Chapter 3

Telling Ama it was a college had made Rose uncomfortable. She didn’t usually mind lying to people who couldn’t pick up on it, but in this case, she’d felt dishonest.

That wasn’t to say she was a liar all the time, she told herself. Most of the magical creatures she knew or had heard of could smell or feel or otherwise detect a lie. And all of her more-than-casual interactions with humans could be counted on one hand.

So, she was half an hour early. She didn’t expect to find the door open. But it was. It didn’t lead into a sanctuary but into a large hall that she thought was called a fellowship hall based on the number of times she’d seen that in food pantry offerings on the internet, i.e. “meet us in the fellowship hall for…”

There were people setting up tables and the smell of cooking wafted in from another room.