by K. C. Lannon
James nodded gratefully. “That’s, um, a relief,” he said brightly, turning to look at the elderly woman. “Now I don’t have to steal it!”
The woman swiftly turned away, her face flushing deeply. James almost felt badly about embarrassing her. Almost. He was glad his brother was not there to hear him give an old woman cheek, knowing that Iain would either laugh or drag him from the shop by his ear. He did not want to risk the latter.
As James started toward the door, the bell chimed again. The shopkeeper reached across the counter and grabbed James’s arm so sharply that he winced. “Put that book away. Now.” The shopkeeper hissed, his eyes wide and fearful. “Don’t let them see it.”
Two Iron Wardens shuffled into the shop, glancing around with no attitude of purpose. James quickly tucked the book away into his school bag and focused his gaze on the floor. He tensed as they strode past. His eyes flicked to their batons at their belts, and he knew from Iain’s experience in basic training that they were taught to use them efficiently.
“You get to school now, lad,” the shopkeeper said, never looking away from the Iron Wardens. “Go on. Don’t let them bother you.”
The Iron Wardens began to ask the shopkeeper about a faery in the area that had been seen loitering around. James hurried out of the shop, clutching his satchel to his chest, and did not slow his pace until he reached the school.
“All right, mouse?” a woman’s voice asked cheerfully.
James halted on the first massive stone step leading to the grand school entrance, his feet suddenly heavy. Just as he was recovering from his brush with the Iron Wardens, his heart rate began to pick up again.
He did not need to turn around to know who was speaking—the loathed nickname was evidence enough. She called him “mouse” because he’d always been short and slight, and she thought that was amusing for some reason.
The last time he’d seen Elaine three years ago, she had looked rough, haggard, ravenous—the same way all the Pan consumers, hidden in the corners of the city, looked when they’d reached the height of their addiction, when human food was not fulfilling enough anymore. Pan was faery’s fruit, meant to nourish faeries only. If humans ate the right amount of Pan, it could be a pleasurable but addictive experience. But if too much was ingested, it became a poison.
Three years ago, she’d dropped his barely conscious brother on the side of the road like rubbish and peeled off, tires screeching.
James didn’t reply, out of a mixture of stubbornness and unease. She had always made him unsettled—by her synthetic joy and jittery demeanor. He couldn’t see her out of the corner of his eye. He figured she must have been waiting outside the gates.
Realizing that James was not going to acknowledge her, she retorted to his silence, “You’ve never been one for greetings or niceties, have you, mouse?”
“I’ve got to go now,” James ground out. He began trudging up the steps once more, quicker this time.
“Tell your brother I’ll be waiting for him. Tell him I just want a chat. That’s all. Please.”
James had no intention of doing that. He leaped up the stairs and into the building. Somehow, facing his first day back at school, friendless and ignored, didn’t seem so daunting. Besides, he wasn’t planning on staying for the entire semester anyway. Soon he’d be far away from Neo-London. Soon he’d find his mother, and everything would be right again.
Chapter Four
“You’d best close that gaping cave of yours, lass,” the grocer teased as they drove through the large gates of Neo-London.
Deirdre didn’t hear him, and her mouth remained ajar as she leaned out the window, staring up at the towering walls of the city, her heart beating loudly with anticipation.
The city of Neo-London was built like a fortress against the southern shore, surrounded by high grey walls, taller than the oldest oak trees. While there were several narrow, one-lane exits and entrances, each entrance featured a barred, sturdy iron gate, half as high as the walls of stone and concrete and nearly as thick.
Deirdre sat back down as they drove into the city into a busy main thoroughfare. All around were narrow buildings, crammed together. The shortest and cheapest were nearest the entrance of the city and were built of wood. As they drove toward the heart of the city and the roads got cleaner and wider, the buildings were increasingly taller and made of brick or stone. But no matter the material, size, or quality of each residence, apartment, restaurant, or business office, each was surrounded by an iron fence with a lockable gate.
“Are they so afraid they’ll be broken into?” Deirdre asked the grocer, pointing at the high gate of a narrow stone house.
The grocer glanced at the iron barrier, shaking his head. “No, it’s to keep the faeries away. They can’t abide by iron. So when there’s no gate, that’s one way to tell when you’re entering a place where one of them live. Look, down on our first left.”
Leaning forward so her nose almost touched the windshield, Deirdre saw they were coming to a large roundabout, the road splitting off in six directions. They got onto the roundabout, slowed by congested traffic. The first thing she saw on the left curb beside them was a tall brick house with no gate around it. The road that went down past it was lined by brick and wood buildings and full of people. Bright banners with designs Deirdre did not recognize hung from house to house, and there were almost no cars around, the street packed with people.
“That’s so pretty!” she exclaimed, giggling into her fingers.
“That’s Ferriers Town, where the fair folk live,” the grocer said, slowing his truck as the flow of traffic briefly halted.
Deirdre peered at the nearest group of faeries passing them. There was nothing especially unique about their clothing; they dressed as the villagers near the orphanage had. And while some had round, tiny black eyes or exceptionally large noses or hair colors that were unnatural, aside from that they seemed human.
“But they don’t have pointed ears or anything,” she observed, watching as a short fellow with a thick white beard and a rosy nose hurried in front of them and down into Ferriers Town. “Are you sure they’re faeries?”
The grocer chuckled at first but stopped when he spotted a tall, wiry woman passing by with dark red hair so thin she was beginning to bald. Deirdre thought she was human until the woman glanced at them, revealing deep yellow eyes with tiny pupils. The grocer quickly locked his truck doors.
“What’s wrong?” Deirdre asked.
The grocer just grunted, gesturing at the tall faery with a jerk of his head. “As you can see, not all fair folk have pointed ears, lass. And not all of them look much different from us. Those are the ones most likely to cause trouble.”
Deirdre frowned, looking back at the throng of faeries. The yellow-eyed faery had disappeared. She did see a couple of others that had the oddest head jewelry; it made them look like they had small, thin horns.
As the traffic began to inch along again, she spotted one skinny woman, hunched over, with long white hair and dark green skin.
She gaped again, turning in her seat. The woman met her gaze and grinned. Most of her teeth were missing, and those that remained were sharp and thin, like a fish. She raised a hand toward Deirdre, as if to wave to her, but then she pointed a bony finger at the crowded street of Ferriers Town. Following her direction, Deirdre looked just in time to see a small group of military personnel stride through, the faeries scurrying out of their way like leaves being blown by the wind. One of the soldiers was pulling along a short, thin-boned, light-haired woman. Her skin was white and without any blemish, and her abnormally large eyes were a rosy gold color. Though her expression was stricken, she did not struggle.
“Careful of the fair folk, lass,” the grocer chided as Deirdre watched the soldiers head toward a large, covered truck. “It’s best to avoid Ferriers Town if you don’t have any business there.”
“But why? I didn’t think they were all that bad.” She twisted to try to look behind her seat to
see if the green-skinned woman was still at the corner, but she was lost from sight.
“I do considerable business with some of them,” the grocer said. “But that’s the thing, you have to know what you’re about. If you go in there aimlessly, you’ll get caught up in mischief for certain.”
“Some of them looked so human. I wasn’t expecting that.”
The grocer nodded solemnly at her. “Like I said, those are the ones you need to be wary of. After all, they may look and act like us, but they really aren’t meant to live with us.”
Deirdre looked back out the window at more iron-gated buildings, frowning, wondering how dangerous that white-skinned faery was and what law she had broken.
Just a few minutes later, the grocer dropped her off at the curb of her new school. It was a large stone building, almost the size of her entire orphanage. It and the small yard around it was surrounded by an iron fence taller than she was, and its enormous gate was wide open; a stream of students trickled past them, heading into the building. Her mouth fell open again, and unable to look away from the building, she fumbled with her small suitcase as the grocer handed it to her.
“Take care, lass,” the grocer said before driving away.
She turned around, waving. “Bye! Thank you!”
He waved in reply before disappearing into the traffic.
Spinning back around, she followed the nearest bunch of students walking through the iron gate. It towered over her, its spikes looking sharp and cruel as wolf’s fangs, its bars hard and unrelenting. If she got trapped behind it, she could never get out.
Her stomach began to churn.
Suddenly gripped with a fear of being left alone with the iron fence and gate, she scurried up the stairs and rushed inside after the other students.
The inside halls were wide, high, and impressive, filled with light both from the glass windows and the ceiling lights. And it was filled with more teenagers than Deirdre had ever seen at one time.
There were boys and girls, though she noticed there were just a few more of the latter than the former. They roamed about, usually either alone, looking hostile and sullen or anxious and wide-eyed, or they roamed in small packs. Aside from a few small groups of chatting boys and girls who were clearly already good friends, no one looked pleased to be there or even pleased to be alive.
Deirdre walked in, smiling at the lively chatter and happy shrieks of girls greeting each other. Not wanting to get overrun by the crowd, she hung along the walls as a large pack of older teenage boys passed her, alternately hooting in laughter and talking in mumbles. They all ignored her, save one who briefly looked her over from bottom to top and then turned his head to examine the next girl in his line of sight.
Following his gaze, Deirdre’s mouth fell open for the umpteenth time that day. The girls, she now finally realized, were barely wearing anything. She took a step back, almost flattened against the wall, as she realized some of the boys had the same fashion sense. There were bare knees, bare arms, bare shoulders, even partially bare chests everywhere.
Don’t they get cold? she wondered, bewildered, watching a girl wearing a tube top and short trousers pass. Sure, this is the southern coast, but it’s not that warm! Are they CRAZY? Or maybe they’re faeries!
Immediately she shook her head. No, that doesn’t make any sense. Maybe they’re all foreign, like from Iceland or something. Mother Superior always said it was really warm here compared to Iceland…
Scratching the back of her head, she began to walk down the hall again, trying to acclimate to the strangeness, looking for some unoccupied adult to direct her. But all the grownups she saw were already busy with a handful or more of other students. She sucked in her lips, watching one of the chaperoning adults talking overenthusiastically with a group of younger teens, wondering what she should do.
Looking ahead, she spotted the most unusually dressed boy. He looked a bit younger than most of the other boys, and he was standing on his own. His clothes did not seem to fit him; his vividly patterned scarf looked too big, and his trousers were rolled up.
What a strange-looking boy. A smile flitted on her face. But I must look pretty strange, too, compared to everyone else…
At first she hesitated to go over and speak to him; she was used to socializing almost entirely with other girls. But the expression of vague concern on his face, coupled with his flowery scarf, reminded her distinctly of Iris, in both confused expression and fashion sense. After also noting that he did not look particularly nervous or aggressive, Deirdre steeled herself and approached him.
“Hullo!” she said, smiling, getting his attention, and then she asked the first thing that popped into her mind, “Your scarf is so weird and pretty, are you a faery?” Then she remembered what the grocer had said about human-looking faeries being dangerous.
Shoot.
To her surprise the boy began to laugh, but it was a weak, surprised laugh that quickly dwindled into stony silence. He looked everywhere but at her, reminding her of some of the shyest girls back at the orphanage.
So she prompted him, saying, “I guess not, though… it was kind of a dumb question, huh?” She laughed at herself.
When he finally looked at her again, his eyes were narrowed slightly. “You’re not, uh, having a go at me, are you? It’s difficult to tell sometimes.”
“Having a… what?” Deirdre tilted her head. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“I guess not.” The boy let out a relieved sigh, smiling. “But no, I’m not a faery. They do look pretty though. I mean, pretty cool.”
Thinking back to the near-bald faery she saw on the road, Deirdre frowned. “I guess so…”
“I once saw them performing street magic,” the boy continued. “They froze and unfroze this stream of water. They can do all these things that have no clear explanation. It’s kind of cool.”
“I didn’t know that! I guess magic could do that sort of stuff. Neat…” She scratched the back of her head again, her gaze falling on his scarf, and she pointed to it, saying, “That really is different-looking, isn’t it?”
The boy looked down at the scarf, holding it out in his hands. “Yeah, it’s…” His gaze snapped up at her, eyes suddenly suspicious, and he lowered the scarf, hands at his side again.
“What’s wrong?” Deirdre asked, tilting her head after a few moments of silence.
“Well, it…” His mouth twitched a smile as he continued, “It’s my mother’s scarf.”
“Oh. Is that normal down here in the city, boys wearing their mother’s clothes?”
He stared at her for a moment before asking, “Where did you come from, exactly?”
“Trinity orphanage, south of old London. I just got here today.”
His mouth silently formed an “oh,” then after another few seconds of awkward silence, he gestured ungracefully down the hall. “Well, I could… I can show you around. If you want?”
Immediately Deirdre answered “Yes!” perhaps a bit too enthusiastically, because his eyes briefly widened in alarm. But he still gestured for her to follow, beginning to head down the hall, and she did so, staying on his heels.
* * *
As James led his new acquaintance down the various school hallways, pointing out various classrooms and amenities, he could not help but feel an unfamiliar burst of confidence. Here he was, showing an older student around and actually carrying on a conversation with her. Well, bits of conversation.
James could not fathom why a girl as interesting and cool as her did not have a throng of students who were eager to get to know her. She was new and from outside the city. She was even unafraid to mention faeries at school.
“And this is the only working drinking fountain,” James pointed out once they’d reached the end of a long hallway of classrooms. He halted so suddenly that Deirdre bumped into him.
“Oh,” Deirdre said happily. “Thank you for showing me around… um…” She trailed off, and her face began to redden, her pale blue eyes l
ooking at him expectantly. James realized with horror that he had not introduced himself.
“I’m— I’m James. James Callaghan.”
Deirdre sighed with relief. She held out her hand to shake. “I’m Deirdre.”
“Deirdre…” James merely stared at her hand. He waited for her to say her last name but quickly remembered that she was an orphan and might not know it. He struggled for something to say. “That’s a nice name. Irish?”
She lowered her hand before nodding in reply. “Yeah, probably. I think so.”
“Uh, I guess you wouldn’t know, would you? I mean, since you grew up at, um, Trinity.” He bit his lip. “I’ve never been there, obviously. I’ve heard of it though. I’ve heard it’s… nice. I mean, I’ve heard the owner really cares about maintaining the building.”
That sounds like a normal thing to say.
Deirdre giggled. “Oh yeah, Mother Superior always makes us keep it spotless, night and day! You never know when an inspector will pop in to check things. And they are SO critical; they never miss a single spot or leak! It’s a lot of work since the buildings are so old. But it’s worth it!”
James then took a look at Deirdre’s schedule (she had completely forgotten about the folder with the schedule, stowed away in her small suitcase) and pointed out which classroom held her first lesson. After that, he headed off to his first lessons of the day.
He wondered if he could get used to the idea of staying in Neo-London if he had someone like Deirdre around to talk to, someone almost like a friend. But it was a fleeting thought. He couldn’t let something like this change his mind, even if it meant giving up a potential friend.
James made a note in his composition book to ask Deirdre about the environment outside the orphanage. She had to have ventured out at some point in her life and probably knew some good information on which roads and paths to travel. Perhaps it was fate, or just pure good luck, that they had met when they had.
