The Golding

by Sonya Deanna Terry

  ‘Our skins are different,’ she said bitterly, wanting not to turn away from the one she had grown to respect with fervour.

  She hoped she had not alienated him with this defeated remark. Thankfully, he did not retreat. He watched her with quiet interest, his expression aglow with an intriguing brand of kindness. Could it just have been kindness, though, or was it something more?

  ‘But our hearts are not,’ he said, and with that his arms went about her, and Eidred felt as though she were soaring through the very stars that danced outside the chamber window. Pieter’s lips were brushing lightly across her cheek. The dizzying sensation of embracing a youth she hadn’t meant to grow fond of, invoked a happiness that was almost too much to bear, but then he released her and stepped back.

  Now achingly aware of the fullness of her feelings for him, her happiness presented itself as something of a burden, weighed down by a dread that had grown greater in strength since the terrible dream. ‘Oh Pieter, I fear so dreadfully for your safety and the safety of Fripso. I have had the most frightening premonition. ’Tis a warning, I feel, of what might happen. I don’t want them to find you. I can’t let them find you. You cannot live like this, you cannot live like this, you cannot…’ Her breathing had become panicked. Her entire being cried out to be held once more by that lad of fey origin who had, only seconds ago in his closeness, wreathed her in a momentary state of ecstasy.

  ‘We will find a way,’ said Pieter, although he shrugged as though devoid of ideas. ‘I must tell you, Eidred, your hope of marrying your prince is breaking my heart, but I understand I have no power to persuade you otherwise.’

  Liberated for a moment from her morbid concerns, Eidred giggled. ‘And why does it break your heart, my Pieter?’

  ‘Is it not obvious enough?’

  Delighting in Pieter’s admission to being heartbroken should she wed, Eidred encouraged him to re-word his concerns. ‘I am not sure I understand what you mean to say,’ she said, wanting to laugh and dance and sing. Pieter’s jealousy of a suitor was maddeningly delicious.

  ‘Well, I embraced you a moment ago, Eidred, not just as one who is a friend, or even…’ Pieter was quite lost for words. ‘Or even as a sprite might comfort a body king daughter… I mean, a gold-skin.’

  ‘How then?’ Eidred’s pulse had become as rampant as a river current.

  ‘It was an embrace of adoration,’ Pieter said with a sigh.

  ‘He means,’ a small voice from the other side of the clothing-quarter said, ‘that he has fallen in love with you.’

  Eidred squealed and threw her arms around her elf. Pieter held her tightly. Tears from Pieter’s eyes fell onto Eidred’s hair and face. Eidred wept too—so great was her joy—and was no longer sure whether the tears dampening her cheeks were Pieter’s or her own.

  ‘What’s more,’ continued Fripso. ‘He wishes you wouldn’t marry that prince. He wishes it was he and not the prince who you’d decided to marry.’

  ‘I am afraid,’ Eidred said slowly, ‘that I cannot abide by Pieter’s wishes.’

  ‘You cannot?’ Fripso’s voice dulled. ‘I suppose you are barred from it. After all, a sprite and a gold-skin together in matrimony would never do.’

  ‘Oh, yes it would,’ said Eidred wistfully. ‘But I cannot agree to Pieter’s wishes, Fripso, for they are unfounded. There is no prince with whom I plan to share my life, and there is no offer of marriage.’

  ‘No prince?’ Pieter was visibly overjoyed.

  ‘Not yet.’ Eidred lowered her voice to a tone that was soft and questioning. ‘Unless of course Pieter of the Brumlynds would like to become one.’

  Pieter’s expression sobered. ‘A sprite and a gold-skin wedded! How could this possibly be?’

  ‘I have thought much of this, Pieter. There could well be a way of fooling my family into allowing us to wed and to at the same time keep Fripso safe.’

  The elf, reaching out to Edired, clasped her in his arms once more, then lifted her up and spun her into circle after circle. Eidred, immersed in bliss, clung to his shoulders laugh­ingly. With gentleness, Pieter returned her to where she’d been standing and murmured, ‘Marrying you would be my greatest wish fulfilled.’

  Pieter’s enthusiasm for the plan was divinely reassuring. His sunburst smile was broader than ever, and his eyes were no less filled with affection than when Fripso had uttered those beauteous words. In love with you. In love with her! Eidred had won the heart of someone she would eternally idolise. That he might have felt some of the ocean-deep reverence she harboured for him was the most magnificent news she had ever in her life received.

  The faerie godmother, Eidred believed, had been responsible for granting nearly all of her requests. One last wish remained.

  She related her hopes to the young man before her while he held both her hands in his. Tentatively, she asked if he agreed to her scheme. ‘Becoming a prince would indeed be dangerous. Are you truly willing to take a risk in marrying me, elf?’

  ‘Princess,’ said a solemn Pieter, ‘how could I not be willing to take that risk?’ He laughed a little and shook his head, evidently marvelling at the surprising turn of events. ‘If both of us were competitors for a title of Most Powerful Spell Wielder, the medal-bearer would no doubt be you.’

  ‘Me? But I am unmagical! Whyever so?’

  Pieter’s eyes shone with elation. ‘In requesting I marry you, enchanting Eidred,’ he said, ‘you have miraculously transformed me into the happiest sprite alive.’

  <><> <><><> <><>

  Sara was the first to greet Izzie when she arrived at the beachside meeting point. ‘No word from Tyson I guess?’ Izzie asked.

  ‘He rang this morning,’ Sara shrilled.

  ‘No way.’

  ‘And he’ll be here a bit late.’

  ‘Just Tyson?’

  Sara looked unsure. Realising Sara didn’t know of the Tyson/Glorion alliance, Izzie hurried towards the other guests lolling on a picnic rug beneath the pines.

  Sara caught up with Izzie. ‘Tyson isn’t seeing anyone, is he?’

  ‘I doubt it. We would have heard by now if he was.’

  ‘I made up some fairy bread,’ Sara said lolloping along beside Izzie. ‘So we’ll have to pretend we’re primary schoolers.’

  ‘You’re a star,’ Izzie said absently. Could Tyson attending mean Glorion would be along too? ‘Hundreds-and-thousands or sprinkles?’

  ‘Hundreds-and-thousands.’ Sara nodded, eager for approval. ‘All sweet and sugary like the ones on chocolate-freckle lollies.’

  ‘Cool,’ murmured Izzie, recalling Rosetta saying the freckles on her nose were ‘sweet.’

  At least, Izzie thought, mine aren’t multi-coloured.

  The sea, seething and grey, gleamed in the smooth curl of its frothy waves. Whether the girls could remain outdoors without having their lunch diluted by the anticipated rain had become an issue of debate.

  ‘Let’s just start anyway and try and beat the showers,’ suggested Izzie. ‘’Cos I can’t wait to unpack this picnic basket! Wait till you see the delicacies!’

  The girls huddled forward, and clapped and whooped as Izzie announced each item from Lena’s health food store. Rella’s butterscotch popcorn and Charlotte’s box of designer chocolates were already laid out on the tartan rug, as were the Singapore noodles that Marla brought, a recipe her Chinese mum cooked for special occasions. The African coconut slice of Jandy’s got the loudest cheer.

  ‘This is an absolute banquet,’ food-lover Izzie roared. She examined the unremarkable photo of Tyson on Sara’s camera. ‘You guys are sooo kind. So, what do we do about the lack of talent so far?’ She inclined her head to indicate two middle-aged men tiptoeing into the shallows. ‘Where are the hotties?’

  ‘They’re probably scared of storms,’ said Andrine. ‘And of mega-intelligent women such as ourselves.’

  ‘Then let’s go seek ’em out and scare ’em,’ said Izzie. ‘Because this party’s gonna be a party.’

&
nbsp; ‘Woo-hoo!’

  ‘Gimme a “b”!’ yelled cheerleader Dalia.

  ‘B!’

  ‘Gimme an “o”!’

  ‘O!’

  ‘Gimme a y”!’

  ‘Y!’

  ‘Gimme an “s”!’

  ‘S!’

  ‘And whaddaz it spell?’

  A dilapidated car decorated with painted flames screeched to a halt.

  ‘Spells yobbos,’ said Izzie. ‘If you add B.O. and turn it into an anagram.’

  Three teenaged boys leaned out of the car’s windows to eye Izzie and her party guests, their heads moving in unison with pulsing drumbeats.

  ‘Ha! Travelling ostriches,’ said Dalia with a snicker.

  ‘Ay, girlies,’ yelled one. ‘Wanna come for a ride?’

  ‘Ignore them, ignore them, ignore them,’ whispered an anxious Andrine, staring at the ground.

  The girls bowed their heads too, in deference to Andrine who was shielding her eyes as though afraid another glimpse of the rhythm-happy speedsters would turn her to stone.

  Refusing to hide away, Izzie held Sara’s camera at arm’s length, angled the lens at the car, then leapt to her feet to take a closer shot.

  ‘Izzie!’ her friends hissed.

  ‘You’ll come for a spin then, will ya?’ yelled the driver. His mates rolled around in their suede car seats, helpless with laughter.

  ‘Just taking your picture!’

  The greasy-haired head-bopper in the driver’s seat revved the motor and snarled.

  In one dramatic move, Izzie pointed to Sara. The girl ducked, curling inward like a daisy at sundown. ‘Her dad’s a cop,’ Izzie called. The camera snapped and whirred. ‘Do you think he’ll recognise you?’

  The driver took off in a squeal of burning rubber.

  ‘That’s one camera-shy dude,’ Izzie said, returning to her guests.

  They embarked on their lunch and chirruped animatedly, commenting every so often on the eeriness of the gathering clouds. One of the girls happened to mention Glorion, a subject that had the effect on Izzie of an invisible hand reaching beyond her ribcage and grasping at her heart. The topic wafted briefly through a conversation which, just as it began to flourish—thanks to a certain amount of persistence on Izzie’s part—changed direction and bypassed Glorion altogether. Not that the news was all that interesting. Izzie had heard the same about him before. A few kids at school thought he faked his Dutch accent. Probably just a rumour. The undeniable appeal of Glorion’s stilted English would have become the target of jealousy among other guys at school.

  As the day grew older and darker, Izzie and Sara resigned themselves to Tyson having changed his mind about the party. Izzie was already acutely aware that no Tyson would mean no Glorion. Teens travelled in packs, after all, particularly boys, who seemed only capable of boarding public transport in threes. In fifth grade a party passport was as simple as arriving solo with a present tucked under one arm, after having been driven door-to-door. A comb through the hair, a soap-shiny face. Now it was peers on either side, like bodyguards, clothes no better than a slightly varying uniform that went under the guise of fashion, and hair that had to be gunked with product and reverse-vacuumed into an imaginative shape. Faces were daubed with tinted zit-cream, lips smeared with chap-sticks, ears decorated with gold and silver, or glass that imitated gems.

  ‘Maybe Tyson thought it was called off because of the rain,’ Sara said in a small, sad voice.

  ‘Could’ve phoned though,’ Izzie said, ‘before jumping to conclusions.’

  The girls went for a walk along the cliffs in search of hotties, but the only form of life they found was a scattering of seagulls. They discussed the latest movies and Charlotte’s new shoes, collected a few pearlescent shells for the summer corner of Izzie’s four-seasons collage and returned to the beach again to gossip some more and bemoan the boylessness of the landscape.

  Then it came time to depart. Darkness had fallen, rain had begun to pelt, and the headlights and taillights of cars on the esplanade turned the road’s glossy blackness into a ribbon of blurry reflections.

  Swinging the now empty hamper, which had, a few hours earlier, harboured a surprise butter cake her mother had baked—with the words ‘Sweet Sixteen’ mapped out in liqueur boysenberries on liquorice frosting—one bloated, bedraggled wet-haired party-thrower made her way down the street, feeling a pinch of grief and a spark of anger at a certain person not bothering to RSVP.

  The street was now a festival of faerie-lantern luminosity. A guitarist in the nearby pub started up a yodelling ballad that sounded as lonesome as Izzie had begun to feel. Wishing she’d accepted a lift with Rella’s family, she glared at the empty bus depot across the road. Buses on Sunday evenings were generally few and far between. She would flick through the teen magazine Marla had lent her to pass the time.

  She went to cross the road and spun round at the sound of a familiar voice. ‘Can I help you with that basket?’ The word ‘that’ had been pronounced ‘dat’.

  ‘It’s not heavy,’ breathed Izzie, unable to temper the pounding of her pulse.

  ‘What are you doing here on a Sunday night all by yourself?’ Dark-eyed, be-dimpled Glorion! Glorion of the caressable biceps and sun-kissed brown hair!

  ‘Having a birthday,’ Izzie said. Glorion would have to think up an excuse for not going. This would be very, very interesting.

  ‘A birthday!’ Glorion beamed. Without hesitation he said, ‘Well if I’d known today was that, and if I’d known I’d run into you on my way to the supermarket, I would have brought a present with me.’

  ‘But...didn’t you get...’ The invitations via his locker and Tyson: he hadn’t received either! Would she admit to having asked him to her picnic? Better to stay coolly detached. ‘Yeah, it was pretty good,’ she said. ‘Everyone was there.’

  ‘So is this party started yet?’ Instead of ‘this’ he’d said ‘dis.’

  ‘Finished,’ said Izzie, smiling bravely up at him.

  Raindrops were dampening Glorion’s fringe, lending him the cuteness of a just-washed puppy. ‘Drat!’ he said, in his inappropriate and adorably uncool way. ‘If it were still on I would have crash-gated.’

  ‘Gate-crashed?’

  ‘That’s it. Gate-crashed.’ Glorion smiled and shook his head, having a silent laugh at himself. ‘My English isn’t as good as my Dutch.’

  ‘My Dutch isn’t as good as my English, so we’re square.’

  ‘That’s funny, Izzie!’

  Wow, thought Izzie. If Glorion thinks that’s funny, he’s easily amused. I can be sooo much funnier than that.

  ‘Where are you off to, Izzie?’

  ‘To the bus depot to catch um a...’ He was standing very close and was looking directly into her eyes. ‘Um...a bus home, so I’m going home. By bus.’ She’d really stuffed that one up. Why couldn’t she think of something more upbeat to say? Something witty or smart? She was still spinning from hearing he’d be prepared to turn up uninvited. If only she’d kept the party going longer!

  But where was Glorion off to, anyway? ‘Where are you off to, Glorion?’ she asked, with a numb-tongued shyness she felt sure would have looked ridiculous on someone like her.

  ‘Supermarket. To buy some dinner.’

  ‘Oh! Ha! Of course.’ Stupid question. He’d already mentioned this! ‘Um...well...better not stand in the way of that.’ Her own fringe was plastering to her forehead, and her scalp felt soggy, an indication that this must be a significant downpour. Rain was rarely able to seep that far through Izzie’s thick tresses. Suspecting she probably looked like a shipwrecked sheepdog, and now, as a result of this realisation, a red-faced one, Izzie turned to say a hurried goodbye.

  But Glorion’s fingers pressed lightly on her elbow, causing a giddiness that rendered her motionless.

  ‘Wait,’ he said. ‘Does it have to be so soon? Australian supermarket trolleys are scary. I have no idea how to operate them. Could you show me some ropes Miss Bi
rthday?’

  Izzie’s stomach gave a small skip of excitement. ‘So you’ve got a trolley phobia?’

  ‘And a rejection phobia,’ grinned Glorion. ‘Come on, Miss Birthday, let’s go.’

  <><> XXXVII <><>

  Eidred’s eyes reminded Pieter of the serene pools wherein his friends the undines dwelt: blue and vibrant with emotion, and now they overflowed with love for a Brumlynd who considered himself to be undeserving.

  Pieter’s days were bittersweet. His own impulsive actions had removed him from the trees, rivers and crystalline air that he’d treasured without thought during his boyhood. Life was now immeasurably altered. Becoming a youth had brought him a treasure of a different sort, in the form of the golden girl who had captured his heart. While he missed Elysium Glades, he knew he could not do without Eidred.

  With fondness he remembered back to when he had begun to find her intriguing. She would return from her lessons each evening to converse animatedly. Had he not felt responsible for her slumber, Pieter would have been happy to continue talking and laughing with Eidred until sun-up. There would be a delaying at first, when she’d tell him she was all right to stay awake, but Pieter would continue to coax until she reluctantly admitted to weariness and agreed to bid them ‘goodnight’.

  The word goodnight was just as much a blessing to Pieter as it was a bane. When considering Eidred, the sound of it made him glad. She would be renewed by the star-spun in the Dream Sphere. When considering himself, it caused the opposite of gladness, reminding him that he would immediately be robbed of something precious, something that would trigger within him an ache for its return. When first this happened, he told himself it was the variation in company he missed, for chatting to a member of the rabbit species he was forced to live alongside tended, after a time, to descend into mundanity. Only so much could be said about Wakkel-Weed and parsnip.

  Even when away from her chamber, Eidred had still been there with Pieter, emanating an unassuming loveliness, for she and her influence had become part of his mind, the memory of all words and mannerisms almost as exquisite as her presence.