Honeyed Words by J. A. Pitts Page A

slept on. I stripped the bed and jostled her, tickled her, poked, and prodded … nothing.
    Someone in the room next door was having an argument, and for some reason it was giving me a headache. Thoughts of ambulances and emergency rooms began to dance in my head. I dug around in my pack, thinking I had some ibuprofen, and managed to stab myself with something. I pulled my hand out of my pack quickly and stuck the offending finger in my mouth. What did I have that was sharp? And why did my finger taste funny? I turned my pack upside down. There, in the midst of my assorted shit, was the flowered necklace the elves had given me. As the room grew fuzzy, I saw there were thorns on those vines.
    I realized two things as I fell over backward. First: my finger was good and numb, likely an effect of whatever the flowers were—and of course, Katie still had on the necklace. I hadn’t taken it off her.
    Second, Skella and Gletts were standing in our dresser mirror, watching us. It didn’t make any sense at first, them standing there. I know they weren’t in the room with us, so the only plausible answer was that they were in the mirror. Crazy making, I know.
    As I hit the floor it got even more surreal.
    Gletts stepped through the mirror. “I thought she’d never pick up that necklace,” he said, very put out.
    Bastard.
    “Don’t hurt them,” Skella said, sounding freaked. “See if she has it so we can fix this.”
    They didn’t realize something. I could feel my body succumbing to whatever poison was on the flowers, but my mind remained clear. I tried to sit up, struggling to rise, and somehow snapped out of my body. It was like back in the bar all those months ago. One second I had lost control of my body, the next I was floating outside myself—I’d gone astral again.
    Gletts was rummaging through the dresser and closets. I quietly floated upward, hovering to the left of the mirror, where Skella couldn’t see me. If I wasn’t so pissed at them, and afraid for what was about to happen, I might think the whole thing was freaking awesome.
    “I can’t find it,” Gletts growled, throwing Katie’s birthday outfit to the floor as he ransacked the closet. “Why wouldn’t she have it with her?”
    Skella pressed against the mirror from her side. I could see the side of her face and a room behind her. It looked rough-hewn, cut stone and timbers. There were a scattering of tables, cauldrons, and assorted tools: hammers, saws, and the like. A huge fire roared in the center of the room, and on the far wall, chained upside down, was Ari. “What the hell?”
    Skella snapped her head around, saw me, and shrieked. “Gletts, she’s awake!”
    Gletts spun around, saw my body lying on the floor, and looked over at Skella, confused. “She hasn’t moved.”
    “I heard something,” she said, looking around, apparently not seeing me.
    I reached out, my hand passing through the mirror like it was a doorway, and touched the side of Skella’s face. She shrieked and fell backward, knocking over a table covered in beakers and glass jars.
    Gletts whirled around, running toward the mirror. He had no problem seeing me.
    “How?” he asked, pausing long enough for me to lunge forward and tackle him. “Get off,” he cried as we tumbled to the ground.
    Since I could feel both Gletts and Skella, I assumed they somehow lived in both states—astral and physical. I didn’t get to enjoy the effects of gravity, however. Should’ve remembered that from last time.
    Gletts punched me in the side—which I felt—and scrambled away on all fours.
    I tried to follow him, but I seemed to be partially stuck in the desk chair. Problem with being in spirit form—interaction with objects in the real world were not as you might expect. It was odd to see one of the wooden rungs stuck partway through my thigh. It took a second to pull myself away from the chair, and while I was delayed, Gletts dove into the mirror.
    “Sonuvabitch,” I growled,