by Amy Sumida
“I know,” Keir smiled indulgently. “And I'm so proud of your heroism. Still, I'd rather you be safe and alive, than a dead hero.”
“Safe is boring, Dad,” I grinned when he groaned.
“There's one more thing you should know about the raven mockers,” Keir exchanged a circumspect look with Tiernan.
“What is it?” I sobered.
“They're ours,” Keir said simply.
“Excuse me?” I blinked at him, sure that I'd misunderstood.
“They're twilight fairies, Seren,” Keir sighed. “The raven mockers are our people, one of the twilight races.”
Chapter Three
The Fairy Realm, isn't technically a planet, it's a solar system, as the Human Realm refers to the solar system which Earth is a part of. But Fairy and Earth are the only planets in both of those systems that are populated. So generally, when one refers to the Realm of Fairy or the Human Realm, they're referring to the planets of Fairy and Earth. That being said, Fairy is connected to Earth in several locations by pathways which can be used to travel between the planets. These paths are like wormholes through space, anchored by fairy mounds which are also known as raths. Each rath leads to a specific location and if you were to lay a map of Fairy over one of Earth, you could connect the raths with a pin shoved through the maps. That's how perfectly aligned the planets of Fairy and Earth are.
The Twilight Kingdom is connected to the United States, with exception to Hawaii and Alaska, which are in Unseelie territory. Even though raths are controlled and guarded by fairies, the Human Councils had built their Council Houses nearby, to both keep an eye on the fey and keep in communication with them. So there was a fairy mound which led directly to Tulsa. I just had to travel to the Tulsa rath in a rather medieval style; by carriage... which would take days.
I'd once suggested to my father that we create some kind of magic powered vehicle which could speed up transportation in the Fairy Realm but he'd been horrified. Frankly, after giving it some good thought, I agreed with him. A bunch of cars zipping down the roads of Fairy would kinda ruin the ambiance. Still, it would make the ride to the rath much faster.
I could have traveled the In-Between at twilight; stepping into the dark, cold place where my magic was strongest, and then stepping out at whatever destination I could envision or name. But only twilight fey could travel in such a way, which meant that I'd have to leave Tiernan behind. Tiernan, although considered a twilight fairy through allegiance, was born seelie.
So instead of traveling the In-Between or taking the long road to the Tulsa rath, it was finally decided that we use the rath which led to Gentry Technologies (Keir's human-based company) in San Francisco and then take Keir's private plane to Tulsa. The SF rath was much closer to Castle Twilight and the plane ride in HR would be faster than traveling that same distance in Fairy by horse.
Still, the SF rath was a hard day's journey from Twilight Castle. We usually took it at a moderate pace and stopped somewhere along the way for the night but the Human Council wanted us in Tulsa as soon as possible. So we'd be riding hard, on horseback instead of in a carriage. Which meant that Cat had to shift into a horse so she could carry me; something which pleased her to no end.
I normally whined about being cooped up in a carriage but riding horseback had its own set of drawbacks. Mainly sore thighs. I was already in human clothes; a pair of bluejeans and my Ewoking Dead T-shirt with a picture of zombie ewoks on it. Honestly, I changed into human clothes every chance I got. As amazing as fairy dresses could be, they were annoying to someone used to having a certain amount of ease of movement. Basically, I liked being able to draw my sword and use it if I had to, and that wasn't something fairy dressmakers took into consideration when they designed clothing for fairy princesses. So I was joyous to be in my old clothes, which made for a much easier ride than if I'd been weighed down with some frilly fairy frippery. Still, with a full leather satchel on my back and my iron sword strapped to my waist, the journey exhausted more than just my lower body. By the time we reached the rath, I wanted nothing more than to curl up on the grass on go to sleep.
The meadow before the mound was idyllic. Spotted with little fey flowers, it was a lush layer of verdancy placed amid overhanging trees, which provided bits of shifting shade. The air was scented with crushed grass and the sugary berries which hung in mass clumps on bushes among the trees. I dismounted in a shaft of warm sunlight and sighed, my knees buckling with the urge to just fall to the soft ground and bury my face in the flowers. I didn't even care about bugs, I just wanted to sleep.
That wasn't happening though. On the other side of the fairy mound, my Uncle Dylan Thorn would be waiting to whisk all of us away to the airport. Dylan was the only non-psycho relative I had on the Unseelie side of my family. Actually, after the stunt my Uncle Shane had pulled, it was looking like Uncle Dylan was the only non-psycho relative I had from both the Seelie and Unseelie sides.
Who knows? Maybe I was going psycho too because I started imagining the Wicked Witch of Oz saying; Poppies, poppies, poppies, as I stared at the alluring meadow. At least we were traveling by private plane so I could shower and sleep on the way to Tulsa. That thought just might give me enough strength to follow Tiernan through the golden door of the rath and resist the poppies... er, fairy flowers.
Set into the side of a small hill covered in thick blanket of grass and wildflowers, the golden door, with its image of the Earth carved into it, looked out of place. But then that was pretty normal for the Fairy Realm. Fairies loved to stick bits of flashy metalwork out among nature, or bits of nature within their flashy homes. So I guess the door didn't look out of place unless you were a human. Which I still was, at least half of me was.
Tiernan opened the door and I followed him into the shadowy darkness of the In-Between, with Cat and my Star's Guard close on our heels. A couple of grooms were staying behind with the horses. They'd be camping there until we returned or we sent word that we wouldn't be returning through this rath. Unfortunately, I often left people waiting outside a rath while I returned to Fairy via another route. I didn't do it on purpose, that's just how things go. So the grooms knew they might be waiting for nothing.
They didn't seem to mind though. They were all young boys, cat-sidhes as most of the stable boys were, and I think they looked on it as a camping trip. At the very least, they got out of the castle and away from most of their duties. So it wasn't surprising when one of them, Searc was his name, told me to take my time in the Human Realm.
Walking the path within the rath was always comforting to me and despite my exhaustion, I perked up once we were immersed in the darkness of the In-Between. It had once scared me; that endless emptiness which lurked beyond the solidity of the path. But now I knew I belonged there, that I was at my strongest within the dark and even were I to step off the path, I could borrow the power of the In-Between and use it to take me anywhere I wanted.
The gloom was pierced by a shaft of sunshine and I looked up to see that Tiernan had opened the door and was stepping out into the basement of Gentry Technologies. Gentry is an unusual company in that it's a research facility run by fairies. The fey generally stick to nature, the elements, and magic; science was awkward territory for them. But my father wanted to push the limits and see if science could be blended with magic. He insisted that science was a type of magic, that it was a study of the laws of Nature and as such, was closely related to our elemental magic.
It was a brilliant concept and had already proved itself to be true in numerous minor experiments but it was also terrifying. Because if my father succeeded, he would have access to a power that no one would know how to stop. Keir wasn't an evil man and in his hands, I trusted that such a skill would be wielded carefully but once something like that is accomplished, it's only a matter of time before someone either duplicates the process or steals the ability for themselves. And I know of several fairies who would love to get their psychotic hands on my father's research.
&n
bsp; So, as much as I supported my father and my Uncle Dylan, I also feared the day when they became truly successful. I hoped it would never come, that they would continue making little discoveries which benefited the lives of both the fey and the humans, without lending itself to more violent pursuits. My close friend Aideen works at Gentry and she had once posed as a whistle blower, informing the Human Council that Gentry had created a biological weapon engineered to kill only humans. This had been a ruse to get me to follow her into Fairy but it fooled us easily because it was so probable. And despite the fact that Gentry didn't research weapons of any kind, I still feared that such an application was inevitable. It stands to reason that when you research life, you will also find death.
I guess technically, my father had already succeeded in making a weapon blended of magic and science; me. My newest mór magic (a fairy's personal magic as opposed to the minor beag magics that every fairy possessed) was a blending of my psychic ability and my fairy magic. The Goddess Danu herself had told me that my magic would be special and my firethorn ability was just the beginning. So maybe I should stop worrying about my father and his experiments. Whatever happened, I'd be able to handle it... hopefully.
“Seren, it's good to see you,” Dylan looked as polished as ever; in a sleek suit and a cerulean tie which matched his eyes. His dark hair was slicked back in a careless manner which nonetheless looked as if it was done precisely.
“Wow,” I slid into his hug. “I don't think you've ever said that to me before.”
“Well this is the first time that you haven't showed up with some kind of trouble at your back,” he rolled his eyes and stepped away from me. “Ah, I see that you've finally heeded your father and come with your guards. Welcome, all of you. Have you all been to the Human Realm before?”
“Only Ainsley and I have but we've prepared the others,” Conri, the only non-sidhe member of my Star's Guard, gave Dylan a cocky grin. He couldn't help it, it was the nature of the beast. In Conri's case, that beast was a bargest, a type of canine shapeshifter.
“Good. Well done, Sir Conri,” Dylan nodded.
Conri's eyes went wide. I don't think he expected approval or respect from my Uncle Dylan who, although he abdicated his place as heir to the unseelie throne, was still considered a royal. In fact, he was a duke, which placed him right below me on the royal scale. A very close below though, since he was the heir to a throne, just as I was.
The members of my guard who hadn't been to HR (the Human Realm), weren't spooked yet. Even with our arrival into one of the strangest rooms I'd ever seen. Gentry's basement was really just a secret room to conceal a fairy mound. The building had been built over and around the rath to protect it but the rath didn't seem to know that it was now indoors.
The door we'd come out of was set into a mound almost exactly like the one which held the door we'd gone through in Fairy. It was covered in grass and flowers; a living carpet which spread out halfway across the cement floor, and the sun shone brightly down on it from somewhere above us. If you tried to look up at that impossible sun, all you would see is blinding light; no ceiling, no sky. But my Star's Guard was used to such things and this didn't startle them in the least. It was the rest of HR that was sure to be a problem, no matter how much they had been prepped.
“My lord,” Tiernan bowed to Dylan. “We appreciate the efforts you've made towards our travel arrangements.”
“Not at all,” Dylan handed Tiernan a black briefcase and then turned to lead us up a spiral staircase. “My assistant did all the work. In that briefcase you'll find disposable cell phones for all of you to use while you're here. I'm sure you'll find them indispensable for keeping in contact with each other... and me,” he turned to cast me a stern look over his shoulder and I grimaced. “We have a van ready to transport you to the airport. The pilot of your father's private jet already has his flight plan set and approved. He's ready to leave as soon as you board.”
“Wonderful,” I stepped out into the second floor office space and headed through the maze of cubicles and desks.
We went through the silent, staring, fairy employees, right over to the elevators at the back of the room. I gave them all a little wave as we passed and a few even waved back. They were getting used to seeing me emerge from their basement. Dylan hit the down button and I realized that we'd have to take more than one elevator car. We wouldn't all fit. I glanced over at Conri and Torquil, who were the first to come up behind me.
“Don't worry, Princess,” Conri smirked. “I'll ride down with some of the Guard. I'll keep them calm.”
“When has keeping people calm ever been one of your strengths?” Torquil rolled his eyes. “I'll ride down with them.”
“You can both take an elevator down with some of the Star's Guard,” Tiernan declared as the elevator dinged and the doors slid apart. “Get in.”
Torquil and Conri scowled at each other as they got into the elevator car. Several guardsmen followed them in until the car was full. Dylan leaned in and hit the button for the bottom floor, then got out of the way. The doors slid shut and the panel above the elevators lit to show their descent. Uncle Dylan pushed the down button again.
“Well, I don't hear any screaming, so that's a good sign,” Dylan shrugged.
“They're twilight knights,” Tiernan said. “Even if they're terrified, they won't scream.”
“If they really are scared of the elevator, the plane will horrify them,” Dylan grimaced.
“I'm kind of looking forward to seeing that,” I grinned.
Chapter Four
The knights were wide-eyed for quite awhile when we first boarded the private jet but they acclimated fast. It was fun to see the magical fey clench their armrests during take-off, some even closed their eyes, while it didn't bother Cat at all. She just curled up at my feet and went to sleep. Maybe it seems childish to delight in their fear but these were the same people who teased me about gawking at the wonders of Fairy. So it was nice to see that they could be awed by simple human engineering.
Then Tiernan passed out the cell phones and explained how to use them. No fear there. Instead of being intimidated, my stalwart knights turned into children, phoning each other and then laughing at the echo of their own voices. When Conri showed them how they could choose their own ringtones, I thought we'd never get another moment's peace.
I'd recently learned that fairies were crazy about human music. Their own musical evolution seemed to have plateaued somewhere around the fey equivalent of Bach. They did orchestral music, instruments that were mostly played sitting down, and if they wanted to get really wild, they might add some vocals. So our extensive offering of music genres was mind-boggling to the fey.
Human music had become big business in Fairy. The markets had stalls offering Mp3 players full of any genre you wanted, along with solar chargers to power the devices and headphones to listen to them. It really isn't all that surprising when you consider that there is a huge fairy population in HR. Why wouldn't they bring some human culture back into the Fairy Realm? But when I first saw Mairte, my brownie personal assistant (I hated calling her my maid), wearing a pair of headphones and rocking out to Taylor Swift, I nearly had a heart attack.
Suffice it to say that my Star's Guard was delighted when they discovered that their new phones could also play music. I had a feeling that I'd be buying them all headphones before the trip was through. Either that or I'd be listening to a wide variety of music played all at once, all the time.
“So if raven mockers are twilight fairies, why haven't I ever met one?” I asked Tiernan as we headed back to the private cabin in the rear of the plane where we could hopefully escape the cacophony.
I needed a shower and then some sleep. I fully intended on letting the rest of the guard shower too but I was using my princess prerogative of going first... and of claiming the bed.
“They keep to the woods and the Human Realm,” Tiernan closed the cabin door and pulled off his traveling tunic. I spared a moment
to appreciate the sculpted muscles of his chest before I started taking off my own clothing.
“Not much for court?” I headed to the bathroom and started the water.
“They're a quiet group, they like to keep to themselves,” Tiernan slid into the small shower stall with me and began soaping me up.
I sighed and draped my arms over his shoulders, closing my eyes to better enjoy the sensation of his expert hands kneading at my knotted muscles. I felt his lips press to mine and opened to his kiss, luxuriating even more in the moment. But I didn't have the energy for sex, so I pulled away, giving him a rueful look. He laughed and backed away as much as the tiny stall allowed him, taking those magic hands with him. Insert disappointed sigh here.
“So they like to keep to themselves, except when they're sucking the life out of dying humans,” I ducked under the spray to rinse off.
“They actually went out among the Native American tribes before America was settled and given its name,” Tiernan went on. “They loved the ideals of the tribes and several of the mockers married natives.”
“Really?” I slid out of the stall so he could rinse off easier.
“Mockers were greatly influenced by the Native American people and most of them have American Indian physical features,” Tiernan paused as he rinsed and then shut the water off and came out. I handed him a towel as he continued. “It's why the raven mocker myths speak of them being witches in the tribe. The natives never knew that the mockers weren't human.”
“So they still believe the raven mockers are human witches?” I lifted a brow.
“Unless they're a government official or council person who has been told the truth behind the myths,” Tiernan nodded.
“I guess it doesn't make a difference,” I mused. “What race your enemy is hardly matters, as long as you know how to defeat them.”
“Which they can, as long as they have a clairvoyant shaman they can turn to,” Tiernan grimaced and handed me my bag.
