by Nancy Werlin
Lucy interrupted: "Zach!"
"Yes?"
"Now!"
Just like that, it was time.
The word for pain had long since detached from its meaning for Lucy, and the formation of a coherent thought about anything but endurance was now unimaginable. The contractions felt like someone was smashing her with a bat. She half lay, half sat on the bed, panting and pushing and sometimes screaming. The world narrowed to the time between contractions, between pushes. It would not be much longer. She could not endure much more.
Sometimes she heard Zach muttering things. "I read all the books about this." Or, "I'm in control." Or, "People do this every day." Or, "You're doing great, Luce." And, most often of all, "Trust me. You can trust me."
"Trust. You," she panted, mostly to try to get him to shut up.
That makes one of us, thought Zach.
Finally, after what seemed like ten million years, Zach said, "Oh my God, Lucy! I can see the top of her head! Keep pushing. Push! Push! Push! Come on! Push! Push-pushpush! Push! Come on! Push!"
Then it was time for the last push, the very last push. And Lucy felt the glorious difference.
She heard her husband gasp with awe. "Oh, my God, Luce," he said. "Here she is. It's Dawn. Oh, Luce. She's beautiful—no joke—I can't believe it—here she is."
The baby was wailing indignantly now, just like she was supposed to.
"Wow," Zach said. "Wow. Feet!" And then, a split second later, he said, "Luce? Are you feeling okay? Considering, you know, everything?"
He was looking at her. His face bore the strangest expression, an equal combination of relief and anxiety. He was holding the baby. Her baby. Their baby. Dawn.
Lucy found she was laughing weakly. She knew what he was really asking. Was she insane yet? She looked back at her husband. At Dawn. And then from somewhere, she found the breath with which to actually speak, and the ability to do it coherently. "Yes. I think so. Considering everything. I mean, I'm not crazy. Not yet, anyway." She paused. "Listen, Zach? Afterbirth. Cut cord."
"Yeah, I know, I remember," said Zach, suddenly calm. "It's all under control. It's all going to be fine now. You are okay, though, right, Luce? Tell me again."
Lucy took a long minute to gather herself, to absorb the truth that she was no longer in labor, that the baby was safe, and that she could still think logically and rationally about where and who she was, and what needed doing. That she felt absolutely terrible, but only physically. Then she answered.
"I'm truly okay. I mean, I'm half-dead. But I'm also fine. And I think—I think it's all going to be okay. You know what I mean." She found she didn't want to mention the Elfin Knight, or the curse, out loud.
"Yeah? All of it's okay?" Zach avoided saying any specific words too.
"Yeah. At least, I think so."
"You did it, after all," Zach said. "You did everything."
"I guess. Maybe. Maybe I did."
She and Zach exchanged one long astonished look. Followed by one long, big, exhausted grin.
"I'll get you and Dawn to the hospital," Zach promised. "As soon as I can. First, though, let's get you both cleaned up."
"I want to hold her," said Lucy.
"Yeah."
However, as soon as the still-slightly-bloody Dawn Greenfield was placed in Lucy's arms, where she calmed and even seemed to coo a little, the wind whipped up violently outside. Simultaneously, the very air in the bedroom of the little cottage changed. A scent filled it. It was a scent that Lucy knew. She had just smelled it, out in the Bay of Fundy.
CHAPTER 56
The Elfin Knight stood before her, beautiful, glittering, and smiling. "We meet again," he said. "And it is time for you to come to me, Lucinda, as you agreed."
A wave of cold shuddered through Lucy. The bargain she had made with the Knight, at the end, before Zach made her complete the plowing and sowing. What had she done?
"Get away!" Lucy said, between her teeth, even though, inside, she had already despaired.
"Luce?" Zach said. "What is it? Are you okay?"
"My sweet, stubborn Lucinda," the Elfin Knight said. "You have entertained me mightily with your struggles. I look forward to our future."
"Luce?" Zach said again, uncertainly.
Zach had come to her. He put a hand, strong, concerned, reassuring, on Lucy's shoulder. She tilted her head down so that she could press her cheek to it, and at the same moment she looked into her small new daughter's funny scrunched-up face. Dawn looked as if she was trying to decide whether or not to commence screaming. Lucy put out one fingertip and gently traced the rosebud mouth, the curve of a soft cheek. The little bundle seemed to decide against lung exercises for now, and nestled against Lucy, helpless and trusting. Needing her mother.
This was the same small creature Lucy had loved and nurtured inside her from the tiniest of organisms. Lucy had fought hard for her life. And now, here she was. Alive. Human. Lucy's daughter. And also, Lucy suddenly thought, the daughter of poor, deceived, entrapped, murdered Gray Spencer.
She held the thought. It lit an ember of defiance and anger inside her. Dawn's biological father would never see her, and never hold her. Never even reject her, if that would have been his choice. His whole life and everything about it had been stolen from him.
"You okay, Luce?" Zach asked again.
Lucy looked up to see the furrow in her husband's forehead.
Zach's daughter now, Lucy thought. Our daughter. Children need their parents! Both of them!
Lucy's anger burst into a full, beautiful flame that warmed her. It began to battle her despair and resignation and fear. She thought of the faces of her ancestors that she had glimpsed at the Bay of Fundy. The Scarborough girls. Their lives, their futures, their souls, their children had been robbed from them. And who knew how many human men had also been used and discarded along with them?
But how was she to fight? Lucy had no idea. Hopelessness leeched back into her.
"Lucy?" said Zach yet again. "You're okay, right?"
"No! I'm not okay. Zach—" Her voice was desperate "The Knight is here. He's here in this room, and he wants me." She looked compulsively at the Elfin Knight, who was laughing silently at her. Her arms tightened around her baby.
Zach looked where Lucy was looking, but his gaze skimmed over the Knight as if he were not there. It then returned to Lucy's face. "All right," he said, but all the uncertainty in the world was in his voice. His hand fell from her shoulder.
The Knight now laughed aloud, and from Zach's lack of reaction, Lucy could tell that this too was hidden from him.
The Knight took a small, deliberate, almost teasing step closer to Lucy.
"Believe me, Zach. He's right there!" Lucy pulled one arm from around Dawn and pointed. But she knew it was useless. This was the beginning of the end. She would now be trapped and enslaved and "mad." For the rest of her life.
Perhaps she would be lucky and her life would not be long.
For one last time, she turned to her husband. She did it knowing he could not save her, and that she could not save herself. "Please," she whispered uselessly.
Lucy's actions and her obvious despair filled Zach with uneasiness. She had said the Knight was present, but there was nothing at all where she had pointed, except dust motes. Still, if Lucy said he was there …
Nervous, uncertain, he slipped his hand beneath his shirt and fingered the seamless vest. He tried to sound soothing. "All right. It doesn't matter if I can't see him, so long as you can. He's there, Lucy. I believe you."
"You do?" Her voice begged him.
"Yes." But Zach didn't feel one hundred percent certain. That strange look in Lucy's eyes. Her obvious anguish. Was this the start of the madness? He tightened his hand around the felt of the vest, pulling the material deep inside his fist.
And suddenly he saw something: a rippling disruption in the way the light and shadow dispersed itself around the dust motes. The disruption grew as he stared; soon it covered a misty area roughly the s
ize of a large man.
How could he have doubted Lucy, even for a moment?
Zach flung his body between the misty, weirdly fluctuating shape and his wife. Somehow, he kept his grip on the vest, though every instinct urged him to put up both fists. "You're not getting anywhere near her," he shouted at the thing. "I won't let you."
"Zach?" Lucy's voice was amazed. "You see him too? Really?"
"Oh, yeah." As Zach spoke, the shape took on greater solidity. Its edges sharpened. There was a huge transparent head, an arm, a wavering torso—
And the man—the Elfin Knight—whatever he or it was—materialized fully from the rippling streaks of misty nothingness and stood before Zach and Lucy both.
"Unbelievable." Carefully, Zach eased his grip on the seamless shirt, wondering if that might make the Knight disappear again. Yes, the Knight's form grew fuzzier. Zach grabbed at the shirt again and the Knight re-solidified.
Well, so now he knew. Effectively, he only had the use of one hand. Zach backed up so that he stood nearer to Lucy and Dawn. He spoke as calmly as he could. "Luce? I don't suppose there's any chance this is a hallucination?"
Lucy dared take a deep breath. "Only if it's a joint one." The relief she felt astonished her. She wasn't alone. Not yet, anyway.
She would not waste these last moments. She knew what she must say to Zach now. It would be her only chance to explain the truth about the curse, and what she had done, and why. "Zach," she began.
Zach interrupted. "Wait, I remember this guy! He works for Soledad! On prom night—he was at the house—"
"Yes, but never mind that now!" Lucy cut in urgently. "Zach, at the Bay of Fundy, the Elfin Knight was there. He talked to me. I have to tell you. I agreed to something. It's bad. I—I—" She stuttered to a stop as she searched Zach's puzzled, waiting face.
"Excellent," said the Elfin Knight, drawing their attention back to him. He was standing gracefully not six feet away. "I see you are aware of your new obligation to me, Lucinda. I was afraid I would have to remind you. You would not have liked that."
He nodded easily at Zach. "And you too are correct. I was present to watch Luanda's prom preparations. I enjoyed that night. I always have to manipulate events, when a Scarborough girl begins to come to me. It can be a little tricky, which is often interesting. The Scarborough girl must struggle unimpeded with the three tasks, and cannot be manipulated. But I always choose the circumstances, and the other main player."
"Gray Spencer," Zach said flatly.
"An easy vessel to maneuver," agreed the Knight. "Teenage boys usually are." He doffed an imaginary cap at Zach. "But not you. Not that there's anything special about you in particular. It's just that at first I overlooked you, and then your ownership of that shirt has protected you to some extent."
Compulsively Zach tightened his one-handed grip on the seamless vest.
The Elfin Knight laughed. "Oh, I can get around that silly shirt if I choose. But it would require more energy than I usually can afford to exert, here on the human plane. I simply haven't bothered. So far." His teeth showed. "It all comes to the same place in the end, anyway, every time. As now.
"It's now time for me to claim Lucinda."
Lucy swallowed hard. She had agreed, she knew she had. What good would it do to protest? The Knight had all the power.
But Zach still didn't understand. "No!" he said fiercely. "Lucy broke the curse. She made the seamless shirt. She found the land. She did the plowing and the sowing. And Dawn has been born, and Lucy hasn't gone crazy. She's as sane as ever, so that proves the curse is over and broken."
"Oh, dear," said the Elfin Knight sweetly. "Poor Zachary. Did you not fully understand what Lucinda was trying to tell you just now? About our new agreement?"
Zach turned toward Lucy, while keeping one wary eye on the Knight. "Luce?"
Lucy wet her lips. "Zach—first know this. It's not just madness that happens to the women in my family. It's—as a result of the curse, they—they go with him. To wherever it is he lives. That's what happened to Miranda." She jerked her chin in the direction of the Elfkin Knight. "Possessions of mine. That's what it really means. Not—not just madness."
She saw the instant flicker of comprehension in Zach's face.
And then the horror.
"And second," said Lucy determinedly, doggedly, "at the Bay of Fundy, at the end, when you saw me stop working—it was because—because—he offered me a new bargain—" She stopped.
A pause.
"What bargain?" said Zach.
Lucy found that she could not quite find the words to explain fully. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "So sorry."
"What bargain?" said Zach again.
Lucy held Dawn too tightly to her. She felt the baby squirm and she managed to ease her grip. Her eyes pleaded with Zach for his understanding. "I—I—"
"Allow me to assist you with your explanation, Lucinda," said the Elfin Knight. He leaned confidentially toward Zach and gestured smoothly with one hand.
The air beside him hissed, and then a little scene appeared, hovering in midair. It was the Bay of Fundy, and there, in miniature, was Lucy with her plow. She faced the Elfin Knight in the sleet and snow. Her back and shoulders drooped with unspeakable weariness. The tide crept relentlessly nearer to her feet.
"Be mine," said the tiny facsimile of the Knight. "Be my true love, and I will let your husband and your baby go free. My curse will end."
"They'd be safe," said the tiny Lucy. "You promise?"
"Yes," said the other. "I promise. If you stop your work, if you give up, they will be safe."
As Lucy and Zach watched the tableau, the tiny Lucy turned away from the Knight. She let go of her plow, and it dropped.
The Knight passed his hand through the air again. The little scene disappeared.
"You see?" he said. "That is the new bargain, which Lucinda entered into freely."
The silence in the room was terrible. Lucy felt it in her bones. She would have looked at Zach, but she did not dare.
"In a moment," the Elfin Knight spoke directly to Lucy, "you will give your husband the baby. And then you will take my hand, and go with me, as Fenella would not. I am now your true love, and you are mine." All of his white, white teeth showed in his smile.
"It is time," he said. "Give up the baby now."
Lucy forced herself to look at Zach. He was looking right back at her. She searched his face for understanding. For forgiveness.
She saw neither.
"But the curse was broken," Zach said. "Luce, you did it. You broke the curse. Right after you gave up."
"I didn't know I could," Lucy said. "I thought I was making the best choice. Please understand."
Zach's face was pale. "I don't."
Lucy's face was even paler. "Then forgive me. When you can. If you can. And remember I love you. And Dawn. Always." Carefully she kissed the baby. She held her out to Zach.
Zach stepped away. With one hand still buried in the seamless vest, he crossed the other over his chest. "No," he said. "I won't give up yet."
"But Zach—"
"No! Don't you go quietly, Lucy! Make him drag you kicking and screaming! Why are you cooperating with him? Don't you see? You're giving in again!"
"But I don't have a choice, because at the Bay of Fundy, I told him—" Abruptly Lucy stopped speaking. A peculiar look came over her face. Then she blinked. "I told him nothing," she said finally, softly. "At least, nothing out loud. I just stopped working."
Lucy looked at Zach, and Zach looked back at Lucy.
"And then you started working again," said Zach.
"That's just exactly right," Lucy said.
Her lips parted in a fierce smile.
Then she pulled Dawn back against her chest. As one, Lucy and Zach turned to the Elfin Knight.
"Consent need not always be in words, Lucinda," he said. "Your intention was clear. You fully meant to agree."
"But I said nothing out loud," Lucy said. There was some str
ength in her voice now. And hope. She was thinking of what Leo had said about the faeries and their tricks.
"I said nothing," she repeated. "And then I continued my work. And I finished it."
The Knight sneered. "It was your husband who made you continue. It was not your intention. You were ready to give up."
Lucy pasted a smile of confidence on her face. "Who cares about intentions? It's actions that matter. And even if you're right, my intention changed. I completed the tasks. And meanwhile, I had promised nothing to you."
"The curse is broken," Zach chimed in. "And there is no new bargain. If that weren't true, you wouldn't be here trying to convince Lucy to come willingly. To take your hand. You'd just whisk her away or whatever. Right?"
The Elfin Knight did not respond.
"Answer!" Lucy demanded. "The original curse is broken, right? Right?"
The Knight said slowly, reluctantly, as if the words were being dragged out of him by some power outside of himself, "Yes. The original curse is broken."
"And there is no new bargain," said Lucy.
There was utter silence in the bedroom of the little cottage.
At that moment, like a light being switched on, the baby was suddenly yelling bloody murder. Lucy fed her a fingertip to try to quiet her.
The Knight had not replied. Lucy's stomach was in knots. Was there a new bargain? Was there not?
She pretended a sureness she did not feel. "We're done here," she said to the Elfin Knight. "And you know it. Go away."
"Go away." Zach came up next to Lucy. She felt his free arm rest around her shoulders.
Another moment of complete silence. Then, outside the house, the storm erupted in several enormous cracks of continuing thunder.
The body of the Elfin Knight swelled. He raised his arms. His face dazzled with its beauty and rage.
Lucy quaked to see him. But even as her pulse pounded with terror, she was seized by a defiant impulse she could not resist. She shouted above the thunder, "Some advice for you, Mr. True Love! Your impossible demands—that's not asking for real love. That's never love!"
The Elfin Knight swelled again in size. Now he filled the room—he reached out enormous arms—