We climb in, I take the front seat and Maggie takes the back for security issues. Just what we need is for him to see the flower/Faery and start asking questions. It smells like artificial pine. A green freshener hangs from the rear view mirror, still swaying from the previous motions of the car. Wrappers from gum and fast food joints litter the floor and an empty pop can rolls around in the back. He shoves most of the litter under the seats, murmuring an apology for the mess as he does so. It’s obvious that the Jeep sees a lot of use.
“Thanks,” I mutter.
“No problem,” he nods, revving the engine. “So where’re you two headed?”
“Er,” I cast around for something to say, not sure whether it would be smart to tell him where but seeing no choice in the matter. “The Apple Orchard just up the hill.”
His face screws up in confusion. “I won’t ask,” he says, turning the knob on the radio. Some song that has a fast drum beat and a bit more screaming and guitar than I’m used to blares through the speakers.
“What is this?” I call over the noise.
“Shinedown.”
I wince at the loudness of it.
“Hey you don’t have to like my music and I don’t have to give you a ride. Your choice.”
“It’s just loud,” I feel the need to point out.
“Well, deal.”
I scowl at him.
We speed up the street and I have to think that I’m grateful he came along when he did. Not so grateful that we could be stopped by a cop . . . But as he said, he is our only help right now. So, I deal with it.
“Don’t I know you from somewhere?” I ask once the song’s over.
“Yeah, remember? The pool? She told me to beat it?” he jerks his thumb over his shoulder at Maggie in the back seat.
I can just feel her glare burning into the back of his head.
“No that’s not what I mean.” I can’t put my finger on it.
“School?” he arches his eyebrows at me.
“Maybe,” I muse.
We pull up to the gate in front of rows and rows of tall apple trees. The house is off in the distance rather than right there by the drive. That’s good. We’ll have a better chance at getting this done and getting out of there before someone notices.
“Do you want me to park?”
I blink at him.
“Do you want me to come with you?” He amends.
“No, stay here. We shouldn’t be too long.” I didn’t know how to begin explaining the whole “Faeries exist” thing to him, I was too busy swallowing it myself. Even with living (barely) proof in the car with us, it was still hard to believe. Just too benign.
“OK.” By his tone he sure didn’t sound OK with it. He strikes me as the type of person who doesn’t like being out of the loop.
We leave our bags in the Jeep. Yeah, granted that isn’t such a great idea considering we don’t know him all that well. But it’s the easiest thing to do. Better to not have to worry about them if the need to run approaches. But we stash them behind the back seat in the small crevice that passes as a trunk in this thing. He gives us a weird look as if to say “what? You don’t trust me?” and opens his mouth to most likely say something along those lines.
I raise my hand palm forward: stop.
We leave him before he can make any snarky remarks, heading towards the gate just off the side of the road. I can hear the bass of his stereo behind us and shake my head in his general direction. I hope that it doesn’t scare them away . . . wherever they are.
I think about how much stock he puts in us trusting him when we don’t even know him from Adam. What’s up with that, anyways? We didn’t even know his name, and he didn’t even know ours. How can you trust someone you’ve just met?
The gate is wooden, five feet tall and is chained shut with a padlock. Great. I give it a sharp tug to no avail. The chains rattle and jangle, not giving way. Unless we have the magical ability to break solid metal we aren’t getting through this the easy way. And with no know how on how to pick a padlock, our chances are even slimmer. So it looks like it’ll be up and over.
I lace my fingers together to form a foothold for Maggie and gesture for her to go first. I can climb myself. Her shoe meets my palms and I give her a boost over the fence, waiting to hear her hit the ground on the other side before I begin to climb. Using the crossbar as my own foothold I hoist myself over the gate. The wood is rough and splinters stab into my flesh. I land with a light thump in the dirt on the other side near Maggie, brushing my palms on my shorts.
“Let’s do this,” I say, striding off into the columns of trees.
2. The Queen's Guard
The air has a strong smell of leaves, apples and dirt. I breathe in the fresh scents, loving the deliciousness of them. The moon finally chooses then to make its appearance, lighting up our surroundings to near daylight brightness, casting shadows that crisscross the ground. Each apple in a tree near us has a pale reflection of the moon, washing out any and all color. The trunks and branches are leeched of light, darkening them to mere silhouettes. I have no idea where we’re supposed to go, but judging by the determination in Maggie’s stride she does. We make our way up the row, quickening our paces to a brisk power walk. It’s uphill so it makes a good work out.
The trees start thinning out and the hill becomes steeper still. I look up from watching where I walk to see our destination. There is a huge, and I mean huge, tree atop a vast mound of dirt covered with grass that looks blue in the night. It has to be over fifty feet tall at least. The trunk is massive. As big around as a mini-van is long. I marvel at its absolute size.
“Is this where we’re going?” I ponder out loud, stepping on a mushy apple core on the ground. There’s a multitude of them strewn about, bruised and rotting.
“Yeah,” Maggie grunts.
We hike up the hill, reaching the base of the trunk. Its bark is knobby and rough and one chunk is as thick as my hand.
“Now what do we do?”
“We wait.”
I am about to ask what we have to wait for when a silver lining of a square lights up in what is clearly a door about four feet tall. It opens outward and we have to jump back to avoid getting smacked by it. The wood must be a foot thick.
“What—?”
“Shhh!”
It opens fully, giving way to a group of what must be more Faeries congregated on the handsomely polished wooden floor of the tree. They’re all the same height as the one in the tulip, clad in multiple shades of leaves and adorned with flower petals and blossoms that wouldn’t have survived this time of year otherwise. Their wings are individually different colors, ranging from translucent to sky blues, grassy greens, lilac purples, sunny yellows, cloudy whites, each one a startling bright color that seems to luminescence in the darkness. The ones on the front line are equipped with an unknown hard material studded with deadly looking thorns, a thorn circlet wrapped about their brows.
“Whoa,” I breathe.
A light source illuminates from within the depths of the tree changing every few seconds, first a golden honey color, then a whitish blue, a violent red, and finally a dim dragonfly green, going through the cycle endlessly. It’s mesmerizing to watch and I feel myself lulled into a dreamlike trance. There was nothing in the world but those colors.
“Snap out of it!” Maggie pinches my arm sharply.
“Hmm?” I mumble drunkenly.
She turns me roughly to the side, away from the light show, slapping my cheek lightly.
“Ow!” I protest. “What was that for!?”
“Don’t look directly at them,” she says in my ear.
“But—”
“Don’t!”
I nod. She searches my face with her eyes to make sure I’m fully aware of what I’m saying. I must be because we turn back towards them. But this time I fix my eyes on the bark above the opening, taking in the whorls and knobs in the tree, refusing to look back at them.
The majority of them a
re whispering something. Something that sounds like: “They have the Sight. They can See us. How is that possible?” over and over again.
“Why are you here?” One of the thorn clad Faeries demands over the murmuring.
“We’re here to help,” Maggie acts as spokesperson.
“We do not need help from mortals,” another of them speaks icily, taking a long, straight thorn from a sheath at his side and brandishes it at us. “Trespassers,” he hisses venomously. “Leave now.”
“Why?” pipes up the first. “They would make good fun. Fine servants they would be.”
Fury makes me glare right at him. I ignore the stupid lights completely. “We’re here because someone tried to kill her.” I point angrily at the flower in Maggie’s grasp. “Now, we’d be plenty glad to just let her die. But we came here in hopes you could save her. If you don’t want your own kin back, fine by me. Maggie, let’s go. This is a waste of time.” I grab her by the arm and begin towing her back down the hill.
“Stay your foot!” one from behind what must be the guard calls out. “Let us see her.”
Maggie and I exchange glances. “Fine,” I say.
Maggie puts the flower/Faery down in front of them.
The one who spoke pushes through the front line. It turns out to be a female with raven black hair and a silver dress; she has a tiara of brambles that have a multitude of tiny flower blossoms on it and some sort of sparkly substance. Royalty then?
She touches the pink petals and they quiver and jump until they dissipate completely, leaving nothing but the Faery left. She’s even grayer than before, the blue is gone. Her dress has even faded in color. Gray tinges the edges of each once emerald leaf. What I didn’t notice before is that she wears a circlet of tiny flowers that look like miniature, in the extreme, white roses.
The other Faery gives a gasp of disdain. “I feared so.” She covers her mouth with her hand. “Breen, gather her up.” Her voice is melodic, like the tinkling of a bell whereas the others were rough and roguish.
The Faery which had said we were trespassers sheathed his weapon and came forward to take the girl in his arms. He then retreated to the depths of the tree.
“You may go,” says the silver dressed Faery. She doesn’t wait for a reply but goes back into the tree to be swallowed up by the others. I’m not certain but I think she said thank you as they were disappearing into the hollow.
The door swings shut, leaving no trace of its presence. It merely melds back together with the surrounding wood.
“Well that was fun,” I say without feeling that it was at all. Just the opposite. My voice sounds dead.
“Heh,” Maggie snorts. “Right.”
“Well, mystery man is waiting for us...at least I hope he is. Why don’t we get out of this place? Quite frankly, I’m tired of it.”
“I’m with you on that,” she agrees groggily.
I’m not even sure I want to know what time it is let alone if the guy is still waiting there for us. I’m riding on the hope that he is trustworthy and hasn’t gone anywhere. The walk back feels like a dream. Like when you’re half asleep and just going through the motions without thinking about it. I don’t want to think about how sore I’m going to be tomorrow. Don’t want to think about how much trouble I’m going to be in when I get home. I just want to fall into bed and sleep for an eternity.
We reach the gate and I hoist Maggie over. I barely make it I’m wobbling so much from exhaustion. I stumble on the landing almost falling flat on my face until Maggie steadies me with her arm. “Thanks.” I mumble.
When I look up I’m elated. The Jeep’s still there. Yes. No more walking. I could kiss him.
I hobble over to the door and climb in, sinking down onto the seat. I give a little sigh of relief. It helps that he doesn’t have music blaring at full blast that second.
He arches his eyebrows at me. “Rough time picking apples?”
“You could say that,” I yawn.
“You know what’s been bugging me?” he asks.
“Hmm?”
“I’m nice enough to give you a lift and I don’t even know your name.”
I smile a little at that. I was thinking something along those lines, too.
“Kate,” I offer.
“You sound unsure.”
“Maybe I am. I didn’t hear your name.”
“And you’re not going to,” he smirks, his eyes glinting mischievously.
“Hey! That’s not fair.”
“Maybe,” he allows. “Maybe you’ll hear it in the future. Maybe not...”
I roll my eyes at him.
“Oh stop flirting you two and drive. I’m a bit tired here,” Maggie interrupts from the back seat irritably. I cast a glare at her and am about to say that I am not flirting with him. But he turns up his radio and drives, drowning out any retort I am about to say. I can swear I see him smiling a little, just a slight curl of the corners of his mouth.
I cross my arms over my chest and lean my head against the window, the air conditioning blows softly across my face from the vents on the dash. It’s easier now to block out the noise of his music. Soon I fall into a dream filled sleep without meaning to.
Faces swim across my eyelids. Broken images that make no sense. First a cement wall then a row a trees then a star strewn sky, a face I don’t know, a shadowy figure, most of which were the events of the day. Others I am not so certain.
I’m shaken awake by the guy. I open my eyes to find that we’re outside my house and when I look into the back seat Maggie is gone. What? How did he know where I live?
“Hey Sleeping Beauty, you’re home.”
I peer at him.
He must be pretty good at guessing what I’m thinking because the next thing out of his mouth is: “The cranky chick told me your address after I dropped her off. Here we are.”
“Oh. Thanks.”
I realize then that its deathly silent inside the Jeep. Strange.
“You gonna get out?”
“Yeah, sorry. Um, thanks for the ride again.” I find my bag on the floor by my feet and hoist it onto my shoulder. How it got there, beats me. I open the door and jump down, closing it as quietly as I can behind me.
He leans across the seat again, opening the window. “The name’s Derek,” is all he says.
I’m so startled that I don’t know what to say. So I just nod like an idiot and make my way to my familiar front door, digging for my keys.
I fall asleep almost immediately after my head touches my pillow. Hearing Derek rev off is the last conscious thing I register.
I meet up with Maggie the next day at her place. My mom doesn’t even say two words to me about last night so I guess I’m off the hook. Or she was too passed out from her own job as a nurse to notice. Unsurprisingly I don’t wake up until late in the day. She’s just leaving for work when I make my appearance in the kitchen to grab a quick bite before heading out myself.
“Morning.” is all I get.
“Yep,” I mumble to an already closed door.
Don’t get me wrong, I love my mom. But the woman needs to cut back on her hours. She takes anything she can get, though. Raising me by herself and trying to keep up a house is hard work. Or that’s what she tells me any time I make the mistake of bringing it up. So, this is what we have, her leaving whenever I’m around and vice versa. Makes it hard to have quality family time.
Since I’m not sixteen yet my only mode of transportation is, sadly, walking, bicycling, or taking the bus. The other having just walked out the door that is. So it looks like I’ll be walking. Ugh. Did I mention I can’t wait to get my driving permit? Stupid age limitations...
Maggie lives in an apartment in down town Hawthorne Hollow with her older brother, Parker.
Their parents died when Parker was only sixteen himself leaving them with an only aunt. Maggie herself was only nine at the time. But when Parker was legal he got a job and they moved out on their own rather than
burden their aunt who clearly didn’t want children at her house. Maggie wasn’t unhappy. Just the opposite. She liked having the freedom other girls her age didn’t. But that didn’t mean she doesn’t miss her parents.
Parker answers the door when I buzz. “Oh, hey Katie.”
His hair is as fair in color as Maggie’s. But where Maggie is all tan and blue eyed, a perfect Californian, he’s pale skinned and brown eyed. A dusting of facial hair covers his jaw line and his hair is a tousled mess. He’s wearing a dark blue band logo shirt and cargo jeans. “Come on in,” he waves.
“How’s it going?” I ask, shoving past him.
“Pretty good.”
“Any news on the band?” Parker was a guitar player after his day job. If you didn’t know him you would have never guessed it. He’d just had a rehearsal for a local band named Bitter Nightingales and was waiting to hear back from them last I heard from his gossip of a sister.
“Maggie ruins everything, doesn’t she?” he laughs.
“You could say so,” I allow, smirking.
“Hey stop talking about me like I’m not here!” comes a protestant voice from the sofa.
“Not our fault you didn’t grace us with your presence little sister.”
I make my way over to her, “shove over,” I say. She scoots and I plop down on the sofa next to her. “What are you watching?”
“Stuff.” she says mysteriously, clicking off the TV.
“What was that for?” I ask, sounding a bit whiny. I could do for some couch time.
“Parker, get out.” She commands, ignoring my complaint completely.
“Not your house.”
“Not yours either,” she counters.
“I pay the rent." She glares at him. “Fine, fair enough. I’m gone.” He saunters off to one of the bedrooms. The door clicks shut behind him.
“Why?" I ask her.
“Wait for it...”
A few seconds later electric guitar music blares through the closed door.
The Faery Keepers Page 2