by Sean Cullen
“Unions between Humans and Faeries are forbidden,” BLT said. “The punishment is Exile.”
“I’ve been so lonely, wandering the world trying to forget the woman I’d loved and the world I’d lost,” Finbar sobbed. “When you arrived here, I saw my chance. I stole the amulet and waited for you to return for it. Then I would strike my bargain with ye.”
Brendan shook his head in disbelief. He looked at the misery in Finbar’s face and felt he couldn’t be angry for the pain the old man had put him through. How could anyone be so cruel as to punish someone for falling in love? The more he thought about Finbar’s case, the more outraged he felt. What if he were to fall in love with Marina Kaprillian? Or rather, what if she fell in love with him (highly unlikely but he was just imagining)? Would that mean he would be Exiled, too? It was ridiculous!
“How can the Exile be reversed?” Brendan demanded. “What do I have to do?”
BLT’s face went blank. “There’s nothing anyone can do. Exile is irreversible.”
“There must be something,” Brendan said, looking at Finbar’s stricken face.
BLT shook her head with a look of genuine sadness. Finbar sobbed and sat down on his cot. The old man hid his face in his hands and wept bitterly. Brendan sat down beside him.
“I’m sorry,” Brendan said softly. “I don’t know what I can do. Why would you even want to come back if you love her so much? How could you bear to leave her behind?”
Finbar wiped his eyes on the sleeve of his coat and looked at Brendan. “She’s been dead nigh on two centuries. My Aislinn died of fever during the Famine in 1832. We were forced to stay on a ship off the coast until the fever took those it infected. The survivors were put ashore in this new land and I was among them. Now, I’m doomed to live without her.”
Brendan couldn’t imagine how it might be to live with that kind of sadness forever. He would want to come back to the people he knew and seek solace. What if his parents turned him away when he needed them most? He couldn’t imagine a worse loneliness. He laid a hand on the amulet nestled warmly against his chest. There must be something he could do.
“I made you a promise, Finbar,” Brendan said firmly. “I will do my best to honour it. I will do everything I can to have your Exile lifted.”
“Oh my.” The icy tone was all too familiar now. Brendan looked up to see Orcadia sauntering into the lamplight. “Such authority as befits a prince of your standing, Breandan. Making promises you can’t possibly keep.”
Brendan stood up to face her. He tried to put on a brave face despite the terror that was flooding through him. BLT fluttered to rest on his shoulder. “I’ve found my token. I will be initiated. I won’t let you stop me. Step aside.”
“I don’t think so.” Orcadia smiled sweetly. “You’ve led me on a winding path, young nephew, and managed quite well considering you had no idea what you were doing. You certainly made me look foolish back there at the hospital. That’s all over now. Greenleaf and D’Anaan and Ariel”-she spat the names as if they were poison on her tongue-”they cannot help you now. I’ll give you one more chance. You must come with me and join my cause, make war on the Humans and be my right hand.” The smile left her face. “Or you will die.”
82 Bairn is an old Scottish word for child. The origin of the term is unknown. Some say that in the distant past, Scottish people mistakenly believed that children were actually little bears. This seems far-fetched. Another theory is that babies, being born naked, were referred to as “litle bare ones,” which over time was transformed into the shorter term “bairns.” It’s odd that BLT would use a Scottish term. Perhaps this hints at an earlier Scottish ancestry.
FAMILY
Brendan concentrated with all his might and said, slowly and clearly, “Leave me alone!”
Orcadia laughed, waving a scolding finger playfully at him. “Not this time! You caught me off guard once. Now I know what you’re capable of and I won’t be Compelled a second time.” She glared at him. “So much power and so raw! Let me teach you how to harness your strength! Together, we will make the Humans bow to us. The Fair Folk will rule the Earth again, as they were always meant to!”
Brendan shook his head. “I won’t join you. I’ve lived among Humans my whole life. I know they aren’t perfect. They can be selfish. They can be cruel. They don’t always do what’s best…” His mind was full of the trip through the lake with Oona. “Maybe they don’t know how lucky they are to have such a beautiful world to call their own, but they are my people even though I’m not Human myself. My parents took me in and loved me, tried to make sure I was a good person. My friends helped me when I needed them and asked for nothing in return.” As he spoke, Brendan’s voice became stronger, more sure. “Humans made a mess of the Earth, it’s true. I won’t give up on them, though. They just need to be shown how to change.”
Orcadia listened to his speech with a smirk on her face. When he was done, she shook her head in mock sadness. “What a little fool you are. You can’t see the big picture. I think you need help to focus your mind.” Orcadia raised a pale hand and beckoned to the shadows behind her.
“No!” Brendan cried as his sister, Delia, stepped into the light. Orcadia must have grabbed her on her way to school. She was dressed in her uniform and her feet were caked in muck, but she didn’t seem to notice. The blank expression on her face made it obvious to Brendan that she was under Orcadia’s power.
“Let her go,” Brendan said through gritted teeth. “Now.”
“I don’t think I will.” Orcadia tapped her chin in a mockery of contemplation. “No. I won’t do it. Unless, of course, you join me.”
“Never,” Brendan said. “If you harm her in any way, I will make you pay for it.”
“Oh, that is truly funny. You will make me pay. You haven’t got a chance, Breandan. No one can help you! You’re uninitiated. The only friends you have are Humans, a sawed-off pipsqueak of a Lesser Faerie, and a miserable Exile. Oh, no, no, no, my dear foolish nephew. I can do whatever I want and you can’t stop me.” Orcadia turned to Delia. “Sweetheart, pick up those garden shears, will you?”
Obediently, Delia reached out and plucked a pair of shears out of a barrel nearby. She held them up. The rusty blades gleamed dully in the lamplight.
Brendan’s mouth went dry. “Don’t…” he whispered.
“Now, Delia dear, put the blade to your throat.”
Without hesitation, Delia raised the blades and pressed the sharp edge upward under her chin.
“Stop it!” Brendan could barely speak he was so terrified.
Orcadia turned her attention back to Brendan. “Now, Brendan. I will give you one last opportunity to see the error of your ways. Pledge yourself to me and I will let her live. Refuse, and I’ll order her to cut her own throat.”
Brendan was completely helpless. He knew he couldn’t let his sister die. She had been the bane of his existence for as long as he could remember, teasing him, playing tricks on him, insulting him. He’d always thought that he couldn’t stand her. Now, when she was about to be taken away from him forever, he knew that despite all the crap she put him through, he loved her.
With that realization, Brendan suddenly felt a surge of strength. His worry and his fear were overwhelmed by another emotion so powerful it flooded his heart and ignited his mind. He looked at Orcadia’s smug face, smirking back at him, and the fire in his heart intensified to an almost painful degree. The emotion that possessed him was anger.
Orcadia seemed to sense the change in him. Her smirk slipped slightly. She took a step backward as he raised his hand and pointed at her. He channelled all his rage into one word.
“No!”
The effect was immediate. Orcadia was hurled backward as if a giant fist had smashed her in the chest. She flew through stacks of rubbish on her way across the cluttered cellar. Brendan heard, rather than saw, her hit the far wall.
Delia dropped the shears and fell into a heap on the concrete floor like a marionette w
hose strings had been severed.
“Oh-ho!” BLT crowed, pumping her fist in triumph. “You nailed her good. A Shout! 83 I wouldn’t have believed it unless I’d seen it!” She capered in mid-air in a bizarre hovering victory dance.
Brendan rushed to Delia’s side. She was breathing easily, almost as if she was in a deep sleep. Finbar came up behind him.
“She’s all right, lad,” the old man assured him. “Just in a deep sleep.”
A searing blast of energy sailed over their heads and smashed into the furnace. The cot was set alight.
“Get her out of here,” Brendan demanded. Finbar gathered Delia into his arms as Brendan stood to face Orcadia.
She walked toward him, blasting stacks of junk out of her way to clear a path. “You dare strike me, whelp?”
“I told you before,” Brendan said firmly with a bravado he didn’t feel. “I don’t like it when you call me names.”
“I’ll do worse than that.” She raised her hands, and a ball of bristling purple energy coalesced between her palms. “Die!” She flung the ball toward him.
Brendan’s intention was to duck out of the way. In his panic, he willed himself to move aside. As soon as he framed the desperate thought, a strange thing happened.
The world seemed to slow down. It was as if some divine being had pressed “Slow” on the DVD of the universe. He saw the ball approaching, and he had all the time in the world. He watched, fascinated, as the energy tumbled toward him, plumes of force erupting and dying back into the orb like tiny solar flares on the surface of a miniature sun. He turned his head and saw BLT hovering in space, her face frozen in wide-eyed fright. Her tiny wings, usually a blur of movement impossible for the naked eye to follow, flapped in slow and languid strokes.
Brendan looked the other way and saw Finbar with Delia in his arms moving toward the stairs with infinite slowness.
I’m warping! Like that Bartender Saskia. They called her a Warp Warrior. I’ve speeded up. It’s awesome!
In the time he’d been marvelling at the Warp phenomenon, the energy ball had moved closer by a couple of metres. Brendan looked around and his eyes settled on a baseball bat sticking out of a barrel.
“That’ll do nicely,” he said.
First, he grabbed the handle of the bat and pulled it out of the box. Next, he dashed across the cellar, ducking under the ball of energy on his way. He stopped directly in front of Orcadia and studied her snarling face, full of rage and hatred. Brendan’s own rage welled up inside him. He cocked the bat preparing to smack the helpless Faerie in the side of the skull.
Instead, he paused. Despite all the trouble she’s caused I couldn’t just smash her like that. It’s too… too much like her. Walking over to the ball of energy inching through the air, he stood in its path and slightly to the side. He took up a batter stance, waggling the tip of the bat in the air. He’d never been good at sports. He’d always been clumsy, uncoordinated. Now, though, he had all the time in the world. He felt completely in control. Being a Faerie had brought him a lot of pain, discomfort, and terror, but there was an upside. Taking careful aim, he swung the bat and connected with the ball of energy.
Time returned to normal.
The impact shivered up through his forearms. The bat shattered in his hands. The wood scorched. The ball of energy went sailing like a rocket, up into the wooden beams overhead. The wood exploded, and the upper floor fell in a cascade of rubble onto the surprised Orcadia, who disappeared under an avalanche of debris.
“Home run,” Brendan said with grim satisfaction. The warping seemed to have drained his strength. He staggered, his limbs quivering and his arms aching from the swing of the bat.
A piece of stray wood tumbled through the air and struck the oil lamp on the table. The lamp shattered, sending burning oil scattering across the piles of rubbish. Immediately, the rubbish began to burn.
“By the Wild Hunt! You’re a Warp Warrior!” BLT cried. “This is totally incredible.”
Brendan didn’t hear her. He didn’t hear the crackle of the flames or Finbar’s cries for him to get out of the cellar. He was completely focused on Orcadia lying in the rubble at his feet.
She moaned and tried to rise, but Brendan wouldn’t let her. He placed his foot on her shoulder and pushed her back to the floor, pinning her down. Blood, red but tinged with a hint of purple, glistened in her pale hair where a stray piece of falling debris had struck her in the scalp. She looked up at him with hatred in her eyes.
“Well,” she rasped. “What are you waiting for? You have to kill me. If you don’t, I’ll find a way to kill you.”
Brendan sneered, “You really are pathetic. I’d be doing the world a favour.”
“Then do it!”
He still held the stump of the bat in his hand. He looked at it and made a decision.
“I won’t be like you,” he said. He tossed the bat aside. Flames licked the walls all around them now. The smoke was growing thick. “I won’t be a killer. My parents taught me right from wrong. My Human parents, that is.”
“Fool,” Orcadia snarled. She struggled to rise. “If my brother could see what you’ve become, he’d be disgusted.”
“Don’t be so quick to put words in my mouth, Orcadia.” The voice was deep and strong. Brendan turned to see where it was coming from. In the centre of the flames raging in the cellar, a shadow appeared. Brendan backed away toward the stairs as a tall Faerie stepped out of the heart of the flames. “I think he is an exceptional child.”
Brendan looked into the face of the newcomer. His skin was white as milk and his lips a thin bloodless line. He had pale blond hair and violet eyes.
“Hello, Breandan,” Briach Morn said. “I am your father.”
Brendan didn’t know what to say. He stared at the tall stranger with wonder in his eyes. “You… you’re supposed to be…”
“In the Other Lands? I was, and I will be again soon.” Briach Morn smiled gently.
“They told me no one could ever come back from there.”
“So I believed as well.” Morn nodded. “But, like all Faerie power, will plays an important part. I willed myself here because I wanted to see you. My wish was sincere enough to grant me a short reprieve. I doubt that I will be able to do it again.”
“Brother”-Orcadia struggled to her feet- “stay! I need you! Together we can take this world back.”
Morn’s face hardened. “You are wrong, Orcadia. I have had many years to contemplate what I’ve done. We will never rule here again. We have had our time. We must accept that.”
Orcadia’s face turned into a snarling mask of fury. “Weakling! You may have lost your nerve but I haven’t. I will do it without you. There are others who will rally to my flag…”
“Oh, dear sister, do shut up, will you,” Briach Morn said wearily. He flicked his wrist and Orcadia was jerked from her feet. She sailed across the cellar toward the shadow in the heart of the raging flames.
“Noooooooooooo!” she cried as she fell into the heart of the fire and disappeared.
“That’s better,” Briach said, smiling. “Sisters, eh? No end of trouble.”
Brendan laughed in spite of himself. “I know.” He looked at the fire. “What will happen to her? Is she…?”
Morn shook his head. “Not dead. She’ll be waiting for me in the Other Lands. There’ll be hell to pay but no matter. I have an eternity to smooth things over with her.”
The fire was spreading, consuming every bit of dry rubbish it could find. The heat and the smoke didn’t affect Brendan, though. Morn seemed to have cast a protective ring about them.
His Faerie father reached out and took Brendan’s face in his long, elegant hands. The skin felt cool on Brendan’s cheeks. Briach Morn looked into his son’s face and smiled a sad smile. “You look so much like her. Your smile especially.”
Brendan felt like crying but he swallowed his tears. “What was my mother like?”
His father’s eyes clouded as if he were looking in
to another time. “She was kind… like you. Such a generous heart. Her people couldn’t understand why she would give herself to me. I understood. She was a Healer, you see, and I was sick. I was sick in my very soul. She gave me a reason to think the world might be a wonderful place. She gave me you.” He smiled down at his son, and this time Brendan did begin to cry. “I didn’t understand what a wonderful gift that was until now.”
“Why did you leave me, then? Why did you go to the Other Lands and leave me alone in the world?”
Briach’s fingers brushed away Brendan’s tears. “I am truly sorry for that now. I couldn’t bear to live in a world where your mother didn’t exist, just as I couldn’t bear to look in your face and see her there. I chose to take myself away. I didn’t want to leave you under the influence of my sister, and your mother’s people hated me. They blamed me for her death. So I left you in the care of Humans because I believed that was what your mother would have wanted. She thought that our future in the world lay with Faeries and Humans coming to an understanding and accepting one another. I tried to make it start with her own child.”
The fire surrounded them. Even through Briach’s magical barrier, Brendan began to feel the heat. His father’s tone became urgent. “I haven’t much time. You have found your token. Do you wish me to initiate you into your birthright?”
Brendan gaped. “You could do that?”
His father nodded.
Brendan thought quickly. He wanted to be a part of the Faerie World but he didn’t want to abandon his Human family. He loved them. He thought about the mother he’d never known and what she would have wanted him to do. He made a decision. “Yes. Do it!”
Briach smiled and closed his eyes. He laid a hand on Brendan’s chest, resting his palm on the amulet.
“Welcome,” Briach Morn said softly. “Welcome, Breandan.”
Brendan felt a shock of tingling warmth spread through his chest. The warmth raced outward from Briach Morn’s hand and radiated quickly through Brendan’s entire body. For an endless instant, he was aglow. Then the sensation dissipated, leaving a slight tingling in its wake.