Alice picked up the washcloth and went to get a clean one and some towels, then finished rinsing off the wound. Probably for the best that she'd passed out, she thought. Least she wouldn't have to feel all this.
The wound wasn't incredibly deep, fortunately, but it was long. Looked like a knife wound, maybe. At least she wasn't stuck trying to remove a bullet.
She awkwardly tied one of the towels around her leg, choosing a white one so that it'd be easy to tell when or if the blood soaked through. Then she got a pillow from her bed and put it under Wendy's head, and turned her attention to Sayvi.
“Looks like it's just you and me for a little bit, kid,” she said, picking him up and walking around with him for a moment before she sat down in her chair.
Less than an hour later he started fussing. Alice walked around with him again, trying to figure out what to do. She didn't have formula, no money to buy any. Maybe Wendy had some money. But she didn't feel right going through her pockets while she was unconscious. Her aunt lived an hour and a half away; even if she'd loan her some money she wouldn't get here in time.
She did go to the corner market frequently. If she could find one of the nicer cashiers, maybe he or she would pay for a can of formula for her and then she could go back on payday--
“Give him to me.”
Wendy's voice startled her so much she nearly tripped. She sat down next to the other woman and watched as she dug through the pockets of her discarded coat, taking out a small silver can and a bottle. She poured the formula-- at least she guessed that was what it was, there seemed to be a hint of blue to it-- into the bottle and then took Sayvi. The baby settled immediately once he started to drink, and Alice got another towel from the bathroom, putting it on Wendy's shoulder.
“Thank you,” she said. “I'm sorry about my earlier behavior. I don't remember all of it, but I know I was short with you.”
“Don't worry about it,” Alice said. Once she was done feeding the baby, she spoke again. “Are you feeling okay?”
“Better, yes. Soon we'll be able to go.”
“Look, whoever was following you has no way of knowing where you are.”
“There are only so many Doors to open.”
“What's all this about doors?”
Instead of answering, Wendy gestured to her bookshelf. “Can you bring some of those over here?”
“Sure. Can you answer my question?”
“I'm trying to think of how to do that,” she said, as Alice brought her a couple of stacks of books. She brushed her hand over each cover, her expression changing depending on the book she touched. A part of her wanted to take them away, put them back on the shelf where they belonged. The only people who'd ever touched those books before now had been her and her mother.
“Umm . . . what are you doing?”
“Reading. It has been some time since I've had a chance to read.”
“Okay,” she muttered. “Look, no offense, but--”
“And those?” Wendy asked, scooting the stacks of books aside. “They're picture recordings?” When Alice just gave her a blank look, she continued. “Records of people acting out stories?”
“They're DVDs. So yeah, I guess so,” she said, bringing her the small stack. Wendy opened each case, touched the silver disc inside. “Let me guess. Now you're watching movies?”
Wendy grinned. “This one's handsome, isn't he?”
She glanced at the box, shrugged. “I guess so,” she muttered uncomfortably, reminded of too many times when other girls at school had made comments about various actors or boys in their class, and how for the longest time she'd had no idea how to respond without either lying about how she felt or making herself an immediate target. “Seriously, this has been a weird enough day already. . .”
“I will explain. I just like to familiarize myself with more of your world's stories when I can, and thought I could do that while I was thinking.”
“'Your world'?” she squeaked. “Oh my god, you're an alien, aren't you? That's what's wrong with your eyes.”
“I'm not an alien. I'm from this world, just a different version of it.”
“You still lost me.”
"My eyes. I . . . I got sick a while back, and it changed my sight. When I woke up I didn't remember much, but I could see differently. I could see the Doors."
“So there could be a door right in front of me and I wouldn't know.” And here she was, sitting on the floor in front of her TV, talking to a pretty woman with shark's eyes about interdimensional doors. She had to have tripped over a rock while she was out taking her walk and right now she was actually hooked up to fifty tubes at the hospital.
“Unfortunately, there's not,” Wendy said. “Which is why we might have to go back to the place you found us. There are two Doors back to my realm there.”
“No, bad idea. If someone's following you, won't they be waiting?”
“Possibly. But we have no other choice. I can't stay here for very long.”
“Why not?”
“I can see the Doors, but I can't survive on the other side of any. My thoughts are already far too scattered. I have to get back to my realm.” She carefully picked up Sayvi. “Do you know of Scheherazade?”
Alice blinked. “The lady from the Arabian Nights stories?”
“No, not exactly. I didn't figure you would have seen her, but it's always best to ask.”
“What's Scheherazade supposed to be?”
“A Goddess. I have to find her. We require her aid.”
“. . . have you tried praying?” At that, Wendy gave her a look, and Alice held up her hands. “Never mind, stupid question. Hey, look, you really can't go back the same way. What about a door to your-- your world that's not in that forest?”
“No time. If I had not already been here for so long then I would search, but. . .” She trailed off, cleared her throat. “Thank you for your help, Alice.”
“I really should see you off.”
“No. I don't want you endangering yourself further.”
“So I'm supposed to send a person who can barely walk on her own, and a baby? Let me just get a couple of things. If we're going to be fighting somebody I can at least bring a kitchen knife. . .”
She grabbed a knife and set it down on the table, then looked around her cupboards for anything else she might need to take.
Just go, she thought. You're only walking a few blocks.
Wasn't she?
Startled and more than a little disturbed at the thought, she quickly shut the cupboard door and hurried back to the other room, the knife in her belt. Wendy eyed the weapon skeptically.
“Do you have any idea what you're doing with that?”
“Yep. Pointy end goes in the other guy.”
“No jokes. Have you ever hurt anyone?”
She opened the door. “Been in a fight or two,” she said, pitching her voice to what she hoped was an appropriately casual tone.
“How bad?”
“Gave a black eye and got one, some other bruises,” she said, getting on Wendy's wounded side and helping her out.
“Were these people you traded bruises with trying to kill you?”
She wished momentarily that she could say yes, if only so Wendy would take her seriously. But while the fights had been far from playful, neither had her opponents actually been trying to take her life. And the one time things had been serious, it hadn't exactly been a fair-- “No,” she murmured.
“Then I will take that, and you take Sayvi. If we encounter anyone, run.”
“But I--” At the look the other woman gave her, she reluctantly nodded and took the baby, holding him well out of the way as Wendy reached over and slid the knife out of her belt. “So you . . . you have killed people, then?”
“Once.”
“What happened?”
Wendy glanced over at her, gave her a half-smile. “Wondering if the people who're after me are justified?”
She took a deep breath. “Yeah.”
“Good. You're not quite as naïve as I first feared.”
“Thank you, I think,” she muttered, looking around as they hurried down the sidewalk. That was one of the few good things about living in this neighborhood . . . people normally didn't pay attention to anything that didn't directly concern them. Which was something she wouldn't have put into the 'plus' column this morning. “Why did you end up here?”
“I thought I'd found a safe place for Darei, in a realm of Goddesses and winged horses.” She paused to rest again, a pained expression crossing her face. “It was an ambush. I managed to make it through another Door.”
“And this 'Darei'--”
“I couldn't protect her.”
“I'm sorry.”
“As am I. Sayvi is her son. Hush now.”
They'd reached the woods.
For the first time since she'd started coming here, Alice felt afraid as she walked into the shadows. Sayvi squeaked, and she muttered, “Shh” an instant before she realized how stupid that was. Well, at least he wasn't wailing.
As if picking up on her thought, Sayvi started to cry.
“Murphy's Law in action,” she muttered.
Wendy gave her a puzzled look. “What?”
“Basically it means 'if anything can go wrong, it will'.”
“Seems true enough,” Wendy said. “But then, we aren't dead, so I don't suppose things have gone too wrong.”
“If you were going to be here longer, I'd explain the “I'll be right back” rule.”
“Here's the Door,” Wendy said, looking around once more before she put the knife in her belt and held out her arms for Sayvi.
Alice hesitated for a few seconds, and then spoke quickly. “Take me with you.”
“What?”
“You heard me.”
“I can't.”
“Why not? Obviously you're not the only one who can go through,” she said, nodding at the baby.
“Just because you can doesn't mean you should.”
A part of her wanted to listen to the argument, just hand Sayvi over and say, “It's been weird. Have a good life” and then go back home and try to pretend this had just been a heat-related hallucination. She could go back to work and make her monthly call to her aunt and everything would be normal.
But she felt a curiosity that she hadn't felt since the days when she'd searched for Narnia in her old home's closets, remembered her mother reading her bedtime stories and then singing her a song before she tucked her in.
Her mother would go.
She wasn't sure she could explain that to Wendy, though, and despite the glimpse she'd gotten of her when she'd been more lighthearted, looking over her books and making flirtatious comments about an actor, she was afraid that she'd laugh at her if she did try to explain.
“Well, what if one of those people after you is waiting on the other side of the door instead?” she asked. “Or if something else happens? You want to try to fight while you're holding him? Besides, if you pass out again--”
“I won't do that.”
“Did you mean to the first time?”
“It wouldn't feel right to take you away from your life.”
She laughed. “Did you see much evidence of a life in that apartment? Look, I could give you a big explanation about how much of a loser I am, but you said something about needing to hurry?”
“I might not be able to bring you back.”
“I wouldn't offer if that worried me,” she said, hoping the other woman would believe the acceptance in her voice. At least she was still holding Sayvi; that concealed the fact that her hands were trembling.
Wendy looked around again, then finally nodded. “All right.” She reached out for her hand. Adjusting her hold on the baby, Alice took it.
Slowly, a bright outline formed in what had previously been just another patch of forest, expanding out until a tall oval of white light nearly made her close her eyes. “And you're sure this is safe?” she asked.
“Second thoughts?”
“No,” she said quickly. “Nope. Of course not.” Help me, she thought, resisting the urge to just turn and run as Wendy stepped into the oval and disappeared.
“Come on,” she said, her voice drifting back and making Alice jump. “It won't stay open forever.”
Last chance to do the smart thing and just hand the kid over and leave, she thought. Then she crossed her fingers and stepped through.
She wasn't quite sure what she was expecting-- heat; cold; colored lights darting all around her-- but it was perfectly normal. Which was disturbing in and of itself, she thought. Going into another dimension shouldn't feel exactly like stepping into the kitchen for a midnight snack.
Looking back as Wendy released her hand, she saw just the oval of light. No hint of the forest they'd just left. Then the light grew dimmer, and disappeared.
She took a deep breath, and finally turned around.
Chapter Two
Once Upon a Time...
They had begun simply, as friends. Even that friendship was whispered about it some circles, for he was twenty years her senior, and the groundskeeper for her family's modest estate. She had been born weak, was easily exhausted, and so she spent much of her time outdoors just sitting and enjoying the sunshine. They had started to talk, and somehow without either of them noticing-- they certainly hadn't gone through any of the proper steps for such a thing-- they'd begun to court.
He'd left the job the day after their first kiss. He'd been certain he was a cad of the worst sort, distracting her from realistic prospects and taking advantage of a woman who had very little experience in outside society. He'd written her a letter explaining as much, saying goodbye and apologizing.
And his Ruth, who had thus far only attended events held in her own home and who had barely ventured two blocks from the safety of that building, had traveled across the city in a carriage to see him. Once there, she had simply said, "You're behaving quite foolishly. Come home."
He had. Her mother and father were skittish about the arrangement, everyone knew that, but they still supported her and even helped them find a home of their own.
Things were quite peaceful for years between them, until their careful planning failed, and she became pregnant. The doctor took him aside and told him that she would most likely not survive the birth, and he did worry, but he also remembered how she had taken that carriage ride because she'd felt it needed to be done, how she'd found a strength he'd barely suspected she possessed. And he prayed that she would do it again.
Ruth did prove the doctor wrong, but barely. They brought in a nursemaid to help care for the boy, as it took her a long time to regain her energy, and on some days during that ordeal she couldn't even summon the reserves to get out of bed.
But then she was her old self again, wide smiles and quick speech and sitting in the sunshine. Only now she held their son on her lap.
When the time came that it all shattered, that her weak heart caught up to her, it was because of him. He usually got up with little Alec in the middle of the night, because she needed her rest. But he'd worked particularly late, and on this night his son's cries didn't wake him.
His wife's scream did.
He vaulted out of bed and ran into the nursery, only to find Ruth on the floor, lying utterly still. Alec was still crying but he couldn't pay attention to that, couldn't look away.
Finally, when he'd let go of her hands, made an effort to stop his own tears, he'd looked to his wailing son.
And seen a stranger's child. This little one had brown eyes, not blue. His hair was darkish blond instead of white-blond, and there was no hint of curl to it.
Panic surged past the grief and he ran to the window, screaming his son's name. And in response, he heard the boy's laugh. Coming from above him.
Looking up, he saw his son floating in midair and giggling as if it were a perfectly natural thing to do. Floating beside him were two tiny women, halos of light surrounding them. He held out
his arms for Alec, terrified that the unnatural creatures were going to withdraw whatever witchcraft they'd used to suspend him there. Alec reached back for him, grinning, and then the wide smile turned into a wail as the tiny women darted off, and Alec drifted away between them.
***
He didn't tell the true story to very many people. Not after Ruth's parents insisted that the replacement was their grandchild, and he overheard a conversation where they brought up an asylum. So he stayed quiet, and avoided the replacement, and researched. He looked into everything he could find about tiny people with wings, about changelings, and ways to get human children back.
When summoning the Fae didn't work, he began to look into how to hunt them down. After six years of research-- long after Ruth's parents had gone from begging him to take an interest in "his" child to ordering him to stay away from the boy-- he found out about Doors. After seven years-- homeless now, but libraries were a home of sorts, and scraps could always be found or stolen-- he was able to open one and step through.
What his research failed to tell him was what happened to the minds of those who passed through such powerful magic without an escort.
***
He remembers trying to take a blond-haired infant from his mother's arms. Was a silly thing, he realized now-- the woman was human-sized, not tiny like the things that had taken his son-- but she hadn't listened to his explanation, had simply screamed and run and before he could get back to the safety of the woods there had been many, many other people.
Now his head hurts dreadfully, and so do his knee and his lower back, and he's being dragged before the Queen. They call him insane. Say he needs to be locked up. And he wants to argue, tries, but all that comes out is Alec's favorite lullaby.
"Leave him," the Queen tells them. "I'll take care of this."
And they leave, and he continues to sing, and somewhere in the back of his mind he knows that he's about to be executed.
Faerietale Page 3