Bat Out of Hell (Promised to the Demons #2) - Lidiya Foxglove Page 0,57

was very good at giving my feelings a push and sending them spinning off. That must be what he meant.

"I'll do it," I said. "If nothing else, because I need to stick close to you and keep an eye on you and these demon powers you've acquired."

"You're already sounding like a real romantic," Bevan said, rolling his eyes. "But I guess we'll see how it goes."

Chapter Twenty-Six

Jenny

I wiped my forehead with my sleeve, as the kitchen was getting quite hot despite the cold outside. I had only myself to blame for working so hard; I found almonds on the ship for topping my chestnut tart, but they were whole and I wanted them slivered, so I'd been slicing nuts by hand in between kneading bread, and every muscle in my hands and arms was getting tired out.

Piers walked in, holding a book. "Am I disturbing you?"

"No!"

"I wondered if you enjoyed some reading while you work." He held up the book.

"Aren't you nice to think of that! I would love it if you read to me! Usually I was the one reading aloud to Mrs. Franch in the evenings while she did her sewing."

"I have to admit it was Bevan's idea," Piers said. "And there aren't many books on the ship. It seems that Cash and his mates prefer music, dancing and card games to reading."

"They do seem very lively," I said. "But I don't care what it is. It'll be nice to have a voice to share the room with, and it'll keep my mind off how much my arms are aching. I'm not used to making food for so many people, I have to admit."

"At least you'll learn a little of what we've been researching," Piers said, cracking open the book. "This is sort of an overview of common knowledge of familiars, which is what we're hoping to expand on..."

"Go right ahead." I picked up an orange to zest.

"'Introduction. The race of familiars is mostly one of secrecy and misinformed assumption, when viewed from outside of the realm of wizards, and even they seem largely ignorant to what power they have truly harnessed when it comes to these chimeral beings, who accompany them from the time of birth, offering them protection and edification, from some source beyond themselves, which this book humbly hopes to explore, if not to explain. It is my hope that in due course, this book will endeavor the reader to approach--'"

"Oof," I said. "That's wordier than Dickens."

"I would say it's about as wordy as Dickens," Piers said. "You don't like Dickens?"

"Not really."

He turned back a few pages. "Well, this is an update of a book from 1655. The last edition was 1888."

"And that's what you and Bevan have been reading?"

"We've been reading everything we can get our hands on. But this one was the most accessible…”

"So faeries use the same years as we do?"

"Apparently they do. They still had contact with wizards after our modern calendar was adopted."

"It seems awfully funny to me that faeries count years based on human religions."

"Just for the sake of convenience," Piers said.

"And they speak the same language as us. Even though we don't speak the same language as we did a thousand years ago."

"Well, that's easy to explain," Piers said. "The fae always speak the same language as humans. Or maybe we speak the same language as they do, when we're in their presence."

"You mean, their language changes based on ours? So they could speak to Chinese wizards just as easily as us?"

"Yes."

"But do the words in their books change too?"

"Maybe it's actually that we see their language as ours when we're in their realm. No one has ever figured it out, except to say that if you put a French wizard and an English wizard in the fae realm together, they both speak to the fae perfectly, but not to each other."

"Wait--I'm so confused! So the fae perceive it as the same language?"

"Yes, they hear their own tongue. And the Englishman and the Frenchman each hear their own tongue."

"Maybe it's more like a translation spell?"

"Well, this isn't the Fixed Plane," Piers said. "So a thing can be two things at once. A place can be both far and close, and a language can be both fae and English at the same time."

“That makes my head hurt!"

Piers smiled. "Funny, since you are not from the Fixed Plane yourself."

"I'm from St. Augustine," I said. "As far as I've ever really known. I feel human, when I think about it. I'm