the pile of monster dust at her feet before regaining her footing. “Fuuuuuuuck that!”
She tore through the tangles of branches and leaves, tripping on the uneven ground. Behind her, the empousai crashed through bushes, snarling. She heard the strange dull noise of slithering, slowly getting closer and closer to her, hissing over dirt and sticks. She sent a prayer to her mother and poured on the speed, grabbing every bit of sunlight that snuck its way through the canopy and focusing it into a concentrated beam behind her, aiming at where she hoped one of the monsters was. The effort of it sent spots flying across her eyes, but the shriek and thud from behind her was savagely rewarding.
In one final push, Deb shoved her way free from the Witchwood, stumbling onto a grassy field across the street from a few buildings. She glanced around for a second, trying to get her bearings, and the remaining dracaena burst from the brush with a hiss.
“Ack!” Deb backpedaled frantically, knocking the dracaena’s opening stab off course and swinging in retaliation. The grass was in need of a trim, snatching at her shoes as she moved. Behind the dracaena, the trees shook, and the sound of snapping sticks and pounding, mismatched footsteps grew louder. She had to finish this fight before the empousai got to her.
She stopped retreating, parried another strike, then lashed out, stabbing the dracaena in the throat. It coughed dryly, and as Deb yanked the blade to the side, turning the snake-woman to dust and sending its knife thudding to the dirt, the empousai erupted from the forest, metal legs clanging hollowly against the packed soil.
Deb readied herself, holding her sword out as the two empousai circled her like two panthers stalking a deer. She tried to remember her monster-fighting classes at camp, maybe to think of an exploitable weakness. Unfortunately, all she could remember was how deadly the vampires were. They used people’s attraction to them to get close enough to strike, with talons sharp enough to punch through a celestial bronze chestplate with enough force. The celestial bronze leg was sure to cause problems, as well, not to mention that if either of them were ‘ancient’, they could just explode into flames.
The good thing was that the empousai had already forgone their mortal disguises, so Deb didn’t have to worry about being mesmerized by them. That was a surprisingly common theme, actually; more often than not, an empousa would jump straight to the ‘murder’ phase when facing a female hero. Still, Deb wasn’t looking forward to facing two of them.
“Don’t suppose either of you ladies are looking for someone?” She tried, hoping to make at least one of them fumble. Neither batted an eye. “Shit, okay. Tough crowd.” She took a step toward the empousa on the right, then threw herself left in a stab. The blow didn’t connect, the empousa disappearing to the side, and Deb turned the stab into a downward cut. Her sword rang against the empousa’s metal leg, cutting deep, and the monster stumbled. Deb would have tried for a killing blow, but her senses screamed in warning, and she jerked the sword free, leaving a deep gash in the false leg, and spun just in time to deflect the second empousa’s talons. She tried to slip under its guard, slashing at the empousa’s midriff, but in doing so, she realized too late, she opened herself up to the other empousa. Claws ripped across her side in an explosion of pain, and she felt sharp needle-like teeth punch into her neck. She yelled, stumbling back and falling onto her ass.
Somehow, that was the right thing to do. The empousa, suddenly sandwiched between her and the ground, screeched and extracted its teeth from her neck. Sensing opportunity, Deb rolled away until she was on her back again and let the sword plummet like an executioner’s axe. The empousa’s scream was abruptly cut short.
Deb kicked onto her feet and swiped at the remaining empousa. It jumped back, away from the blade, and snarled at her. Deb huffed, already out of breath. She didn’t have the time or energy to play a game of back and forth. Exhaustion and frustration spurred her into an open, one-handed lunge, but the empousa simply swayed to the side faster than Deb could blink and shot out a hand.
The inside of Deb’s right arm exploded in pain, numbing her mind with shock. She dimly felt the sword drag itself from her hand, the weight suddenly too much for her grip to be maintained. When the fog cleared - as quickly as it came; thanks, battlefield reflexes - she found herself on her knees, clutching her wounded arm uselessly. She hyperfixated on individual blades of grass, the green tinted red by drops of blood.
Something blurred up to collide with her face with a massive CLANG , and suddenly she was staring at the sky. She couldn’t tell if the clouds were blurry because her eyes weren’t working or if that was just how Aeolus decided they should be today.
The empousa limped into view, hair flaming and talons glinting in the sunlight. Deb’s fingers scrabbled weakly against the blades of grass, searching for her sword and finding nothing. The empousa regarded her for a moment, then, in a rush of movement, planted its metal hoof in her gut and grabbed her throat as she doubled over, gasping in pain.
Deb choked, clutching at the empousa’s wrist as the world sped up and slowed down at the same time. She could smell the barnyard scent of the empousa’s animal leg, feel the warmth of the blood leaking out of her arm and sliding down her bicep, taste the air that couldn’t reach her lungs, and she couldn’t move an inch. The empousa’s foot crushed her against the ground, and her vision started to swim. The empousa grinned.
Then its snarl of victory melted, replaced with confusion and shock. The grip around Deb’s throat loosened, then evaporated as the vampire’s body collapsed into a cloud of golden dust. Deb coughed, heaved in air, and hacked as she inhaled what used to be the empousa, flopping back to the ground. Through the haze of pain and monster residue, she made out a blur of pink.
“Oh my god, oh my god, are you okay? What the hell was that?” The girl from the Starlight bounced back and forth in an adrenaline-filled panic, the fallen dracaena’s knife clutched in her hand. Her laptop was nowhere to be seen, and for some reason that worried Deb. She struggled to her hands and knees.
“Whoa, whoa, hang on!” The girl dropped to her knees in front of Deb and grabbed her by the shoulders, careful to keep the knife’s blade pointed away from her face. Nice of her, Deb thought giddily.
“You’re bleeding. Oh, shit, your arm is bleeding. That’s bad.” The girl started tugging her sweater off, and Deb finally snapped back into reality.
“NO!” She coughed and started again, acutely aware of her face flushing. “No, I’m - I’ll be fine.” She tried to stand, but the world spun around her and she stumbled. The girl caught her, handling the well-muscled weight of a demigod shockingly well. Deb wondered how her arms looked with that strength, if they were anything like her legs - not the time, Deb.
“You’re not fine!” The girl sounded panicky, her voice rising as Deb struggled to stand. “Your fucking arm is bleeding, and those - those fucking things were attacking you and you were killing them -”
Deb’s head snapped to the girl. “Wait, you could see that?” She asked in disbelief. What were the odds of finding a demigod in fucking Hatchetfield?
“I - Yes, I could fucking see that! That’s not the problem here, your arm is all fucked up!” The girl pushed herself to her feet, still holding on to Deb. “Here, come on, I’ll get you to Dad’s, I’m sure he has something -”
Deb shook her head, immediately regretting it as spots exploded in her eyes. “Shit - no, it’s okay, I’ve got this.”
“No, you don’t!”
“Just fucking get me to the road!” Deb threw her uninjured arm over the girl’s shoulders and started staggering toward the road, relying on her for balance. “Do you get carsick?”
“Not really?” The girl’s answer came as more of a question, but Deb took it anyway. They stumbled to a stop on the curb, and Deb went to reach into her right pocket. Her arm protested, shrieking silently as it grated against her shirt. She gasped shallowly. The girl raised her eyebrows at her. “Now what, Miss Monster-fighter?”
Deb forced herself to breathe. “Reach into my pocket. There’s a coin.”
The girl maneuvered around Deb, holding her up while wedging a hand into her pocket, avoiding her eyes. There was a faint pink tinge to her cheeks. Deb chalked it up to adrenaline and nerves. “Got it. Now what?”
“Toss it in the street.”
“What?”
“Do it!”
The drachma spun in the air, catching the light in a myriad of colors tinted gold. As soon as it touched the asphalt, it sank through like a mirage. Ignoring the girl’s gasp, Deb stepped forward, to the very edge of the curb. “Stêthi, ô hárma diabolês!”
The pothole-ridden pavement liquified, becoming a deep red bubbling substance, and a dark, smoking taxi exploded from the depths. An old woman with gray skin leaned out the window. Her grizzly hair flopped over where her eyes should have been. “Passage?”
“Two to Camp Half-Blood,” Deb gasped. She waved at the taxi. “Door.”
Fortunately, the girl realized that she was talking to her and not the Gray Sister. She helped Deb onto the resolidified street and into the taxi, and, after a second of hesitation, clambered in herself.
The sister in front of the wheel cackled. “Off we go!” She shouted in glee, and Deb was slammed against the back of her seat as the taxi rocketed away from Hatchetfield. The girl let out a startled scream.
Deb tried to reach out to put a hand on her shoulder reassuringly, but the flair of pain in her arm stopped her. The girl looked at her, her fear obvious, but with determination in her eyes. “What do you need?” She asked.
“Rip my shirt,” Deb wheezed. “Tie it.”
The girl nodded and leaned over to her, taking a handful of bloodstained orange fabric. She raised her other hand, and Deb noticed the dagger still clutched within her white knuckled grip. The shirt’s fibers parted easily against the celestial bronze, and before Deb could blink, the girl was looping the strip of fabric around Deb’s injured arm. “Deep breath,” she said, and Deb’s world erupted into a kaleidoscope of colored blotches as she tightened the makeshift bandage.
Her vision cleared, sweat trickling down her forehead. The countryside was starting to look familiar, meaning they had about ten seconds until they got to camp. “Thanks,” she managed. “Owe ya.”
“Yeah, you do,” the girl teased. Then she sobered. “After dragging you out of whatever the fuck you were doing, you owe me an explanation. First of all, where the fuck are we going?”
The taxi screeched to a stop, throwing Deb against the seat in front of her. The middle sister snickered. “Enjoy yourselves, dearies!” The backseat’s door flew open.
The girl tumbled out, dry heaving, but when Deb tried to slip out herself and almost fell, the girl caught her again. “You’re fine. Okay?”
Deb swallowed. “Yeah.”
“Good. Where do we go now?”
Deb pointed to the top of the hill, where Thaila’s tree stands tall and proud. “There.” The girl just nodded, readjusted her grip on Deb, and started the trek up the slope. Deb let her take the lead, focusing on staying conscious. Breathe. Breathe. She was not dying to a fucking vampire.
In. Blood trickled down her arm, catching in the creases of her hand before falling to the ground
Out. Her vision fuzzed in and out of focus, like a bad TV screen.
In. Her feet slipped against the grass. The soles of her shoes must be bloody. Damn. She liked those shoes.
Ou-
“What is this?”
“Huh?” Deb looked up at the girl blearily. She had her hand outstretched, pressed against air like a mime. She looked confused.
“Why can’t I -” She strained forward, looking for all the world as though she was pushing against a wall. “I see it! How do I get you in?”
“You can’t -” Deb’s brain catches up, and her mouth falls slack. “You’re mortal?”
“Wha- Yeah, I’m… ‘mortal’!” The girl was starting to seem scared. Deb vaguely wondered why. “How do I get in?!”
“Uh…” Deb blinked. “What’s your name?”
The girl didn’t even question her. “Alice.”
“Last name?”
“Woodward. Hurry it up, please!”
Deb licked her lips and pushed herself upright. “I, Deborah Mainwaring, give Alice Woodward permission to enter camp.”
Thunder boomed, the sudden burst of sound throwing Deb off balance again. Alice’s gaze snapped to the sky for a second, then she shook it off and forged on. This time, she passed the spot as if nothing had ever been there, stumbling slightly as she prepared to meet resistance.
They crested the hill, and Camp Half-Blood stood before them in all its glory. Deb’s gaze swept the grounds lazily until Alice shook her shoulder. “Stay with me, Deborah!”
“Deb,” Deb muttered. Alice tossed her head impatiently.
“Fine! Deb! Where do I fucking go?!”
Deb scanned the cabins below them. “You see that golden cabin that’s kind of glowi-”
“Got it.” Alice began to stride down the hill, pulling Deb with her. Deb stumbled, beginning to really lose feeling in her limbs. She groaned, but Alice just kept going, hauling her increasingly limp body across the grass. “Come on, come on, you’re gonna be okay…”
Deb’s eyes fell shut, and her breathing slowed, as did the spread of the sticky, wet feelings on her arm and side. She fought to get her feet under her, struggling against the encroaching blackness, but it was a losing battle. The last thing she heard was the sound of voices, soft but growing quickly, and Alice’s desperate shouts for help.
—-
Deb woke up slowly. She lay on an unfamiliar cushion, a pillow propping up her aching head. Her face felt warm, and the insides of her eyelids glowed a soft red. She tried to reach up to brush her hair off of her face, but her arm flared with pain. “Ugh.”
“And she lives!” The glow across her eyelids vanished, and Deb’s eyes finally fluttered open. A toned face grinned down at her, dark hair curling around his face. “Was the empousa at least hot?”
Deb let her eyes close again with a pronounced groan. “Shut the fuck up, Ollie.”
The head counselor of the Apollo cabin chortled. “C’mon, getting bit on the neck is a pretty intimate thing. I’d hope you were at least into it!”
“Fuck off, Ollie.” Deb laughed in spite of herself. Cliche as it was, the son of Apollo knew how to light up a room. “Where’s… uh…” The name escaped her for a second. “Alice! Where’s Alice?”
“The mortal girl who dragged your sorry ass back here?” Deb tried to kick him, but Ollie caught her leg and returned it to the bunk. “Chiron took her to the Big House about ten minutes ago. They should be back right about…”
Ollie paused, looking expectantly toward the door. Nothing happened. Deb raised an eyebrow at him.
The thud of hooves reached the cabin, and feet tapped their way onto the porch. Ollie turned back to her and smirked, gesturing to the door. “Now.”
Alice burst through the door, closely followed by Chiron, clip-clopping his way into the cabin. “Oh, thank fucking god, you’re okay!”
Deb rolled her eyes at Ollie. “Your powers know no bounds.”
Alice skidded to a stop at the side of Deb’s bed, rambling. “My god, everything makes so much sense now! Demigods, gods, monsters - I thought I was fucking nuts for years! And your arm - Jesus, that was fucking terrifying! Also, your teacher is a horse? I have so many questions!”
“I am a centaur, child,” Chiron corrected her gently. He turned to Deb. “My dear, I will not lecture you on the foolhardiness of your actions. I think you fully understand the gravity of your injuries.”
Ollie piped up next to her. “Actually, sir, she just woke up. I haven’t had a chance to give her my appraisal.”
“Ah.” Chiron nodded. “Well, proceed, then.”
“Yes, sir.” Ollie turned to her, slipping into medic mode in an instant. “Aside from various bruises and scrapes, you sustained four shallow cuts on the left side of your torso, a pair of deep cuts running up the length of your right arm, one of which was along your cephalic vein, a mild concussion, and an empousa bite to the neck. The combination of all of these literally almost killed you. Your blood flowed faster due to the empousa bite, and your concussion almost rendered you unconscious during it. You’re lucky Alice was there.”
Deb blanched and looked down. She hadn’t realized how close she’d come to death. If it hadn’t been for Alice hauling her back to camp…
The girl in question spoke up. “So, bite on the neck… isn’t that, like, a vampire thing?”
“Vampires are very much based on legends of empousai,” Chiron explained. “They are servants of Hecate, formed of dark magic from animals, spirits, and metal. Their bite both numbs and intoxicates the victim.”
“…oh.” Alice said in a small voice. She plopped onto a random bed and stared at her knees. Their small group remained silent for a long moment.
“Well,” Chiron finally said, “I must return to the Big House. Deb, do whatever Ollie tells you to. Alice, if you have any more questions, please do not be afraid to ask. Farewell.” He clopped in a half circle and ducked beneath the Apollo cabin’s doorframe. Deb, Alice, and Ollie stayed where they were as the sound of hooves receded.
“So… thank you,” Deb ventured. Alice looked up, almost confused. “For saving my life. Twice over.”
“Oh.” Alice tugged at the hem of her sweater. Deb noticed that there was a massive red stain discoloring the area where their bodies had been pressed together. It made her feel both guilty and… something else. She wished she could remember more of how Alice’s arm wrapped around her felt. “Uh… y’know. No problem.”
Ollie cleared his throat, making the two girls jump. “So, I’d love to stay here and keep an eye on you two, but Daniel managed to burn himself on the climbing wall earlier, so I’d better go take a look at him.” He strolled to the door and turned around, shooting Deb a wink. “Behave.”
Deb sputtered indignantly, then gave up and dropped back onto her pillow, sure her face was turning redder than Apollo’s cows. She dared to take a glance at Alice and saw a barely hidden smile between pinkish-red cheeks. “Sorry about him.”
“It’s alright.” Alice turned the smile on her. “He seems fun.”
“Yeah, that’s Ollie,” Deb said, fondly remembering the counselor leading a campfire singalong, deliberately off key to encourage the rest of the campers to join in. “Bit of an ass when he’s healing, but otherwise, he’s the best of us. Apollo cabin personified.”
“Apollo cabin…” Alice shook her head. “This is so fucking insane. You’re all children of… gods?”
“Or descendants, in the cases of some of the Romans here,” Deb said. Fortunately, Chiron seemed to have told Alice about that particular peculiarity, because she didn’t seem too surprised. “Honestly, the gods aren’t too good about keeping themselves to themselves. So many of them are married, or have some kind of partner.”
Alice nodded. “So, you’re a… demigod, too?”
Deb tried to spread her arms, wincing as the right arm throbbed and opting for a dramatic flair with her left hand. “Deb Mainwaring, daughter of Iris. At your service, miss.”
A smile worked its way onto Alice’s lips. “And the monsters?”
“What can I say?” Deb sighed. “They’re literally made to kill us. I don’t attract as many monsters as a kid with a stronger parent - like Percy Jackson, the son of Poseidon? He was a godsdamn magnet - but we all get our fair share. I was not expecting to run into anything out in fucking Hatchetfield. It was so quiet when I was a kid, just spooky stories.”
“You grew up in Hatchetfield?”
“Yeah. I moved here in… about ninth grade, when I found out who Mom was.” Deb looked at Alice. “Why? You new to the area?”
“Not really. I was raised in Clivesdale,” Alice said. “My dad grew up in Hatchetfield, but he moved to Clivesdale to live with my mother and bring me up. After the divorce, he moved back to Hatchetfield. I got to see him every other weekend and about half of the summer, but it was always the better part of the month. That whole thing started at the end of ninth grade.” She looked over at Deb with a half smile. “We just missed each other.”
Deb let out a low whistle. “Damn. That is some shit. I’m sorry.”
Alice shrugged. “It’s fine. I just wish Dad fought harder for custody. I miss him.”
“Yeah, and Clivesdale just sucks ass,” Deb declared, heat in her voice as a long-buried prejudice resurfaced. “Fuck Clivesdale.”
“Fuck Clivesdale!” Alice cheered in agreement, flopping back onto the bed. Deb caught herself staring at her chest, rising and falling mesmerizingly with her breaths, and tore her eyes away.
“So, do you know why you could see the monsters? I don’t know if Chiron explained it to you…?”
Alice righted herself, eyes alight with mirth. “Yeah, he said something about clear sight and mist? What does that mean?”
Deb shifted, pushing herself into a more upright position. “Alright, so the Mist is like this curtain that keeps most mortals from seeing demigod stuff, like monsters and our weapons and our powers, but it can also affect demigods, to a much lesser extent. The thing is, sometimes mortals just aren’t affected by the Mist at all. They can see the world even better than demigods, but they’re incredibly rare. Our Oracle, Rachel, is one. Whenever she’s here next, maybe you can ask her about stuff.”
Alice formed an ‘O’ with her red-lipsticked, gorgeous - ahem, perfectly normal lips. “Oh, that makes so much sense! There’s been so much shit that I’ve just convinced myself I was imagining. Giant people, Cyclopes, I guess, and these absolutely crazy creatures, and these weird ass things just walking around and no one noticing!”
Deb smiled. “Well, I’m glad getting beat up by vampire demons led to you discovering the real world. And, also, y’know, you saving my life.”
Alice grinned too, meeting Deb’s eyes with her beautiful blue gaze. “You know, I’ve been writing a play about this gay vampire girl, but after seeing one almost kill you and stabbing it in the back, I’m not sure vampire girls are such a good idea.”