by James Riley
Still, he had to let his dad go be free sometime, and going to regular, everyday nonmagic school was going to be weirdly relaxing after what he’d been through at the Oppenheimer School. Sure, it was still school, but at least he wouldn’t be dealing with evil otherworldly horrors, hurrying to learn magic spells so he wasn’t kicked out, or bargaining with faeries.
Homework and tests just didn’t seem so bad in comparison.
Fort walked out the apartment door with one last look at his dad and aunt, then turned and almost ran down the stairs, 100 percent ready for some normalcy.
“Hey, you,” someone said from his right. “Human kid. Finally. I’ve been waiting all morning!”
Fort froze and slowly turned to see who was speaking to him, only to almost teleport away instantly when he did.
A girl around his age stood tapping her foot in the middle of the sidewalk, which was all fine. The weird part was her green skin and bright yellow hair. And what was worse, he recognized her.
This was the faerie girl who’d tried to buy Damian from them, back in Avalon, before disappearing with Ellora to meet the faerie queen.
“You?” he said, barely able to get the word out. He looked around quickly, but thankfully the sidewalk was empty for the moment. Still, it wouldn’t be long before someone else showed up and saw this girl with green skin. “What are you doing here? You can’t be here!”
“What do you think I’m doing here?” she asked, giving him an impatient look. “Do I really need to spell it out for you?”
“Yes!” Fort shouted, pushing her behind a nearby wall, his heart racing now. “You can’t let anyone see you like this! They’ll know you aren’t human!” And as panicked as everyone was about London being destroyed, a girl with green skin was not going to get overlooked.
“What are you talking about?” she asked, a confused expression passing over her face. “I look completely human. See?” She lifted up her hair, revealing rounded ears. “Trust me, I did my research. I blend in completely.”
“We don’t have green skin,” Fort hissed at her.
“What, really?” she said, looking as surprised as he was about seeing her in the first place. “Why not?”
“Because we don’t come in that color!” Fort whispered as a car turned onto the street, a few yards away. He quickly moved to stand in front of the faerie girl, pretending he was on his phone, barely breathing until the car passed by. As he finally took in some air, he turned back to find her staring at him weirdly.
“This is going to be harder than I thought, clearly,” she said. “You people make no sense. Okay. So what colors are you?”
“I don’t know—it depends on a lot of things,” Fort said, then realized what he was saying. “Wait, that doesn’t matter. You can’t be here! Why are you even here?”
“I really thought you’d have figured it out,” the girl said, raising an eyebrow. She stared at him for a moment, then her skin faded from green to a shade that matched Fort’s. “There. Now no one will notice me.”
He blinked a few times. “How did you do that?”
“Magic, obviously,” she said. “I thought you people knew how to cast spells.”
“We can,” he told her. “But it usually has, I don’t know, a glow.”
She crinkled her nose. “Oh, seriously? You’re using their kind?” She gave him a smug look. “Tylwyth Teg use natural magic. It’s so much less involved.”
Fort just stared at her for a moment, not understanding any of this. “Can we get back to why you’re here? Pretend I have no idea, and tell me slowly.”
She sniffed. “It’s not like I have to pretend. You made a bargain with my queen, and she’s sent me to collect. Why else would I be here?” She seemed to consider this. “Though I’m sure the queen would have sent someone else if she weren’t annoyed with me for trying to show your human companion the way to her. As if you wouldn’t have found your way there on your own. But no, I get punished because ‘humans cannot be trusted, only tricked.’ ” She rolled her eyes.
Fort felt his entire body go ice cold. “A bargain?” he whispered, backing away from her in horror. The faerie queen had given him a green jewel to make sure his father would be protected, which Fort had assumed would keep his dad safe when Ellora removed him from time.
Instead, it’d fixed his father so that the coming world war set off by his father’s new ability to use magic wouldn’t happen. And for that, Fort owed the faerie queen everything.
He just hadn’t expected to be paying her back so soon. Or by way of a faerie showing up randomly on the street.
“Yes, a bargain,” the faerie said, looking at him closely. “You’re not too quick, are you?”
“What is it that she wants?” Fort asked, dreading the answer as a chill passed through him. “My firstborn child? My sense of sarcasm? My voice? Do I get to pick between options or something?”
The faerie’s eyes lit up. “No, but I like where your head is at. Remember those things you just offered, and I’ll make you a deal for them later. I have a piece of the North Wind that would be a great trade for your voice. Plus, you could swallow it and use it to howl, so it’s not like you’d be completely speechless—”
“What does she want?” Fort practically screamed, then forced himself to quiet down as someone opened their door up the street, staring at them curiously. With the faerie girl no longer green, she didn’t stick out as much, but either way, Fort needed her gone as soon as possible.
The girl moved in close, looking up and down the street to make sure no one was listening. “She wants your dragon,” she whispered, then stepped back and clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Oh, by the way, my name is Xenea. Nice to meet you!”
- FIVE -
FORT SUDDENLY FOUND IT REALLY hard to breathe. “My… dragon?” he said, his voice just barely above a whisper.
Xenea nodded. “That’s what I’m here for.” She stuck out her hands and opened and closed them in a “gimme” gesture. “Any time now. I don’t have all day.”
Fort’s mind raced as he stared at the girl, not trusting her or her queen in the slightest. Yes, he’d made a deal, but not for a living creature! What would the faeries do with a dragon? And how did the queen know he even had one?
Xenea started tapping her foot. “Is it… close by?” she said, glancing around. “Are we going to need to travel? What are we waiting for?”
“What… do you want the dragon for?” he asked, still trying to decide what to do. If the faeries loved dragons, and could raise Ember properly, maybe he should give her to Xenea, so she could take her away to safety.
“Oh, to use it as a hostage, I imagine,” Xenea said, rolling her eyes. “There are a bunch of elder dragons on Avalon that refuse to give up their land to my queen, and it’s always bothered her, so I’d guess she’d try to give them your dragon as a trade. And if they don’t take it…” She gave him an evil grin. “Well, we wouldn’t want the dragon to get hurt, now, would we?”
“Whoa!” Fort shouted, stepping backward with his hands up. “I’m not handing anything over to you so you can hurt it!” Okay, he hadn’t known Ember that long, but even if she weren’t incredibly cute and attached to him, there was no way he was giving her—or anyone—to the queen when Ember might be injured, or worse!
“I don’t know that she’s going to hurt it,” Xenea said, sounding exasperated. “I said I’d guess that she would. There’s a chance the dragons will take it in trade, too! They’re all old, and I’m told there hasn’t been a new one born in a few thousand years, so a young one would be worth a lot to them.” She scrunched up her face. “Worth a lot to me, too, if you’d just let me have it earlier, like I asked.”
Earlier? What was she… Wait, was she talking about Damian right now? “You’re saying you want that same dragon, then?” Fort said, suddenly feeling a lot less concerned. “The one that looked like a teenage boy?”
She gave him a strange look. “I assumed that, yes. She just said t
hat you would be in contact with a dragon, and I should come to retrieve it. Why, how many dragons are you in possession of?” She leaned in closer, giving him a suspicious glare.
“Just the one!” Fort said quickly, blinking rapidly as he tried to figure out how to get rid of the faerie girl. “But I’m not in possession of him. He’s his own person. I don’t even know where he is. So you should probably go looking for him, maybe in the UK—”
“No, the queen was very clear that you’d have the dragon,” Xenea said, still looking unconvinced. “Are you absolutely sure you don’t have him in a cave somewhere?”
“I promise you, I do not have Damian at all, let alone in a cave,” Fort said, breathing a sigh of relief. “But seriously, I’d look in Britain, where—”
“If he’s not here now, then he’ll probably come back,” Xenea said, nodding to herself, before cringing. “Which means I’m stuck with you until he does. Ugh.” She turned back to the street as if seeing it for the first time. “What sort of land is this, anyway? You live in stone houses when there’s a perfectly good wooded area right over this path?” She pointed at the park across from Fort’s aunt’s apartment. “You people really are backward.”
Before Fort could even respond, a rumble down the street told him that the school bus was almost here, and the panic set back in. “I have to go,” he told Xenea, backing away from her. “But I’ll be back later. You can wait for me in that wooded area, okay? I promise, I won’t see any dragons while I’m gone.”
She sighed, shaking her head as the bus turned the corner. “No, if you’re going somewhere, I’m coming too. I have to at least confirm this dragon isn’t there first.” She paused. “Where exactly are we going?”
“To a school,” Fort said, his nervousness increasing as the bus drew closer. “You wouldn’t like it. It’s a lot of learning about, I don’t know, human stuff—”
Xenea’s eyes lit up at that. “Really? That might actually come in handy, as the queen says we’ll be taking back our la…” She trailed off and blinked. “I mean, so I can learn more about your people.”
Fort had no idea what all of that meant, but now it was too late, and the school bus was pulling up. He couldn’t let this faerie girl come to school with him… but wouldn’t it be more dangerous to leave her here, right outside his aunt’s apartment where Ember was?
As much as he wanted to find a safe place for the baby dragon, that did not include handing her over to the faerie queen. He hadn’t known the baby dragon for more than one night now, but the last thing he was going to do was let some stranger touch his cat-dragon. That was not going to happen!
At least now Fort knew that apparently there were dragons on Avalon, which meant that if he could figure out a way to do it, he could send Ember to them to be raised. All he’d need was his Reopen Portal spell, and she’d be safe. But he’d cast his last instance of that spell to get them to Avalon in the first place.
But right now, there were more important things to worry about, like how to get rid of Xenea. As the bus pulled up in front of them, a whirlwind of excuses passed through Fort’s mind, but before he could even begin to say something, Xenea pushed past him and entered the school bus.
Oh no.
He quickly followed the faerie girl up the steps, his heart ready to explode out of his chest.
Everyone stared, but fortunately not in a panicked way, like they should have been, considering a magical creature had just walked onto their bus. No, they were watching her more like she was just a new student, the same way they eyed Fort, with both suspicion and curiosity.
Before Fort could figure out a way to fix things, the door behind them closed, and the bus driver told them to take a seat.
Fort ducked into the first seat he came to, and Xenea followed him, touching the plastic seat cover with distaste. “What is this made of?” she asked, far too loudly. “It looks like leather, but this is no beast that I’ve ever seen. Do humans raise this green animal?”
“It’s plastic—it’s fake,” he whispered. “You shouldn’t be here, you know. We’ll both get in trouble. They’ll know you don’t belong here!”
“Oh, it’ll be fine,” she said, waving a hand absently. “What’s this vehicular conveyance we’re on? What sort of magic does it use to move? Why do you look like you’re going to be sick?”
“It’s a school bus,” he told her. “It’s taking us to school, like I said, where they’ll ask who you are and why you’re there, since you aren’t enrolled at the school, and then they’ll probably hand us both over to the army or something.”
“You didn’t answer about what magic makes the school bus run,” she reminded him, standing up to look around.
He quickly pulled her back down, his face glowing red. “The bus doesn’t use magic,” Fort hissed at her. “It’s got an engine, and it runs on gasoline. And I probably look like I’m going to be sick because—”
“I’ve never seen you two before,” interrupted a boy from across the aisle. “Are you new?”
Before Fort could stop her, Xenea turned to him and smiled. “New to your school bus? Yes. New to this world?” She gave Fort a quick wink. “Of course not! We’ve both been here our whole lives, fellow human.”
- SIX -
FORT BLUSHED EVEN HARDER, HIS face feeling like it was on fire, and he leaned past Xenea to wave at the boy. “Sorry about her,” he said. “She’s just tired and likes to talk nonsense sometimes.”
The boy gave Fort a questioning glance. “What do you mean? She sounds normal to me.”
“Yeah, what are you talking about?” Xenea asked, looking as confused as their neighbor across the aisle.
“I just… oh, forget it,” Fort said, not understanding the other boy’s confusion. He sank back into the plastic seat, trying to pretend none of this was happening, that a faerie girl wasn’t following him to school and having a conversation where she said things like “fellow human.”
At least it couldn’t get any worse than that—
“So what’s your name, human boy?” Xenea asked the boy. “You may call me Xenea.”
“Yejun,” the boy said with a smile. “Where are you from, Xenea? It sounds like you’ve got an English accent, at least a bit.”
“Oh, I’m from Earth, just as you are,” she said, and Fort groaned loudly.
“She is from the UK, yeah,” Fort told the boy. “That’s why she’s acting so strangely. It’s a cultural thing.”
“Okay, but she’s not acting strangely,” Yejun said. “Why do you keep saying she is?”
Fort opened his mouth to respond, then shook his head, not even knowing where to start. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
“Excuse him,” Xenea said. “He’s in the middle of learning a life lesson about paying off his debts. Tell me, Yejun, about this place of learning we’re traveling to, this school. Who runs it? Must we pay any fealty to them?”
Fealty? Fort waited for a reaction to that, knowing there was no way this kid could let that go.
“Oh, it’s run by our principal, Mrs. MacNamara,” Yejun said completely normally. “And you don’t need to pay her any fealty. I’m not even sure what that means.”
Fort’s mouth dropped open as he just stared at Yejun, who gave him an odd look in return. How was he so calmly answering all of her ridiculous questions? He had to know that people from the UK didn’t ask about paying fealty to school principals, not to mention probably didn’t say they were from Earth, either.
And yet, here he was, acting like this was all completely ordinary. Was Yejun some kind of extradimensional creature too? Were there more of them at schools now? How many faeries were on this planet, anyway?
“Is there anything I should know about this MacNamara human?” Xenea asked. “For instance, the queen where I come from—by which I mean Earth, of course—does not react well to impoliteness, or if you break a covenant with her. Either one can lead to years in the dungeon.”
Again, Yejun shrugged at this lik
e Xenea hadn’t just popped the word “dungeon” into the conversation. “Oh, sure, you should be polite, but she’s not bad. She loves really bad jokes, so that’s the only thing you have to watch out for. No dungeons. That might just be a UK thing.”
Xenea nodded. “Bad jokes? I shall watch out for them. Can they be dangerous?”
“Only to anyone with a sense of humor,” Yejun said with a smile.
“Hmm, that would include me,” Xenea said. “Thanks for the warning, fellow human.” Fort sighed loudly enough to make her pause, but she didn’t wait long before continuing. “I might come to you later for more information. Please don’t hold back if you think there are things my friend and I should know.”
“Sure, and it’s nice to meet you,” Yejun said. “What’s your friend’s name, by the way?”
“Forsythe,” she said, nodding at Fort.
“Forsythe, you should know that we don’t judge other people’s cultures here,” Yejun said, giving him a sort of pitying look. “It’s not okay. Everyone’s from somewhere else, you know?”
That was it. “I do know that!” Fort shouted, as other kids turned to look. “And I don’t care where other people are from. I just thought that you… and what she said… how she sounded…” He trailed off, noticing just how much of the bus was staring now.
“Sounded… what?” Yejun said. “Like she comes from a country that just went through something horrible less than a week ago? Wow, man.”
Fort’s mouth opened and closed as he had literally no idea where to even begin to explain. When Yejun finally turned away, Fort leaned in toward Xenea. “What did you do to him?” he hissed.
“What?” Xenea asked, looking confused, only to smile a second later as if she’d just realized what he was talking about. “Oh, do you mean the glamour? That’s nothing.” She paused, giving him a questioning look. “You really don’t know about glamours?”
