Rua

by Miranda Kavi

  As the last bell rang, Rylan slipped into class and sat in his usual spot in front of her. “Hi,” he whispered.

  She bit back her many questions and smiled instead.

  As he studied her face, a frown settled in over his. He covered her right hand with his left hand. “It’ll be okay.” He left it there long enough for the warm tinglies to run up her arm then returned his attention to the teacher.

  She kept her eyes on her hands, but she felt the gaze of her classmates boring into her from all angles. She risked a glance at Jennifer. She’d lowered her chin was giving Celeste a death stare. Celeste quickly moved her eyes back to her hands, but couldn’t help the teeny tiny smile on her lips. Eat it, bitch.

  Celeste spent the rest of class trying to keep her eyes on her teacher, instead of examining Rylan’s thick black hair and imagining what it would be like to run her fingers through it. She tapped her feet impatiently through sixth and seventh hour. By the time the final bell rang, her head was in full-on migraine mode.

  Out in the hallway, she dumped her books in her locker then leaned against it. She and Rylan hadn’t discussed where they’d meet, so she waited, and waited. Her classmates filed out of classrooms and clustered around lockers. Some laughed, most were talking. They were worried about prom, grades, tests, and clothes. She wished she had those kinds of worries instead of the scary-dark-things-that-follow-you type of worries.

  She pushed away from her locker and started to the double doors. Maybe he was out in the parking lot.

  An arm draped across her shoulders without warning, causing her to jump. She turned, ready to admonish Tink for sneaking up on her, but it was Rylan.

  His face was close to hers since he was so much shorter than Tink. “There you are. Ready?” His breath reached her. It smelled nice, like mint and honey.

  She leaned in to him without meaning to. “Yes.”

  They walked to the double doors. He left his arm across her shoulders, which suited her just fine. She stared straight ahead as she walked, not wanting any distraction to take her out of his reach.

  “How are you feeling?” he asked. “You don’t look well.”

  “How kind of you to mention that.”

  “That’s not what I meant. You’re beautiful, as you always are, but you look pale and tired,” he said in a serious, matter-of-fact tone, like he was reading her a grocery list.

  Her tummy did strange flip-flops with the compliment, but she managed to prevent the usual blush. “My head hurts.”

  “I’m sorry.” He opened the door with his free hand then slid his arm off her shoulder, resting it in the small of her back. He dropped his hands off her completely when they left the building.

  She felt exposed without his touch. She followed him to his car.

  The Perk was only a few miles a way, which meant she only had a few minutes alone with him. “Do you even need to drive?”

  He smiled. “Not always, I can walk or take a bus.”

  “That’s not what I mean, and you know it.”

  He glanced at her. “I do, eh?”

  “Yes.”

  “No, I don’t need to drive.” He parked his car and got out, and that was the end of the conversation.

  She got out and walked past him towards the door of the shop.

  “Wait.” He rested his hand on her arm. A spark of something flew between them, something extra, something that made him drop his hand. “Please stay close to me.”

  She avoided his eyes, but nodded in agreement.

  She stepped into the coffee shop. Tink had told her about this place, but she’d never been before. It looked like what coffee shops looked like before the onslaught of massive chains. Mismatched couches, loveseats, and battered tables were scattered around the space. Tall windows let in bright squares of light. The menu was written in colored chalk on a giant chalkboard and housed behind a huge oak bar with an ancient cash register.

  She scanned the small shop, half cast in shadows in the late afternoon light. She saw Dr. Ramone settling into a table.

  “Let’s order.” Rylan her to the cash register. “What do you want?”

  She tried to sort out the talls, mochas, and espresso drinks scrawled on the chalkboard, but the constant pounding of her head and her nerves from being with Rylan left everything in a blurry jumble. “I don’t care. You pick.”

  He ordered two lattes, and pulled out his wallet to pay.

  She fumbled for her purse, but he put his hand on her arm.

  “I got it.”

  “Thanks.” She wrapped her hands around the white mug then went to the table Dr. Ramone had selected. She wore jeans and a sweater, with a pair of horn-rimmed glasses. She had a huge, steaming coffee in front of her. She smiled at Celeste, but her smile faded when she saw Rylan.

  She sat across from Dr. Ramone. Rylan sat on her right.

  “Hi,” she said to Dr. Ramone.

  “Hello, Celeste. I’m very glad to see you.” She glanced at Rylan then back at Celeste. “Don’t you want to have this conversation in private?”

  “No, I want him here,” she said.

  Dr. Ramone nodded. “These things we speak of are not meant for everyone.”

  “He’s not everyone,” Celeste said. ““He’s a, um...” She glanced around the shop to see if anyone was listening.

  “Sidhe, or least some of him is. I know, but he’s not Tuatha,” Dr. Ramone said.

  Celeste took a sip of her coffee. “Rylan stays or I go.” She glanced at Rylan, who rested one elbow on the back of her chair.

  “I’ve told you, Celeste. It’s not me you need to fear. There are some—”

  “Fayga already showed up,” Rylan said.

  “What?” Dr. Ramone slammed her cup down on its saucer, sending splatters of coffee across the table. Several people turned to stare. She picked up her napkin and blotted at the coffee on the table. “Sorry.” She lowered her voice. “That’s what I was worried about. Not good, Celeste. What happened?”

  “First things first,” Celeste said. “Are you Tuatha?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why are you helping me?” Celeste asked.

  “Because you’re one of us.”

  Rylan chimed in. “I’ve already told her.”

  Dr. Ramone shot him a wary look. “And what exactly did you tell her?”

  “I told her that there can only be five,” he said. “I warned her about what has happened in the past.”

  She picked up her coffee again. “So, you don’t trust me? Is that why? Because if that’s so, he’s done you a big disservice, even though I’m sure his intentions are pure. Most of them anyway.” She set her cup down. “We haven’t had a new Tuatha in over fifty years, and no Tuatha,”—she glanced at Rylan—“has been murdered by another in hundreds of years. That’s very old-school. We’re much more cooperative now. We have a board and everything – very organized.”

  “Are you next in line?” Celeste asked.

  “No, I’m not. I’m the third in. Regina is the oldest. I can assure you she means no harm. She is very old and ready to go. She didn’t want to scare you, so we decided someone further down the line would make contact with you.”

  Rylan leaned back in his chair. “I still don’t trust you. How did you find her?”

  Dr. Ramone glowered at him over her mug. “And why should she trust you? I found her the same way you did, the same way Fayga did.”

  Celeste looked back and forth between the two of them. “What is that supposed to mean? Do I have a honing beacon attached to my forehead?”

  “Sort of. Sidhe can sense Tuatha, and Tuatha can sense Sidhe. You can tell when another Tuatha is in the world. It’s hard to describe, but we all knew you were getting ready to join us,” Dr. Ramone said.

  “Then how come I didn’t sense you?”

  “You did notice I was different, didn’t you?”

  “Yes,” Celeste said.

  “And Rylan? I’m sure you had a reaction to him even before you
turned.”

  She glanced at Rylan, remembering the pounding headache that she’d gotten from him only a few short days ago. “Yes, I did.”

  And how do you feel now?” she asked.

  Celeste did an internal check. Her headache was gone, the voices were quieter. She still felt the pressure and heard some noises, but they were muted, like she had put on ear muffs or something. “Better.”

  “Good, I’m trying to relieve some of the pressure. I can’t do it all. I’ll need to start teaching you to control the Sidhe immediately, or else the pain will only get worse.”

  “Control.” Rylan’s voice was barely audible.

  Dr. Ramone turned to Rylan, eyes flashing in the weird supernatural way. “Please, I insist that you let me speak freely. If you don’t like it, leave. I’m glad you’ve decided to undertake the role of guardian, but let me do what I need to do.”

  Celeste rested a hand on Rylan’s arm. It was meant to be calming, but it just made her blush instead, so she picked it back up.

  “When did you turn seventeen?” she asked Celeste.

  “Three days ago.”

  Her dark brown eyebrows moved up. “Really? And you’re not overwhelmed?”

  “I wouldn’t say that. I’ve got a nasty, nasty headache. It’s getting worse.” She glanced at Rylan, sensing his disapproval at her telling so much. She lowered her voice. “Dr. Ramone, I see them everywhere, especially at night.”

  She smiled. “Please, call me Kara. I can help you, show you what to do. What have you been doing thus far? Most people without training would be completely overwhelmed, curled up in a ball in some padded room somewhere, muttering about voices. We’ve had that happen before.” She frowned at the memory.

  “Okay, Dr. Ram—I mean, Kara. I make a circle with my light and it keeps them away.”

  “Your light?” she asked. “What do you mean?”

  Rylan kicked her under the table.

  Kara cocked her head to the side. “You have purple light burning in your hands? No, from everywhere. Interesting.”

  Oh yeah, she can read my mind.

  “Not really,” Kara said. “Only what you project to me. When you are obsessing over something or upset about it, I can pick it up, but I can’t pick up everything.”

  Before she could stop it, her mind focused on Rylan, on her huge, sad, puppy-love style crush. She didn’t want to think of it, tried to stop it, but it was there, she was sure, on the very front of her mind like a giant, blinking, neon “I’m pathetic” sign.

  Kara’s eyes traveled to Rylan then back to Celeste. She cleared her throat. “I’m glad you sorted out how to make some sort of protection around you.”

  “Am I doing it right?” Celeste asked.

  “There is no right or wrong. We all do it differently. But as you can probably feel, it’s only a temporary fix. Tell me, what happened with Fayga? She didn’t cross, did she? I think I would have felt that.”

  “No, she didn’t,” Celeste said. She relayed the story to Kara, watching as her eyes widened when she described the circle and pulse of power that made Kara, and all the Sidhe, disappear.

  “We need to begin your training immediately. She’s not the only nasty one. Some of the Sidhe are very old, and very dark. They hate humans, hate this realm, and want to destroy it all. Those are the ones that we must keep out. I think you have probably injured her, so she will leave you alone for a few days.”

  “You don’t have a purple flame thingy?” Celeste asked.

  She smiled again. “No. We each have a special gift. Mine is the mind-reading thing, yours is apparently the light, which sounds very powerful.”

  “Oh.”

  Kara finished her coffee then pushed it to the edge of the table. “We have a lot of ground to cover, but what are your most pressing questions?”

  She smashed her hands together in her lap. “Do Tuatha, you know, live normal lives? Have careers and all that? I mean, how do you support yourself when your main job is passing the Sidhe through the portal?”

  “Celeste, there is a lot more to it than the portal. This is why you can only put so much in what Rylan says.” She paused and looked at him. “Sorry, it’s the truth. You don’t know the half of it.” She leaned forward, toward Celeste. “There is a lot more you can, and should, do. I will explain it all at a later date, and eventually take you to meet the board.”

  She folded her hands in front of her. Her nails were clipped short, but neatly manicured and painted a fire-engine red. “To answer your question, yes, you can live a normal life. I will train you to have most of your portal duties on ‘auto pilot’ so to speak, where they pretty much come and go without much active attention from you. Your existence, your being, is the portal. You just need to set up some sort of alarm system that triggers when something weird is happening.”

  “So, I can go to college, get married, have a family?” Celeste asked.

  When she mentioned the word ‘family,’ a pained look washed over Kara’s features. It was over in a split second then she was back to normal. Celeste glanced at Rylan to see if he’d seen it too. He had, judging by his furrowed eyebrows.

  Kara smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “It can be hard to find a balance at times, but yes. You can do all those things. Um, did you have any other questions?”

  “What’s with the crows?” she asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  Celeste thought of the swarm of crows, the ones she’d banished, and the one she called to her. She let the images flicker through her mind. It was a lot easier than trying to explain. “Ah, I see.” Kara nodded. “That’s normal. We all have special affinities in nature. One of yours is with blackbirds. You may have more.”

  Celeste smiled. “Cool. That, I like. What is yours?”

  “Bats,” she said.

  “Creepy,” Rylan said.

  Celeste ignored him. “And Regina?”

  “Water. She can manipulate water.”

  “Awesome,” Celeste said. “How did she find out?”

  Kara adjusted her glasses. “She knew she was Tuatha when she was a little girl, but never had a connection with any animal. She thought something was wrong with her. It took her years to correlate that every time she was sad, it poured buckets. Whenever she had something important going on and it was raining, it’d stop.”

  “Wow,” Celeste said.

  “Any more questions before I take my leave?”

  “Why is the night and darkness so…” Celeste dug for the word to describe her love of dark and night.

  “Compelling?” Kara asked. “It’s part of your nature. We derive our power from the other side of nature, the one most cannot see. All of the supernaturals are more active at night.” She glanced down at her watch. “I need to go. Meet me tonight at 10:30 p.m., you choose a place. We must begin your training immediately.”

  Rylan chimed in. “My place. It’s isolated.”

  Kara’s smile tightened, but did not disappear. “Fine.” She jerked her head in Rylan’s direction. “This one can help your parents stay asleep while you are out.” She stood and picked up her multicolored purse. She strode out of the coffee shop without another word.

  As soon as she walked away, Celeste’s head started its annoying heavy pounding again. She rubbed her temples, wishing in vain for the pain to stop. “Oh, God. I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”

  He stood. “I’ll take you home.”

  She walked out to his car. Evening had arrived, bringing the shadows out with it. The good ones and the bad ones. He opened the door for her and she slid in then rested her pounding head on the doorframe while he drove her home.

  “I still don’t know about her,” he said. “I don’t trust her.”

  “She seems nice. It seems like if she meant me harm, then she would have done it already.”

  “I guess we don’t have much of a choice,” he said. “She’s right, my knowledge is limited.”

  “We? You know, you
don’t have to do this for me. I’m very grateful for everything you’ve done, but this is not your responsibility,” she said

  “What, you don’t want me around?” He parked in her driveway.

  “I didn’t say that, I don’t mean it in that way.” She exhaled too hard, sending a few red curls around her face. “Yes, I do want you around.”

  He smiled. “Good. See you later.”

  She stepped out of the car and forced herself not to look back at him as he backed out of her driveway.

  CHAPTER 12

  “Who was that?” her dad asked as she walked in the front door. “That didn’t look like Tink.”

  “Rylan.” She dropped her backpack off by the couch, trying to be as casual as she could. She grabbed a candy from the dish on the coffee table, threw it in her mouth, then collapsed on the edge of the couch.

  Her dad sat next her and turned down the T.V. As usual, he was watching the news. “So, where were you guys? School ended a while back.”

  “We got coffee,” she said, nice and smooth. It wasn’t like she was lying or anything.

  “Oh, I see,” he said. “Are you guys dating or something?”

  “Dad! I don’t really think I’ve been here long enough to be dating anyone.” She pulled her legs underneath her.

  “Dating who?” Her mom breezed into living room. “Celeste, please take your feet of the couch, babe.”

  “No one.” She unfolded her legs.

  “No one, except the guy she just had coffee with.” Her dad stood to leave.

  “Not Tink?” her mom said.

  “Rylan.” He left.

  Nicely played, Dad. Drop the bomb, then leave.

  “Rylan? The guy who showed up on your birthday, but didn’t stay? When did you guys start dating?”

  “Not dating, Mom. We just had coffee after school. What’s the big deal?”

  Her mom raised her hands in mock surrender. “Fine, fine. If you continue to have coffee with this boy, then we need to meet him. I mean, really meet him.”

  “Sure.” She smiled and nodded, but the splitting headache made it hard. She rubbed her right temple with her finger.

  “Still have a headache?” her mom asked.

  “Hmm mm.”