Excerpt: Cerulean House I: Prophecies

A piercing scream woke most of the Cerulean House residents that november morning, and caused Bumble to start barking. Halo Ceruleus groggily dragged herself out of bed and stumbled in the direction the noise was coming from. She soon found the cause; Emily was standing in front of the mirror in her bedroom, screaming because she seemed to have grown a thick, brown, bushy beard overnight.

“That’s got to be one of the worst hangovers ever,” Halo mumbled, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

“It’s not funny!” Emily screeched, “I don’t know how it got there and I can’t magic it away!”

“Then shave,” Halo responded, “I’m going back to bed.”

She turned to leave the room, but her way was blocked by Thunder, who was still sneezing and changing shape with each one. In a few seconds, she had transformed from a cat to a raccoon to a large German man with a thick mustache who was wearing lederhosen.

“We’ve got a problem,” Thunder said in a German accent, looking thoroughly annoyed.

“Well, actually, you’ve got a problem,” Halo said, smirking slightly, just before her nose began to tingle. She let out a massive sneeze that sent her wings flying out of her back. They tore through her baggy t-shirt and knocked over a vase of flowers that was standing on a table by the door. Emily gave her an annoyed look.

“Sorry,” Halo mumbled, “So... We have a problem...”

She tucked her wings away and slipped through the door, past German Thunder, before making her way down the corridor to the left wing of the house. She banged noisily on Chaos’ door, but then opened it without waiting for a response. It was probably a good thing she did, as Chaos was lying on the floor, half his body covered in grey tufts of hair, shivering madly.

“Er, Chaos, mate, are you alright?” Halo asked, as Thunder and Emily joined her in the room.

“Stupid question, ja,” Thunder said, before adding, “Damn accent.”

Halo helped Chaos to his feet and wrapped the quilt from the bed around him. The shivering subsided a little, although it was still pretty bad.

“What’s happening to me?” Chaos asked worriedly, “Is this normal?”

Emily shook her head. “We’ve all got similar problems,” she said sympathetically.

“We’d better go check on Finn,” Halo said, putting an arm around Chaos and leading him out the room.

“One more thing,” Chaos said through his chattering teeth, “Who’s the German guy?”