Discovering Fae

The longer we were in the darkness of the woods, the less scary it seemed. It was dangerous of course, and it was still scary, but I was able to see the dark beauty to it. The way the moss hung from some of the tree branches, the way the rare specks of light seemed like it danced before the canopy covered it again, even the cumbersome undergrowth that made any and all of our progress through the woods practically a war.

This was the third day that we had been looking for any sign of Zane and Mal had returned a little while ago with a new com-wisp from Ben.

“They’ll be in Cosh in three hours,” he said, taking a drink from the skin of water Dad passed him after he gave me a tight hug.

“Hopefully they have a better time of it then we do,” Dad nodded as he put his pack on his shoulder.

“Seeing as they’ll be in a village, I’d be willing to bet they’ll be fine,” I snorted.

“There’s more of a chance of them coming across something that isn’t so friendly than we are, at this point,” Dad muttered.

“So it’s not just me,” Mal said as we started walking again.

“What am I missing here?” I asked, confused.

“These woods are not just dark, Fae,” Mal said. “They’re supposed to have some of the more aggressive creatures, but we haven’t seen hide or hair of anything bigger than a feral brownie.”

“Any guesses as to why?” I asked after a moment.

“Not a clue,” Dad said. “It’s certainly something for your mother and I to look into when we return to the palace.”

“I’m not going, am I?” I asked.

“That’s the idea, actually,” Dad laughed. “Don’t worry, Fae. We have time to spare before we have to go back. Months, actually.”

“You’ve been away so long already,” I frowned.

“We handle most of our duties remotely. Allows us the freedom to roam about, mostly to look for you,” he shrugged.

“I don’t think me going to the palace is a good idea,” I frowned.

“Why not?” he asked.

“I don’t do well with snobs,” I grimaced. “I may not be sparking off randomly, but I don’t have the greatest control either. The last thing I want is to get mad or irritated and end up setting fire to the drapes.”

“Good. Those drapes are hideous,” he laughed. “Don’t tell your mother I said that, though.”

“I’m serious, Dad,” I rolled my eyes, but smirked with him.

“So am I. My eyes damn near bleed when I look at them,” he elbowed my shoulder. “As for snobs... roasting them might not be advised, but a little zap to the behind always works for your mother.”

“Or I could just scowl at them. See if I inherited your natural talent for the expression,” I teased, and he chuckled.

“I found... something?” Mal called from ahead of us.

Dad and I rushed over, and I covered my mouth and nose at the stench. Like bad meat when you open the fridge. Only worse. Mal quickly came over and shook his head as he put a hand on my shoulder.

“It’s not him, is it?” I asked.

“Not Zane,” he shook his head. “But he was here.”

“You’re sure?” Dad asked, looking in the brush where the smell was coming from.

“I’ve been bitten by him before. That’s him or another dog Morphi,” Mal nodded.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Someone killed an earth fairy,” Mal answered. “Ripped him apart.”

“This isn’t just any kind of death,” Dad shook his head. “Whoever did it was in a rage beyond anything I’ve ever seen before.”

Blaine

We have been in this town for half an hour and already I want to hit someone. I was being careful not to make it obvious that I was a hellhound. Being young and unbound, in this part of the Sidhe, was asking to have everyone and their grandmother try to bind me to them. But it was so hard not to literally bite someone.

Ben and I were acting the caring nephews protecting their aunt while she asked all the questions. I, for one, was happy enough with the arrangement for the same reason why Fae thought it would best for Quinn to be in the group out looking for Zane’s trail in the woods. I was more likely to growl at people right now.

Ben seemed to be handling it all better than I was, occasionally making a comment or remark that tracked with the bare story we were using to both explain why we were there and the questions. Apparently, it was still a rite of passages to hunt something dangerous and a hazed Morphi was pretty dangerous. And I had thought that practice had died out a long time ago.

Now, on a normal day, or as close to normal as it’s gotten since finding out who Fae’s parents are, Mary scared the absolute hell out of me. Quinn did, too, but Mary was different. I knew what to expect from Quinn to an extent. But Mary? She was normally easy to read, like an open book, which was the totally opposite of her husband. She hid nothing from anyone. Every emotion she had, you saw it running across her face and through her eyes, a lot like Fae.

Most of the time, what you saw on Mary’s face was gentler emotions, like kindness, sympathy, and the fierce protection of a mother over her child. But there were moments where the colder, harder, more dark intentions came through. Just a quick flash in the middle of casual tones, like discussing the weather, then it was gone as the subject changed to more pleasant things. “Oh, those flowers would look lovely in Fae’s hair, but if anyone so much as touches the air she breathes, I’ll rip their skin off and whip them with it until there’s nothing left. Oh, look at that pretty blue in that necklace. Pity it’s all fake.”

Yeah. Terrifying.

I was insanely glad it was Mal Bonded to Fae and not me. The looks he got from Quinn alone were enough to make me want to tuck tail and run, but the sweet and innocent smile Mary got when she warned him that if he so much as twitched wrong and it upset her daughter, she’d make him wish he was dead would have made me tinkle like a chihuahua.

Being here was showing me another part of Mary that scared me. I had thought that she never cared to keep her thoughts from running rampant across her features and that she was simply not able to. I was very wrong. I guess after being with Quinn for so long, she picked up a few things from him. That cold, merciless look that seemed like it was going right through you looked almost out of place on the parts of Mary I had seen so far. If anything, it was unnerving coming from her, since I knew that she meant every word she said.

It was then that I realized that, while she was capable of it, Mary did not, ever, bluff. Again, a trait I saw in Fae as well. There was no way they had been around each other enough already for Fae to pick up learned behaviors like the glare the graced Quinn’s face all the time, but I had seen Fae pulling many times before she was taken the first time. If there had been any doubt in my mind about who her parents were, they didn’t last long once I started noticing those little similarities.

Even now, seeing Mary facing off with a mouthy imp that thought suggesting he tell her the information she wanted in his room over a greasy bar, I saw where Fae got her attitude. Ben was smirking and shaking his head as he leaned against a light post that didn’t look like it could withstand a brisk breeze, let alone being leaned on like that.

“Shouldn’t we do something?” I asked him, finding amusement in watching Mary nearly yanking the imp’s jaw off by the double braid of beard hanging from his chin.

“If we did, it would put a damper on the reputation this is going to earn her,” he shrugged. “Just keep an eye on the crowd. Keep the fight as fair as possible.”

“The whole stinking cesspit of a town could come after her and it still wouldn’t be fair to them,” I snorted.

“They don’t know that,” Ben smirked.

Once Mary finished by literally pulling the hair off of his face, the imp howled and ran away as she tossed the braids into the street with a look of disgust on her face.

“It seems filth is the mark of status around here,” she said wrinkling her whole face as she wiped her hand on her leg. “Bathing is less a requirement and more an unsavory suggestion.”

“Imps are vile in more ways than one,” Ben agreed.

“In my experience, that one was basically squeaking with cleanliness,” I shrugged.

“Well, it wasn’t entirely for nothing, I suppose,” she said. “We need to go to the other side of the forest. He saw a Morphi that looked like a rabid dog a few weeks ago coming out of the forest in Ha’anok, which is almost directly south of here.”

“And he’s sure it was Morphi?” I asked. “Lots of things in there can look like rabid dogs.”

“He saw it shift, so yes. I would say he’s sure,” she nodded as Ben whispered into his hand where he had the comm wisp hidden. “We’ll stay in town for the night, so we don’t look too eager, then move on.”

“They found something, too,” Ben said quietly. “Dead earth fairy, ripped apart in a rage. Both Mal and Quinn are certain it’s a Morphi kill. Maybe a month, give or take.”

I frowned. Zane could be a hothead at times, but I couldn’t see him killing anyone that wasn’t trying to kill him first. The Haze was destroying my brother in ways I didn’t even consider before. The memories I had of him, the way I saw him were being beaten down and turned to dust the more we learned.

“What’s that look?” Mary asked as we started walking back to the inn we were staying at.

“I know that it’s not my brother. It’s his body, but not his mind,” I said.

“But?” she prompted.

“But it still hurts,” I sighed. “Whatever pieces of my brother there may have been during all of this are gone. There is no hope for him and hunting him down?”

“Do you know what caused the civil war?” she asked me after a moment.

“Someone thought they could do a better job of running things,” I answered.

“In a nutshell, yes,” she shrugged. “But mostly? No. That’s what started it, sure, but what kept it going was less ideology and more a crazed notion of grandeur.”

“I don’t understand.”

“My mother wasn’t of the bloodline, so I had a cousin on her side. Useless little shit, really,” she said. “Grew up having ever whim seen to. Had no brains to speak of, either. A rock troll has more sense than he did.”

“Harsh,” I snorted.

“But true,” she nodded. “He couldn’t be bothered to learn the basic skills needed to run a simple traders stall, let alone a merchant’s guild. Why bother when he could just hire people to do it for him?”

“Lazy little brat,” I rolled my eyes. “I know a few of those types.”

“He got it in his head that since Dad was dead and I was missing, presumed dead, that he was next in line,” she rolled her eyes. “He had no brain in his head, but he did have someone in his ear that did. Someone that I once believed I cared about. If my father hadn’t have died, I probably would have ended up marrying him.”

“Did Quinn kill him?” I joked.

“No. I did,” she answered plainly. “I had to hunt him down and cut his heart out of his chest while he was still alive.”

“Vampire?” I asked.

“Turned, yes. Thought the extra strength would help him,” she scoffed. “Damn fool that he was didn’t believe I was Bonded and got it in his mind that Quinn was keeping me a prisoner against my will.”

“Turned vamps are pretty unstable,” I frowned. “And he chose that?”

“He wanted the power for political reasons, but the darkness that came with it changed him,” she nodded. “The civil war started out with a fool wanting something shiny and turned into the personal vendetta of a madman. The point is, Blaine, that I understand where you are right now. Torn between the memories of then and the reality of now. The darkness tainting every good thing you know about the person you love. It takes hold and doesn’t let go. Not easily.”

“Fae thinks she can save him,” I said.

“You don’t,” she stated. “I’ve seen a lot of things happen that I didn’t think were possible. I’ve also seen things that I knew were possible fail. It’s served to teach me that you can’t count on a sure thing. Stranger things have happened than bringing a Morphi out of a Haze beyond the usual time frame. Just because it’s never been done doesn’t mean it can’t happen.”

“Did you try? To bring him out of the darkness?” I asked after a moment.

“No,” she answered. “It was either kill or be killed. He loved me. I know he did. He loved me too much, in the end. If he couldn’t convince me he was trying to save me, he’d kill me to set me free and see it as mercy. Some darkness is too deep to be pierced. Unfortunately, that’s not a lesson that can be taught.”

“She feels guilty,” Ben said as we got into the room we had rented. “I see it when she thinks no one’s looking. She hates herself for causing all of this to happen.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I shook my head.

“Is it?” Mary asked, sitting on one of the beds and pulling her boot off, shaking a rock out of it. “Spirit Bonds can be denied when Called. You all answered it, sure, but in her mind, she thinks differently. She believes that, if you had known what was going on with her and that piece of-ahem. Gary, I mean. If you had known what you were getting into, you never would have answered the Calling.”

“We’ve told her we don’t regret it,” I huffed.

“She does, though,” Mary said as she pulled her boot back on. “In her eyes, it’s her fault Nando died. It’s her fault that Zane didn’t get the care he needed to bring him out of the Haze. Hell, she probably even believes it’s her fault that he Hazed in the first place. It’s not easy, being a Caller, you know. It sounds all glorious and all, but when something happens to our guardians, we always feel that it’s our fault.”

“It isn’t, though,” Ben growled with a flash of sharp teeth.

“It’s been a very long time since the last of my Bonds faded and I still blame myself for the things that happened,” she said. “It was war and injuries, and deaths happen in wars. I know this. But if I hadn’t have Called, they wouldn’t have been anywhere near a battle to begin with.”

I frowned as I thought about what she said. I never thought about it that way. No wonder Fae was having such a hard time since Nando died. I knew she blamed herself, but I figured it was like how I blamed myself. Or how Ben blamed himself. We each felt like we didn’t do enough to keep him safe, just like we blamed ourselves for Fae being taken. One of us should have been there with her. We never should have been in that hole in the ground without another exit.

But hearing Mary’s explaining it from her own experience, I understood now. She was taking everyone’s blame as her own. All of the bad that happened after she fell into the pool, whether it was due to the Call or not, she was taking and placing it solely upon her own shoulders.

“Foolish,” Ben shook his head.

“I didn’t say it makes any sense,” Mary shrugged. “Gods know I gave up trying to find the reason in it a long time ago. She’ll always blame herself, no matter how much you tell her otherwise. It’s not a rational thought that can be swayed. It’s raw feeling.”

“That’s not reassuring,” Ben mumbled.

“No, but it explains why she’s so bent on making things right,” she smiled. “She can’t fix what happened to Nando, but this? As long as who she thinks is Zane is alive, physically, she believes he can be brought back, mentally.”

“But he’s gone,” I raked my hands through my hair. “Out of everyone, I want it to be true the most. I want my brother back more than anything in this world. But he’s gone!”

“And this is why I’m not arguing with her,” she said gently. “Simply telling her won’t convince her. She has to figure it out for herself. I may not know her as well as either of you do, but I know myself. I hunted Grayson down with every intention to try, just like Fae’s doing. The closer I got to him, the less I saw of the man I knew and the more I saw what the darkness had turned him into.”

Once again, I saw everything that ran through her head on her face. She regretted it. She regretted killing him, that Grayson guy. She had no choice, but she still was hurting over it, just like she was hurting over whatever happened to the others that were Bonded to her. I knew finding Zane would be a mercy to him. Having someone who loved him, who knew him before the Haze, kill him quickly would be preferable than whatever fate he faced otherwise. But seeing the pain haunting Mary, I began to pray we never found him. For Fae’s sake.