by Holly Hook
Stilt leaned back in the seat. "Maybe your parents wanted to protect you from getting stolen by the king again. They wanted you to have a chance, even if you weren't here."
"My real ones, you mean?"
"Well, your father. He's a miller over on the border between the light region and the dark region. Had you stayed with him, King Henrik would have you in his prison already. You have the same father every time you're born, Brie. He's always the same poor man, leading the same life over and over again. And you have the same mother, too, but she always dies when you're very young."
My heart ached. "That's sad." I wondered if my father looked anything like me, or if he was just like the parents I had back in the other world. Had. I was already thinking of them in the past.
"But you can't go and see him," Stilt told me. His glow faded. It was like a mood ring. "King Henrik will expect that. Your father is scared of Henrik. If you're with him and he asks for you, he will send you."
I sighed and joined Stilt in leaning back on the bench. The driver stopped the carriage at a stream so the horses could drink and then took us over a bridge. Another wagon passed us, this one full of pigs. We were reaching a more populated area, with more people.
The light got longer, and we fell into silence. My biological father was no better than my adoptive parents if Stilt was telling me the truth. Maybe if I found him and showed him what I could do this time around, he would accept me and want to keep me. But if Henrik showed up--
I wasn't going back there. I was tired of that sort of thing.
He could continue to be poor, and I had no desire to see him.
And Stilt must have wanted something.
We rolled through a bit more forest, and the shadows grew long and scary under the trees. Yes. We had to get somewhere before nightfall. I worked at the wool, making coin after coin and dropping them on the floor. My gold spinning abilities wouldn't get us through the night. At best, it might get us captured. We had to find an inn or something.
The trees cleared once again, and another town spread out in front of us. This one was a lot bigger than the last one. A giant wheel spun on the side of a building, and some cows grazed outside the city limits. Two men in leather hats and overalls chatted it up outside of a low stone building. A small castle stood in the distance on a hill, surrounded by majestic trees, and I tensed.
Stilt wrapped his fingers around my arm, and the zing of energy made me jump and made heat rush to my face. "Don't worry," Stilt said. "That castle belongs to the kind King. He's not a terrible man." He sounded nervous. Why, if this King was supposed to be a good ruler?
Stilt still held my arm. His energy radiated underneath my skin and down to my fingers. My hand heated like I was ready to create more gold. Stilt had some magic in him, all right.
My breath caught. Some of this I was feeling might not be magic.
He let go, and I could breathe again. Stilt stood up, facing the outside.
I didn't know Stilt. Not really. I couldn't be getting close to him. I had to keep a safe distance and promise him nothing. What if he was enchanting me? I needed safer space, then. I couldn't afford to get hurt again. Stilt might not have liked gold, but there had to be something he wanted. Something he was hiding.
"I need to go pick up your dress," Stilt said. He sounded absent and lost.
I handed the gold coins to Stilt, and he vanished, leaving the carriage and me behind with Sylvia. She hadn't spoken in hours. I wondered what she was thinking under that hood and why she had to wear it. Her hands were those of a young woman.
I crept closer to the front of the carriage, making sure Stilt was gone.
"Sylvia," I said.
She ignored me.
"Sylvia. Who's Stilt?"
She reached up, silent, and pulled her hood farther down over her face. I caught a glimpse of red trim that matched the same bloody shade of the tassels on King Henrik's horses.
I felt stupid, prodding her, but something was very off here. I checked to make sure Stilt hadn't come back from town. He hadn't, and wouldn't until he had found me a dress.
The woman leaned over as if begging me to leave her alone. She became a mass of black cloth, huddling down against the night to come.
These people couldn't be with King Henrik unless there were some elaborate trick going on. But Henrik was a king. He didn't need to trick me. All the guy had to do was send an order. He answered to no one.
I'd need to be very, very careful then.
I was tempted to get out of the carriage and walk through town to find Stilt myself, but I remembered my dragon leggings and the fact that it might get me jailed here, or worse. I probably fit these people's definition of a witch, and if I knew anything about fairytales, it was that witches were always the villains. But weren't witches old and ugly, too? I had one thing on my side, at least.
Stilt returned just as I'd resolved to go out searching for him. He held a beautiful yellow dress in his hands, and he cradled it, careful to keep its fibers off the ground. It was the color of straw sitting in the sun.
I opened the carriage door for him, and he handed it to me. "Put this on," he said. "The tailor wanted to get home, so I couldn't get it hemmed for you, so I had to take a risk and use some magic to get it down to your size."
"This is like, a noblewoman's dress or something," I said. It wasn't a peasant dress at all. "Thanks. Am I expected at a ball or something?"
Stilt muttered something and turned away, closing the door behind him.
I was excited to put it on. The door closed and I made sure no one was looking. Stilt hadn't walked around to the back window, and even if he had, he was too short to take a peek. And Sylvia wouldn't face anybody. I set my leggings down on the bottom of the carriage and my shirt as well and managed to slip on the dress. Something about it felt familiar and the memory tickled at the back of my mind for a moment before vanishing in a puff of smoke. All my past lives here. Was it possible for them to rise back up to the surface of my mind, or did they vanish each time I died and was born again?
At last, I got the dress adjusted. Stilt hadn't done a bad job estimating my size. I wondered how much he'd been checking me out on the carriage ride.
It was a gorgeous dress, like nothing I had seen someone at the prom wear. It was as if someone had spun the sun right into its fibers. Fitting. I just hoped that this town wasn't so impoverished that I stood out and someone tried to steal from us. But this was better than wandering around with dragons on my legs. The boy back in the other town would eventually tell someone about the dragon girl who spun gold. People in these stories never stayed quiet about what they had seen. It was Story Rule Number Thirty-Seven or something like that.
Dusk deepened outside. I stepped out of the carriage and Stilt smiled as he took me in. "Come on," he said. "Let's go find an inn."
Sylvia jumped down from the carriage and started to untie the horses. There had to be a stable around here where they could stay for the night. We stood there and watched her work, and I opened my mouth to offer her some help, but Stilt put his hand on my shoulder. Another zing of magic ran through me. Now my whole body was tingling. My muscles tensed and I flinched, and Stilt removed his hand.
And then he leaned close.
"She prefers to do the work herself. Let her."
His breath blew hot on my ear, and then he backed away. Relief and disappointment washed over me.
Careful, Brie.
There were too many secrets here to let my guard down. And I had just gotten rid of Hardy. I didn't need any more problems this early in the game.
Sylvia continued to untie the horses, and she fiddled with the reins. I considered asking her one more time if she needed help, but she turned her back on me and pulled her hood down farther on her face. I didn't get it. I turned away and walked with Stilt towards the center of town.
We passed a woman out dumping a bucket of water on a small garden of veggies. She watched us as we passed. Her dress was a white apro
n covered in food stains over a black skirt. She wore a bonnet that was cleaner than the rest of her. Her face was hard and her hands rough from years of work. This town wasn't a place for people who were lazy and sipped tea all day. It was a bunch of extras, the nameless townspeople in all the stories.
I hurried past her. I could feel the woman's gaze on the back of my neck.
I didn't fit here. How had Stilt found this dress in the middle of this town?
At last, we arrived at a long, low building with a thatch roof. Stilt knocked on the door, and a plump older woman answered. She smiled. Her teeth were yellow and black, but she seemed kind enough.
"May we rent a room for the evening?" Stilt asked. "My bride and I need a place to sleep, so we're not robbed in the middle of the night. My driver is taking our horses back to your stables."
The woman nodded and waved us in without a word. I followed Stilt.
His bride?
He winked at me. It was a cover story, but heat rushed to my face all over again.
Would we be sharing a room?
A bed?
My heart hammered. Stilt wasn't even human, but he looked almost human. I couldn't spend the night with him. Just him touching me about sent me through the roof.
Stilt spoke to the woman in a low voice. My eyes adjusted. We were in a lobby of some sort. My shoes made the floorboards underneath me creak, and a pair of candles lit the tiny space. The woman nodded to Stilt and waved us deeper into the inn. I could hear drunken snoring coming out of one closed door. There was another closed door at the end of the hall and Stilt opened it up and waved me in as soon as the old woman was gone.
"Are you kidding?" I asked.
His smile made me want to slap him. "Does it look like I'm not serious? You need a bed for the night."
I wasn't sure what that meant.
My heart pounded. The memory of Stilt's fingers around my arm rose back up again. The magic. The tingling. Did Stilt have more planned than just staying here for the night? Maybe this was what he wanted in return after all. I couldn't deliver that. Not to him. Hardy and I had never even gotten to the stage where we did anything. I wanted to, but then the video games and the gold swayed him instead.
"I...I think I'll go back in the carriage and sleep for tonight."
Stilt's face fell, and then understanding came over his features. "Brie, if we did anything intimate, it might kill you. Elves are too magical for most humans." He thought for a second and grinned again. "Or maybe not. You have some magic yourself and might be able to withstand--"
"I get it," I said, holding up a hand. My ears must have been crimson.
"This isn't what this is about," Stilt said. "I was just having some fun. You know, a jest."
"You said you weren't joking." I wasn't sure whether to feel relieved, disappointed or embarrassed.
"I wasn't joking about staying here for the night," Stilt said. He moved around me. Closer to the lobby. He was leaving. "I can head underground or into the forest for the night. It's where we elves dwell much of the time. I'll be at home there. You, on the other hand, need shelter."
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding.
Stilt wasn't staying the night after all.
That was a good thing. I told myself that.
I entered the room and Stilt remained at the doorway. He flashed one more grin at me and nodded. "Good night, Brie. I'll see you in the morning."
Was that dread in his voice?
He closed the door.
There was a straw bed in the middle of the room and a small table with a candle. I picked it up and checked the room, making sure nothing was hiding in the corners and nothing waiting to come out and snatch me. All clear. It was a small room, just enough to keep me safe for the night.
I flopped down on the straw and stared at the thatch ceiling for a long time. I'd stepped into another world. My iPod poked at me from the dress pocket, and I twirled Hannah's friendship ring. Only silence and the sound of drunken laughter outside floated in once in a while. The darkness deepened and I let out a breath. Stilt might try to come back in any second.
But the door never creaked.
He had gone for the night.
Was he even interested in me at all?
He had to be, in one way or another. Stilt had a motive behind this. You didn't take a risky trip into another world and face down knights for no reason.
I had to find out what it was.
I wasn't going to lie here and wonder about it all night. I was going to find Sylvia and demand some answers out of her. Where was she? She must not have gone too far, unless she was an elf, also, and had gone underground with Stilt.
The thought made worry creep up. Jealousy, but I waved it away. I had to know where I stood, even if it had nothing to do with whether Stilt was into me.
I got back up and grabbed the candle. Thankfully, it had a metal candleholder, and it didn't burn me to carry it around. I opened the door and peeked down the hall of the inn. No one was here. It was dark, darker than the scariest alleys I'd heard of back in the other world.
Why did Stilt have to be so frustrating?
I crept down the hall, careful not to make the wooden planks creak too much. Someone had stuffed some of them with mud and straw, muffling the noise. I was glad for that. These people used what they could, but it worked.
The old woman had vanished from the front lobby if you could call it that. The fire had burned low in the fireplace, and the wooden table and chairs stood empty and sad.
There were two other closed doors on the other side of the room. I put my ear to the first one and heard a guy grunt and roll over. A drunk, maybe, or a tired traveler. No. That wasn't Stilt. Stilt wasn't capable of emitting sounds like that. At least, I didn't think he was.
Next door. It was open, and no one rested on the bed.
I checked behind me to make sure the old woman wasn't coming to throw me out. My dress swished as I turned. The stables had to be close to the inn and now I had to go out there and search for them. Maybe it was fruitless. Sylvia might have gone with Stilt.
I opened the front door and the night air blew against my face. The moon rose overhead. It looked just like the moon back in the other world. Of course. It made sense that Fable would mirror Earth.
The stars were bright here, very bright, and the ground very black. A dim light poked between houses from far away, maybe from a fireplace, and a man yelled somewhere. I hoped it wasn't Fable's version of an abusive relationship.
The yells stopped.
I felt vulnerable out here.
I could smell the horses or their business. It had to be close.
The crickets masked my footsteps and went silent as I approached. I could make out the outline of a long, low building and I blew the candle out, regretting it right away. Darkness closed in. I had to feel along the stone wall of the inn and past a lump that might be the innkeeper's house. The smell intensified.
And along with it, low voices.
Stilt's low voice, and a woman's.
He hadn't gone underground after all.
I crept closer, holding my breath. The two stopped talking. A light flickered inside the stable, and a horse snorted. Even the animals were settling down to sleep.
I could make out the building now. It was a long, low building with a door open a bit on the side. The light inside flickered. Another candle burned. I got closer and dared to peek inside.
The flame made me squint at first, but then I could make out the inside of the stable. The two brown horses had settled in side by side in twin stables, and there was another horse, a spotted gray one, in the very back. My nose got numb to the smell, and I made out piles of clean hay on the floor of each stable.
And Stilt stood inside a clean stable along with Sylvia.
My heart sank.
Stilt was removing his shirt. He tossed it down on the straw and stretched out his muscles. Every line was perfect. Every muscle in his chest, defined. Stilt was like
a statue come to life, filled with blood and life and magic. His skin was perfect. Unblemished.
Then he turned around.
His back faced me now, and then I saw the horror.
Scars.
Lots and lots of them, crisscrossing Stilt's back like lines on a map. Many were red. Angry. Others were more white, faded and old. It was as if someone had taken a whip to Stilt on more than one occasion and beat him within an inch of his life.
The backs of his arms had them, too. Stilt had tried to shield himself from the blows, but it hadn't done any good.
Stilt flopped down on the straw, hiding the horror from view. And then Sylvia reached up and went to pull off her robe. She muttered something long and tired and Stilt said something back that I couldn't hear over my heartbeat.
Sylvia wore a blue dress with a white apron like a servant girl. I didn't get why she was hiding it.
Then I saw the real reason she wore that hood all the time.
Sylvia had no eyes.
There were sunken, black holes where her eyes should have been. Her eyelids hung ragged as if something had eaten them out and left tatters in their place. Only darkness remained where eyes had been. The skin had healed, but I couldn't stop the sickness from rising inside of me.
And then Sylvia walked over to lie down beside Stilt.
I turned away from the stable and ran back towards the inn, not looking back.
Chapter Six
Terror filled my sleep.
I ran down a corridor in a castle, trying to escape, trying to get away from the man chasing me. His heavy footfalls fell on the stone, and I ran under wooden supports, searching for an exit. The man insulted me in every way possible. He called me a trickster. A liar and a thief.
I bolted into a room.
It was full of straw, piled high up to the ceiling and ready to collapse on me.
I woke with a start.
Tiny slivers of sunlight poked through the thatch roof above me.
They made strange patterns on the floor and the walls of my room. The straw bed poked into me at odd angles, and I made myself get up. My limbs ached, and my head felt heavy from the day before.
