A laugh burst out of Soraya before she smothered it with her hand. The noise was unexpectedly jarring, cutting through the quiet peace of the rose garden like a blade.

  Soraya’s eyes quickly darted back to the street, checking if she’d alerted anything to their position. A couple of cars swished by on the otherwise empty street of Exposition Blvd. Once satisfied they were all clear, she looked back to Jesmine, who watched her with weary eyes.

  “I’m serious, Soraya. You’ve always been…different. It would explain a lot,” Jesmine stated cautiously.

  Soraya folded her arms across her chest. “I haven’t been any more different than you or Delilah,” she objected. “It’s one of the reasons why we got along so well. And are you hearing yourself? I’m a fairy—elf? Ahvi’s an elf fairy? Really?”

  “And yet, there are monsters hunting us down. Winged men are flying through the streets. I watched you disappear right in front of me, and I couldn’t do a damned thing,” Jesmine’s voice wavered a fraction. “If you had told me a week ago I was about to encounter all this crazy bullshit, I would have laughed in your face and told you to check yourself into a mental hospital,” she said, dead serious.

  “But after living through it…I know our choices boil down to believing it and staying alive—or walking out there to see what those demons would do when they caught us. Maybe nothing because it’s ‘not real.’ Or maybe we die.” She held Soraya’s gaze. “But if it is real—and I think it very much is at this point—they are after you for a reason. It’s because there’s something about you—not me—that they are attracted to. Maybe you even have something they want.”

  Soraya let her words sink in. She agreed with most of what Jesmine had to say—already having reached the same conclusions herself. But when it came to applying it to her, Soraya—

  The image of her standing in front of their shared bathroom mirror blurred into the forefront of her mind. The running facet she left on in her stunned state echoed in her ears as her wide eyes bore into her unfamiliar reflection. The points of her eats were unmistakably protruding out of her glistening, black hair. Then—nothing. She had promptly fainted until Jesmine roused her from the bathroom floor.

  Of course, this was right after she’d encountered Makoto in all his savage-like beauty. And his ears…She’d known something was off. And for a moment, she had even wondered if maybe—just maybe—she was like him too.

  Then there was Ahvi to contend with. Her empty room. The fact that her phone number was no longer in service—disconnected. And there was something else…something about her Soraya was struggling to remember.

  The hairs on her arm stood on end at the memories—memories she had so quickly forgotten within hours.

  And that was when she recalled the fog and ringing.

  The fog-like feeling and the ringing in her ears…they hadn’t made a reappearance so far, and as she remembered more and more…She wondered if the fog and the ringing were only present when she was actively trying to retain her memories—and some outside force was equally trying to rip them away from her, causing the ringing and fog side effects.

  Yet…There were other times when her memories had simply…slipped away, leaving her none the wiser that she’d lost them in the first place.

  Her stomach clenched with terror at that last thought. How would she know what she’d forgotten if that were the case?

  Soraya rolled her shoulders back trying to release the tension from her body. It would be a real problem if both of them forgot what was happening around them. Where would that leave them if they forgot about everything?

  Believing in the situation wouldn’t matter then. They would be sitting ducks and more than likely go back to the apartment, oblivious to whatever hell spawns were waiting for them.

  The fear. The confusion— the panic they would feel if they ran into those monsters again. Even though, to their forgotten minds, it’d be the first time…They would be goners.

  So how would they stop themselves from forgetting while they flee for their lives? And how did Ahvi fit into this mess?

  “Look, Soraya,” Jesmine said, pulling her from her thoughts, “I’m not saying that you being one of them is necessarily a bad thing. It just makes you…unique.”

  Soraya glared at her.

  Jesmine put a hand on Soraya’s shoulder and gave it a comforting squeeze. “I still love you, and I’m positive so will Delilah. You might just need to give her time to adjust…assuming we can convince her that elves and monsters are real. You know how she can get.”

  Shaking her head, Soraya shrugged off Jesmine’s touch. “Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind. But we don’t know anything for sure yet,” she said stubbornly. She could feel the adrenaline seeping out of her, and it was being replaced with a bone-deep weariness that not even sleep would be able to fix at that point.

  “Well, I know one thing for sure,” Jesmine said with conviction. “Those monsters are after us, and that big creepy, zombie-looking one is bad news. And…I saw some other weird shit. Like, I wasn’t even on earth, kind of weird.” Soraya’s eyes widened. She wasn’t alone in that either. “It happened when I went to see my hookups. Remember? I texted you that evening and you were rightfully giving me shit for it?”

  Soraya said dryly, “Yeah, I remember. We had gotten dinner with Ahvi and split up afterward… I think that was the last time I saw her.”

  Soraya had gone to that odd shop after they had split up. She’d planned to question Laura, the shopkeeper, about the supernatural. The woman was as strange as her shop, and Soraya’s gut told her she might know something about their situation—maybe even help them out. Or call the cops. Either worked. At this point, Soraya had no better ideas for getting out of this mess.

  “Yes! And don’t give me that judging look—I wanted to see them again. They had told me they would only be in town for the next couple of days, and I wanted to seize the day. Or rather that—“

  “Jesmine, focus,” Soraya interrupted. She hadn’t forgotten Jesmine’s earlier hints about Ahvi, and she hoped whatever came next wasn’t as bad as she was making it out to be. Elf-fairy business aside, Ahvi was still their friend…at least she hoped that was the case.

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  “Right, right. Anyway, it was through Ahvi that we met these men, Right?”

  “The Midnight Jungle,” Soraya confirmed, tilting her head forward. Her hair slid across her face, and as she reached to brush it back, her fingers froze against the unfamiliar pointed curve of her ear.

  “Yeah. And the second time, those guys invited me to their hotel. Gave me these very odd instructions—know that I think about it.” Jesmine murmured that last part more to herself as she pulled off her bag and unzipped the little side pocket. She produced a hair tie and passed it to Soraya who accepted it with a tight smile.

  Ignoring her ears for now, Soraya arched an eyebrow while finger-combing her hair back from her face. “Seriously? They gave you weird instructions and you just…went anyway?” She questioned while snapping the hair tie in place to add emphasis to her disappointment.

  Jesmine flapped a hand. “Yeah, yeah. Whatever. What are you, my mother?”

  “Your real mother doesn’t care about you,” Soraya supplied.

  Jesmine rolled her eyes before continuing. “Well, the third time I went to see them, I was headed for their hotel, and I kept getting turned around. And for the life of me, I couldn’t remember where it was or anything. Then, I saw Ahvi crossing the street nearby where I thought their hotel was. And, I don’t know, she looked—anxious. She’s always cool calm and collected. So I knew something was up and I followed her. And wouldn’t you know it—she led me to the very hotel I was trying to find in the first place.”

  Soraya listened with rapt attention. Jesmine’s story was eerily similar to her own experiences. She recalled her journey to retrace her steps to find the bar Ahvi took them to, only to realize she’d forgotten where it was located.

  “And boom, I was at the hotel door—which, by the way, was in a place where a door shouldn’t be. It kind of reminded me of a speakeasy. A hidden door hiding a cool place and all that. It was inside some random alley, right smack in the middle of a brick wall.”

  Soraya didn’t say anything as an image of a pair of mirrored doors opening up to a sidewalk flashed through her mind.

  “So, I followed Ahvi through before the door closed and found myself back in their hotel lobby. It was actually a really bougie joint—though it was odd because now that I think about it, the door was in a completely different place than it had been when I went the first and second time, and the inside looked twice as big as the outside,” Jesmine scrunched her brows, no doubt the memories she’d lost coming back to her in the moment.

  Soraya knew exactly how she felt. Windows with an endless starry night sky stretching far off into the distance and an empty abandoned shop where a restaurant should have been quickly flashed through her mind. “Wait, when you went through the door, did you feel any pain at all?” Soraya asked, remembering her elevator ride down after—she quickly banished the thought away as her pulse quickened. She can share her story later.

  Jesmine furrowed her brow. “Not at all. Why?”

  Soraya shook her head. “Never mind, keep going.”

  “Okay, so I find myself in the hotel lobby,” Jesmine continued. “And before I could reach the stairs, I was stopped by this uppity bitch—and I mean she was something else.” Jesmine’s upper lip twitched. “She started asking weird questions, and then she started calling me a ‘halfbreed’—the fucking racist—and a, a—“

  Jasmine snapped her fingers rapidly as she tried to recall the word. Then snapped her fingers with finality and pointed at Soraya. “A ‘spec.’ No clue what that meant, so I laughed in her face and told her she was failing her fellow racists with that weak-ass slur, and then, get this—“ She leaned forward, eyes blazing. “This half-dressed hoe called me an ‘impure human filth!’”

  Soraya winced. She knew exactly where this story was going. Jesmine’s parents used to abuse her a lot when she was a kid. Called her names, but they’d especially liked to call her ‘filthy kid’ or ‘filthy child.’ It left a mark, among other things.

  “So, you know what this filthy human did?” Jesmine’s smiled wickedly.

  Soraya smirked. “You punched her.”

  Jesmine smacked her fist into her palm. “Right on her perfect nose. But damn, I have to admit, it felt like I was punching a brick wall—and then she screamed, causing a whole scene. And I may have cursed at her, I don’t know, it was all a blur.” She chuckled before sobering.

  “Then these two big guys showed up. I think they were hotel security, which, you know, I was expecting because by the looks of her and the hotel, she must’ve been loaded and you know how the rich are well protected.” She picked up a small stick near her leg, jabbing it into the dirt with a shrug. “I was prepared to go to jail.” She gestured to Soraya with the stick. “Didn’t even see them coming, mind you. I would have tried to run away so I wouldn’t have to call you down to the station.”

  “Appreciate the sentiment,” Soraya acknowledged as she noticed tension beginning to bracket her friend's shoulders.

  Jesmine gave her a slick smile, but it faded before it got the chance to bloom. “Then…well, before I could even take a step back to the door, they threw me to the ground and I was out.”

  Soraya spat a curse as anger flooded her system but held back from saying anything to allow Jesmine to finish. She pulled in a rose-scented breath and let it fill her lungs before slowly letting it trickle out.

  Jesmine tucked her legs in close, her eyes trained on the stick she was poking over and over again into the grass. “When I came too, I…I was in this really dark room. Laid out on some stone table. My clothes were gone, but I still had my bra and undies—and I could hear people talking.”

  The sound of a light wind rustling through the rose bushes was the only thing registering in Soraya’s head as every thought eddied out of her.

  “I tried not to make a sound, because whoever these guys were, they sure as shit weren’t cops. Or if they were, they were fucking dirty pigs.” Jesmine stabbed the stick deeper into the grass. “But one of them must have noticed I was awake because the next thing I knew, they were grabbing me. I tried to fight them off, but they were strong—too strong.”

  Soraya’s stomach clenched as nausea rolled through her.

  “They forced something down my throat—laughing like a bunch of psychos while they were doing it—and before I realize it…I’m hallucinating. At least I thought I was. The first thing I noticed about these scumbags was how odd looking they were. They… didn’t look human.” Jesmine shook her head. “They were too perfect, too…pretty. Their hair…their eyes—it was natural but unnatural. And then the second thing I noticed was their ears…” Her eyes flicked to the side of Soraya’s head, “Pointed ears. Like yours.”

  Soraya absorbed every word.

  “They were saying shit, but I wasn’t really understanding anything they were saying. I was looking for a way to escape—officially freaked out, you know. That’s when someone kicked the door down. And then they were there.” Jesmine smiled darkly. “The two men I’d been seeing. They outright just killed the bastards, cutting them down with swords like it was nothing. It was—“ She blew out a breath, “It was pretty hot, but I realized…they weren’t humans either. Pointed ears, glowing eyes…” Her brow furrowed. “They were…predators in human skin.”

  Soraya swallowed.

  “But they saved me and pulled one of their shirts over my head. And when we stepped outside…” Jesmine clutched the stick. “I knew we weren’t in L.A. anymore. And their hotel was a fucking stone palace cut into the side of a mountain. That place…it felt different. I think…I think I was in a different world.” Jesmine jammed her stick into the ground and met Soraya’s gaze.

  “When they brought me back to the lobby, I saw Ahvi there, and she was Ahvi but…not… and that’s when I realized she had pointed ears too. There was some shouting—on my end—and I rightfully didn’t trust anything she had to say about some organization she was a part of and that she was here to help you. I was too freaked out to think clearly, and I guess they knocked me out. By the time I woke up, Ahvi was carrying me to my room. I tried calling out to you, but she knocked me again—don’t know how she did it, but I know it was her doing.” Jesmine shook her head at the memory.

  Soraya recalled waking up to Jesmine screaming for her. The image of Ahvi flashed through her mind from that night, and she understood exactly what Jesmine was talking about. Ahvi had looked different. It was clear that Jesmine was able to see them for what they were because of the liquid the creeps had made her swallow.

  But for Soraya…nobody had forced her to drink any strange liquid the night she saw Makoto in all his savage beauty—like a predator, as Jesmine had said. So why was she able to?

  Jesmine’s words came back to haunt her:

  ‘I think you’re fae.’

  Soraya was no longer laughing.