I set the lyre back in the box as I stood up from the floor, wobbling a little from my legs being a little asleep, I had to catch myself on the arm of the couch. I was thinking that maybe my uneasy sleeping was also possibly caused by the fact that I had had a very good dinner and my body’s been accustomed to running on probably less than a thousand or something calories every day, but walking upwards of a marathon every day at the same time. I was still dressed in only Calico’s robe, more comfortable than I thought at first because there is a tail slot for it, but I was just unaccustomed to this kind of clothing.

              I tightened the robe around me as I opened the door to the guestroom, I couldn’t hear anything aside from the ambient sounds of the city around the floating tower, despite the fact it’s base was at least twelve-thirteen stories up, the skyscrapers around the tower were far, far higher up, upwards of twice if not thrice as high up as the tower. Past the overcast sky, I couldn’t see their top floors. The tower had this soft herbal scent to the air, there were lots of hanging herbs and things in that office room on this floor and about the giant kitchen downstairs, it was pleasant and mixed with the smell of old books and the scent of Calico’s magic which was so thick on everything in the tower sense it is his home. I could only assume that upstairs was his room, so I did not even ponder the thought of looking up there, but I stepped out of the room as I looked around a little before making my way down the stairs, my own stomach telling me where I should go first. Calico said I had free reign of his kitchen, but…even when I was young at home, I didn’t have free reign of the kitchen or anything like that, so it felt…alien and strange to be able to look around his kitchen without someone physically and metaphorically breathing down my neck watching every move I did.

              I walked across the kitchen as I walked towards the all glass end of the room where the dining table was, the walls and ceiling all being glass giving this vague dome like look to the area, almost giving the city a fish-eye like effect, all the lights having a bloom around them and lots of the colors smearing a little at the edges of the panes. Everywhere I looked around the city…there was light, there was life, there was beauty and magic; flocks of fairies, pixies and other people flitting past leaving softly glittering trails of fairy-dust in their wakes, ents found themselves rooted in large balconies and pieces of the large skyscrapers, growing so thick and tall that there were hanging neighborhoods from their boughs, glowing bridges of magic or glass or other materials randomly bounced between buildings, people milled about with every possible animal feature someone possibly could; other people with cat like elements like Calico, people with rabbit ears reminding me of the warrenfolk on the mortal plane, people with bird like legs and wings like harpies, but also people that were just human sized anthropomorphized birds, people that were just human sized and structured big cats or other animals, nymphs, sylphs, naiads and dryads galore and just…so, so many different people…even eladrin were milling about in droves, though my knowledge of them is rather minimal because of how little of them exist in the mortal plane: they’re considered the forefathers of the elves, the people who bridged the gap between fey and humanoid, being as much of either as they weren’t. Usually if you saw one in the mortal plane, they were so incredibly old, but I saw eladrin children, geriatric ones and every age in between where on the mortal plane you only ever see them as geriatric and at the rate they age, that made them centuries old if not older. I even saw drow and all other types of elves an all sorts of other people that were considered rarer on the mortal plane.

I didn’t see anyone like myself though, I saw faun and satyr galore and lots of people with all sorts of different horns, antlers and pieces, but…no hellkin. We’re not the rarest type of people out there, but we’re not the most common either, when I was attending Paradise Academy, I’d say for every thousand people there was maybe a dozen or so of us, we’re pretty visible sense we have skin that is pretty much every possible shade and color under the sun, the goat legs, horns and things of that sort…it is possible for us to have more humanoid skin-tones, but it’s a bit more seldom seen, most of us have skin-tones you could easily find in a 64 count box of crayons. People like me, skin that’s shades of red, are usually the most common for hellkin, the range of red can be anywhere between a very off-white pink to a near black burgundy, but the true, primary lipstick red like I have is considered one of the more “common” skin-tones for hellkin. I remember at Paradise, because of the stigma of our people, all us hellkin, maybe a few hundred or so of us, we had a school wide, not newsletter, but it wasn’t a club either, we just upheld this promise to ensure to keep the backs of the others of us and to not allow anyone to treat us how like some people like to out and about. People are always a bit wary around those of demonic origin, even the warlords are treated like that if not worse due to the fact they’re half-archdemon. I’ve had a lot of people tell me all sorts of things that were very, very insulting because of what I am.