Tales of the Fairy Anthology

by Catherine Stovall

  Sylvie picked up both their packs and followed along behind him as he searched for a tree he could climb. The trail he found petered out, and no tree presented as an easy climb.

  “Can you hear music, Pete?” Sylvie had her head cocked.

  He spun around and stared at her. “All I can hear is your jibber jabber. I can’t think with all your noise. Stay here and I will go find some help.” Without waiting for an answer he strode off into the trees.

  Sylvie dropped his backpack and wandered back the way she had come to sit in the patch of sunlight. She was sure she had heard music. She laid her head on her pack and watched dust motes float down the sunbeam. Her eyes drooped heavy and popped open. Muffled music made her flip her pack to one side and push her ear to the ground. She closed her eyes again.

  Pete thrashed through thorny bushes, tearing his shirt and scratching his arms. “The under growth wasn’t this thick?”

  He fought his way across muddy ditches, slipping and ripping his jeans. When he fell in a ditch for the third time, he saw a piece of denim.

  “Circles again? Blast. I can’t see the sky to get my bearings in this damned forest. Wait, if I follow the direction of the stream, I will be able to find civilisation.”

  He flattened himself to the ground to see if the puddles in the ditch had a flow direction. Jumping up, he headed in the way he thought it flowed—down a clear water way with occasional puddles and a slight trickle in the direction he walked. His boots and trouser legs were soon covered in a thick layer of clinging mud, and once he turned a bend, he had to fight through brambles overhanging the almost dry creek bed.

  “Well at least I can’t go in circles if I keep to this ditch.” He pushed through a particularly tangled and thorny bramble and slipped in the mud. “What the f—” A piece of denim fluttered in the breeze, caught on the brambles he had just pushed through. “That’s not possible. I must have backtracked somehow, maybe a loop in the water way, and I didn’t notice?”

  He snatched the fabric from its thorn and shoved it in his pocket. His boots felt so heavy he sat down to clean them off. Putting one on the ground beside him, he started cleaning the sludge off the other with a stick. When he turned to pick up the other boot, it was gone.

  “I put it right here. It was right here.” A note of hysteria had crept into his voice. “Sylvie, is that you? If you try to play tricks on me, I will make you pay. Bring back my bloody boot.”

  His voice bounced back at him from the trees in an eerie echo. A rustle behind him made him spin around. He was alone, but his boot was where he had left it. He picked it up and immediately dropped it. A thick, red, glistening liquid coated the boot and his fingers.

  His face drained of colour. The silence in the forest unnerved him, and for the first time, he realised there were no birds or insects. Not even a fluttering leaf broke the silence, and his breathing sounded like bellows in the stillness. He moved cautiously toward his boot and cleaned it in the muddy puddle in the centre of the creek bed.

  “It’s just berry juice, just berry juice. Sylvie said there were berries. It’s just juice.” He pulled his boots back on, becoming aware of the dimming light. “Night? I can’t stay here alone. I have to get out of this place.”

  Pete began to run. Roots tripped him up, branches slapped his face, and he crashed into tree trunks that suddenly appeared where he could swear no tree had been. He thought he saw leering faces in the bark and pushed back from them in fright. His mind filled with panic, forcing adrenaline to course through his body. As the light faded, his sense of direction completely deserted him. A ground mist began to rise, and he couldn’t see where he put his feet.

  Something screeched and flew straight out of the mist at Pete. He fell backwards screaming and felt his heart thumping painfully in his chest.

  “Just an owl, just a fucking owl!” He lay still, trying to steady his breathing.

  The mist swirled around him, seeping into his many small cuts and abrasions, making them sting. Rising to his knees, he peered into the deepening gloom. A twig snapped nearby, and Pete flinched. He waited, his muscles tensing. His stomach knotted with the resurge of adrenaline.

  Pete stood up, his legs like jelly and his hands shaking. “Who’s there?” his voice wobbled and he began to move away from the direction of the sound.

  Another twig snapped ahead of him, and he abruptly turned to his left. Blundering in the grey darkness, he once again found twigs catching his hair or slapping his face and he crashed into tree trunks. In a lumbering run, his breath sobbing from him, Pete found himself twisting away from every strange sound in the night and every time he tripped he heard things moving toward him.

  “Get away from me, get away,” he screamed and hauled himself up from the pool of mist and the skittering, scuttling sounds in the dried humus of the forest floor. A sound, like chuckling, made Pete run faster.

  A wobbling light, pale and distant, caught Pete’s eye. He lumbered toward it. “Help, help me.” His voice was hoarse, and when the light winked out, Pete stopped, bewildered. Another light far to his left flared up. Turning toward it, he moved through the silhouetted trees with more surety. As the light began to move away, he called, “I’m coming, wait for me.” He picked up desperate speed, thumping his feet into the ground beneath him. “Don’t leave me here,” he screamed.

  The light stopped moving, and more lights joined it. Pete flung himself the last few meters into the crowd of people waiting in a clearing. A police officer stepped forward and caught him as he fell. He eased Pete to the ground, and someone threw a blanket across his shoulders. Another person pushed a hot mug into his hands, and he gripped it like a life preserver.

  “Mr Renfrey? Pete Renfrey?”

  Pete nodded. A person was giving first aid to his many cuts and abrasions. They eased his boots off and cut what was left of his jeans. The water cleaning his legs stung and he sucked air through his teeth. It took a moment to realise he was being spoken to.

  “Mr Renfrey, we’ve been looking for you for over a week. We were about to give up the search.”

  “A week? We were only in there three days. Sylvie would have starved in a week. She gave her food to some beggar woman…” He was babbling. Someone in the crowd put a steadying hand on his shoulder, and he drew a breath.

  “Mr Renfrey, when did you last see Miss Arden?” The police man had squatted down beside him.

  “Mid-afternoon. I told her to stay in one place, and I would find help. I got lost. I got turned around in the forest. I kept going in circles. I’ve been going in circles for days. I tore my trousers and kept coming back to them. Look.”

  Pulling a piece of floral cotton fabric from his pocket, Pete frowned at the pale material in his hand. “It wasn’t this bit, it was denim.” He searched his pockets and found a scrunchie with a few hairs in it, an ear ring, a bracelet, half a packet of chewing gum, and a berry. “It was in here. I don’t know where this stuff came from.” He looked at the pile in puzzlement. “These are Sylvie’s things? Sylvie was eating berries. She had no food left.”

  Someone stepped from the listening crowd and whispered in the police officer’s ear. The police officer nodded two or three times and looked into the face of the other.

  “Mr Renfrey, let’s get you back to the station and make sure you are okay. We’ll keep the search going for Miss Arden. Do you know what direction you came from? How long since you left her?”

  Pete shook his head as hands helped him rise.

  “Is there anything you can tell us to help narrow our search?”

  “There’s someone in there, maybe more than one. They were chasing me, I’m sure. I got turned around and around, they were laughing at me. There’s something in there.” Pete was shaking and his speech tumbled out of his mouth in an almost incoherent raving.

  “He’s in shock, take him to the hospital. We’ll call off the search ‘till morning. It’s too dark to find anything tonight. Thanks everyone, we’ll meet at the end of Const
aic road and start at first light.”

  The paramedics settled Pete in the back of the ambulance and gave him something to calm him down. Pete listened to the crowd of searchers breaking up; keys jangling, boots crunching, cars revving into life.

  “You are pretty lucky, Mr. Renfrey. If you had come ten minutes later, we would have left the clearing. It’s a long way back to town from here.”

  Pete looked at the speaker and tried to focus. Whatever he had been given was sending him into a puffy cloud of easy. After the adrenaline high of the day, his limbs slipped into bliss and his mind fogged into a happy space. Over the paramedic’s shoulder, Pete saw a row of grinning faces with razor sharp teeth and skin like flaking bark. They began to giggle, and Pete screamed, pushing himself backwards on the gurney.

  The medic looked over his shoulder and frowned. “Reaction, Jace. Best get us back to town pronto.”

  “On it.”

  The lights flicked on in disco flashes, and Pete kept screaming until the doors shut, closing out the terrifying faces.

  Sylvie smiled. The branch she sat on lurched to one side and she clung firmly to her seat, hugging the trunk with one arm. A small brown creature climbed up her free arm, careful to avoid the bandage of moss and leaves. He came to rest on her shoulder, chittering in her ear and tugging her hair in a gentle pull. He curled his tail around her neck, and she leaned her cheek against his little wrinkled face. Looking at her naked legs swinging high off the ground, she giggled like a little girl.

  They would find her clothes covered in blood by a muddy pool. Just a little blood, but it would be enough. Sylvie shimmied down the tree as if she had been born to such acrobatics and ran lightly through the night forest, easily avoiding obstacles. She heard her brethren running with her and felt her core fill with absolute joy. The life of the forest wrapped her in welcome, and she found herself home.

  Saltwater

  Saltwater was a dark fey. He was dark in nature, but more than that, Saltwater was dark in spirit—too Dark. He was so dark that Saltwater’s parents had practically given up. They could only wish that, now that their son was old enough, he would just flit, shimmer, or just Goddess knows, slink away and go be dark somewhere else other than his bedroom.

  Saltwater’s parents, Salacious and his terrifying wife, Lemon-drop, were at their wits end. There was a circle of salt in front of their son’s bedroom, which prevented them from entering or even knocking. Once caught in that stuff, that horrid warding stuff, a dark fey had to count every grain. It was just plain annoying and was the last straw, so to speak.

  How their son had even managed to get the blasted salt in the first place was a puzzle, but it was the sheer nastiness of it that hurt! If he had done it to anyone else, Salacious and Lemon-drop could have at least have been proud, but to do it them? To his own parents?

  From the very beginning, Saltwater had been difficult. He had even been difficult to conceive. With great reluctance, since he had a rather jealous nature, Salacious had averted his blood red eyes as his wife took advantage of a mortal late one night after too many bottles of dew and too many arguments. His sperm had just not been vicious enough and Salacious just had to accept the fact, since he did want a child - a little girl to spoil with pretend poison parties, or a little boy to play bat ball with. Salacious had drawn the line at the mortal’s wife raising the infant, but of course he had lost that battle as well.

  “Our son will be a changeling,” Lemon-drop had firmly declared, adding as the final clincher, “I don’t have time to change cobwebs.”

  Perhaps this had been the start of it all, but Lemon-drop, nineteen years later, still held her ground as the arguments continued. She refused to believe that her son’s behavior had anything to do with the care giving given by a mortal - until a boggle could be found to replace Saltwater in his crib at the Johnson’s house. She denied any and all culpability.

  Even when Salacious and Lemon-drop heard the wails of horror when Bill and Sue Johnson discovered the boggle, it had brought little pleasure. For as soon as Lemon-drop held her toddler in her furred arms, the child had refused to glare at her, but smiled instead. It had been horrifying to say the least.

  A Pooka who specialized in behavioral modification had been brought in immediately. Saltwater did learn to scowl effectively, but Salacious had always wondered about his son. As much as he wanted to nurture his child’s dark magic, Saltwater had kept asking for ponies and making flowers sparkle until Salacious wanted to slap the boy.

  He hadn’t, of course. Salacious always maintained, loudly if necessary, that he would stand by his son, no matter what he was. Even as the young Saltwater colored bright rainbows instead of dripping gore in kindergarten class, or later in middle school, when he had brought a puppy home to the hidden grove. In the end, the puppy had been named Fred, and Salacious and Lemon-drop averted their eyes when Saltwater taught Fred to fetch sparkly pink tennis balls.

  “It doesn’t matter!” Lemon-drop wept tears of acid, leaving an attractive trail of seared flesh on her cheeks. “He is our son.”

  Fred became a fine and loyal dog, with loving eyes. It was off putting, but again, Salacious and Lemon-drop stood by their son, even when Fred rescued a mortal from an ogre. Commiserations came from all over, and advice was offered from the neighboring fey. Salacious and Limewater nodded their heads and even tried a few well-meant tips.

  “You must douse the child in a stagnant pond. It worked with my niece when she started painting her nails. ”

  “Stick him in a volcano for a while. That will do the trick.”

  And so on, but nothing really worked. Saltwater eventually did stop smiling, which should have been a good thing, but somehow wasn’t.

  By the time that Saltwater started high school, he had more than an effective scowl, but it was not the right kind of scowl. It was a dissatisfied scowl, and not the scowl of pleasure that one would surely expect from a young fey with advantages.

  Saltwater no longer sketched pictures of happy kittens, it was true. His drawing pad was filled with appropriate renderings of death and destruction but there was something... lacking. There was something ... off. It was as if even a scribble of a burnt building or his rather good portrait of a screaming pixie drowning in oil was somehow poignant, with a pathos that was disconcerting.

  Aunt Magdela’s suggestion that Saltwater be placed in an institution was not met with favor, and she had been sent flying with a burst of flame for suggesting it, but still...

  On a Samhain night, Salacious eyed his son in his bright, orange tuxedo and hoped for the best. Saltwater had clutched the required bitterroot corsage in a cast off beetle shell, ready to hand it to the young hag who had agreed to be his date. Salacious and Lemon-drop had taken pictures and waved, but eyed each other as the youngsters climbed into the rat pulled carriage limo. Their concerns were justified when Saltwater slunk home, (and not in a good way), before the moon had even set.

  “She is just so ugly,” Saltwater whined to his parents as an explanation.

  “But ...but, she is a Hag, son,” Salacious had stuttered. “She is supposed to be.”

  She was in fact, quite seriously ugly, and Salacious snuck glances when his wife wasn't looking. That wart, hell yeah.

  “And she is really, really disgusting!” Lemon-drop had added encouragingly, but to no avail, somehow the young Hag’s ugly features were not attractive to their son. He moped off, accompanied by a charmed Fred the dog who did not age, but had remained cute and puppy-like for far, far, far too long.

  Salacious and Lemon-drop pretended to ignore the pop music pounding from their son’s room, its door closed against them.

  And now, this salt business. All because Lemon-drop had brought home pamphlets about hex camp!

  “You will find this utterly mangling!” Lemon-drop coaxed, trying to sound cool by using current teen jargon. “Look, read here.” She said, unfolding the pamphlet. “You can even bring home a jinx!”

  “What do you
say, son?” Salacious asked as Saltwater stood there, refusing to meet their eyes or to even look at the itinerary.

  “You don’t want me,” Saltwater said. “You never did.”

  “That is not true,” Lemon-drop protested.

  “It is,” argued Saltwater. “You are always comparing me to the seed giver!” He shook his shiny, black hair that rippled down past his dimpled chin.

  “You wouldn’t say that if you saw the Johnson guy, I tell you. He had really blue eyes and well-formed lips. It was…well, it was terrible is what it was! But we so wanted a child and your father…”

  Salacious looked away as he usually did, trying not to think about it. He had heard this story too many times.

  Saltwater apparently had as well, as he scoffed (And not in a good way), “Ma, I have heard this story before!”

  “Well,” retorted Lemon-drop, “It is still true. The mortal was gorgeous.”

  “You know,” Saltwater sneered, “You have told me this story so many times, that I am starting to think you enjoyed it!”

  This remark rendered his mother silent with shock and prompted a slight nod of agreement from Salacious, who couldn’t help himself. It was true. There were times it really did seem that way.

  True or not, he came to the defense of his wife, saying, “You apologize to your mother this instant, I am sure she would have preferred... something, a little less…”

  “What? A little less what?” Lemon-drop screeched defensively.

  “Oh come on. Admit it. You liked it. Look at dad, he knows what I mean. Are you two getting a divorce?”

  Salacious opened his beaky mouth, but not a sound emerged. Lemon-drop looked between her husband and her frustrating offspring. “Of course we are not getting a divorce! Whatever makes you ask that?”