Xander's Folly

by Belinda M Gordon

  What a surprise—the figure in the shadows was a girl. I had thought she was a boy—not because she was working on an engine, but because of the way she stood. She appeared defensive, on guard, like she was in a constant fight-or-flight mode.

  "Get out here, Sloan," John said, exasperated.

  The teenager shuffled into the light. She wore her hair short, which had helped create my earlier illusion that she was a boy. Now I saw that her hair was purple. The baseball cap cast a shadow over the details of her face, though I could see her dark eyes staring warily out from under its bill. She had an earring in her bottom lip and two along the upper edge of her right ear. Tattoos of black and gray flowers covered her neck. Rips in her grimy black sweatshirt exposed glimpses of tattoos running over her shoulder and upper arm as well. Not your average looking teenager.

  "I've been showing Sloan how to change a… Ummm… In the engine…?"

  "The carburetor," Sloan said.

  "Yeah, you got it. The carburetor."

  "Sloan, nice to meet you," Alexander said. He stuck his hand out and she hesitated before shaking it. "Did the school send you here?" The girl pursed her lips and shook her head.

  "I ain't no high school kid."

  I thought Alexander had overestimated her age. My guess put her at thirteen or fourteen.

  "They don't send kids my way anymore," John said. "I've been retired too long now. I told you, she's one of the neighborhood kids. She wandered in one day."

  "The damn dog pushed me," Sloan muttered. "I like cars. Mr. M is willing to teach me, so I keep coming back." She shrugged her shoulders as if that explained everything.

  "Let's watch the language, Sloan," John said, as though he had repeated that line many times.

  He took us over to the car, excited about his newest restoration project. I knew little about cars and cared even less. Through their conversation I learned that it was a '68 Ford Mustang. Evidently a favorite among car enthusiasts. Once the conversation got past those few details, I stopped listening.

  Assuming we would be there a while, I set the basket of food on the worktable next to the radio. Two metal shelving units stood nearby, one against the wall and the other lined up parallel to it, a two-foot gap between them.

  Cardboard boxes, old kitchen gadgets, and more car parts cluttered the shelves. But a wedding portrait that hung on the wall between them caught my eye. I moved to take a closer look, stepping into the space between the shelves.

  The bride, presumably Alexander's mother Neve, stood in front of the groom, a younger John Mannus. John had his arms wrapped around her while she held her bouquet. Both of them wore joyful smiles. As I studied the photograph, I heard two people approach the garage.

  I turned, intending to make my way out from the cramped space and meet the newcomers, however the dog stood at the end of the shelving units with her big body blocking my exit. She cocked her head and flicked her tail as if scenting danger as a couple arrived at the door. They knocked and entered.

  Before they had taken a second step into the garage, Sloan slipped back into the shadows and a low growl rolled in the big dog's chest. Goosebumps covered my flesh as I sensed something amiss. I hid between the shelves, peaking between boxes to see who had arrived.

  ALEXANDER

  While Dad was giving me an inventory of the work needed to complete the Mustang, someone knocked on the garage door. A warning buzzed through me like an electrical shock—whoever had just arrived was a threat. My gut said they must not know Tressa was here, though I had no idea why.

  They swung the door open without waiting for a response, giving me no time to prepare. I glanced around the garage, my mind racing. The picnic basket sat on the workbench, but Tressa had disappeared. Where had she gone?

  The sword called to me as my anxiety grew, making my arm tingle. I opened and closed my hands into fists several times, willing myself not to reach for it.

  The light from the open door illuminated our guests. The new arrivals were George and Nancy Morgan, a middle-aged couple who lived in the house across the street. While growing up I had seen them, one way or the other, probably every day. But now I realized I had never truly seen them before that afternoon. My unease escalated.

  "Hey, John. We were out for a walk and thought we'd stop by to say hello," Nancy said. Her hair, which I remembered as flat and mousy, had changed to a slick charcoal gray with pointed ears protruding between her chin length curls.

  "Cold for a walk, isn't it?" Dad asked, his words polite at best as he continued to fiddle with the carburetor. Her smile faded when he didn't greet them enthusiastically.

  "Alexander, you're here! That's great," George said, his dull colorless eyes now sparkling a clear, glacial blue. "We were hoping to talk to you."

  I had disliked this couple as a kid. Even then, my instincts had told me that their smiles and cheery exchanges were unnatural. They had no kids of their own; as a teenager I'd decided they simply had never learned how to interact with children. Now I understood the real source of my distrust: both of the Morgan's were Sidhe.

  "Hello Mr. and Mrs. Morgan, nice to see you again," I said struggling to keep my face composed. I couldn't let them know that I saw past their glamour, but the transformation in their appearance was shocking. A couple that I had for years considered frumpy and nondescript was standing there with movie star looks.

  Undoubtedly, as Sidhe, they would recognize Tressa if they met her, but that alone didn't make them a threat. Alarm bells clanged in my head, making me believe that the Morgans were Unseelie.

  Finally, my father invited them to come into the garage. They chatted with him about local neighborhood gossip involving people I didn't know. Everyone I grew up with had moved away and newer, younger families had taken their places.

  I took advantage of this to glance around again as I pretended to organize a splattering of tools in an old red chest. Wherever Tressa had disappeared to, she was staying out of sight. The panic in my chest ebbed.

  I watched the Morgans as they stood near Dad and tested my gut. I didn't sense a threat toward him, but the dog growled and bared her teeth. Though she didn't move toward the Morgans, the low rumble in her chest clearly warned them not to approach her.

  "You've got that stray in here again?" Nancy said, looking disapprovingly at the dog. "Is that girl here too?"

  As Nancy glanced around, the door of the garage clicked shut. Sloan had made her way through the shadowy garage and slipped out.

  "Don't let that girl in here, John. She's a troublemaker. I'm pretty sure she's a pickpocket, too."

  Her tone with my father annoyed me. She spoke as if she had authority over him. She wasn't holding in Dominion, but perhaps she wished that she could. Dad shrugged off her words, unperturbed.

  "She's just a teenager trying to figure things out. I taught high school for forty years; I've seen a million like her."

  During his years as a teacher, my father had mentored many troubled kids. He had a special knack with them, so much so that the high school continued to send him teenagers who needed guidance long after he had retired. He took pride in seeing them turn their lives around. If Nancy thought she could make my father give up on Sloan, she was badly mistaken.

  George Morgan pulled me aside. He had a list of concerns that worried me as much as my new discoveries about him and his wife.

  Fifteen minutes later they went on their way.

  "Are you hungry?" Tressa asked my dad as we left the garage. She opened the top of the basket to show him the contents. "I brought sandwiches, soup, and a pie."

  "Lemon meringue, my favorite!" Dad said as he opened the back door and let us into the kitchen. "Let me get washed up before we eat. You guys make yourself at home and I'll be right back."

  We watched him leave, making sure he was out of earshot before speaking.

  "You're sure they're Unseelie?" I asked.

  "Aye, their auras leave me no doubt. Though they seem so docile... They've lived across the
street since you were a child? So much for us keeping the Unseelie out of the Human World."

  I nodded; I had thought the same thing. "They moved in a year after Mom disappeared. Could that be a coincidence?"

  "I suppose." Tressa wrinkled her nose, not really buying it. "They must have a purpose in being here."

  "I wonder if they're the reason my mother hasn't returned." I shook my head, rejecting my own idea. I couldn't wrap my mind around the idea that these people were a threat. Nothing in the past or even in their attitudes today suggested they meant to harm my father or me.

  "Do you think it was one of them who called you yesterday?"

  "I don't know—George chewed my ear off today. He could have told me all that on the phone." I lowered my voice, although my father was still on the second floor. "He said Dad's not taking care of himself—not eating regularly, stuff like that."

  Tressa opened the refrigerator door. "Aye, there isn't much in here."

  "On top of that, his electricity got turned off last week. He didn't pay the bill." A lump clogged my throat as shock went through me again. Evidently he had the bill on an automatic payment plan but didn't track his account balance. He forgot to transfer the funds to cover the full amount. Not something I had ever expected from my father, the math teacher. "Do you think it's dementia or Alzheimer's, or something like that?"

  "He's young for that, but it certainly isn't unheard of at this age. The timing seems odd, though, with this starting up just as we return from Faery," Tressa said as she searched through the cupboards for a bowl to heat the soup. Despite the thermos, it had gotten cold.

  "What are you thinking?" I asked, desperately hoping her alternative was less disturbing than the idea that my father had Alzheimer's.

  "The Unseelie often feed on human energy. Not so much the Sidhe—it's usually other types of Unseelie fae. But the Sidhe can do it. It's the opposite of what I do when I'm healing someone. I push my essence into the wounds to heal them. In much the same way, they pull the human's essence out of them. They create a wound-mentally, and sometimes physically too."

  I leaned against the counter and rubbed the back of my neck to ease the tension—this wasn't a better scenario.

  The microwave hummed as it heated the bowl of soup. I pushed off the counter and pulled three plates from the cupboard. Tressa unwrapped and plated the sandwiches.

  "Are you saying the Morgans are doing this to him? They've been living next to him for over twenty-five years. Why now? If they wanted to hurt him, they could have done it anytime. Why alert me that it's happening?" I asked. None of this made sense.

  "By now all the Sidhe—and every other fae in the Otherworld—has heard about the trial. It will be common knowledge that you have the Claíomh Solais. I wonder if they planned to lure you here and get you to relax your defenses."

  "Hmmm, I don't know. I felt an urgency to hide you from them, but no indication they were looking for the sword or posing a threat to my Dad. My sense was that you were in danger, not me… but maybe I only got half the story." I shook my head. "We haven't hit on what's really happening here."

  Tressa put a finger to her lips, putting an end to our conversation. A second later, my father called out cheerfully as he came down the steps.

  "Hey, what should we do for dinner? I don't have much in the house."

  The lump in my throat returned as Tressa and I shared a worried look. Dad came into the kitchen wearing jeans and a fresh shirt.

  "Oh, you brought food, that's great!" he said.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  TRESSA

  After dinner the men insisted that I wait for them in the living room while they cleaned up the kitchen—not that there was much for them to do. I found my way to the room in the front of the house.

  A comfortable, overstuffed sofa and matching loveseat, covered with worn and faded floral chintz fabric, welcomed me when I entered the room. The threadbare Wedgewood blue carpet added to the lived-in, cozy feel. Masterful oil paintings of landscapes and seascapes hung on the walls, contrasting with the frayed furnishings.

  A row of bookcases lined one wall, displaying many framed photographs, among other things. Some were casual collages of family snapshots while others represented more formal occasions. I started at one end and examined each, going from shelf to shelf, case to case. The photos told the family's story. There was another photo from John and Neve's wedding—a casual snapshot this time. They looked so young and happy. Next was a picture of Neve holding Alexander as a baby. He looked toward the camera, laughing; she looked at him, adoration on her face.

  Then came pictures of Alexander as he got older; school pictures, with groups of friends, playing basketball and one of him looking uncomfortable in a tuxedo with a coltish teenage girl next to him.

  I had mixed feelings as I studied the photographs. They provided a fascinating retrospective of his life: what he had looked like as a baby, his interests in school, how he had changed as he had grown.

  But they also struck a blow to my heart. It all seemed so normal, so human. This is what I had been trying to tell him earlier. Life with me would not include the everyday human experience on display here. In effect, the pictures illustrated the life he would be giving up.

  I paused in front of one particular photo, given a place of prominence. It was a wedding portrait. Alexander's wedding portrait. My heart thumped as I stared at the pretty young girl who had come before me.

  "I guess I should put that picture away," John said. I turned to find that both men had entered the room without my noticing.

  "No, of course not. This is important for Sophia," I said, trying my best to smile. I searched for something else to talk about and my eyes landed on a row of trophies on the top shelf. "What are the trophies for?"

  "Didn't Alexander tell you? He was a champion basketball player in his school days."

  "No, he did not!" I said with mock astonishment, smiling genuinely this time.

  "That's right! Best point guard the school has ever seen. He led his high school team to three state championships." John beamed. "He went to college on a full scholarship."

  Alexander flushed with embarrassment as his father pulled out two photo albums. John and I sat next to each other on the couch and looked at them together.

  The first book contained pictures of Alexander as a baby, with Neve in many of them. John pointed to a photo similar to the one on the bookcase. His expression mirrored the one Neve wore in the photo as she looked at Alexander. Clearly he adored them both.

  "We married young, but we wanted to have a family right away. We had almost given up hope when Alexander arrived, nearly fifteen years later. She doted on him."

  I debated how to bring up Neve's disappearance, however I couldn't come up with anything that didn't sound blunt or intrusive. I glanced at Alexander. He stared at the photos of his mother, the abandoned little boy reflected in his eyes.

  Pictures and newspaper clippings about Alexander's basketball career in high school and college filled the second album.

  "How about you? Were you an athlete in school?" John asked. I laughed.

  "No. My interests lay in the arts."

  "Oh, just like my Neve. These are her paintings." He indicated the art on the walls.

  "They're lovely," I said. "My talent lies in music."

  We turned the last page of photos to find a sketchpad. I pulled it out and flipped it open. The drawing on the first page depicted a dark scene with children playing in a cemetery.

  "I haven't seen that before," Alexander said. He stretched out his hand and I gave him the sketchpad. He scrutinized the sketch, scowling. "I thought I knew all her work. When did she do this?"

  "I forgot they were there. I don't like that set. It's not her best work." John reached for the sketchpad, but Alexander kept flipping through the pages.

  "When did she do these, Dad?" Alexander asked again, more insistent this time.

  John's face became stern, an implacable expression that
could quell a classroom of teenagers. "I don't want to talk about it."

  "If not now, then when?" Alexander asked, growing angry. He huffed out an exasperated breath before speaking more calmly. "Come on, Dad. It's long time since we talked about this."

  The two men locked eyes. I was wondering how long they could stay in that silent power struggle when John sighed and looked down at the floor.

  "Do you remember when the babies in town disappeared?"

  Missing babies? Whatever I had expected him to say, this wasn't it. Alexander thought for a minute as though trying to force a memory to resurface.

  "I think I remember something about two babies dying. It was on the news, and there was a lot of hushed talk about it by the teachers at school."

  "Someone murdered them; drowned them in the bay, or so people said."

  Alexander rubbed his forehead. "And what does that have to do with Mom?"

  "She was always one for having vivid dreams. She talked about not being able to shake one here and there. But then she started having nightmares, right before it happened. She wouldn't tell me what the dreams were about, but after the babies disappeared she grew hysterical. She kept mumbling that she should have stopped it—as if somehow she knew it would occur.

  "After that, she dreamt constantly. She said drawing helped get them out of her head. The pictures seemed dark, like her mind was a scary place, but they never made much sense."

  The dreams she had been referring to must have been the string of premonitions she'd had before leaving home. It would be easier to say you had a bad dream than to explain a gift of Second Sight. While Alexander's premonitions tended to be more immediate, her predictions focused on future events and might, in fact, have come to her in dreams.

  "Mr. Mannus?" I asked timidly. He looked up, startled.

  "John, to family and friends," he said.

  "John," I repeated, averting my eyes. "Did she say anything before she left? Do you have any thoughts on what happened to her?" I asked, keeping my voice gentle.