However, tonight the fresh breeze and the charm of the forest wrapped in silver speckled shadows didn't call to Linna. She was more interested in the place she had been than where she could go and, instead of slipping out from under her warm blanket, she took a deep breath and pulled it to her chin. She closed her eyes, reached back and tried to take hold of her dream. As usual, her memory was hazy, filled mostly with feelings and scents and colors. She had to concentrate to remember more than the feel of the bark beneath her fingers and the yellow sunlight filtering through the leaves. There was always sunlight, because in Faerie, where Father Willow lived and had welcomed her visits for nearly seventeen years, the sun was still taking its turn around the dance floor.
Linna groaned in frustration. She wished again for the thousandth time that she could just fall back to sleep and return to Father Willow’s meadow, but she was only granted one visit per night. In her younger days, she had tried to make her way back to the old tree’s side a second time in the same night, but she had never been successful. She would have to wait until the next evening to return, and then only if her dream found its way into his corner of Faerie.
“Linna, you idiot,” she chided herself. Why had she spoken and ruined everything? You would think that you had learned to keep your mouth shut after all this time.
She sighed and waited patiently while the fragments of her dream wheeled about her mind. Linna was used to the trouble it took to remember the specifics of her visits to Father Willow, probably because Faerie encouraged light thoughts and anything heavier often sank out of reach.
Father Willow she naturally recalled; he was always rooted deeply in her dreams. He was her guide, her protector and her teacher when she walked there, and had been since the first time she fell asleep in her bed and awoke in his arms.
After a minute or so, the dream began to piece itself into a whole that she could understand. Little brown leaf sprites playing...looking exactly like leaves to the untrained eye...rolling around like puppies at Father Willow’s feet...stretching out their arms to catch the wind and ride it....
That’s right. Father Willow had taken her hand and held it fast when she had begun to walk away, following the voices in the wind.
That breeze, she thought. It had warmed her and reached out to her heart when it blew by. Never had she felt such a strong attraction to the hint of something in the wind. If it had been a movement, it would have been a hug. If it had spoken, it would have said, “Come.” If it were a scent, it would have been jasmine, freshly blooming. If she could have tasted it, it would have been butter on fresh bread, hot from the oven. She had wanted to know the moment it had brushed her skin: What had the wind swept over before it made its way to me?
Remembering how she had wanted immediately to see what beautiful soul laughed with the sun in its voice, Linna frowned at how Father Willow had held her back. Why had he stopped her? He had always brought her amazing folk to play with in the past. One of his favorite things was to share the lovely creatures of Faerie with his adopted daughter. He was always teaching her about his world. Her earliest memories were filled with charming and wondrous visitors. She had played with nymphs, sprites, little vole people and many others. She had even met a centaur once, although his severe manner and irritated frown had scared the six-year old Linna; she had practically sewn herself to Father Willow's side for the entire visit.
A select few of his friends would sometimes become her special guardians and take her into the woods outside the meadow. They had shown her the wonders of Faerie and introduced her to even more friends. He would swell with satisfaction when she returned from spending time with her teachers and playmates, so why had he kept her from leaving the meadow tonight? Was it because she would have gone alone? Did he think that a girl her age still needed a chaperone?
A short, irritable hmph accompanied the question: Doesn’t he know that my eyes and ears are sharp, and my mind is even sharper?
Linna wasn’t a child anymore. She was nearly a grown woman, and, despite the fact that she was always a little hazy and her abilities were limited when she visited him as a dreamwalker, she still could easily take care of herself. She had heard many voices in her nearly seventeen years and she had been taught by Nana, a genuine forestchild, to listen carefully. She had learned to differentiate between the forest’s knights and knaves before she could even speak and had not fallen for a knavish trick in many, many years. At the very least, she only needed to speak a word to return safely to her body in her own world. She couldn’t think of one good reason for Father Willow to keep her in his meadow.
Linna turned onto her side, tucking her arm under her head and pulling up her knees comfortably. She wiggled her head until it fit just right in the crook of her elbow and, with a quick burst of air from her lips, blew aside the strand of wavy, black hair that had fallen forward to tickle her tan face.
After one last huff, she cast aside her irritation and cradled in her heart the memory of joy on the wind. What had intrigued her, beyond the playfulness imprinted on the breeze, was the scent that it had carried, the scent of a knight. The energy of a knight, be it plant, animal, or one of the forest's fae folk, was something she had always been able to spot in a heartbeat. Nana had told her that even when she was a young child, she had been drawn to the different knights that lived in their forest, fearlessly hugging or playing with any that she encountered. Once she had even met a human with a knight's soul. She had guided the lost traveler out of their forest and pointed the woman in the direction of the town she was seeking when she was only seven years old. She could still remember the lady's cheerful smile and warm, compassionate spirit. Knights were such beautiful souls. She couldn't help her attraction to them. Their hearts were filled with a quality that she admired. Like Nana, they were protectors of the land and the folk that resided in it.
Linna wondered what kind of knight it was that tread a soft path through Father Willow's woods. Perhaps a herd wandered with its buck, or a flock visited its mother tree. Since it was clearly lively, it might have been a kind of sprite she hadn’t yet met, although she had never known a sprite that was also a knight...they tended to be knavish. It might have been something more rare, a woodland child or something that had found a Door to Faerie. Whatever it was, she wanted to meet it at least once, because a knight was a treasure to behold.
Linna curled up tighter under her blanket and let the memory of a sweet heart fill her, warm and bright and strong.
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About the Author
Laura Rheaume lives in Southern California with her husband and sons. A teacher by profession, she is also a student of aikido and a lover of road trips with the family. The Halfblood Series was her first major work and is based on a short story she wrote one spring break while camping on one of California's beautiful beaches. She has also written a stand-alone fantasy entitled Father Willow's Daughter. Your visit would be welcome at her website:
http://www.halfbloodheritage.com.
Halfblood Legacy Page 63