The Deepest Black

by Rainy Kaye

  “I wasn't going to do it,” he says, his breath puffing against my face. “I wasn't going to let them do it again. They thought they could make me, but I wouldn't do it to us anymore. Wouldn't do it to you.”

  “Do what to me?” I ask, voice quivering. I search his face, finding anger, hatred. . .and something else I can't pinpoint.

  “I wasn't going to take you back,” he says. “I wasn't going to let them keep getting away with destroying us, one after the other, for the sake of tradition. They made me leave you, but they weren't going to make me come back for you.”

  His words settle cold and hollow in my chest. “You're the changeling.”

  “There is no room in this world for our kind,” he says.

  It was true. All of it. I had been delivered to my world—the human world—and then never picked back up. Those people on the farm are my real family. My fae family, anyway.

  But I still have so many questions.

  “Why send Matteo for me, then?” I find my voice, speaking louder. “If you didn't want me here, why did you send someone to collect me?”

  He lets go of my jacket and steps back, pushing up one sleeve of his poet shirt, revealing inch by inch, red scars slashed along his arm.

  “Every day for more than twenty years, Ember,” he says, and I can hear the struggle in his voice to remain calm. “Sometimes they wouldn't let the wound heal for weeks.”

  My gaze flicks to his face. “You were punished for not bringing me back?”

  “It's tradition,” he says with a sneer. “No one defies tradition.”

  “You did.”

  “For a while.” He lets down his sleeve, covering the years of torment on his arm, but the rage never leaves his eyes. “For a long while, I resisted. They were desperate. I was the last living changeling, besides you, of course, and I was growing older. We're the only ones who can have the portal opened, you see. That's why my Order loves me.

  “I can open portals, do things they cannot do. Even manipulate the shadows in ways they cannot. They think I wanted the curse, but how little do they know it was just a fortunate twist for me. I just seized the opportunity when it presented itself. ”

  He's clearly proud of his Order, but I don't want this conversation to derail. I want to know more about how I factor into this mess.

  “So they insisted you come collect me,” I say, keeping him on task. “Then finally you caved and sent Matteo for me?”

  Rage lights his face. “I never gave in!”

  His fist slams into the wall next to me. I reach up and yank down the metal candle holder, lit candles dropping to the floor as I swing at him. The metal catches him in the face. He stumbles backwards. The candles light the carpet, a sparkle of small flames that begin to smoke and grow. He breaks his fall and charges at me. I drop the candle holder and run toward the door, veering around the fire. He rushes toward me. I reach for the doorknob, grab it. His head smacks the chandelier, upsetting the spider in her web, as I barrel out the door. The step down has me glancing back. We were inside a wooden gypsy wagon. I round the small structure, finding myself on a hill. Light from the flames inside the wagon flicker beyond the curtains.

  I take off down the hill, feet uncoordinated under me as I try to collect my nerves and brain cells. His lanky form sways behind me as he tries to close the space between us. The shadows move around him, slithering out of his way as if he's a king and they were his servants.

  I half fall, half hop toward the base of the hill, stumbling as I reach the bottom. I land on my hands and knees. He shouts behind me. I dare a look. A shadow has reared up at him. He flicks his hand up, and the shadow retreats.

  He is darker than the curse itself.

  I head back toward the farm. As much as I want to leave that place behind, I have nowhere else to go. No one else in this twisted city might be willing to help me, and I may have even screwed up that too.

  As I take the roads that seem familiar, that I hope are leading me to the only home I can return to right now, the shadows spread across the sky. They reach the tops of the buildings and eat away the color, the life.

  I left my fae family, and the shadows came back. It might be my imagination, but I can feel eyes on me, beasties watching me with approval that I've given them free reign of this world again.

  At some point, I lose Franjo. The leader of the Order of Ice. The changeling before me. My savior and my death. He will find me again, and he will surely kill me next time. The only people who can tell me how to protect myself from him are my fae family.

  But I can't remember how to reach them. All of these damn roads look the same, littered with trash and death. The more I stagger about, turning one way and trudging along, then giving up when it doesn't look familiar and looping back, the more lost I feel.

  My feet and ankles ache in time with my injured head, but I refuse to stop. If I keep moving, even if I never find the way to go, Franjo won't be able to catch me again. It's a horrible plan, but it's all my racing mind is capable of putting together.

  Something that sounds like a metal can clunks and then rolls way. I glance left and then right, then steal a peak behind me. I expect to see Franjo's lanky form galloping toward me.

  The night is empty. Just me and the curse shadows, ever twisting and grappling, pulling themselves from the invisible beyond to take this world in full.

  If I could find a portal, I could cross back to my home turf, but even that seems worthless. Franjo knows where I'm from and how to find me. I have no doubt he would swoop low enough to harm my mother—my human mother, my real mother.

  Franjo is a changeling too, which means he also has two sets of parents. His fae parents, and the human parents who raised him. How would I feel if someone had just whisked me away from my mother and never let me see her again? All because of some strange tradition that I had no control over. Wasn't even aware of.

  I'd be heartbroken. Angry. I probably wouldn't want to do it to anyone else, either. But how far would I go? Would I destroy the entire world—the human world—to stop the changeling cycle?

  No. My mother lives there. The people I love live there.

  I nearly stop, nearly turn back around so I can return to him and remind him that the world he loves is still there, but he's destroying it.

  The memory of the glint in his eye, the anger seeping through, is enough to keep me running away from him, even if I don't know where I'm going yet. I can't stop that anger. It is beyond simple rational conversation. He has the marks on his arms to prove it.

  The top of the device appears in the distance. My heart skips a beat in delight. I know this area!

  I veer toward the Storyteller's house, my vision locked on the device as it grows taller. With barely a thought, I turn and dash through the yard, up to the front. My fists beat on the door, my breathing haggard in my ears. No one answers, but they hadn't last time, either. I go for the knob, try to turn it, but it doesn't give. I shake it, beating my other hand louder against the door.

  “It's me! Help!” I realize that tells no one anything, but I doubt the Storyteller can even hear me in her basement amongst her books.

  I try banging and shaking the door a few more times, then resign, body aching, and look back toward the street. This world seems to be closing in on me, and not just the shadows. Everywhere I turn, there's less options, less hope—and there wasn't much of any of that to begin with.

  I jerk around, peering toward the side of the building. There is a portal in the back yard. I hurry off the porch and over to the tall stone fence towering over me. Clamping my jaw, I poke my fingers into the stones above me and try to grapple on as I work the toes of my shoes into the fence, but make no progress. My nails scrape across the stone, bending one back and sending a tiny sting of pain down my finger. I pull away, feet sliding to the ground, and shake my hand as I turn, looking for items to pile up. There's all the planks and pipes in the street, but I can't imagine how to make any of it usable for scaling the wall. It's a
ll either too flat, or flimsy, or just not practical.

  A shadow down the street catches my attention. Not one of those shadows, but a silhouette of a person. A woman, with a round belly.

  I know her.

  My feet take off before my brain can even finish the thought. Boards crack under my feet, sending up plumes of dust that coat my tongue on an inhale. I wipe the back of my hand over my mouth, but only manage to taste dirt and sweat.

  I come up on her, panting as I slow. She turns, rigid and eyes wide.

  She lets out her breath. “You,” she says, sounding relieved. Then her tone becomes worried. “You mustn't stay out here. They're. . .”

  Her gaze stares past me, and I follow where she's watching several dark figures saunter toward us. The moonlight reveals their elongated faces, deadly claws, and wisps of wings. The dark fae.

  “Get inside,” she whispers, moving for her front door.

  I stick close to her, my eyes never moving from the approaching fae.

  “I need to get back to the farm,” I say in a low voice. “They're the only ones who can help me.”

  She stops in her doorway, arm against the frame to block my path.

  “Farm?” Her voice is on edge, and I don't understand why.

  “My parents. . .” I have no idea how to begin to explain this.

  “You live at the Hawker farm? You're the changeling?” Her gaze nails her accusation to me like a hammer. She picks up a broom leaning against the wall.

  Hawker?

  I shrivel like a punctured balloon. “Yes. I just. . .”

  I'm a Hawker.

  “They're over there.” She leans forward, resting her hand on my shoulder and stretching to point down the street with the other. “Just follow that road, take the first right, and keep going until you see the farm. Get over there.” She recoils back from me and jabs my side with the broom handle. “Go home and stay there!”

  I glance at the dark fae, who aren't in a rush to get to us, but will destroy us when they do. Their faces boast their desire—their need—for carnage.

  “What about them?” I whisper, afraid to point.

  “Go home, and none of us will have to worry about them.” She slams the door in my face, leaving me alone in the night with the shadows, the dark fae, and, scariest, my confused thoughts.

  I turn and run in the direction she had pointed. My eyes search for the first right I can take. I'm afraid I will overlook it in my rush, or that it will be blocked off and I can't reach it

  I don't glance back. If the dark fae have taken off after me, I don't want to know. I just have to focus on getting to the farm. That's what the woman said, and I will trust nearly anyone's advice at this point. At least it's something besides wandering aimlessly.

  But the nagging notion won't let up: I'm a Hawker. Somehow, the shadows, the beasties, and even the dark fae are my fault. Do I have to stay on the farm forever? If I leave, not only will this world be destroyed, but so will mine. The human one. The one where everyone I love is, oblivious to the disaster in this realm that's spilling over into theirs.

  And it's my fault.

  Mine.

  The turn is up ahead, and I stumble over my own feet trying to take it without slowing down. The street still looks the same as the others, but I keep going.

  Am I really sentenced to life on the fae farm forever? If I refuse, everyone dies. What kind of choice is that? I can never see Mom again, either way.

  The road starts to fade into dirt and then the path begins to wind uphill. I hunch a little and take the slope, soles squeaking on wet grass and my heart swelling with sadness. It swells until it pushes at my sternum. Pushes against my throat, and fills my head until my eyes water.

  The farm comes into view, and so does the wall. The one built to separate the cursed feuding neighbors. Built right through their property.

  The entire family—my fae family—is standing outside the gate, gathered close together. Their eyes light up, and they all rush toward me. They encircle me, wrapping me in their embrace, proclaiming how they had been so worried about me, how they were afraid I wouldn't find my way back.

  I lean into the imposters and cry.

  * * *

  Around the table at breakfast, I expect the Inquisition, and I have no idea how to explain why I had left the farm last night. They probably have already guessed that I was planning to go back home, my real home, but how can I tell them that I would wish a curse on them just to not live here? That the only thing stopping me is that the curse is hurting my world, too.

  I push down the memories of Franjo's torture marks, trying not to remember the treatment of changelings who don't want to participate in the tradition. As farmers, Mama and Papa probably have little control over how the authorities here would handle me.

  I realize there's only the clinking of spoons against bowls as everyone eats their warm fruit soup. My hand is still, so I force myself to join in with the steady noise, clicking my spoon against the side of the dish on purpose with each bite, illustrating they don't have to worry: I'm here, and I'm participating.

  The soup is a pleasing blend of fresh blueberries in a thick syrup, cut with cinnamon and vanilla whose aroma fills my head as I lean in to slurp off the spoon. Mama gets up and goes to the kitchen, then returns with a small container and leaves dollops of a yogurt and cream cheese blend on our bowls before sitting back down. The addition is refreshing, a strange contrast to the shadows outside the door.

  The shadows that are slowly, but steadily, lifting. By the time we finish our meal, the shadows are just at the top of the trees, the grass bright green, as if the sunlight peeking through is projecting the ground.

  I clear my throat. “I was thinking about going out with Dell and Oliver again.”

  Mama and Papa exchange looks, and I can tell they are afraid I'm going to try to leave again.

  “I didn't get to see it all last time,” I assure, then turn to the boys who are trying to fold airplanes out of their cloth napkins. “Can you show me around the rest of the farm?”

  Dell's eyes light up. “We can find more of those things. What did you call them?”

  Mama and Papa look at me, and my heart skips a beat at the concerned expression on their faces.

  “They're called chickens,” I say hurriedly, standing up and trying not to seem like I'm ushering the boys out the door before either parent asks questions. Dell starts to protest that he meant the bumpy creatures with tails, but I cut him off. “I'm sure there's more interesting things besides chickens.”

  I urge the boys off their chairs and shoo them toward the back door, into the yard. Once we're outside, I take a deep breath, picking up hints of wild flowers and green vegetation, underlined by a coolness of country air—which is odd, since we're technically in the city.

  Something about the lingering taste of breakfast and the equally satisfying freshness of the outdoors makes me think the fae world didn't used to be all bad. Not that I would want to stay in it, but it's not a place I would expect the fae to want to flee from. At least, not before the shadows.

  Oliver is off in the distance, bending to turn over rocks, then moving on. I've lost sight of Dell. I look back and forth, finding him walking away from the haunted overturned shed. His hands are stained blue, and he wipes them on his jeans as he heads over to Oliver.

  I stroll toward the boys, gazing up at the shadows. Now that it has retreated, it seems to be hanging in folded curtains, like the Aurora Borealis, but black in a day sky. It makes me afraid, deep in some primal part, and I could, for a moment, believe that there are gods, a whole council of them, and they are angry.

  Something darting on the ground catches my attention. I search over the grass, trying to catch a sign of it again. Another flash, toward the right. I home in on it, picking out the lizard blending into the ground cover. I start to call the boys over, but I catch another quick movement nearby.

  It takes a minute for my eyes to adjust, but then I see two, possibl
y three, lizards, darting from spot to spot, working toward the tree line. I glance at the boys who are busy poking sticks at a fallen log, and then follow after the lizards. I step lightly, carefully, afraid to injure them, or scare them off their path.

  Bit by bit, they work their way to the trees, and I'm right behind them. As they scurry into the foliage, I take one more look at the boys, who are still unconcerned with what I'm doing, then duck under the branches.

  My shoes crunch against the dead leaves layering the ground. I hold my breath, listening for the slight rattle as the lizards continue their daring zips from one concealed spot to another. I make sure I know where they are before I take each step.

  Then the leaves rattle to the right, and then the left. Then at the same time. I look from side to side, unable to find my lizards as the leaves jump and scurry.

  Not leaves, but lizards. More than a dozen. I tread lightly as I make my way into their midst. They flee deeper into the woods, and I pick up my pace.

  The dozen lizards have become hundreds. I take off on a run, following as they run a jerking course in a steady direction. My lungs fill with cool air exploding with the scent of wet ground and moss. The leaves become less dry and crunchy, more slippery. Using one hand to push back branches from my face, I don't slow down. I don't think. I just run.

  The forest parts, and I come to a stop, breathing heavily. In front of me, next to a tree that has been growing since the dawn of time, is a little stone hut. It's covered in so many lizards, they look like a jigsaw puzzle. They continue in a thin layer up the trunk, across the ground, and up the surrounding trees as high as I can see.

  My eyes adjust to the swarm. More lizards are emerging, one or two at a time, from the hut.

  A portal.

  I haven't seen anything besides humans and fae use it—until now. No wonder the boys were so confused. The lizards aren't from the fae world, but they must have crossed through. I guess they live here now. I'm certainly not going to try to round them up and herd them back through.

  I step lightly around them, if that's even possible, thankful they scurry out of my way, and head toward the hut. When I reach the portal, I halt at the door to watch the lizards. They're not really doing anything, just hanging out. Good thing I'm not afraid of reptiles, because they aren't interested in moving out of my way. I reach for the door and push it open.