In a Dark Land

by Christina Soontornvat

  “You lost the Piper’s flute already?” said the freckled Whelp with a cluck of her tongue. “Such a shame what happened to him. I always liked him.”

  The other Whelp pouted sadly. “He used to come visit us all the time. Never asked us any questions. Had lovely manners.”

  “Good clothes too,” said her sister.

  Izzy could hear the shouts of Fillifut and the whack of bodies running through reeds. “Please. We’re in a hurry.”

  “Speaking of manners,” said the freckled Fen Whelp.

  Her sister leaned forward, sizing Izzy up. “If Peter sent you, then he must have told you that we don’t answer questions up top.”

  “You mean we have to go under?” asked Hen.

  The Whelp smiled, her thin lips exposing rows of small gray teeth. “That’s not your question, is it?”

  “No, it’s not!” Izzy looked behind her. The Fillifut were drawing closer. “OK. What do we do? Wait!” It was so hard to remember not to waste a question! “What I meant to say is, please tell us what to do next.”

  The Fen Whelps shared a satisfied smile between them.

  Groaning, they rose up to their full height, ribbons of black water rolling off their skin. Izzy’s legs felt weak beneath her. The Whelps had bodies like walruses, but they were at least twice the size. Thick folds of blubbery white skin cascaded down from their shoulders. They pumped their tails, heaving themselves into the shallows toward her.

  The Whelp with the freckles leaned forward and held out her thick flipper to Hen. “Ready?” she whispered.

  Hen reached for the flipper with one hand and pinched her nose shut with the other. “Come on, Izzy.”

  Izzy took a deep breath and forced herself to walk. She inhaled sharply as her boots filled with the frigid lake water.

  The other Whelp grinned down at her. Izzy reached out and took hold of the rubbery flipper.

  With a snarl, the Whelp pulled her under.

  19

  A Tale of Betrayal and Heartache

  The cold water wrapped around Izzy as the Whelp pulled her swiftly down, farther and farther from the light rippling on the surface above.

  Izzy’s chest burned. She writhed in the Whelp’s grip, trying to tell the creature she needed air. She was about to die! The Whelp pulled her faster. Izzy’s feet touched something solid. The Whelp reached down and scooped a plug of black silt up from the bottom. She shoved it into Izzy’s mouth.

  Izzy choked on the slime, gagging as it slid down her throat. She sucked in a breath, expecting to feel water fill her lungs. Instead, it felt like taking a gulp of cold air on a winter day. She breathed in and out, cautiously at first, then more easily when she realized she wouldn’t drown.

  Hen bobbed on the sand beside her, like an astronaut bouncing on the moon. “This is the coolest thing ever!”

  Hen’s words came out clearly, not in the gurgling voice Izzy expected. “You mean the weirdest thing ever,” said Izzy, pushing away a strand of hair that kept floating in front of her face.

  The Whelps had swum a few yards away. They reclined on the sand, flicking their tails, looking bored.

  “Well, here we are,” said the Whelp with the gray freckles, resting her chin on her flipper. “I’d offer you something to eat. But I doubt we have the same tastes in snacks.” She licked her sharp teeth with a thick gray tongue.

  Her sister picked a wooden doll up off the sand and twirled it around. The Whelps gave Izzy the creeps. She remembered what Tom said about them, how they chewed up people they didn’t like, bones and all.

  Hen didn’t seem afraid of them. She bobbed over to the one with the doll. “Can I see her? Did you make her? I mean—” Hen caught herself. “I wonder if you made her.”

  The Whelp handed the toy to Hen. “Yes, we make all of them.” She nodded behind her to a pile of wooden bodies with jointed limbs.

  “Oh wow,” said Hen. “That’s cool. I have dolls at home, but I never made one before.”

  “They aren’t dolls,” snapped the freckled Whelp.

  The creature swam over and lifted one of the figurines out of the pile. She tugged on strings tied to its limbs, and it danced on the bottom.

  “Puppets!” cried Hen. “Me and Izzy love puppets!”

  “You do?” the Whelps asked in unison.

  “Yeah, at home, we do puppet shows for Mom and Dad all the time,” said Hen. “Izzy comes up with the stories, and I act them out. Izzy knows every story there ever was.”

  The Whelps exchanged a look. “Not every story.”

  The freckled one smoothed Hen’s floating curls off her face. “I bet we know one she doesn’t.”

  The other Whelp scooped up an armful of marionettes. “We never, ever get an audience! Any visitors we get just ask their questions and leave.”

  The freckled Whelp swam close to Izzy. “Have you thought of your question yet?” she said in her ear.

  Izzy’s pulse quickened, but her brain felt waterlogged. She should have had this part planned out beforehand. She had to ask the question in the right way. If she asked, “Who am I?” or “Where am I from?” the Whelps could answer her with one or two words, and that would be the end of it. She shut her eyes. How had Peter phrased it that day in Avhalon?

  “I think there is some story that connects me to Rine and the King’s Key,” she started.

  The Whelps grew still and leaned forward a little.

  Encouraged, Izzy continued. “And I know Peter plays some role…”

  The Whelps grinned at each other.

  “I wish I could know all about him, about me, the witches, and how we all fit together.”

  “A question,” said the Fen Whelps. “It must be a question.”

  Izzy took a deep breath. “All right. I think I’ve got it. My question is, what part do I play in the story of Earth and Faerie?”

  The Whelps broke into giggles. They clapped their flippers together like excited children.

  They took Izzy and Hen by the hands and swam them to a gravelly patch of the lakebed.

  The freckled one ran her flipper under Hen’s chin. “Your sister has asked a very good question! The perfect question. To answer it, we’ll have to tell you a story.”

  Hen squeezed Izzy’s arm as they settled down on the gravel. “Good job!”

  “I guess,” said Izzy. “At least they don’t seem like they’re about to eat us.”

  The light shone down from the surface onto a wooden platform built onto the lakebed. It had been set up like a miniature stage, with fabric curtains waving gently at the back. The Whelps swam behind the curtain, whispering to each other as fabric rustled and wood clacked against wood.

  The freckled Whelp rose up, grinning. She cleared her throat and announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome one and all! We now present for you…”

  “Bada-bum-bum!” said the other.

  “…a performance we call A Tale of Betrayal and Heartache!”

  The light focused on the stage, and the Whelps receded into darkness. A marionette floated down into the spotlight. Izzy could barely see the silhouettes of the Whelps controlling the strings above.

  “Of all the weird things I’ve seen in Faerie, this is definitely the weirdest,” she whispered to Hen. “A puppet show at the bottom of a lake!”

  “Shh! It’s starting!”

  The marionette strolled to the lip of the stage. A blue suit had been sewn onto him, and he held a little tin rod in one hand. He bowed to the audience and raised the metal rod to his face.

  “That’s got to be Peter!” said Hen. “That’s his flute!”

  This was a different kind of magic than anything Izzy had seen before. The strange light and the undulating fabric made the Peter marionette seem alive. He sauntered across the stage, flute to his lips. Even though his features were just painted on, the Fen
Whelps had captured him perfectly. It made Izzy realize how much she missed him. The curtains parted, revealing a painted forest backdrop that Izzy assumed must be the Edgewood.

  Two smaller marionettes followed behind him. They were both boys, both with round ears. These were human children Peter had lured into Faerie as part of the Exchange. They didn’t look alike. One had straight dark hair and olive skin. He had a wooden crutch attached to his arm, and it swung out in front of him with every step.

  The other boy had thick brown curls. He turned his head all around, looking in wonder at the painted trees of the Edgewood. The Fen Whelps had used green glass beads for his eyes. They caught the light and sparkled.

  “Who’s that?” asked Hen.

  Izzy sat up straighter. “I think it’s supposed to be Rine when he was a boy.”

  “And who’s his friend?”

  A swishing whisper came from backstage. Shush-a-shush-a-sash-a-sash-a.

  “Sasha,” murmured Hen. She said it louder. “Sasha? Yeah, I think that’s his name—Sasha.”

  The Good Peter puppet stopped center stage. The boys peeked out timidly from behind him. Two more marionettes, a fairy man and woman, entered the scene. Stiff smiles had been painted across their faces. Peter put one hand on each boy’s shoulder and guided them to follow the fairy couple, who hugged them close.

  “What’s going on?” asked Hen.

  “I think Peter is bringing those boys to live with that fairy couple,” said Izzy. “They’re adopting Rine and Sasha.”

  The Peter marionette exited the stage. The fairy couple’s faces changed. They scowled at the two boys, who cowered under them.

  “I don’t like them,” whispered Hen. “They look mean.”

  Rine and Sasha sat at the lip of the stage, scrubbing at the wood with tiny rags while the fairies loomed over them, wagging their wooden fingers. At one point, the woman kicked Sasha’s crutch out from under him, and he clattered against the stage.

  Hen gasped. “Hey! They can’t do that to him!”

  “Peter told me that sometimes the Exchange goes wrong,” whispered Izzy. “He said that fairies aren’t always nice to the human kids they take in.”

  The light flared in Rine’s glass eyes, but he couldn’t fight back. The stage lights dimmed.

  “Was that the end of the show?” asked Hen.

  “I think it was just the first act,” said Izzy.

  The lights came up again, and the boy marionettes had been replaced with older versions of themselves. The same green glass eyes for Rine, the same crutch tucked under Sasha’s arm. In this scene, the friends were on the run.

  Or rather, one of the Fen Whelps held the puppets dangling at center stage while the other turned a crank that made the painted backdrop scroll quickly behind them. When it stopped, it showed tall mountains topped with snow. A stone cottage stood on one of the slopes. The friends smiled. They hugged each other. And even though Izzy knew she was watching Rine, her enemy, she was glad the boys had escaped their cruel fairy family.

  The next act of the play showed Rine and Sasha hard at work. They were learning how to be witches.

  Sasha sat at a desk piled high with a stack of books. He pored over them while the stage lighting went from bright to dim, again and again, to show the passage of days. Sasha obsessed over one book in particular. Izzy scooted closer to the edge of the stage to see. Her heart thumped when she realized what it was. The leather cover had a scrolling B on the front, just like The Book of the Bretabairn.

  While Sasha stayed inside with his books, Rine hiked all over the stage, lifting up rocks and looking underneath, plucking plants and grinding them up. When the two friends came together, they showed each other the magic they’d learned that day. Rine had been working on something special—something he was eager to show his friend.

  In the next scene, Rine and Sasha stood in the Edgewood again, near the village where they had first been adopted. The Rine marionette approached the village, arms held out.

  Hen sat up on her heels. “What’s he about to do?”

  Izzy shivered, remembering what Peter had told her the day he brought her back to Faerie. Some humans have quite a capacity for vengefulness. “I think he’s about to get revenge,” she whispered.

  The stage lighting shifted to red. One of the Fen Whelps rippled yellow and orange ribbons among the village buildings. Rine had used his spells to set the entire village on fire. He watched it burn, his green eyes glowing with the light from the flames. Sasha tried to stop him, but Rine shook him off.

  Rine turned his back on the burning village and walked off stage without looking back. Sasha watched him leave, shielding his eyes from the blaze.

  Hen rose up on her knees and pointed to the burning village. “Look, look! There’s something in there!”

  Izzy leaned forward so she could see. A small object lay tucked in between the buildings. Sasha crept toward the fire. He plucked the tiny bundle up out of the flames and held it in the crook of his arm. The Whelps added sound effects: a gurgle and coo.

  “Aw,” said Hen. “Look, Izzy. It’s a baby.”

  Izzy held very still. The bundle was just a stage prop, a smooth stone wrapped in a scrap of fabric. But Izzy knew they had come to the point in the story where she made her entrance.

  That little bundle was her. And all the rest of her birth family and her village were burning up, smothered in the red and yellow ribbons of fire.

  The lights blacked out. Time for the next act.

  Back in their mountain cottage, a spotlight shone on Sasha’s desk, center stage. The other lights remained low. It was nighttime, and he was alone. He held the baby, bouncing it on his good knee, turning the pages of The Book of the Bretabairn with the other hand. In one swift motion, he ripped out a page. He sat looking at it for a long time. Then he folded it into a small square.

  Sasha placed the square of paper on the baby’s chest. He shut his eyes and swayed gently, like he was rocking her to sleep. A golden light began to glow on the baby where the square of paper lay. The baby cooed, comfortable in Sasha’s arms, while he kept repeating the spell over and over.

  Izzy placed her hand over her own chest. She felt a warm prickling sensation in her heart as she watched the light grow brighter and brighter and then blaze like a firecracker before going out completely.

  Hen reached over and took Izzy’s hand. “Are you OK? You look like you’re going to be sick.”

  Izzy nodded but couldn’t answer. She felt hot and cold at the same time, and her pulse thrummed in her temples.

  Onstage, Sasha peered down at the baby, looking worried, but she was fine. She even laughed when he tickled her. The page from The Book of the Bretabairn was gone. Sasha had hidden it inside the baby’s heart.

  In the next act, Sasha and Good Peter appeared onstage together. Sasha pressed the baby into Peter’s arms. Even though the puppets didn’t speak, Izzy knew this part of the story. Sasha was asking Peter to hide the baby somewhere Rine could never go. He was begging Peter to take her to Earth.

  Peter tilted his face at Sasha, as if to ask why, but Sasha shook his head. He wouldn’t explain. He looked over both shoulders, like he worried someone would be listening. Finally, Peter shrugged and nodded. He would take the baby.

  Sasha bowed to him. He turned and exited stage right, leaning heavier on his crutch than before. Peter left the stage in the opposite direction with the baby.

  One final act remained. The lights dimmed. Props scraped against the stage as the Fen Whelps set the last scene. When the lights came up, Sasha lay in bed, his crutch leaning against the headboard. Rine kneeled beside him, waving his arms over the bedcovers, working spell after spell. Sasha held up his hand to stop him.

  “Oh no,” whispered Hen. Izzy squeezed her hand.

  There was nothing else to be done. Rine hadn’t learned the spell to stop
death. Maybe that spell didn’t exist.

  The lights went down. When they came up again, Rine stood looking down on a gray headstone, holding Sasha’s crutch. He bent down to lay the crutch over the grave, but at the last minute, he flung it off the lip of the stage. It landed in the sand near Izzy’s feet.

  Rine’s wooden jaw dropped open, and he let out a horrible, heartbreaking cry. He sank to his knees, head hanging down in his lap. The marionette was so still that Izzy thought the play was over. But then Rine looked up into the audience, straight at Izzy and Hen.

  His eyes flickered angrily. The light in them grew brighter and brighter until the whole marionette glowed like a torch, tinting the stage and the sand green. Rine flamed white hot. Izzy shielded her face. There was a loud crack, like an explosion, and then everything went dark.

  Izzy opened her eyes. Trails of bright-green sparks floated down from the stage and fizzled in the sand.

  The Fen Whelps floated out from behind the curtain and swam in front of the stage. They linked flippers and bowed deeply.

  Hen wiped the corners of her eyes. She stood up and applauded.

  “There you have it,” said the freckled Whelp.

  “I do believe that was the best performance we have ever given,” said the other.

  Izzy still held her hand over her heart. She felt numb, like her mouth wouldn’t form words. Her lungs had started to burn.

  Izzy looked at Hen, who had a strained look on her face.

  “Oh, we should tell you,” said the freckled Whelp casually. “Once your question is answered, you must get back to the surface.”

  The other Whelp yawned and stretched. “Else you’ll drown.”

  Izzy gasped, sucking down a cold mouthful of water. She grabbed Hen’s hand and kicked off the lake bottom. They climbed and clawed their way to the surface. Izzy shut her eyes tight, her chest about to collapse. Her energy had just run out when a pair of furry arms shot down from the surface and grabbed the back of her shirt.

  The arms pulled her up out of the lake and hauled her to the shore, where she promptly threw up a stomach full of black water.