Page 48 of Leviathan's Song
Private transportationlike my family’s was almost unheard of in the Boundlands. Most people took rails when they could and walked when they couldn’t. Some people rode animals or rickshaws, but more often than not, we walked. The very, very rich drove private cars that hovered just off the ground using the same magical tech as our public rails.
My parents had something all their own.
“What is that?” Levi’s voice was flat as I approached the door of my father’s transport. It was a construct made of metal, stone, and glass, looking somewhat similar to human cars, though my dad had only briefly seen one himself. He didn’t have enough human ancestry to make it long in the Void and found his few excursions there ‘baffling overall.’
Inside was spacious and comfortable, with seats in the front facing backward so everyone could converse during a trip. I took my bag from Ryo and tossed it onto the floor inside. “It’s a private transport. Ryo plugs into the front and powers it himself. Ryo, will you take us home, please?”
I climbed in first and turned around to see Levi hesitate just slightly before unslinging his pack and climbing in behind me. He sat heavily beside me, looking around with a slightly horrified expression. I reached across him and shut the door for him while Ryo stepped into an indentation in the front that was built to hold him, and pushed some of his power into the transport.
The air around me hummed with my father’s magic, reminding me of old-growth forests and springy ferns curling out from underfoot. The feeling was familiar and immediately calming, reminding me of hours spent playing in his workshop while he tinkered and built.
“What’s wrong?” I asked Levi. He looked like he’d just had an adrenaline dump and was headed toward fight instead of flight, leaning forward in his seat as we levitated slightly and began drifting down the street. “You’ve ridden a bus. Haven’t you ever ridden in a human car in the Void?”
“No,” he hissed slightly. “Do I look like I hang out with Voiders all day?” He bared his slightly too-pointy teeth to make his point and glanced out the window before sinking back in his seat. The interior of the cabin caught his attention, and he stared at the leather seats and clean lines of the interior walls. “What kind of Narnia shenanigans have you dragged me into?” he whispered mock-aggressively.
“Put your safety harness on.” I demonstrated, showing him how to click it into place across his lap. We weren’t really in danger of getting into a wreck the way humans did on a daily basis. There was no traffic here like there was in the Void, but occasionally, an animal would run out in the road and Ryo would have to come to an abrupt stop, sending us tumbling to the floor.
“Seriously, Elara, I knew you came from money, but this iscrazy.”
I shrugged, realizing he felt uncomfortable and not knowing what to do about it. “It’s not a big deal.” He looked at me like I had two heads.
“It’s not like it’smymoney, and they didn’t even buy this, my dad made it.” Kind of. He commissioned the transport and then created the heartstone sharing rig with Ryo by himself. That was the important part in my mind anyway.
Levi sighed and rubbed his face. “My anxiety about meeting your parents just quadrupled.”
“Dad won’t even be there today. My mom didn’t come from money, and she’s mostly human.” I frowned slightly, wondering about his reaction to the estate. “I should probably warn you that the house is quite large.”
“I figured.” He slid farther down in his seat, loosely gripping the straps of his backpack, which rested between his feet. I knew the disparity between our economic situations had the potential to cause problems, but I’d hoped that since it didn’t matter to me, it wouldn’t matter to him.
I watched him as his eyes took in the details of the cabin around him and the archway of trees looming over the road—actually the beginning of the long driveway leading to the estate—above us. His face radiated stress in the slashing lines of his eyebrows and the twitching muscle as he clenched and released his jaw.
My gaze drifted to the muscular lines of his neck, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed, and the indentation in the muscles above his collarbones. He caught me looking, and I felt my cheeks heat.
“I can’t believe I took you to my dad’s. What are you even doing with someone like me?” he asked despondently.
“Because I want you,” I answered curtly, feeling irritated. I knew I was already a little in love with him, though it felt too early to admit such a thing, even to myself. Did he think money affected how I felt about a person? “What kind of question is that?”
Even as I asked it, I felt myself grow defensive about what kind of person he was accusing me of being—not to mention the category he placed himself in—and firmly shoved that line of thinking back. This was insecurity, plain and simple, and I wasn’t going to allow it to be a wedge between us. “Don’t answer that. We are not our families’ financial stations. It doesn’t matter to me, and I had hoped it wouldn’t matter to you.”
I reached out and squeezed his hand as Ryo brought our transport to a stop in front of the main gates to the estate house. He released a deep sigh as we pulled to a stop. This conversation would have to wait.
“That’s… a lot of dogs,” he said, and I looked up to see the bulk of my parent’s pack of mastiffs jumping at the gate.
My answering grin stretched my face so hard it hurt. I loved these dogs so much. My family had been breeding them for generations, and my dad had always had a special interest in their training and pedigrees. He also liked having them as guard dogs for when my mom was home and he couldn’t be.
“Don’t touch them or talk to them, please. No eye contact.”
Ryo opened my door and reached in for my bags, backing up to let me out once he had retrieved them. I stepped out and raised my closed right fist to my sternum, and as one, the dogs sat and the barking stopped. Until the youngest popped back up, all wiggle-butt puppy enthusiasm, and I sighed in spite of myself. He was the sweetest boy, but my father obviously hadn’t been putting the time into him that he usually invested in them.
Ryo unlatched the gate, and I stepped through, pausing to place my hand on the exuberant puppy’s rump and guide him into a sitting position again, before reaching back to take Levi’s hand and leading him through the pack. The oldest dogs waited patiently, the younger ones quivering with energy and excitement as we made our way to the front steps. It gutted me a bit not to have the time today to spend with them like I normally did.
The manor was built of stone and was large for elven standards (we had notoriously low birth rates), complete with manicured gardens, a sweeping tower, and defensible parapets. It was, in essence, a small castle, set atop a craggy hill, surrounded on all sides by a wide, rolling meadow. The grass eventually gave way to deep forest, but off to the side and further back from the house sat the family crypt, which served as both the entrance to the catacombs and a place of residence for the sentries we’d come to retrieve.
But first I planned to raid the fridge and give my mom a hug.
One of the large wooden doors into the main keep swung open and there she was, looking younger than a full human would by at least two decades, all pale skin and dark-brown hair. The only thing that gave a hint at her age were the wisps of grey hair beginning to form at her temples.
People often remarked about how I took after my dad in features, but while my skin was closer to my father’s darker elven grey, my small build and dark hair mirrored my mother’s. Our taste in clothing had always been our most noticeable difference. Where I preferred blouses that were loose fitting and billowy, or slouchy like the sweater I wore today, my mom always dressed in conservative, understated, high-necked affairs.
