Rise of the Fey

by Alessa Ellefson

  “Y-You already know?” I say, blushing furiously.

  “You have to learn to control your emotions,” Lady Vivian says sternly. “Otherwise, even a small annoyance such as a fly buzzing about your ears could be a trigger.”

  “Control my emotions?” I repeat dumbly.

  “That’s right,” Lady Vivian says, patting my cheek. “And a great way to achieve that is to make sure you get plenty of sleep.”

  I nod. “Goodnight, Lady Vivian,” I say, before retracing my steps back to the school, my heart turning cold with dread. For if there’s one thing I know for sure about myself, it’s that I have a very short fuse. And if Lady Vivian’s right, that means things about me are likely to quickly go KABOUM!

  Maintaining my cool certainly doesn’t come easy, and my self-restraint keeps being tested over the next few days as word of my ‘minor’ incident spreads through the school like wildfire.

  “Hey, demon spawn!” someone yells in the hallway as Keva, Bri and I make our way to Lore class.

  A rotten apple skims my face and splatters against the wall.

  “That’s foul,” Keva says, covering her nose at the sweet yet pungent smell that’s sprayed over me.

  I swing around just in time to see a knight and his squire fist-bump. I fight back my urge to retaliate as the knight swaggers over to me, an oily smile stuck to his equally oily face.

  Just keep calm, I tell myself, breathing furiously through my nose.

  “You know what the repercussions are for going against someone of higher rank,” the knight says with a grin. “So you better keep your filthy eyes down.”

  “That rule goes out the window if there is abuse, though,” Bri says. “So I’d keep my distances if I were you.”

  “I don’t see how anything we do to the changeling could be called abuse,” the knight’s portly squire retorts, his stringy hair falling into his eyes.

  “We’ll see what KORT has to say about that,” Keva sniffs disdainfully.

  To our surprise, the knight’s grin only widens at her threat. “Do it, why don’t you?” he taunts. “Let’s see how popular your precious President will be when word of his pet gone rogue comes out.” He steps forward, forcing the three of us to back into the wall. “At which point, I doubt anyone will mind if he’s fragged.”

  I blink at the boy. “Is that supposed to be an insult?” I ask.

  The knight and his squire burst out laughing.

  “That’s sedition!” Keva shouts as the hour bell rings and both boys scamper away. “I’ll have you reported!” she yells again, but her words don’t hold much conviction.

  “I still don’t get it,” I say, as Bri drags us to class.

  “It means they may intend to kill him off,” Keva says darkly, “by placing him in danger every chance they get. Deliberately.”

  I repress a shiver. Surely they can’t seriously want to lynch Arthur, he’s one of them! But that midnight vote between the KORT knights and Lance’s warning right after trot back to the front of my mind, and I can’t help but wonder if Arthur’s position at school really is that precarious, or that dangerous.

  “To your desks, quickly now!” Sir Lincoln snaps as Keva, Bri, and I arrive last. “We do not have a single minute to spare. As if it wasn’t enough that my class has been reduced to an hour a week! Don’t they understand that history is just as important as EM training? How are we to evolve if we have no basis to compare our actions to?”

  “I’m sure those demons would love it if I went after them with my Lore book,” Daniel says.

  Brockton and Ross snigger in their corner.

  “Perhaps we should try it on the one we have in class,” Daniel continues. “Might as well prove herself useful for once.”

  My face heats up. If I could only punch the simpleton without potentially blowing the whole classroom up, I’d totally go for it.

  “Shut up, Daniel,” Keva says. “We all know you’re better with a book than you are with a sword, so if you already suck at that—”

  “Enough!” Sir Lincoln shouts, spittle flying from his thin, dry lips. The outburst is so uncharacteristic of him that everyone immediately quiets down. “We’ll start where we left off last week: How to act if you find yourself in the presence of Fey while unarmed. Adams, please read.”

  I throw a surreptitious look in Daniel’s corner, and catch him staring at me. Instead of looking away, however, he points at me then draws his thumb across his neck, and I quickly look back down to my book, suddenly afraid—afraid of what people may do to me, but mostly afraid of what I may accidentally do to them.

  In an effort to calm myself down, I force my eyes to trace each and every word on my textbook page as Laura reads them out loud.

  To avoid the unhappy chance of falling in the Fey’s bad graces, one must be aware—and respect—a certain code of conduct amongst these somewhat fickle beings. For not only are they immortal, but they can hold grudges spanning what would equate to us humans as generations upon generations.

  Therefore, one should remember the following two key points while in the presence of the Fey:

  First, a Fey would rather die than to be dishonored, or preferably kill the one guilty of the affront.

  Second, there are no free gifts—should you receive something from them, anything, they expect something of equal, if not greater, value in return.

  It is important to note here that one’s pulchritude23is oftentimes directly related to how willing the Fey are to give out favours.

  Though many have tried to subdivide the Fey into different classes and groups, or even courts, and therefore ascribe different codes of conduct to each, one must remember that, at their basic level, the Fey are all the same—angels who have fallen from grace. So no matter how innocent some of them may seem, one ought always remember their unspoken motto:

  Nothing is certain in this world, not even one’s immortality.

  The latter of which the Fey are willing to do anything to preserve.

  “You hear that, Morgan?” Daniel says in a mock whisper. “Doesn’t matter how innocent you look, we all know what’s hiding inside you!”

  “Bet we all know why Arthur wanted her, huh?” Brockton says.

  Ross nods. “Heard your mama was a whore!”

  “We still haven’t figured out which kind,” Daniel says calmly. “Perhaps an empousai?”

  “What the hell is that?” Ross asks.

  “A demon who likes to kill men,” Daniel responds. “Easy to detect if you look down though, they apparently have donkey feet.”

  Understanding dawns on Ross’s face and he chortles. “Yeah, and we all know how much of an ass she is.”

  “Bet her dad died of shame,” Brockton adds.

  Pure, unabated rage pumps through my veins like arsenic, burning through the last tendrils of my control. My hands stiffen around my open textbook, crumpling the pages.

  I take an unsteady breath, trying to refocus my eyes on the lesson, but my vision remains blurry.

  “I certainly would’ve killed myself too,” Daniel says, “if I knew I’d created a freak like her!”

  “For heaven’s sake, Daniel!” Bri explodes. “We all know you’re a virg—”

  Keva yelps. I have a dim sense of her and Bri stumbling away from me. I shut my eyes—I need to calm down….

  Someone shouts my name as a violent wind picks up inside the room, sending furniture flying into the walls with loud, wood-shattering crashes. The explosion from a few nights ago flashes before my mind’s eye, and I whip my hands over my ears to block out the screams, unable to stop what’s happening around me.

  “Get out,” I whisper, terrified, as a storm breaks loose above our heads, quickly soaking through my uniform.

  “Sowilo!” Sir Lincoln shouts, his voice drowned out by the tempest.

  The wind suddenly drops and the downpour abates to a light drizzle as calm is slowly restored over the classroom. Panting, I crack my eyes open and find my classmates eyeing me wear
ily from the tops of the remaining chairs and desks to avoid the foot of water that’s submerged the room.

  “Another pair of shoes ruined!” Keva exclaims, fuming. “Couldn’t you have at least warned me?”

  “Sir, Bri’s hurt!” Dina yells.

  My eyes widen. “What?”

  Jack vaults over my desk, pushes me aside, then drops to the floor to lift Bri’s small, inert body out of the water.

  “Oh my god, did she drown?” Laura asks, hopping onto Keva’s desk so she can get a better look.

  “Don’t be stupid,” Keva snaps, pushing her away.

  Laura squeals as she slips off her perch and falls into the water, the class bursting into nervous giggles around her.

  But Jack’s not saying a word.

  “Out of my way, Morgan,” Sir Lincoln says, waving the last of the storm clouds out the windows with another push from his sylph.

  He gently gathers Bri in his arms then lays her carefully on top of our desk to check for a heartbeat. Bri’s face lolls to the side, pale under the blood streaking down from a cut on her forehead.

  With a muffled whimper, I stagger back towards the exit then turn around and flee.

  “It don’t matter where you go,” Daniel calls out after me, “we’re still going to hunt you down, she-devil!”

  I barrel down the hallway towards the restrooms, and a surprised scream greets my entrance as I reel towards the stalls.

  “Leave!” I manage to utter, before I fall onto my knees and get sick.

  I hear a girl run out, shrieking, while my stomach heaves again, emptying itself of all its contents. I swat my hair away, sticky with sweat before another wave hits me, followed by a low rumbling propagating through the floor.

  “No,” I say weakly, holding tightly onto the toilet bowl.

  The rumbling grows louder and I throw myself out of the stall as the floor convulses before the toilet explodes, dirty water erupting like magma from the broken pipe. I let out a terrified scream as the toilet in the next stall explodes as well with a deafening sound.

  Large pieces of white porcelain fly overhead, cracking one of the sinks and shattering the mirror above it. I cover my head as the silvery shards fall in a scintillating shower around me and into the fetid water flooding the bathroom.

  My hand convulses around something sharp. I suck in my breath as a stinging pain lances through my finger and, looking down, find that I’m gripping a large piece of the broken mirror.

  A strange sense of calm suddenly descends upon me, as if I’m no longer inhabiting my own body. I watch myself raise the shard to my arm.

  “I’m a monster,” I say flatly, “and monsters don’t deserve to live.”

  I push the jagged piece of mirror through the remains of my shirtsleeve and into my flesh. Blood pools at the tip then flows down to my blackened hand as I pull the fragment of glass across my forearm, from elbow to wrist. I bite on my lips to stop myself from screaming, the pain burning its way up to my shoulder, forcing me to connect with reality again. Yet, even as the cut reaches my hand, it’s already mending itself.

  I pull the shard back out before ramming it into my forearm again, cutting more deeply, only to watch in horror as my muscles, tissue and skin knit themselves back up again.

  I burst into hysterical sobs, raking the broken piece of glass up and down my arm, feeling it hit the bone, until the water around me is scarlet with my blood, my arm screaming in agony.

  The door to the restrooms slams open.

  “Morgan, stop!” Arthur yells.

  I hear him rush over, the water splashing as he drops on the floor next to me, then his warm hand grabs my own before I can stab myself again, crushing my fingers in his fist.

  “I’ve got to find the ogham!” I shout, tears pouring down my face. “Only then will I be able to stop!”

  Arthur twists my arm around and I let out a sharp yelp, dropping the shard into the murky waters of the overflowing toilets.

  “No!” I scream hysterically. “I’ve got to find it, it’s the only way!”

  “Morgan, stop it!” Arthur yells, grabbing my other arm before I can find another piece of glass.

  “Don’t look at me,” I wail, bursting in renewed tears. “I’m evil! You should put me down before I hurt anyone else!”

  Arthur’s arms suddenly encircle me, holding me so tight to him that I can barely breathe. I try to fight him off, but no matter what I do he doesn’t let go.

  “I can’t hurt them anymore,” I wail, pounding his back feebly. “I keep getting everyone killed….”

  “Shh,” Arthur says, rocking me back and forth, “it’s OK, everything’s OK.”

  My sobs eventually die down to a hiccup, and Arthur finally pulls away from me.

  “Bri’s fine,” he says, “there’s nothing to worry about. It was just an accident.”

  I want to tell him that he’s got it wrong. That he was never supposed to protect me. If he’d kept me in jail, then Bri would never have been hurt in the first place. And if I hadn’t been brought to Lake High, Owen wouldn’t have sat in that stupid chair, and Percy wouldn’t have almost died fighting the banshee, and the whole attack on the school wouldn’t have happened! And if my father had let me die at the hands of that Shade, then Agnès would never have been murdered, and he himself…

  A strangled sob escapes my lips.

  Everything bad that’s happened around me started with my cursed birth.

  “Let me show you something,” Arthur says, pulling me up after him.

  I stumble as he leads me to an intact mirror. Then, using his wet finger, he traces some runes on its surface before whispering a few words. The mirror fogs up, smoky white tendrils rising from its smooth surface before dissipating again to show me a woman’s face, smiling as it looks down at something outside the mirror’s range.

  “Who is that?” I ask, my voice breaking.

  “You really don’t recognize her?” Arthur asks. “Even after you fought tooth and nail to save her?”

  Arthur traces another glyph in the mirror’s corner and the image pulls out so that I can now see what the woman’s smiling at.

  “A baby,” I whisper, finally recognizing the pregnant lady from the fight by Little Lake Butte Des Morts. I glance at Arthur in amazement. “They both survived?” I ask, still unwilling to believe what my eyes are showing me. The woman had been attacked by a Fey, pumped full of poison, and on the verge of giving birth in below-freezing temperatures…those aren’t what can be called ideal survival conditions.

  Arthur nods, smiling. “They wouldn’t be there if it weren’t for you,” he says.

  I look again at the nursing mother, remembering the warmth that had spread from my hands into her body. I hold out my hand to touch the infant’s soft-looking cheek, but the moment my fingers graze the mirror the image dissolves.

  “So don’t you ever hurt yourself like that again, understood?” Arthur says meeting my eyes in the mirror’s reflection. “If it weren’t for you, those people wouldn’t have made it, Jennifer would be long gone, and I would just be another name on the casualty list.”

  I nod slowly, though I am not entirely convinced I shouldn’t have my powers restrained somehow.

  “Good,” Arthur says, sounding relieved, “then let’s get out of here and call for a cleanup crew.”

  But as he takes a step, his knee gives out.

  “You’re bleeding!” I exclaim, rushing to his help.

  “It’s nothing,” Arthur says, pulling a shard of mirror out of his knee and dropping it on the inundated floor.

  “Don’t tell me it’s nothing,” I say. “It’s an open wound and”—I straighten up and point at the broken toilets which, thankfully, have stopped their spewing—“with all the crap around us, it could get infected, or you could get cryptosporidiosis24, or hookworms, or—”

  “OK, OK, I get it,” Arthur says with a disgusted grimace. “I’ll go see Dr. Cockleburr.”

  “Or…” I narrow my eyes at hi
m and he takes a half-step back, wincing.

  “Or what?” he asks apprehensively.

  “Or I could heal it for you,” I say haltingly.

  Arthur looks around uncertainly.

  “Don’t you trust me?” I ask, unable to stop my voice from shaking.

  I find myself holding my breath as I wait for his answer.

  “Do…do your thing then,” Arthur says, rather stiffly.

  “Awesome,” I squeak out. I clear my throat. “Uh, why don’t you sit down over there?” I say, motioning towards a small wooden stool down by the showers where the floor isn’t covered in refuse.

  As Arthur limps across the room, I wash my hands and arms until my skin is raw, apprehension knotting my insides, then drag my feet over to him.

  “Could you, uh, roll up your pants?” I ask, kneeling before him.

  I hold my hands before me so they won’t touch anything dirty as Arthur carefully reveals his wound.

  Without my asking to, he passes his hand over his injury.

  “Laguz,” he murmurs.

  One of Arthur’s rings sparkles pearlescent white and a soft jet of water washes the grime off his leg. A vision of Bri lying unconscious on the school desk flashes before me and my hands start shaking uncontrollably. I look up apprehensively, but Arthur has the good grace to pretend not to notice.

  “It appears to have passed right next to the patellar tendon,” I say to distract myself from the terrifying thought of losing control over my abilities again. I gently prod his knee and blood seeps from the deep gash. “Though it could have damaged your meniscus…and perhaps even your anterior cruciate ligament.”

  I babble on for another minute, enumerating every single medical fact I know about the knee to hide my increasing nervousness.

  Finally, when I’ve run out of things to say, I take a deep breath, lay my hands over the cut and close my eyes.

  Please, just please don’t let me blow his leg to pieces, I silently pray. Slowly, a pleasant heat envelops my hands. I want to open my eyes but I’m too scared to see what I’m doing. What if I’m making it worse instead, or making something strange grow, like a spike, or fur? Arthur’s leg is awfully soft, now that I think about it….