Have Yourself a Faerie Little Christmas

by Michelle L. Levigne

  "Be glad to." Harry fought the urge to salute, or maybe he should bow? Something about Angela, so relaxed and timeless, reminded him of the Fae Queen and her court of intensely brilliant, ferociously logical advisors and councilors. Not that he had done more than watch them at work in the Bureaucratic Transparency viewing globe that was available to all Fae.

  "So, you'll be hanging around for a while?" Maurice asked, when Harry reached to take hold of Bethany's hands, intending to lead her out of Divine's.

  The impression he had was that Angela wanted him to begin Bethany's education now. The tour of the town could wait.

  "Oh, yeah, we're home for Christmas. Maybe until New Year's. Just depends on how long it takes until the loonies realize she came here instead of hiding out in L.A., like she usually does for the holidays."

  "Usually." Bethany snorted and her mouth twisted in a crooked, one-sided grin. "I've only been 'it' for a little more than a year now. Daddy and I rented a place in the hills last year, guaranteed un-find-able. We had to move out in the middle of the night the day after Christmas because people were camping in front of my door." She sighed. "Maybe I never should have left Neighborlee. I was happy doing commercials and community theater. Maybe I should quit and get a job as a director, or start my own theater company. Does Neighborlee High need a new drama teacher?"

  "Go get your lessons, enjoy Christmas with your father, and we'll worry about your career next year," Angela said, making a shooing motion toward the door. "Oh, and take this with you."

  Harry saw the dimensional slit pop open and a bag of chocolate paradise wafers, from his favorite Fae confectionary, popped into her hand. He barely had time to read the label and see it was his favorite flavor, with raisins and cinnamon and peanut butter swirls, before it flew through the air toward his face. He caught it with the hand not holding Bethany's.

  "You two will need some fuel for your discussions," Angela said.

  "Hey," Maurice said. "That's the good stuff. The really good stuff. How come you never conjured up any of that for me?"

  "You never needed it." Angela smirked. "Besides, I'm Bethany's godmother."

  "Okay, now we know who's really to blame." He winked at Harry and Bethany, who had paused in the doorway. "Nothing like having a not-quite-Fae godmother to mess up your life."

  Bethany giggled. That was all the assurance Harry needed that she would be fine. She just needed some time to think, some more details, and a good dose of Sarafina's Ambrosial Chocolates to soothe the soul and body.

  "Where's the best place we can go for some privacy?" he asked as they walked out the front door of Divine's.

  "I need to walk. Can you just let go of the spell holding back your invisibility and keep me in the field?"

  "Sure, but we'll need to be pretty close to keep you inside the buffering field, so people don't run into us." Harry handed her the bag of chocolates. He was afraid he would squeeze it hard enough to pop it, maybe even melt it.

  "That's fine by me. I... I really need someone to hold me for a while." Her lips trembled a little as she smiled. "And there's nobody I'd rather hold me than you."

  Monday, December 17

  Lori wondered if maybe she had outstayed her welcome. Brick was busy with all sorts of Christmas preparations. The last few days, he had seemed distant. There was a strange light in his eyes, as if maybe he couldn't figure out why he spent time with her. Or maybe he expected her to put an evil spell on him. Which made no sense, because he certainly didn't believe in Fae magic--only the magic that Humans could create at this time of year by believing and giving and doing for one another.

  She hadn't seen Will or Phill in several days--except for running into Will in town, talking with Hargrove. And she had no idea if Brick was even going to show up today.

  There was only so much sightseeing a Fae on her own in a strange, unfamiliar land could do, even if she did have unlimited credit, and taxis showed up whenever she needed them. How many museums and galleries and shopping malls could she explore all by herself? How many movies could she watch?

  There was just so much shopping she could do before her hotel room got a little too full for comfort--without booking another hotel room just for storage. Yes, she could put all her purchases into ether-space, but she might just forget them once they were out of sight.

  She had done that with a flock of sheep back when she was still a child. It wouldn't have been so bad with just the sheep, because they didn't care about time--but she had been playing with the shepherd boy tending those sheep, and accidentally put him in ether-space without thinking of the consequences. When she remembered more than two Fae years later, only a few minutes had passed for the boy and the sheep, but thirty years had passed in the Human realms. That poor boy hadn't been very happy. He had been sweet on the shepherdess in the next pasture, and now she was all grown up and married--and fat and graying.

  Besides, using ether-space to store all her purchases and souvenirs would send up a homing signal to anyone who might have realized she was missing from the Fae realms. That was the last thing Lori wanted to do.

  "Okay." She shuddered as new insight washed over her. She was by herself, taking an early morning walk in the Metroparks, so it was safe to talk to herself. No one could hear her and think something was strange. "I guess that means you don't want anyone to realize you're gone--which means you don't intend to go home any time soon." She sighed, the sound turning into laughter. "Well, duh. Going home means the Aunties will drag you out to parties and teas and dances, to meet all the totally boring, Enclave-bound prospective husbands they've chosen. Why can't they leave me alone and wait for Need to find the perfect match for me?"

  "Probably because Need isn't fashionable anymore." The familiar female voice chimed off the ice coating the bushes and rocks all around Lori.

  The air split apart and Epsibellah skipped out into the park. She gasped as icy air wrapped around her, snapped her fingers, and a navy blue mink coat enfolded her, with a matching poofy hat and gloves.

  "That's better." She snuggled down into her new wraps, and looked around. "Interesting place you've come to hide out, Lori. Where are we?"

  "The Human realms."

  "The Human realms?" Epsi hunched down and dashed into the shadows of the nearest pine tree. Since the tree was covered with snow, the moment she touched it, the entire sparkling load cascaded down on her. Her repulsion field kicked into effect, sending the snow sliding down around her without touching her, in a visible bubble effect.

  Lori fought a giggle, remembering that Epsi was an Enclave baby--with an inborn or ingrained fear of anything remotely related to the Human realms. Something like agoraphobia among the Humans.

  "What in the name of the Dungeon Dimensions are you doing here?" Epsi demanded, when Lori gave up her walk as a lost cause and crossed the snow to stand with her in the shadows.

  "Hiding from the Aunties and their matchmaking, same as always."

  "Oh, yeah, that's right. That's actually why I'm here. You have no idea how much magic and how many favors I used up, tracking you down. If Titomio hadn't seen you hanging with Will and Phill before you went missing, I never would have thought to check on their flight plans. That's how I found you."

  "Then how could you not know where you ended up?"

  "I didn't actually read the flight plans, just plugged in the coordinates and followed the trail of their exit." Epsi tipped her head back to look at the sun, which was about an hour away from emerging from the tops of the trees. "You certainly picked a gorgeous place to hide."

  "And you're here because?"

  "The Aunties. They've found somebody for you."

  "Not again." She wanted to drop down and sit on something--and maybe kick her legs in a miniature tantrum--but there was no place to sit without using some magic. Using magic might send up a signal flare for anyone actively seeking her.

  "What's he like?" she asked, opting for a heavy sigh.

  "Boooooring, what else?" Epsi echoed
her sigh. "One of those well-bred boys. You know the type. Emphasis on breeding. As in breeding out Need altogether."

  "They know how I feel about letting Need do the choosing." She tried not to growl, but it was hard. She wanted to turn into something fanged and with big talons, every time her matchmaking aunties tried to lecture her on how antiquarian and uncivilized it was to depend on Need to find the perfect mate.

  Her aunties, and quite a few of their generation, were of the opinion that the Fae race had outgrown the usefulness of Need. They believed that matches should be made for more intellectual reasons--family connections, politics, magical talent lines. A growing number of matchmakers and political movers and shakers tried to make matches and get "those young folks," meaning anyone under the age of two hundred, married and bound together before Need had any chance of awakening. Their intent was to someday "raise" the Fae race to the point where no one was caught in Need anymore.

  The unfortunate fact was that their theory had too much fact and reality and plausibility to it. Need matches usually resulted in children who themselves experienced Need. Conversely, those who married and procreated without Need produced children who were less likely to experience Need at all as the generations went on.

  "Thanks for the warning." Lori needed somewhere to sit and think, no matter how long it took. She thought there was a bench around the next bend in the walking trail. "What do you think I should do? Go back and fight, or stay in hiding for the rest of my life?"

  "Sweetie, you know how I feel about being out among the Humans. Not that I'm a germophobe, but... Well, there has to be a reason why so many of us decide to settle in and stay among Humans after long exposure to them, right?"

  "Right. They like it better out here than back home."

  "No! It's like an infection. Madness." Epsi looked around and wrapped her fur tighter around her. "The thing is, if you go back, you know they'll be waiting for you. They probably have all the access portals set with tripwires to sense you the moment you appear. If you're not careful, they'll have the groom waiting and the wedding planned and have your house constructed, right down to the baby rooms and the babies' names picked out. All they're waiting for is for you to show up, so they can wrap your wedding dress around you."

  "Sounds like an execution." Would it be so bad, staying out here in the Human realms for the rest of her life? Will and Phill certainly seemed to like it better out here.

  Of course, now that she thought about it, she couldn't honestly say she thought they were happy. She had seen so little of either of them the last few days.

  The longer she stayed away from home, the more time her aunties would have to set up the ambush wedding. Then again, the longer she stayed out here among Humans, the less appealing she would be to whichever inbred Enclave wimp had agreed to pair up with her.

  Would it be so bad, staying out here until she became so contaminated by Humans that no one would take her if she begged? She was very aware of how certain socially upright members of Will's and Phill's families disapproved of them and socialized with them as little as possible when they were home. The eccentrics, however--the weird cousins and explorers and experimenters--were delighted with Will and Phill. The eccentrics were the ones who were so much fun at parties and festivals and during the twice-centennial assemblies and conclaves.

  That settled it. Lori would much prefer being considered eccentric and interesting than socially acceptable and predictable and boring. She would stay out here.

  All right, so what was there to do besides shop, visit museums, learn about Human history, and get involved in giving out trees to people at Christmas? She would have to go to Divine's and check with Maurice.

  "You've made up your mind, haven't you?" Epsi asked. She wore that smug little we're-in-so-much-trouble grin she had worn when they were children and cutting out on various socially restricting lessons. Such as the proper spells to make sure their dresses stayed crisp and sparkly, and their hair held up to the strongest breezes. Or to ensure butterflies' wings changed colors on a set rhythm or in accord with the emotions of the people who wore them in their hair.

  "I don't suppose I could talk you into staying with me? It'd be fun, at the very least."

  "There's fun, and then there's fun." Epsi shuddered hard enough to knock more snow off the branches overhead, which sent another umbrella-shaped shower of white cascading around them. "Thanks. Maybe in another fifty years or so, I'll build up the guts to venture out. Not right now. Maybe if there's a global-thermonuclear war to clear the land a little bit..."

  "You're horrid. Humans are not bacteria."

  "I know. But they're so savage."

  "And so full of life!"

  "Mmm hmm. And some kinds of life can just stay on their own greasy, grimy carcasses, thanks very much." Epsi snapped her fingers and made her blue fur shimmer and fade away. "I'm heading home before someone realizes I've gone. If they don't know I've been looking for you, they won't track me and find you. Be happy, sweetie." She smirked as they hugged. "Invite me to the wedding."

  "There isn't going to be any wedding." Lori almost clutched her friend tight in a panicked reaction. Or maybe she just wanted to squeeze Epsi until she squeaked, to pay her back for that momentary scare.

  "Hmm, you say that now, but something tells me there's a man involved. A Human male. It makes decisions so much easier when there's a reason to do something that's stronger than the reason not to do something. Know what I mean?" She winked, stepped back, and the slit in the dimensional wall split open and wrapped around her. In another moment, before Lori could think of a suitable retort--strong enough to change her hair to green--she was gone.

  "A man?" There was something delightfully scary in the idea.

  She had needed a quiet day alone to think and get her bearings, but maybe she would have been happier if she had been somewhere crowded and noisy. At the very least, she wouldn't be able to think quite so hard right now. Where was a distraction when she really needed it?

  * * * *

  Sometimes Brick suspected that various members of the Chamber of Commerce resorted to extra-curricular help to survive some of the more mind-dullingly boring meetings. Until about five minutes ago, he had never suspected that someone had shared those survival tactics. Especially without permission or even asking if he wanted help.

  It had to be drugs. Someone had slipped him something at the breakfast meeting in the Chamber offices. Put it in his coffee or sprinkled it on his Cream of Wheat while his back was turned, or maybe that bowl of blueberries.

  He was positive Lori had been talking to a woman just a few minutes ago. Later he would worry about why they stood about eight feet off the path, hiding among the trees and snow. Or why the woman wore a blue fur coat.

  While he stood there, trying to read their lips, wondering what they were doing there, the air seemed to split open and the stranger vanished. Just vanished, without a pop or a flash or a bang. How?

  The only answer he could come up with was that the woman hadn't been there in the first place. He had just imagined her, maybe mistaking a movement in the shadows for a person.

  There was only one problem with that theory: he had heard voices. He couldn't make out the words, because both the woman and Lori kept their voices down, but he had distinctly heard two different voices. Unless Lori was a ventriloquist, that meant either that woman talking to her knew how to vanish into thin air, or someone had drugged him at the Chamber meeting.

  Brick chose the drugs. If he chose a woman in blue fur who had the ability to vanish into thin air, then eventually he would have to choose to go quietly insane. Or maybe loudly. His immediate family didn't care that much about social standing or appearances, so if he wanted to go screaming, drooling, spinning nutso, he was free to do so without feeling his ancestors' disapproval.

  He didn't want to go nuts. He wanted to spend Christmas with Lori. Hallucinating was the more benign explanation.

  The next question was whether he had been
hallucinating Lori, too.

  "Lori?" he called, and flinched as his voice bounced off the ice-covered branches and the crust of the snow.

  "Hi." She waved and plowed through the drifts to get back to the path, and then more drifts to where he had stood for the last twenty minutes or so, dithering and tying his brains into knots. "What are you doing out here?" Those sparks he had seen before seemed to swirl around her. "Please feed my ego and tell me you were looking for me."

  "Oh, definitely." He crooked his arm and bent it out, offering it to her. She blushed delightfully, a pink haze filling the air around her cheeks, and slipped her hand into the crook of his elbow. "I can't go a day without seeing you."

  "Now that you've made my day, what can I do for you?"

  "Want to help me with some extremely important shopping?" Brick hadn't come looking for her, per se. He had been driving down the park road when he thought he saw her, so he had gotten out of the car and come closer. His errand came to his mind again, just as it occurred to him that he had waded through snow higher than the tops of his shoes, and his socks were getting wet and icy, crusty cold.

  "Well, considering how few my talents are, it's a good thing that's what you need. I've become a whiz at shopping over the last few days. Shopping where, for who, and for what?"

  * * * *

  Two hours later, Brick scooped half the contents of the shelf of cinnamon-scented candles into the shopping cart Lori pushed. He nodded to the list she consulted. "What else?"

  "Containers." She waved the paper. "They're not on the list, but it makes sense that if you have candles, you should have something for them to sit in, to contain the wax when it melts."

  "That's why I keep you around. Common sense." He turned, surveying the shelves in either direction along the aisle.

  "Hardly." She laughed, fighting down the funny little quiver of pleasure from his half-teasing praise. No one had ever accused her of having common sense before. Usually she was lectured for having ridiculous values, caring about simplicity and natural things over the high social standards her blue-blood family felt duty-bound to uphold. "I just like candles. I even had a hobby of making candles for a while, so I know all the disasters that happen when you don't control melting wax."