Box of Frogs

by Helen Harper

  ‘Who are you?’ he asked, his voice silky smooth.

  My lips opened. I bit back the word. It was sheer stubborn will holding me back now. I was really struggling but I wasn’t going to give in. Not like this.

  Morgan’s green eyes held mine. ‘Who poisoned you?’

  I couldn’t hold it back any longer. The word fell out of me in a rush of air. ‘Madrona.’

  He dropped my hands as if he’d been burned.

  ‘See?’ Cravat Man said. ‘I told you that bitch was behind all of this.’

  I yanked my hands back, placing them behind my body as if that would help me. ‘You absolute idiots,’ I spat. ‘I’m Madrona. I poisoned myself by touching a poisoned sword. Not my finest hour, I admit, but I didn’t know any better.’

  All four of them stared at me in shock. I was only just getting going.

  ‘You call me evil?’ I hissed, addressing Morgan in particular. ‘You lot dragged me here against my will and began interrogating me like we’re in Guantanamo Bay. I’ve not done anything wrong! How dare you try and pull information out of me like that? It’s … it’s…’ I searched for the correct word. ‘Impolite!’

  While the other three continued to stare at me open-mouthed, Morgan leaned back on his haunches and regarded me carefully. ‘You’re certainly not on the side of good, Madrona,’ he murmured. ‘If indeed that’s who you are.’

  I almost howled in exasperation. ‘I’ve got amnesia! Apparently I’m Madrona – everyone keeps telling me I am – but I don’t know for sure. And I tried to be bad. I’ve spent all crappy day trying to be the villain you think I am. It’s not worked.’ My voice was rising. ‘You know why it’s not worked? Because I reckon that I’m not the bitch you keep telling me that I am. I’ve not met this bloody Rubus you keep talking about. I bet he’s a damn sight nicer than you lot. He can’t be much worse. So I theoretically sell some pixie-dust drug shite to some faeries to make them feel better. Big bloody deal! At least I’ve not tried to drag answers out of someone with some stupid truth-spell thing. I almost died out on the street an hour ago and now I’m trapped in this ridiculous oafish body. None of this is my fault! Stop being such an arsebadgering bastard and let me go!’ I glared at him for extra effect.

  All Morgan did was take a step back. He did not, however, take his eyes off me. ‘Yeah,’ he said slowly. ‘That’s Madrona.’

  Jodie’s lip curled. She might have been doing a good impression of disdain but I could tell she was nervous. ‘You told me that you guys could only keep up glamours for a short period of time. If that’s your ex, how come she still looks like that? It means any of you could pretend to be someone else whenever you wanted.’

  Morgan’s head tilted. ‘I wasn’t lying to you before, Jodie. No Fey had ever been able to maintain a glamour for more than a quarter of an hour.’

  Her arms flailed in my direction. ‘Then how is she doing it?’ she screeched.

  ‘Good question.’ He raised an eyebrow at me. ‘Madrona?’

  My glower only increased. ‘Do I look like I have any answers? Everything that happens to me only gives me more questions! I don’t want to look like this! I want to look like me!’

  Morgan glanced at Viburna and Cravat Man. ‘Well,’ he drawled, ‘the wind did change direction earlier today. Maybe she’s stuck in that form forever.’

  My glower abruptly transformed into a gape. ‘What the hell? Are you telling me that I’m trapped like this? That I’m going to look like a brutish, muscle-bound prat with a Santa Claus beard for the rest of my days?’

  He shrugged. ‘You could shave.’

  ‘You…’

  Morgan held up his hands. ‘Relax. I was only joking. The wind’s got nothing to do with it.’

  ‘Then what does?’ I demanded. ‘Why do I still look like this?’

  Recovering slightly from her shock, Viburna spoke up. ‘It could be the rowan poisoning,’ she said doubtfully. ‘It might be preventing her from returning to her normal appearance.’

  ‘Or,’ growled Cravat Man, ‘it might be one of those dust concoctions. Who knows what Rubus has been adding to his bloody drugs?’

  I’d had enough. I got to my feet, dusted myself off and sniffed. ‘I don’t know who any of you people are. Unless you’re planning to keep me here against my will, I’m leaving.’

  It irked me beyond belief that Morgan merely looked amused. ‘You’re not a prisoner. I should point out, however, that if Jodie hadn’t noticed your shenanigans in the centre of town and called us, it’s highly likely you’d be dead by now. The rowan was working its way through your body faster than I’d realised. We saved your life. And if you want to know how to return to your normal body, we can help you with that too.’

  ‘Why?’ I asked suspiciously. ‘You obviously hate me. Why would you want to help me?’

  He put his hands in his pockets. ‘I never said I hated you.’

  ‘I hate you,’ interjected Jodie. Then she seemed to regret her words and took a step back. I smiled at her. I liked people who told the absolute truth. Unfortunately, my expression only seemed to scare her even more.

  Morgan’s mouth flattened. ‘Perhaps it’s best if the three of you leave. I’ll deal with Madrona.’

  ‘We have questions,’ Cravat Man said.

  Viburna nodded. ‘Lots of questions.’

  ‘Yeah?’ I sneered. ‘Well, I don’t have any answers.’

  Morgan sighed as if we were a bunch of squabbling children. He might have been right. ‘Answer three questions, Maddy. You owe us that much for giving you nux. As an added bonus, I’ll help you get rid of the glamour.’

  I drew in a deep breath. ‘Fine. But I was telling the truth. I might not be able to answer your questions. I don’t know very much.’ I lifted up my chin and gazed at the others. ‘And they leave. It’s just you and me.’ I glanced at him. ‘Not because I like you or trust you, or anything like that. I’ve just had enough of the sniping and the staring.’

  Cravat Man stepped forward. ‘Why you…’

  Morgan moved in front of him. ‘Deal.’

  ‘We’re going to find out what you say anyway,’ Viburna said. ‘He’ll tell us.’

  ‘Great,’ I returned. ‘Bully for you. I’d still like it if you left. Too many freaks and not enough circuses.’

  Viburna glared; in fact, all three of them did. They really didn’t like me very much.

  ‘Go,’ Morgan said.

  Jodie pouted slightly. ‘But—’

  ‘It’s for the best.’

  The three of them gave me their own special brands of dirty looks, which were amusingly identical, and started to leave. I could hear Viburna and Cravat Man as they walked away.

  ‘How the hell is she maintaining that glamour?’

  ‘Fucked if I know. And how did she resist the Truth Draw?’

  Easy: I was simply a superior being.

  Morgan stared at me. ‘You’ve built up a resistance. There’s only one way that could happen and that’s if Rubus used his Truth Spiders on you.’

  I shuddered. I didn’t really want to know what a Truth Spider was. I yanked my gaze away from his as something else occurred to me. I pushed past Morgan and went after the unfortunate trio. He lunged for me, his hand encircling my wrist. I stopped in my tracks but called out, ‘Jodie?’

  She turned and looked me, wariness written all over her face. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Thank you.’ I coughed. ‘For helping me out in the street. You didn’t know who I was but you still came to my aid.’

  She seemed surprised. ‘I knew you were Fey,’ she muttered eventually. ‘You have the eyes. And you were shouting up and down the street that you were a faery.’

  I winced. I didn’t think I’d really been shouting. ‘All the same,’ I said, ‘thank you.’

  She stood there for a moment before pursing her lips and shrugging. ‘You’re welcome.’

  I closed the door with my foot and moved back, eyeing Morgan. ‘You’re still holding me like I’m abo
ut to run away with your family jewels.’

  He didn’t let go; instead he watched me, his expression shuttered. ‘You keep surprising me,’ he commented.

  I rolled my eyes. ‘Even evil drug-dealing bitches can be polite.’

  His response was quiet. ‘I deserve that.’

  I looked away. ‘Why is Jodie here anyway? She obviously knows about all this faery business. Why is she allowed to know the truth?’

  ‘She was in trouble and I helped her. My identity was revealed in the process. If you want to know more, you’ll have to ask her. It’s her story to tell.’

  That was remarkably gentleman-like of him. ‘Fair enough.’ I waggled my index finger at him. ‘Be careful though. Talking to humans about their real ethnicities didn’t help the vampires.’

  Morgan blinked. ‘Vampires?’

  The briefest flash of pain rattled through me. So that was Julie’s NDA in action, I thought faintly. Morgan frowned and I shook my head in dismissal. ‘Never mind,’ I said quickly. ‘Just me being crazy.’ I beamed at him. ‘Let’s get this show on the road. I’ve got places to be and people to meet. Not to mention that my balls are really itchy. How do you guys deal with that all the time? It’s so annoying.’

  Morgan looked faintly disgusted. ‘You’re right. The sooner we both get what we want and you get out of here, the better.’

  Chapter Fourteen

  ‘So,’ Morgan drawled, once we were sitting on chairs in a more civilised manner than when he’d been trying to force me to talk on the floor. ‘When you say you tried to be a villain today, what actually did you do?’

  I glanced at him archly. ‘Is that one of your three questions?’

  ‘No. I’m simply trying to establish how much time I need to spend cleaning up whatever other disasters you’ve created.’

  I folded my arms. ‘There were no disasters. No one was hurt.’ I sniffed pointedly. ‘Apart from me. So you have nothing to worry about. Let’s stay focused on the here and now, shall we? How the gasbudlikin hell do I get back to my normal body?’

  He rubbed his chin. ‘It would help if I knew how you ended up like this. Did you choose that particular body based on someone you saw?’

  ‘No.’ I shrugged. ‘It was an unconscious deed. I didn’t plan on looking like this. I just had a passing thought that a certain situation would be easier to deal with if I were a burly man. When I looked in the mirror, I was.’

  Morgan didn’t even twitch. ‘You didn’t have to concentrate to make the change?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘You didn’t feel any pain or alteration in your physiognomy when it happened?’

  ‘Nope.’ I paused. ‘Physio-what-omy?’

  He rolled his eyes. ‘Never mind.’

  ‘So what’s the magic word?’

  Morgan looked me up and down. ‘Magic word?’

  ‘You know. To transform me back. There must be a special word or something so I can return to normal.’

  He let out a bark. ‘The last thing you’ll ever be is normal, Maddy.’

  I beamed at him. ‘Thank you. But, really, come on. What do I say?’

  Exasperated, he muttered something under his breath. ‘There’s no abracadabra. We’re not wizards, Maddy. We’re Fey.’

  ‘So you keep saying, but I don’t really understand what that means. I don’t know what I’m capable of or how being Fey makes me different from everyone else on this planet. And if Fey Land is so amazing, why on earth did we all leave it in the first place?’

  Morgan ran a hand through his hair. ‘The history is complicated. And it’s not Fey Land – we don’t come from a theme park. The name of our homeland is Mag Mell. It’s not even a separate place, it’s a mirror image of here. Just more…’ he cast around as if searching for the right word ‘…natural.’

  That made no sense. ‘Pardon?’

  ‘In essence, Mag Mell – and us by extension – are more attune with nature. Both there and here.’ He flicked a hand at me. ‘Your name is Madrona.’

  ‘So I’m told. It’s a stupid name. Everyone from Fey Land, I mean Mag Mell, has stupid names. Apart from you. At least Morgan is vaguely sensible.’

  ‘It’s Morganus actually.’

  Oh. I’d already known that. ‘So Morgan for short? Can I call you Mo?’

  He tutted. ‘A madrona is a type of flowering tree. Viburna, who you just met, is named after a type of hedgerow. Opulus’s namesake is a rose.’

  Cravat Man? He certainly hadn’t been sweet enough to be named after a flower, even if it did have sharp thorns. I was beginning to see a trend, though. ‘And Morganus? What kind of plant is that?’

  ‘A morganus isn’t a plant.’

  I raised my eyebrows. ‘What makes you so special?’

  ‘I’m not special,’ he grunted. ‘Let’s move on.’

  Hang on. ‘What’s a morganus?’

  ‘It’s really not important.’

  ‘If it wasn’t important,’ I drawled, ‘you would have told me.’ I flicked back my hair before belatedly remembering that I still didn’t have enough hair to flick back. ‘Go on. What’s a morganus?’

  Morgan clenched his jaw. ‘Antigulareus Morganus is a small sea creature.’

  From the look on his face there was more to it than that. ‘What kind of sea creature? A whale? A dolphin? A shark?’

  ‘A snail,’ he said stiffly.

  I let out a crow of laughter. ‘You’re named after a snail?’

  ‘The sea snail is a very noble creature.’

  ‘Mm-hmm.’ I pressed my lips together and tried to keep a straight face.

  ‘Moving on…’ Morgan said.

  A small giggle escaped me. I choked with the effort of trying to hold back but it was no good. Before too long, I was doubled over. ‘You’re named after a snail.’ I laughed harder. ‘Is that because you’re very slow? Or because you’re very small?’ I held up my pinky, crooking it to indicate what I was referring to.

  ‘You’re being ridiculously childish.’

  I gasped for breath. ‘You’re named after a slimy snail!’

  He folded his arms and glared. ‘The coil on a sea snail’s shell is extraordinarily elegant. The spiral is also a vital part of all nature. It forms the very basis of mathematics. The Fibonacci sequence is mirrored on certain shells. The golden ratio of maths is expressed through the humble sea snail.’

  I wiped away the tears from my eyes. ‘Yep. Sure.’

  Morgan sighed. ‘Madrona, do you want to hear about Mag Mell and the Fey or don’t you?’

  ‘Sure.’ I nodded, trying to bring myself under control. ‘Speak on, Snail Boy.’

  The throbbing muscle in his cheek gave away his irritation. ‘I’m so very refreshed and challenged by your unique point of view.’ He glowered. ‘As I was saying, Mag Mell is not a separate world. It’s more like an extension of this one, or vice-versa. Both demesnes are intrinsically linked, not that the humans know that. What happens here affects Mag Mell. Fey were regularly dispatched here to ensure that the environmental damage caused by the onslaught of technological advances was not too great. We would minimise the effects, which would minimise the mirrored damage in Mag Mell, which in turn would keep the human demesne equally healthy. It’s a symbiotic relationship.’

  ‘It sounds,’ I said, recovering from my giggling fit and beginning to appreciate that this was actually rather serious, ‘that all this was in the past. We don’t do anything now for the environment?’

  His answer was flat. ‘Very little. Not because we don’t want to but because we can’t. When the border crossings closed, we were effectively shut off from our own power source. There is next to nothing we can do, even as Fey, without the invisible ties and links to Mag Mell. Without our interference, and without Mag Mell’s continued support, the damage here is getting worse.’ A grim note entered his voice. ‘No doubt the reverse is true in Mag Mell. We cannot tell because we have been unable to communicate with anyone there for a decade.’

 
I examined his sober expression. ‘What happens if the borders never re-open?’ I asked softly.

  Morgan raised his shoulders. ‘We don’t really know. The humans may discover ways to maintain a better balance on their own. They are trying to improve their ways. Or our lack of ability to interfere may lead to total catastrophe. We can’t really tell – no one knows what the future will bring. Many of us still try to mitigate the effects of the border closures and influence the humans to look after their world.’

  ‘I’m guessing,’ I said drily, ‘you’re referring to people like yourself.’

  He inclined his head although there was nothing self-congratulatory about the look on his face. ‘There are other Fey who choose to live their lives selfishly, uncaring about what might happen next.’

  I eyed his expression. ‘You mean Fey like me, don’t you?’

  ‘I was referring more to those like Rubus. But,’ he said heavily, ‘yes. Fey like you.’

  ‘Because I work for Rubus.’

  Morgan gave me a brief nod. ‘You do.’

  I mulled this over. There was more to Morgan’s disgust for me than simply hatred of my drug-dealing ways, even though I was beginning to think that they were bad enough. Credit where credit was due – he certainly possessed an admirable streak of selflessness. ‘We still have access to magic, though. I altered time.’ I pointed at my large body. ‘I look like this.’

  ‘Fripperies only,’ he told me. ‘Those sort of tricks aren’t meaningful. Not in any earth-shattering way. Not unless you over-use them anyway.’ His eyes took on a distant sheen. ‘We used to be able to encourage growth, affect the seasons when necessary and dampen down pollution. That’s the reason why most of us are located here, in the centre of the country, rather than in the south in London. Not that it makes much difference any more. Now all we can do is a few parlour tricks while pining physically and emotionally for home.’

  I swallowed. Any taunts or irritation had gone from his voice; all that remained was a deep melancholy. No wonder I’d turned to dealing drugs.

  ‘In any case,’ Morgan continued, ‘that is why it is such a surprise that you have been able to keep the glamour for so long. Without setting foot in Mag Mell, our abilities are severely hampered and much diminished. If I hadn’t seen you maintain this body shape for so long, I wouldn’t have believed it.’