An Argument of Fairies

by Cory Huff

  As he made a right around the corner near his house, his left foot came up off the ground and pushed off the house next to his, propelling him straight into the back of a tall, muscular man. Auley fell down but immediately scrambled up again as the man turned around. He looked funny, blonde hair with his eyes covered with blue coloring, like a woman.

  He saw his dad, Kerry, on the ground, his face bloody. Kerry saw Auley and yelled out, “Run!” Dad dove into the legs of one of the tattooed men and Auley dodged past the two men into the street.

  Auley looked around, seeing multiple people, and shouted, “Help! Please help! They’ve got my dad!”

  Aidan, Nia, Liam and Sophronia were walking toward Aidan’s tannery, when they heard Auley’ unmistakeable high voice. “Help! They’ve got my dad!” Aidan whipped his head around, seeing his brother, and charged forward without hesitation. Nia looked at Sophronia and then turned, hot on Aidan’s footsteps. Liam and Sophronia, knowing they needed to get out and that they were only here to get supplies, looked at each other and jogged ahead more cautiously.

  Aidan’s little brother saw them coming, turned and pointed down an alleyway. Aidan charged in and saw the two tall warriors beating his father. The blonde behemoths heard him coming and they both turned, smiles on their faces. Brannan and Einain stood shoulder to shoulder, each of them ready to meet Aidan and Nia. Aidan had to stop them from hurting his father. Aidan came straight at one of them, dodging under the first fist launched by those long arms and coming up and under for a punch to the gut. Brannan’s stomach was like iron. He didn’t even react to the punch and Aidan was so surprised that he took a hook to the side of his head, sending him slamming into the wall.

  Nia hardly fared better against the equally large Einain. She dodged the first punch, the second and the third, but getting close enough to punch back would have put her in a dangerous situation. Despite her recovery workouts copying the church warriors, she hadn’t had the training that Aidan had and she quickly realized she was in over her head. Dodging another punch, she fell over backwards, turned it into a somersault, and scrambled back out of the alley. Einain charged after her and they all ran into Sophronia and Liam.

  Einain kept his feet in the tangle, grabbing Nia by the shirt as she fell backwards again into Sophronia. He punched her twice. Sophronia shoved Liam aside and pulled a dagger. Einain saw the dagger, dropped Nia and grabbed Sophronia’s arm. They struggled for control of the dagger, Einain trying to bend Sophronia’s wrist back.

  Aidan recovered immediately after slamming into the wall. It hurt, but he’d been hit pretty hard in practice too. He gathered himself and sprang off of the wall, inside the reach of the man who had beaten his father and landed his own punch on the man’s face, snapping his face to the side. Brannan grunted in pain, no longer smiling. Aidan drew his dagger, swiping across in one fluid motion. The warrior jumped back, stopped at the opposite wall and Aidan came forward, dagger stabbing in an unpredictable pattern as he had been taught.

  The warrior dodged and drew a dagger of his own and slashed wildly at Aidan’s arm, just missing. They both started circling in the alley, cautiously jabbing at each other's defenses to see who would make a mistake.

  Liam recovered and charged the big blonde warrior, trying to help Sophronia keep her dagger. Einain saw Liam coming and kicked to the side, hitting him in the stomach, doubling him over. Einain then twisted his hip back and down on the retraction and dragged Sophronia off balance. She lost hold of the dagger and nearly fell over as she was jerked forward. Nia landed a solid punch to the warrior’s kidney and he screamed in pain and rage, whirling around and slashing a deep cut in Nia’s shoulder. She yelped and dove away. Sophronia pulled another dagger and stabbed it deep into the man’s side from her knees. He roared again and backhanded her. Sophronia took the blow and allowed the momentum to carry her backwards and up into standing. The man charged forward, grabbing at Sophronia’s slashing dagger hand while also stabbing forward low and fast.

  Aidan realized that he was doing this fight wrong when the warrior stayed low in his defensive crouch. Aidan wasn’t going to get him out of this stance by circling like this. He was fighting a trained warrior.

  So he threw his dagger at the man, who flinched and tried to dodge out of the way. Only he found that when he dodged to the side, Aidan was there with a boot to the head. The warrior reeled backward, slashing wildly to keep Aidan away, but Aidan had backed off and drawn his shortsword. Standing over his father, he shouted, “In the name of the Creator, you will not harm my father or my friends. Stand down now and I will spare your life.”

  The warrior looked at him astonished for a moment. Then he grinned and unhooked a hand axe from his belt. He clanked the dagger and the axe together as a challenge of his own. He took a deep breath, seemed to quiver for a moment, and then charged Aidan with a terrifying, ululating scream that had Aidan startled.

  Sophronia knew she couldn’t lock up with the man, but he was so fast that she didn’t have room to get away and create space. She slashed across and he hesitated then timed his next charge as her arm was out wide. That dagger came in low and she knew she would be stabbed. She tried to throw her hips back but it wasn’t far enough and the digger bit her stomach. Pain blossomed that made her gasp. This wasn’t supposed to happen. She had trained to fight. Everything she had learned about fighting had turned out to be a lie.

  Nia came back up out of her roll and saw the stab. She knew it was serious before the blood started welling out of the wound. Nia thought that she was supposed to come find a friend to help, and this woman who had helped her was just stabbed. Nia became angry.

  She heard the wind begin to pick up. It had the sound of a raging storm crashing to the shore. In that crash Nia heard instructions and felt the power of the storm. In the next instant, she hurtled herself forward, kicking the man in the back of the knee, knocking him down to a kneeling position. She then brought her hands in hard over his ears like a thunderclap, and he roared in pain. Nia brought her knee up hard into the middle of his back, a storm hurtling a small boulder into a body, sending him sprawling forward and then she pounced on his back. Like a crashing storm surge, she screamed a primal scream as she brought her foot down on the back of the man’s neck. There was a loud crack.

  Aidan set himself to meet the charge, then at the last possible instant, he dove to the warrior’s dagger side, bringing his shortsword down across his body and slashed the warrior’s hamstring. Brannan went down hard and Aidan rolled to his feet, charging back in, shortsword leading. The warrior, to his credit, managed to struggle back up on one leg, clearly in agony, but with a grin on his face. Aidan hadn’t been paying attention to the position of his father relative to the chaotic movement of combat. The warrior made eye contact with Aidan as he chopped his axe down, burying it in the chest of Aidan’s father.

  Aidan screamed, “No!” As he saw the axe descending and tried to change his sword stroke to intervene, but he was too late. His shortsword cut deep into the warrior’s arm. Brannan punched Aidan, who barely seemed to register the blow. Aidan buried his dagger to the hilt in the off-balance warrior’s throat. Blood gushed everywhere, covering Aidan in dark red fluid. Brannan’s eyes bulged as he grabbed at the dagger and slowly sank to his knees. The life fled from his eyes, but Aidan was too consumed with rage to notice.

  Liam froze when he saw Sophronia stabbed in the stomach. The next thing he knew, he heard the loud crack of the man’s neck as Nia, in a blind fury, rode him to the ground. Her bare foot came up and down again as Nia raged. The bones were broken. The man didn’t move.

  Liam heard Aidan scream, “No!” He whirled around and saw Aidan bury his dagger in the man’s neck and shuddered as dark red blood fountained everywhere. Aidan pulled the dagger out and stabbed repeatedly, the doomed warrior sinking to his knees and then slumping to his side. With each stab, Aidan screamed, “No!” Liam ran to him but pulled up short as Aidan knelt on the man’s body, stabbing him over and ov
er. Liam saw a man lying on the ground with an axe stuck in him. Was that Kerry? He started to hurry around Aidan to help Kerry and Aidan was suddenly stabbing at Liam, who backpedaled yelling, “Aidan it’s me! Stop!”

  Aidan yelled, “Stay away from my father!” And then he turned around, throwing down his shortsword and knelt down next to the man. Aidan put his bloody hands on his father’s head and bowed his head. Liam heard Aidan choke out some words. Aidan’s breath came in great, heaving sobs. His words were barely discernible, “Kerry Shamhradháin, in the name of the Creator I heal you.” Liam wasn’t sure what he was doing.

  Aidan changed positions, putting his hands on his father’s chest. “It’s not working. Why isn’t it working? I did this before. Why isn’t it working? Father! You have to live!”

  Then Liam heard “Fire!” He turned and looked. At the end of the block, there was smoke billowing. His tannery was on fire. He ran down the street, forgetting Aidan and Kerry.

  “It’s not working. Why isn’t it working? I did this before. Why isn’t it working? Father! You have to live!”

  Aidan was frantic. His blood was hot. His heart was racing. He felt sick. He was covered in the blood of the dead warrior. He was angry. He couldn’t get calm. Couldn’t hear the quiet voice that told him what to do.

  He put his blood stained hands down on his father, willing something to happen. The peace that accompanied his other two miracles was nowhere to be found. This was his father, who was gushing blood from an axe wound to his chest.

  Aidan sobbed in frustration. He felt a hand on his arm and he looked. His father, in obvious pain, was trying to speak. Aidan leaned over. His voice barely audible, Aidan’s father said, “Aidan, I love you. You…” he sucked air in and some of it whistled out through the horrific wound in his chest. “I drank…because…elves. Liam’s father…fire and elves.”

  The whistling sounds stopped. His father’s eyes were glazed over. Aidan screamed in frustration, “NO!” He ripped the axe out of his father’s dead chest. He turned to the corpse of the warrior. The world faded from his awareness.

  Nia stood over Sophronia, who was holding a cloth over her stab wound and cursing to melt the paving stones. “Damnit! Stupid! I’m so stupid. We need to be out of here and now I’m stabbed! What the hell just happened? Who were those men?” She started as Nia knelt down. “What are you doing?” She asked as Nia lifted the cloth. The cut didn’t look deep, but the blood loss could be serious if this wasn’t looked at soon.

  She looked up at the people running down the street to help with the fire. The wind had died to a breeze. She suddenly had an idea. She touched Sophronia’s wrist and lifted her lip, seeing her gums. She attuned herself to the blood flowing through Sophronia’s veins and focused on the wound. There it was. Nia willed the wound to close. Something in the bleeding changed and Nia knew Sophronia would be fine. “Stay here,” said Nia.

  Nia looked over to Aidan. He was silently hacking at a body on the ground with an axe. He was covered in blood. Nia ran to him, yelling, “Aidan! Aidan! There’s a fire!”

  Aidan started and looked up, “Fire?” He asked, in a monotone voice.

  Nia looked at him, not sure what to say. “Yes, Aidan, can ‘t you hear everyone yelling? There’s a house on fire down the street. I think it’s Liam’s workshop.”

  “Fire and elves,” Aidan said, almost inaudibly. He turned and started walking down the street.

  “Faster,” Nia said as she jogged past him.

  Liam ran to his tannery, full of worry and panic. His life was here. Yes, he was going to leave for a while, but he didn’t want to see it destroyed. His family’s possessions were here. The only things he had from his father and mother. He had to save as much as he could.

  There were people there ahead of him. They hesitated with blankets and buckets of water. They swatted at sparks. Despite the fact that most of the neighborhood had stone houses, spreading fires could destroy sheds and other wooden structures. The side yard, the workshop, was already engulfed in flames. He yelled at everyone, “You have to get back. The tanning chemicals are on fire. They could explode or form a noxious gas. Get back! Go!”

  Liam then ran past everyone and through the front door.

  There was smoke, but not chemical gas. Visibility was low. The heat didn’t seem too bad. He ran across the front room, heading for the hallway to get to his bedroom. He nearly tripped over something. It was a sword lying on the ground, unsheathed. The metal danced with the red light of the fire. The hilt was wrapped in leather, surrounded by a guard that looked like the branches of a willow tree hanging down from the blade.

  And suddenly Liam was on the ground. His ears were ringing and he felt stunned. He saw a familiar, pointy eared shape standing over him. The woman from the woods? Mindee. She booted him in the face and he rolled across the room. He tried to get to his feet but she was there and she kicked him in the ribs, blasting the air from his lungs. She was on top of him, pounding him in the face. Liam tried to protect himself, throwing up his arms which she swatted away as easily as a child, hammering him over and over again. He tried to summon the anger that had saved him in the woods, but it never came when he demanded it. He started to become detached from the pain. Blows rained down but he stopped feeling them. He grunted and moaned as she hammered his face and his head bounced off of the floor. He knew the end was near.

  As if from a distance, he heard a faint voice mutter, “You don’t have to kill this one. He’s not the blasmaigh.”

  You don’t get a say here Caile, and you know you’re not supposed to speak out loud, responded Mindee, internally. He helped that woman get away, and he nearly killed me with the Ogham. He has earned a death sentence just as surely as her.

  He’s not a human, the rules don’t apply here, responded Caile.

  What? That came from Mindee, Seine, and the others.

  Look at him. He has the blood of the Sidhe in him. Why do you think his use of the Ogham was so powerful? Responded Caile.

  It doesn’t matter.

  Yes, it does.

  Let’s kidnap him instead, let others decide.

  Let him go. He is Sidhe.

  Her mind was chaos. Her selves were arguing. There was only one way to focus and clear her mind. The bladesong.

  Liam, unsure what was happening, opened his eyes. Mindee was swaying, staring at the fire. She held the sword in her hand, pointed down at Liam, trembling. She brought it up slowly, languidly, into a fighting stance. Her left foot came forward with her right sword arm rising up and to the right as her body turned in a slow pirouette. As she came around the sword extended outward in a lunge that was long, controlled and terrifying to watch. Mindee had a look of intense concentration on her face. Liam wondered if he was going to die. Her dance was terrifying and beautiful. It went onward as the flames spread. The fire came into the house and smoke poured through the living room area. Mindee began to be obscured in her dance. Liam began coughing and he didn’t understand how she could stand in the smoke.

  The sound of booted feet. Screams. Swords clashing. Darkness and silence.

  Nia charged past the crowd and through the front door she had seen Liam enter. Liam had been inside too long. She had given up trying to get Aidan to hurry. When she entered, she was astonished to see a woman doing some sort of dance, with Liam on the ground beaten bloody. Nia charged forward wordlessly and shoved the woman in the back, just below the right shoulder blade, sending her flying. The sword dropped to the ground. Nia kicked it aside. “Did you do this? What’s wrong with you? Who are you?”

  Mindee hit the ground and rolled right to her feet. She didn’t scream. She looked at Nia with a puzzled expression. Nia realized the woman had pointed ears. Then Mindee charged forward.

  Mindee was taller than Nia, giving her longer reach. She led with a right jab. Nia backed up. More jabs. Nia dodged left, right, right again, lean back, and then she dropped down. Mindee kicked her in the face when she dropped down. Nia stumbled back. Wh
en Mindee closed Nia surprised her, and herself, by popping up and catching her with an uppercut to the jaw. Mindee stumbled back. Nia pressed on, kicking Mindee’s left leg and causing her to fall down. Nia pounced on Mindee, raining hammer blows down on her head. She had to stop this pointy-haired woman and get Liam out.

  Mindee was an experienced warrior and her surprise at Nia’s counterattack was only momentary. She protected her head with her arms and Nia’s blows did little damage. Mindee gathered her legs and used her knees to create space between her and Nia. She then shoved Nia back, using the space to spring up to her feet.

  Both women were bruised. Neither were ready to back down. The room was full of smoke. They were both coughing and squinting. In the melee, Mindee and Nia had circled the room and neither of them were certain where the exit was, but they both knew that if they didn’t get out, they were going to be asphyxiated.

  Mindee looked around for Liam. She started toward him and Nia pounced, over committing to protect him. Mindee stopped short and kicked Nia in the ribs, sending her sprawling. Caile gracefully jumped to her sword and picked it up. “I don’t know who you are little woman, but this sword is not meant for you. Run away and you can live.”

  Nia was confident. The Spirits were with her. She had dedicated her life to them. She would not be a coward. She stood up and coughed out, “You can’t have him.”

  The pointy-eared woman looked sad for a moment. The tip of the sword lowered, trembling, for a moment. Before Nia could register the change, impossibly fast, the woman exploded forward in a lunge, driving the steel of the sword through Nia’s ribcage, through her heart and out the back. Mindee harshly whispered in Nia’s ear, “You don’t get to decide.”