by K. G. Wilkie
Alyssa seemed surprisingly unruffled. “I already guessed he was either the head of a gang, for the school or the whole area even. I`d also believe it if he was the son of a mafia boss,” she continued thoughtfully.
Jackie couldn`t help it. She burst out giggling as the picture of Aeron in a moody pose against some abandoned alley wall seemed so ridiculous to her. “Not a gang or the mafia, you goose,” she said with a grin.
She quickly sobered as the mental vision turned grey, his moody pose outlined in fire. “He`s even worse,” she whispered. Her hands fluttered and worried at the hem of her shirt. “Much worse than those any little human gangs. He has such a terrible temper, and more power than anyone else in our world.” she whispered, lost in her own ruminations.
Her friend laughed, the carefree sound breaking up the tense atmosphere. “Look, are you feeling all right?,” she asked between silenced giggles. “I mean, where`s the s`mores and campfire to match all these ghost stories?” Jackie got the ghost of a grin as well.
“Don`t worry,” she continued, “I know the difference between a friend and a slimy little slug. I`d even be willing to step on him if he were small enough!,” she joked.
“All right, all right. You win,” Jackie was smiling too by this point. “Just remember what I was saying about that nasty little temper of his!”
Alyss waved the warning off. “Go on with you,” she laughed.
Eventually they decided that dire conversations actually did warrant a trip to pick up some cones. The two girls walked along the boulevard with arms linked, ice cream dripping down their chins. Darien came backing out of the nearby music shop, hand gripped on a new pack of guitar picks and steel strings when he caught sight of the two of them. He stopped, casually moving closer. “I see bright eyes and blushing cheeks,” he observed. “Something exciting must be happening.” The girls squirmed under the scrutiny. “Something about a ‘him?’,” he asked, ready to hear juicy gossip. They glanced at each other for a moment with secretive eyes. “You can`t just leave a fellow hanging like that kind of hinting,” he exclaimed indignantly.
“Well, we’ve had icecream now. I’d consider that pretty exciting,” his sister teased.
He gave her puppy dog eyes. “I know it’s not just that. You guys must be holding out on me. Come on, you`ve gotta tell me. I need to know what kind of guy has the guts to move in on my sister,” he said. He added thoughtfully, “And I suppose I`d defend my sister`s friend as well,” he grinned. “Come on, tell me, I`ve got to know which guy I get to kill,” he teased with a charming smile. That set his sister off into another fit of giggles. Jackie, oddly enough, looked at him stony faced, however.
“Oh, just talking about that Aeron,” his sister responded breezily. Alyss was dismissive, oblivious to the tense set of their bodies and their darkling glances. “I guess he`s a boy, but he`s not really much of one, is he?,” she asked impishly.
Her brother and friend exchanged dark looks with each other. Smiling, Darien tapped her on the shoulder. “Hey, Alyss, you mind grabbing me an icecream too? I mean, you guys both have treats, so I feel a little left out,” he dimpled at her.
She stuck her tongue out at him. “If you feel so bad, why don’t you get it yourself,” she asked. He looked down at his toes, going theatrically bashful. “Well, you know,” he said, “I just don’t know how to deal with these vegan stores. They’ve got all these weirdos in them,” he grinned.
She smacked him on the bicep. “Weirdos? I’ll have you know we are perfectly normal! Besides, I just got some sorbet from Brusters, no hippies or bleeding hearts involved at all.”
“Well, that can’t be true, can it?” When he saw her confusion, he added impishly, “I happen to know one weirdo bleeding heart who goes to normal ice cream stands so they must all have been invaded by now. Besides, those vegans must be super rude, because my sister is one and she’s so mean she won’t even buy her little brother a measly little ice cream cone.” He put his hand over his heart in a dramatic motion of despair.
She sniffed at him, then dug around in his pocket. “Oh, hey, watch where you put that hand, eyaaaah!” She snorted and rolled her eyes as she pulled out a ten dollar bill. “I’ll pick it up for you, but I’ll keep the change,” she said, sauntering off.
“That’s really some girl there, isn’t she,” he said with admiration.
Jackie just frowned at him. “What are you doing, messing around with her like that,” the girl demanded with her hands on her hips.
His grin abruptly disappeared. “I`m not ‘messing’ with her at all,” he answered, “though I like hearing that, coming from a lackey working with the one person in the world determined to screw with her head the most,” he responded scathingly. “What are you doing here anyways, forest freak,” he ended sulkily.
“Forest freak,” she gasped in outrage. “I`ll have you know, my contractee is one of the oldest lakes in the entire East forest, one of the Great Lakes in this realm! And my sister is no minor nyad, she is contracted with one of the great redwoods,” she exclaimed with pride. “He`s nearly five hundred feet around, you know,” she said. “In fact, he was one of the first born trees, and he has been around much longer than a mere human like you,” she sniffed. “He wouldn`t have joined with just any nymph!”
“Yeah? I get he is really powerful, but what about you? You are just a weak little dryad. You`d be weak, powerless, if your lake didn`t agree to lend most of his strength to you. And what are you doing here anyways when you are supposed to be protecting and caring for him in return for the power boost he gives you,” he challenged.
“Pshaw,” she waved him off. “Fighting? That`s what our warriors are for, dummy. Besides that, I`d have to have quite a bit of power of my own, or such a powerful spirit would have rejected joining with me, as I wouldn`t be strong enough to defend him without some strength of my own. That`s the whole point of contracting.” She laughed then. “They aren`t teaching you guys much in that citadel of yours, are they,” she sneered. He blushed at this barbed insult.
The citadel. A domed city in the Western Wastes, where the male magical humans lived and were brought up in a world controlled by a board of elders, and each wizard`s position was determined by accomplishments within their apprenticeships and jobs. The rest of their kind, the witches, normally lived hidden away in their own domed city far north in the Arctic Wates. They lived separately year round except for during the Summer for their two month mating season overseen and supervised by the elders of both cities. All of those who broke any rules of their city were permanently cast out of their nation, though many of them joined a band of rebels called alchemists that ran loose through both worlds and often lived as common highwaymen and women.
He growled, the insult clearly hitting its mark. “Only initiates are taught much of anything, and I will not qualify for that training until I reach my nineteenth year,” he muttered. “Besides, what are you doing, messing with Alyssa yourself,” he went on in a strong voice, a clear challenge.
“I`m trying to protect her, dummy,” Jackie said. “What about you? How`d you manage to worm your way into her circle?”?
He thought for a second, remembering the past. The elders were tired of his inadequacy, his lack of skill with even the simplest of the children’s spells. They had long been whispering among themselves, plotting some great movement, and one day they started to put their mysterious plan into action. They dragged him out of the room he was cleaning, the usual scutwork, and pushed him through one of the portals to the other side, a promise of a raise in rank and future glory if he succeeded in the brief plan they had outlined for him.
He carefully set himself up in that alley. But that forelorn and hopeless expression was genuine, reflecting his lack of hope in success. Everyone knew that true humans were heartless, and why would one invite him into their lives? His own people ignored him and pushed him out of their city. It would be no good to expect any great things from them. But a girl walked up to him, concern in
her guileless face. His heart thumped unexpectedly, unused to the sight of a female. Her hair hung down in loose waves, and the faintest scent of honeysuckle and vanilla wafted from her. His eyes clung to her. She held out a hand, so small and delicate, and he gladly held it, hoisting himself up.
“What about you?” Jackie demanded it, aggravated that he had taken so long to answer.
“I just happened to be in the right place, right time,” he said. “What’s so sinister in a nice girl helping me out?”
She waved her hand at him “Puh-leese. Why were you so far from your city, heck even from your world, in the first place? If you wanted to score some chicks or have an adventure or something you could have snuck into the Witch’s city or something” she said suspiciously.
He looked at her coldly. “There is nothing of interest to me in the Witch City, or the nearby Nymph kingdom. Anyways, why would you think I`m so interested in a mere human anyways?” As if reciting some lines he continued, “We may share the same race, but my people and their knowledge are infinitely superior in power and cul-culture to those Mundanes.” He faltered on the end, visibly confused on whether he ascribed to his people`s philosophy or if time had somehow softened his intent. Surrounded by Mundanes devoid of any hint of otherness, he was also being forced to consider if the Mundanes were quite as useless and weak as he had always been taught. They certainly had been developing and creating a lot since his people had last interacted with them, making lights and cars and so many other things that filled the role magic had always played in his own life. And he hadn`t ever seen anything magical approximating some of their most creative inventions.
She just shook her head, tut tutting him and interrupting his confused and jumbled thought process. “All these years, and you don`t know the first thing about her,” she said patronizingly. “She has more power and prestige than you can image, even your higher end of the race has no real comparison,” she said superiorly. “She simply hasn’t remembered all of the details of that,” she said. “I suppose,” she added, “you just weren`t trusted enough by those superiors of yours to have been told anything that matters,” she smirked. With the air of someone sharing an Earth shattering fact she continued, saying, “She`s the Alyssandra.”
He looked at her blankly.
“Come on!” She shook his arm. “The Alyssandra, the one we`ve all been searching for, the manhunt of the century,” she pantomimed a news reporter’s exaggerated movements.
He still looked confused.
“Gosh, they really don`t teach bottom rungs like you anything. I don`t know how they can be such snobby know-it-alls if they make sure all their young ones are clueless,” she griped. In a clearly exasperated voice she continued, “The consort, the future queen, the woman only I was able to recover successfully.” His brow wrinkled in confusion. “You clueless numb-skull,” she exclaimed.
“I know how to do lots of things. It`s no concern of yours the teaching practices of the elite wizards,” he responded loftily.
“Yeah, I bet,” she said. “What, they taught you how to sweep the floors and run errands for those geezers?” He blushed a dull crimson.
“Well, besides,” he said, “Why would anyone of us marry a dull human anyways? If Aeron gets the succession instead of Richard, why would anyone let one of them be the queen anyways?” With the realization of supposedly superior logic he added, “Why would that guy know a human anyways?! Isn`t that infinitely more suspicious?”?
She raised her nose. “I`m certainly not going to tell a nobody like you if you don`t already know,” she said primly. “Besides, I`m more interested in why you are spying on her if you’ve already admitted that she doesn`t matter.”
He laughed gustily. “What, you think I`m trying to bring down this great public figure by being a family member? What, I`m just going to use my powerful knowledge of her favorite shampoo brand and how she likes her spaghetti? It’s not exactly blackmail material, you know!”
“You aren`t her relative at all, so how could you be doing anything besides spying,” she asked him suspiciously. “Besides, did you even bother to tell her you aren`t related, or have you been hiding it from her this whole time?”
He laughed more honestly this time, a quiet chuckle. “I think you`ve made a mistake somewhere. She knows perfectly well we aren`t related. She picked me up off the street.”
She pursed her lips. “That`s already pretty fishy. Why were you on the streets in the first place? You should have been cozy in your little city on the other side of the gate.”
“Why tell her? She already knows that.” He said it with a touch of dramatic flair, her gasp very gratifying. “She`s the one that picked me up off the streets, remember? It would just be too much of a bother to craft such a big memory block, and then to try to fill in a lifetime of sibling like memories- too much of a bother.” He gave her a calculating look. “I`ve noticed you`ve been her friend for a few days, as opposed to a few years, so I`m not quite sure where you are getting off on saying this to me,” he haughtily added.
She looked at her toes. “You still shouldn`t have been on this side of the portal anyways,” she muttered.
He looked at her head on, but then an instant flash of inspiration came to him. “Well, I should have been. But, alas, they pushed me out and closed the door behind.” Heaving a great sigh he added, “I must have just happened to stumble through one of the stray portals.”
The portals. After the Fairy Hunts, the real first Crusade, the peoples of magic sought out and created magical sanctuaries that were shielded from the eyes and presence of the Mundane humans. Finding that these areas were hunted after by fairy hunters and mobs as well as encroached upon by the Mundane`s dwellings, the Warlock Convention begged the most powerful warlock, Durin, to find a solution to their problem. After scratching his head for a century or two, he discovered that he could make an exact replica of Earth that was separate from the original, protecting the magical peoples from any interaction with the Mundanes. These two Earths, however, were still connected by magical portals scattered throughout both worlds.
“You were kicked out of the city,” she asked incredulously. “I`ve never heard of that happening before.” She stopped, then looked incredibly guilty. “I`m so sorry, I just thoughtlessly said,” she paused, “I just, I didn`t know,” she bit her lip. “It must have been awful for you,” she sniffed. “I can’t believe I’ve been so insensitive.”
He put his hands up to ward off any further water works. “Calm down, just chill," he said with alarm. He was starting to feel a little guilty for his heart wrenching lie. “This isn’t anything major here, the show you are marathoning is not canceled, the hero didn’t die, you did not pass go, so just chill.” She regained her composure. “Why are you so upset anyways,” he asked. “This is my problem. It’s not like it’s going to affect you or anything.” he continued.
“But it`s just such an awful thing,” she wailed. “How can they do that to one of their own, and after all those years of you working so hard,” she cried. He awkwardly patted her back, still shocked by her emotional reaction.
Her obvious support of him was touching. His throat dropped to the pit of his stomach, swallowing awkwardly around the ball of guilt choking him. To think that she would be so supportive of a stranger, and one she had been so suspicious and hateful towards so few moments ago! He continued to awkwardly pat her.
Far away, Aeron sighed. He settled himself on the chair tucked away in his bed chamber, smoothing his hair back. He pulled out a sheet of paper and a pen from his desk and scribbled a note. He gave a great sigh, puffing out his cheeks, then leaned back. A swirl of black fire came to him instantly when it was called, and he cast it and his orders through the divide like a fishing line to perfectly break up the tense scene.
The black fire finally caught up with the pair, spitting out a missive into Jackie’s hand.
I see you had a good chat with my brother. I am not amused. However, you have served me well these las
t few years. I also like that your first thought after speaking with the princes on this side was to attend to your duties. I am giving you my permission to leave your post and duties and to attend to the search for your sister. As she has gone missing while under my protection I am sending some of my soldiers on the mission to find her. You may join the hunt or go to your home to wring your hands or do whatever you feel like doing until she is found and returned to where she ought to be. If you would like to join the search party I will send you along the usual way.
She jumped and gave a victory fist pump. “Yes I want to look for Pris! I’d happily go with a search party.” The black fire burned out the note in her hand and moved until it was fulling encompassing Jackie`s body.
Darien gratefully let go of her disappearing form, rubbing his neck in agitation. “I only can`t go back because I have a job to do here as a happy little spy,” he muttered, walking swiftly away. She would say it was my little spying job. He grinned. Eh, she probably had the right to attack me like that, though, he thought. After all, whatever the elders have in mind will probably ruin her whole world. I`m sure her life will be at least a little off kilter from that kind of change.
A blue creature glittered into view out of invisibility. He hunted with his claws in a dimensional pocket until his face lit up and he pulled out his notepad and pen. He quickly scribbled a note. He summoned his scrying sphere and plunged the note into its depths so that it fell on top of the prince’s desk. He grimaced at the note, then pulled his own notepad forward.
I’ll address this later. For now, put him on the most wanted list- spread the word to all of my people.
