Jessica wrenched her forearm from Chance’s grasp. “But headmistress! It’s the king!”
“We do not strike fellow students, Miss Penner, not for any reason.”
“I witnessed the whole thing, headmistress,” Chance said. “Holly didn’t provoke them at all. They were teasing her unmercifully. Holly never even responded.”
“Thank you, Mr. Mac Craith. You and Miss Ó Cuilinn may go to the tables,” said the headmistress. She turned to Jessica and Naomi. “As for you two, you will go directly to your quarters and skip dinner. I think you need something to dwell on while your stomachs growl.” She raised her arm and pointed back out of the dining hall.
Jessica and Naomi looked extremely put out; they walked out glowering, without saying anything.
Chance and I found a good place to sit at the table.
I glanced at him after we were settled. “Thanks,” I whispered.
“No problem,” he said. “I cannot believe how sour those girls are.”
“I can,” I said, piercing a bite of potato halfheartedly.
“Hey,” he said softly, putting a hand over mine. “It’ll be okay. If they keep this up, they’ll eventually get expelled. If they let it go, everything will calm down and blow over.”
“I just worry someone’s going to get hurt before it’s over,” I looked up at him. “And it will probably be me.” Tears filled my eyes.
“I won’t let that happen, Holly.” He gently squeezed my hand.
He took his napkin and dabbed at the corners of my eyes, then rubbed my back.
“Hey,” said Liesl, walking up and taking a seat beside me. “Everything okay?”
“Yes.” I took Chance’s napkin he’d been using to dry my tears and blew my nose with it. “Everything’s fine.”
Liesl looked concerned.
“Just a couple of troublemakers,” said Chance. “We took care of them.”
Renée took a seat with us. “Oh my God, I’m so famished I can’t believe it.” She grabbed a plate and some fried chicken. “What a weekend that was. WHAT AN AWFUL WEEKEND!”
I turned to her. “Renée, how was your last class?”
“Brutal.” She took a bite of a drumstick and began chewing.
By silent consensus the three of us did not mention the unpleasantness of the past ten minutes.
“I’m so excited the King is coming to the school!” said Liesl.
“Oh my God, me too,” said Renée. “The reason he’s coming is upsetting, though.” She glanced at Chance. “Have you heard anything about the actual explosions?”
“The headmistress is being very secretive about what actually happened,” said Chance, “but I know a few fourth-years who were up on the north tower when the blasts occurred. They say the impacts were close to the base of tower three and about three stories off ground. I went around the side of the castle today to see if I could spot anything, but the damage is out of sight.”
“It’s probably on one of the inner tower keeps,” said Renée. “Can’t see it from the ground. Have you noticed any work on the inside?”
“No, but those hallways have been blocked off. I think most of the damage was on the outer walls. The inner wall repairs wouldn’t be seen,” Chance said.
The rest of the meal chatter faded into the background as my thoughts turned inward.
Jessica and Naomi’s hatred of me had not lessened, as I had hoped it would after the center hallway incident.
Apparently, the warning from the headmistress had done nothing but drive them underground.
Renée had said she’d cautioned her sister as well.
I thought for a minute.
Renée knows my true heritage, but is bound by a Secrecy Spell. She cannot tell Naomi my secret outright, but she probably stressed how important it is to stop bullying me.
But it hadn’t made any difference.
WHY?
I wondered how many of the students felt the way Jessica and Naomi do?
This bullying was a new experience for me. I’d always been a loner, together with Aunt Clare. We’d stayed to ourselves. We’d never bothered anyone. We’d tried to be invisible.
You had to be, if you were going to survive on the streets.
I smiled, remembering the first time I had stolen an apple from a street vendor.
“Holly, that’s dangerous. They notice you when you do that. Being visible means being vulnerable,” Aunt Clare had cautioned. And I had cooled it on the thievery.
For a while.
The dry spell had been broken the fall when Aunt Clare and I’d had a string of bad luck.
The week we went hungry.
I was about eight, and it had been windy and rainy all week. Aunt Clare had found half a discarded sandwich in the subway tunnel. She’d snatched it before anyone else could see, and we’d shared it in a dark corner of the underground. We hadn’t eaten in a day and a half, so the thing had been gone in a few minutes.
I remembered licking my fingers of every crumb I could find, and wishing I had more.
I’d looked up and seen Aunt Clare watching me.
I knew she’d given me the lion’s share of the meal, and I’d felt so much love for her.
I’d jumped into her lap and given her a hug.
“Come on, kiddo, let’s go find some water,“ she’d said.
We’d gone to a water fountain we frequented when we were in that part of the city.
“Remember, sweetheart, never drink from old water,” Aunt Clare had always cautioned me. “This mean, no puddles, no large fountains, and no rivers or gutters.”
And I never had.
“You can get sick enough to die from the tiny creatures in the old water.”
Aunt Clare had taught me so much.
But when we’d spent days looking for food during a storm that kept everyone inside, things had gotten desperate. I remember thinking longingly of the half sandwich we’d shared as I searched every trash can and every nook and cranny of the city for something to eat.
Three days passed.
Aunt Clare had retreated to our cubby underground, and a fourth day had gone by without her emerging.
She’d grown weaker and weaker.
It had been up to me. I’d walked miles down the streets on the fifth day, kicking every piece of trash and debris I’d found, trying to ignore the hunger gnawing at my stomach.
I’d wandered down to the farmers market set up on Union Square, staring hungrily at the tables heavy with every kind of green food imaginable.
There’d been a table set up by a grocer, laden with the biggest, reddest apples I’d ever seen. The grocer was making trip after trip back and forth from the table to the truck parked nearby, getting ready for the day’s sales.
A thought had entered my mind. A thought of eating one of those apples, and bringing another back to Aunt Clare.
I’d watched the grocer carry box after box from the truck. I’d seen him empty the crates from the truck until he’d had to climb into the back of his truck to grab the next crate. He did this once, then twice, taking even longer the second time.
By the time he’d walked from his table to get the third load, I had darted forward, hiding in the shadows, not thinking, just acting on instinct.
I’d glanced toward the man, who was just climbing up into the back of his truck again, and I’d acted.
Up went my hand, from where I crouched, half in the shadows.
Four apples. Then I’d scurried away.
It was fast, and no one had seen me.
As I ran back to the underground, my heart had thudded in my chest with the thrill.
I could’ve been seen.
I could’ve been CAUGHT.
I’d thought about all these things as I ate my apples in the cubby opposite Aunt Clare, who munched on the two apples I had brought her.
I’d watched her face, noticing how hollow her cheeks were growing, and the dark circles under her eyes.
She’d winked at me betwe
en bites.
“Just be careful, Holly,” she’d whispered.
She understood.
Sometimes such things were necessary.
My thoughts returned to the present. My friends were still chatting amicably.
I looked down at the feast on my plate. The fried chicken, the mashed potatoes, a large pat of butter melting in the middle of the mound. The green beans and carrots on the side.
Aunt Clare and I had been grateful for four stolen apples.
Now I was living like a king, eating three meals a day, and I realized I hadn’t been hungry since Chance found me.
I looked around the room. The dining hall was massive, with ceilings several stories high, and tall windows that let the sunshine in.
I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude.
“Hey, Daydreamer?”
I looked over at Chance.
“Are you done?” he asked.
I looked down at my plate and saw I had eaten every bite except for half a biscuit. Never waste food. I grabbed the piece of bread off my plate and stood to join the others.
“Okay, well, see you tomorrow!” Renée waved and walked out.
Liesl turned to me. “I’m going to the library again, I can’t get enough of their rare book collection.”
“Have fun!” I smiled as she walked out.
“Well, I guess I’ll just turn in ...,” I said.
“Wait,” Chance said in a quiet voice. “We never got to watch the sunset.” He pointed out the window. The sky was just beginning to turn pink. “Join me on the roof?”
I stared out at the horizon. “Are we allowed to go outside? The repairs ...”
“I know how to reach the other side of the castle’s parapet,” Chance said. “And that turret faces west, so it’s a perfect place to watch the approach of twilight.”
I gazed at him, my head still a daze.
He grinned back at me easily.
There was something in his expression ...
“Sure,” I smiled.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Sunset and a Sighting
We walked out and up the stairs.
It took about ten minutes, but we were fast. Chance took the stairs two at a time, and I joined him, finding new energy.
At the very top, Chance indicated a seldom-used hallway, and at the end of this hallway was an old oak door, darkened with age.
He tried the handle, and it opened on the second try, creaking rustily.
He turned to me and put his finger to his lips in a shhh gesture, and then beckoned me through the door.
I emerged on the turret and looked around. I was surrounded by stone, there were lamps every dozen feet, already lit for the evening.
“Come this way?” Chance beckoned me to the right, and we walked down the covered parapet walk until we emerged in the open air. Just a few dozen feet farther, and we turned a corner and I felt the breath leave my lungs.
The sky was on fire.
Bright pink and orange color spanned the sky from end to end. Above this was a darkening rose color that slowly, ever so slowly, was turning into purple.
“I love the sunset,” I said softly.
“I’m taking an art class this year, as one of my electives, and I’m trying to work up the courage to paint the sunset,” Chance said.
“Oh! You should!” I turned to him. “Then you’ll immortalize the moment forever!”
He grinned down at me. He was so tall he nearly towered over me. I felt like I was looking up at an adult, even though we were just over a year apart in age.
“Chance?” I asked, turning back to the sunset. It has subtly changed. It was a moving work of art from mother nature.
“Yes.”
“Can I ask you about your past?”
“Sure,” said Chance. “Ask me anything.”
“Where did you grow up?”
“I was born in East Sussex, England,” said Chance. “In the Ashdown Forest, to be exact.”
“Ohhh! You were born in a forest?”
“Yes. In a stone cottage on the western edge.”
“And, all the faefolk come from various heritages?” I asked.
“Yes. I, for instance, come from Faun heritage.”
“Faun heritage?” My eyes were on the sunset.
“Yes,” he said.
The flaming pink and orange colors were darkening.
“If you watch the land, as twilight comes upon it, you might see a faun or two,” Chance said softly.
I dropped my eyes to the school grounds and searched.
Chance lowered his head to my level and looked with me. After a few minutes, the sky had darkened enough so that the magical sparkle of twilight was soaking the land. “There,” he whispered, pointing to a spot on the edge of the school lawn.
I looked. “I can’t see anything.”
“Wait until he moves again; look for movement,” Chance murmured.
I trained my eyes on the area he indicated.
The shadows were growing long, and the lamps around the school grounds made glowing circles of yellow here and there.
A cool breeze ruffled my hair as I held still and waited.
I was not disappointed.
The movement was what caught my eye. The faun was right where Chance was pointing.
He moved hesitantly in the bushes at the edge of the grounds, and seemed to be playing a flute as he walked. I’d never wished to be able to hear something as much as I did in that moment.
The blond faun looked grizzled and wore a short beard. He had hooves and long, pointed ears, and was, for all intents and purposes, naked as a jaybird. Large horns curled around either side of his head. He looked wild and natural. I couldn’t take my eyes off him and had to consciously force myself to blink when my eyes began to sting.
We watched him as the sun set into the trees, until he wandered back into the forest and was gone.
I stared at the spot he had disappeared into for a few minutes after he was swallowed by the trees, thinking about fauns and heritage and the true forms of the faefolk.
We’d been learning the different heritages in class, and also about how the fae could shift into glamours and appear human. And about how this shifting into a different form affected not only their physical form, but their mindset.
I turned to Chance.
“I have questions,” I said, smiling shyly. I hated to get personal, but I figured it was kind of like continuing my lesson from class.
“I have answers,” Chance grinned.
“Okay. We’ve been learning about the different heritages and the shifting of forms and how it changes both appearance and mindset.”
Chance nodded.
“So, you’re shifted right now?”
“Yes,” Chance said.
“And do you ... ‘unshift’ when you go to sleep? You know, change back when you’re unconscious?” I hadn’t noticed any difference in Chance when we were lost in the forest.”
Chance ducked his head and smiled. “Er, no. I stay in this form, all the time. I’ve been in this form for so long that it’s changing back to fae form that I have to concentrate on.”
“Ah,” I said, thinking about what he said. I looked back up at him. “Why?”
Chance smiled. “Shifting into form happens naturally, as a defense mechanism, starting when you’re very young. At first you do it on accident, then on purpose, and it feels safer, so it becomes second nature.”
“So ... does it hurt to shift back?” I asked.
Chance slowly shook his head.
I thought of something.
Can I shift? Have I ever shifted? What would I look like if I shifted into a defensive glamour?
“Shifting in an adult is a rather personal thing,” explained Chance. “An intimate thing. That is why you never see it unless the faefolk is very young, or very elderly.”
“The faun we saw down there, was he an elder?” I asked.
“Yes. He was grizzled and had a beard
and grey in his hair, plus his horns were very large and probably deeply ridged.”
I glanced back down on the lawn and forest. The light had dimmed enough so that it was impossible to see details, except ...
Fireflies!
“Oh!” I was enchanted. There were hundreds and hundreds of them, little dots of light floating across the school lawn, dancing in and out of the bushes, winking in and out of sight in the forest.
“Look.” Chance pointed again. “Where the faun was, and where he walked. There’s a thick line of fireflies there.”
The fireflies were everywhere around the lawn and forest, but Chance was right: The path where the faun had been was especially thick with the glowing insects.
You could almost draw a line and follow it to follow the faun.
“The fauns are the spirits of the forest, as close to mother nature as the dryads,” Chance murmured. “The fireflies are drawn to them, and, in fact, that is where the magic began, long ago, of the fireflies following the forest magic. The fireflies are not part of the fae, and yet they are drawn to them. Have you ever heard the expression ‘drawn like moths to a flame’?”
I nodded.
“That is where the magic of light drawing moths and other twilight insects to it began.”
I stared at the fireflies. It was amazing they were not fae, and yet were drawn to the faun.
“So, in this case, the faun is the light the fireflies are drawn to?” I asked.
“Yes. The light of the magic every fae exudes.”
Hmmm.
“Okay, that makes sense,” I smiled back.
Waitaminute.
I glanced at him. “I’ve never felt drawn to any insect or faefolk in particular.”
He smiled. “That is because you are part of the faefolk.”
I thought about that for a minute. “So, I could possibly shift into human form? What would that be like? Would I look any different? Would my hair change color?”
Chance chuckled. “Holly, you are already shifted. Right now.”
What?
“But, but ... I’ve never looked any different, as far as I know,” I sputtered.
“Like I said, it starts very young, and it a defense mechanism, so the child doesn’t really realize they are doing anything different,” said Chance. “You said your Aunt Clare raised you?”
Faerie Misborn Page 23
