Fairy, Neat (Fairy Files Book 6)

by Katharine Sadler

  Jerome shook his head, but he knelt under the crevice and jumped. He managed to get in there, but it was a tight fit and he couldn’t extend his arms at all.

  “I’m slipping,” he called down to us.

  Hieronymus and I got under his feet and pushed him up into the crevice and he started moving up slowly, using his hands and feet and back for leverage.

  “I’ll help him,” Vervain said, her grin so wide it took up most of her small face.

  “He’s a lot bigger than you,” I said.

  Vervain laughed. “And a lot clumsier. I can get him out.”

  Vervain leapt up after Jerome, her small body lodging in the crevice. She got her whole body into the crevice like she had before and the two of them moved up and out of sight.

  “She’s amazing,” I said. “I’ve never seen anyone who can move like her.”

  Hieronymus watched her disappear without a word. He turned to me, but his expression was grim. “I have a good feeling about none of this, princess.”

  Before I could respond, he closed his eyes and began his shift to fairy-size. Where I could shift in an instant, it took him several minutes and his body twisted more like Frost’s did when he shifted to wolf. Hieronymus’ face creased in pain and he cried out once before he shrank to fairy-size. He glanced at me and flew up through the crevice.

  I shifted and followed.

  ***

  Vin, Frost, and I crept into the forest moving as carefully and quietly as we could. We’d seen Benny and Chelsea swooping and diving over the trees about three hundred yards out, so we had time to reach the sasquatch. We had time, unless he moved. He moved fast and he had no reason to worry about being quiet.

  Jerome, Vervain, and Lensy entered the forest behind us, far enough back not to interfere with our progress, but close enough to see if one of us was injured. Vin veered to the left, Frost stayed center and I moved to the right.

  There were no paths here, no easy routes. The brush at our feet was thick and dense, and branches and briars smacked our faces and gripped our clothes as we moved. I would have been miserable and complaining about the chaos of nature, the difficulty of movement, but my heart pounded with adrenaline and a healthy dose of fear for what we were about to face.

  I saw the dark shadow of the beast before I saw him. I froze for a moment. His shadow stretched more than ten feet. I reminded myself he couldn’t truly be so large. I stepped forward and froze again when I saw him, his eyes wild, his teeth bared. He was seven feet tall and almost as broad. And his expression…It was wild and lost and absolutely insane. There would be no reasoning with this creature, there would be no rational argument, no harrying that would convince him to stop. He wouldn’t stop until he was dead or we were.

  While he didn’t see me, I studied him. His face was tan and lined, as though by many decades. His hair was long and knotted and covered every inch of his body, except his face, which was oddly free of any facial hair. His teeth were sharp and jagged and…He was breathing heavy and patches of his hair were gone, as though they’d been burned off.

  I pulled in a deep breath and I waited until he’d turned around, searching for the source of a twig snapping somewhere in the forest or a scent he’d just picked up. I ran toward him as quietly as I could. I could see Frost on the other side of us, ready to move in next. I slashed at the back of the beast’s leg, right behind the kneecap. The beast roared and spun, but I’d already melted back into the forest, my camouflage clothing helping me to blend in. I moved to the right as Frost darted in and stabbed at the beast’s kidneys.

  The sasquatch was facing me when he was hit and I saw the fierce rage in his eyes. He spun toward Frost, but Frost was already gone and Vin was moving into position, getting ready to attack.

  We each went at the sasquatch twice more before it got wise. I was approaching the beast, pike in hand, ready to strike, when he spun on me and swiped with his long arms, claws extended. I darted back, just narrowly missing being slashed. He kept advancing and I hopped back, trying not to trip over a root or a bush. Behind the beast, Frost roared and the sasquatch winced like he’d been hit, but he kept coming for me, clearly tired of the game we’d been playing with him.

  I hopped back as quickly as I could and found myself against a tree. I tried to spin around it, but the moment I took my eyes off the beast, he was there. He wrapped his huge hand around my scrawny neck and squeezed, his nails digging into my flesh. I kicked and gasped for air. I heard Frost roar, but my vision was going blurry.

  I tried to shift, to narrow my neck, but when I did, the Sasquatch tightened his grip before I could move or get a breath. I shifted my left hand to a bear paw and clawed at the sasquatch’s side. He winced and grunted and tightened his grip so hard I was sure he would break my neck if I pushed him any further. I shifted my hand back to human.

  A familiar screech rent the air and flames and heat rose around me. The sasquatch shrieked and writhed. His grip loosened enough for me to get one gasp of air, but he didn’t let me go. I met his eyes and the fury and fear in them terrified me. There was no mercy in those eyes, not even a hint. He wasn’t going to let me go until one or both of us was dead.

  I saw a flash of talons behind the sasquatch’s head and then we were airborne, ripped up through the canopy of branches. I grasped his furry arm to try to stabilize myself somewhat and make sure I wasn’t dropped if the sasquatch loosened his grip. He twisted to roar up at the dragon carrying us and I shoved myself at him and wrapped myself around him with my arms and legs. I was not going to die by being dropped from…I made the mistake of lowering my gaze and I would have vomited if my airway hadn’t been obstructed. We were really, really high up.

  My own grip on the sasquatch tightened in abject terror and he must not have been able to get a good grip on my neck in our new position, because I found I was able to suck in small gasps of air.

  A screech below us made me look down again, and this time I saw another dragon. Chelsea’s flame-red, lithe dragon body was sailing below us. She was keeping pace with Benny and she peered up at me like she wanted me to…Oh, hell no. I wrapped my arms more securely around the sasquatch. I was not going to voluntarily drop from one dragon to another. I was not going to allow myself to fly…That thought must have gotten in with a little bit of air, because it gave me an idea. I pulled in a few breaths and tried and to calm myself. I closed my eyes and shifted to fairy size. I did it without considering the risks, because I knew I’d chicken out otherwise.

  As soon as I was tiny, the wind generated by Benny’s flapping wings sent me caroming back over the sasquatch’s shoulder and through the air in a tumble like I was going through a dryer. I was falling, dropping like a bullet, and I couldn’t stop spinning. This was bad, this was very, very bad.

  I hit something hard and bounced, then bounced again. I reached out with both hands, striving for something, anything to stop me, but I felt only air. I flapped my wings, trying to right myself, but another gust of wind, probably from another flap of dragon wings sent me spiraling again.

  I. Just. Wanted. To. Stop. Moving. Preferably before I hit something, but I’d take anything at this point. I tried flapping my wings again and finally righted myself. I was just above the tree tops and I was facing a flame red dragon with apology in her eyes. She used one talon to point to the east, but I shook my head. I was not flying anywhere else. I was going to find ground and I was going to shift back to human-size and I was never, never, ever going fairy small again.

  She let out a sigh that knocked me back a few feet and offered me her paw. It took a few moments of gesturing and snorting, but I finally understood what she wanted and climbed onto her extended paw.

  We flew until we reached a charred section of trees, below which I could see our friends standing. Chelsea got me as close to the ground as she could and I fluttered the last few feet to the dirt below. I shifted to human size and then I spread-eagled on the dirt and hugged the ground as hard as I could.

  It w
as about then that I realized my throat was on fire and it was harder to breathe than it should have been. Someone dropped down next to me in the dirt and placed a hand on the nape of my neck.

  “It’s okay, baby,” I heard Frost say. “Hieronymus is here.”

  I felt Hieronymus’ magic flow into me and the pain in my throat began to ease bit by bit. When he left me, I could breathe and my throat only ached a little. Hieronymus looked pale and was listing, his eyes at half-mast. Frost, who must have already been sitting on the ground, wrapped an arm around my shoulders and pulled me close.

  “It was bad?” I asked Hieronymus.

  “Your throat was collapsing,” Hieronymus said in a weak voice.

  “Move, move,” Chelsea screeched, racing toward us, completely naked. “We have to get to an open area.”

  None of us questioned her. Frost and I propped Hieronymus up between us and took off after Chelsea with Vin, Lensy, Jerome and Vervain following.

  Frost and I didn’t move very quickly, trying to make our way through dense brush, three people wide. “Leave me,” Hieronymus said.

  “Don’t be an idiot,” Frost growled.

  We were slow, but we made it to an open field. “Benny dropped the sasquatch far from here, but he’s fast and the fall probably didn’t hurt him,” Chelsea said. “We need to move before he tracks us.” She shifted to dragon just as Benny landed in the field. They both knelt and looked at us expectantly. They wanted us to ride?

  I took a step back. I was not going up in the air again. No. Way. “Wait,” I said. “We can’t leave Bluebell and Clove.”

  I looked around the field and realized I had no idea where the cavern was or how to get there. Frost stepped up next to me, a hand on my arm. “I’ll go with you,” he said.

  “Do you know how to get there?” I was filled with hope. Frost grew up in the wilderness and he had a wolf’s nose. He frowned and looked at the forest around us, his brow wrinkled in confusion.

  “I’ll get them,” Vervain said. “Everyone else should go with the dragons. We’ll meet you near the mountain peak.”

  “You can’t go alone,” Jerome said. “I’ll go with you.”

  Benny growled with frustration. “No,” I said. “I’ll go with Vervain. Everyone else should go with the dragons.” I tried not to let my relief at not having to go airborne be too obvious.

  “No,” Hieronymus said. He was already seated on Benny’s back and in no position to stop me.

  “You go,” Frost said. He pressed a kiss to my cheek and headed toward Chelsea, dragging Jerome with him.

  “Princess,” Hieronymus said, “you must not take the risk.”

  I rolled my eyes. I doubted it was safer on Benny’s back. The dragons had explained to us early on that they couldn’t carry us for long distances, much less many of us at the same time. The dragons were big, but they were more the size of a helicopter than an airplane. “I’ll see you soon,” I said. I blew a kiss to Benny and he flapped his wings and rose, unsteadily, into the sky, before Hieronymus could argue anymore.

  “Let’s go,” I said to Vervain. She nodded and started into the forest. I looked back once to see Frost watching me, his expression concerned, as he rose on Chelsea’s back. I waved to him and followed Vervain.

  We moved as quickly as we could, brambles and branches slapping at our skin, and reached the crevice in just under fifteen minutes. “I’ll shift and fly down,” I said to Vervain. “You watch for the sasquatch and get in here if you see him.”

  She nodded, her lips pursed. “I’m not an idiot.”

  I didn’t have time to soothe her hurt feelings, so I shifted to fairy and flew down the crevice and into the larger cavern. Bluebell and Clove were seated with their backs against the stone wall, their heads together as they spoke in low voices.

  I shifted back to full-size. “Bluebell,” I said without crossing the cavern to reach them. I’d heard or seen no sign of the sasquatch on our tail and yet I couldn’t forget how huge he was or the terrifying expression he wore. He may as well have been at the top of the crevice, breathing down our necks for how frantic I felt. “Clove. We need to go now.”

  Clove leapt to her feet and pulled on her pack. Bluebell followed suit, but she was pale and shaky. “What’s going on?”

  “The sasquatch is gone, but he’s making his way back here, fast. We need to go before he gets here.”

  Bluebell nodded, but she looked like she was about to be sick.

  As soon as they were ready, I shifted to fairy and flew to the bottom of the crevice. I shifted again and waited for them. Without Vervain, I was going to have to explain to them how to get up and out of the crevice, something I’d never done before myself.

  Clove looked back at Bluebell as she approached me. “She had a really hard time getting down here,” Clove said. “It’s going to take both of us to get her back up.”

  “Okay.” I looked up at the crevice, considering my options. Something smacked me right in the face and almost took out my left eye. Rubbing my cheek, I saw a length of rope. Vervain was indeed not an idiot.

  Using the rope, Clove and I helped Bluebell and ourselves out of the crevice. Vervain waited for us at the top. “Hurry,” she said. “We need to start climbing.”

  The four us watched as Vervain found a hand-hold and began to hoist herself up the thirty-foot rock wall.

  “Vervain,” I said. “None of us are going to be able to go that way.”

  She looked down at us, her eyes wide. “It’s very easy.”

  “Maybe for you,” I said. “But you have to trust me when I say it’s not easy for any of us.”

  Vervain frowned, but she dropped back down to the ground next to us. “There’s another way, but it’s twice as long.”

  “We don’t have any choice,” I said.

  Vervain jumped off the wall and started back into the woods the way we’d come. I followed Vervain, Bluebell followed me, and Clove held the rear. Luckily, the brush had been tramped down and there was a sort of path to follow, so we were able to jog down the mountain, before we took a hard right and started back up the mountain by another well-worn path. We were only a few feet up that path when we heard the roar of the sasquatch.

  Bluebell gasped, but she didn’t complain when Vervain picked up the pace. We raced up the mountain, but the sasquatch was fast, inhumanly fast. Faster than any fae I’d ever seen and, when Clove screamed, I knew we’d failed. We were about to be sasquatch food.

  A screech from above and a shadow blocking out the light, caused us to look up and see Benny hovering above us. He must have tracked us after he’d gotten the others to safety. Without an open field, there was no way he was going to be able to help, unless…“Everyone get down,” I yelled. I dropped and looked over my shoulder to see Clove hit the ground a few feet from the sasquatch, but she was covered in blood and she wasn’t moving. Flame heated the air around us as Benny burned away the top layer of the trees. I covered my mouth with a hand and prayed the entire forest didn’t catch fire. It hadn’t the last time Benny had blazed a clearing, but I wasn’t sure we’d be so lucky twice.

  Another blast of flame and then Benny shot down, grabbed the sasquatch by the shoulders and took off with him. Benny wasn’t flying very steadily, weaving like a drunk dragon in the sky, so I didn’t expect him to be able to get the sasquatch far. There had to be some way to kill that beast, but I doubted we’d discover it.

  I ran, bent over to avoid the smoke of the still smoldering forest, dragon flame must be less capable of spreading than regular fire. I dropped next to Clove. I didn’t bother looking for outward damage, I put my hands on her and dropped my healing energy into her body.

  “Please,” Bluebell said, her voice choked by fear and tears. “You have to help her.”

  I followed my healing energy to Clove’s most egregious injury, but my healing energy spun, unable to settle. Her head, her ribs, her spine, her organs, her…Her heart. She was a mess, like the sasquatch had squeezed her and
banged her head on a tree. There was…I rose out of her body and faced Bluebell, whose eyes were red-rimmed, tears running down her cheeks. “I’m so sorry,” I said.

  “No,” she said. “You have to…” She sobbed and grabbed both of my wrists. “Please. I will do anything. If you save her, I will owe you the debt for saving her life. I will give you…Everything I have. I…Please.”

  I’d never healed someone this close to death before and I knew…I knew that the price I paid could be my own life, but I had to try. I didn’t know Clove or Bluebell very well, but the agony on Bluebell’s face was real and I had the power to help her. I couldn’t not help her.

  I slipped my hands from Bluebell’s grasp and placed them on Clove’s chest. I dropped back inside and I began to heal her. I wasn’t sure where to start, because I wasn’t sure how far I’d get before I ran out of energy. A person with a working body but a non-working brain would be the same as a dead person.

  First, I tied up all the damaged veins in her heart and got everything pumping again. I heard a gasp from Bluebell and suspected fixing the heart had caused Clove’s bleeding to increase, but I couldn’t worry about that now.

  I moved on to Clove’s brain and let my healing energy restore the damaged parts and heal her cracked skull. I could feel my energy fading and I knew I had to work faster, because fixing everything would do no good if she had no blood left in her body.

  The cracked ribs weren’t poking anything vital, so I left them and healed her spleen and liver. I healed the lacerations that were allowing blood to pour from her and then I moved on to her spine.

  Everything was a bit fuzzy and I could feel my physical body sway, but I pushed on. I had to heal her spine, I had to…My healing energy found two cracks and I pushed that energy toward them. I pushed everything I had at that broken spine and then my world went dark.

  ***

  My head and my back ached. I shifted, but it only made the pain worse. I realized the pain wasn’t coming from the inside, but from the outside. I opened my eyes and I saw a view to die for, a view of a valley, treed and green and heart-stopping-ly beautiful. Also, heart stopping? The fact that I was up high enough to see that view and wasn’t being offered that landscape as a screen saver on my computer screen.