When she could think again, she opened the book randomly. It was a photographic chronicle of her life. She turned the pages, amazed at the pictures. How did Dad get all of these? Each photo was neatly labeled in her mother's precise handwriting. Mom had assembled this book. Mom had made this for him.
She turned back to the beginning. The first photograph was of a very young version of Mom with long golden hair down her back. She wore a lacy, medieval-looking wedding dress with a long jeweled belt. Whoa, was that a garland of flowers in Mom's hair? Keelie smiled. Mom would be so embarrassed to know she was seeing this early version of her.
Dad stood next to her in the photo, his long dark hair pulled back into a ponytail. Weird, but he seemed exactly the same today. He hadn't aged at all. To Mom's left was Grandmother Josephine in a dark suit with her usual fluffy white blouse, and by Dad's side was a woman with long, rippling gray and silver hair tucked behind obviously pointed ears. Her hair was held by a thin crown of silver wire. Her beautiful green chiffon dress was embroidered in a scrolling silver design. Keelie looked closely. Leaves. What else?
She stared at the picture, a slice of time long ago. Mom looked so happy. She had her arms through Dad's and gazed up at him, a smile on her face. It was obvious that she really loved him, at least early on. What had changed?
Keelie stroked the slick paper of the photograph as if she could really touch her mother. Mom, why did you take me away from him? Why did you break up our family?
She'd never know. Her dad knew his version of the truth, and Mom's was gone forever.
In the second photo, Mom sat cross-legged on the floor beside a baby with a riot of dark curls. Smiling, Keelie touched the baby's hair. Dang, her hair had been doing the wild puffy 'do even then. On the other side of the curly-haired baby, Dad waved a stuffed dog, trying to get her attention, a goofy smile on his face. The baby was focused on her blocks, ignoring both parents.
Keelie brought the picture closer. Her baby blocks seemed to have been made from cherry wood. She slapped her hand against her forehead. She was becoming wood obsessed. Was she going to I.D. every piece of wood everywhere for the rest of her life?
Another photo showed Keelie, a little older, sitting in Dad's lap, holding a baby doll. Keelie smiled. The baby doll had pointed ears. Where had it come from? Dad's smile was just as goofy as the one in the other pictures. This was a guy in love: in love with his wife, in love with his baby.
It occurred to her that sometimes when he thought she wasn't watching him watch her, he still got that goofy smile on his face.
She looked up toward the ceiling. If Mom was hanging out on a cloud with the other angels, Keelie wanted her to come down and talk to her. To answer her questions. She closed her eyes. When she opened them, she was still alone in her father's bedroom.
She shivered, although the cool mountain morning was no colder than usual. The shawl had come loose while she looked at the photos and she wrapped it tighter. Maybe it was just psychological, but she felt warmer, safer.
She had a few more days to decide if she belonged in Dad's world or whether she would return to the world her mother had given her. A third choice came to her. Dad could come to California. Not L.A., but maybe the wooded hills of the north. They could be a family again, and Ariel could live with them.
She'd still be close to her friends, and to all the memories she'd made with her mom and Grandmother Josephine, but she wasn't sure anymore whether she belonged there. She'd been certain of the answer when she'd arrived at the Faire, but not anymore.
The thought made Keelie restless. Maybe she needed a walk to clear her head. She had decisions to make about her life. And she wanted to know more about being an elf. It was a big step to go from preppy California kid to finding out she wasn't all the way human, talking to trees and fighting evil forces in the forest. It sounded like the plot of a video game, but it was her life.
If she did go with Addie to California, Keelie knew she would break Dad's heart. They had gotten so close after all these years of being apart.
But hadn't he left Keelie with Mom all those years ago? Sporadic letters from Renaissance festivals across the country, toys shipped for Christmas via UPS. That wasn't parenting. He hadn't been there for the really hard stuff. For when her tooth got knocked out rollerblading, or when the boy she had a crush on had asked her to a dance, then didn't show up to take her. Mom had been there. She'd understood.
A faraway voice in her head asked, What about the time you saw the thing in the forest, and Mom told you it wasn't there? But it was. And Mom had seen it too. And it was not a white horse, either, not with that giant horn.
Keelie felt a sudden urge to be outside among the trees. She wrapped the shawl tighter around her shoulders. Feeling very different from the Keelie Heartwood who had tried to catch up with Ms. Talbot only the week before, she stepped out onto the landing of the outside stairs.
What had changed her? Dad? Ariel? Certainly not that hateful cat. She'd also developed an obsession for wood and craved to be around living trees. If she went back to Los Angeles, she would have the beach, but only foreign transplants, palm trees, and scrub to talk to. She wondered what kinds of faces they had. Maybe she could grow an herb garden to satisfy her need for greenery, or buy a sapling.
Keelie wiggled her bare toes, smiling. Sir Davey had said that working in the mud would make the magic bypass her mind and tap into her heart. Maybe walking barefoot on dirt would do the same thing. Maybe she should go to the meadow to talk to the aspen. She remembered the pulse of energy it had sent through her when she'd touched Moon.
Right about now, Keelie could use some of that healing energy for herself.
Her phone rang inside. She followed the sound to where her bag was on the floor by her bed, and of course, Knot had shed his fur all over it.
"Hello," she answered.
"Hey. All plans are in place for the Great Escape."
Keelie didn't want to think about the Great Escape, not when she was planning the Great Compromise.
"Can we talk tomorrow? Dad's calling me."
"Dad? I thought he was Father, the troll, the old man, the sperm donor."
"Tomorrow. We'll finalize the plans."
"Okay, Keelie. Tomorrow." Laurie sounded mad at her.
Keelie shoved the phone under her pillow, then wrapped the shawl tighter around her, feeling guilty. Knot was on the bed, glaring at her with his weird green swampgas eyes. He hissed.
"Shut up, you old masochist. I'm not paying for that tassel, either. Wait till I tell Dad."
Zeke called her from outside.
Knot's fur rose in a lion's ruff.
"Chill, furball. I'm not going anywhere."
Knot hissed again, unmollified, and backed up a step as if readying for an attack.
"Shut up, psycho kitty."
His purr cranked up.
"Hey, didn't you hear me calling you?" Dad stood by her curtained doorway. He stared at the shawl.
"Dad, I can explain."
"Please do." His gaze shifted to Knot, who'd fallen flat to the bed and was pretending to be asleep.
"It's his fault." Keelie jabbed a finger at the cat. "He stole a tassel from the Shimmy Shack, and I chased him to get it back, and then he was in your room, and I thought he was going to pee in your drawer, so I was just protecting your stuff."
"I see."
"And when Knot left, I saw the book of pictures and the shawl. And it smelled so much like Mom..."
His voice softened. "I see." He turned away for a second, then looked back at her. His eyes seemed brighter, as if he was holding back tears. "Keep it. I was going to give it to you anyway."
"Thanks. Why were you calling me?"
"You got a box from my mother. Your grandmother. Let's open it and see what she sent."
Keelie followed him to the living room, remembering what Dad had told Sir Davey about her being "the one." And whatever that was, her grandmother wouldn't accept it. She thought of Elia's tau
nt about half-humans, and Elianard calling her a half-breed. Was her grandmother like that, too?
"Let's open the box." Dad cut the brown wrapping paper, and a strong smell like cinnamon drifted around the room. Keelie recoiled. It smelled like Elianard. She picked up the paper wrapper and smoothed it out. The return address read "Dread Forest, Oregon." Could she live in a place called the Dread Forest?
She watched Dad open the box and looked inside. "Wow. You want to see what your grandmother sent you?"
"There's nothing in there that might bite?" No telling, around here.
"No." He laughed and ruffled her curls with his hand, as if she was a little kid. She smoothed them back down and leaned over to look in the box.
"Dad, what if instead of living in the Dread Forest we lived in northern California, you know, where the big redwoods are?"
"Our home is the Dread Forest." He looked at her curiously. "Why are you asking?"
"If we lived in California, I'd be near my friends, and we could still live in a forest. I could even take care of Ariel. We could be a family."
"We're already a family, Keelie. And your grandmother lives in Oregon. We have a lot of family there, actually."
"Maybe you do, but I don't. I haven't had a single birthday card, or phone call, or damn, you're still alive from her since-um, let me think-oh yeah, my entire life." She was yelling, and she hadn't meant to.
Dad stared at her. "Where did that come from?"
"You are so clueless. We are not a family. Mom was my family. We're starting out, but that doesn't mean you can tuck me into your little woodland world like a chipmunk or something. I'm not a tree. You are not my shepherd."
"I never said I was. I'm your father." He was yelling now, too.
"Quit yelling."
"I didn't start it, you did."
"Oh grow up. You are such a Peter Pan with your groupies and your elfie ways. All granola and oatmeal and ceremonies with the trees. I need to get out of here. I need to touch some concrete. See you later."
"Where are you going? Come back here. We're not finished."
"Oh, we so are." She slammed the door on her way out, but it clicked shut so she opened it and slammed it harder.
As she stormed down the stairs, she saw Knot in her window, his mouth hanging open in kitty shock. And that made her feel great. She stuck her tongue out at him and headed for the Shire.
She needed human companionship. If there wasn't a party on, she'd get one started.
Scott started to say something to her, then turned around and walked the other way. She glanced at the mirror over a table in the shop. Blotchy and swollen around the eyes. Fabulous. Sean would fall to his knees when he saw her-and throw up.
The sky was roiling again, a perfect reflection of her feelings. She needed some thunder, some lightning. At the bottom of the hill she saw the bridge and slowed, remembering the Red Cap. Maybe she shouldn't be alone out here. And she should have brought her cloak.
She stepped onto the bridge, expecting to hear the voice beneath it, but she heard only the water gurgling through the rocks. The grass was slick and muddy all the way up to the bridge, and mushrooms dotted the banks.
Keelie shuddered. The Red Cap had been here, probably after the storm that had flooded the stream. Where was the creature that had saved her? And what was it?
The logical conclusion, since this was Water Sprite Lane, was that it was the sprite herself.
"Hello? Sprite? I wanted to thank you for the other day. You saved my life." No answer.
She stepped off the path and walked downstream, looking at the water going around the trees that bent over the creek. The bank was higher here, and below she could see sandy areas, little beaches that marked sediment deposits.
She would have loved to play here when she was a little girl. At the next bend in the creek, she saw a movement near the water. A big fish was gasping, beached on the sandy shore.
"Poor thing. I'll save you." It might have been too late, but she jumped down, holding on to roots as she went.
The fish turned large brown eyes to her and gasped her name.
Keelie backed up, banging her head on a tree root. Aspen. Something crawled onto her shoulder from the ferns that hung over the bank. She froze, hoping it wasn't a snake or a big bug. The mossy face that looked at her from an inch away seemed familiar now.
"Bhata."
The stick seemed pleased. An arm like pine needles scratched gently at her cheek, the other pointing at the fish.
Keelie knelt by the fish. It blinked up at her, long whiskers at either side of a wide, lipless mouth, and held up a thin, bony arm with three webbed fingers on a small hand. "Keeliel."
"Sprite?"
It closed its eyes, then opened them again.
"It is you. Are you hurt? Can I put you back in the water? What can I do to help you?"
At the edges of her sight she saw that other stick fairies had come, as well as some of the buggy ones, the ones her dad had called by another name. The banks were filling with them.
She hesitated, then put a hand out and pushed at the sprite, grimacing at its cold, clammy fishiness. Ew.
The sprite cried out, and the little arms wrapped around her wrist, its sticky fingers grasping at her skin. Keelie was torn between screaming, running, and helping the poor thing.
Sympathy won. She looked around for something she could use like a back board, and she saw the aspen above her, its slender trunk rising toward the tree canopy, its roots partially exposed by erosion.
Keelie pulled off her charred heart pendant and wrapped it around the sprite. Nothing happened. Her eyes on the sprite, she reached behind her and grasped a thick root.
The world turned green. In the meadow yards away, she saw Hrok, and beyond him, on the large rock, was Sir Davey, surrounded by scientific equipment, busily working.
She looked down at the sprite. "Heal."
Nothing happened. She thought of the night in the meadow when she had healed Moon. Did it have to be a particular tree?
Hrok, help me.
Let go of your shields, Keliel Tree Talker. Let the magic flow through you. Release your fear.
What fear? The sprite was kind of gross, but she wasn't afraid of it. What was she afraid of? The Red Cap. Her father's anger. Herself. Her plans. Her future. What she had become.
No, what she had always been. It was the truth she feared. And what was that? That she wasn't totally human. But that her parents had acted all too humanly. They'd loved each other and had given up that love for her. And now she was planning to leave her father.
She couldn't go back to California. She wasn't the same Keelie anymore. She was Keliel Tree Talker, the Tree Shepherd's daughter. She had to discover what that meant. That would be her life from now on.
A rush of green energy pulsed through the root, burning her muscles as it scorched its way to her other arm and down, down, filling the sprite. Keelie tried to release it, afraid so much energy would hurt the little being, but it held her tight in its grip, getting stronger, taking in the magic like an oxygen-starved swimmer.
Around her the air buzzed and clicked with excited fairies. Finally, the strange, sticky fingers released their hold on her, and she let go of the root.
The sprite vanished, leaving the charred heart pendant on the sand.
Keelie picked it up and wiped the grit off of it. The sprite was nowhere to be seen. "Ingrate," she muttered.
And then the bhata attacked her.
seventeen
Keelie climbed the roots, her long dress bunched over her arms, thanking the aspen as she went and keeping her face in the crook of her elbow so that the bhata couldn't scratch her face or get at her eyes.
When she had her feet back on the ground, she ran, skirts lifted, grateful for the big sleeves that kept the clicking stick things from getting on her arms. Before she reached the path, a swarm of bugs came from the bridge and she veered, heading toward the meadow. The bugs caught up with her quickly, and
they clung to her hair, digging at her scalp and pinching her neck.
Her skin buzzed with their magic, and she felt queasy from the chlorophyll she channeled to save the sprite. She quickened her pace, and then the queasiness turned into fear as she hit the outer edge of the Dread. Her chest felt tight, and she felt as if the woods were closing in on her.
The bhata clicked and pinched their way into her clothes. Keelie screamed and yanked the hem of her gown up and over her head. The bhata that had covered it were enfolded in the discarded gown, but others took their place.
"Sir Davey," she cried. "Help."
He turned, his mouth sagging open as he saw what pursued her. "Up here, lass. Hurry."
Hurry? Was she strolling? She leaped the last few feet and grabbed the rock, her feet scrabbling for purchase on its lichen-encrusted sides.
Sir Davey pulled her up to the top of the rock. The bhata that had been all over her had gone, but the buggy ones still hovered. Davey stared at them. "The feithid daoine. You don't see them often."
"I'd rather not see them at all. I don't know what I did to piss them off, but they swarmed me like I'd attacked their honey or something."
"Where?"
Keelie told him about the sprite and about calling on Hrok and the aspen to save it.
"And the sprite vanished, you say?"
"Yes." The wind had picked up, bringing the scent of rain.
Davey noticed, too. "This rock isn't the safest place to be in a lightning storm. We'd better get you back home."
"What is all this stuff?" The rock was covered with boxes, huge chunks of crystals with wires attached to them, and a metal disk that swirled around atop a wooden pole staked into a pitted hole in the rock. It looked like an elementary school science experiment.
"There's bad magic right here somewhere. It's elusive, and I'm trying to track it down."
The Tree Shepherd's Daughter Page 22