Uniting The Fabled

by Rebecca Bosevski

“You brought the equillis home.”

  “They should never have been exiled.”

  “Certainly so. Oh my dear, there are so many wrongs you can set right.”

  “What happened Dad? I needed you to help form the council to avoid a fight, to avoid a war. But look what I walked into.”

  “You forget, my dear Desmoree, in your world there is rarely a split vote and if there is the chief, the prime minister, makes the final decision. Both sides voted in the interest of their own and we have no chief.”

  “Shit. And I couldn’t ask for an odd number or they would have complained that the council was biased towards one side.” Dad was right. I didn’t think this through. “So what do I do?”

  “You take the lead.”

  “But I don’t want it.”

  “You are the only one at the moment that both sides will listen to. One day that might change, but for now, you have no choice.”

  I rubbed my forehead and looked out at the glistening light moving across the back hills of Sayeesies. The unicorns were home; I had brought them here and now I had to fix the mess I created before I could get back out to find Ava. I turned and took a breath, ready to call out across the crowd of angry fey.

  The barriers fell. Did I release them or did they fall on their own?

  I scanned the crowd of flushed faces. “I gave you a chance to be under an elected lead and you couldn’t see past your own stubbornness and bigotry to vote based on your own point of view. So I will take the deciding vote. Whenever your elected council is tied, I will make the decision.”

  There was a grumble from those that didn’t want me in power. I didn’t blame them. Other than what I was, there was no reason I should lead them, but they forced my hand.

  “Council, step forward.” One by one they made their way towards me.

  Eight in total, two Stalisies women I had seen before in the market with Phoneas, the teacher who scolded Jax for observing her class, and the man I had threatened that day in the square.

  Another man I had not yet met, a Tanzieth, stepped up next, followed by two women, also unknown to me.

  “Where is your fourth Tanzieth member?”

  “Here,” Max said, stepping from my side to stand with the others. Makes sense the Tanzieth would elect him, he was already their leader.

  “Max,” I said, smiling a little. “Tell me what was the vote concerning?”

  He squinted at me momentarily. “A Tanzieth family wanted to return to their family home in Sayeesies. Their grandparents lived in the arkreed fields before their banishment.”

  “Is someone else living there?”

  “No, the dwelling has been unused, left to wither, actually. They want to restore it, make it their family home again.”

  “And the vote was split?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you for fricken real?” I asked, looking to the Stalisies four. “They can have their family home. Max see that the arrangements are made immediately. Listen to me, all of you. Many of you won’t want me making your decisions. So, start making them for yourselves. Don’t side with your kind because you are the same, cast your vote because it’s the right decision to make.”

  They all nodded but refused to make eye contact. I saw a young boy intently watching our interaction.

  “Could you come here please?” I asked, nodding at him when he pointed at himself for conformation.

  “What is your name?”

  “M... Marx,” he stuttered out. He had short blonde hair that stuck out at different angles and a thin tall build. He had to be in his early to mid-teens.

  “Do you have a job?”

  “N...No.”

  “Would you like one?”

  He nodded. I looked around and saw a stall of fruit to the side. I walked over and emptied the bulbous green fruits on top of the spikey brown ones. I still hadn’t learned all their names. Walking back, I used my magic to transform the basic crate to create a mail box of sorts.

  “This is for you. With each decision the council must make, they will cast their votes on simple plain square paper that you will provide. Their votes will be placed in the box and you will read the votes back to the council, one by one. If it’s a tie, the vote can be recalled once more, then if it’s still a tie, come find me.”

  “How do we know the boy won’t tamper with the vote?” The man who had threatened Jax snarled. The boy arched his shoulders, dropping his head a little he looked at his fingers fumbling together so as to avoid eye contact.

  “I assume you know your own handwriting, yes? Then as he calls the votes he will turn the paper so that you can see the writing for yourself.”

  Marx looked up at me biting his bottom lip, he took the box, nodded, then stood beside my father.

  “Now back to your day.” I grabbed Jax’s hand and made straight for the portal once more, before pausing. “Where is Madel?”

  “I don’t know, she disappeared after you shielded the mob. Maybe she’s looking for Ava?”

  “I hope so, we have to go. The unicorns gave us our best lead yet. We need to find the dwarves.”

  “Really?

  “Yep, so where do we find them?”

  “You are not going to like it.”

  “Jax where do we need to go?”

  “A cemetery.”

  “What?”

  “Dwarves live beneath the earth, and they form entrances within the human crypts.”

  “Desmoree,” Max yelled out from behind me. “Do you need help?”

  I turned about to shake my head when I saw the Nazieth. The Fourth and Second Nazieth had joined the Ninth. Each of them wore a different colour leather-like gear. High collared coats, with shiny white buttons, and fitted pants of the same leather, adorned with holsters for various weapons and accessories. The Ninth wore black. They were the elite. The Fourth a muted green, and the Second golden yellow. I preferred the Eighth Nazieth, theirs were midnight blue.

  “I will take the Ninth Nazieth if they will join me.” I called back.

  “Des, what?” Jax asked. “Why them? They are warriors, killers even.”

  “Yes, and we have demons chasing our daughter.”

  He nodded as the last of the Nazieth joined us at the gate. I didn’t have to tell them where we were going, they didn’t care. They protected the fey, they would protect us and they would protect my daughter.

  I recited the cast to direct the portal to the human world, picturing the opening Moyeth and Jax had brought me through on my first visit.

  I must ask Madel to show me other entrances.

  The onyx shimmered then, became like liquid, ripples running across it in tiny waves. I stepped through and they followed closely behind.

  The ground squished beneath my feet and water pelted me from the dark sky above. I cast a shield like an umbrella. Large enough to fit our entire party beneath it. I could have flown to the nearest cemetery faster than we were going to have to walk, but I wanted the Ninth Nazieth with us.

  Trudging across the saturated grass we were relieved when the storm passed and only a drizzle remained, allowing me to drop the rain shield so we could pick up our pace. I am so tired, we need to find Ava soon. I need to sleep.

  I knew of only one cemetery. And there better be an entrance at this one, ‘cause it’s the only one I know and I don’t particularly want to ask someone for directions to another one.

  I had worked there only once. A high fashion shoot, goth themed. The designer wanted his creations to be photographed like the rising dead. I reluctantly did what he asked, Dazzle magazine loved the concept and my photos, but I never wanted to do it again.

  It was a nice enough place. Well looked after, large trees, pretty flowers. But the vibe was still weird. The idea the models were standing above where people lay in their boxes, buried beneath the ground, sent shivers down my spine.

  When we came upon the entrance I gasped. Like a real-life fifties film gasp.

  My eyes darted between the mounds of
dirt littered across the grounds to the scattering of soil frosting every surface.

  Can I really be seeing this? I thought as my brain struggled to accept the scene in front of me. Struggled to accept how it was even possible. Someone had dug up the graves. But the dirt piles were small and many, not piled neatly as if shovelled by hand, instead more as if the coffins exploded sending the soil into the air to then fall in clumps around the site.

  I am so not checking for bodies.

  10

  “WHAT HAPPENED HERE?” The leader of the Ninth Nazieth asked, stepping through the ornate iron gateway.

  We followed him and then made our way quietly into the site, choosing to walk the pretty pebbled drive rather than risk stepping on someone’s resting place. We walked around a circle of memory plaques, presumably placed above where ashes lay or in place of a body to be buried, and only then were we able to see the extent of the site’s decimation.

  More than thirty graves had been dug up, the piles of dirt gave away the unprofessional excavation. More like scattered mounds, the dirt covered most of the grass of the surrounding plots too.

  “Someone else look, I don’t want to,” I said, pointing to the closest open grave. Jax was first to take a step, but the leader of the Ninth overtook him to investigate. Jax stopped and breathed a heavy sigh.

  Chicken.

  “The coffin is open, no body inside,” he said, joining us back on the path.

  Something moved from the corner of my eye and I darted towards it. I had to hop around broken headstones and mounds of dirt and grass. The Nazieth were on my heels, Jax too, I presumed, but I swear I saw a glint of rainbow hair.

  Ava.

  I stopped at the door to a mausoleum, the old wood cracked and splintered but whole all the same. The big brass lock showed its age but wouldn’t budge when I twisted and shook it.

  I cast an opening spell I knew by heart and pushed, but the door wouldn’t budge. Age had fused the hinges.

  “Here,” the leader of the Ninth said, joining my side. On my signal of a nod, we heaved the door open. Dust flew around the room, but there was not a sound. No movement. The large stone coffin lay in the middle of the room and came into view clearly as the moonlight shone through the back window of the mausoleum.

  Jax reached my side, panting.

  “Shh,” I chastised, not wanting to scare Ava away. “Ava,” I called softly into the dark space. “Are you there?”

  Something moved at the back of the room but it was too small to be Ava. I dove across the floor, landing on my side I reached and gripped hold of a squirmy animal. It’s leather-like skin caught the light coming through the mausoleums window and cast a shimmer of rainbows across its reptilian surface. It clawed at my hands to try to free itself.

  “Stop struggling, I am not going to hurt you,” I said as I tried to keep my grip.

  “Let me go, they will be back. I have to warn the others.”

  “The other who?”

  “Stupid girl, the other dwarves. The dark ones are here, if they find the others they will force us to make the door. Then all will be lost. Let me go!”

  Sick of struggling with the dwarf I cast the shield spell to hold him in place and climbed to my feet.

  “Now if you want me to let you go, you are going to have to tell me what you know about what happened out there? Did you see a girl with rainbow hair?”

  The dwarf stopped struggling against the shield and sat in a lump on the floor.

  “Maybe I did, but why should I talk to you?”

  The leader of the Ninth pulled out a blade and moved towards the dwarf.

  I raised my hand to halt him. “Look, that girl is my daughter and if you want to get to your dwarves and warn them then you will tell me what you know.”

  I suddenly remembered one of the items I needed from the fabled was a dwarf key. Crap.

  “Look, I am sorry, I’m just trying to help my daughter. She’s in trouble. If you know anything it would really help us out a lot if you could tell us, then maybe we can help you get back to your dwarves.”

  Jax frowned at me, and I winked. He knew I wouldn’t be this accommodating unless I needed something off them.

  “Yes, please help us?” Jax joined in, bending to be closer to the dwarf. “What happened out there? Did you see?”

  The dwarf succumbed to Jax’s smile like so many had before him. Jax had a way of making anyone feel at ease. Hell, when I should have cut off his head for trying to kill me, I couldn’t help but fall into those dreamy eyes and forgive him.

  Weird, right?

  “I saw it,” The dwarf said, looking only at Jax. “I saw the dead rise, only to be swallowed by darkness. The only light, your rainbow haired one, running from the dead.”

  “Did she raise them?” Jax asked and I shoved him.

  “Of course she didn’t.” I glared at him. “Tell him, go on,” I said to the dwarf.

  He nodded. “She brought them up from the dirt that one. But I don’t think she knew what she were doing cause she ran pretty quickly after that.”

  “Where did she go, did you see?”

  “She ran to the gates, then there was a big swirling light and she was gone.”

  “She portalled?”

  “Maybe. There was a flash, but I didn’t see exactly. I was trying to get to the others, to warn them. We have to help them, we have to go.”

  “Why is the darkness after your people?”

  “The darkness want the door. The darkness will kill the dwarves to get what it wants.”

  “What is the door?”

  “The door to their world. We make the doorways, they want to set the rest of the darkness free. Come on missy, I have to go, release me now!”

  “The mouth of hell, you could open a door to the darkness?”

  “We wouldn’t do such a thing, now let me go.”

  “No, but you could?”

  He nodded a deep frown creasing his forehead.

  “I need something from your elders to seal the door for good. Can you take me to them?”

  “I will show you, but you have to promise to get us out first. Make sure we are safe, then you can ask the elders for what you need.”

  “Agreed.” Like I wouldn’t help them first anyway.

  The dwarf pushed out against the shield again, only this time I released it and his arms flew forwards easily. He made his way behind the stone coffin and pushed on some scrollwork etched into its base.

  The coffin vibrated then the side of it dropped away to reveal a dark hole.

  “So we have to go down there?” The leader of the Ninth asked, a slight tremble in his voice.

  “You aren’t afraid of the dark, are you?” Jax joked beside him and a flash of concern crossed the leaders face. But in an instant, it was gone and the warrior façade returned.

  “Fear can be controlled, harnessed for it’s power. The Nazieth will follow you, will fight for these dwarves and for you.”

  I shook my head and followed the dwarf inside, the hole was actually a sloped tunnel that I had to crawl through in order to fit. The dwarf strolled ahead and as he went, the small stones in the tunnel illuminated, lighting the way.

  Shrieks carried on the air found us.

  “I think we are too late, hurry! We have to help them!” I called back to the others.

  Reaching the end, I climbed out of the opening and phased into my fairy form. I was surrounded by dwarves, all of them shimmering in rainbow light while they fought dark swirls of mist. The mist lunged and lifted them from the ground, tossing them towards walls and into each other.

  “What is it?” I yelled to the Nazieth who were crawling out behind me.

  “They are demons. Stuck halfway between their world and ours. Ninth guards, your knives and blades can defeat them,” he called to his fellow Nazieth, and they all pulled what looked like glass swords from their boot hilts.

  A dark swirl headed towards me. I threw up my shield and it bounced off it. I threw shield
s around all my group and the dwarves. The black mists bounced off them like pinballs flying around the room. I released the Ninth Nazieth so they could attack with their blades. The first swung through a swirling mist and it stiffened then fell to the ground, a solid mass. The warrior knelt and stabbed the mass with his blade again and it shattered into a fine dust before disappearing completely.

  I cast a shield over him as another mist attacked and it bounced off. Quickly releasing it, the guard made short work of it, but when I attempted to raise the cast again it wouldn’t stick, and the darkness enveloped the guard.

  He wailed and blood spurted from the cloud of black mist, he gurgled and fell in two pieces onto the floor.

  I screamed.

  Jax lunged at the mist with a Nazieth’s blade. It solidified like the first had and fell to dust on the floor beside the body of the fallen guard.

  “Des, are you okay?” he yelled, swinging the blade towards another.

  “I can’t keep the shields up. I can’t protect us.”

  Jax and a guard both plunged their weapons into a cloud headed for a gathering of dwarves pinned against the wall to my left.

  “Here,” he said and slid an identical blade towards me. “Now you don’t need a shield.”

  I knelt to grab the blade and came up in time to swing it through an approaching dark mist. It felt like trying to slash through sludge, not mist, and I had to throw more weight behind it to force it completely out the other side. The mist solidified into a lumpy blob. I pierced the blade through what looked to be its middle and it dematerialised into dust, falling to the floor beside a dwarf that leapt onto my leg and latched on tight.

  I almost shook it free when I saw her eyes. They were wide with fear. I focused on the others. I tried to cast the shields again, this time wrapping them around the remaining swarms of mist to slow them. They held like invisible bubbles, but then my fairy form faltered and I transformed back to my regular form. The dwarf ran from me to a huddle of it own kind behind an overturned table.

  So it’s me, or them. Great, I thought as I concentrated on removing and raising each cast as the Nazieth and Jax finished the darkness within them. On the last, I collapsed to the floor, my head a mess as the room spun around me.