Page 54 of The Pushy Pixies Are Going Down
That made Aeson snort. “Truth.”
So apparently Aeson wasn’t as unaware of the manager being a jackass as we thought. He didn’t seem to realize just how uncomfortable the guy made Chaos.
Miles shook his head. “Seriously, Ace. Don’t worry about it.”
Aeson sent him a strained smile. “We have two more floors to go. Will you guys make it? There’s an elevator if you want to take it instead?”
I gave the kid a small push. “We aren’t that old, you little turd.”
He laughed, looking like the lanky teenager he was as he walked ahead of us.
Miles shoulder-bumped me, shooting me an amused and exasperated smile, before following him, and Lyric dragged me along.
Chapter Fifteen
Miles
Both Aeson and Chaos still looked way, way skinnier than I liked. It wasn’t that they were just thin kids. It was that they actually looked unhealthy if you paid attention. They both tried to hide it with their baggy clothes, but there was no hiding the sunken eyes and pale complexion.
They needed to be fed. Healthy meals, and a lot of them.
But more than that, Winter and I needed to find out what was going on with them.
It was clear they didn’t have parents helping take care of them. Or at least, whoever their guardians were didn’t have the money to feed their family properly.
I shouldn’t judge because I had no idea what their situation was. They could be trying their best. But whatever was going on, they clearly needed help.
We needed to find out more about their situation so we knew how best to help them. If their family was eligible, I knew a bunch of programs that could help put more food on their table.
But again, I couldn’t do that without knowing more about their situation or without speaking to their guardians.
Too bad the teens were pros at avoiding direct questions. Sigh.
Sola rubbed her cheek against mine in comfort, and I knew she was feeling my emotions. My sweet girl.
Winter and I followed Aeson up to the fourth floor, and even though I tried not to show it, I was a little out of breath. Which was ridiculous considering I’d been walking with Win and Goliath all the time, and it wasn’t like I sat on my ass all day. I was active and did steps all the time.
Just not this many steps in a row, I guessed.
As I sucked in a few deep breaths, I took in my surroundings, absently petting Sola while I pressed my shoulder to Win’s. There were a lot of people in this building and out in the gardens, so the background noise was intense. Getting a small break from that while I took everything in was a relief.
We were in the dragon history section, and it took my breath away.
There was a mural along the circular wall of big, giant, beautiful dragons flying over a forest and a village, of two dragons twisted together, looking like they were in love, of a dragon sitting on a nest full of eggs, and a dragon setting a large tree on fire.
It was mesmerizing.
Most dragons were super small these days, but in the wild parts of the world, they were still bigger than houses.
Archaeologists had discovered many, many dragon skeletons and had come to the conclusion that they used to be very common long ago. Over the years, like many other faerie and animal species, their numbers had diminished, which was the sad state of so many. And dragons in particular had become smaller and smaller in order to stay out of harm’s way and find enough food. Or at least, that was the assumption of why dragons were so much smaller today than they’d been in ancient times.
As humans grew in population, other species suffered.
It made me sad to think about.
Luckily, there were a lot of like-minded people who helped preserve the natural world as best we could. Hopefully, we wouldn’t let any of the magical creatures or other animals go extinct.
That probably wasn’t realistic, but it was something I truly wished for.
