Lies of the Haven: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Adventure (Faerie Warriors Book 1)

by J. A. Curtis

  Arius halted and backed up a few steps before turning his bewildered glare on me.

  I stepped up next to him. “Look at its neck. Look at the charms.”

  He looked at the beast, seeing details I couldn’t. His eyes grew wide. “Dairlin.”

  Might this be her special ability? Why didn’t Arius know about it?

  “Go get the rope from the shaft, we will tie her up,” I said, keeping my voice low. I made sure not to shine my light in the creature’s face but kept the beam in her general direction to monitor her.

  “What are you going to do?” Arius asked, also keeping his voice soft.

  “Hopefully stand here until you come back.”

  Arius sheathed his sword and walked out of the cave, back toward the shaft. I was glad he knew where to go. I wouldn’t have been able to find the shaft on my own. The beast cowered in the corner, whimpering and licking the wound on her shoulder. I also sheathed my sword.

  “Dairlin?” I said, my voice soothing. “We’re here to help you.”

  The beast, cowering in the dark, dank corner, growled low in its throat. I hoped I was right, and this was Dairlin.

  The creature began to pace back and forth as it eyed me. I swallowed and hoped Arius would hurry. Sending Arius away put me at a disadvantage. I hadn’t been the one to lay a blow on the beast. She had no cause to fear me.

  But what was I thinking? The beast a human child? No, not human, a faerie. The incredulity from that morning, the insanity of it all washed over me like waves threatening to pull me under.

  Don’t freak out.

  The creature bellowed forth a hissing roar, and my body’s reflexes responded. I flinched and stepped back. Wrong move.

  The beast lunged at me, ivory tusks reflected in the beam of my flashlight. I had one option. I jerked my flashlight up to block those flashing tusks. The beast careened sideways as I heard the bulb shatter, and we were both plunged into blackness.

  I prayed the beast couldn’t see in the dark. Don’t make a sound. I took a slow, careful step. Glass from the broken flashlight crunched under my shoe. There was a snarl, and coarse fur hit me. I stumbled out of the way, cursing the glass that crumpled beneath. My shoulder hit the sharp, jagged wall of the cave, and I reached out like it were a lifeline. My hands scrambled across the rock, guiding me. The beast must not have been able to see, either. Otherwise I’d have been her snack by now. But she could still hear and maybe even smell me. I heard more snarls, and the beast crashed into the wall in front and behind, searching.

  Pull out your sword, I thought, defend yourself. But if this was Dairlin, and she was out of control, then my sword could hurt her. What if she ran onto my sword in the darkness? The sword remained at my side.

  My hands lost the wall, and I started to panic before I realized the wall only curved around to the side. A side tunnel. With a silent sigh on my lips, I pushed into the new tunnel. Perhaps I’d lose the beast.

  Pain shot through my foot. A boulder jutted up from the tunnel floor and I crashed over it onto the ground. I grunted as I landed on the cool, gritty floor of the tunnel. My sword casing hit with the force of a gunshot, the sound cracked through my brain.

  The beast roared, and her claws tore at the ground, scraping like nails on a chalkboard. Then it was on me. Its hot breath on my neck, its tusks pinning me against the ground, its claws slashing the armor protecting my back. My fingers stretched out for help and found nothing.

  Except for the broken flashlight still in my hand. I grabbed a tusk and jerked hard to the side. The beast yelped. It pulled back, and I flipped onto my back and wielded the flashlight like a sword. Hitting, slicing, stabbing. Then I threw my weight up and heaved myself against the monster’s tusks, all the while bludgeoning the beast with the cracked and broken flashlight stick in my hand.

  I was pretty sure it shouldn’t have worked, but I found myself out from under the beast. I scrambled to my feet and ran blindly into the darkness until I hit the tunnel wall so hard, I knew I’d better slow down. If I got injured, that would mean the end.

  The beast kept right with me, nipping at my heels in the darkness. My attacks with the flashlight had only made her angrier. A light began to animate the tunnel, and I saw more and more of the surrounding rocks. At first, I felt relief—I was getting close to a way out. But then I realized if I could see better, so could the beast.

  I turned and threw the broken flashlight stick at where I thought the beast was behind me and ran.

  The beast gave chase, its heavy pants behind me, hot and raging. My sword banged against my side, but I had no time to undo it. Would I have to jump for a rope? Would Arius be there? Was this even the same entrance the faeries used? Would there even be a rope? Still, I raced for the light as if it would be the source of my salvation.

  14

  Not Alone

  “Always help the innocent.”

  I ENTERED A LARGE CAVERN and skidded to a stop, almost plunging headfirst into a large underground pond. The light was coming from a large opening into the world high above, way out of my reach. The walls of the cavern were streaked from years of runoff, as if crying over my imminent end. This was no escape.

  I whirled around with the wish I could somehow get back out before the beast caught up to me. But my luck had run out. It came through the entrance to the cavern, snarling and snapping. For the first time, I saw the beast in the light. It came hunched over, a long snake like tail whipping behind it with tusks and horns and slashing fangs. Thick legs extended into long claws. It had a long reaching nose and dark bloodshot eyes that glowered at me. An image I would forever behold in my nightmares.

  It plowed toward me, saliva slung from its jaws. It leapt. The force of its weight bowling into me would take me down hard. Its claws reached for me, about to shred my face.

  And I ducked.

  The beast sailed overhead. Waves lapped as it splashed down into the pond’s center, which was deep, because it twisted and thrashed to stay afloat.

  It must not be able to swim.

  I was safe.

  The monster would drown, and this craziness would end. I straightened, my hands resting at my sides as the panic of survival began to wear down. The sword in my sheath clanked a little at my side as I watched the beast lose its battle to stay afloat.

  A pale little hand shot above the water. A human hand. And I remembered what my panicked mind had forgotten—it wasn’t the beast that didn’t know how to swim.

  I dropped the flashlight and dove into the frigid water, making my way to that little desperate hand. The fingers were slipping beneath the surface. I reached down, and the little fingers wrapped around my wrist like tentacles. With a harsh yank, she rose while the force of her desperation pulled me under.

  When I broke the surface, I heard desperate sobbing. Dairlin was human, but she was frantic, clawing at me and thrashing around in the water at the same time. I worried I wouldn’t be able to hold us both. My sword banged against my side, an unnecessary weight.

  We began to slip under the surface of the water. I kicked hard to keep us afloat, but already my legs burned from exertion. I wrapped my arms around Dairlin’s little body, her skin cool and slick. She wasn’t wearing any clothes.

  “I got you Dairlin, I got you,” I said, trying to make my voice as reassuring as possible. Her thrashing lessened, and I took a breath that ended up being half filled with water. I spit the water out and continued.

  “We’ll get out of here, but I need you to wrap your arms around my neck,” I said.

  The cool thin arms locked around my neck.

  “Good,” I gasped. “Now, when I tell you, kick your legs. Can you do that?”

  The sobbing mop of hair clinging to me bobbed up and down. I let go of her and Dairlin cried out in fear.

  “It’s okay,” I said. My hands worked at the belt buckle at my waist until it pulled free and I released it, letting it fall away. I slid my arm back around her shivering body. Could faeries drown? It did
n’t seem to fit in with Dramian’s recipe for falling, but from Dairlin’s reaction, I didn’t think we could breathe under water either.

  “Kick with me. We’re going that way.” I pointed to the edge of the pond. With one great kick to get us moving slowly, slowly, we started moving toward the shore. My feet hit the pond floor, and my shaking legs propelled us forward until we collapsed on dry ground, both of us exhausted and breathing hard.

  “Mina!” Arius’s voice echoed to us through the tunnels.

  “Here!” I shouted back.

  He came charging in, rope wrapped around one shoulder. Dairlin started sobbing again. Arius came forward and scooped her small body into his arms.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she sobbed, her face buried in Arius’s shoulder. “I only wanted to borrow it for a day, I was going to return it, I swear.”

  “What was it?” Arius asked.

  “Nuada’s ring,” Dairlin moaned. “Nuada always wears it, and she was out of her office, and I thought I would borrow it for the day and all the other faeries would be jealous. I-I thought maybe they would tease me less. But Taxir accused me of stealing it, and I got mad at him. I said I would eat him. Next thing I knew, I was changing into a t-terrible monster, and I couldn’t control myself.”

  Arius and I exchanged puzzled looks. “Where is the ring now, Dairlin?” I asked.

  Dairlin wiped her nose on her bare arm. “I lost it in the water.”

  Arius set Dairlin on the ground. I noticed the cut in her right shoulder was there, but thankfully it didn’t look deep. A bit of blood seeped from the wound, but Dairlin didn’t seem to notice.

  I became distracted from Dairlin when Arius’s sword belt and tassets hit the floor of the cavern. He drew off his gauntlets and unbuckled his greaves where they landed next to his other discarded gear. He pulled off the leather armor top so that all he was left wearing were his spandex shorts. Then he stepped into the water, walking in until he launched himself forward, his arms moving in easy strokes. When he got to the middle of the pool, he dove and disappeared under the water.

  “Mina?” Dairlin’s voice brought me back to reality. My slack jaw snapped shut, I forced a smile and tried to turn my attention back to the girl.

  “I-I’m sorry I attacked you,” she said.

  “It’s okay, Dairlin. You didn’t know what you were doing,” I said. The sad and frightened girl shivered from the cold water clinging to her bare skin. I looked down at the armor Arius had left.

  “Here.” I grabbed Arius’s leather top and pulled it over Dairlin’s head. The bottom of the armor almost came down to her knees. She threaded her arms through the large arm holes.

  “You don’t think Arius will notice, do you?” I asked, and Dairlin gave a tentative smile. She threw her arms around me. “Hey, we are faeries. It’s not like we could have drowned,” I said.

  Dairlin stepped back her eyes wide. “It would have been worse because we are faeries.” She shivered. “The pain would have never stopped.”

  Her words chilled me more than the dip in the underground pond. There was more to this immortality bit than I had thought through.

  Arius broke the water, my sword case clutched in one hand, his other hand balled in a fist I assumed had the ring. He came out of the water like Poseidon himself, his hair splayed across his forehead. The water on his muscled chest glistened in the streaks of daylight shining down from above. The droplets gathered around a thin white scar along the bottom of his right ribcage. I bit the inside of my cheek until it hurt.

  He dropped my sword next to me, and I picked it up and tried to focus on dumping the water out of my case and strapping it back around my waist. I heard Arius strapping his sword back into place as well.

  We walked back through the tunnels, the cavern behind us, Dairlin held my hand, and I trailed mine along the cave wall to find our way while Arius warned of the occasional obstacle or turn that came upon us. As I tripped around obstacles Arius warned me about, I thought how nice it would be to see the details he easily made out despite the darkness. Dairlin appeared much happier now, like the last traumatizing half hour hadn’t occurred at all. She skipped beside me, humming to herself. I glanced ahead to where I thought Arius was walking, unable to make out even an outline of him.

  “Do five-year-old kids usually play in dangerous caved-in mine shafts?” I asked. The bump of Dairlin skipping stopped and her hum silenced. She walked solemnly beside me. I hadn’t meant to upset her, but I was still trying to process how I had ended up down here.

  “You say that like it's a bad thing. Yes, they may come down and explore as long as they are not alone. We all explored and played games here when we were younger,” he said.

  “Doesn’t seem safe,” I said.

  “The world isn’t safe. Besides, it's not the mine that was dangerous today.”

  True enough. I thought of the emerald I’d seen Nuada wear on her hand at our last discussion. “Can I see the ring?”

  He didn’t answer for such a long time I thought he had ignored my question. Then he pressed something hard and round into my palm. A shifting sensation came over me, and in my mind, I saw a necklace. The necklace held five stone casings similar to that of the ring. In each casing except the last sat a different colored stone, including the green emerald. The last casing sat empty.

  The feel of the ring in my hand came back into focus. I stared at the darkness where it lay in my palm. What was it? It held power if it could transform Dairlin into a crazy monster. But it must do more than that if Nuada insisted on wearing it all the time. After all, she didn’t turn into a bloodthirsty beast when she wore it.

  “Don’t put it on!” Dairlin’s shriek made me freeze. Dairlin’s vision wasn’t any better than mine in the pitch-black tunnel, but I had dropped her hand to place the ring on my finger. She must have guessed, or at least feared, what I was about to do.

  I pulled my hand back at the sound of Dairlin’s ragged breathing. “I won’t.”

  But Dairlin made a sound like she was drowning so I turned and handed the ring back to Arius and then took both of her small hands in each of my empty ones. “See, no ring.”

  “Don’t put it on,” Dairlin said again. “No one put it on.”

  “We won’t, Dairlin,” Arius said. Dairlin’s ragged breathing calmed. “Who isn’t safe?” he mumbled to me.

  “I was curious.” I didn’t tell him I had seen something. He would want me to tell Nuada, and all I saw was a silly necklace. Not exactly impressive.

  We made it back to the air shaft. The light from above gave a soft illumination to our surroundings—not that Arius needed it. He had hacked the rope with his sword, too far up to grab. Palon appeared in the opening and dropped a new length of rope into the hole. We called up that we were all fine, and he looked relieved. Dairlin grabbed the end and began making her way up and out.

  After she cleared the mouth of the shaft, I grabbed the end to follow her. Suddenly, Arius was right next to me. His dark eyes burned like two coals in the darkness.

  “Mina,” he said. “Thank you.” There was an emotion in his voice I wasn’t used to hearing. He stood so close.

  “Your lips are purple.” Did those words come out of my mouth? I couldn’t help it. Shirtless Arius was standing inches from me.

  “So are yours.” He reached up and brushed a strand of wet hair from my face. Even though his fingers were cold, my skin burned at his touch.

  “You didn’t recognize Dairlin’s charms on the monster?” I forced the words past my short-circuiting brain.

  His eyes dropped. “I should have,” he said. “But when I saw the shredded clothes and the scratch marks, I lost it. If you hadn’t come down...”

  We both knew what would have happened.

  I touched his arm and his eyes rose back to mine. “Saving Dairlin was my responsibility, too.”

  “I’m glad you did.”

  Move, Mina. Move now. The words were in my mind, but I didn’t know what they
directed me to do.

  Something had changed in Arius’s eyes, and he stepped back, his face becoming obscured in shadow. I shut my eyes and took a deep breath.

  Pulling on the rope, I started my ascent out of the mine. I wondered if he understood. At least now he must’ve realized that I cared.

  15

  Dreams

  “Dreams are a mirror into the soul.”

  THAT NIGHT, I HAD A dream. I knew it wasn’t a vision because visions were like high definition television. Dreams had now become more like grainy old-time movies.

  Arius stood shirtless surrounded by a sea of water. A wreath of coral circled his head, and he clutched a trident in his left hand. He glowed with the radiance of the sun on water. He smiled and reached out to me.

  “Mina,” he said. His voice echoed all around me, wrapping around me like a warm blanket. “I’m yours.”

  A blood red dragon dove from the gray skies, wings flapping and steam hissing from his nostrils. He flew right at Arius.

  “She’s mine,” the dragon roared in Dramian’s voice. The great dragon blew fire down onto Arius, but Arius waved his trident, and a wave of water shot above him, protecting him from the hot flames. But the dragon wouldn’t be undone. He circled closer, his fire burning hotter, burning up Arius’s stream of water.

  Arius lifted his trident higher.

  Huge tentacles shot out of the water. One caught hold of the dragon’s long tail. The dragon hissed in outrage and tried to fly away, but more tentacles latched onto the dragon’s legs and torso and neck. With great effort, the tentacles pulled the snapping and struggling dragon down into the depths of the sea.

  Arius lowered the trident and turned back toward me. Part of me was horrified that Arius had just drowned Dramian deep in the sea. But the flush of desire on his face, the spark in his eyes distracted me. He moved toward me, and I realized Arius hadn’t been standing. He swam toward me, the second half of him a long fish’s tail.