The Paranormal Council

Chapter 2

2

“I have a good feeling about tonight,” her sister said from her position lounging on Lia’s bed.

“You have a good feeling about every night!” She laughed. While everyone knew that Aella had a temper, she was also surprisingly optimistic, and her announcing that she ‘had a good feeling’ before an evening event was completely normal for Lia, so much so that she tended to ignore it. She also tended to have much more realistic expectations than her sister. Though there was one night, a year ago, that Aella had been right about. Lia forced herself to concentrate, knowing that she couldn’t get lost in her memories of that night while her sister was in the room. And memories seemed to be all she could have, she hadn’t seen the man since, no matter how hard she looked for him whenever they went back to the club.

“This one more than normal. Have you picked a dress yet?” Lia sighed at Aella’s question. She loved wearing formal gowns as much as the next woman, but she hated heels and had never quite got used to them. Her dryad nature had never allowed her to get past the preference for bare feet, even at formal events like this one.

“I’m thinking the blue one.” She pushed through the various dresses in her wardrobe, each of them a pale pastel colour. She knew that it made her fade into the background a bit, especially when compared to her sister’s bolder choices, but if she was honest, she liked it that way. Aella rolled her eyes.

“Why don’t you borrow one of mine?” She asked that almost every time. While there was a couple of years between them, they were the same size, and almost identical apart from Lia’s blonde hair and Aella’s dark brown. Even their eyes were the same moss green, a result of their dryad heritage.

“Would this one not do?” She ignored Aella’s question and pulled out a pale blue backless dress. The neckline was high, and the skirt of the dress fell down to her feet like a waterfall. When she’d tried it on in the shop, it had almost looked like the ripples on the top of a stream when she’d moved, and despite its conservative nature, she’d felt beautiful.

“Least its backless.” Aella wrinkled her nose and leapt to her feet gracefully. She didn’t look back at her sister until she got to Lia’s open bedroom door. “One day I’ll convince you to go bolder.” She flicked her hair over her shoulder, a move that Lia had never been able to replicate, and left, probably to spend her time primping. Lia sighed again, holding the blue dress up to her body so she could see it in the mirror. Hanging the dress over the top of her wardrobe, happy with her decision, she collapsed on her bed and picked up the book she’d been reading. She had a few hours before the reception started and there was no way that she was going to spend all of them getting ready. She’d only read a few pages when the story dragged her in and she soon forgot that anything else was going on around her.

It wasn’t until the light faded, and it became too dark for her to make out the words, that she realised quite how much time had passed, leaving her with just half an hour to get ready. She knew she could do it, but that didn’t stop her cursing her stupidity; rushing getting ready was never fun.

Luckily, this wasn’t the first time that Lia had left herself short on time before a big function, and she quickly donned her dress. The silky material felt good against her skin, and she was pleased to see that the dress looked as good on her as it had when she’d bought it. She braided her hair into a fishtail plait that fell over her shoulder and almost to her waist. She kept her makeup simple with just a small amount of liner around her eyes; she’d done it like that since she’d discovered how much she hated the caked on feeling a lot of makeup brought on. All she needed now were some shoes. Grimacing, Lia made her way to the rack in her wardrobe which contained dozens of pairs of shoes in various colours and styles. While it would have been most women’s dream to have such a large collection, looking at them filled Lia with dread, and it took several minutes of forced contemplation for her to settle on a pair of pale gold sandals. It wasn’t quite going barefoot, but at least they didn’t have heels. She gave herself an appraisal in the mirror, happy with how the outfit looked, but there was one final touch she needed. She walked towards the corner of her room, where a small cherry blossom tree was growing from the floor. Most people would probably think she was somewhat eccentric for having a tree growing from the floor of her room, but as a dryad, she needed her tree near her in order to ground her. Lia wasn’t all that sure how the magic worked, but having their tether near them was important to all kinds of nymphs, not just those linked to trees. She also wasn’t sure what would happen if she was too far away from it for too long. She was sure that a nymph somewhere must have tried it, but whenever she’d asked her father about anything to do with their powers, he’d just clam up and not tell her.

“Xylia!” Her father’s voice boomed through the halls, making her jump; she hadn’t been expecting to hear anyone calling her full name. She’d started going by Lia when she was just twelve, thinking Xylia sounded pretentious and that wasn’t how she wanted people to see her. Now, the only person who ever called her Xylia was her father, and even then, he didn’t call her it often.

“Coming!” She shouted back, reaching up to pick one of the tree’s flowers. The one she chose was so pale that it almost looked white, and she tucked it into the tie of her plait, the delicate scent comforting in a way that she couldn’t explain. The cherry blossom was a tradition that she’d started when she was a little girl, feeling like she was close to her tether made her feel more at ease in social situations, and while she’d grown out of some of that, there was a still a part of her that dreaded them.