The Changeling (30 page)

Slowly and deliberately, she said, “Cassandra will not hurt you, because it means her destruction. Recall, I told her as much. What you need to understand is that everything she has done has been for her own gratification. Like all Unseelie, Cassandra derives pleasure from torment and intimidation.” Shaking her head and appearing exasperated, she added, “Nevertheless, I will let her know of my displeasure—she will not bother you again. If she even frowns at you, I will pluck her eyes out.”

Her anger seemed to have subsided, so I pressed my luck. “Any news about the Second Aetherfae?”

Ozara studied my face, and then she turned and faced the fountain in the garden, allowing the late morning sun to reflect off of her luminous red hair. “No. As you have undoubtedly guessed, or been told—it matters not—I have been searching for signs. There are always signs. I have found nothing.”

She paused before admitting, “I do not believe there is a Second Aetherfae. I will confess, however, I thought there was a Second. The possibility was chilling, and it seemed inevitable once it became clear that you were inclined to all four elements. That is why I have been gone. We have contacted the clans and spoken with informants. None have seen a scintilla of proof that another exists. It is unlikely a Second could escape detection from Fae the world over.”

“How unlikely?” I whispered.

“Nearly impossible.” She turned back to me, smiling.

“Really?” I asked without thinking. I didn’t know whether to believe her or not, but it was good news if true.

“Yes. You see, there is no reason for you to take the fifth trial, at least not yet. That day may come, but until then, tread softly. The Council is adamant and so am I. Should you break the deal we struck, cross the line even slightly, there will be no choice but to remove you from the Weald. It behooves you not to press us.”

I nodded. “And my brother?”

Her expression softened and she looked at me like a mother comforting a child, taking both of my hands. “No word. I apologize for my absence, but now that the threat of a Second is most likely no threat at all, I will turn my full attention to locating him. I promise.”

TWENTY

RICOCHET

I’d been careless and I’d been caught. Now I had a nanny, or two of them actually, and for all I knew they were permanent. Before she left, Ozara told me she’d see to it that Cassandra wouldn’t bother me again and neither would the Ohanzee. I’d overplayed my hand and both of us knew it. Two Seelie, who I didn’t know, were now my constant companions. They followed me everywhere during spring break, to Candace’s house, to Rachel’s, to the Crescent Hotel—they never left my side.

Candace was frustrated because every time she saw me, I mentioned Aunt May, signaling that our conversations were being monitored. Her frustration was mounting, so I risked creating an Air barrier. Fortunately, neither Fae reacted. While it was up and my escorts couldn’t hear, I warned Ronnie, Rachel and Candace that I had bodyguards. All three understood when I told them our
conversations
had to come to an end for a while, but that worried Rachel more than ever. She began calling me each evening, just for small talk, doing her best to keep my mind off the situation. The three attended every one of my swim practices. We did homework together, and they took me to the Garden Bistro any time I’d let them—all, I knew, to keep my mind off of my unwanted immortal companions as much as possible.

For three weeks, neither of the two Fae was further away from me than fifty feet, and it drove me nuts. On a positive note, Ozara’s promise had worked. Cassandra avoided me and my bodyguards
.
Quid pro quo, I guess.

My new companions ignored me when I tried to strike up a conversation. The first was Fire inclined and always remained in Naeshura. The second, Air inclined, took the form of various flying insects. Since my bodyguards wouldn’t tell me their names, I called them Smokey and Gusty. I chuckled when I revealed their new names, but the humor I initially felt transformed into genuine annoyance in just two days. So much so, I considered renaming them Ball and Chain.

Fortunately, Smokey and Gusty didn’t know when I was trying to track Cassandra, and they didn’t come inside the cottage, at least the main part of the cottage. Any time I passed the threshold of the library and got close to the gazebo, they were there. Even though the elemental stones were gone, and as far as I knew creating Aether without them was impossible, Ozara saw to it that I wouldn’t be getting any additional free passes.

It took very little time to figure out that my elemental escorts were powerless to prevent me from visiting Cassandra when I projected my mind. I had spent an hour each morning of spring break trying to figure out where she went at 9 a.m. With my new attendants, she apparently felt free to take up her usual routine—she’d stopped trying to catch me snooping around the Seoladán. Still, it didn’t matter how hard I concentrated, I couldn’t keep up with her when she shot away to the southwest. So I changed my tactics.

On Tuesday morning, when I’d floated above my body, I willed myself across the lake and waited for Cassandra to shoot past me. I felt her essence disappear over the top of a hill further along her route, so that’s where I waited on Wednesday. Thursday and Friday I willed myself along the same path each time she got close. In time, I learned that she turned back every mile or so, probably to make sure nobody tracked her. She was oblivious to my presence.

By Friday, I had followed her to the south side of the lake, near Springdale, but I was only slightly closer to finding out where else she went. It appeared that Billy was correct back in January. If she was indeed going to Mitch, it was in a more populated area.

It was my guess that humans were holding Mitch, making it impossible to simply ferret out his location by tracking Fae. It also meant that he was virtually invisible among the other quarter-million people who lived and worked in the metropolitan areas on the other side of Beaver Lake.

There was another problem as well. At the south side of Springdale, Cassandra darted back and forth erratically, a mile in one direction and then three miles in another, never in the same place and so randomly I couldn’t detect a pattern. After three or four turns she disappeared each time. I hoped that meant she was getting close to where Mitch was being kept. While that excited me, it was frustrating because I didn’t have any way to get closer. Clearly I needed a new plan.

***

In early April, and for the first time in over a year, I experienced a few moments when I felt like a normal teenage girl. Prom was in a few days, and even I got caught up in the moment. Of course, I wouldn’t be going with Doug, but I was going. Turning down at least twelve different proposals, I’d decided to pass on a date. I was comfortable with the decision, because I didn’t want to risk drawing anyone else into the crosshairs. Mom and Candace, however, were not happy.

Both of them pressured me to reconsider, and Candace began dropping hints about eligible boys. Mom took a more direct approach. Over my father’s short-lived objection, she encouraged me to call Doug and try to patch things up. I politely tried to sidestep the suggestion, but I wasn’t as smooth as Gavin. In so many words, she told me that Doug and I were bound to make up, and she thought I’d always look back at our “spat” as a mistake. She just didn’t understand everything that was going on. It was too late to make up.

I finally diverted Candace’s focus from me by placing it on Rachel. We’d spent so much time together, Rachel’s crush on a senior named Adam was the worst kept secret in our circle. Candace and I worked on her, and Ronnie worked on Adam. When Adam finally asked Rachel, I thought she’d pass out. Unfortunately, when Rachel secured a date, all focus shifted back to me.

Prom was going to be fun and I was going to have a good time. At least that’s what I kept telling myself. The committee had finally settled on a theme that everyone could agree on—Ronnie’s original idea, and one that seemed appropriate for the elegant old hotel—the golden age of Hollywood. It became official when I agreed to provide the ultimate backdrop for photos in the form of period correct rolling art for the red carpet. There probably weren’t too many prom committees with access to a Duesenberg or a pair of 1930s Packard roadsters. For that matter, most people my age didn’t even know what they were.

***

On three separate occasions, I feigned being sick and stayed home from school in a futile attempt to find Mitch. It was the most frustrating experience of my life. I knew he was close, somewhere southwest of the Weald, and I knew that Cassandra was going there each morning, but I couldn’t keep up with her erratic movements. What was almost as frustrating was that I hadn’t seen Aunt May since the first time I attempted astral projection.

If there was any good news, it was that Cassandra had apparently lost interest in Doug. He hadn’t been on the Weald since Dad threatened to wring his neck, and when I tracked her, Cassandra hadn’t gone anywhere near him. Sara confirmed that Cassandra hadn’t gotten close Doug in the weeks since his family moved to Fayetteville.

From the moment my bodyguards had shown up, I hadn’t dared to read Pete’s journal. I wanted to finish it, but the thought of its location being discovered by anyone scared me. Smokey and Gusty never came in the cottage, but I couldn’t risk retrieving it because I knew they were watching my every move. Astral projection was my only free time, and experiencing it and the freedom it provided, became addictive.

Early in the morning, after I’d lost Cassandra somewhere over northern Fayetteville, I’d willed myself back to the Weald and onto the second island. Through the thick fog I sensed three Unseelie hunting a deer they’d undoubtedly smuggled across the lake from the Weald. They were brutal and cruel, and despite my desire to save the poor thing, they weren’t what I was looking for. Reluctantly, I left it there and willed myself to Sherman and Victoria’s.

As I had long suspected, neither were in the cottage. I got the impression that, like all Fae, they only went inside when humans showed up. The long driveway gave them ample opportunity to shift into human form and take their places when the need arose. Up the hill above the bluff line, however, I felt them. Drifting closer, I sensed eight Fae.

Through the fog a clearing appeared. Surrounded by bluffs on two sides, all eight were in Naeshura and maintaining fixed positions. When I got close enough, I could hear them debating. While I didn’t speak the language, I somehow knew what they were saying to one another. They communicated with clear, precise thoughts, but they were doing so very methodically. Maybe excruciating was a better adjective. One would communicate and several minutes would pass before there was a reply.

Ozara was not with them, but the eight in the clearing were members of the Council. After what I perceived to be an hour or more, I knew why it had taken Pete O’Shea seventy years to gather just one journal full of information. They didn’t say much to one another, and what they did say didn’t amount to much. I expected eavesdropping on the Council to be exciting and filled full of useful bits of information. It was neither, but not all was lost.

As I concentrated on them, waiting patiently during the pauses, I noted a tinkling sound, musical really, coming from the bluffs behind them. Without any effort on my part, I found myself mere feet from a tiny rivulet of silvery water seeping out of the limestone above me. Mist floated past my mind’s eye, so I drew closer for a clearer view.

Tiny flecks of deep green moss danced back and forth on the blackened, moist stone face as droplets stretched ever so slightly downward before letting go and falling into a small pool of clear water. Drop after drop, they swelled, shimmered and broke for the surface. Their sweet tympani of contact was followed by tiny ringlets that obscured and distorted the small colorful stones on the bottom.

It was beautiful. I concentrated on the tinkling sound, mesmerized momentarily. My conscious mind was lulled into a peaceful, restful state. I’d been so preoccupied with tracking Cassandra I’d never noticed how vibrant and alive everything seemed in astral travel. Rather than let the tether instantly pull me back to my body like I usually did, I simply relaxed and allowed it to pull me gently and slowly across the clearing, through the plants and shrubs and over the smooth stones and dark earth.

Until that moment, the fog that always obscured my vision seemed annoying, like an obstacle or a blindfold. Suddenly that changed. As I drifted back toward the cottage, I was overcome by the sensation of floating in a cloud. It was almost as if the Earth and the heavens had been miraculously joined, permitting me to experience both at once. There was no blue above me, but I could just make out the sun behind by the thin white veil.
Veil. That’s a more appropriate description than fog.
Moving through it was similar to watching layers of gauze curtains being pulled, one by one, away from a gift. Each ghostly object slowly took form and became more vibrant, the colors richer and more obvious, and then gradually drifted back behind the veil when I passed by.

I could hear the wind gliding though the trees, whistling over the rough edges, clattering through the leaves, but I couldn’t feel it. Although it was true that I couldn’t physically touch anything, I felt connected to everything I drifted past. After Mitch was safe, I promised myself, I would spend more time exploring this remarkable new world.

TWENTY-ONE

MISCHANCE

On the morning of the prom I attempted to track Cassandra again, but I tried a different tactic: I moved to the south, toward the east side of Fayetteville with the hope she’d pass by me when she finished her jittery, evasive movements. She never did. I planned to move slightly west in a circular pattern the next day.