Authors: Theresa M. Jones
“You’re laughing at me,” I accused as I pulled away from him, scooting to the furthest part of the couch. My feet still hurt too badly for me to get up from the couch, so scooting away and glaring would have to work.
He shook his head and tried to stop himself from laughing, but only managed to change the laugh into a snort that sounded ridiculous. His head went from leaning all the way back to down in his hands. I rolled my eyes, because it
so
wasn’t funny.
“Listen, Lily, I’m not laughing at you. It was just funny the way you said it. You were so serious, like we could just stand up and you would instantly learn how to wield a blade. It’s not that easy. Fae train for decades to wield a blade. If your magic is as strong as I believe it will be, based on your parents, it will come easier for you than for others, but it’s never easy.”
I started to reply to his idiocy, but he stopped me. “I will help you; just know that it won’t be easy and fast.”
I sighed and nodded. “I know. I just…I need to learn.”
“I know. And I will help you. You are in good shape. I mean, we walked for over fifty miles today with, what…three stops? You didn’t complain and continued on, despite being without magic. But I think before we start training with a blade, we should learn some basic defensive moves.”
I didn’t argue that I needed more than basic moves. I didn’t ask about what I would do if we found them tomorrow. I didn’t voice any of my insecurities or misgivings and just held it in because I needed this. Even if it made me even a little more capable, it would be worth it.
Still, I couldn’t help myself from looking down and shaking my head at how little I could do. How weak I really was.
“Tomorrow we travel to the Central Village; I believe that is the way they went. And if they passed through it, we will find someone who saw them. I feel confident we will find something on them. But, as I said before, there are not only good Fae in The Empyrean. We have bad people just like you do in your Mortal Realm.”
“I get it, there are criminals everywhere.”
“Yes. Criminals. But not only criminals are bad. Things are very tough in The Empyrean right now. Incomes are lower, jobs are scarce, and taxes are higher. Here we don’t only pay taxes in money, but also essentials and magic.”
“What do you mean?” I had been slowly angling myself closer to him, but now I was back in my original location, right next to him.
“I mean, we have currency.” He pulled a tiny leather bag that had been strapped to his belt and poured a few coins into his hand to show me. “But we also trade magic and essentials. An essential can be anything essential to life. Food, clothing, blades, anything. We trade a lot. Like those cups we used earlier, they are very rare here.”
“Why? What makes them so rare?”
“They are created in Lemuria, which is a city beneath Muircadia where the Sprites live. It takes many years for one to be formed, as they are formed from the waters above the city, and then must be crystallized with magic. They are not as rare in Muircadia, but here in Ardennes they are. Someone could trade a cup like that for a very hefty price.”
“Wow. There’s so much about this place I don’t know.” It was strange to think that there was a city underneath water, but hey, here anything is possible.
“Taxes have continued to increase, due to the battles. See, there are some that are very loyal to our king and queen, and some who are absolutely not loyal. The rebels blame King Mastikh for the disappearance of the previous king and queen and the troubles that followed their disappearance, and so they cause riots and are continuously fighting to dethrone him.
“The real problem is that the fighting is only causing more trouble. All citizens are required to give magic to the throne once a month to help strengthen the Royal Guard, which may not seem like a lot to you, but it used to be once a year. It is exhausting and makes the Fae weaker for a short time. Eventually, you end up magicless, which is the worst thing that could ever happen to a Fae.”
“And everyone is okay with this?” I asked, appalled that the king and queen could willingly strip their subjects of their magic.
“No, obviously everyone is not okay with it, which is why the rebellion continues to grow.”
“How long does it take for a Fae to lose his magic?” I asked.
“If you don’t do it often, your magic will rebuild. But doing it so often makes it difficult for the magic to restore. Fae are not living as long as we once did. If your magic is strong and pure, you could give some magic once a month for a few decades before you begin to notice a difference. But with the general population it’s taking only a few years before they begin to seriously weaken.”
“That’s horrible.”
He shrugged his shoulders before murmuring, “Yeah. It really is.”
I leaned back against the couch, my shoulders sagged and my head began to drop. My legs ached and my feet hurt even worse than my legs. As we talked, my eyelids began to droop, creeping closer and closer down.
In all honesty, it sucked that The Empyrean was having so much trouble, but I just didn’t care that much. This wasn’t my home. This wasn’t a place I really cared about. My being here was only a means to an end. A vengeful end.
“There’s a bed in the back. If you want to use it I can show you where it is.”
I only shook my head, not even having the energy to talk anymore. All the talk about the lack of magic and weakening fairies made me feel even weaker than I already did. Or maybe it was the bazillion miles we hiked today. And we had a gazillion more to walk tomorrow.
He stood up, and moments later came back with a thick blanket. He draped it over me as I scooted further down on the couch, where I was almost in a laying position. I pulled the blanket up under my chin, wincing at the sting in my hand from where the glass tore my skin at home. It was still red and bruised due to how deep it had gone in. Now that it was fully scabbed over, I could make out a shape. It was almost a perfect water drop, like a tear. The only inaccuracy was the slightly jagged tip. A broken tear. How fitting…
In that moment, I welcomed sleep. I needed it.
I didn’t dream. Thank God.
I woke to a light shining in my eyes. At first I thought I was walking through a porta again, coming to the end of my journey and seeing the bright white light at the end of the triangle, multi-colored tunnel. But it was just the sun blinding me through another strange window.
I saw Alec walking around in the kitchen and remembered why I was there. I threw my legs over the edge of the couch and tried to stand, but as they groaned in protest I immediately remembered the crazy long walk yesterday. I tried but failed to withhold the moan from escaping my lips.
Alec walked in and nodded at me.
“Breakfast is ready.” He walked back into the kitchen apparently not noticing my painful situation. I willed my legs to cooperate and tried to stand again. My feet shouted at me in anguish and my legs twitched with an ache I had never felt before. And yet, I knew it would only get worse. If only I had been in track back home or something, maybe then I would have been better prepared for this. But really, how could anyone ever prepare for a situation like this?
Alec was sitting at the table when I walked into the kitchen. I sat on the chair, and finally regained control of my mouth, forbidding the moan of pleasure to escape. How ridiculous that it could feel so good to sit, after I had just been lying down for hours.
At the table, the blue liquid filled the glass I had used the day before, and beside the glass was a large leaf with flowers. The flowers were unfamiliar to me but I wasn’t a botanist or anything. They were yellow, with a brown center, and the pedals were so large and thick the flowers almost looked fake, like plastic decorations.
I sat and watched as Alec ate one after another while reading a book. The flowers weren’t really that big, but I probably couldn’t fit the whole thing in my mouth at once. That didn’t stop Alec though, he stuck the entire thing in his mouth, chewed and swallowed, before grabbing another. Between my leaf and his was a bowl that looked very regular and was filled with many more of the flowers.
“Flowers?”
He looked up at me, taking his eyes from the book he read, and smiled. It was the first time he had smiled since just after we arrived. For someone who loved this place so much, he didn’t really appear happy most of the time.
“The ruptin flower is very good for you, and tastes pretty great too. We’re lucky I found some behind the house. They’re not nearly as plentiful as the cheslins, and they don’t last long at all after being picked. We will take the cheslins with us for our trip, but even though they taste so good, they can get boring after a while. Believe me.”
So I just went with it. I picked up the flower closest to me on my leaf-plate, and stuck it in my mouth. Just as I had thought, I couldn’t stick the whole thing in my mouth, so I bit it straight down the center. It wasn’t crazy juicy like the cheslins the night before. But it was still sweet. In fact, it tasted just like a cherry, the same consistency and everything, just a different color and shape.
As we ate, I asked, “So, are you all vegetarians or something?”
His eyebrows twitched just a little, before he smiled at me again. “For the most part. The animals have their place in this land, just as we do. We are all connected, as I explained back in the Mortal Realm. We do not harm them if we don’t have to. And most of us don’t eat them. The vegetation is enough for us…Well, it always had been anyway. It’s not as plentiful as before, since so many of the Fae are losing their magic.
“The only exception is really the Pixies. They eat just as much meat as most mortals do.”
“Hmmm…so the plants and stuff are connected to your magic too?”
“Yes. We are all connected. The animals, the sky, the water, the land, the plants, the fae, and the fire. All of it is connected. All of
us
.” He emphasized the ‘us’, I guess wanting to remind me that I was Fae too. Whatever. I didn’t feel Fae. I was just me. An orphan. Homeless.
“So, I was wondering why we don’t use the tripudio?” I said, deciding to change the subject. It was something I had thought about when my legs were screaming at me earlier on the couch.
“We could. It would save time, but could cost us infinitely more. If we pass them, how would we know? We could lose their trail easily, and then where would we be?”
“Dang,” I said, only because he was right and it sucked. “Okay, so what now?”
“The trip to the Central Village is at least two weeks, so we will take some provisions from here. Mostly the nectar and cheslins. They will sustain us.”
Two weeks? Shoot. Me. Now.
“Nectar?” He pointed to my glass, indicating that the blue stuff in the pretty glass was nectar. “What is it?”
“It’s juice from the trees. It’s equivalent to the water from the Mortal Realm. The water here is different, and only a Sprite can drink it. All other Fae drink some derivative from their province. We are Sylph, but we can drink the nectar of the Nymph. Just as they can drink our serum from Kamalani. And both Nymph and Sylph can drink the wine from Vesuvius of the Pixies. The only ones that are different are the Sprites. They can only be sustained on water, and none of the rest of us can drink their water.”
“I feel like I should be taking notes,” I chuckled. “Yellow flowers, good. Water, bad. Fae blade, strong. Tripudio, can save time but lose the trail. Anything I’m missing?” Though I was being sarcastic, I felt the smile pulling at my lips.
“Don’t tell anyone your real name. That’s an important one,” he said.
“But I thought you said it wasn’t…”
“It’s not dangerous or anything. It’s custom. But it’s important. You only say your real name to the one you love and pledge your life to.”
“Oh.” Weird.
He cleared his throat and shifted in his chair, then suddenly found his book very interesting once again. I could have been polite, I could have let him read and not question his abrupt change in mood, but I didn’t.
“Have you ever told someone your real name?” He took a deep breath before closing his eyes for a good three seconds. Then he looked up at me and nodded.
“Once, but I will not talk about it.”
“How old are you?” He already knew I was young. Basically a child.
“I am in between.”
“Ugh. What does that even mean? Why do you always talk so weird?”
He shook his head. “Come with me, we have a long journey, and you appear to be finished eating.” Obviously, since the flowers were gone. Duh.
Fairy boys were even worse than mortal boys. And I didn’t even understand mortal boys.
I was so screwed.
When we left the tree house, it felt surreal; it was the first place I slept in this strange land, the first place I cried for my parents here, the first place Alec and I connected on a level of friendship. But I tried not to dwell on it too much. I walked behind him as we left that little, lonely village of empty tree houses.
After walking for a few hours, we stopped at a little clearing where we could sit off the trail and eat. We ate some cheslins and drank the nectar, and my legs and feet loved me so much for the rest I could almost hear them blowing me kisses.
We hadn’t talked much since we left. I had tried to start a conversation when we first started walking, but Alec quickly shut me down. I didn’t know if it was because of where we had stayed, and whatever loss he had felt, or if it was because of something else.
But I was tired of being quiet.
“What did you mean when you said you were ‘in between’?” He looked over at me, actually looking at me for the first time since we left the village. His green eyes sparkled in the sunlight that snuck its way between the branches above us casting luminescent rays here and there, and his yellow hair was again creating an artificial crown around his head.
“I am too young to do some things and too old for others. I am not a novice…Umm, a young Fae. We call Fae in their first century a novice. They are too young for many things. Inexperienced. Immature. Reckless and impulsive.” I tried to ignore the fact that I wasn’t even a novice yet. I must still be a baby to him. “And I am not yet an elder. A Fae becomes an elder either by completing a great feat or living past the age of 600.”
“Oh. So you’re somewhere between 100 and 600 years old?” I chuckled at the absurdity of it, since he looked to be in his early twenties.
“Yes. I know it seems old to you, but we don’t age the same as mortals. A novice is basically a teenager-a young adult, while the in-between is anywhere from a twenty to forty year old mortal. So, I’m equivalent to a mortal in the early to late twenties,” he explained. “I have been a Realm Guard for the last 120 years. I was the first novice to be allowed in the Guard. Because I’m just. That. Awesome.” The pride shone through his eyes. It sounded impressive, sure. But I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at him.
A stirring in the trees stole my attention from the ridiculous fairy. At first I thought it was the wind, but it wasn’t very windy right then. Then I thought maybe I would finally see another Fae. But no, that wasn’t it either.
What walked through the trees, right in front of us, literally took my breath away. At first glance, it was just a really white horse.
But it wasn’t a horse at all. The animal’s mane and tail were whiter than anything I had ever seen. Whiter than snow. Whiter than the bright white light from the porta. Whiter than the whipped cream I smother my pumpkin pie in. And atop its head were two horns. One right above its head, like a unicorn. And another, smaller horn above its nose. The horns were brilliant blue, like sapphires twisted into a curling, cone shape.
“An abada,” Alec breathed, as stunned as I was. He remained very still, so I did too. Just because it was pretty, didn’t mean it was nice.
The creature walked into our tiny clearing, stopped and looked right at us. Really, I felt like it looked at me, but that was pretty crazy to think, so I decided it actually looked at both of us, the strangers in its land.
When its blue-eyed gaze met mine, I felt like time stopped. It was like I was floating in the air, hovering above the ground and between space and time. I defied gravity and all laws of physics in that moment. The most beautiful sound in the world filled my ears. It was like I always imagined Heaven to be. With singing angels and bright lights and beauty.
And then it bent its head down to the ground, almost like how the animals in the
Lion King
bowed to the baby Simba, and just turned away from me and left. Like everything else, it left me alone in this world. Well, in all the worlds, or Realms, or whatever.
“Please, look at me!” Alec was right in my face, his green eyes now overcoming the blue ones I had just looked at. He was hunched over, bending at the knees to be on my eye level. He looked frantic, almost panicked. When I looked at him, he sighed. It wasn’t in frustration or impatience for once. It was a sigh of relief.
“You scared the crap outta me.”
“What? Why?”
“You’ve been staring off in the distance for the last twenty minutes.”
Twenty minutes?
The unicorn, or abada thing was just there a second ago.
“Was it real?”
“The abada?” I nodded to answer his question. “Yes it was real. But it left twenty minutes ago and you were just frozen. You didn’t even blink.” Then he sat down in front of me, crossing his legs.
“I was worried.” Though I could tell he meant it, he seemed surprised by that revelation.
“Hmm. Well, I don’t know. I felt like I just blinked and it was gone, and then you were in my face.”
“Did it speak to you?”
“What? The horse? I mean Unicorn…Ugh, The abada? Animals don’t talk.”
“Just answer me. Did it say anything to you? In your head.”
“No. I mean, when it looked at me I felt like I was flying, or floating at least. And I heard some singing, like the most beautiful sound you could imagine.” After saying the words out loud, I felt pretty ridiculous. But everything about this whole place was ridiculous. Everything was weird and different and it just brought into focus how alone I really was. I didn’t fit in back in the Mortal Realm, and I certainly didn’t fit in here in this crazy fairy world.
He searched my eyes again, as if he was hunting for an answer to something. But then, it almost looked like he was in awe…of me. Which didn’t make sense. I was no one special. But when he looked at me like that, I felt special, important. Not alone. Unfortunately the spell broke as soon as he spoke to me.
“Abadas are very rare. They rarely interact with any Fae, especially not one who hasn’t even received her magic yet.” He took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a minute. “They can see the future. Had you been a little older, you would’ve been able to understand what he said to you. When they speak to us, it is only to tell us of the future and offer advice.” Then more to himself than to me, “I can only imagine what he said to you. What future he saw.”
“It was beautiful,” I said, because the future stuff was too weird for me. And really, it was beautiful. “Those horns were so pretty. The same color as her eyes.”
He nodded. “Yeah, they are always pretty. But all abadas are male. The females are unicorns.”
“Unicorns are real too?” He chuckled at my surprise. Which only made me laugh as well, because when would I learn to not be surprised about anything in this place?
“So, we have a good thirty miles left to walk today. You ready to start again?” He asked me after he stood up and gathered all the supplies back into the abscondita. My feet continued to scream at me, as soon as I stood on them, but I ignored them. This was only day two, out of who knows how many days left.
As we began walking again, the silence hung heavy on us.
“Why are you so quiet when we walk?” I finally asked. The sounds of my footsteps were really annoying. I felt so antsy, wanting to do something more than just walk through a freaking forest. And the quiet was just unnerving.
“Because things are…Being back there…” He took a deep breath and held it in for a while before releasing it. He stopped walking and turned around to look at me. His eyes looked darker than jade, no longer bright and cheery. His face held a scowl so severe it rocked me to my core, making me very afraid of this fairy I really didn’t even know. And once again, his vein was bulging in his forehead and out the side of his neck.
“I’ve been in the Mortal Realm for the last forty years trying to forget everything, and being there last night was hard for me. It brought up memories I’ve tried to forget. Brought up angers and passions so old I thought I had buried them decades ago.”
The anger he projected only spiked my own anger. I was furious at everything. I hated those murderers. I hated being so alone. I hated being afraid and incapable. I hated the unknown and this whole stupid place. And all I could think of was why the hell did he want to yell at me? It wasn’t my fault.
I welcomed my rage and directed it back at him.
“Then why the hell are you here with me? Huh? Why trek around with me, not even a novice or whatever, just to come back here and rehash all those memories?” My anger was surging through my body, boiling my blood. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew I was being unfair. He was helping me when he didn’t have to, and without him I would be screwed. But in that moment, I didn’t care.
“Because I know what it feels like!” He was shouting now, which only put fuel to the fire within me.
“You have no idea what it feels like. I lost my parents. I’m alone! And stuck with a stupid, cocky fairy who is so quiet I can hear my own heart beating!”
“Are you so naïve to think that you are the only person in the world who has known loss?” His anger faded with his words. Instead, it was replaced with grief. I had seen it back at that tree house. I knew he had lost someone, but right then, I saw it clearly. He was still heartbroken over whatever had happened.
As quickly as his vulnerability appeared, it vanished. He pulled a mask over his face, leaving only impassiveness and a hint of cruelty.
“I’m only helping you because I’m curious about your parents. It was obvious they were someone special, and I want to know why they were unmarked in the Mortal Realm. And why they were so brutally murdered. If you want to go the rest of the way on your own, be my guest.”
The challenge was clear. The threat, obvious. And there was no way I could call his bluff now, not without knowing anything about this place.
I took a deep breath in an attempt to calm my nerves. I wouldn’t be nice to him. I didn’t have the energy for it. Instead I walked past him and continued down the trail, hoping that he would take the hint and follow me.
Eventually the sun slipped lower in the sky, and Alec created some form of light that hovered above his head and a few feet in front of him. I was thankful for it, but didn’t say thank you. I was still angry with him. We hadn’t spoken since our argument, and I wasn’t going to be the first to cave.
“We should stop here for the night.” Again, I didn’t reply to him, only nodded my assent. Here didn’t seem like anything special to me. We were still just on a trail, walking through the forest.
We walked off the trail just a little and stopped in a small circle of trees. Alec gathered some branches from the surrounding area into a small group, and then pulled out the box of matches from the tree house. The fire was full and thick, and provided some comforting heat.
I sat close to the fire, watching the yellows and oranges and reds intertwine and flicker. Despite its destructive properties, fires were glorious to watch burn. The heat they emanated was pure strength. It was so hard to stop a fire once it got burning that often they would burn for days. It was like the fire was soothing me, providing a much needed calm to my insides.
“Thinking back to the abada,” he started, “it could have been anything that walked through that path. Most Nymph are friendly, but as we both know, not all are. And there are creatures in this forest that are not as nice as the abadas.”
I nodded. It was something I had been thinking about as well. Along with contemplating my loneliness and lack of…everything, I was also thinking about my inability to protect myself, let alone avenge my parent’s deaths.
“I think it’s time you learn how to defend yourself.”
I couldn’t agree more!