I turned and ran.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The woods betrayed me.
Branches scraped my clothing, grabbing at me to slow me down and sacrifice me to the night. Each breath was a stab of cold air inside my lungs. The moon was full but cloud-covered, making depth impossible to distinguish. I lifted my feet too high, stomped down too hard, jarred my knees, slammed my toes into rocks. I stumbled over roots and branches buried in the snow, scrambling to escape the shadowman with blood moon eyes. The monster darker than the darkness.
I glanced over my shoulder. Nothing followed but blackness and woodland shadows. I clambered over a steep hill to a ravine. Brambles snared my ankle and tripped me on the way down. I yanked my foot free, thorns piercing cloth and flesh. Blood bloomed against the flannel, warm and sticky, as I scrambled to my feet.
I leaned against a tree trunk and covered my mouth to quiet my panting. My ankle throbbed and stung and I tasted ash on my lip. A breeze snaked through the trees, chilling the sweat on my forehead. Ice creaked overhead on the branches. My shoulders slumped as my breathing began to steady.
Delano materialized from the tree's shadow and snatched my wrist. I screamed and thrashed as he yanked me to him, my fist pounding his chest, as cold as a corpse beneath silk as slick as ice. He clenched my forearms and shoved my back against the trunk. I shrieked as the tree's bark scraped my spine. My body-heat abandoned me for this monster, leaving me cold and alone and forsaken, just like a husband sneaking off to his leg-spread lover, like a chickadee falling to a predator of the night. I am going to die in these woods, I realized. For how did you defeat a shadow? How did you evade the moon?
My vision blurred. Reality became a fading background, as if only me and the darkling existed. All warmth drained to Delano with the moonlight, the starlight, the glints off the snow and ice. Did he steal them all? Or were they powerless against him, like a magnet or a black hole? "Don't kill me!" I cried. "Please don't kill me! Please!"
Delano tilted his head, his lips pursed. A moth fluttered onto his shoulder and stretched its wings. "Kill you?" He scoffed. "If I wished you dead, why would I build you a fire to warm you, feed you, and give you strength? No, no, no. I have much grander intentions."
I stiffened, my chin trembling, feeling like the world's biggest fool. The fire wasn't a gift, after all. I fell for a darkling's bait.
A coyote howled in the distance. Delano tensed; his eyes flashed like reflectors in the dim moonlight. "Did they mark you?"
"Wha-What?"
He glanced over his shoulder, his fingernails digging into my triceps. "Did they mark you?"
"I-I don't know what you're talking about."
"I don't have time for games!"
"I don't know! I swear!"
Delano yanked the overcoat off my shoulders. I thrashed and kicked and scratched myself away from him. He snatched my coattail as I scrambled for the hill, and threw me to the ground. My palm landed on a rock; I twisted my body and hurled it at his head. He ducked, snatched my arm, pinned me in the snow.
"Stop fighting, you stupid girl!" I squirmed fruitlessly, shrieking. He flipped me onto my stomach. My face sank into the snow, and I spat out a mouthful of ice.
"Stop!" I wailed, the snow crunching loud in my ear. "Please! Stop!"
The darkling pushed my overcoat and shirt up to my neck, grinding his knee into the base of my spine. One of my arms was stuck beneath my pelvis, the other he pinned to my side. My skin tightened as the snow pressed against my stomach, but Delano's pants were just as cold. Dear, God. Is he a demon? The Grim Reaper? Is a devil about to rape me?
Delano brushed his fingers across my shoulders. "You are clean," he said, then hoisted me to my feet. I tugged down my clothing. Shadows uncoiled from the forest and circled us like a lightless eddy. Delano's flesh absorbed the darkness. I kicked and bucked uselessly as shadows snaked around my legs. The darkness crawled to my chest, encasing me like a frigid cocoon. I cursed myself for my stupidity, and for irrationally riding the waves I had caused. If I had never hopped the train I would be brokenhearted and miserable, but at least I wouldn't become a murder victim of night manifested. Delano squeezed me to his chest and I felt a pulling sensation, as if a black hole had burst open to suck us out of existence. I cried out and—
"ARGH!"
"Chick-a-dee-dee-dee!"
Delano staggered backward, flailing his arms as the chickadee thrashed its wings and pecked his face. The darkness fell off my body and rejoined the shadows. I scrambled away, clutching my overcoat to my chest. The chickadee dove and weaved, jabbing Delano's head with its beak, then bolted into the darkness.
I sprinted after the songbird, my ankle screaming from where the thorns had torn my skin. Delano snatched my hair. I shrieked as he whirled me to face him, his eyes blazing like two moons aflame.
Then I saw nothing.
The woods lit up like a silent flash-grenade. My eyeballs stung like thistles in their sockets; pain filled my skull as sharp and white as the light. Gigantic white blobs blotted out my vision. A warm gust whizzed beside my ear; something hard whacked Delano. He yelped and released me and stumbled away, and that was all I knew for certain. Snow cracked to my left. Then heavy breathing. The slap of flesh smacking flesh. Another light explosion. A frigid gust. A rush of heat. My heart pounding like a war drum inside my chest.
I crouched, trembling, blindly patting the snow and soggy leaves. My eyes watered, the dance with the coyote now seeming naive. I felt small, and vulnerable, and foolish. The white blobs started shrinking in my vision; a shadow flickered in my peripheral. Fingers wrapped around my wrist and I yanked myself free.
"You're safe, Miriam," the chickadee said, as it landed on my shoulder. "The darkling is gone, but we need to leave."
"I can't see," I said. "The light blinded me."
"That's why I am here," said a new man's voice, cheerful and musical. "To guide you." The stranger grabbed my hands and hoisted me to my feet. I realized then his flesh was hot. So unlike Delano's ice.
The white blobs in my vision shrank as the stranger and I fled through the trees. Well, more like the stranger fled. I hobbled and fell and struggled through the brush and snow. He glided through the forest as if ice skating across a frozen pond, calling out hazards we approached—Root! Rock! Dip! Puddle!—but his warnings did minimal good. The stranger caught me each stumble, wasting no time after I regained my footing. I squinted, curious to see my first faerie. All I made out was that he wore a hat and a large backpack.
We fled for nearly two hours—sometimes jogging, sometimes walking briskly, but always fleeing. The chickadee perched on the faerie's shoulder, bobbing in the darkness with his graceful stride. We had escaped the woods and now scurried through fields, but the easier terrain was still unforgiving. My ankle throbbed from where the thorns had cut me, and my chest ached from running without a bra. A stitch chewed my side, making me limp. The stranger hoisted my armpit onto his shoulder, supporting me but never stopping. I strained to hear footsteps sneaking up behind us through the crunch of weeds and snow.
"I didn't see the protector I sent," the chickadee said. "Did she ever find you?"
I nodded and spoke between puffs of breath. "Yes. She was. Helpful. And warm."
"Glad to hear it," said the chickadee. "Turkeys are hit or miss with their honor, quite frankly."
I felt a sinking sensation in my gut. "Turkey...?" My pace dwindled, then I lurched as my guide yanked me forward. "Don't you mean coyote?"
This time the stranger's pace lessened ... then his speed increased to a gallop, his arm muscles straining as if towing an anchor. I panted hard to keep up, the stitch gnashing at my side.
"Coyotes are not faerie helpers," the chickadee said, somberly. "The darkling must have sent a spy."
My stomach heaved, and I decided to never eat turkey again.
"Jump! Hole!" the stranger shouted. I jumped blindly, and puffed a relieved breath when my boots struck flat ground. "We're almos
t there," he said, as if enjoying some dysfunctional family vacation. He sounded hardly out of breath. Twenty minutes later we stumbled out of the snow dappled weeds, and my boots struck blacktop. I squealed as if we had stumbled upon a treasure trove glittering with diamonds. The stranger didn't pause. He hauled me along the roadway, his head swaying from side to side, scanning the darkness.
Something growled behind us. I tensed, then relaxed when I saw two headlights approaching from down the road. The stranger ordered me to stay on the shoulder, then waved his arms above his head as he entered the lane.
The chickadee landed on my shoulder. "Are you hurt?"
I shook my head, hands on my thighs, gasping. "No. I was. Worried. About you. Though."
"Sorry it took so long. Your guide made it nearly to the farmhouse."
My heart winced. The farmhouse seemed a world away. Was Sam there now, I wondered? Was his lover nestled beside him in our bed? Or was Sam still in the city with his family, staying close to where I had disappeared?
My guide waved down a pickup truck towing a horse trailer. The headlights illuminated him briefly as the truck slowed, then stopped a few feet past. Brown tweed jacket, tattered blue jeans, red hiker's backpack with sleeping bags strapped to the top and bottom, charcoal fedora. The buckles on his chunky motorcycle boots glinted in the passing headlamps' glow. He was several inches taller than me, and svelte. Far from frail, though. He appeared strong, sturdy. Like a musclewood tree who had gone thrift shopping for clothes while drunk out of his gourd.
"That's—" God, I felt stupid even saying it, "—my faerie guide?"
The chickadee nodded.
My faerie guide spoke to the driver through the passenger window, then waved me over. "The driver is heading west," he said, and threw his backpack into the truck bed.
I wiped my forehead with my sleeve. "Where to?"
The faerie laughed, a sound like shell chimes tinkling in the breeze. He hopped into the bed. "No idea. But it must be better than out here, don't you think?"
I imagined Delano's blood moon eyes watching me from the darkness, his corpse-cold nails digging into my flesh. I grabbed the faerie's hand and clambered into the truck bed. We sat beside each other in the corner, our backs against the cab, the backpack and two bales of hay near our feet. The faerie tapped the window with his knuckle. The engine roared as the driver sped off.
The wind chilled the sweat on my brow. Smells of hay and horse manure wafted from the trailer, mixed with the tailpipe's exhaust. A chain clanked against the hitch. I thought about the train ride, rattling, cold, caked in grime. It seems like months ago, not days. My teeth chattered, and I pulled my knees to my chest.
The faerie shrugged off his tweed jacket. I tensed up when he wrapped his arm around my shoulders, splaying the jacket across us like a blanket. "The driver says we'll be driving until daylight." He slid my arm through one of the sleeves, and slid his into the other. If he noticed my unease he made no indication. "You need to rest." I watched the darkness lining the road and bit my cheek. The faerie cupped my jaw in his hand and pressed my ear to his shoulder. "Sleep. You're safe now. I promise."
Relief and exhaustion fell over me. My ankle throbbed, and every muscle ached. The faerie was warm, as if running a fever, and my head sunk onto his shoulder. He smelled like dew drenched ferns and hollow logs and early hints of spring. The edge of his hair tickled my brow in the wind. "I don't even know your name," I said with a yawn.
"Orin." He gently squeezed my side. "Now sleep."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
My eyes were open, yet I questioned if I was dreaming.
Orin's chin was lifted to a salmon sky. His fedora was off and the dawn wind streaked through his hair as the pickup truck raced to the horizon. The chickadee was curled in the cup of his hand, sleeping soundly; Orin's thumb stroked the bird's head. His eyes were closed and his lips were stretched into a smile, as if he listened to a hidden symphony tucked inside the roar of wind and engine and clanging trailer. I kept my head on his shoulder, not wanting to alert him I had awakened. Not wanting to disturb his communion with morning's first light.
Orin was not the Tinkerbell I had imagined, and in the daylight all stereotypes I held about faeries melted away. He looked my age and human—very human—except for the tips of his ears which rose to dull points. Still, something was different about him, a strangeness felt before witnessed, like the tingle on your skin from a scandalous secret. What caught me first physically was his nest of hair. It glinted in the sun like mica, conjuring up memories of flip-flops and sunscreen and plastic toy buckets. Each strand was like a grain of sand, its own color of yellow or bronze or copper or tan, millions of flecks creating the illusion of a golden, sun-drenched shore. I didn't want to stop staring at it.
The truck's metal bed dug into my hip. I shifted carefully, discreetly.
"Good morning, Miriam. Did I wake you?" My breath caught in my throat when Orin looked at me. Gold speckled his eyes, dancing like coins of light on tropical waters. For some reason his smile made me think of apricots and tea glasses, tinkling with ice.
"No, no." I sat up straight and slid my arm out of his jacket. "Where do you think we are?"
Orin shrugged and put on his fedora. "Not sure. Missouri?"
Snow dappled pastures and barbwire lined the four-lane highway; the land's flatness, sparse trees, and cotton candy sky stretched beyond every horizon. An enormous truck stop waited ahead, standing alone like a blacktop oasis. I should be at work today, at my own tiny gas station, I thought. I doubted Sam had told my boss I was missing, meaning I had left the station shorthanded. The thought made me feel guilty, and a little ashamed.
The click of a turn-signal sounded. The chickadee woke to the bump of the truck stop's driveway. It blinked and stretched its wings, then hopped onto my wrist and bowed. "It was an honor being your watcher," the bird said.
I frowned. "You're leaving?"
"I must deliver the message that you have been reached safely. Orin will take good care of you from here. And who knows? We may meet again."
"Thank you," I said. "You are the bravest chickadee I ever met."
The chickadee puffed its chest and lifted its chin proudly. It then chirped a thank you and a goodbye before flying west over the station.
The pickup parked beside a gas pump. Orin helped me out of the bed; a horse stomped its hoof in the trailer. The driver's eyes widened when he saw us together, as if he thought he had rescued a couple of kittens, and in the daylight realized we were a couple of skunks. He mumbled incoherently to our thank yous and informed us he would take us no farther.
Warmth washed down on me as we entered the truck stop's lobby. I stopped beneath the overhead heating vent and sighed with pleasure. The hot air bounced off me, as if my skin had a layer of ice which needed to melt before reaching my core. Orin joined me without question, lifting his face like a sunflower to the outpouring warmth. We stood in silence, thawing for several minutes. Travelers darted around us to get to the travel store and diner. The air smelled of cooking grease, hash-browns, and bacon-wrapped comfort. My stomach rumbled.
"Hungry?" Orin said.
I blushed. "Starving. But I—Oh my God! Showers!"
Ahead of us, between an arcade and laundry room, stood a sign for private showers. Orin lifted his eyebrows, seeming to notice my filthiness for the first time. "Hm, yeah. You could use a good scrubbing." He pinched the bottom hem of my pajama top, the flannel nearly black from pitch and mud. "Better clothes, too, yes?"
I frowned. "I can't. I didn't bring any money."
Orin whipped out two fistfuls of hundred dollar bills from his jacket's pockets. "Will this cover your needs?"
"What are you doing?" I stepped up to him, chest to chest to hide the wads. "You can't go around waving cash!"
He tilted his head. "Why?"
"Because you might get robbed!"
Orin shrugged and stuffed the bills back into his pockets. "Well? Is it enough?"
; "Way more. But I can't take your money."
"Of course you can. The Realm provided it to help you." He adjusted his backpack's straps and headed toward the travel store. "So you better follow me if you want any say on what you'll be wearing."
I frowned at Orin's mishmash of tattered clothing, and hurried to join him.
If Keith's Corner Shop had a beef-jerky-eating older brother with mutton chops and a doughy stomach drooping over his belt-line, I imagined this travel store would be him. It catered dominantly to male road warriors in need of comforts and supplies, and gifts for their loved ones forced to stay at home. Orin threw T-shirts of all sizes over his arm, with screen-prints of semis and NASCAR and aggressive fonts announcing the King of all Kings. I returned them as quickly as he gathered them.
He poked my nose with his pinky. "Pick something or I'll buy it all."
I bit my lip and slid hangers along metal rods. I chose a fleece lined hoodie and two black, long sleeve shirts with silver winged hearts on the front—the only women's smalls on the clearance rack. They were also the only women's wares in the travel store. I chose the smallest pair of men's jeans, a belt, fleece lined gloves, and a bag of men's one-size-fits-all socks. I debated if I could make men's briefs work too, but decided against it. Orin plopped a wool blanket, a water bottle, and a folding knife in my arms. "Keep that within reach while we're on the road," he said, pointing to the knife. "Just in case." My stomach knotted. The items in my arms felt ominous. They weren't purchases, I realized. It was survival gear, tools to keep me alive on this adventure ... whatever this adventure was.
Orin grabbed a black knapsack, toiletries and snacks, then met me at the checkout. A scrawny man complaining about the order of his lottery tickets stood in front of us. The cashier feigned sympathy—something I had done countless times in my own store—but kept glancing at me with narrowed eyes. I knew I was a fright with my filthy clothing, matted hair, grimy skin, reeking of woodsmoke and mud and sap. Still, old insecurities whispered that something was inherently wrong with me, that I didn't belong. I left my husband, hopped a train, got lost in the woods, brawled with the supernatural, and nothing has changed. I longed for my secret mineshaft where no one ever found me. Here (wherever here was) I was a freak with no sanctuary. My coping mechanisms of nature strolls and housecleaning had vanished.
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