Catching Stardust

Copyright © 2013 Heather Thurmeier

KINDLE EDITION

All rights reserved
.

Catching Stardust

Falling Stars: Book 1

   
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    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

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Dedication

To my sisters,

I wouldn’t be the woman I am today without both of you in my life—teaching me, supporting me, and most of all loving me for who I am without question.

Without you both I also wouldn’t:

1. Be terrified of spiders. Thanks for that.

2. Know not to mix grape drink mix directly into the bottle of vodka… I mean water.

(Mum, I swear I meant water.)

3. Know how to ride a horse bareback.

4. Know how to buy a properly fitting bra.

5. Know how to take out a zombie at 20 yards with a kickass bow and arrow.

For these things and many more, I say thank you.

This book is for you, Leslie and Tricia.

~XOXO, Your Baby Sister.

I want to say a special thank you to Shoshanna Evers. You have always been one of my biggest supporters and I wouldn’t be nearly as knowledgeable in this industry without your help, guidance, friendship, and brutally honest feedback.

Chapter One

Maia’s star was missing.

Well, it probably wasn’t missing. Stars don’t usually just fall out of the sky, now do they?

She studied the darkness above her. Millions of stars speckled the night, shining down on her. As she scanned the sky looking for her favorite one, she squinted her eyes as if doing so would somehow make sense out of what she saw.

Maia squirmed, trying to get comfortable on the hard surface beneath her back. Now that she thought about it, why was she laying on something hard, damp and cold when her bed was warm and cozy with luxuriously soft sheets made of the finest cotton-silk blend stardust could buy?

She definitely wasn’t lying in her bed. Had she fallen asleep in the park again?

Sometimes that happened after a particularly delicious dinner or a party with too much wine—she’d wander into the park near her home to dip her toes into the coolness of Calliope Springs and she’d fall asleep on the damp grasses with her feet still dangling in the water. The feel of cold water washing over her calves and between her toes was incredibly soothing and would almost always lull her into a restful sleep.

She wiggled her toes. No cool water slipped between them. Instead, her feet were bound in strappy sandals
.

I’m so not at the springs.

She focused on the stars once more. Actually, now that she really studied them, the stars themselves seemed unusually far away tonight. And why were the twins staring back at her? She didn’t fall asleep to Gemini—she fell asleep and woke to Aries. Always Aries. For as long as she’d been one of the sisters of Pleiades, she’d always fallen into her dreams wondering how Aries could be so darn stubborn every single day of his eternity. Seems he made it his mission to live up to his hardheaded ‘ram’ reputation.

Maia’s gaze darted around quickly scanning her area. Bed? Missing. Curtains? Nada. Waterfall just beyond her balcony? Neg-a-tive. No balcony either.

Odd.

A crystal clear view of the Pleiades constellation in the sky? Impossible. If she were on Pleiades how could she be looking at Pleiades?

One, two, three, four, five, six… Damn it to Hades.
She counted the dots of her constellation again. Only six stars were visible where there were supposed to be seven.

Maybe stars do fall from the sky.

But they shouldn’t. At the very least, there should be a marker-star put in her place. Of course that was usually planned in advance when people knew they’d be doing some intergalactic travel, and since she hadn’t planned for this trip to—where the hell was she anyways?

She should be on the planet of Pleiades, surrounded by the constellation of seven stars that represented herself and her six sisters. And yet here she was, apparently in a completely different part of the galaxy.

She rolled onto her side and propped herself up on one elbow. She was in a small field, on top of a low hill, surrounded on all sides by tall, leafy trees. Oh yeah, and the unmistakable New York City skyline beyond the trees loomed over her like a villain in a cliché movie. She could almost hear the evil laughter echoing in her head.
Mwahahaha.

Well, that would explain the smell of sweat and car exhaust.

“I’m on Earth. Why in Hades am I on Earth?”

Maia thought back to the last thing she could remember doing, which certainly hadn’t been teleporting to Earth. She remembered having dinner with her sisters, Electra and Merope. Merope had cried on her shoulder about fighting with Scorpius. Another lover’s quarrel. Seemed they happened on a regular basis with those two. I mean really, what did that girl expect when she dated someone like him? Maia always got the distinct impression Scorpius crept around in the background waiting for the right moment to strike and stab you in the back when you least expected it.

She couldn’t worry about Merope right now. Merope was probably already over whatever their fight had been about and moved on to the make-up sex part. Sadly, Maia often had to listen to
that
tale the following day over breakfast.

Maia needed to focus on her own problems for a change—mysterious, unplanned teleportation currently topping her list.

After dinner and probably a few too many glasses of wine, she’d said goodbye to her sisters for the night and went for a walk in the park near her house. The stress of comforting Merope left Maia longing for the cool water of the spring and soothing sounds of the waterfall, so she’d planned on taking a quick dip before heading to bed.

At that point her mind went fuzzy, as if a memory hid just beyond her reach. She sensed it was important, but yet she couldn’t grasp it.

She stared up at the sky. Orion—the hunter’s constellation—seemed to twinkle the brightest as it did every time he got really angry or was immensely thrilled with himself.

Show off.

Suddenly she remembered standing with Orion in the park near Calliope Springs. She’d been about to pull off her clothes for a quick skinny-dip when Orion wandered out of the bushes, startling her. Orion pleaded with her to give him a chance. He’d advanced on her, pulling her against him and kissing her.

She’d clipped him one in the jaw instead.

Then what?

She fought the haze clouding her memories, trying to grasp a hint of what had happened next. It didn’t make sense. Why was she here? How was she here?

“He cursed and whined about his sore jaw and I turned to leave then…” She rubbed her hand across her forehead as if doing so might help her conjure up the memories she needed. “Think.”

He’d kissed her. She’d punched him…then…

She’d been thrown over his shoulder like a carcass from one of his hunting excursions. But she wasn’t a carcass. She’d fought, squirming and punching his back as he’d carried her into the woods.

“You’ve left me no other choice,” he’d said.

Then everything went blank as the memory ended abruptly.

“I should’ve known,” she seethed. “This is because of Orion. I’m going to kill him when I get my hands on him.”

It was always because of Orion. She’d made it perfectly clear about a million times over the course of eternity that she would never be interested in him and yet Orion couldn’t seem to get that tidbit of information through his thick scull.

This still didn’t explain how she’d gone from Orion’s shoulder in the woods on Pleiades to flat on her back in Central Park on Earth.

The shock of waking up on Earth settled into the pit of her stomach like one of Electra’s paperweight-like biscuits. Her sister couldn’t bake to save her life, yet she insisted on hosting dinner parties. Maia would happily eat her sister’s cooking right now if it meant she was still on Pleiades instead of Earth. She wasn’t happy about this situation, but hanging around pouting in the middle of Central Park wasn’t going to help her get back home so she could give Orion a piece of her mind.

And she’d probably give him a strategically placed kick with her pointy-toed boots too.

A lump of bright pink and zebra stripes shimmered under the light cast by one of the nearby street lamps lining the walking paths through the park. The colorful heap of material lay a few feet from her, halfway tucked under the cover of a bush.

She crawled across the grass on her knees. As she got closer, she could see her worse fears confirmed. The lump of tacky material was a bag. There was only one way she could think of that she’d ended up on Earth with a hideous bag like that beside her.