“You look exhausted, Mrs. Johnston.”
I stared into her sunken eyes, rimmed with dark circles. My joints ached for a split second and then subsided. I saw the redness and swelling… the stiffness… They flashed like snapshots in my mind. Instantly I knew her fingers ached when she played the piano, and I knew her stomach ulcer kept her up at night. One touch could take it all away. But Gran had enforced the keep-your-hands-to-yourself rule at an early age.
“Oh, Lorelei, you know… story of my life, hon.” She glanced up at the oversized, walnut-framed blackboard with the specials scrawled in chalk, and handed me her menu. “Bring me the usual, will you? And a slice of that famous lemon pie?”
“You got it.”
The café was swamped tonight, the sudden cold snap meant lots of aches and flu bugs. People flocked to the Lemon Balm Café and Tea House for the ambiance as much as they did for the herbal tea.
I poured steaming water into the clear glass teapot. This wasn’t your typical English breakfast blend. Well, it was… but with a few extras added in. Then again, this wasn’t your typical tea house, and I wasn’t your typical teen. Not even close.
The freak label got smacked on my forehead long before I understood what it meant to be a clairsentient empathic healer. Basically, I can see when people are in pain, and well… heal them. Being gifted might sound great; but it’s meant a lifetime of trying to hide what I can do, and why, just to blend. In a town the size of Drearyton Cove, population sixty-three hundred, blending, was nearly impossible. After the quote-unquote incident, it was safer to leave the healing to Gran’s secret blend of teas.
“Witnessing a child who could heal with the touch of a hand would be too much for people around here,” she’d said. And so I listened — mostly — keeping my hands to myself, and staying far away from sports, parties, and people, which were no more than accidents waiting to happen. Not only for the obvious reasons: accidents meant injuries, injuries meant blood. Nothing made me hit the floor faster than that bitter, metallic stench of blood.
Fire And Ice (Faerie Song Trilogy 1) Description:
Adventure wasn’t something Lorelei was interested in. Gifted with two otherworldly talents for singing and healing, she’s always shied away from her gifts, preferring solitude, over attention. But when she meets Adrius, with his dangerous mystique and eyes that peer into her soul, her uneventful life becomes irrevocably altered.
Adrius knows more about her than any newcomer should, including the condition of her mother’s mysterious illness. Accepting his offer to help leads her into a terrifying world, where Elves are more lethal than Legolas, and Faeries…. are nothing like Tinkerbell. The two magical beings are fire and ice opposites.
One Lorelei can’t help falling for, and the other she’s compelled to be with. Now she’s trapped in their world, expected to prevent a war between witches and faeries, or forfeit her mother’s life. As secrets unravel, Lorelei must fight to save much more than her mother’s life. One mistake could put the fate of thier world- and her soul, in jeopardy.
