"That's below the belt, you brat!"
"—-and show some sense?"
"I am showing some sense here. It's called a sense of adventure—-"
"What about your sense of danger?" Mary Priscilla retorted. "That's an entire town coming out of nowhere—-"
"Exactly my point!"
The little girl blinked up at me. "It is?"
"We have an entire town to explore!"
Mary Priscilla groaned.
"Make that an entire magical town!"
The kid groaned again.
"I mean...can you just imagine how much magic was needed to make something like it?"
"More magic means more danger," the little girl said so gloomily I just had to shake my head at her. Honestly, this kid. She was just so cynical I wouldn't be surprised if she turned out to be Minos' sister from another mother.
An entire magical town to explore!
How could anyone resist such a thing?
"Saoirse?"
Certainly not I!
"Where are you going?"
"I'm just going to take a peek." I was already floating away as I spoke, and I silently thanked my lucky stars that I had decided to switch into my ghostly form before leaving the apartment. In today's era of security camera surveillance, safe "changing" areas in public were getting harder and harder to come by and—what the holy ghost?!
The brat had suddenly popped out in front of me, and I barely managed to keep myself from occupying her most personal space. "Mary Priscilla!" She knew how much I hated going through people, dead or alive. Most other ghosts had an easy time getting used to the process, but I didn't think I could ever adjust to how invasive possession felt, never mind if it was just a moment of me "passing through".
"What do you mean you're going to take a peek?" Mary Priscilla demanded.
"Uh...just that?"
The little girl shook her head. "I just don't have a good feeling about this—-"
"Fifteen minutes then," I said impulsively. "I promised Hadrian I'd be back in the Underworld before dinner, and..." I showed her my watch. "It's a quarter past six, which means we have fifteen minutes to spare. Fifteen minutes," I bargained. "And then we'll leave. Deal?"
Mary Priscilla started fidgeting. "I don't think—-"
"It's going to be fine, I promise!" And to end the dilly-dallying, I simply grabbed the little girl's icy hand and dragged her alongside me so together we could go into the light.
I mean, lights.
And boy did those lights keep getting brighter as we came closer. They shone so much harder and brighter than Rihanna's diamonds that by the time we were inches away from its entrance, I had this need to shield my gaze with a pair of sunnies.
The noise had grown exponentially as well, and it was a glorious mishmash of festival sounds. Aside from the usual chatter and laughter, there was also the heavy banging of gongs, the crackle and boom of fireworks overhead, and the clatter of plates and chopsticks from hole-in-the-wall restaurants.
I threw an excited smile over my shoulder at Mary Priscilla. "Isn't this great?"
The brat just looked at me.
Once a killjoy, always a killjoy.
As we passed under the giant arch marking the festival entrance, I couldn't help yelping in surprise when the pair of gargoyle-looking creatures resting on the arch suddenly roared as if welcoming its newest guests.
"That's incredible!"
"It's just stupid motion technology," Mary Priscilla muttered.
"Back to being Little Miss Party Pooper, aren't you?"
"I can't help it," she said sweetly. "Someone has to be an adult around here."
I stuck my tongue out, and the brat snickered. "I rest my case."
Yeargh!
She totally got me there, but whatever. This place was just too amazing to let Mary Priscilla's parade-raining ways get to me. There was just so much to look and experience here, and no matter where I looked, there was always something entrancingly new to discover and delight in.
On one side of the road, colorful lotus-shaped candles floated down a stream that ran parallel to the festival's main route while red-and-gold lanterns drifted above our heads to light up the skies. I retraced their trail with my gaze and eventually saw they were coming from beyond towering temple gates. Even this far, I could easily discern several animal statues made of colored quartz: a blue serpent, a vermilion bird, a white tiger, and a black tortoise. They were all enormous in size and poised as if they were about to leap, climb, or fly over the temple gates at any moment.
“Those stone statues look unbelievably cool, don't you think?"
Mary Priscilla wouldn't even follow the direction of my gaze. "I really don't like this place, Saoirse—-"
I wrinkled my nose at her. "Of course you wouldn't." The kid watched horror movies for educational entertainment but ran away in disgust every time she heard Sesame Street playing on the TV. So yeah, with this place practically oozing with warmth and happiness coming from the festival goers, it was only to be expected—-
"Oh my God, do you smell that?" I was once again distracted, my nose, sniff-sniff-sniffing away as delicious smells wafted towards us. Although the scent of incense still perfumed the air rather overpoweringly, there was something else this time...