Fairy Bad Day

by Amanda Ashby

  She reluctantly flipped open the yellow folder and randomly read one of the questions on the worksheet. List ten things about your designated elemental that your training partner might not know. Well, for a start, fairies were dumb. Annoying. Sarcastic. Ate too many Skittles and most definitely had bad taste in clothing.

  Then she stopped herself, since she had a feeling that this wasn’t exactly the sort of information she was supposed to use, and opened up her slaying guide. It was actually a copy of the original one that Sir Francis had written more than four hundred years ago. A Complete and Utter Reference to the Vile and Evil Creatures That Have Spewed Forth from the Gate of Linaria and How They Shall Be Slain—In Three Volumes.

  Unfortunately, when she’d told Curtis yesterday that there wasn’t a big section on fairies, she hadn’t been joking, and she once again looked at the short paragraph in annoyance.

  Fairies are the smallest and least dangerous of the air elementals and unlike some of the other creatures that came out of the Gate of Linaria, these beasts show a remarkable aptitude to adjust. Not only do they speak languages but they also cover their person in clothing. It is truly most remarkable. I have yet to discover an effective ward that works on them or where their kill spot is, though due to their unaggressive and somewhat docile nature, I don’t think this is of much importance . . . .

  Emma shut the book and pushed it away from her. Sir Francis might be considered the greatest slayer who ever lived, but it was blindingly obvious that he didn’t know jack about fairies. What was even worse was that if she wanted to have even a chance of staying at Burtonwood and then moving on to the Department of Paranormal Containment when she graduated, she was going to have to accept that from now on she was stuck with them.

  There, she had admitted it. The thing she had been skirting around all day.

  She was Louisa Jones’s daughter and she was a fairy slayer. Even in her head she could hear the sound of canned laughter. She was making a mockery of her mom’s legacy. She moodily thought about the U-turn her life had made. Unfortunately, that led to her thinking about Curtis.

  Despite what Loni said, Emma knew there was a reason for the way he had acted earlier that day. For a moment she wondered if it was because he was embarrassed to be seen with her. Or it could be that he was getting her back for how badly she had acted toward him when the designations had first been announced. Or . . . or nothing. She cut herself off as she realized how pointless the whole exercise was.

  At the end of the day it didn’t matter how nice Curtis was (or how cute it was when his blond curls splayed out across his tanned forehead in abandoned disarray), the simple fact was that he was still the guy who had taken the one thing she had wanted more than anything in the world. Which meant that once they had finished working on this assignment together, she would have to make sure she kept her distance from him. It would be the best thing for everyone (and by “everyone,” she meant herself, since she wasn’t sure she could handle any more humiliation).

  Emma sighed and looked out the window. The November light was fading, and judging by the way the scattered students were hurrying across the quad toward the cafeteria for dinner, it was obviously getting colder as well as darker. Then she caught sight of Loni and Tyler standing over by the statue of Sir Francis, where they had agreed to meet her. It looked like they were bickering.

  For a moment Emma smiled at the fact that while just about everything she had ever believed in was now dead in the water, at least some things never changed. A scraping of chairs brought her out of her thoughts as she realized that everyone around her in the detention room was leaving. She started to gather her books and her laptop when a screeching static sound suddenly blasted into her ears without warning.

  Emma only just resisted the urge to scream out loud as she clasped her hands to her ears. It was several seconds before the pain subsided enough for her to glance around, and when she did, it was only to discover that everyone else was still casually slinging their bags over their shoulders and making their way out of the room as if nothing had happened.

  Okay, so that was weird and—

  But before she could even finish her thought, the static buzz increased and her sore eye started to tingle in agony. She bit back the pain and got to her feet. As she did so, she caught sight of a dark shadow up in the already gray sky outside. Emma gasped as she realized it was the same creature she’d seen from her window during the code blue. And the same creature that the fairy had been wearing on his T-shirt yesterday.

  The darkhel.

  Her first instinct was to yell out a horrified warning as she watched it swoop so low that it almost flattened Loni’s spiked dark hair, but instead she quickly scooped up her stuff and grabbed her bag.

  “Hey,” someone protested as she elbowed her way past him. “What’s wrong, a fairy emergency?” But Emma ignored the sarcasm as she pounded down the hallway and went flying out into the quad while letting out a small prayer of thanks that she’d had an armament lesson that afternoon and therefore had her full slaying kit with her.

  As she ran, she pulled out her sword and threw the rest of her kit to the ground. Thanks to the fact that most fairies were only ten inches long, it had been a while since she’d used it, but as soon as her fingers wrapped around the hilt, it once again felt like it was an extension of her arm.

  “There you are,” Tyler called out as he and Loni jogged over to where she was frantically searching for the darkhel. “You’re never going to believe what... er, why do you have your sword in your hand?”

  “And unsheathed,” Loni added in concern. “I thought you were going for the sane and normal approach?”

  “And, in case you didn’t realize, walking around with an unsheathed weapon definitely isn’t sane or normal,” Tyler clarified before narrowing his eyes. “What’s going on?”

  “It’s here,” she hissed as she continued to crane her neck just as the screeching static sound rang out in her ears again. This time the pain was worse. “Can’t you hear that?”

  “Hear what?” Loni demanded as she leaned in to study Emma’s face. “Em, what’s going on? Did something happen?”

  “The darkhel has—” But before she could even finish her sentence, the ringing in her ear subsided and she heard a flap of wings. She spun around just in time to see the dark shadow fly once around the quad before it moved into a vertical position and plummeted down like a fallen angel about thirty feet away from her, its enormous wings suddenly snapping back as it hit the ground.

  As soon as it landed, she knew that the creature wasn’t a dragon. Rather it was seven feet of pure venom poured into a manlike body and draped in black leather and studs like some sort of sadomasochist’s armor. For a second it just stood motionless, like a decayed, long-forgotten statue, before it suddenly turned its head and focused in on Emma.

  Instantly the creature’s face was transformed into a terrifying mask of planes and angles that gleamed and glistened with menace as its sinister red eyes bore into her. Her stomach churned and her hands felt moist and damp around the hilt of her sword.

  “Emma, talk to me,” Loni demanded in a confused voice, but Emma hardly heard as she raced forward, determined to get between her friends and this abomination. “What about the darkhel? It’s . . . oh no. It’s here, isn’t it?”

  Emma didn’t respond. All she could hear was the rush of air as the creature raced toward them, its red eyes never leaving her. She forced her terrified breath out from between her lips as she swung her sword back and forth in her hand, reacquainting herself with its weight as the beast finally reached her.

  “So you can see me? Interesting,” the creature hissed in a guttural voice as it came to a halt only a few feet in front of her. “That will make it more fun when I kill you.” It grinned, revealing a set of razor-sharp teeth squished into a wide, misshapen mouth.

  Emma kept her balance as she lifted her sword. Well, at least she definitely knew it was a fairy now since dragons were mo
nosyllabic to the point of muteness. Especially when they were fighting.

  “It’s the fear, isn’t it?” the darkhel speculated as it closed the distance between them and she could all too clearly see the dark pits of its eyes. “It’s made you incapable of speech.”

  Emma ignored it, instead trying to focus all her energy on what she was doing. Every elemental creature had a kill spot. For dragons it was under the neck, for demons it was the spinal cord. For goblins it was the heart. Unfortunately Sir Francis, in his not-so-infinite wisdom, never bothered to mention a kill spot for fairies, and so she decided that she would start with the neck and go from there.

  She licked her lips and tried to control her breathing as she waited for the darkhel to come closer. It took a couple more steps toward her, an evil grin on its face. Without hesitation, Emma lunged forward, driving her sword deep into the fleshy dark skin at the base of its neck. The vibration went racing back up her arm as the point of her sword bounced off it like a nickel on sidewalk and she felt herself reeling from the impact. She lunged again, this time harder, and let out a sigh of relief when she managed to pierce the surface and a gush of dark, fetid blood started oozing out. For a moment the darkhel reached up and touched the open wound before it grinned at her. Okay, so the neck wasn’t the kill spot.

  Before she could regain her composure, the darkhel casually lifted one taloned hand and swiped it across her face. Emma managed to duck out of the way just in time. Then she drove her sword straight into its heart. She felt like she had struck iron and her muscles screamed in protest. Ignoring the pain, she pressed forward with all her might. The darkhel staggered back, which gave her time to regain her stance.

  “Okay, no more Mr. Nice Guy,” the darkhel droned as it ignored the blood that was now flowing freely down its torso. Instead it came toward her with lightning speed and sent her sword flying from her hand. The weapon landed on the manicured grass with a thud and Emma felt herself go crashing to the ground. The skin across her brow immediately split open, and the blood started to trickle into her eye. She quickly wiped it away with the back of her hand before realizing that the darkhel was leaning over her. She only just managed to roll out of the way to save herself from having her windpipe slashed by its long talons.

  She groggily started to raise herself up, but before she could, the darkhel again loomed over her, this time pinning her down with a heavy leather boot. The boot pressed into her chest and she struggled to catch her breath. Emma glanced up and found herself staring into dark eyes that were full of rage. She shut her own eyes and tried to wriggle her hand onto the hilt of her sword, but it was no good.

  “Well, my small brothers didn’t really do you justice when they told me about your skills,” the darkhel hissed, its stinking breath sending goose bumps racing up and down Emma’s skin. “But still, I guess they were right about one thing. You’re only human and humans just break so . . . argh.”

  Argh?

  For a moment Emma blinked before realizing the creature had stiffened and raised its giant, corded hands up to its ears. Then she caught sight of Loni standing directly behind it with the subsonic blaster she’d just spent the last six months building. Tyler was next to her, clutching the thin rapier that he preferred, ready for action. As the darkhel continued to clutch at its ears, obviously trying to cut out the low-frequency noise that Loni’s invention was emitting, Emma had all the time she needed to roll away and flip back up to her feet just as the creature turned and raised a giant arm at the unsuspecting Loni.

  “Run!” Emma screamed as she realized her friends didn’t have a clue about where the darkhel was attacking from. At the same time she reached down and grabbed her sword before thrusting it deep into the creature’s hamstring. The impact almost sent her reeling again, but she balanced herself and pulled the sword out. The darkhel seemed to sag as it spun back around to face her, its eyes blazing.

  “You know,” it said in a low, guttural voice, “you really are your mother’s daughter.”

  Emma, who had just been about to plunge her sword into its arm, felt her weapon drop away as a sense of disbelief washed over her. “Wh-what did you just say?”

  The beast needed only that one second of hesitation to get to its feet, and before Emma could even open her mouth, it had spread out its gigantic wings and lifted off the ground into the air.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Your mother?” Loni shot Emma a blank look half an hour later as she handed her another ice pack. “Are you definitely sure that’s what it said?” Loni asked as she stood up and started to pace the cramped space in her dorm room.

  “Absolutely, one hundred percent positive. It said I am my mother’s daughter.” Emma put the pack on her aching arm and tried not to groan out loud from the pain. She and Loni and Tyler had decided to go back to Loni’s room in case anyone had seen Emma’s one-sided fight and told Kessler about it. Of course, if they had, it wouldn’t take long for him to find her. All he needed to do was follow the blood trail. At least they had managed to clean up the cut on her head, but it still throbbed in protest.

  “Okay, so we’ve got a creature that no one has ever heard of and no one can see except you,” Tyler said from over by the window as he ticked off the words with his fingers.

  “You forgot to add that it fights like a ninja. Honestly, you guys, I feel like my arm is going to fall off. The darkhel’s skin is thicker than a dragon’s. How is that even possible?” Emma asked.

  “How is any of this possible?” Loni rubbed her forehead in bewilderment. “I mean, you have no idea how weird it was that I could see you fighting and talking to something but there was nothing there. I don’t know how sight-blind people deal with it.”

  “They don’t have to deal with it, because for the most part they don’t even know it’s out there,” Tyler reminded her. “So don’t be feeling sorry for civilians, feel sorry for us. I mean, we know how dangerous elementals are, yet there was nothing we could do to help.”

  “Trust me, you helped. And besides, you definitely don’t want to see the darkhel. I’ve fought brentton demons that are better-looking than this thing.” Emma put down the ice pack and rubbed her sore eye. “The problem is that I have no idea where to go from here.”

  “I’ll tell you where we go, straight to Kessler.” Loni finally stopped her pacing and sat down on the bed. Emma instantly shook her head (remembering too late that head shaking, along with everything else, hurt).

  “I hate to say it, Em, but Miss Zodiac’s right,” Tyler agreed.

  “I can’t go to Kessler,” she told her two friends. “I’ve tried that already and managed to get myself stuck with detention. I think I’ve become the girl who cried wolf. Or in this case, the girl who cried invisible fairy. I can’t risk being expelled.”

  “Yes, but Emma, I think you’re forgetting something here,” Tyler said.

  “What?”

  “That thing tried to kill you.” Loni took over, and Emma realized that her two friends were so busy agreeing with each other that they were forgetting to bicker. “I mean, granted I couldn’t see it happening, but I certainly saw you being flung around the quad like you were a rag doll.”

  “Yeah, I’ve never seen you have your butt whipped like that since . . . well, never. I mean even when you had to take on that mammoth Department guy who came to teach us some hand-to-hand combat techniques last year, you totally beat him. I actually made a lot of money on that fight,” Tyler reminisced for a second before Loni jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow. “Which is entirely beside the point.” He coughed. “The point is that thing was totally taking you down.”

  “I know.” Emma rubbed her bruised arm. “And the worst thing is that so far I have no idea where the kill spot is.”

  “Did you try the neck?” Tyler asked, instantly curious, since like dragons, the huge salamanders that he fought were fire elementals and so they shared the same kill spot (not to mention the same love of roasting their victims in flames).

&
nbsp; “Neck, heart, and spinal cord, and I swear each time I got a clear strike.” Emma paused to rub her still-aching shoulder. “Yet it just looked at me like I was some sort of annoying mosquito. I have no idea what’s going to happen the next time I have to fight it.”

  “Next time?” Loni’s voice started to turn high-pitched. “You think there’s going to be a next time? Because that’s even more reason why we should go to Kessler.”

  “I promise, if I thought there was any chance Kessler would listen to me, I would go and see him, but aside from all of my aches and pains, we have no proof—”

  “Wait.” Tyler cut her off and suddenly darted over to Loni’s laptop and started to tap away at the keyboard. “That’s it!”

  “What’s it?” Loni demanded.

  “We get proof that you were fighting the darkhel and then Kessler will have to believe you,” he said as his fingers continued to fly across the keyboard.

  “How?” Loni demanded.

  “Okay, so this is completely off the record, but I might happen to know how to get into Burtonwood’s security system. They put out an EMR pulse every two minutes to make sure all the wards are working and that no elementals enter the grounds.”

  Loni widened her eyes. “Tyler Owens, how exactly do you have the security clearance to get into that system?”

  He grinned. “Let’s just say I know someone who was dumb enough to bet against Ruby the cockroach, and then when they couldn’t pay what they owed me, they offered me the code in lieu of cash.”

  “You know how to hack into the surveillance system because of a bet you made on an insect?” Emma double-checked to make sure she was hearing right.

  “That’s correct. I mean, it’s not my fault if people continue to underestimate the speed of a five-legged cockroach.” He gave an unrepentant shrug. “Anyway, the thing is that Emma was fighting the darkhel for at least ten minutes, which means there should be some sort of image, and maybe we can get some clues from the thermal resonance. Of course it would help if I knew what I was looking for,” he added with a frown.