First Chapter of Morrigan's Curse/Feathered Heart... (Fantasy Fiction)

[Emma C. Pasternack]

Chapter 1.[MOU1] 

Bri Winter lay on her couch, tossed popcorn into her mouth, and stared at the TV blindly. Daytime TV got her through the day, well, at least until midday, after that, she was at a bit of a loss. There wasn’t much she enjoyed about her life. Maybe the sighting of an eagle overhead or a cobweb pearled in frost. She often wished she had been born a couple of centuries earlier when life seemed more romantic. “Seemed.” As the old cliche says—things are not always what they seem. The eighteen hundreds may have spawned Romantic poets, but it was filth ridden and rampant with disease.

The women on TV were getting heated about Botox, the Puffy Filler Face, and other stuff Bri would never have to worry about. At eighteen, Bri looked younger than her years, she would always look younger than her years. That was part of her “curse.” To the women on TV right now, she doubted her perpetual youth would be perceived as much of a problem.  

Bri sighed stretching her legs, wing tips digging into her hips as she tried to sit up, but her black sweater caught on something sticky. Lumps, dirt, and stickiness. That about summed things up these days. Of the millions of things she knew she’d miss about her mother she never thought her cleaning would be one of them. She slumped back like some fallen angel on the sticky couch and sighed again.

   “Hello, love!” called a voice from the front door.

   Bri leapt to her feet, popcorn tipping over, wings spreading wide and knocking over a picture on the far wall. The tips bending hard against the ceiling sending shocks of pain through her shoulder blades and down her back. Altogether too big for this place, she winced, brushing popcorn off the seats into . . .what? Where’s the bin? A lone black feather fell to the ground.

   “Bri? I’m coming in, love.”

   Aunt Stella. Her silver Sky Walker heels rapped loudly, sticking to Bri’s badly washed linoleum floor. They stuck only for a second, but still Bri closed her eyes and shook her head with an inward groan. Her dad was as useless as she was when it came to cleaning.

“Ah, Bri, they’re beautiful,” sighed Stella, covering her mouth in awe. It was always the same with Aunt Stella, always the awe, always the beauty, never the damned inconvenience of having six-foot wings attached to your back that were agony to draw out of the flesh, agony to keep within and even more agony to tuck away. Beauty wasn’t exactly the first word that sprang to Bri’s mind.

“Sure,” said Bri, “Give me a minute.” She closed her eyes. Bones stretched, her back arched, and she hit the floor crouched on all fours, neck bent forward reaching to the ceiling, not that she could see the ceiling, her eyes were squeezed closed, and her mouth opened in a silent scream. There would be no sound. She had mastered that much by eighteen. The fire spread out to her shoulders; they cracked, her back torn open, cold blood trailing down her skin, and finally the shiver passing through her as the wings pushed themselves within her flesh. Bri let her head hang loose for a moment as her body adjusted to the pain rattling through her bones. Keeping the wings concealed took more energy than releasing them. Placing her hands on her knees she slowly got to her feet.

“Caught you at a bad time, love?” asked Aunt Stella, languishing in the doorway, sucking on a cigarette.

   “Those things will kill you,” said Bri.

   “Have to catch me first,” cackled Aunt Stella.

            “Right,” smirked Bri, pushing a wisp of her short hair behind her ear and getting to her feet. She couldn’t resist the old broad. Aunt Stella’s enthusiasm for life was only matched by her love of cigarettes. Two loves that ran deep, no matter the irony that one would eventually end the other.

   “What a mess. And I mean you, not the couch.”

            Bri looked around; thin curtains still drawn, flowers from Mrs. Mulligan dead in a vase, and an interesting rendition of the Leaning Tower of Pisa constructed from dirty glasses. She sighed, swatting popcorn off herself.

   “Come on, get the kettle on, I’m parched. Waste y’r life watchin’ that drivel,” Stella marched through to the kitchen. Her words definite. Final. No arguments allowed. That’s how she always spoke. Bri appreciated it, mostly.

   Bri’s toes curled when she saw the pile of crumpled bedsheets waiting to be folded piled on the kitchenette table. She scooped them up and pushed them back into the washing machine. Giving Aunt Stella a tight smile. It didn’t matter, not really, Stella loved her, and Bri knew it. As the only child of Stella’s younger brother, Llewellyn Winter, the 100th king of their tribe, Bri was the daughter Stella wished she’d had.

   “Where’s y’r dad this fine morning?” asked Aunt Stella, eyebrows arched at the dishes filling the sink.

   “Out. Went with Tommy Mulligan and the others to work on Ender’s farm. They’ve got the October potatoes to start pulling,” said Bri, striking a match and inhaling the glorious smell of sulfur before lighting the gas stove.

            Aunt Stella made a Tsk sound and squeezed herself between the table and bench, her bare legs squeaking on the plastic seat. Blue eyes sliding to Bri. Celtic eyes that spoke of the long history between gypsies and Celts, not to mention Stella’s long aquiline nose. That was a Celt trait no doubt about it.

   “Wastin’ y’r life watchin’ that drivel.” Stella pulled on her cigarette. The usual Benson and Hedges. A brand, in Bri’s view, reserved for only the hardcore smoker.

 “You said. So will sucking on those cancer sticks.” Bri rested her head against the cupboard, closing her eyes.

“Can’t argue with ya there. Damned things will be the end of me. Get on with that there tea.” The plastic seat cover squeaked against her thighs.

Bri felt a thud, not her heart, a thud within the room— an earthquake? In Enfield, London? Was that even possible? The trembling began, hands and fingers. She gripped the counter, neck tightening, legs shaking.

“No, no, no!” Bri shook her head and honed in on the water bubbling, slowly churning in the kettle, toes sticking to the linoleum floor—ground, Bri, ground…she told herself.

The image took hold—a small, gold clasp…a book…a man’s hand, his hand? How could she know his hand? She’d never met him. The image ebbed. With a sigh Bri released the countertop, fingers white.

Bri could feel her Aunt’s eyes on her back. “Was it him?”

“I think so…”

“Same place?”

“His hands, a gold clasp, and a book. I can’t be sure, I’ve never even met the man!”

Bri felt her aunt’s weighty stare shift, the gentle flick of ash.

“It’s Fate. Meeting ’ll happen. Timings right.”

 “Today? You’re saying I go today? I can’t go today!” Bri tried to shake the feel of the warm gold clasp.

“You got more pressing matters goin’ on around ‘ere, have ya?” Stella scoffed.

“Dad’ll kill us both. I can’t go running to the one place he’s forbidden in search of some guy I’ve never met because…” the next words cut in her throat.

“Cos she believed?”

“I haven’t decided—” Bri cut in, but Aunt Stella held up a hand.

“It was decided when ya mother gave ya a gift, and that gift turned out to be the sight of that boy. He’s got this cure your hell bent on seeking Bri. Though, why you’d want it is beyond me. But, it was decided with yr mother.”

“You mean when she refused treatment and died a painfully slow death? Right? Yes, I remember that. That did decide a lot of things for me.”

“It’s time, Bri. No more puttin’ it off.” Stella got to her feet pulling down her skirt.

Bri turned to face her, cheeks burning, her body giving way— “I miss her . . .” her body trembled, bile rose in her throat.

Stella caught her before she hit the floor. “Alright, alright. Come on now.”

“I . . .” Bri began, stopping to catch her breath. Everything swayed in and out of focus, as if she sat atop a rollercoaster waiting for the inevitable drop.

Stella’s firm hand clutched her elbow, momentarily enveloping her in the smells of stale cigarettes, gypsum, and hairspray. Makeup, like cement, filled the lines around Stella’s eyes and mouth. Tired, hooded, steely blue eyes that saw more and saw further than most dared. Aunt Stella was built of iron not afraid to delve into pockets of the world few would peer at from a distance. Yet those eyes looked at her with a love that threatened to bring Bri to her knees. And that simply wouldn’t do. The electric kettle clicked off.

Bri closed her eyes gratefully, allowing her head to hang for just a moment longer. After a couple of breaths she gripped the cold, steel, metal back of her chair she pushed to her feet. Turning her back and withdrawing cups and tea from the cupboard, she hoped to avoid the keen questioning that was sure to follow. Aunt Stella didn’t like to be told no. There wasn’t a person in their clan that accepted the word—come to think of it. “No” was perceived as nothing more than a challenge to the Winters.

“Right. Well, I made ya this for the journey. Here.” Stella took a pouch out of her handbag.

Bri poured water onto the loose tea in the old, chipped teapot.

“A putsi?” Bri turned the pouch over tenderly in her hands.

It was small, maybe one-inch by two-inch square, made of a light shade of yellow with small star-like, white flowers, “Is this . . . is this my old dress?

“Course. A putsi should be made from somethin’ loved, preferably worn, by the owner.” Stella smiled. “I know ya don’ like our traditions, Bri but indulge me in this one. Ya never know what you’ll find when ya travel, and a putsi finds room for whatever ya place inside it.”

Bri looked down and whispered, “You know I’m a curse.”

Stella’s pale blue eyes raised to meet Bri’s and hardened. “I never believed that.”

Her words weren’t mean, but her tone was absolute, brusque and she stepped away straightening the putsi cigarette crackling.

It had been decided. She would go to the Deep. Find the boy, honor her mother’s sacrifice, and live a—"normal life”. A life without wings, a life free from the curse. Easy.

---

 [MOU1]Chapter 1.

Morrigan

 [MOU1]Chapter 1.

 

[Heidi]

Hello Emma, I enjoyed your dynamic intro. Your book and mine seem to have a common element, a protagonist who longs for a more romantic time and is confronted with it. I look forward to meeting you.

[Emma C. Pasternack]

Hi Heidi, thanks for the feedback. Morrigan actually faces anything but a romantic time. More like battles with gods, and the revealing of nasty secrets.

Have you been to one of these events before?

Emma

[Heidi]

I went to one of Michael's Monterey retreats. In fact, I came up with story idea a few days beforehand, when reading that he was looking for high concept. I hear this event will be next-level, sometimes brutal.  Brace yourself for a Morrigan-like experience.