Enchanted Revenge

by Theresa M. Jones

“I am too young to do some things and too old for others. I am not a novice…Umm, a young Fae. We call Fae in their first century a novice. They are too young for many things. Inexperienced. Immature. Reckless and impulsive.” I tried to ignore the fact that I wasn’t even a novice yet. I must still be a baby to him. “And I am not yet an elder. A Fae becomes an elder either by completing a great feat or living past the age of 600.”

  “Oh. So you’re somewhere between 100 and 600 years old?” I chuckled at the absurdity of it, since he looked to be in his early twenties.

  “Yes. I know it seems old to you, but we don’t age the same as mortals. A novice is basically a teenager-a young adult, while the in-between is anywhere from a twenty to forty year old mortal. So, I’m equivalent to a mortal in the early to late twenties,” he explained. “I have been a Realm Guard for the last 120 years. I was the first novice to be allowed in the Guard. Because I’m just. That. Awesome.” The pride shone through his eyes. It sounded impressive, sure. But I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at him.

  A stirring in the trees stole my attention from the ridiculous fairy. At first I thought it was the wind, but it wasn’t very windy right then. Then I thought maybe I would finally see another Fae. But no, that wasn’t it either.

  What walked through the trees, right in front of us, literally took my breath away. At first glance, it was just a really white horse.

  But it wasn’t a horse at all. The animal’s mane and tail were whiter than anything I had ever seen. Whiter than snow. Whiter than the bright white light from the porta. Whiter than the whipped cream I smother my pumpkin pie in. And atop its head were two horns. One right above its head, like a unicorn. And another, smaller horn above its nose. The horns were brilliant blue, like sapphires twisted into a curling, cone shape.

  “An abada,” Alec breathed, as stunned as I was. He remained very still, so I did too. Just because it was pretty, didn’t mean it was nice.

  The creature walked into our tiny clearing, stopped and looked right at us. Really, I felt like it looked at me, but that was pretty crazy to think, so I decided it actually looked at both of us, the strangers in its land.

  When its blue-eyed gaze met mine, I felt like time stopped. It was like I was floating in the air, hovering above the ground and between space and time. I defied gravity and all laws of physics in that moment. The most beautiful sound in the world filled my ears. It was like I always imagined Heaven to be. With singing angels and bright lights and beauty.

  And then it bent its head down to the ground, almost like how the animals in the Lion King bowed to the baby Simba, and just turned away from me and left. Like everything else, it left me alone in this world. Well, in all the worlds, or Realms, or whatever.

  “Please, look at me!” Alec was right in my face, his green eyes now overcoming the blue ones I had just looked at. He was hunched over, bending at the knees to be on my eye level. He looked frantic, almost panicked. When I looked at him, he sighed. It wasn’t in frustration or impatience for once. It was a sigh of relief.

  “You scared the crap outta me.”

  “What? Why?”

  “You’ve been staring off in the distance for the last twenty minutes.” Twenty minutes? The unicorn, or abada thing was just there a second ago.

  “Was it real?”

  “The abada?” I nodded to answer his question. “Yes it was real. But it left twenty minutes ago and you were just frozen. You didn’t even blink.” Then he sat down in front of me, crossing his legs.

  “I was worried.” Though I could tell he meant it, he seemed surprised by that revelation.

  “Hmm. Well, I don’t know. I felt like I just blinked and it was gone, and then you were in my face.”

  “Did it speak to you?”

  “What? The horse? I mean Unicorn…Ugh, The abada? Animals don’t talk.”

  “Just answer me. Did it say anything to you? In your head.”

  “No. I mean, when it looked at me I felt like I was flying, or floating at least. And I heard some singing, like the most beautiful sound you could imagine.” After saying the words out loud, I felt pretty ridiculous. But everything about this whole place was ridiculous. Everything was weird and different and it just brought into focus how alone I really was. I didn’t fit in back in the Mortal Realm, and I certainly didn’t fit in here in this crazy fairy world.

  He searched my eyes again, as if he was hunting for an answer to something. But then, it almost looked like he was in awe…of me. Which didn’t make sense. I was no one special. But when he looked at me like that, I felt special, important. Not alone. Unfortunately the spell broke as soon as he spoke to me.

  “Abadas are very rare. They rarely interact with any Fae, especially not one who hasn’t even received her magic yet.” He took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a minute. “They can see the future. Had you been a little older, you would’ve been able to understand what he said to you. When they speak to us, it is only to tell us of the future and offer advice.” Then more to himself than to me, “I can only imagine what he said to you. What future he saw.”

  “It was beautiful,” I said, because the future stuff was too weird for me. And really, it was beautiful. “Those horns were so pretty. The same color as her eyes.”

  He nodded. “Yeah, they are always pretty. But all abadas are male. The females are unicorns.”

  “Unicorns are real too?” He chuckled at my surprise. Which only made me laugh as well, because when would I learn to not be surprised about anything in this place?

  “So, we have a good thirty miles left to walk today. You ready to start again?” He asked me after he stood up and gathered all the supplies back into the abscondita. My feet continued to scream at me, as soon as I stood on them, but I ignored them. This was only day two, out of who knows how many days left.

  As we began walking again, the silence hung heavy on us.

  “Why are you so quiet when we walk?” I finally asked. The sounds of my footsteps were really annoying. I felt so antsy, wanting to do something more than just walk through a freaking forest. And the quiet was just unnerving.

  “Because things are…Being back there…” He took a deep breath and held it in for a while before releasing it. He stopped walking and turned around to look at me. His eyes looked darker than jade, no longer bright and cheery. His face held a scowl so severe it rocked me to my core, making me very afraid of this fairy I really didn’t even know. And once again, his vein was bulging in his forehead and out the side of his neck.

  “I’ve been in the Mortal Realm for the last forty years trying to forget everything, and being there last night was hard for me. It brought up memories I’ve tried to forget. Brought up angers and passions so old I thought I had buried them decades ago.”

  The anger he projected only spiked my own anger. I was furious at everything. I hated those murderers. I hated being so alone. I hated being afraid and incapable. I hated the unknown and this whole stupid place. And all I could think of was why the hell did he want to yell at me? It wasn’t my fault.

  I welcomed my rage and directed it back at him.

  “Then why the hell are you here with me? Huh? Why trek around with me, not even a novice or whatever, just to come back here and rehash all those memories?” My anger was surging through my body, boiling my blood. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew I was being unfair. He was helping me when he didn’t have to, and without him I would be screwed. But in that moment, I didn’t care.

  “Because I know what it feels like!” He was shouting now, which only put fuel to the fire within me.

  “You have no idea what it feels like. I lost my parents. I’m alone! And stuck with a stupid, cocky fairy who is so quiet I can hear my own heart beating!”

  “Are you so naïve to think that you are the only person in the world who has known loss?” His anger faded with his words. Instead, it was replaced with grief. I had seen it back at that tree house. I knew he had lost someone, but right then, I saw it clear
ly. He was still heartbroken over whatever had happened.

  As quickly as his vulnerability appeared, it vanished. He pulled a mask over his face, leaving only impassiveness and a hint of cruelty.

  “I’m only helping you because I’m curious about your parents. It was obvious they were someone special, and I want to know why they were unmarked in the Mortal Realm. And why they were so brutally murdered. If you want to go the rest of the way on your own, be my guest.”

  The challenge was clear. The threat, obvious. And there was no way I could call his bluff now, not without knowing anything about this place.

  I took a deep breath in an attempt to calm my nerves. I wouldn’t be nice to him. I didn’t have the energy for it. Instead I walked past him and continued down the trail, hoping that he would take the hint and follow me.

  Eventually the sun slipped lower in the sky, and Alec created some form of light that hovered above his head and a few feet in front of him. I was thankful for it, but didn’t say thank you. I was still angry with him. We hadn’t spoken since our argument, and I wasn’t going to be the first to cave.

  “We should stop here for the night.” Again, I didn’t reply to him, only nodded my assent. Here didn’t seem like anything special to me. We were still just on a trail, walking through the forest.

  We walked off the trail just a little and stopped in a small circle of trees. Alec gathered some branches from the surrounding area into a small group, and then pulled out the box of matches from the tree house. The fire was full and thick, and provided some comforting heat.

  I sat close to the fire, watching the yellows and oranges and reds intertwine and flicker. Despite its destructive properties, fires were glorious to watch burn. The heat they emanated was pure strength. It was so hard to stop a fire once it got burning that often they would burn for days. It was like the fire was soothing me, providing a much needed calm to my insides.

  “Thinking back to the abada,” he started, “it could have been anything that walked through that path. Most Nymph are friendly, but as we both know, not all are. And there are creatures in this forest that are not as nice as the abadas.”

  I nodded. It was something I had been thinking about as well. Along with contemplating my loneliness and lack of…everything, I was also thinking about my inability to protect myself, let alone avenge my parent’s deaths.

  “I think it’s time you learn how to defend yourself.”

  I couldn’t agree more!

  Chapter Eleven

  Self-Defense: The act of defending yourself.

  “Stand here in front of me,” Alec said as he stood up in front of the fire. The flames cast an eerie glow to his face. He was still in a bad mood, that much was obvious, but at least he wasn’t scary anymore. His eyebrows were constantly tugging downward between his eyes, and his lips never lifted a millimeter up into even an almost smile.

  So without arguing, I stood up in front of him. My feet still hurt like crazy, but I was getting pretty good at ignoring them. This was something I not only wanted, but desperately needed.

  “First we should work on your stance. Basically, how you stand. You are smaller and weaker than most opponents you will face. But that doesn’t mean you have to lose. With the right amount of knowledge, you should be able to at least fend off an opponent so that you can get away.”

  “I don’t want to get away. I want to win.”

  “Baby steps, Lily. I can’t teach you how to kill, not when you couldn’t even fend off an attack. We will work on defensive moves, before offensive moves.”

  Though what he said made sense, I didn’t want to hear it. I wasn’t going to confront those murderers only to cower and run away. But I didn’t say that, because I really did need to learn at least basic self-defense moves.

  He walked up closer to me and showed me how to stand.

  “First, when faced with an attacker, you should be steady on your feet. Place your feet shoulder width apart, and bend your knees, but just slightly.”

  I did as I was told, but then he shook his head and came to stand next to me so that we were both facing the fire now.

  “Like this,” he said. He opened his feet about two feet apart and barely bent his knees, not at all like I had been standing. So, I tried to make my body mimic his.

  “Yeah, that’s better. Next you should keep your arms up, like this.” He moved his hands up in front of him, just barely below his shoulders, and had his elbows bent. Again I tried to mimic him.

  “No. Don’t keep your elbows so close to you. Your arms need to be out so that you can move them quickly. And don’t clench your fists. If you keep your hands open, you are more likely to be able to grab onto your attacker and deflect his attacks.” As he said it, he had walked around in front of me and faced me, so that I had to look down at his hands.

  I could barely look at his hands though. He had placed them on my arms, to place them in the correct position. All I could do was look at his eyes. I knew they were green, but in the darkness of the night they looked almost black. Especially as he faced me and the flickering of the fire couldn’t reach them.

  He smelled so good. Like fresh air. Clean. Pure. Strong.

  “Good, that’s good,” he said, and then looked up into my eyes. They were so dark they reminded me of the Demons eyes on Supernatural. So freaky, and almost scary.

  He took a step back and then mimicked the position I was in. It felt weird to stand like that. Awkward. Unnatural. But I tried to maintain the position. I wanted so badly to be good at it.

  “One of the best things you can do, since you are so small, is to use your opponent’s weight against him. Standing as you are should give you an advantage. You can move quickly away, to the side, or you can pull your opponent down as they lunge for you.”

  I nodded, because I didn’t know what to say. He kept standing in that position, and then moving to one side or the other before getting back in the same position.

  “Try to find the position again on your own.”

  So I did. I moved to my side, and immediately felt better. Standing like a puppet didn’t feel right to me. Nevertheless, I tried to find the same position again.

  “Hands up and elbows out a little more. And your feet are too far apart.” I adjusted my stance, as he suggested. “Good. That’s good. Do it again.”

  And I did. I did it again, and again, and again. Before too long my arms ached from holding them up at such a strange position and my thighs ached more than even my feet did.

  “I think I got it, can we move on to something else?”

  “Things take practice. Keep going.” I sighed, to show my own annoyance, but did as I was told. “Now when someone comes at you, you will want to incapacitate them as soon as possible. The best places to aim are the eyes, nose, neck, groin, and knee.” As he named the places, he also pointed to them.

  “I’m sorry about earlier,” I said completely changing the subject. My parents had always lived by the rule that you never go to bed angry. And really, my anger was unjust. It shouldn’t have been directed at him. Especially not after everything he was doing to help me.

  Bringing me here was something he didn’t have to do. Teaching me how to defend myself, so not something he had to do. All of this was something I needed and could never have done without him.

  But he didn’t answer me, not even to make a snide comment about how out of place the comment was. He only nodded and motioned for me to continue through the moves.

  “Have you been in a lot of fights?” I asked finally, after going to and from the position time and again.

  “Yes.” He said the word simply. As if that was answer enough.

  “How many?”

  He sighed before answering, and then stopped standing in our battle stance and went over to the blanket he had laid down earlier.

  “Just as I was not in the mood to talk earlier today, I am not in the mood for pillow talk.” What a jerk. He was always shutting me down. Even after I just apologized.
“Go to sleep. You will need your rest for tomorrow. If we can keep up this pace we may be able to shave a few days off our journey to the Central Village.”

  Finally I was able to lie down, curl into a ball, and sleep. I tried not to think about my parents. I tried not to be affected by Alec’s attitude. I desperately tried to mask the sobs that continued to escape me throughout the night.

  The next morning when I woke, I remembered my dream clearly. I had been remembering the time my parents had bought me a new bike for my birthday. It was my favorite bike, blue with purple sparkles. And my first bike without training wheels.

  In Kansas there aren’t many hills, and I had always been complaining about how I couldn’t ride fast enough. So my father had built me a ramp. It wasn’t a huge one, just a few feet off the ground. But it had been more than enough. And when I pushed as hard as my legs could push, and rode as hard as I could down the street, I’d gone fast enough that I’d felt like I was flying.

  When I rode back to my parents, they were beaming at me. Both so happy to see me so happy. Their love was apparent on their bright faces.

  When I told them that I felt like I had been flying, their smiles wavered. They immediately plastered smiles back on, though they were fake. At the time it wasn’t noticeable to me. But now, as I saw it again, it was apparent.

  As I sat up from my pallet of blankets, looking up at the tiny bit of sky visible through the layers of leaves above my head, I couldn’t help but wonder what they had been thinking in that moment. Were they upset that I mentioned flying, because they knew I would be able to fly one day? Were they upset that they could no longer fly, since they were, for some reason, in the Mortal Realm? Did they miss it? Did it worry them that I loved it so much?

  So many questions that would forever remain unanswered. So many things I wanted to ask them, but would never have the chance to. Since the sky was still dark above me, I knew it wasn’t too late in the morning. Alec was still sleeping, wrapped in his own blankets.

  I could tell that the sun would soon rise. Oddly enough, I felt like it would come up soon because of the air. It was as if I could feel the change in temperature and moisture and for some reason that made me believe it was almost dawn. So strange…