Otherworld

Snow White: Part 1 [Ayo]

Snow White: Part 1

[Ayo]

Shit, shit, shit.

My heavy black Harley boots thumped against the cobblestones as I rounded a corner sharply and took off for another alleyway that was wedged between a brothel and a soup kitchen, ducking under a clothing line and doing a quick spin out of the way to duck into a doorway, breathing hard as I pressed myself flat against the entryway.

I held my breath a moment later, sensing the force chasing me moving down the street. I watched two men sprint past my hiding spot, moving right on down the alleyway toward the main street that led out of the redlight district. I waited a good five minutes after they had passed before I sighed in relief, reaching up to wipe sweat from my face.

That was close. Too close.

I reached into the black pouch that hung on the left side of my holster, then drew out a handful of ancient silver coins that glittered in the neon lights hanging from the brothel around me. The coins were double-sided with the image of a weeping willow on one side and the image of two crescent moons with a star on the other. The ancient powerful coins were more than just valuable pieces of silver, but had the ability to summon one of most powerful creatures in the known realms.

An Atlantean god named Xenon, god of rebirth. I'd heard most of his coins had disappeared in the past few decades, but a gang in the redlight district had been spreading rumors about having obtained a chestful of them. While they'd definitely been exaggerating, these were the most I'd ever seen. Eight of them, all glittering in my hand and would probably kill me if the gang found me.

They weren't my gang. They were a gang I'd dealt with before, one my parents would murder me over if they ever found out.

The Phoenix Pirates gang was infamous in Styx for human trafficking and collecting the rarest and most expensive of items that they normally sold on the black market down here. I'd bought a couple vials of opium from them before and managed to get my hands on a small baggy of medical marijuana for a friend once, but I hated dealing with them. They were a group of scruffy looking pirates is what they were.

And their leader was the worst. A huge mountain of a man with eerie gold eyes, the left side of his head shaved while the right was a waterfall of long straight black hair. Tribal tattoos from every culture I've ever heard of, and a few I haven't, marked his dark skin from head to toe, and he had enough muscle mass to give even my dad a run for his money. Almost anyway.

He was the worst. A flirty weirdo with a brain that Hades would love to dissect and an enigmatic mask that he tore off whenever he managed to get a hold of me. I shuddered to think what he'd do if he found out I'd been the one to run off with his coins. Normally, I would've bought the damn things off him, but the price he was asking was ridiculous and I'd have to ask my parents for the money and that would lead to a whole other war to be fought.

And right now, they couldn't be bothered with my problems, not with their new kids, Holly and Keros. A wave of bitterness swept over me as I slumped against the wall behind me, frowning down at the coins in my palm.

I didn't hate the twins, not really. It was too hard to hate innocent faces like that.

I just hated the fact that I hated the situation. I used to be able to follow Blaine all the time and I could talk to him about just about everything. Now, I couldn't even get him to come downstairs to make breakfast and because my cooking sucked, I'd had to eat city food for a while on money Cerberus had lobbed at me to make me go away when I harassed him for it earlier this month.

Basically, I didn't have time for them and they didn't have time for me. I was at the point in my life where I didn't really need them, and I shouldn't want them either. So it was time to focus on my life, not theirs. No matter how much it pissed me off.