by Vivian Arend
This had to be Earth. It had to be, which begged the question what had Rumpel done to her? Why had he sent her here? Was this part of the game?
The girl sighed. “You’re nuts, ain’t ya, lady? Escape from the loony bin or what?” Her hard eyes glared at Shayera.
“What? No,” she snapped. “Where am I?”
The girl’s eyes grew wide and then she planted her hands on her hips. “You running from somethin’? How could you not know where you’re at? Look around, isn’t it obvious?” A dirty finger pointed at a spot over Shayera’s shoulder.
Twisting, she followed the girl’s gesture and spotted a giant green figure—statue more likely—perched on a massive island in the middle of the murky, bluish-gray water. Racking her brain for the niggling worm of a memory, she knew she’d seen that statue somewhere before. In one of Mother’s picture books, but where? From what?
“New York, lady! Damn, you really is nuts. Look, sorry I ever bothered you.”
The girl turned to go and Shayera couldn’t just let her walk away, this was the first human contact she’d had that was somewhat helpful. “No, wait!” She held out a hand. “Please, I’ve got nowhere to go. I don’t know how to get back to where I’m from. I need…” Feeling a sense of disgust at her current predicament, she thinned her lips. Was she really going to beg a child for help? One who’d just admitted that her mother was off somewhere, doing Goddess knew what, and here she was begging for money so that she could feed them?
She couldn’t throw herself on the girl, but she did need help.
“Police!” She smiled, so thankful her mother had taken the time to teach her of this land’s strange customs. “Take me to the police and then I promise I will leave you alone.”
The little girl narrowed her eyes. “Why you wanna go to the police? They’ll just throw you back in the loony bin.”
“I swear, I’m not escaped from an asylum.” At least that’s what Shayera thought the girl meant by loony bin. “But I’m lost and have no cash,” she said, hoping she was using the correct wording.
The little girl seemed to consider it for a bit before finally nodding. “Yeah, okay. Just to the po-po, after that you’re on your own.”
A sense of relief like she’d not felt since arriving here washed through her and Shayera beamed. “Thank you.”
“Whatever. C’mon.” The girl turned and walked toward the smarmy-looking Paco.
Shayera nibbled on the corner of her lip because she had the terrible sense that she should not for any reason trust this Paco character, but knowing she was literally at their mercy, she followed.
Up close Paco was even more off-putting than he’d been from her earlier vantage point. Covered in pockmarks, his burnished bronze skin gleamed with sweat. His stench was carried to her on the stiff, briny breeze and it was all Shayera could do not to gag at the odor of his unwashed body.
“Who are you?” he asked in a thick Spanish accent.
Opening her mouth, Shayera meant to answer, but the girl interjected. “She’s mine, that’s what she is. We ain’t filching off her—she ain’t got nuthin’ no ways. We’re taking her to the pigs. You got a problem with that?” She shoved her finger into the boy’s bird chest.
Rubbing at the sore spot, he glowered but shook his head.
In that one exchange Shayera realized she’d been lied to. Paco was most definitely not the one in charge.
“What is your name anyway, lady?” The girl turned.
“Shayera,” she said, wiping her palm across her dress once more.
“I’m Brenna,” the girl said, and then before Shayera could move away, she grabbed hold of her hand. Bracing for the transference of power, Shayera’s entire body stiffened up. Brenna clearly noticed because her gaze widened. “Don’t like to be touched, yeah? That’s fine, I get it.” She dropped Shayera’s hand but didn’t act in any way like the touch had affected her.
Curling her fingers to her furiously beating heart, it dawned on Shayera that mother had mentioned Earth was not full of magic. Obviously her powers were void here and as much as that was a relief, it was also a worry, because if her siren call didn’t call it also meant her only form of protection was nullified.
“Yo, Frankie,” Brenna called toward a redheaded, skinny mass of gangly knees and bony elbows sitting beside a Dumpster.
The teenage boy looked up, and he too had a hard glint in his eyes. “What, boss?”
Brenna snorted, obviously realizing that Shayera knew the truth. “You stay there. I’ll be back, keep doing what you supposed to, got it?” She all but growled that last bit, and ten or not, Shayera had to admit to being slightly intimidated by this hard-as-nails girl.
The boy gave a thumbs-up and then went back to gazing around the park.
“C’mon then.” Brenna jerked her head. “Cops this way.”
They turned and Shayera pointed. “Just us? No Paco?”
The girl laughed, finally appearing as young as she actually was. “Nah, the sentries stay. They can do without me for a bit. So tell me bout yourself, Red, ’cause I know you ain’t from round here.”
Running her fingers through errant strands of curls, she sighed. “That obvious?”
Once again they were back on the sidewalk, but now that the girl was by her side, Shayera noticed people were giving them both a wide berth. No more were people just rushing into her as if she were invisible. Another thing she noticed was the way women hugged their purses to their chests and how men kept a hand glued to the pocket where they kept their wallets when the girl walked past.
It was obvious to Shayera that this girl, though acting a savior at the moment, was likely not someone she wanted to hang around for long. There was a nagging feeling in the back of her mind that as helpful as Brenna was being right now, she wouldn’t always be.
“Couldn’t be more obvious even if you was wearing a sign around your neck.” Brenna laughed and picked at her thumbnail.
Just then a woman with a stroller walked slowly by. The woman was thin and had streaks of salt-and-pepper hair and wore a plain black dress, and her skin looked aged and very brown. She kept her head down and was chattering away under her breath at the baby inside the carriage.
Likely a grandmother out for an afternoon stroll. Shayera smiled, at least until Brenna kicked her foot out, tripping the poor woman who hadn’t been on the lookout. With a cry she lost her balance and as she fell, the stroller toppled with her.
Terrified for the child’s safety, Shayera rushed forward, nearly breaking her neck as she leapt, stretching her arms out desperately to right the vehicle before the babe fell out.
But she was too far and it crashed right on top of the old lady. The bundle inside smacked hard against the concrete. There was a quick cry of breath and then nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Shocked, stunned, Shayera could only stare on because this couldn’t have actually happened. This young girl couldn’t have deliberately and violently caused the death of a little one. The baby was fine, it had to be. The thought of an infant finally spurred Shayera into motion.
Brenna’s constant guffaws was a grating, awful noise in the back of her head. The bundle on the ground still did not move.
Panicked, Shayera grabbed at the cloth-swaddled body that lay lifeless on the sidewalk. No one stopped to help, but plenty of eyes were looking on in bright-eyed disbelief. Shayera patted the child’s back, afraid to turn it over for fear of what she’d see. But there was no response.
“Why did you do that?” Shayera snapped as she patted the baby’s back harder.
The old woman was screaming as tears fell from her eyes. “My baby! My baby!” That’s when Shayera noticed that the poor woman’s left foot was tilted at an odd, gruesome angle.
Her hands were frantically waving at the bundle in Shayera’s hands and Shayera’s heart shattered as she finally turned the swaddled child over. Then her eyes swam with tears because there was a large purple bruise on the side of the babe’s head and blood
slid from its ears.
“Oh, baby, no. No.” She moaned and feathered her fingers along its dented little skull. “Oh no, child, sweet child. Oh please, baby,” she choked out between tears because she knew there was nothing that could be done.
A fall like that should not have killed the little one. It should not have. How had this happened?
“Give me my baby!” The grandmother screamed, and blinking herself back to reality, Shayera handed the beautiful little girl to the sobbing woman, who crooned and cradled its head to her breast. She rocked back and forth, completely oblivious to the pain of her broken foot.
Brenna’s laughter was growing louder; she was braying like an ass and hugging her arms to her chest. “Did you see that, Red? I only tripped them. Wow, what a freak show, yeah?”
Fury filled Shayera so that she was washed in it, bathed in its deadly glow. “You killed that baby!” She pointed back at the huddled woman.
“Oh c’mon, Red.” Brenna held up her hands. “It was a fluke, I just tripped her. You can’t be mad at me.”
There was no thought or reasoning to what Shayera did. One second she was standing, shaking with the heat of her anger, and the next she was on top of the girl with her hands wrapped around Brenna’s neck.
The girl’s eyes were bulging, but not with fear—no, with a horrible smugness like she knew, knew Shayera wouldn’t do it.
“You’re not bitch enough to kill me,” Brenna gasped out as Shayera’s fingers squeezed just slightly tighter.
Tears streamed down her eyes for the loss of the child, for the loss of that innocence to this horrible little monster underneath her. The cries and taunts of the boys of her village, the ugly faces of mother’s whose expressions said she was a whore no different than her dad had been, all that hate, hurt, it mingled with this moment and Shayera knew that she could kill Brenna.
She could end her. Her own hate was passionate and strong and it would be nothing, to choke the life from the girl.
“Do it,” Brenna snarled, trapping Shayera’s hands back against her throat despite their loosening. “I ain’t got nothing in this life! Nuthin’.” She spat, and when the wet slime landed on Shayera’s nose, the red of fury tried to come upon her once again.
But in that moment she thought not of her mother or her father, but of Briley and how he’d feel if he ever discovered what his Shay Shay had done.
Deserved or not, the dispensing of justice wasn’t something that Shayera could ever take upon herself. The girl would have to pay for her actions, but not because Shayera was her judge, jury, and executioner.
“I hate you for what you’ve done,” she gritted out and her hands shook as finger by finger she released the girl’s slender throat. “But I won’t kill you either.”
The second she released the girl, and just as she made to stand, Brenna’s hand reached out and smacked her so hard and fast across the face that she cried out in pain and humiliation, grabbing hold of her cheek.
“You lose, bitch!”
And then the scene disappeared and she was in back in the room of stone. Her cheek was on fire and the wetness of Brenna’s spit was still on her nose. Wiping her face with the back of her hand, she gasped, completely overwhelmed by the experience.
And as the adrenaline pumped through her system, she covered her eyes and kneeled, and then, pressing her face to the cold stone, she wept.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Later that night after Shayera had eaten a bowl of the most creamy and divine tomato soup she’d ever had and taken a long hot bath, Dalia brushed her hair out at the vanity.
“I failed,” she said miserably, staring at her still red-rimmed eyes. She’d only just stopped crying an hour or so ago.
“I heard, miss.” Dalia’s strokes were gentle and even, helping somewhat to soothe the still-frayed edges of her nerves.
Shayera made sure to keep herself as muted as possible as she dropped her head to her arms, stroking the waxed smoothness of the vanity with her fingertips. “I don’t think I can do this, Dalia,” she whispered beneath her breath. Just the memory of that child still made her breaths shudder through her chest.
“Miss, if I may.” Dalia dropped to her knees, peeking up at Shayera, her smooth ebony skin flawless even through her frown. “Perhaps losing isn’t such a bad thing.”
She sniffed. “Rumpel told me this morning to not lose. And yet my very first test I failed miserably. The worst of it is I’m not even sure how. He wouldn’t even look at me afterward. He just stared straight ahead and when I tried to engage him—”
Sighing, Dalia swept at an errant curl slipping into Shayera’s eye. “I realize you don’t know me well yet, but I like ye. In many ways you remind me of me sister, and so I tell you this with the hopes that you’ll listen. Lose. Every test. Lose them all, Shayera. Believe me when I tell ye these are challenges you do not want to win.”
Eyes wide and nibbling on the corner of her lip, Dalia looked nervous, and that more than anything made Shayera worry even more.
“But what happens if I win? Doesn’t winning mean I get to go home? If I lose, that’s bad. Right?”
Inhaling deeply, Dalia rose to her feet, brushed at her black gown, and shook her head. “Do not ask me those sorts of questions. I’m telling you more than I even should.”
The dull pain in her head continued to throb and she moaned, wishing for a moment that she was four and able to run into her mother’s arms. The only saving grace to this was that whether she failed or won, her father was safe and in the end that was all that mattered.
The other thing was that even though the game had felt so real, it wasn’t. Though her heart still ached with the loss of the child, in reality, there’d been no child. So as much as it hurt, she was okay.
“Tell you what, you need a pick-me-up.”
Scrunching her eyes, she shook her head. “I need bed. I’m tired.”
“No, miss, if I may be so bold…”
Lifting her brow, Shayera waited.
“You’re heartsick and need to take your mind off today’s test. Would you like to smile again?” Dalia’s own was large and gentle.
It was on the tip of her tongue to say no, but the girl was grabbing her hand and tugging.
“Up. C’mon now. I think you’ll like it.” She waggled her brows.
Unable to resist her gentle teasing, Shayera growled an okay. Tonight the wardrobe had given her not just a silk gown but also a robe, and true, there didn’t actually seem to be anyone around other than Dalia, but the way the girl materialized from thin air made Shayera believe they could see her even if she couldn’t see them.
“Fine.” She tightened the golden sash of her hunter-green robe and, slipping on sandals, shrugged. “Take me away.”
“Come then.” Dalia held out her hand and Shayera understood that the maid wanted her to take it.
Still not fully comfortable touching skin to skin, she gritted her teeth, tamped down the charm until it was almost nonexistent, then took Dalia’s hand. A tingling rush of heat slipped through her palm, traveled along her bloodstream, filling and rushing through her body like a wave and making her gasp as a mirage shimmered before her eyes.
In less than a second she was as immaterial as her maid sometimes was. She could think, but she couldn’t speak and desperately wanted to as the sensations of moving through cold stone, hard woods, and diaphanous silks pulsed against her. She was free-floating atoms, nothing more than frenetic cells buzzing and rubbing frantically together. She was everywhere and nowhere. All things and nothing. The sensory overload of blurring colors, scent of sulfur, whistle of rushing air, it was too much.
And then they were there, wherever there was, and she was gasping, sucking sweet flower-scented air into her lungs because she was whole again and she could feel the silk of her gown caress the flesh of her body as she held on to her chest and took just a moment to gather her quivering, nervous self in order.
“You all right, miss?” Dalia patted her back.<
br />
She laughed, because if she didn’t she might pass out. “Fine, let’s just never do that again.”
Giggling, Dalia spread her arm. “Well, whaddya think?”
The entirety of Rumpel’s castle was coldly beautiful, but she hadn’t ever felt truly at home. Not until this moment. The room was done in soft shades of rose and seafoam green. The walls weren’t the typical, cold black stone as the rest of the place, here there was wood, and the world smelled of cedar, and there was the crackle and snap of a flame in a hearth. Rich, woven tapestries depicting scenes of maidens frolicking and dancing decorated the walls. Here there was no furniture; what there was was a wooden dais not much higher than five, six inches at most off the ground. It was a good twenty or so inches wide and at its center was a patina-stained bronze bowl, inside of it nothing more than water.
Frowning, she turned toward Dalia. “What is this?”
“It’s where you learn your happiness. This room is yours to enjoy whenever you need it.”
“Are you leaving?” she asked as the girl turned.
“I’ll be back when you need me.” Then she vanished in a puff of smoke.
Sitting cross-legged, not really sure what she was doing but longing for just a moment of joy, Shayera peered over the bowl. The room was dark, too dark to see a reflection. And yet she did, in exacting detail—from the freckles scattered along her nose and cheekbones, the fullness of her rosebud lips, the coppery red of her hair, and finally to the ivory of her skin.
For a moment she thought that maybe the riddle of the bowl was in her reflection. That it was showing her that happiness could only be found within herself. But maybe was overthinking it, because slowly the view changed and no longer was she staring at herself but at a dark gray pall.
Dalia had said the bowl would help her find her happiness, but what did the gray mean? And perhaps it was just a strange play of shadow upon light, but did there seem to be something hidden within the veil? A figure of some sort, something small, not very large? She cocked her head because she could swear it wasn’t her eyes deceiving her, there was color there. It was red and bright.