Trefoil

by M.C. Moore

  Chapter 19…

  As they entered the park, Meckenzie reached out to Kellan and Taggart through her mind. Kellan, where are you? Taggart, we are in the park. Where are you?

  Taggart immediately replied. I am close to the carousel. We got separated by the softball fields. I was circling around the trees trying to see if she headed off that direction.

  Meckenzie relayed the information to Jeff and Isabel so they could head off in that direction. She suggested they circle around the fields like Taggart was doing, that way they could spread out and cover more ground.

  They were approaching Umpire Rock, when Meckenzie heard a loud creaking sound. It was the sound of stone on stone. Jeff was coming out of the trees when the ground shifted underneath him and he was thrown back. Meckenzie looked around for the cause of the disturbance. There standing on the top of the rock formation, was the stranger who followed Isabel. It was dark, but Meckenzie was able to make out the stranger’s resemblance to Ty. This must be his brother.

  “Meckenzie go back into the trees.” Isabel shouted from about ten yards away. The earth began to tremble under Meckenzie’s feet. It was like trying to get traction on Jell-O, she ran as best she could towards the tree line only to have the ground move with her.

  Jeff had recovered his footing; the first thing on his mind was getting Meckenzie out of harm’s way. He was barreling towards her, coming much faster than anticipated, so when he hit the area of ground moving under Meckenzie’s feet, his balance was compromised and he tackled her to the ground. They flew through the air reaching the tree line and the ground with a thud. Jeff’s weight crushed Meckenzie to the ground. She could hear a fight going on in the clearing. The pop and sizzle of electrical energy flying through air must have been coming from Isabel’s magic. The grinding and earth moving tremors were coming from Ty’s brother.

  Jeff got back to his feet and pulled Meckenzie to safety.

  “You have to stay here. I need to work around behind him. Call out to Taggart, tell him to stay away. They are after you three and we can’t bring you to them.” Jeff didn’t wait for a response he dashed off into the night.

  Meckenzie made her way to the edge of the trees so she could watch what was going on. She knew she needed to contact Taggart, though she couldn’t imagine with how close he was that he couldn’t hear this fight going on in the middle of Central Park.

  Taggart stay away from Umpire Rock. Isabel and Jeff are fighting Ty’s brother the earth mover. Where are you?

  I’m by the chess and checkers house, where are you? Taggart sounded frantic.

  The northwest side of the rock in the tree line. Still no sign of Kellan?

  No, I don’t know where she could have gone. I don’t know where the fire starter is either. I am afraid she is circling the tree line too. Taggart’s thoughts were all over the place. She knew that Jeff had said they should stay apart, but she felt like they would be stronger together. Plus, if something happened to Taggart, she would never forgive herself.

  Meckenzie started to concoct a plan; she needed to take control of the situation. Move through the trees to the Northwest of where you are. I’m going to come around and meet you. We need to be together.

  Okay. Keep listening for me and call out for Kellan.

  Meckenzie started her way around the tree line keeping the battle that was happening to her right in sight. She spotted Jeff moving in the tree line west of Ty’s brother. Jeff was moving quickly toward the top of the rock, but it was not an easy climb. There was no cover for him; the playground was at his back. Isabel must have sensed Jeff moving closer because she redoubled her efforts at slinging magic. The ground moving under Isabel’s feet did not seem to affect her balance. Wherever and whoever trained Isabel, they did an excellent job, she fought the battle smart and hard.

  Kellan? Come on Kellan where are you? I love you sister. Just let me know where you are so we can come get you.

  Kellan was still not responding. Meckenzie thought that she was either out of range, knocked out, or, and she didn’t want to think this at all, dead. The thought of Kellan dead made the world turned upside down for Meckenzie, losing Kellan would kill her. Since they were in the womb together they really had been together their whole lives. Meckenzie started to cry as she made her way to where Taggart should be coming to meet her.

  Kellan? Please answer me. Taggart, she isn’t responding. Meckenzie couldn’t lose her composure now, she needed to be strong. They were in a battle and somewhere in this park was a fairy fire-starter looking for her and her brother.

  Just as Meckenzie was about to call out to Kellan again, she heard the crunch of leaves and branches in front of her. Just in case it wasn’t Taggart she ducked behind the nearest tree. Taggart stumbled into sight, looking about like a crazy person. He looked like he could collapse into a pile of emotion and tears at any moment. Meckenzie felt the same way.

  I’m behind the tree in front of you. Meckenzie thought it best to make her presence silently known. Just as Taggart turned towards Meckenzie, a girl stepped out beside him. Her hair was black and long, she was thin of frame. She looked like a model; her height was close to six feet tall. With a flick of wrist, she sent a flame sizzling towards Taggart.

  Fall down to the ground now. Meckenzie shouted at Taggart. The warning was a second too late and the flames caught the hood of his sweatshirt. He fell to the ground and quickly rolled over to see where the fire was coming from.

  The girl quickly ran towards Taggart, her hands ready to disperse the vengeance that flashed across her face. Meckenzie had to do something, so she ran in the direction of the girl and the fight that was about to ensue.

  Meckenzie shouted to distract the fire-starter. “Hey.” Meckenzie jumped quickly to her left, as she saw the girls thoughts. The flame sizzled past her and hit the tree she had previously taken refuge behind. Meckenzie had no physical powers that could benefit her in this fight, but she did have the ability to read the girl’s mind and know what she was thinking before she did it.

  Currently, the girl was wondering where her brother Ty was. She couldn’t figure out how Meckenzie had gotten away from him. Meckenzie realized this was a bargaining point. She might be able to get Taggart out of here and find Kellan in the process.

  “I’ll tell you where Ty is and what I’ve done to him, but first tell me where Kellan is.”

  The girl stopped dead in her tracks. She was contemplating whether Meckenzie was bluffing. She wanted nothing more than to kill Meckenzie right then and there. Ty was important to her, but her rage was something else entirely.

  “Ty is too smart for you to have pulled something over on him. He has to be around here somewhere.” She was questioning Meckenzie trying to get a feel for exactly what, if anything, she could have done. She started shifting to the left, which would bring her to the tree line and within sight of her brother, the earth mover, up on Umpire Rock.

  “You seem to be living under the impression that I was alone on that date. You seem to think that we wouldn’t have had a plan in case Ty was who we thought he was.” The fire-starter moved a little closer to what she assumed was her escape. Meckenzie could hear in her thoughts that she was going to blast Meckenzie, then head for the rock.

  “Blasting me will not get Ty back to you. If you want to find him, then you will have to tell me where Kellan is.”

  “Even if you did do something to him, he would kill me if I told you where she is.”

  Meckenzie’s worst nightmare was confirmed. They had Kellan. They had her, but from the sound of it, she was still alive.

  “Is she alive?” Meckenzie and the fire-starter were both moving in a circle, each trying to get closer to their brothers. Meckenzie wanted to keep a safe reaction distance between them. She needed to be able to get out of the way when fire-starter finally made her move.

  Meckenzie decided to push harder
into the girls mind and see if she could see where Kellan was. Meckenzie saw a bridge. There were like 25 bridges and archways in the park. Meckenzie needed to know which bridge it was. The girl was thinking so many different things that Meckenzie needed to ask a specific question to get her thoughts back to Kellan.

  “So you hid her near a bridge?” Meckenzie of her lesson in psychology class that had said that people can’t help thinking about something if suggest it to them. So she thought saying the word ‘bridge’ would spark the thought process necessary to get the location from the girl’s mind.

  “Get out of my head.” The fire-starter screamed as she hurled fire at Meckenzie. Meckenzie had seen it coming and dodged it once again. The verbal cue had worked though, the girl had flashed to the Driprock Arch. It was close by. In fact, the way Taggart had been working around the park, he would have come directly upon the arch if he had headed down the walk from the chess and checkers house.

  While all the discussion had been going on between the Ty’s sister and Meckenzie, Taggart had managed to get himself up and was working his way around the opposite way of Meckenzie. They would have her trapped between the two of them soon; Meckenzie knew that they needed a way to control her though.

  That is when Isabel stepped up behind the girl and said, “Dul a chodladh.”

  The girl went out like a light, Isabel bent down to make sure she was really out. Taggart made his way to Meckenzie.

  “Did you figure out where they took Kellan?”

  “Yes, she is somewhere near Driprock Arch. I never actually saw her, but that was where the girl was thinking about when I asked about her hiding Kellan. Isabel where’s Jeff?”

  “He is securing the other one. I don’t know what we are going to do with them? It’s not like we can take them back to the house and hold them prisoner.”

  “We can’t do that because Ty will come after them and it could be worse for us then. We need to get them out of the park though.” Meckenzie didn’t want to sit there discussing it anymore, she wanted to go find Kellan. She sense Taggart was feeling the same thing.

  “We are going to find Kellan.” Meckenzie said as she started walking away from Isabel.

  “No you are not. You are not going off without us, too much is unknown. There could be more of them. This could be a trap to get all three of you together. We are going to wait on Jeff.”

  Meckenzie thought Isabel was being unreasonable. It was completely possible that Kellan was out there somewhere bleeding, or dying. Meckenzie had to go find her. If something happened to Kellan because they were standing here deciding what to do with the bad guys, Meckenzie would never forgive Isabel.

  “Taggart go get Jeff and bring the earthmover back over here. We need to go get Kellan and the only way this is going to work is if we put both of Ty’s siblings in one place, so one person can guard them and three of us can go look for Kellan.” Meckenzie was taking control of the situation, it was the only way that they were going to be able to go recover Kellan. She searched her cell phone out of her purse. Meckenzie figured that Kellan had her cell phone on her and when they got to the bridge she would just call her and wait until she heard the ringing of the phone.

  “You are going to have to go by the Thai restaurant and take the confusion curse off of Ty. Can you do that from a distance?” Meckenzie was now telling Isabel what to do. Maybe she did have a leader buried deep inside of her.

  “Yes, I can take it off of him from the street. Why do you want to do that though?” Isabel asked.

  “Well, the only way this is going to work is if we make a deal with him. We will give him back his siblings, if they promise to leave and not come back. I mean we beat them here tonight and we weren’t even ready. Imagine what we can do now that we know who they are and what they can do. I think Ty will agree just so he can get better prepared. This war is not meant to happen here in the human world. If we are going to fight, then we will do it in Aquanis.” Meckenzie didn’t even know how she was reasoning all this out; it just seemed to make sense to her.

  “We need to get them somewhere other than the park though.” Isabel added.

  “I know. I just don’t know where. I mean I need to talk to him tonight and get this settled, so maybe we find Kellan and get her home. Then you and I pick him up from the Thai restaurant and take him for a drive. If we had two limos, then we could put his brother and sister in one with Jeff, since they are asleep it would be no problem, and you and I could go get Ty in the other car. When it’s time to exchange, we just take him to the limo with his siblings and Jeff comes with us.”

  Meckenzie picked up the phone and called her dad.

  “Dad, its Meckenzie. Listen, I need you to be calm. A lot of things have happened tonight and it is not over yet, so we need your help to settle it.”

  “Meckenzie, what is going on? No one is here and no one is answering their phones.”

  “I know dad, look, I need you to rent two limos. Send them both to Columbus Circle. We ran into some trouble tonight with Ty, his sister, and brother. We have the ability to negotiate with them to leave us alone, so it is important that we have the limos to do the discussing. Jeff and Isabel are both here so we are as safe as we can be. I just need you to stay at home and not do anything crazy.”

  “Meckenzie this is very scary. Let me talk to Isabel.”

  Meckenzie handed Isabel the phone and shrugged her shoulders. She went over to Ty’s sister and began trying to lift her up. She had gotten her into a sitting position when Jeff and Taggart came up with Ty’s brother.

  “He’s a big fellow.” Taggart looked winded. He had almost been set on fire tonight, so it was understandable.

  “We need to go find Kellan. I think Isabel, Taggart and I should go. If she needs healing we’ll need Taggart. If a spell has been used we’ll need Isabel. And I’m the one who saw the vision. I think Jeff can handle these two sleeping beauties.” Meckenzie had taken control again. Isabel was still whispering into the phone to Meckenzie’s dad, so she didn’t have the chance to argue.

  Meckenzie and Taggart started off towards the Driprock Arch. Meckenzie motioned for Isabel to follow. She complied, still on the phone. As they got out to the walkway, Meckenzie reached back and took the phone from Isabel.

  “Dad, there isn’t any more time for discussion. Call the limo service. They need to be limos, because we need the privacy glass, two of them. We don’t have any more time to waste. I love you and we will talk to you soon.”

  With that Meckenzie hung up the phone. She needed people to start cooperating for this thing to work. She didn’t need any arguments, just actions.

  Isabel laughed, “You are definitely your mother’s daughter. You got that Queen thing down pat too.”

  “Well, thank you, I think.” Meckenzie wasn’t really in the mood for any of this. She just wanted to find Kellan.

  “So what’s the plan Queen?” Taggart was getting some of his humor back. He was trying to lighten the mood.

  “Dad’s sending two limos. We are going to put Ty’s brother and sister in one and send them off with Jeff. Then Isabel and I will go find Ty. He should still be in the vicinity of the Thai restaurant, as I cast a confusion spell on him. We will remove the spell and bargain for them to leave, if we return his brother and sister. That should buy us enough time to train, graduate, and then we will go to Aquanis and resume this little fight.”

  “What makes you think Ty will honor it? He was going to kill us you know. They said as much when they attacked us earlier.” Taggart had brought up a valid point. Meckenzie had no way of assuring that they would cooperate.

  “Well, I guess we threaten them with numbers. We can bring in a couple of extra people to guard the house. We can stop going to school so they don’t have the advantage of finding us in public. We can take the next few weeks and train. Then after our birthday party, we can leave. I think if w
e tried to leave now, Dad would have a heart attack.”

  “You want to drop out of school?” Taggart looked shocked.

  “We can test out early. Tell them we have a family emergency. All three of us are way ahead anyway. We aren’t going to college now, so what does it really matter?”

  Taggart looked heartbroken. He had been working so hard to be school valedictorian. Taggart still had hopes of Harvard on his mind.

  “Look, when we finish this thing, you can come back and go to Harvard. They will still take you. We just have to make up a convincing family emergency. I have an idea we can discuss later.” They had arrived at the arch and Meckenzie wanted to concentrate on finding Kellan. “I’m going to call her phone, so let’s spread out and listen for the ringtone.”

  Meckenzie made the call and the three of them went in separate directions listening for Kellan’s phone. Meckenzie had to call five times before she caught the sound of ringing coming from behind a tree between the arch and the skating rink. It was dark enough that Kellan was hidden in the shadows. Kellan was propped up against the tree, sleeping. her hands and face had been badly burned. Kellan had tried to fight Ty’s sister, and it had not gone so well for her.

  “Taggart, heal Kellan before we wake her up. She will be in a lot of pain if you don’t and it might trigger her to grow.” Isabel knelt beside Kellan and motioned Taggart to do the same.

  Taggart placed his hands on Kellan’s face first. Meckenzie noticed tears in Taggart’s eyes and she could read in his mind that he felt responsible. Meckenzie placed her hand on Taggart’s back letting him know through her thoughts that she knew it was her fault. She was the one that decided to go on this date to get the information from Ty. Meckenzie could have insisted they stay home.

  Taggart began healing Kellan’s burned hands. Her face was healed and looked more flawless than before. Any traces of acne were gone along with the burns Kellan had suffered. Taggart took her hands in his own, placing them together. Within seconds Kellan was completely healed. Taggart really did have a miraculous gift.

  “Okay, now I’m going to wake her up. Kellan will still be in fight mode, so everyone step back.”

  Isabel began whispering the words to wake Kellan up. Meckenzie and Taggart took a step back. Kellan began to open her eyes. She blinked twice and then jumped to her feet. Her fists went up and she almost took a swing at Isabel.

  “Kellan stop.” Meckenzie yelled. “It’s Isabel. Kellan look at me.”

  Meckenzie took a step toward Kellan. Taggart tried to grab her so that she wouldn’t get in the way of the swing that Kellan was about to throw, but Meckenzie shook him off and stepped closer. Without hesitation, Kellan spun around and threw a vicious right hook that broke Meckenzie’s nose. Meckenzie fell back onto the ground with a thud, blood poured out of her nose down the front of her dress.

  “Meckenzie.” Kellan realized too late that she had just hit her sister. “Are you okay?”

  She dropped to the ground beside Meckenzie. Isabel laughed, as she always did when the triplets didn’t listen to her.

  “I told you to take a step back. I think eventually you will start listening to me. Taggart do you have enough energy to heal your other sister now?”

  Taggart didn’t respond, he was already kneeling next to Meckenzie, moving her hands away from her face.

  “This is going to hurt a little. I need to move your nose back into position.” Taggart was pushing and prodding at Meckenzie’s broken nose trying to determine exactly where he needed to move it. “Okay, take a deep breath. On the count of three. One. Two. Three.”

  Taggart popped Meckenzie’s nose back into place. Meckenzie screamed. A million little camera flashes went off in her vision. Taggart kept his hands on her nose for a moment so he could mend it. When Taggart was done, he sat back on the grass beside Meckenzie. He had used all the healing he could use in one night. Meckenzie hoped that he wouldn’t be asked to heal anyone again tonight.

  “I’m sorry Meckenzie. I thought you were that fire breathing witch that attacked me.” Kellan said apologetically.

  “It’s okay. I deserved it. You wouldn’t be out here if it wasn’t for me and this stupid date.” Meckenzie really did think she deserved being punched in the face. The whole evening was a disaster.

  “I hate to break up this pity party, but we still have two sleeping fairies that need to be taken care of.” Isabel brought them all back to the situation at hand.

  The evening was not over yet. They all made their way back to Jeff, who had called in his own reinforcements. Standing beside Jeff was a red haired gentleman. He had the most intriguing green eyes that seemed to sparkle even in the darkness. He had brought with him a wheel chair. Meckenzie had been worried about getting everyone to the cars without attracting attention. The wheel chair would work fantastic for one of the slumbering fairies, but carrying the other would attract a lot of attention.

  Jeff noticed the blood on Meckenzie’s dress and immediately ran over to her. He looked her over from head to toe, but could find no wounds.

  “What happened?” Jeff said with worry in his voice.

  “Kellan happened.” Taggart laughingly said.

  Kellan punched him in the arm and laughed herself. She was starting to forgive herself for hitting Meckenzie.

  “I accidently punched her, broke her nose. I think it improved her looks, but Taggart fixed it anyways.”

  “So what’s the plan?” Jeff asked. “I called my friend Bowen. He has a particular talent that might come in handy for us.”

  Isabel had been particularly quiet since their return. Meckenzie turned to find her staring at Bowen with rapt attention. It seemed that Bowen was as interested in Isabel as she was in him, they had locked eyes. Everyone began to notice the two of them.

  “Bowen.” Isabel finally spoke.

  “Isabel, how are you?” Bowen moved towards Isabel. A smile touched his face, making his eyes dance more than before. The smile made him look twenty years younger than the his fifty-something year old appearance, or maybe it was Isabel that inspired his youthful look

  “I’m good. How long have you been in the city?” Isabel’s breathing became heavy. The sweetness of her words reminded Meckenzie of cotton candy, there was something happening under the surface of the pleasantries being exchanged..

  “A few months, I’ve been tracking for the Queen. She has had me looking for these guys.” Bowen pointed to the ground where the two Fae rested comfortably. “Though I didn’t know that I was looking for Tiernan’s progeny.”

  “What?” Isabel was looking back and forth from Bowen to the two on the ground. “Tiernan’s progeny. They’re the heirs to the throne of the Raven.”

  “Yes, it seems, as best as my intel can gather, that the fire clan has a produced a set of triplets that they are claiming are the heirs to the throne in Aquanis. It would be best, in my opinion, if we just killed them now and were done with the whole thing.”

  “I don’t think so.” Meckenzie objected. “Killing them here brings a whole lot of questions down on my family. There is not going to be any killing tonight.”

  Bowen bowed at Meckenzie and smiled. “You are your mother’s daughter.”

  “I keep hearing that, thank you.” Meckenzie was ready to get this over with. “We need to get to Columbus Circle with these two. There should be two limos waiting for us there. We will put these two in one limo and Isabel and I will go get Ty in the other limo. We will convince him to leave the city, by bartering with him for his siblings.”

  “That might be where I come in handy.” Bowen said.

  “Why is that?” Meckenzie couldn’t see how this man who wanted to kill the teenagers could be of any help to convincing them to leave.

  “I’m what they call a bedazzler.” Bowen said.

  “That was what I was going to tell you.” Jeff interjected. “Bowen here has t
he special gift of being able to convince people to do what he wants them to.”

  “It’s in the eyes.” Bowen said with a smile.

  “They are sparkling.” Kellan added the words that Meckenzie was thinking.

  Bowen laughed from the soles of his feet. “Yes.”

  “Okay, so Bowen, Meckenzie and I will go retrieve Ty. Jeff will take the other two and meet us when we call him.” Isabel finally pulled her eyes away from Bowen and rejoined the conversation.

  “Excuse me. What are we supposed to do?” Taggart added.

  “Go home.” Isabel and Meckenzie said simultaneously.

  “No.” Kellan objected. “We will go with Jeff. If something happens and they wake up, he’ll need some help. Plus, I am not going to be pushed out of this. This is our fight too.”

  “I agree with Kellan.” Taggart looked at Meckenzie. “If something happens, it would be better for there to be more of us.”

  “Fine.” Meckenzie didn’t want to argue about it. “This has taken too long already. Let’s get them to the cars.

  They put the earthmover in the wheel chair so Kellan could push him to Columbus Circle. Bowen and Jeff lifted the fire-starter up and draped her arms around their shoulders. They carried her as if she were drunk and had passed out. That was the cover story that Bowen had determined would be the easiest to sell.

  Meckenzie felt like they were heading off into the night to make a deal with the devil himself.