When We Were Still Human by Vaughn Foster (best ereader for textbooks .txt) 📕

counter sectioned off most of the left side of the room, and behind it, countless bottles of what looked to be alcohol sat on their shelves.

Avia stood in the corner, casually talking with two men holding glasses of wine. One easily cleared six feet, the other was half a head shorter. They looked a little older than Vladimir, so maybe early thirties. But she knew that wasn’t true. Their eyes had the shadows of men much older.

Vladimir waved and walked Val to the group. When she got closer, her Mark pulsed, and words formed in her head—just like they had with Avia.

Zadkiel, Val mouthed, focusing on the shorter man to the left.

Head archangel of the Heavenly Hosts, the second sin of Heaven. Pride.

Long, scarlet hair messily fell across his face as he talked. Though semi-formal in a white vest, golden tie, and white dress shoes, his body movements were casual. He was beautiful but without the haughty visage she would have expected from the Sin of Pride. Instead, his demeanor screamed of either boredom or drowsiness. She couldn’t tell.

Val turned her attention to the other, immediately recognizing him as: Gemini, once one of the Zodiac Constellations. The Sin of Envy.

What that was supposed to mean, however, was another story.

The bulk of his muscles gave him a giant’s stature next to herself. His face and short hair hinted of African descent, but it was impossible to tell. Black stretched across him like the night sky, with hundreds of tiny stars speckled over his body. In the center of his chest, protrude a shard of green stone, roughly the size of her fist. Val tilted her head, then quickly scanned the room. In her mind, she saw an image of a man and a woman. Both bore the name Gemini. However, she only counted five people present.

She looked back to Gemini, who also seemed distracted. His green eyes repeatedly drifted to the side like he was in a different conversation entirely.

“Look who’s awake!” Vladimir exclaimed as they approached the group.

“I can see,” Zadkiel remarked, looking her over. He was polite, but between his tone and the constant glances at the couch, Val was positive he’d been disturbed from a nap. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet.”

Val shook his hand and happened to catch Avia’s glance in her peripheral. The other girl showed no signs that they had met. Instead, she simply walked behind the bar and started pouring herself a drink.

“Umm… thank you,” Val replied, her cheeks reddening. Zadkiel opened his mouth to say something, but yawned. He rolled his head back and Val noticed a roman numeral II etched into the side of his neck.

“So, this is Gluttony,” Gemini muttered to himself. He leaned down and studied her for a moment. “I thought she’d be... bigger.”

The bass and amplitude of his voice only magnified his size. There was a dialect in his tone as well. Her immediate thought was French, but it seemed mixed with something else. Besides. She eyes the glowing green stone planted in his star-covered chest. It was clear he wasn’t from any human territory.

“So did I,” a woman’s voice remarked.

Val jumped. “Who said that?” She turned left, then right, but it was still just the five of them.

“My apologies, Valerie.” Gemini sighed and shook his head. “That was my sister. She can be—”

“I can answer for myself.” Gemini snapped to attention, eyes closed, back straight. Val then watched in awe as his hips widened and his body narrowed into an hourglass figure. Within seconds, the dominating man had transformed himself into the small, delicate framework of a woman. Her body was like his, enveloped in the beauty of darkness and stars. But the resemblance stopped there.

Where he had been pure muscle, she was nearly half his size. His short hair was replaced with over a hundred intricate braids that fell above her breasts. When the transformation was complete, Val recognized that she was the same woman who had stood next to Gemini in the vision moments before.

Handing Zadkiel her glass, the woman stepped towards Val, who was now an inch or two taller than the Sin of Envy.

“Hello, Val,” she said cheerfully, extending her hand.

“Umm, hello.” She tentatively shook then quickly let go. The stars on the woman’s skin were hot. Not enough to burn, but certainly to startle. Val took a step back, reddening from embarrassment.

The woman tilted her head then seemed to realize Val’s confusion. “Oh, I’m sorry, this must be very strange for you, isn’t it? Come, sit with me on the couch. My brother can make me appear as such an unpleasant person.”

“I only work with what’s there,” Val heard the deep voice mumble.

“Shut up, Cas,” the woman absently rebuked, then led Val by the hand to the couch. “Vlad, why didn’t you give her a heads up? The poor girl looks confused to death!”

“Well, sorry if explaining Celestial anatomy wasn’t on the top of my to-do list,” Vladimir said, throwing himself onto the loveseat across from them. “I’ve been trying to catch her up on everything the Mark was supposed to do. Didn’t go through quite right.”

“Hey, Avia!” Zadkiel called. “How’s your arm?”

She gave him a nod and raised her glass. He then turned back to Vladimir with a wicked smirk. There was a clear history of competition between them. Vladimir messing up the Mark must have put Zadkiel at an advantage.

The woman put a hand on Val’s shoulder and sighed. “Try to let the men do anything, and this is what happens… Anyways, I’m Pollux, but you’re free to call me Paris. The brute you had the... pleasure of meeting earlier was my brother, Castor.”

Images from an astronomy class she’d taken as an elective drudged their way to the surface. Val finally understood. “The Gemini constellation.”

“Yes.”