Regen

by Cassie Greutman

  “You got something there.” Jaden reached forward and wiped a thumb across the side of my mouth. Okay, awkward. But nice. Awkward and nice. And so cliché. Why had he done that?

  “Hit the bathroom people, and we’re out of here. I want to find a hotel before dark,” Rebecca said. Ten minutes later, we were on our way.

  One good thing about Rebecca being in the back, it meant Nina and Rebecca weren’t talking. I wanted to be the one to have that whole discussion with Nina, whenever we could do it with just the two of us.

  Nina kept looking over at me, like she was checking on me, but she still didn’t seemed too freaked out. Or disgusted. Or whatever other bad emotion I’d assumed she’d have if she ever found out I wasn’t normal.

  Half-way. We had to be at least half-way. Maybe tomorrow I’d be turning Jaden over and heading home with Nina. If I could figure out a way to find Starren. Maybe the three of us would head to D.C. and I’d take him to the Hall. That should work. It wouldn’t be hard to sneak him onto a plane.

  “Trish, do the kids and Rebecca know what’s going on?”

  Oh boy, the talk was coming much sooner than I’d expected. I tried not answering, but Nina seemed to be on to that. She just waited, taking her eyes off the road once in a while to stare at me.

  Fine. “Yes, they know.”

  “Good. Then it doesn’t matter if we talk with them in the van.”

  Well yeah, it kind of did to me, but she deserved to know what was going on and I didn’t think there would be anymore stalling. I slumped forward. “I guess not. What do you want to know?”

  “So… what exactly was that back at the accident?” she asked after a moment of silence. “Everything that happened blew my mind for a bit, but once I got thinking about it I realized you know a lot more than you’ve been telling me.”

  “Why haven’t you called Dan? I thought you’d call him right away and he’d show up by now.”

  “Don’t change the subject. Spill. Now.”

  I sighed. I’d known this talk was coming, but I still hadn’t figured out an easy way to explain things. Might as well just let her have it. “There is another world, called Faerie. People from there are called fae. I guess I’m one of those people, even though I don’t remember ever being there. We have different abilities, mine is healing.”

  She looked almost sick for a second, making me tear up. No, those weren’t tears. I blinked a bunch of times to make sure.

  “You’re really careful about this, right? How many people know? Do you know what could happen? They could take you away, for good.”

  “Yeah, I know.” It wasn’t me that was freaking her out, it was the thought of me being taken away? Was I reading this right? “I live with you and you didn’t know until today.”

  “True. Let’s keep it that way. Continue.”

  A shiver ran through me. She wasn’t the only one that didn’t want other people to know. “I didn’t want to risk your life, that’s why I didn’t want you to come. It’s not like I’m really risking anything. And you were right, back home. It was Wade that made me disappear for those couple days. He killed me.”

  “What!” she yelled, the van swerving and making the passengers in the back yelp. She got it under control, but her face was still white. Really white.

  “Shh!” I said. I widened my eyes and jerked my chin toward the back. I still didn’t really want them to know what was up.

  Nina reached down and turned the radio on, switching the speakers to the back. Smart lady. The Martans seemed to be pretty busy with each other, but still.

  “Obviously it didn’t work out like he expected. Apparently I still heal after my heart stops. I’m sure he wouldn’t have left without checking that.”

  “Why would he do that?” she hissed, thankfully this time at a much lower volume. “Dan and I didn’t like him for you, but we would never have guessed he would do that or you’d have been locked in the house.”

  I shrugged. That was another long discussion. It would make her worry, and possibly make her call Dan. She had taken this whole thing pretty well, considering, but would he do the same?

  Nina stared me straight in the face, like she had no idea what to say to that. She had to know I was telling the truth, she’d seen me heal. “But you’re okay now? Totally healed? How did he hurt you?” She looked like she was about to start frisking me looking for injuries.

  “I’m fine, don’t worry about it.” She didn’t look too sure. “Seriously, it was healed when you picked me up in the woods.”

  “Did it have something to do with why we are helping Rebecca and the girls?”

  I scratched my head. “Yes, kind of I guess.”

  “Who’s after them, for real?”

  “We don’t even know.” I leaned against the cool window, staring down at the asphalt below. “I thought it was the Council, the rulers of Faerie, but I can’t come up with a reason they would want to hurt them. I’m not even sure if they care about them, or if they just want Jaden. He’s Jaime and Lucy’s brother.” They wanted Jaden, sure, but how would killing his family help with that? If they were going to use his family against him, they would have been trying to capture them. The goblin knew I’d pop up in Faerie, but he should have also known the rest of the group were human and would just die. I groaned. This was getting so confusing.

  Nina reached over and grabbed my hand, her other hand firmly gripping the wheel. “This all sounds crazy. Why did they want Jaden? And where is he?”

  Well that was a tough one. “Because they were worried about his ability. Jaden died. An accident of some kind.” I kept it vague. She didn’t seem to notice. She had plenty of other stuff to process.

  “And they’re fine with yours? You aren’t in any trouble with them, right?”

  “I’ve got it covered.” I hoped. If Jaden kept up his side of the bargain. Where were Cray, Starren, and Wade right now? Hopefully Cray was good. And Starren was okay. She was a little bull headed, but now that she wasn’t right here about to kill me I could wish her well. How had the battle against the gorgeous dude gone? She was strong. She could take care of herself, she was fine. She had to be. I couldn’t care less about Wade. That was the story I was sticking to, anyway.

  Her eyes narrowed. “Did Wade have something to do with the Council?” Wow, she was way too smart.

  “Maybe.”

  “Did they send him after you? I thought you were fine with the Council.”

  “I am now. Don’t worry about it.”

  She tapped me on the nose with her finger. “Like I’ve stopped worrying since the day you disappeared. You’re going to have to start trusting me. How many of these fae are there?” She paused. “Are Rebecca and the girls fae?”

  Trust definitely wasn’t in my nature, but even with as much as it scared me, I was starting to trust Nina. Like trust her for real. And at this point it wasn’t even about trust. It was that I just wanted to put all this behind me, never have to think about it again. And I never, ever wanted her to know what I had to do to buy my freedom. She hadn’t met Jaden, but I knew she wouldn’t approve of what I’d be doing to him as soon as we reached Fort Wayne. “I don’t know how many fae there are. I’ve never been that involved with them. No, Rebecca is human and the girls are half.”

  “Anything else you want to tell me?” She checked the rearview mirror, staring at the Martan family for a moment.

  So many things I should tell her. I looked up, catching her kind eyes and I wanted to, just for a second. But I wasn’t ready yet. Might not ever be. I trusted her. I didn’t even have to ask myself that anymore. But I also didn’t want to dredge up all those old feelings. Of being inadequate. Of not belonging. I belonged somewhere now, and I wasn’t ever going back to not having that again. Even in my memories. “No.”

  She squinted at me for a second, like she was trying to decide if I was being honest or not, but didn’t ask anything else. After a moment she reached forward and t
urned the radio off.

  “What’s so special about Fort Wayne?” Nina asked Rebecca, looking in the rearview mirror again. “Why do you think you’ll be safe there?”

  Rebecca shrugged. “We’re just hoping Trish’s friend is right.”

  “Trish’s friend?” Nina looked back at me. Okay, so she had a reason to question that. It wasn’t like I’d ever brought anyone home from school.

  “Another fae. He should know,” I said.

  Rebecca didn’t seem surprised I was talking about fae in front of Nina. She could probably hear our entire conversation from the back, even with the radio up.

  “And you trust this friend?” Nina asked. “Enough to not be worried?” She sounded worried. That was kind of her default right now, which made me feel bad.

  “He can’t lie,” I said. “He might be wrong by accident, but he isn’t the kind that gets things wrong.” Scratch that. He’d gotten the wrong fae twice before we’d caught up with Jaden. Hopefully this wasn’t a wild goose chase. Oh well, we’d had to get them away and Fort Wayne was as good a place as any.

  “Why can’t he lie?”

  Shoot. That was not something I really wanted her to know about.

  “No fae can lie,” Rebecca answered for me. “It’s really convenient for the rest of us.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Nina said. “Might come in handy.” She looked back at me and winked. It came across strained, like she was trying too hard. But at least she was trying. Wait a second, now she knew I couldn’t lie to her. Crap. “Where did you meet this fae?”

  “Are you going to tell her? Tell her what you were doing with them?” Jaden finally spoke, and now I wished he’d keep his mouth shut.

  I glared at him but didn’t answer. It wasn’t like I was going to be taking him away from his family. They couldn’t even see him. “He needed my help with something, that’s how we met.” Keep it vague. Vauge wasn’t lying.

  “And how did you meet the Martan’s?” Nina asked.

  Rebecca glanced at me as if to say she would defer to whatever I said. At least I hoped that was what that look meant. “A friend introduced us.” Kind of.

  “How, when they were in Chicago?” All of the sudden Nina’s face went blank. “Wait a second. You called me from a Chicago area code yesterday.” She turned and gave me the strongest stare I’d ever seen anyone use.

  Someone needed to turn on the air. It was getting really hot in here. I tugged at my shirt sleeve, trying not to let her catch my eyes with her death glare.

  Her gaze swung to Rebecca.

  Rebecca nodded in sympathy.

  Shoot. I was dead.

  “Trisha?” Oh, so it was Trisha now. I really was in trouble. I looked to the back seat for support. Jaden raised an eyebrow but didn’t say anything. Jaime was sleeping, of course. Lucy screwed up her face into an expression that was as close to sympathy as I’d seen there, but didn’t have any advice either.

  “Yes?” I stalled, scrambling internally. At this point I totally didn’t care if she knew about everything except for Jaden. I would be perfectly happy telling her all I knew about the fae. Everything but that.

  She didn’t say anything, just raised an eyebrow. Ouch.

  “Okay, yes, I was there yesterday. I was just trying to help.”

  Nina looked from me to Rebecca and back to me. “How did you get here? How did you get back?”

  “A friend helped.” Say as little as possible. That was my only plan here. Anything could lead to me being forced to admit why I’d come, and after that, what I was about to do. She may not hate me for being fae, something I could still hardly believe, but turning over an innocent man? No, she wouldn’t go for that.

  “You sure have a lot more friends than you’ve ever mentioned to me.” Nina looked like she just wanted to close her eyes and forget everything, but she was still driving. “Next time something like this comes up, talk to me first.”

  I nodded. Thankfully she let it drop after that, but I knew I’d have more explaining to do later. She was just being thoughtful and not chewing me in front of the Martans.

  Rebecca and Nina mostly ignored us for the next hour, Nina asking questions and Rebecca answering from the back, only turning to me when Rebecca didn’t know the answer to something. That wasn’t often, and sometimes I didn’t have an answer either. She actually knew some stuff about my kind I didn’t. Her husband must have trusted her completely to tell a human all these things.

  And he must have been a strange fae. So far the rest of them I’d met hadn’t been too keen on humans. Was that why the Council was so against him? Because he’d revealed the secret to a human? And why were they chasing his family? Lucy had snorted and laughed the first few minutes, then put her earbuds in and ignored the conversation. Jaime was still blissfully napping against her mom. I envied her.

  Jaden was staring outside in the middle set of seats.

  “You okay?” I asked him quietly.

  He looked at me for a second, then back out the window. “I guess.”

  He didn’t look like it. Did I really want to get into that? I sighed. “What’s wrong? We’re almost done with what you wanted. Your family will be safe.”

  “Yes, but after tomorrow, when you turn me over, I’ll never see them again. They’ll take me back to Faerie. If I’m lucky they’ll return me to the school. If not, I don’t know.”

  I crushed the guilt. Dan and Nina, Dan and Nina. This was for them. Or for me, but so I could stay with them, which was kind of for them, right? Not selfish at all. Thinking of my family. “Is the school really that bad?”

  “It’s not terrible, there’s just no freedom. No going outside, the elemental kids would escape. The shifters would go down the drains of the showers, so only baths. They keep us all under lock and key.”

  Okay, yuck. That didn’t sound nice. But it didn’t matter. “I’m sorry Jaden. I have to do what’s best for my family.”

  He nodded. “I know. Family is all we really have.”

  His statement was a sucker punch. I’d never really thought of it like that before, but he was right. Why else would I be fighting so hard for my little thrown together family? Somehow it had become everything to me. And here I was taking him away from his.

  But he couldn’t even interact with them. It was fine. It had to be fine.

  “I’ll always worry about them, Trish, even if they are in Sanctuary.”

  “Hush up, you worry too much. They have no idea where we’re going. No one but Cray could find us, and he’s on our side.”

  “You don’t think there are others with his ability out there?”

  I guess I’d never really thought of that. There were probably other healers out there too, healers that would understand me. Interesting. And Starren and Wade had found us at that gas station.

  Nope, not thinking about it. Dan and Nina, Dan and Nina.

  Forty something miles. Piece of cake after the last two days. We got gas and seats got rearranged again, Rebecca driving and Nina taking shotgun. The half hour went by quickly. Rebecca and Nina let out a cheer as we passed the city limits sign.

  I felt something weird go through me, or out of me, as soon as we passed the city limit sign. For the first time in my life I felt a nagging pain in my knee. It was really strange, that injury had healed itself months ago. I turned to ask Jaden if he’d felt anything weird and caught sight of Lucy’s face. She looked a mixture of horrified and absolutely ecstatic. It was really strange. I turned to see what she was looking at and all I saw was Jaden. “What?” I asked.

  Lucy reached her hand out slowly, so slowly, it was trembling. She paused for a second, then laid her hand on top of Jaden’s.

  “Luce?” Jaden said.

  The van careened off the side of the road onto the berm and screeched to a stop. “Jaden?” Rebecca said from the front.

  “Jade, Jade, Jade!” Jaime yelled. “I told them you were around.”

&n
bsp; I caught a glimpse of Nina’s face. She looked freaked, like maybe this was too much for her. If I’d known this was going to happen I would have warned them all. Cray was dead the next time I saw him.

  “This is the Jaden?” Nina asked. “The one that died?” She gave me a look that said we were going to be having another discussion soon.

  Everyone was too busy to answer her. Rebecca flung off her seat belt, jumped through the opening between the front seats and grabbed Jaden in a bear hug that enveloped Lucy and Jaime as well.

  They could see him here. That was so amazing. Oh no, no it wasn’t. I started to hyperventilate. No, no. This changed things. Now what was I going to do? How could I convince him to leave his family and go back to Faerie with Starren, even if he had promised? And how could I drag him away from his family now, even if he still planned on holding up his end of the bargain? No, this couldn’t happen. This wasn’t the plan.

  I took a deep breath, glad everyone was so focused on Jaden that they didn’t notice my reaction. It didn’t change anything. It couldn’t.

  “I don’t think we should just sit here by the road,” I said after a minute of reunion going on in the back. “Fae abilities don’t work here and we’re supposed to be safe, but we’re just trusting Cray’s word.”

  “Who is Cray?” Nina asked.

  “The friend that told Trish where we’d be safe,” Jaden said.

  “He’s the one that needed help?” Nina asked. “Are there fae living around home and that’s how you know him?”

  “He was on my squad.” Truth, but too much truth?

  “Squad?” Nina asked. She did not look happy. I better not lose her and Dan by acting fae and covering stuff up when I didn’t even know why I was doing it. It would be stupid to mess things up with them when I was going to ruin Jaden’s life to get to stay with them. Honesty. Hard habit to form. “What squad are you talking about?”

  “The one tracking me down,” Jaden said.

  “What? Tracking you down? And you brought him to the house?” Rebecca asked Jaden.