Short Story Excerpt: Girl Plus WTF

I figured I'd start the new year with my first blogged story excerpt. Probably not going to be a long one, but let's see where it goes...

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Struggling on the edges of sleep, she labored to open eyes sealed shut by the day old lash tint she forgot to remove.

'She' was a good start. Definitely a girl, but the rest of the details of her life eluded her. She had gone to sleep in her own bed, vaguely recalling that she'd caught a whiff of those sheets and added 'bed laundry' to her to-do list the next day.

This definitely wasn't her own bed. For one, the sheets smelled like honeysuckle and she didn't own any such dressing gown as the one encasing her outstretched arm. Or any such dress-like fashion at all for that matter.

Ryleigh (her name, doing good so far) pushed her arms forward, freezing in place as she felt some foreign appendages behind her stretching in the opposite direction.

She shouldn't have any such muscle memory for how to move whatever was back there at all, yet it folded like an arm at her willing it do so and she smacked herself in the cheek with a bevy of silky white feathers.

A very inhuman squawk escaped her lips. In a sudden frenzy of flapping wings, she simultaneously dislodged herself from the bed and managed to tangle herself in the previously unseen canopy above her. Ryleigh tumbled to the floor, screaming bloody murder from the colorful swirl of limb-trapping fabrics.

The sound of a door and the scuffling of feet cut through her humiliation, the gentle peals of laughter at her expense only adding to the assault on her pride.

"My lady, still yourself. You're only making it worse" came the patronizing voice of the intruding female.

Ryleigh complied but rebellion still exploded from her being and on a stream of colorful vocabulary.

Number one, let's do away with this 'my lady' nonsense.

"Vile woman, what have you done to me?" Ryleigh sputtered, disentangling herself from the offending pile of sinfully soft silks.

Vile woman? Really? Now she was doing it too.

"Not a thing, my lady. I just came to wake you but it seems you're an early bird."

Oh, ha ha. Early bird, get it? Yuk yuk and har de har. At least the woman wasn't self-satisfied with that little pun. It was probably more infuriating that the uniformed woman's face was so serene and serious instead. And oh yeah, the 'my lady' thing.

"Ryleigh. Not 'my lady'."

"Fair enough, and I'm Lyta, not 'vile woman.'"

Ryleigh didn't want to like this woman but couldn't help a smile at the quick wit.

"What kind of horror show are you running here, Lyta?" Ryleigh emphasized the name with a venomous punch. "You get your jollies sewing wings onto people's backs?"

Ryleigh might have suspected the stoic woman was simply a victim of too much Botox if not for the sudden lift of eyebrows at the accusation.

"I'm not sure how hard you hit your head on that tumble but those are the same ones you fell asleep with. Indeed, the same ones you were born with. I assure you there's no trick involved."

"Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids."

Humor was her best defense but she might have spoken another language for all of the recognition this Lyta gave for the comeback.

Ryleigh's eyes swept around the room again. No televisions or computers or any of the commonplace things she might find in her home. Still not uncommon in a prison though. In its place were many not-so-commonplace things that told her this was probably a place without cereal featuring cartoon rabbits.

Her eyes found Lyta once more, noting that despite Lyta's assurance that her wings were commonplace, Lyta had no wings of her own. She did, however, sport a wicked set of pointy ears. Ryleigh's hand drifted to her own ears, relieved to feel their familiar roundness was still intact.

Ryleigh narrowed her eyes as the woman's words rekindled in instant replay.

"And when exactly was I born?"

Lyta's expression became bored and a frustrated sigh escaped her lips.

"Apparently yesterday," Lyta mumbled before her eyes softened with sympathy. "I realize you've suffered quite the ordeal. Your parents died just days ago and you've barely moved since. You not only take the title of Lady of Aldivan but you've been summoned to the King's Council on the eve of war."

Ryleigh blinked incredulously. She was pretty sure last night she had talked to her parents on the phone, although she had been somewhat incapacitated, bloated from polishing off a bag of Cheetos. She had a Level 60 battlemage on Skyrim. Unless Cincinnati was about to start a war with Canada, she was also pretty sure that nothing Lyta was saying made one bit of sense.

Ryleigh got to her feet, not without taking out what could have been a lamp on the table behind her with one unaccounted-for wing. She cringed as the shattering sound of glass punctuated her nonexistent grace.

"Whatever drugs you're on, I need some."

Lyta's rueful smile told her that this incomprehensible babble was no joke.

"My name's still Ryleigh, right?"

Lyta nodded and Ryleigh expelled a pent-up breath.

It was a start.

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