by Callie Stone
“Hang on just a moment, Natasha,” Troy interrupted, staring at the red dots on the map of Europe. The intensity of Troy’s gaze at the image of the map was enough to interrupt my manic flow of thoughts.
“What is it, Troy?” I asked, slightly annoyed by his interruption for seemingly no purpose.
“We’re not going anywhere just yet…”
Troy turned his attention from the laptop to us, and his stare intensified.
“We’re staying here.”
Clearly, I wasn’t the only one of my teammates who took Troy’s serious reaction to something he saw in the map to be, well, something serious. Alexander, Kieran, Michael, and I all slowly huddled around the map of Europe displayed on the laptop screen.
It was something the director must have managed to put together himself quickly from some connection he’d made himself. There were four red dots placed above reported portals in the continent, with a fifth yellow dot over Paris, representing the newest portal we’d traveled through in the grocery store.
“What does it mean?”
5
These are Not Ruins
Natasha
“It means the end of days, that’s what it means,” Michael muttered in reply.
“No, it doesn’t,” I shot back with a frown.
There was something happening for sure, with Michael making what seemed to be a serious observation with no traces of his standard ironic defense mechanisms.
“Of course it does.”
“Does someone want to explain what the hell is going on with this map, apart from the obvious?” I looked around at my teammates, growing impatient with how tight-lipped they were being despite the thoughts they all clearly had brewing.
“It’s the end of the world,” Michael continued.
Before I turned around to look at him, I knew I was wrong about Michael’s sudden seriousness; I could hear the smirk in his voice already.
Indeed, by the time I had turned my head to suss just how sincere Michael was being, he had shifted his face into the form of American televangelist, Jim Bakker. “The end of days!” he shouted before laughing and instantly shifting back into his own form. “Just messing with you.”
“You arsehole,” I groaned, as Michael grinned with delight from getting me to swear.
“Yes, Natasha, I am,” he agreed.
Rolling my eyes, I turned my attention back to the map, with the four red dots representing reported portals and the yellow dot representing the newest portal.
“The tri-pointed star,” Troy stated softly, suddenly, referring to the symbol we both had oddly hazy memories of spotting in our recent sojourn to the fairy realm.
“But there are four of them,” I blurted out, simultaneously with my realisation that Troy had discovered some sort of pattern, a constellation of sorts between the dots on the map of the continent.
“Five,” Kieran corrected. We all turned slowly to look at him, all of us turning our heads at a measured, heavy pace, all of us moving with the kinetic slowness of a shared realisation.
“Four dots, and the newest at the grocery store.” I began before Alexander had begun drawing on the laptop screen with a magic marker.
“You know you can do that with software, buddy,” Michael started but stopped but when he and the rest of us spotted what Alexander had done. He’d drawn a pentagram between the dots on the map. “Oh fuck.”
Finally, there were traces of real concern in Michael’s voice.
“There’s more,” I continued, sensing it.
“My old kingdom we just visited,” Troy interrupted me again, almost seeming in a trance. “The one through the nearby magic circle, there was a pentagram there as well. It was carved into the earth.”
“Fuck,” I grumbled, that evening’s second atypical use of heavy profanity on my part causing the boys to all take notice and turn their attention towards me. “I saw it,” I continued. “The pentagram in the fairy realm, and there was more than one.”
“What was that about the end of days?” Alexander hissed at Michael. “Because this isn’t a joke.”
“It’s not my fault!” Michael cracked back. “I didn’t do this.”
“Hey!” I interrupted, getting in between the pair of them. “We are all literally on the same team here, so everybody shush and let me think for a moment.”
As my teammates did obey my wishes to shut their mouths for long enough for me to think, I did my best to start formulating some course of action.
I took a quick glance at the other points on the map outside of Paris. One location I recognised as being Madrid, and another as Rome. There was another dot over northeastern Switzerland—likely Zurich—and the last dot was over some tiny speck of an island near France.
“We need to visit them all,” I said.
“What?” both Michael and Alexander asked in unison.
“It’s the only logical course of action,” I continued. “And that’s also what Emilio meant by going on a trip. I’m sure of it.”
“Five of us,” Kieran added. “And five fairy circles.” He was already busy typing at the laptop, messaging Emilio. “Oh, and it seems that Director Hask agrees with Natasha. More details to come, he says, but he wants us to do recon on the supermarket sight ASAP. I guess together, or...”
“We’re not splitting up,” Alexander protested. It seemed as though the team were agreeing with my plan at least. “If we’re going, then we’re all going together.”
Alexander had a point; though I didn’t especially want to visit every location on the map alone, the team going together would pose its own set of risks.
I remembered the last time we were split up and I fell under the spell of a siren in Sicily. While everything eventually turned out okay, I was still a bit hesitant to go through an adventure quite that intense again.
By the way the boys all turned to me right then, it seemed they’d all, consciously or not, made some tacit decision to let me decide.
I did not question why that was. With the urgency of the situation, I made the call I’d felt was best.
“Alexander’s right,” I said. “And we are going through this all together for logistics, for safety, and so we can all go back to that supermarket to see what’s happening to the portal to the Kingdom of the Fae.”
To my teammates’ credit there was no more hesitation once I had stated my decision and what supported it. The boys all started to move towards the coatrack and the hall closet, gathering their things for our impending trip to the magic-ravaged grocery store.
It was some action to take, after all. The enormity of what hung in the balance, the souls who were already suffering, and biblical proportions of what was potentially afoot seemed to be filling the air of the flat with a shared solemnity and a sense of staggering purpose and responsibility.
“At least the first stop is an easy walk away,” I commented. The central Parisian supermarket where Troy and I had fallen through the portal to the fae kingdom was the obvious first place to venture, and any doubt about such had been removed by the director’s explicit instructions.
Fortunately, it was also getting dark enough that Alexander could travel with us safely. When the five of us finished silently descending the building’s old, dark stairwell and emerged into the Parisian evening, the atmosphere was dark and quiet, with an unseasonable chill—and possibly news of the earlier chaos which had rocked the neighbourhood—keeping the usual crowds at bay.
The walk to the supermarket was tense and quiet. Going by our past experience dealing with these same forces, I could not help but feel as though we were walking straight into some trap, even though we knew that Director Emilio Hask would not have even planted the seed of such a plan in our minds of he weren’t positive that it was currently the best course of action.
“It’s at the end of this street,” I said, meaninglessly. After I let out that bit of anxious chatter as we strolled as casually as we could through the cool Paris evening air, I half expected Tr
oy, who had just been there with me that day, to say something like ‘I know’.
Instead, Troy lay a gentle hand on my shoulder, reassuring me. Instead of communicating ‘I know’ he instead sent the much better message of ‘I know, we are all nervous’.
We quickened our pace to a march, finally reaching the supermarket’s sliding doors. I expected them to be locked, but they give way with ease from nothing more than a simple push.
The supermarket was dark, and the only light I could make out was entering from the myriad of glass-paned doors, as well as the few neon signs advertising soft drinks that still managed to flicker through the darkness.
There was no lingering police activity or any sort of investigation of the phenomenon occurring. The supermarket was barely even shuttered off. It was as if the authorities were fearful of how to approach the situation. There were no proper lights on inside, and I was immediately struck with a sense of unease.
No, the supermarket was not particularly well-lit in its then closed and damaged state, but as my eyes slowly began to adjust to the darkness, I saw...nothing out of sorts, shockingly.
At least not at first. But as we wandered further into the darkened grocery store, it became increasingly apparent that things were still very far from normal.
The hellish essence that Troy and I had experienced earlier was still present, leaving a dim, auburn aura around many of the store’s surfaces. The vaguely fiery glow became more apparent as my eyes adjusted to the dark.
But other than that, nothing looked out of place.
“It’s a little creepy how quiet it is,” Kieran commented, as earnest as ever.
“Yeah,” I replied. “I don’t see where the actual portal is yet. I do not love this.”
“Of course you don’t, you’re much too angelic for this,” Michael added with a little humour in his voice.
I shot him a glare. It was a heck of a time for him to be such a little shit, but he clearly felt as tense as any of us.
“I’m serious.” Inadvertently I had lowered my voice almost to a whisper, an unwitting reaction to the ineffable oddness I could discern in the air. “There is something off, even more than when Troy and I were sucked into the bloody portal earlier.”
“Well it is a market,” he replied. “You never know when the store manager is going to jump out at you and tell you to get out, or as they say in French—”
“Michael,” I cut him off. “I’m not in the mood. Hell, we have yet to even solidify a proper plan for...”
I was interrupted by an overwhelming sensation. My entire body quite suddenly began to feel that sense of...creeping otherness. It was as if every cell in my body was itching, or falling asleep, or on fire, or some horrid, conflicted combination of all of the above. The only thing that helped me stay at all focused and in some semblance of the present moment was the cold sensation of my fingers gripping reflexively into my palms as I felt a mood of balance and a distinct, deep drop.
And then, the drop ended and I was on solid ground again, dirt and grass.
Eyeing my surroundings, it took less than a second to realise that I was standing in the middle of a clearing in a forest. It was dark out, the only light coming from the three-quarter moon in the sky above. I looked behind me to see that the rest of the team was with me. Alexander was rubbing his head in pain, while Michael was looking out into the forest with a look of awe on his face.
“Where are we?” he asked out loud, seemingly dazed for real.
“You know,” I grumbled softly.
“We’re back in the kingdom,” Troy then answered, almost chanting it as the set of emotions that only this place could inspire within him washed over him as it had earlier.
“We cannot afford to stay still,” Alexander started, looking up at the moon before turning his attention to me.
I nodded, not needing to be convinced of that. I looked out into the forest, taking a step forward.
“Let’s go, then.”
Troy grabbed my shoulder, looking at me.
“The state of this place must be as bad if not worse than what we have already witnessed. We cannot just wander. We need to think.”
Troy looked over at Michael, his eyes betraying a searching uncertainty that was unusual for him.
Even Michael’s usual trickster spirit seemed at a loss in that bewildering moment. Letting himself display an unusual degree of anxiety, he took a deep breath, turning his attention to the trees.
“We need to find the road, or something,” he started, almost talking to himself. “If we can find the road, we can find our way back.”
Just as he said that, there was a rustling in the bushes. The five of us grew immediately silent and still as we turned our attention to the sound and movement.
Out of nowhere, close to where we heard the rustling but seemingly out of thin air, a face appeared, followed by a small body. It was a girl, much younger than any of us or any creature I’d seen in the fae kingdom thus far. She had brown hair that hung over her eyes, which were a light blue. She was wearing a raggedy dress, and looked just as confused as we must have looked.
“Who are you?” I asked.
“I’m Amelia,” she said, staring at each of us. “Who are you?”
“We’re...we’re friends.”
She continued to look at us. I realised that she recognised us as creatures, foreign in one way or another from the ones she would know in the kingdom. However, I was growing impatient with this sudden, peculiar, slow-paced distraction.
“Where are you from?” I asked.
“I’m from the town over,” she said, motioning her head to her left. “Why?”
“Are there any other creatures where you’re from?”
“Creatures?” she asked. “You mean like animals?”
“Like us,” said Kieran, finally speaking up. “Have you seen any of our kind?”
“You’re not from here either, are you?”
The five of us looked at each other, and I looked back at her, waiting for an answer to my question.
“I saw a few people who were dressed really weirdly,” she said. “They were walking around the town a few days ago. I think they were from some place called France, though.”
“What did they look like?” asked Alexander.
“They had funny clothes,” she answered. “They wore stripes, and the men wore beards... Wait a minute...”
She looked at each of us again.
“Are you from France?” she asked.
“We’re from another world,” I answered. “A world under attack by Kalgin.”
“What’s a ‘Kalgin’?” she asked.
“It’s...he’s a demon,” said Michael, stumbling over his words. “But not an ordinary demon. He’s...it’s much, much worse.”
“How do you kill it?” she asked.
“You don’t,” I said. “Or, rather, I don’t know.”
The five of us stood in silence for a moment. I could tell she knew that we were, mostly unlike any other creatures she had ever seen. Yet, she was not bothered by it in the least. A look of curiosity was written on her face, as she stared at each one of us, and her curiosity blossomed into awe when her eyes turned to Troy, who she must have recognised as a fae. Then, she smiled.
“How did you guys get here?”
My own eyes turned over towards Troy, as did Alexander’s, Michael’s, and Kieran’s. Although he had not been a prince in that kingdom for eons, we had all seemed to deduce that he would best know how to address the girl, how to answer her questions.
“Well...it’s a long story,” answered Troy.
“We have time,” said the girl. “We’re not going to be let out for a while yet...”
Troy bit his lip, and then shrugged.
What did Amelia mean by that, I wondered?
We were back in the Kingdom of the Fae, for sure, having just fallen through the portal at the Parisian supermarket. Yet, we were in the middle of a forest clearing, at night, and this Amel
ia, wandering on her own, was talking of being trapped. Sensing that I, and the others, were bemused at best with this encounter, the former fae prince decided to do the talking.
“Amelia,” Troy boomed, stepping into the clearing. “How have things been in the Kingdom of the Fae?”
“Not great,” said Amelia. “There are demons everywhere.”
“Well, we’re going to change that!” Troy said, surprising me with both the boldness of that statement and a regal quality to his voice I had never heard from him previous. “We’re here to help save you guys.”
“Who’s ‘we’?” asked the girl.
Troy turned, introducing each member of the team, starting with Alexander, then moving onto Kieran, then Michael, and then finally me, Natasha. While I did feel myself blush when Troy said my name, the other teammates and I just looked at each other, confused at the spectacle.
Like, were we supposed to bow or something?
“Where’s Zavier?” asked Amelia.
“How do you know of Zavier?” Alexander asked, confused, as I believed that we all were by then.
“Things change,” she said, quite cryptically, a bitter tone in her voice.
“Amelia!” A hoarse, guttural voice cried out from beyond the clearing. “You cannot possibly have reason for speaking with that ghastly prince.”
From out of the bushes, a hunched figure loped into the moonlight. He was clad in rags and his skin a sickly grey. Behind him came more figures. Some looked close to collapse, others probably were. All of them were gaunt. The males were all shirtless, and the females wore dresses that were none too fresh.
The group of fairies were all disheveled and covered in grime that couldn’t have come from anywhere but the most ravaged and war torn sections of the fae kingdom. Dark eyes stared out from an array of pale faces, staring at the team with a mixture of awe and terror. A few were brave enough to edge closer to get a better look at us.
“Who are you?” one of them asked.
“We’re here to help,” offered Kieran, as gently as he could.