“Mildred can’t fly. She’s too heavy.” Wynn shook her head. The girl didn’t lose any of her wonder as she continued to pet Mildred. The hen closed her eyes and cooed in contentment. Sometimes the girl buried her fingers in Mildred’s fluffy feathers. Other times she stroked carefully over the bird’s smooth wings. Finally she smiled. It was a pretty smile, even though her scars reached down to her lip on one side. Wynn didn’t think she used it often, but she should.
“Thank you. I’ve always wondered.” The girl handed the hen back to Wynn. She took Mildred gratefully, and settled the hen in her lap.
They sat in silence for a while. Wynn thought carefully about everything she said. “Your name is Stripeless?” she asked.
“That seems silly.” The girl gave her another smile, this one was more like Zephyr.
“What is your name?” Wynn asked again, more insistently this time. She didn’t like not knowing what to call the girl.
“I call myself ‘I.’ Or sometimes ‘me.’ I have never needed more than that. You are the one who needs something to call me. What would you choose?” She leaned forward over the fire she had made in the rocks. The light flickered over her skin, lighting the warm brown tones with soft golden light. Wynn remembered the mark on her back, flames in the shape of a star. Fairies were always named for the magic they could do. She had fire in her hair, and smoke for a dress.
“Flame,” Wynn said. She wished she could make rocks catch on fire. That would be easier than lighting tinder with flint.
The girl closed her eyes a minute. Shadow rumbled a low growl and squinted. Finally the girl smiled again. “Shadow likes it. I think I do too. You may call me Flame if you want. I’ll do my best to answer if you call it.”
Just then Wynn’s stomach growled as loud as Shadow.
“Hungry?” Flame smiled again, and for a second she seemed very familiar. She pushed herself up, leaning on her staff. “I’ll go out and get us something to eat. Stay here with Shadow where you are safe.”
“It’s dark.” Wynn stood and looked out the doorway. It was pitch-black beyond the crumbling room.
Flame tipped her head to the side. The scars across her face stood out in the dim light. “Don’t worry. I’ll get along fine. I’ll be right back.”
Wynn watched as Flame strode past her and out the door. Wynn followed her out, keeping a hand on the door frame. Flame swept her staff in front of her, then climbed up the crumbling ruins like a cat.
Now she was very alone. Except for Shadow. Wynn noticed a white rock at her feet. She picked it up and rubbed it. It was soft and sandy for a rock. Wynn liked it. It felt good in her hand so she kept it. Wynn came back inside as Shadow rose and circled around her. Mildred hopped up on a branch of the tree root. She looked happy as she tucked her beak in her feathers and fell asleep.
Wynn sat by the fire and tried to wait. She didn’t like waiting. The rock warmed in her palm, and she passed it from hand to hand. Softly she sang a song under her breath. It was her favorite song. The one that told the way to the Silver Gate. She and Elric had battled many scary things to reach the gate. She knew he would come for her.
But she was far from him. She had to get closer to where he could find her. She needed help. She didn’t think Flame would help her. She was nice, but she liked it here in the woods. Wynn needed to go home.
Wynn tapped the rock on the stone floor. It left little white marks where she tapped. She looked at the stone again, then pulled it slowly against the floor. It left a dull white line.
She could draw! She would fix the picture on the wall. That would keep her busy.
Wynn found a smooth, dark part of the wall and scratched the stone against it. Shadow made a funny noise in her throat and came forward. She sat next to Wynn, watching Wynn draw a new picture.
Wynn continued to sing, and Shadow flopped her tail back and forth. Each soft thump landed in time with the song. Wynn rubbed Shadow’s ear and sang louder, before turning back to her picture. She had to do a good job.
Wynn worked a long time. She was very focused on her picture when she drew the last little part.
“Why are you over there?” Flame’s voice filled the room. Wynn had gotten used to the quiet. She jumped up and dropped her drawing rock on the ground. It clattered at her feet. She stepped away from the wall.
“You’re back!” Wynn was very glad Flame was safe and didn’t get lost in the dark or eaten by a monster. She gave her a big hug. Flame seemed surprised, and held her arms stiffly down, without wrapping them around Wynn’s shoulders. Wynn let go. Maybe Flame didn’t know hugging. Wynn smiled anyway. “I made a picture for you,” Wynn said.
Flame dropped a clump of bulbous fruits by the fire. She squinted again, coming very close to the wall. Her nose almost touched it as she looked at Wynn’s drawing. Then she reached out and touched the wall, drawing her finger over it.
“What is it?” she asked.
Wynn felt sad. She wasn’t very good at drawing. The people looked like sticks, and Mildred was a blob with two legs poking out of her sides. Shadow’s stripes didn’t stay in her lines. “It’s you and me and Mildred and Shadow. We are all together. We are friends.”
Shadow pressed her enormous head against Wynn’s side. She almost fell over as the cat rubbed against her. Flame turned away from the wall. “Thank you,” she said. Her voice sounded different. “Shadow likes it very much. She says it is wonderful.”
Wynn wrapped her arms around Shadow’s neck and gave the tigereon a tight squeeze. “You’re welcome.”
“Come, sit by the fire and eat.” Flame used a stone knife to slice off a chunk of the dark purple fruit. Its insides were bright yellow and a little bit stringy. She handed a piece to Wynn. Wynn took a bite, and immediately shoved as much as she could in her mouth. It was sweet!
She smiled, but then the flavor changed. It turned bitter. Wynn swallowed it quickly.
“Do you like it?” Flame asked. She took her own bite, and chewed it without flinching.
“I like the sweet part,” she said. She took another piece. She knew how it felt to be so hungry it was dangerous. She wouldn’t turn down food, even if it did taste bitter at the end.
“The fruit nearby is better here than any other place in the wood.” She wiped her chin with the back of her hand. “Fruit in the rest of the wood only tastes bitter.”
“Thank you,” Wynn said, helping herself to more.
“It’s a blessing and a curse. The elves come around here to pick the sweet fruit sometimes. That’s when we have to hide.” Shadow settled down between them, and curled her long tail around Wynn. “Shadow and I used to live near the rock ledges. The sweet fruit grew there, too. The elves came around so often to gather them, we had move to a new part of the forest, a hollow near the stream. After a while, the fruit there turned sweet as well. We came here not long ago. Now the sweet fruit is growing here. It seems to be spreading. We’ll have to move again before long.”
“Are the elves mean?” Wynn asked. The fairies always said they were bad.
“They aren’t mean. They’re very desperate. They do what they must to survive. As long as you stay away from them, they aren’t a bother. It’s the fairies they are really after.” Flame used her staff to prod the fiery rocks. Sparks flew up and drifted toward the ceiling. “There is something about you I don’t understand.”
Wynn knew what that was like. She didn’t say anything, just tucked her ruined dress around her legs.
Flame didn’t really look at her, but stared past her out the door. “If you were safe underneath that shield, why did you come into the wood? You were protected there.”
“A snake tricked me,” Wynn said. She felt heat rising in her face. She was very angry at that snake. “It looked like Mildred. She was hurt. I needed to help.”
Flame brought her pale gaze back toward Wynn. “You risked your own safety for your bird?” Her hand stroked Shadow’s neck.
“She is my friend,” Wynn said. “Friends do
nice things.”
Flame’s forehead wrinkled. She looked like she was thinking hard. The fire danced over the rocks, sometimes growing bright, and other times dimming to a soft glow. “I will help you find your way back,” she said. “You don’t belong in these woods. If you are my friend, I’ll get you home.”
In the distance, a reaper howled.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Elric
ELRIC SPENT MOST OF THE night awake, sitting on the floor near his window staring out at the wood and praying for his sister. The night sky was unbearably bright underneath the glowing dome. He could see the darkness beyond it, and imagined Wynn lost or hurt somewhere in those shadows.
He paced until exhaustion forced him to sit again. He didn’t want to go anywhere near his bed. He knew he would fall asleep, and that would feel like giving up. The hours slowly passed, with Elric only feeling more and more sick with his situation. He could see no way out.
Then he felt a cool breeze against his cheek.
Zephyr appeared next to him. “Hello, Prince.”
“Zeph!” Elric shot to his feet. It was such a relief not to be alone, locked in his room with his grief. He really needed a friend. “I’m so glad you’re here. What time is it?” He had lost track of the hours in the quiet part of the night.
“Not yet morning. It is still dark beyond the dome.” Zephyr’s feet left the floor as he peered through the window.
“I can’t leave her out there, Zeph,” he said. “I have to get out of here and find her. If there’s any chance at all that she’s alive, I can’t give up.”
Zephyr looked down and nodded. “I know. That’s why I brought help.”
With a wave of his hand, a sparkling mist covered the door, then faded to nothing. It slowly opened to reveal Osmund standing on the other side holding his woodcutter’s ax.
“So, are we going into the Nightfell Wood or not?” he asked with his usual ambivalence. But Elric could see the light in the man’s eye.
Elric stared at the man in his doorway in shock. His mind was reeling. He thought that Osmund had sided with the Fairy Queen. Osmund stepped through the door and softly shut it behind him as if nothing were amiss.
“But—but you betrayed us,” Elric stammered as he stared down the man. “You told the queen to lock me up!”
Osmund shrugged. “The Otherworld has taught me a thing or two,” he said. “Including how to say one thing and mean another. Masking intentions can come in handy, especially when you need to get away with something dangerous and you don’t want your mother to know. If I hadn’t said what I said, the queen would have locked me up too, and then where would we be?” Osmund glanced around Elric’s room. “I told you to play along before we left the Otherworld, but like always, you have trouble listening.”
Elric stared at him with his mouth agape.
“So, are we going to save Wynn or what?” Osmund asked. He held out his hand. Elric hesitated only a moment, then took it. Osmund helped him to his feet. “We need to be sneaky to get out of here. There aren’t many fairies around at this time in the morning, but the ones who are walking around are almost all guards. We have to take care or we’ll be spotted.”
“I can help with that,” Zephyr stated. “I’ve been working on something.”
He pressed his palms together. A strange blue-gray shadow formed around his fingers. Slowly he drew them apart and made a motion similar to shaking out a blanket. The shadow grew and stretched. It filled the air above their heads, then settled down over them. Elric felt the weight of it, like the cool, moist air of a summer night lingering on his skin.
He looked up at Osmund, and all the color was gone from the man. His normally green tunic looked shadowy gray, and his dark brown hair was now black. Elric looked down at his own hands, and his skin was the color of bleached wool. Zephyr floated in the air, an enormous grin spread across his face. “I can’t believe that really worked!”
“What did you do?” Elric asked, still looking at his ghostly gray hands.
“I gathered twilight,” he said. “I’ve cloaked you with it. As long as you aren’t moving, you will disappear from sight. The magic should be stronger in the shadows, but I’m not sure how long it will last. It’s a new magic for me.”
“It’s brilliant,” Elric said. “We still might need a distraction to get out of the palace, though. The fewer eyes on us, the better.”
Zephyr nodded. “I can take care of that. I’m good at distraction. Listen, once you pass through the shield, there is no way to get back inside unless a fairy lets you through. I will stay by the twisted oak near the shield to the north of the gardens. That’s the place where Wynn disappeared. I will stand there for the next hundred years if I have to, so you’d better come back quickly, because it is going to be terribly boring waiting around for you that long.”
Elric clapped Zephyr on the back. “You’re a true friend.”
Zephyr turned to Osmund. “I know what you think, but I won’t let you down.”
Elric got the impression something was amiss between the fairy and the former prince as Osmund glared at him. “You’d better not,” Osmund warned. “Or I’ll have your head.”
Zephyr turned. “Elric, am I not reliable?”
Elric gave the fairy a sidelong look. He didn’t know Zephyr to be reliable, but he chose to trust him now. Elric gathered the contents of a bowl of fruit near his window and dropped them into his old traveling sack. “I’m glad to have you at my back. We will find you at the oak when the time comes.”
Zephyr’s smile faded, and suddenly he looked more serious than Elric had ever seen him. He nodded. “Go, and good luck.”
Osmund gripped his ax with both hands, and Elric looked around his room. The handle of the silver sword the queen had given him glinted from its mounting on the wall. He climbed on his bed to pull the hilt from the hooks. The blade gleamed like moonlight and the blue heart of fire.
Elric rifled through his overturned things to find his belt and a scabbard. He looked at the sword again and had a sinking feeling. “This sword is a relic. It’s full of fairy magic. It was never meant for me.”
Osmund hitched his ax over his shoulder, “That’s the nature of being a changeling. You never quite fit in. The only question that matters is, is it sharp and pointy?”
Elric let out a snort and put the sword in the scabbard.
Osmund tucked his short ax into the strap of his sack. Let’s go.”
The three of them crept through the door. Zephyr disappeared and Osmund and Elric pressed against the wall. Elric watched in amazement as the details of Osmund’s hands, then his arms and shoulders, slowly blurred and melted until he couldn’t make out Osmund at all.
“The way is clear,” Zephyr’s voice whispered as a soft breeze blew through the hall. Elric pushed forward and hurried down the stairs with Osmund behind him. The steps seemed to fly under his feet. He felt as if he were sliding down the stairs, his shoes barely touching the ground as he raced downward.
A stiff wind hit him, harsh and cold.
“Back,” Osmund whispered, and he pressed himself into a nook. Elric followed and held perfectly still. Once more, he watched his body melt into the wall as if he didn’t exist. It was like being in a dream, floating through the air, but he was awake. He could still feel his body even though he couldn’t see it. He wondered if this is what Zephyr felt like every time he became the air.
A fairy climbed the stair, carrying a heavy dark cloth. Mourning chimes rang from the bells he had tied around his waist and ankles.
Once the fairy had passed, Osmund nudged Elric. It was eerie watching Osmund’s hand appear as he moved it, to tap Elric on his invisible arm. No matter how long he lived in this world, he wasn’t sure he would ever get used to magic.
They came to the entrance of the throne room. Now was the time they needed a distraction. Four guards lingered in the chamber, including Lord Raven. He was talking to a fairy in the form of a large owl perched near the fract
ured crystal. They both inspected the thin lines of silvery mist still leaking from it.
A metallic clang echoed just beyond the main chamber door. Shouts rang out as the sound of water splashing on stone rang through the chamber. All the fairies turned their heads. The guards twisted and disappeared, only to reappear as a badger, hawk, boar, and wolf. Raven didn’t change form, instead he ran toward the door muttering under his breath. The owl flew after him.
“Zephyr, get back here! You are to set this right!” Raven’s voice called out.
Whatever Zephyr had done, it had worked.
Cloaked in shadow, Elric and Osmund ran toward the halls that led to the kitchens and the gardens beyond.
Once in the darkness of the abandoned kitchens, Zephyr’s spell seemed to pull night from the air around them, and hid them even as they ran. They snuck right past two fairies running toward whatever mess Zephyr had made. Once they reached the fields of flowers, Elric finally felt free. He wanted to run as fast as he could, but kept his pace measured to stay with Osmund.
They became one with the shadows of the early dawn as they finally reached the shield. Elric knew at least one of the dangers that lurked in the darkness of the wood. The reapers were terrifying, and he didn’t know what other monsters awaited him. He reached out, then hesitated to touch the shield. He could get lost out there. He could be trapped in the wood, too. Would he know enough to find his way? Did he have the courage to find his sister?
Osmund stepped forward. “Wynn has the heart of a dragon,” Osmund reminded him. “She’s out there somewhere. Let’s go get her back.”
Together they stepped through the shield and into the darkness beyond.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Wynn
WYNN WOKE TO A GENTLE tap on her shoulder.
“It’s morning,” Flame said.
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