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Description

"Hold me down, hold me down
Sneaking out the back door, make no sound
Knock me out, knock me out
Saying that I want more, this is what I live for
Hold me down, hold me down
Throw me in the deep end, watch me drown
Knock me out, knock me out
Saying that I want more, this is what I live for"

Halsey ~ Hold Me Down

A gorgeous spring afternoon in Pineshadow has struck again. Not a cloud blocks a patch of the clear cyan sky, and the sun radiates its rays onto the plants below, giving photosynthesis and cellular respiration the ability to happen. A wonderful thing for the plants, an everyday commodity to learn for the science class.

Like the blooming flowers and tall grasses a lawnmower has yet to whack down at Pinelake Park, the three girls that occupy it as their home base are flourishing with recommenced life... or rather, one watches as her two best friends make a world of dark fantasy arise from the still pages of a book.

What could possibly go wrong?

A hot streak of improvement in the past few days had put Evie, Mya, and Winter in an elated mood, and relaxing in the Saturday sun had only made their moods shoot past elated and into a solar system of blissful content.

As for Evie and Mya, it had been a whimsical day since the two had woke up, checked the notifications on their phones, and ran together to the Barnes & Noble at the mall to pick up the latest installment in a book series so gay, so holy, so dark, and so captivating, that they felt physically in the world of Nero once more...

"We're now entering Aether and the Confessor Within! A villain even spookier and dirtier than Vira, judging from her stare..." Mya observed, putting a hand on the Confessor's vine-strewn chest, which had a glowing pink ruby embedded in it.

"She must have plant-based magic... but why call her the Confessor if her magic involves plants? It grinds my gears!" Evie exclaimed, putting a finger under the cover.

"Well, Ev, let's start reading and find out... and while we're at it, let's become Aether and Nori once more. I'm Nori, as always."

"I'll be Aether, then. Let's go back to Nero and kick some ass!"

"Woo!"

Up in the tree the girls sat directly under, Winter was stretched out on the thickest tree branch closest to the ground, resting on her belly and watching her sister and friend jump into their alternate world of unbridled fantasy.

Lovebirds. It's like they've forgotten I'm here... but that book series is for them and them only. Who would I be in there? That one cabin kid who's too meek to talk?

She smiled, unable to hide the fact that she enjoyed Evie and Mya's happiness. In her darkest hours, they were there for her, and their joy made her cranky, reclusive self bloom like a Pacific bleeding heart in the Pineshadow spring... their infection was contagious.

She wanted them to keep making her sicker, and so she gazed at them with a small sigh, grin willfully showcased.

"Heyyyy babe," Evie read as Aether, placing a hand under Mya's chin and pulling it close to hers, her tone matching the implied seductiveness of Aether's. "Life's been so antagonizing to us lately. Let's work out the knots, shall we?"

"Oh, you know I can't refuse you when you've caught me in your trap like this," said Mya, portraying Nori, who gave her conceit to "Aether" and bowed down in their lap. "I'll fulfill what it is you demand."

Winter propped herself up, lightly chuckling at Mya's position and how Evie was blushing, but smiling, ready to continue on with the romantic ambience. Both of you are demanding something...

Switching to the role of narrator, Evie spoke aloud, "Aether slid their hands over to the pale-skinned ones of Nori, their fingers latching together, inseparable and warm. They reeled their girlfriend in, and she blinked her beautiful brown eyes, their magic putting the fire-tempered Aether into a trance. Like the strike of a clock's second hand, their faces sprang at each other, nose-to-nose, and the bliss was a rapture that could have made the desert in Nero part for summery forests."

Mya, playing along in her role as Nori, pressed her nose to Evie's and rubbed it; Evie's thoughts of being narrator lapsed for a second as she returned the feeling, rubbing along. Her soul rumbled, pleased with this romantic heaven, but oh, she needed more, and Mya. A sting in the heart became an ache, and the two saw their eyes meet.

They had to continue on, and Evie resumed from where she left them hanging.

"A flash of fire in Aether's eyes perfectly enumerated her desire, and embers flew. Their hair bobbed behind their shoulders as Nori's face became entangled in theirs, lips crashing into one, and the sweetness was making them needlessly greedy for each other's love, and warmth-"

Not even bothering to give her the time to finish, Mya flung herself onto Evie and kissed her hard. Oh my god, Evie was burning up with a fever so scarlet in love that her skin sprouted in goosebumps. But she couldn't ever say no to this, this love, this passion, not when her heart could burst and her blood vessels could combust and she'd turn blues and blacks from being deprived of air, but she needed this.

Reminding herself to breathe, her soul convinced her to rise back up, but this time, it was her turn to play along. She threw her lips to Mya's, coming into contact with honey-and-sugar taste mingled in, and losing herself in love's neverendding grip, she fought back against the rush of the tide and the adrenaline putting her heart into a hot pursuit of that ecstasy. Kisses went to making out, but before they became tangled and face-down in the grass, a laugh from a tree had brought them back to reality.

"You two are alarmingly committed to this book series!" Winter yelled, watching them with amusement, bright as a ruby, on her face, and their faces became red, but not like it mattered. Winter didn't read the Aether series, of course she wouldn't understand the thrill.

"Wait until you get a girlfriend, you adorable dork! You're gonna be babbling around like a moron!" Mya retorted, blowing a raspberry at her sister, who caved, blushed, and retreated to her silence, again watching the girls from her perch.

"You sure you don't want to hop down and read, Winter? We know you love anything gay!" Evie reminded her, but Winter shook her head and sat up on her branch, swinging her legs to and fro, catching the sun rays through the dappled leaves of the oak tree.

"No thanks! Aether is a world meant for you... I have my own hobbies tugging my brain fibers twenty-four seven!"

Suit yourself, then. More badassery for us, Mya believed with an exclamation point, and taking the book from Evie, she picked up the role as narrator and put her narrating gear to high.

"-and warmth. Nori kissed back, her hands loosely but instinctively climbing up Aether's back, reaching for her shirt collar. Crackling with the sun's flares, and driven mad with love-harkened speed, Aether's response was to place their chin near their girlfriend's shoulder blade, and then, making it known in the heat of their moment, they sharply bit down on Nori's neck and-"

Mya, lowering the book, paused awkwardly, and the realm of Pineshadow hit her square in the forehead. Swearing part of her cranium had been lost, misplaced, or that she had just read wrong, she read the page slowly from where she left off, her eyes going wider and wider.

"Oh, that's not-"

She finished the page, gently placing the book in Evie's lap. She let the hell break loose in her system.

"IT BURNS! Aaaaaaah! No! I did not need to know that, I did not need to see that!"

She flopped into the grass and rolled around, and befuddled, Evie picked up and read the page for herself. It wasn't that bad, right? Surely a bit of roughhousing wouldn't lead to-

"What in the name of Pineshadow's green earth?! What- I thought these books were marketed for teenagers!"

Winter, having listened to the commotion, grew concerned and faced Evie from where she sat in the tree. "Unpleasantries?"

Evie sighed, her stare going deadpan, and her left eye twitched with frustration. "I want several years of my life back."

"Give me bleach! My eyes... my poor untrained eyes!" Mya hollered, still rolling around in the grass with hands on their face. Oh, out of all of the things she could have predicted, she could have not imagined Aether and Nori (both eighteen) doing... that.

Winter had solved the puzzle, to say the least, and a repulsed ick sounded from her. That content had to be handled with care! "Well, forget the book. Get up here, idiots. Kept the branch toasty for you."

"I greatly appreciate that, Win," Evie thanked, prepared to make the climb up, and Mya, rubbing the grit and what the hell out of her eyes, readied herself to do the same.

But at the same moment, another human, small and timid, had entered their space of humored discord and acres of fantasyland. She'd overheard much of the nonsensical screaming and yelling, and, to her, the impressions left behind were fun.

Fun that she needed when life was continually seeking an opportunity to kick her to the curb.

Amira was walking in with no context, and she had no clue what her friends were going berserker about in the grass, but who's to say she wasn't going to have fun when all three of her friends were smiling and having the time of their lives?

She dashed up to them with incredible speed and waved. "Hey guys!"

Evie and Mya had forgone their mission to climb up the tree in an instant, and hearts inflating with giddiness, they skipped up to Amira, and Evie clutched the book under her right arm.

"Amira!" Mya greeted. "Back in action today?"

"Yeah, suppose so. You two seemed busy." She tugged at her sweater collar, raising it higher above her neck, and another hand tugged at the bottom of it.

"We were bawling our eyes out over the latest Aether book," Evie commented, showing the cover to Amira, who analyzed it curiously and whistled.

"Hoo. Is it good?"

"So good we might have forgotten the series is tagged for older audiences."

"Oh." Amira, flustered, bit her lip and looked at the grass awkwardly, shaking herself out of the implications of that and wringing her hands together. "Besides what you... got tortured with, did you deal with anything else?"

"Change anything to anyone, and you got your answer there, Amira," drawled Winter from her place in the tree, and swiftly remembering that she was up there, Amira peered up into playful ice-blue eyes. Her essence, bunched up in knots, was placed at ease.

"Guess who's principal abused her power to twist and bend the rules to make us comform to bullcrap bigotry?"

Shetani!? Oh god, not again... Amira frowned, her eyes narrowing, and her heart, so evenly aligned with the girls' rhythm and pride, dropped to the bottom of her stomach and beat with an unhinged tilt.

Their newest principal, one who apparently prided herself on firmness, stricter rules, and a team effort rebuild... was a bigot. A hefty bigot. The girls had tried to have hope that she'd grow lenient with time, but now? Shetani had trounced her words and was taking the mantle for herself.

What she's always wanted... power. She almost shuddered, but she remembered her time and place and kept still. Her friends needn't worry about her. She was perfectly okay.

"Shetani, isn't it? What did she do now?" she questioned with a forced nuance in her voice, and Evie stepped forward, hand smacking Mya's shoulder. She smacked hers.

"She added multitudes of rules targeting our clothing, school safety, education, you name it. It was ridiculous. The entire school was ready to engage in a full-blown riot!"

"However," Evie added, her eyes lingering on Mya's lovingly, and Amira made a half-smile, "we didn't just stand around and let Shetani knock us down. We had to fly higher and scream loud to make her hear reason - and our duty became clear when Shetani tried to profile Winter for her hairstyle."

"Profile? As in target?" Amira asked, a hand flying over her shocked mouth. That was horrifying!

Stalked because her hair was against her rules... why do I feel so numb?

"Basically what it was, creepy and screwed up," Winter remarked, tasting tartness on her tongue. She hopped down from the tree, positioning herself next to Mya and gripping her hand, relaxing her riled temper with the softness of her palm.

"Thankfully, and unfortunately, I wasn't the one to face Shetani's idea of torture and comformity. She chose Mya instead when she stood up for me, and she got assaulted, emotionally and physically... I can't describe it without feeing sick to my stomach."

"Me neither," Evie growled, and Mya nodded. Amira, disgusted, hugged her belly, her brown eyes flashing with discontent and worry that added to the chains wrapped around her heart.

What... what was she doing in there?? She promised me she wouldn't...

Her eyes began to itch, and her fingers tapped her belly. No! No weakness! They can't know!

"Mya, are you alright after all that? It sounds... it sounds so wicked..."

"Mostly. I'm still recovering in places, but Shetani didn't stop me from confessing everything. We immediately accosted her the next day, and I got the guts to sock it straight to her. She relented by the end of the day and reversed her rules, barring the politics rule she implemented on her first day."

"Without Mya, we wouldn't be where we are now," Evie concluded, peppering her cheek in a few kisses before turning to an awestruck, relieved Amira again. "We have made progress, but we have leagues to go until we get our personal freedoms back. Shetani doesn't want us to express ourselves... but scripts and stories can be flipped. We fight on, we march on."

Amira brought herself to finally smile completely. The girls were defiant. They could scale the walls of a fortress and come out unscathed. They were beloved heroes, for crying out loud! Shetani was a demon to reckon with, but if even she could bow to the girls and install change in place of stoking an environment of radical partisanship, if she could be forced to obey rebellion...

There could be a new beginning.

"Shetani..." Amira flinched briefly mentioning the name of that sycophant principal, but stood upright and rubbed her neck, scratching a rough patch of her skin there. "It's wonderful you managed to wrangle some of your liberties out from her hands. I can't imagine dealing with someone as horrid as she is, gosh..."

She began to scratch her neck more intensely, keeping her words sealed behind her teeth - the girls couldn't know that she, in fact, was dealing with Shetani.

Because they were kin, or in Shetani's distorted worldview, master and slave. Yet, as all mighty as Shetani was, the girls had trumped her in her game of chess... for now.

She'll win more. I know she will. But perhaps the girls can stall her progress?

She stopped scratching her neck, her skin screaming for less pain, and she took her hand away. Then, Winter gasped, making her jolt and shift her feet.

"What? Everything okay?" she prompted.

"Amira, there's bruises on your neck!"

Christ! Amira, curling her fingers in and out, couldn't control her breathing, and she inhaled a few times rapidly before shoving the excess air down within her.

She had covered them up and kept them out of sight... they were ugly things, things they didn't need to see, things they needn't know... given that their origin was reared in hate.

Swallowing her history, she shrugged it off and played the game she had studied for years and mastered: denial.

"Whoa, it's nothing, don't worry!" she assured sweetly, prising open a shiny white smile to overtake the frame of her face. "I just tripped and clipped the corner of a table. Not the greatest experience on earth, but I'm here and walking, y'know."

"Yowch. Sorry that happened. Table corners are agony," Mya joked, many flashbacks to her childhood simultaneously occuring, and her eyes clouded with a stare lasting for thousands of meters past Amira.

Amira casually pulled her sweater collar up higher again, resting midway around her throat, where, shielded snugly underneath the blue fabric, was a leather contraption and a tag so humiliating she felt sweat trailing down her back at the notion of it being uncovered.

Buy it, please buy it, don't ask me more questions-

Luckily, the girls didn't suspect anything amiss about her behavior and quiet movements. They were denser than water when it came to the truth, and Amira preferred it to be that way.

"Sweater getting loose on you?" Evie inquired, and Amira deflected the question off again, scratching her short mess of dark brown hair.

"A little. Nothin' I can't handle."

But she couldn't handle it behind the scenes, and when neither of her friends had their eyes upon her and had ceased their questions, Amira looked away, back toward where she came, in that house on Burlsberry Lane, silent with lackluster bushes in the front, quaint, peaceful when it was anything but peaceful.

She didn't want to be there now, think of there now, when her heart was screaming at her to stay. Get away from Shetani, from spine-crushing work, the painful threats and abuse, being treated like a plaything instead of a human.

Everything was never as it seemed, but for the girls, they were painfully oblivious. It killed Amira inside to have to do this to people she'd befriended, but this was for the best. They had to remain safe, and she had to fulfill Shetani's wishes of granting her a passage to power.

Evie, noticing that she'd gone eerily still and was glancing back out at the neighborhood longingly, trotted up to her and tapped her on the shoulder. She yelped, turning around, but relaxed and patted herself down.

"Oh, sorry! I didn't meant to startle you out of your thoughts. You appeared to be somber. Everything alright?" she prompted gently, and Amira nodded.

"Yeah. I daydream a lot... and last night, I was hopelessly sleepless."

"Oof. Insomnia is a freak," Winter muttered. "Sleep better tonight, Amira."

"Knock yourself out, Ami!" Mya chimed in excitedly, bouncing on her toes around Amira. Some news could bring some light and jubilee into the sleep-deprived girl's spirit.

"Me and Evie are having a full "date day" tomorrow. We're spending every hour together, invading the mall, eating at the mall, and then sleeping over at her place. It's gonna be epic!"

"We're probably gonna be up all night, but I'm willing to do an all-nighter if Mya wants to. It's not like homework is trying to gnaw at my bones right now," Evie quipped, pulling her happy-go-lucky girlfriend into her for a hug and more kisses, and Amira turned her head.

"Aww... that's sweet. You guys are lucky." Luckier than I ever will be, having all these privileges... but I can't be jealous when you two have worked through the catacombs to get where you are now.

"And I'll have my own company to get me by. I'm leaving the tomfoolery to the girls this time around," Winter stated with a pleased grin on her face and a wink at her sister, who winked back, snapped her fingers, and made a clicking sound with her tongue. They chuckled.

Winter noticed Amira's shy, small smile on her face, and the way her small, dark brown eyes saw Evie and Mya and saw the love, the happiness... she felt it too, the butterflies, the company of friends...

Idea. A lightbulb flickered on in Winter's head. She was used to being a loner and spending her days in her own solitary confinement, a land of wonder that could do anything she pleased as long as her waking dream was in balance... and she'd let her friends in on that dream, and they'd expanded it.

Her waking dream had obviously evolved now from a necessary survival skill to a hazy pasttime, but that didn't mean someone else should be denied the action and thrill of chasing an imagination created skillfully by design.

"Actually, let me rephrase that. I'll leave the toomfoolery to Evie and Mya unless someone else wants to hang out with me for the afternoon. Amira, would you like to accompany me?"

Although her ears were hidden enough by her hair, Amira felt them glow red, and she blushed from the honor that had been bestowed onto her.

Winter, her newest friend, inviting her to hang out alone for the afternoon. The two of them, getting into hijinks, learning each other and doing the things friends did. She'd never heard anyone ask for her to chill with them. She smoothed herself down, biting her lip anxiously, but being with Winter - oh!

Being with Winter, a sweet and hilarious and adventurous person... that sounded fun. Fun. An escapist's dream of fun!

"O-Okay! I'll join you when I'm done with my chores!"

"Awesome!" Winter replied in glee, hopping up to her side. "I can't wait for tomorrow."

"I can't wait for tomorrow too," Amira agreed, meeting Winter's pretty ice-blue eyes and smiling, giggling with her and flexing her hands, and she flexed hers, and their movements mirrored near-exactly.

"They're beans, aren't they, My?" Evie asked Mya, who nodded.

"I love seeing people make friends."

Amira ended up talking to Winter for longer than she intended, but what she didn't notice was the way her eyes shone with this affection, saccharine and made of crystal, that remained there even after she left, barely comprehending what she had agreed to.

A day out with her friend. Just the two of them and a bunch of imagination to fill and spread around.

On paper, she didn't have to worry about a single thing. She could be carefree, skipping back home to yap about the news to a family that loved her...

...but in reality, this was a meeting she'd have to bury with her intestines. Shetani would be infuriated if she found out she agreed to something as prepostorous as this.

Talking with an outsider, her enemy... ah, why did I agree to this??? If Shetani gets the memo, she's going to want to see scars on my skin and tears in my eyes...

But Winter, she's just so... great. She's so friendly, one of the sweetest people I ever met... I don't want to be a no-show and disappoint her. I have to make this work for you, Winter... I want to see you.

Amira was trapped in between two worlds, each pulling her back and forth. She could either appease her aunt, remain her loyal slave that followed her every command and lapped up her teachings like holy water in the desert.

Or she could fracture the chains to her body and constantly escape to be with the girls, who always treated her like an equal, saw her as her equal, and gave her attention that wasn't cruelty or beatings.

Amira only had one choice to make - and neither presented an outcome that spelled out anything different from her hiding dangerous secrets from two parties, one that controlled her, and one that appreciated her.

And now that the sole three to appreciate and acknowledge her existence were becoming mainstays in her life... she began to dread what would happen if even the tiniest secret, a secret no lighter than a grain of sand, slipped out from behind her lips.

Catch Shocking Secret on March 30th!

Description

"Hold me down, hold me down
Sneaking out the back door, make no sound
Knock me out, knock me out
Saying that I want more, this is what I live for
Hold me down, hold me down
Throw me in the deep end, watch me drown
Knock me out, knock me out
Saying that I want more, this is what I live for"

Halsey ~ Hold Me Down

A gorgeous spring afternoon in Pineshadow has struck again. Not a cloud blocks a patch of the clear cyan sky, and the sun radiates its rays onto the plants below, giving photosynthesis and cellular respiration the ability to happen. A wonderful thing for the plants, an everyday commodity to learn for the science class.

Like the blooming flowers and tall grasses a lawnmower has yet to whack down at Pinelake Park, the three girls that occupy it as their home base are flourishing with recommenced life... or rather, one watches as her two best friends make a world of dark fantasy arise from the still pages of a book.

What could possibly go wrong?

A hot streak of improvement in the past few days had put Evie, Mya, and Winter in an elated mood, and relaxing in the Saturday sun had only made their moods shoot past elated and into a solar system of blissful content.

As for Evie and Mya, it had been a whimsical day since the two had woke up, checked the notifications on their phones, and ran together to the Barnes & Noble at the mall to pick up the latest installment in a book series so gay, so holy, so dark, and so captivating, that they felt physically in the world of Nero once more...

"We're now entering Aether and the Confessor Within! A villain even spookier and dirtier than Vira, judging from her stare..." Mya observed, putting a hand on the Confessor's vine-strewn chest, which had a glowing pink ruby embedded in it.

"She must have plant-based magic... but why call her the Confessor if her magic involves plants? It grinds my gears!" Evie exclaimed, putting a finger under the cover.

"Well, Ev, let's start reading and find out... and while we're at it, let's become Aether and Nori once more. I'm Nori, as always."

"I'll be Aether, then. Let's go back to Nero and kick some ass!"

"Woo!"

Up in the tree the girls sat directly under, Winter was stretched out on the thickest tree branch closest to the ground, resting on her belly and watching her sister and friend jump into their alternate world of unbridled fantasy.

Lovebirds. It's like they've forgotten I'm here... but that book series is for them and them only. Who would I be in there? That one cabin kid who's too meek to talk?

She smiled, unable to hide the fact that she enjoyed Evie and Mya's happiness. In her darkest hours, they were there for her, and their joy made her cranky, reclusive self bloom like a Pacific bleeding heart in the Pineshadow spring... their infection was contagious.

She wanted them to keep making her sicker, and so she gazed at them with a small sigh, grin willfully showcased.

"Heyyyy babe," Evie read as Aether, placing a hand under Mya's chin and pulling it close to hers, her tone matching the implied seductiveness of Aether's. "Life's been so antagonizing to us lately. Let's work out the knots, shall we?"

"Oh, you know I can't refuse you when you've caught me in your trap like this," said Mya, portraying Nori, who gave her conceit to "Aether" and bowed down in their lap. "I'll fulfill what it is you demand."

Winter propped herself up, lightly chuckling at Mya's position and how Evie was blushing, but smiling, ready to continue on with the romantic ambience. Both of you are demanding something...

Switching to the role of narrator, Evie spoke aloud, "Aether slid their hands over to the pale-skinned ones of Nori, their fingers latching together, inseparable and warm. They reeled their girlfriend in, and she blinked her beautiful brown eyes, their magic putting the fire-tempered Aether into a trance. Like the strike of a clock's second hand, their faces sprang at each other, nose-to-nose, and the bliss was a rapture that could have made the desert in Nero part for summery forests."

Mya, playing along in her role as Nori, pressed her nose to Evie's and rubbed it; Evie's thoughts of being narrator lapsed for a second as she returned the feeling, rubbing along. Her soul rumbled, pleased with this romantic heaven, but oh, she needed more, and Mya. A sting in the heart became an ache, and the two saw their eyes meet.

They had to continue on, and Evie resumed from where she left them hanging.

"A flash of fire in Aether's eyes perfectly enumerated her desire, and embers flew. Their hair bobbed behind their shoulders as Nori's face became entangled in theirs, lips crashing into one, and the sweetness was making them needlessly greedy for each other's love, and warmth-"

Not even bothering to give her the time to finish, Mya flung herself onto Evie and kissed her hard. Oh my god, Evie was burning up with a fever so scarlet in love that her skin sprouted in goosebumps. But she couldn't ever say no to this, this love, this passion, not when her heart could burst and her blood vessels could combust and she'd turn blues and blacks from being deprived of air, but she needed this.

Reminding herself to breathe, her soul convinced her to rise back up, but this time, it was her turn to play along. She threw her lips to Mya's, coming into contact with honey-and-sugar taste mingled in, and losing herself in love's neverendding grip, she fought back against the rush of the tide and the adrenaline putting her heart into a hot pursuit of that ecstasy. Kisses went to making out, but before they became tangled and face-down in the grass, a laugh from a tree had brought them back to reality.

"You two are alarmingly committed to this book series!" Winter yelled, watching them with amusement, bright as a ruby, on her face, and their faces became red, but not like it mattered. Winter didn't read the Aether series, of course she wouldn't understand the thrill.

"Wait until you get a girlfriend, you adorable dork! You're gonna be babbling around like a moron!" Mya retorted, blowing a raspberry at her sister, who caved, blushed, and retreated to her silence, again watching the girls from her perch.

"You sure you don't want to hop down and read, Winter? We know you love anything gay!" Evie reminded her, but Winter shook her head and sat up on her branch, swinging her legs to and fro, catching the sun rays through the dappled leaves of the oak tree.

"No thanks! Aether is a world meant for you... I have my own hobbies tugging my brain fibers twenty-four seven!"

Suit yourself, then. More badassery for us, Mya believed with an exclamation point, and taking the book from Evie, she picked up the role as narrator and put her narrating gear to high.

"-and warmth. Nori kissed back, her hands loosely but instinctively climbing up Aether's back, reaching for her shirt collar. Crackling with the sun's flares, and driven mad with love-harkened speed, Aether's response was to place their chin near their girlfriend's shoulder blade, and then, making it known in the heat of their moment, they sharply bit down on Nori's neck and-"

Mya, lowering the book, paused awkwardly, and the realm of Pineshadow hit her square in the forehead. Swearing part of her cranium had been lost, misplaced, or that she had just read wrong, she read the page slowly from where she left off, her eyes going wider and wider.

"Oh, that's not-"

She finished the page, gently placing the book in Evie's lap. She let the hell break loose in her system.

"IT BURNS! Aaaaaaah! No! I did not need to know that, I did not need to see that!"

She flopped into the grass and rolled around, and befuddled, Evie picked up and read the page for herself. It wasn't that bad, right? Surely a bit of roughhousing wouldn't lead to-

"What in the name of Pineshadow's green earth?! What- I thought these books were marketed for teenagers!"

Winter, having listened to the commotion, grew concerned and faced Evie from where she sat in the tree. "Unpleasantries?"

Evie sighed, her stare going deadpan, and her left eye twitched with frustration. "I want several years of my life back."

"Give me bleach! My eyes... my poor untrained eyes!" Mya hollered, still rolling around in the grass with hands on their face. Oh, out of all of the things she could have predicted, she could have not imagined Aether and Nori (both eighteen) doing... that.

Winter had solved the puzzle, to say the least, and a repulsed ick sounded from her. That content had to be handled with care! "Well, forget the book. Get up here, idiots. Kept the branch toasty for you."

"I greatly appreciate that, Win," Evie thanked, prepared to make the climb up, and Mya, rubbing the grit and what the hell out of her eyes, readied herself to do the same.

But at the same moment, another human, small and timid, had entered their space of humored discord and acres of fantasyland. She'd overheard much of the nonsensical screaming and yelling, and, to her, the impressions left behind were fun.

Fun that she needed when life was continually seeking an opportunity to kick her to the curb.

Amira was walking in with no context, and she had no clue what her friends were going berserker about in the grass, but who's to say she wasn't going to have fun when all three of her friends were smiling and having the time of their lives?

She dashed up to them with incredible speed and waved. "Hey guys!"

Evie and Mya had forgone their mission to climb up the tree in an instant, and hearts inflating with giddiness, they skipped up to Amira, and Evie clutched the book under her right arm.

"Amira!" Mya greeted. "Back in action today?"

"Yeah, suppose so. You two seemed busy." She tugged at her sweater collar, raising it higher above her neck, and another hand tugged at the bottom of it.

"We were bawling our eyes out over the latest Aether book," Evie commented, showing the cover to Amira, who analyzed it curiously and whistled.

"Hoo. Is it good?"

"So good we might have forgotten the series is tagged for older audiences."

"Oh." Amira, flustered, bit her lip and looked at the grass awkwardly, shaking herself out of the implications of that and wringing her hands together. "Besides what you... got tortured with, did you deal with anything else?"

"Change anything to anyone, and you got your answer there, Amira," drawled Winter from her place in the tree, and swiftly remembering that she was up there, Amira peered up into playful ice-blue eyes. Her essence, bunched up in knots, was placed at ease.

"Guess who's principal abused her power to twist and bend the rules to make us comform to bullcrap bigotry?"

Shetani!? Oh god, not again... Amira frowned, her eyes narrowing, and her heart, so evenly aligned with the girls' rhythm and pride, dropped to the bottom of her stomach and beat with an unhinged tilt.

Their newest principal, one who apparently prided herself on firmness, stricter rules, and a team effort rebuild... was a bigot. A hefty bigot. The girls had tried to have hope that she'd grow lenient with time, but now? Shetani had trounced her words and was taking the mantle for herself.

What she's always wanted... power. She almost shuddered, but she remembered her time and place and kept still. Her friends needn't worry about her. She was perfectly okay.

"Shetani, isn't it? What did she do now?" she questioned with a forced nuance in her voice, and Evie stepped forward, hand smacking Mya's shoulder. She smacked hers.

"She added multitudes of rules targeting our clothing, school safety, education, you name it. It was ridiculous. The entire school was ready to engage in a full-blown riot!"

"However," Evie added, her eyes lingering on Mya's lovingly, and Amira made a half-smile, "we didn't just stand around and let Shetani knock us down. We had to fly higher and scream loud to make her hear reason - and our duty became clear when Shetani tried to profile Winter for her hairstyle."

"Profile? As in target?" Amira asked, a hand flying over her shocked mouth. That was horrifying!

Stalked because her hair was against her rules... why do I feel so numb?

"Basically what it was, creepy and screwed up," Winter remarked, tasting tartness on her tongue. She hopped down from the tree, positioning herself next to Mya and gripping her hand, relaxing her riled temper with the softness of her palm.

"Thankfully, and unfortunately, I wasn't the one to face Shetani's idea of torture and comformity. She chose Mya instead when she stood up for me, and she got assaulted, emotionally and physically... I can't describe it without feeing sick to my stomach."

"Me neither," Evie growled, and Mya nodded. Amira, disgusted, hugged her belly, her brown eyes flashing with discontent and worry that added to the chains wrapped around her heart.

What... what was she doing in there?? She promised me she wouldn't...

Her eyes began to itch, and her fingers tapped her belly. No! No weakness! They can't know!

"Mya, are you alright after all that? It sounds... it sounds so wicked..."

"Mostly. I'm still recovering in places, but Shetani didn't stop me from confessing everything. We immediately accosted her the next day, and I got the guts to sock it straight to her. She relented by the end of the day and reversed her rules, barring the politics rule she implemented on her first day."

"Without Mya, we wouldn't be where we are now," Evie concluded, peppering her cheek in a few kisses before turning to an awestruck, relieved Amira again. "We have made progress, but we have leagues to go until we get our personal freedoms back. Shetani doesn't want us to express ourselves... but scripts and stories can be flipped. We fight on, we march on."

Amira brought herself to finally smile completely. The girls were defiant. They could scale the walls of a fortress and come out unscathed. They were beloved heroes, for crying out loud! Shetani was a demon to reckon with, but if even she could bow to the girls and install change in place of stoking an environment of radical partisanship, if she could be forced to obey rebellion...

There could be a new beginning.

"Shetani..." Amira flinched briefly mentioning the name of that sycophant principal, but stood upright and rubbed her neck, scratching a rough patch of her skin there. "It's wonderful you managed to wrangle some of your liberties out from her hands. I can't imagine dealing with someone as horrid as she is, gosh..."

She began to scratch her neck more intensely, keeping her words sealed behind her teeth - the girls couldn't know that she, in fact, was dealing with Shetani.

Because they were kin, or in Shetani's distorted worldview, master and slave. Yet, as all mighty as Shetani was, the girls had trumped her in her game of chess... for now.

She'll win more. I know she will. But perhaps the girls can stall her progress?

She stopped scratching her neck, her skin screaming for less pain, and she took her hand away. Then, Winter gasped, making her jolt and shift her feet.

"What? Everything okay?" she prompted.

"Amira, there's bruises on your neck!"

Christ! Amira, curling her fingers in and out, couldn't control her breathing, and she inhaled a few times rapidly before shoving the excess air down within her.

She had covered them up and kept them out of sight... they were ugly things, things they didn't need to see, things they needn't know... given that their origin was reared in hate.

Swallowing her history, she shrugged it off and played the game she had studied for years and mastered: denial.

"Whoa, it's nothing, don't worry!" she assured sweetly, prising open a shiny white smile to overtake the frame of her face. "I just tripped and clipped the corner of a table. Not the greatest experience on earth, but I'm here and walking, y'know."

"Yowch. Sorry that happened. Table corners are agony," Mya joked, many flashbacks to her childhood simultaneously occuring, and her eyes clouded with a stare lasting for thousands of meters past Amira.

Amira casually pulled her sweater collar up higher again, resting midway around her throat, where, shielded snugly underneath the blue fabric, was a leather contraption and a tag so humiliating she felt sweat trailing down her back at the notion of it being uncovered.

Buy it, please buy it, don't ask me more questions-

Luckily, the girls didn't suspect anything amiss about her behavior and quiet movements. They were denser than water when it came to the truth, and Amira preferred it to be that way.

"Sweater getting loose on you?" Evie inquired, and Amira deflected the question off again, scratching her short mess of dark brown hair.

"A little. Nothin' I can't handle."

But she couldn't handle it behind the scenes, and when neither of her friends had their eyes upon her and had ceased their questions, Amira looked away, back toward where she came, in that house on Burlsberry Lane, silent with lackluster bushes in the front, quaint, peaceful when it was anything but peaceful.

She didn't want to be there now, think of there now, when her heart was screaming at her to stay. Get away from Shetani, from spine-crushing work, the painful threats and abuse, being treated like a plaything instead of a human.

Everything was never as it seemed, but for the girls, they were painfully oblivious. It killed Amira inside to have to do this to people she'd befriended, but this was for the best. They had to remain safe, and she had to fulfill Shetani's wishes of granting her a passage to power.

Evie, noticing that she'd gone eerily still and was glancing back out at the neighborhood longingly, trotted up to her and tapped her on the shoulder. She yelped, turning around, but relaxed and patted herself down.

"Oh, sorry! I didn't meant to startle you out of your thoughts. You appeared to be somber. Everything alright?" she prompted gently, and Amira nodded.

"Yeah. I daydream a lot... and last night, I was hopelessly sleepless."

"Oof. Insomnia is a freak," Winter muttered. "Sleep better tonight, Amira."

"Knock yourself out, Ami!" Mya chimed in excitedly, bouncing on her toes around Amira. Some news could bring some light and jubilee into the sleep-deprived girl's spirit.

"Me and Evie are having a full "date day" tomorrow. We're spending every hour together, invading the mall, eating at the mall, and then sleeping over at her place. It's gonna be epic!"

"We're probably gonna be up all night, but I'm willing to do an all-nighter if Mya wants to. It's not like homework is trying to gnaw at my bones right now," Evie quipped, pulling her happy-go-lucky girlfriend into her for a hug and more kisses, and Amira turned her head.

"Aww... that's sweet. You guys are lucky." Luckier than I ever will be, having all these privileges... but I can't be jealous when you two have worked through the catacombs to get where you are now.

"And I'll have my own company to get me by. I'm leaving the tomfoolery to the girls this time around," Winter stated with a pleased grin on her face and a wink at her sister, who winked back, snapped her fingers, and made a clicking sound with her tongue. They chuckled.

Winter noticed Amira's shy, small smile on her face, and the way her small, dark brown eyes saw Evie and Mya and saw the love, the happiness... she felt it too, the butterflies, the company of friends...

Idea. A lightbulb flickered on in Winter's head. She was used to being a loner and spending her days in her own solitary confinement, a land of wonder that could do anything she pleased as long as her waking dream was in balance... and she'd let her friends in on that dream, and they'd expanded it.

Her waking dream had obviously evolved now from a necessary survival skill to a hazy pasttime, but that didn't mean someone else should be denied the action and thrill of chasing an imagination created skillfully by design.

"Actually, let me rephrase that. I'll leave the toomfoolery to Evie and Mya unless someone else wants to hang out with me for the afternoon. Amira, would you like to accompany me?"

Although her ears were hidden enough by her hair, Amira felt them glow red, and she blushed from the honor that had been bestowed onto her.

Winter, her newest friend, inviting her to hang out alone for the afternoon. The two of them, getting into hijinks, learning each other and doing the things friends did. She'd never heard anyone ask for her to chill with them. She smoothed herself down, biting her lip anxiously, but being with Winter - oh!

Being with Winter, a sweet and hilarious and adventurous person... that sounded fun. Fun. An escapist's dream of fun!

"O-Okay! I'll join you when I'm done with my chores!"

"Awesome!" Winter replied in glee, hopping up to her side. "I can't wait for tomorrow."

"I can't wait for tomorrow too," Amira agreed, meeting Winter's pretty ice-blue eyes and smiling, giggling with her and flexing her hands, and she flexed hers, and their movements mirrored near-exactly.

"They're beans, aren't they, My?" Evie asked Mya, who nodded.

"I love seeing people make friends."

Amira ended up talking to Winter for longer than she intended, but what she didn't notice was the way her eyes shone with this affection, saccharine and made of crystal, that remained there even after she left, barely comprehending what she had agreed to.

A day out with her friend. Just the two of them and a bunch of imagination to fill and spread around.

On paper, she didn't have to worry about a single thing. She could be carefree, skipping back home to yap about the news to a family that loved her...

...but in reality, this was a meeting she'd have to bury with her intestines. Shetani would be infuriated if she found out she agreed to something as prepostorous as this.

Talking with an outsider, her enemy... ah, why did I agree to this??? If Shetani gets the memo, she's going to want to see scars on my skin and tears in my eyes...

But Winter, she's just so... great. She's so friendly, one of the sweetest people I ever met... I don't want to be a no-show and disappoint her. I have to make this work for you, Winter... I want to see you.

Amira was trapped in between two worlds, each pulling her back and forth. She could either appease her aunt, remain her loyal slave that followed her every command and lapped up her teachings like holy water in the desert.

Or she could fracture the chains to her body and constantly escape to be with the girls, who always treated her like an equal, saw her as her equal, and gave her attention that wasn't cruelty or beatings.

Amira only had one choice to make - and neither presented an outcome that spelled out anything different from her hiding dangerous secrets from two parties, one that controlled her, and one that appreciated her.

And now that the sole three to appreciate and acknowledge her existence were becoming mainstays in her life... she began to dread what would happen if even the tiniest secret, a secret no lighter than a grain of sand, slipped out from behind her lips.

Catch Shocking Secret on March 30th!