Sight for Sore Eyes (Fairy Tales of a Trailer Park Queen Book 8)

by Kimbra Swain

  “It wasn’t that long ago,” I said. “Sirens have a way with men.”

  “She didn’t with me,” he said proudly.

  “Levi, my mother was a siren,” I said.

  “Oh,” he said. “I see.” I laughed at his realization.

  “However, I’ve never needed to employ those skills. I’m just naturally alluring,” I said winking at him.

  “You don’t have to tell me that,” he said.

  A murmur moved through the crowd. Looking to see who had arrived to cause the rumble, I saw a dark sedan pull up with tinted windows. It had to be Tennyson. He exited the car looking more casual than I had ever seen him. Dark slacks with a button-up shirt with long sleeves that were rolled up revealing his tattooed arms. He held his hand out, and Jenny emerged from the car. The murmur rolled through the crowd again. Louder this time. His eyes met mine, then nodded his head in acknowledgment. Jenny looked beautiful. The off-shoulder dress flowed down around her legs which were exposed as she walked through the long split in the skirt. She wore a wide-brimmed straw hat and multiple necklaces including one like my own Hamsa hand.

  People seemed genuinely happy to see them together. As I watched them join the conversations around the awaiting pyre, I noticed that the green haze had strengthened. Either this would dispel all of it or we would all have one hell of a battle with each other.

  Luther and Betty passed Aydan back and forth. He loved the attention because he didn’t meet a stranger. I could see his smile from across the field. The flash of straw blonde hair and brilliant blue eyes reminded me of his father. While Dylan’s absence saddened me, Aydan was my bright light.

  “Howdy, Grace. You look nice,” Joey Blankenship said behind me.

  I turned around to see him standing with Devin who leered at me. Devin looked like he had aged from nine to thirteen in just a few weeks. Joey elbowed him, and he dropped his eyes.

  “Thank you, Joey. You are looking rather human,” I said.

  “Yes, it seems now that I’m out of Summer, I can glamour myself,” he said. I hadn’t seen him since we got home, but I knew that he was working for Remy as an assistant and runner.

  “Good to see you, Devin,” I said.

  “Thank you, ma’am,” he said without looking up.

  “Y’all have fun,” I said as Remy called out for Joey to join him and Tabitha across the way. She waved at me, then gave me a thumbs up for the dress.

  Winnie and Mark chased each other through the crowd. The worries of the day were forgotten. I envied their childish games. It was so simple. Fun.

  “Don’t envy them, Grace. Admire, but no envy. We shouldn’t stir up this curse any more than we have to,” Levi warned. I nodded but didn’t answer him.

  It was wonderful to see the whole town here. I couldn’t find a single person that was missing. Even Chris Purcell and his wife had shown up. I caught Mrs. Frist staring Mrs. Purcell down. The green haze thickened around her. Flitting to the people in the town, I saw the smoke gathering around them. Quickly, I rushed through the crowd trying to remain polite to those who spoke to me. I felt Levi on my heels.

  “Tell Nestor to take Aydan and Winnie to one of the RVs. Get them out of this,” I instructed Levi.

  “On it,” he replied.

  “Astor!” I said, making eye contact through the crowd. “Find Finley and the two of you keep an eye on everyone. Don’t let anyone start to fight. I’m getting the gypsies. We’ve got to do this now, or we are going to lose it.”

  He leaned over Ella, kissing her on the cheek. He whispered something in her ear, and she nodded in acknowledgment. Dashing through the crowd, I saw him find my white-haired brother. He stood alone against one of the RVs watching the scene. When Astor spoke to him, his body tensed as he scanned the crowd. His eyes met mine. I knew he could see the building curse.

  I finally found Wendy in the back of a group of gypsies who were partaking in swirling glasses of absinthe. It was uncanny how the green of the liquor matched the green of the haze.

  “We will start the dance. Are you ready?” she asked.

  “Yes,” I replied as we made our way to the pyre.

  “Fire it up!” Wendy called into the crowd. It distracted them from each other long enough for Fordele to start the fire. Wendy placed a wreath of wheat on my head. Four other gypsy women joined us wearing flower crowns. We took our places around the flame. I had gone over the movements in my head, but at the moment, I hoped that my body remembered them, because my brain was fried.

  “Focus, Glory,” I heard Finley in my head.

  “We’ve got your back,” Astor added.

  “We all do,” Tennyson chimed in. His voice in my head was gentle compared to his outward appearance. Then I realized it. Tennyson was a love talker like Levi and William. Which made all the sense in the world, I had just never noticed it. Tennyson was a lot of things that I had focused on from the moment I had met him, but when he spoke in my head, I knew what he was. I wasn’t sure how he had hidden that identification from me, but I saw Jenny saddle up next to him. He’d gotten his one love back, and I couldn’t be happier for both of them.

  Finally, my eyes focused on my bard who made his way to the front of the crowd. “Dance, Grace,” he said. One of the gypsies brought him a stool. He sat down next to the other men who carried instruments. He rolled up his sleeve preparing to play.

  Mike, the Solomonar, approached Levi. He handed him a very small object. Levi grinned and thanked him. With a puff from his mod, Mike turned the tiny object into the songbook. Levi turned the pages until he found what he was looking for. The crowd ceased to murmur, and as the darkness fell around us, Levi’s voice echoed in the circle.

  May the powers of The One,

  The source of all Creation;

  All-pervasive, omnipotent, eternal;

  May the Goddess,

  the Lady of the Moon;

  and the God,

  Horned Hunter of the Sun;

  may the powers of the Spirits of the Stones,

  rulers of the elemental realms;

  may the powers of the stars above and the Earth below,

  bless this place, and this time, and I who am with You.

  The fire spread through the wood as the music began to fill the circle. I joined the women step by step. The dance came back to me. Those old days when I had found a home with the gypsies. The thrill of moving from place to place took hold of me and was only recently dispelled by a wonderful man and our family.

  As we twisted and turned, circling the fire, I caught the green haze moving its way through the crowd, not resting on a single person. It wound its way through the crowd toward the fire. The bright green hue snaked along the ground like a temptation. If we lost the crowd now, we wouldn’t complete the spell.

  “Keep dancing, Grace,” Levi’s voice echoed in my head. I had lost my step watching the haze but quickly picked it back up. The music tempo quickened as did our steps. The dance became more and more sensual drawing the evil to us and the fire. Tempting it to try to overtake us. However, each one of us wore protection amulets. I knew that the curse wouldn’t rest on us. If we could get it moved toward the fire, I was sure that I could magically shove it into the blaze like a sacrificial lamb.

  The haze made it to my feet as I danced around the fire. The cool curse slithered up my leg, and its clammy tendrils wrapped around all the dancers. I saw panic in Levi’s eyes, but I shook my head so he would know I was alright. Perhaps I was insane to think I could hold this thing off. It was too late to worry about it. We continued to dance as the entirety of the haze had latched on to those of us dancing around the fire. Reaching out to the wind stone, I pulled that power to me in a swirling vortex. I reached upward and I danced, coaxing the wind down into the fire. The swirling magic sucked the haze into the fire.

  As the last few steps of the dance were completed, the haze rested inside the fire. Around the bonfire, there was a salt circle. I pricked my finger on a pocket knife I’d hidden
in my skirt. The blood droplets hit the salt engaging the protection circle which held the haze inside within the fire.

  A shout went up from the crowd as we realized the dance was over, and the curse had been trapped. The fire would consume the curse, then as the fire died, so would it.

  Turning to the crowd, I realized they were cheering and clapping for us, the dancers, and the musicians. We stood before them in a row, taking a well-deserved bow. I’d forgotten the woes from earlier enjoying the moment as we had saved Shady Grove once again. As the musicians, started to play again, the crowd continued to mingle. Some decided to dance themselves. Smaller fires were started for the children to roast marshmallows.

  I moved toward the fire where Winnie and Mark were laughing and roasting. Levi stood beside me.

  “Well done, my Queen,” he said.

  “I had help,” I said. “Does Nestor still have Aydan?”

  “Yes, he stayed in the RV. Aydan fell asleep,” Levi said.

  “Thank you all for your support. Having it means the world to me,” I said speaking to all my knights.

  “You always will,” Tennyson’s smooth voice filled my head. I blushed at his tone.

  Levi looked at me with alarm. “Tennyson is a love talker,” I said.

  “He better not be love talking you!” Levi said.

  “Hey! We just dispelled one evil spell. Let’s not haphazardly cause another one,” I said smiling at him. He laughed, shaking his head at me.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. Part of me didn’t like an agreeable Levi. It was terrible that I preferred the brooding one. “You are ridiculous.”

  “I know,” I said.

  The party continued for quite some time. Winnie kept begging to stay a little longer. I had no intention of leaving the party until the fire died out. The green haze still floated over the remaining embers left after the blaze.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of red. Spinning toward the flowing cloak, as it hurried through the crowd, I grabbed Levi by the arm. He made a motion toward Astor and Tennyson who took off after the running woman. I couldn’t see her face, but she was running toward the fire. Not away from it.

  The hood hung down over her face, but she pulled a blue tinted mason jar from under her cloak.

  “Dylan!” I screamed.

  The townspeople turned toward the running woman. She cut through the salt circle with a drag of her foot, then just before Astor tackled her, she threw the jar into the fire.

  “No!” I screamed. Levi grabbed my arm, holding me back. “Let go of me,” I snarled at him.

  “No, Grace. Wait,” he said. I struggled against him, pushing his arm off of me. He overpowered me, wrapping his arms around mine pinning me to his body.

  “She threw the jar into the fire with the curse!” I screamed.

  “Everyone get out of here!” Tennyson yelled.

  Chaos erupted as the remaining smoldering coals exploded into the crowd. Levi jumped in front of me as a force wave blasted past us knocking both of us to the ground. I tried to fight to get up, hearing the screams around us.

  Levi’s dead weight covered my lower half. He wasn’t moving.

  “My children,” I gasped before passing out from the impact.

  Levi

  Watching her pace the room, my heart ached for her. I knew that this part of the story would be the hardest for her to tell. As fairies, we don’t take life for granted, but sometimes we forget about death and its impact.

  “I can’t,” she muttered.

  “We can wait until tomorrow if you want, but yes, you can. You will,” I said.

  She slumped down on the couch. The muscles tensed in her forehead and a mournful scowl formed on her face. Even upset, she was the loveliest thing I’d ever seen in my life. Would ever see. I could edit this later on in our lives, but I had the feeling that my perspective on Grace would never change.

  “Why?” she pouted.

  “This is your story, Grace. I can tell the parts that you weren’t conscious of, but this part is all you, honey,” I said.

  “Don’t call me honey,” she protested.

  “Baby,” I said.

  “I ain’t your baby,” she started to give a little.

  “Momma,” I said with a laugh.

  “I’m definitely not your momma,” she replied as a smile started to form on the edges of her lips.

  “Thank the gods below,” I said.

  “I am the gods below,” she smirked.

  “Well, thank you, then,” I replied.

  “You should be grateful for all I’ve done for you, Levi Rearden,” she said.

  “I am. You know I am,” I said.

  “Perhaps we can skip this part and come back to it later,” she said.

  “If we go past it now, I have a feeling that you won’t come back to it,” I said. “Grace, tell the story. It’s a good story. It needs to be told. Hell, I need to write it.”

  A knock on the door broke the tension. She got up to answer it. Mark Maynard, Troy’s adopted wolf son, walked in with a sad face. He and Winnie had been friends forever though in recent years it was clear that Mark’s affections were deeper than Winnie’s.

  “What’s up, Mark?” I asked.

  “Have you seen Winnie?” he asked.

  “Not since this morning,” I replied.

  “I thought the two of you were going down to the farm,” Grace said.

  “We were, but she never showed up. Will you just tell her that I’m tired of her putting me on the back-burner?” he said.

  “I think that is something you should tell her yourself,” I said.

  “I would if I could get five seconds of her time. She’s too busy doing other shit. Pardon my language,” he said.

  “Fuck,” Grace said.

  “Damn,” I added. “Your language doesn’t bother us.”

  “She must have turned off her cell phone because she isn’t answering,” he said.

  “Or she could be out of range,” Grace suggested.

  “That’s possible,” I replied.

  “I’ll call her,” I offered. Dialing Winnie’s number, I waited for a couple of rings, but it rolled over to voicemail. I shook my head at him.

  “Thanks for trying,” he mumbled.

  “Is she okay?” I asked Grace.

  “Yes,” Grace said. I knew that she could track Winnie where ever she went, but several years ago Winnie made her mother swear not to use it except in emergencies. “She knows I’ve pinged her.”

  “She will get over it,” I said. “Sorry, Mark. I don’t know what to tell you.”

  “Thank y’all,” he said as he skulked out the door.

  I watched him climb in his pickup and drive away.

  “She shouldn’t take him for granted,” I said.

  “She will come around when she is ready. If you rush it, she will run,” Grace said.

  “Like her mother,” I smiled.

  “So much like me that you would think she was my blood,” she said.

  “Are you ready?” I asked.

  “I suppose I’m as ready as I ever will be. If I leave anything important out, just fill in the blanks,” she said.

  “Go ahead. Finish the story about the midsummer bonfire,” I said with my fingers poised over my keyboard. Grace took a deep breath, swallowed, then began to speak. Her voice didn’t tremble as I expected it to, but her face showed all the emotions she meant to hide.

  Grace had changed over the years from the moment I’d first met her in the trailer park to now. Sometimes the change was subtle, like her changed opinion of Kady. Sometimes the change was groundbreaking. Those were the ones that really hurt, but the circumstances made you stronger on the other side of it. She was the strongest person I’d ever known, and just like back then, I loved her deeply.

  Whimpers and sobs filtered through the haze of my senses. A heavy weight laid across my body, and I lifted my hands to push it away, only to realize it was Levi. He groaned as I started to
move.

  “Levi, get up,” I rasped.

  As my eyes came into focus, I noticed small fires around us in the grass and people helping each other to stand and checking on those who couldn’t.

  “People are hurt,” Levi said, pushing up on his elbows. He brushed the hair out of my face. “Are you hurt?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “We need to find the children.”

  “Nestor had Aydan in one of the RVs. They don’t seem to be damaged by the blast,” he said, as he pushed up off the ground. He reached down to help me up. As I stood, my balance wavered, and he steadied me. “Whoa, there. Maybe you should sit back down.”

  “Need to find Winnie,” I said rubbing my head.

  The bonfire behind him had been blown to bits, but a gathering flame rose up above it. Green haze filtered around it and through it.

  “Oh, my stars,” I gasped. Levi turned to look at the growing flame which formed giant fiery wings stretching out across the field. People started screaming and running. The haze was now visible to the naked eye and swirled around in the flame as the body of the bird formed. “It’s him.”

  “Remember what I told you. He’s different,” Levi warned. “Now he’s fueled by the curse.”

  “He won’t hurt me,” I said, stepping around him. He knew he couldn’t stop me. As the bird covered the night sky, I looked up to him. “Dylan!”

  The bird’s head jerked to me. Retracting his wings, he settled on the ground nearly ten feet away. His body shifted from flaming bird to flaming man. His eyes burned the hot blue of the hottest embers.

  “Bard!” a deep, gruff voice emanated from the form. He didn’t sound like Dylan at all.

  “The green haze. Grace, he will come after me. You let me deal with it. Just stay out of the way,” Levi said.

  “Fat chance, Dublin. I can bring him out of it,” I said.

  “I told you, Bard, that once I found you again I was going to burn you into an oblivion,” Dylan growled.

  “Dylan, Darlin’, please don’t do this,” I cried out to him. “I need you to calm down, so you can meet your son.” Looked to the edges of what was left of the crowd, I saw Astor emerge holding his glowing sword. Behind Dylan to the south, Tennyson stepped out with another glowing sword to flank the Phoenix.