by Sumida, Amy
Change.
“Wanna give me a little help me with this?” I whispered to Faerie.
I've done all I can. You're doing fine.
“You suggest I change my attitude?” Aalish screeched. “Have you no respect at all? Has your human blood poisoned you so much that you think you can speak like this to me, a Faerie Queen?”
Arach started to stand up, an evil look on his face, but I grabbed his arm and pulled him back down. It said a lot for his love of me that he both stood in my defense and sat at my request. He was so going to get some when we got home.
“Do you have any children, Queen Aalish?” I asked and if possible, the room got even more quiet.
“What?”
“Have you ever born a child? Does your kingdom have an heir?”
“What does that have to do with anything?” She looked like she wanted to stab me repeatedly but I was used to that expression.
“You call them pests,” I gestured to the pixies whose numbers had grown and were now distinctly on my side of the room. “You say they have little magic, and yet I see among them, children.”
Gasps, shouts, yelling, and then the High King himself stood and silence ruled once more.
“Explain that comment please, Queen Vervain,” King Cian said with dangerous calm.
“Just an observation,” I shrugged. “Have you never wondered why the fey you term lesser, have an easier time conceiving than you do?”
“It is not spoken of,” King Cian gave me a warning look.
“And that's why you remain childless,” I shook my head. “Silence will not fix the problem.”
“Get this horrible woman out of my castle!” Aalish screeched.
“Sit down, Aalish!” King Cahal stood and Aalish sat with a shocked gasp. “My Queen is reacting out of grief for our lost subjects. Please do not hold her words against her, Queen Vervain. We want no war with Fire, especially now when it's so important that we come together.”
“Noted,” Arach nodded. “Peace between us then,” he waved down the red caps with just a little disappointment. “For now.”
“Pixies,” King Cahal ignored Arach's insinuation. “If you wish to join the House of Fire, you have my blessing, but I hope that someday you will remember your true home and return to the Kingdom of Earth where you will be missed, despite what your Queen has said in anger.”
The pixies gathered and started speaking in hushed tones, while everyone else waited quietly for their response. Finally, a pixie man slid down a long vine and jumped onto the table before King Cahal. He was dressed in brown leather and looked a little like Robin Hood. He bowed, just as I imagined Robin would bow, before speaking.
“My King, it's been long since we were even acknowledged here in the Earth Kingdom, to be the source of such conversation both saddens and encourages us. We are of Earth and here is where we want to be but Queen Vervain shines with the light of change and the land whispers to us to follow her. We must turn to the light.”
Shocked muttering spread but I wasn't surprised that Faerie was speaking to them.
They're the only ones who never stopped listening. Ironic that no one listened to them, isn't it? That is the correct word, is it not? Irony?
“Yep,” I said under my breath. “This is all kinds of ironic.”
“We will go to the Fire Kingdom,” the little man continued, “and we will wait for that change. When it comes to the Kingdom of Earth, maybe we will return.”
“I guess we're going to have to teach them to Hunt,” Arach smirked.
“Shut up,” I hissed at him, “is that all you can think about, more warriors?”
He shrugged since I had told him to shut up and I grimaced at him.
“Traitors,” Queen Aalish hissed.
“My love,” King Cahal looked down at her. “Cease, it's over. You will anger Faerie herself.”
“But Cahal,” she gaped at him.
“Enough, Aalish,” he shook his head. “I am weary of this, let it be. You've cost us too much already,” he turned back to the pixies. “Go with our blessing.”
The little man bowed and suddenly there were pixies raining from the sky around me. I laughed softly, trying not to be a bad winner, and gestured for them to have a seat behind us. They swarmed over the table and gathered on the floor behind our chairs but the pixie who had addressed the Earth King came over to me first.
“Thank you, Queen Vervain,” he bowed deeply to me. “King Arach, for your generous offer.”
“What's your name?” I could feel the room watching us avidly.
The pixie man straightened from his bow and blinked bright green eyes at me in shock. “It's Artair, my Queen.”
Those words seemed to seal the deal, for the large group of pixies behind my chair started cheering. I gave them a quick smile before holding my pointer finger out to him. His eyes got even wider until I moved my finger under his hand and lifted it. He shook my finger excitedly.
“Nice to meet you, Artair,” I laughed. “Welcome to the House of Fire. May blood flow and fire burn.”
“May blood flow and fire burn,” he repeated, as if testing the taste of the words. Then he nodded and shouted with a raised fist, “May blood flow and fire burn!”
This time, the red caps joined in the cheering and Arach leaned over to shake Artair's hand too.
“Gather your belongings and your children if you're blessed enough to have any,” Arach smiled, “the House of Fire is happy to have you with us.”
I glanced down the table and saw Aalish casting an evil look my way. Great, someone else who wanted me dead.
Chapter Seven
The dinner was a slightly awkward affair, with low conversations and poor Queen Meara serving as a type of boundary between Aalish and I. The High Queen was originally from Fire though, so she tended to ignore Aalish, choosing instead to speak to me, no matter how hard the Earth Queen tried to draw away her attention away. I would have been content to speak to Arach all night but the more Aalish interrupted Meara, the more Meara seemed disinclined to tolerate her.
So there was one more reason for Aalish to hate me.
The pixies had packed quickly and returned to the hall with the speed of the desperate. There were lots of little bags and even a few tiny carts filled with belongings. There were a few children too, more than I'd seen at first, one was still a babe in arms. It reminded me of the scene in Fiddler on the Roof, when the Jews are driven out of town and they pull their little carts sadly away. Except this exodus was happy or at least hopeful.
When the excruciatingly long meal was finally over, I called Fearghal over and instructed him to gather the carts carefully and help the pixies to our carriage. The pixies had gaped at me then. They'd evidently expected to have to walk the entire way to the Fire Kingdom. That they not only expected to have to walk but were more than willing to, showed me just how badly they'd been treated. I can't even imagine how long it would have taken them, or what kind of obstacles they would have been up against, like carnivorous animals and plants. I doubt that they all would have made it, and yet they hadn't asked for help or further consideration.
In that moment, I became theirs, lost to the courage, perseverance, and strength of the pixies. My heart claimed them and I vowed to myself that their life would become better by leaps and bounds among the fire fey.
We'd piled into the carriage, Arach and I on one side and all the pixies on the other. Their belongings were on the floor of the carriage, carefully stowed by the red caps, and the pixies themselves were huddled together, looking both excited and scared.
“It's going to be alright,” I assured them. “No one in Fire will harm you, you are fire fey now.”
“Thank you, my Queen,” Artair was still the spokesman. “We will make do, my people are just concerned over what the Fire Kingdom itself will hold for us.”
“Your cousins, the fire pixies,” Arach took over for me, “do well in the Fire Kingdom even though, as you know, they are not compl
etely immune to fire. We will take the proper measures to ensure your safety. The fire pixies live in the forest in front of Castle Aithinne but they also roam freely in the castle. You can either settle in with them or you can have your own quarters within the castle. Castle Aithinne is made from the mountain and you may feel more at home inside its walls.”
“I think you're right, my King,” Artair glanced at the others and they all nodded to him. “A room within the castle would suit us nicely and then we wouldn't have to impose on our cousins. I think we can make do with one chamber.”
“I'll give you a large one,” Arach nodded, “but if you require more space, simply ask. We have numerous empty rooms and giving you a few is no hardship.”
“My King,” Artair bowed, “my Queen. We cannot thank you enough. We have felt separate from the fey for so long. To be given such a welcome is too much to hope for.”
“I think the House of Earth will come to regret their treatment of you,” I observed. “Every fey is important and has something to offer their House. If you weren't, Faerie wouldn't have created you. For example, our pixies train with the red caps and goblins now. They've been on two Hunts already.”
“The Wild Hunt?” Artair paled. “They're allowed to go? What use can they possibly be to the Host?”
“I don't know if you know this but three of our pixies were killed recently.” I frowned, thinking back to the sight of the tiny corpses.
“No, we didn't.”
“The fire pixies asked to help us hunt the murderer,” Arach continued for me with pride in his voice. I think the little ones had impressed him even more than they had me. “They deserved their vengeance as much as I did, and so I let them come. The red caps carried them in their pockets,” he grinned, remembering it fondly, gauging by the look on his face. “They were fierce when they were finally let loose. The House of Fire is proud to have our pixies as part of the Host.”
“I'm not sure if we'd be able to do that,” Artair's shoulders began to slump. “It seems a little too far from our natures.”
“No one expects you to do anything you don't want to do,” I gave Arach a look when he sighed. “I'm sure you have other skills to offer Fire.”
“Well, we are fine craftsmen,” he looked at me hopefully and gestured to the earrings I was still wearing. “We really did make those.”
“Well then,” I beamed, realizing that these fey had talents better suited to my tastes than Arach's, “you've made me a very happy woman.”
“I thought I did that,” Arach grumbled.
“A woman needs more than sex alone,” I teased. “We need clothes, shoes, handbags, and jewelry. And I think we just hit the jewelry jackpot.”
Chapter Eight
The earth pixies were welcomed by their cousins, the fire pixies, with open arms. I guess when you're abused as a group, you learn to stick together despite your differences. The earth pixies were offered a place among the fire pixies in the village of hollowed out trees and burrows in front of Castle Aithinne, but the earth pixies chose instead to inhabit the large room Arach had provided for them.
It was like a refugee camp at first but every time I checked on them, they'd made themselves a little bit more at home. Until finally I ventured in and found a mini wonderland.
The bed had been removed to give them more space and the only pieces of furniture they'd requested had been tables of differing heights, so Arach had let them have as many as they liked. The room was full of them, placed neatly side by side against three of the walls and coming out into the room in a tiered manner so that the tallest were at the back. This created two levels for them, the tiered top level and then the floor beneath the tables.
They'd built themselves little houses on the top level and had somehow managed to import enough soil to cover the tables and grow a nice layer of grass around the homes. There were little flowering plants all over as well and they must have brought some seeds of those glowing, hanging plants we'd seen in Castle Crith-Fuinn because they were growing off the walls, lighting the room brightly. When I'd asked how they slept at night with the light from the flowers, they'd giggled at me and reminded me that flowers close at night.
There were bridges and rope ladders connecting the different tables and also vines from the glowing plants on the wall, which they used to navigate the two levels. Beneath the tables were workshops, always busy with the sound of clinks and clanks coming from them. There were also gathering places and distributing halls which handed out the food we gave them as their share of the House of Fire's provisions. This was another shock to them and some of the pixie women actually started crying the first time they were brought food. I wanted to confront Aalish all over again when I heard about that. There were only two reasons to cry over food, either it's so wonderful that you are moved to tears, or you've been starved. As much as I liked the food made by the chefs of Fire, I didn't think it warranted tears, so that left only the latter. What kind of monster starved their own people?
Their bathroom had been converted into a sort of hot house, with lush flowers growing around the sink and mini trees filling the useless tub. They got their water from the faucet in the sink, treating it like a natural water source they could simply turn off and on at will. The women gathered there a lot, they'd worked out a schedule for washing times and water gathering times, so they could fill the sink and do all their laundry at once. The room had become a village unto itself.
I was impressed by their ingenuity. Arach, however, was impressed by their efficiency. They'd made hundreds of pieces of jewelry for us in the two weeks they'd been there, including setting stones into weapons, belts, baldrics, and even boots. We had become a sparkly household. Arach had sent some of the pieces to the High King and Queen as gifts and now fey were flocking to the Kingdom of Fire wanting to trade for more jewelry.
The Dragon King had become a businessman.
I was told that Queen Aalish was green with envy, probably not the best color for her with that yellow skin as a foundation. Part of me wanted to stick my tongue out at her and say neener neener neener but the other half of me was too refined. Or maybe too concerned over her possibly plotting my downfall. So I just secretly giggled and gossiped about her with the pixie women.
King Cahal had actually mirrored us, asking after the pixies and how they were getting settled. I liked him for that and had hopes that he'd make the change Faerie said was needed but I was doubtful over his wife. He didn't speak of her during our short conversation but the lack seemed to be even more telling. The Queen of Earth was not pleased.
We'd had invitations from the other two kingdoms to come for a visit but I wasn't sure about the rulers of Air. They were hard to read, especially King Fionn with those totally black eyes. Kinda creepy. Arach assured me they were a perfectly normal fey couple and that he'd spent many enjoyable evenings in the Kingdom of Air but I was still a little hesitant. What he found normal was definitely not my definition of the word.
I should have been jumping at the chance to interact with the other fey, Faerie was insisting more and more regularly that they needed to change, but something about the Air Kingdom made me uneasy. So we accepted King Giurmean's invitation first. Seeing as I was deathly afraid of the water, and having been drowned by a killer kelpie already, my insistence that we visit King Giurmean first kind of threw Arach for a loop but finally he just shrugged, chucking it up to one of my human eccentricities.
There had been no further abductions and no more missing fey to report. The peace had an edge to it though, like the center of the storm, nice and quiet right before all hell broke lose. So tensions had been high, everyone waiting to see what would happen next while hoping it wouldn't happen to them. Faerie, although quite vocal about the fertility issues of the fey, had no more to say about the abductions either, just some cryptic line about the darkness.
Who knew an entire realm could be afraid of the dark?
I sighed and smoothed my dress nervously. A visit to another ki
ngdom required faerie finery to reflect your status, so I couldn't just show up in any old dress. I had a couple of magical choices that Arach had given to me for the Faerie-God Ball but Arach said they were too ostensibly fire in their design and it was thought to be rude to go into another element's kingdom proclaiming your affiliation so vibrantly. I couldn't walk into Water waving my Fire flag. One must be subtle, he said.
I was totally confused by all the nuances of faerie etiquette and I told him so in no uncertain terms. I believe I used the words crazy faeries and stupid rules, so Arach promised to have something appropriate made for me. I didn't usually like men picking out my clothing but I had to admit, Arach had good taste and he hadn't failed me yet.
This newest dress was no exception. It was magnificent and kind of miraculous. As a gesture of peace and goodwill, Arach had commissioned a dress made out of both of our elements, fire and water. How do you make a dress of fire and water? Hell if I know but some sidhe seamstress had done herself and her magical abilities proud. I was wearing a dress made of steam.
No, not steam punk, there were no wires or pumps or gadgets attached and I didn't have a corset on of any kind. I was enveloped in a gown of warm mist. It was opaque, like fog, but glistened like clouds in bright sunlight. It was a brilliant white but had an opalescent shimmer to it that shifted constantly from pearly pinks to cerulean blue.
You probably think it was a full, fluffy affair, something from Cinderella or some other old Disney cartoon, but actually it was the most slinky dress I'd worn in Faerie, even counting the black number I had been wearing the first time I'd popped in by accident. The steam dress was meant to be steamy and create a steamy atmosphere.
It clung to every curve I had, stretched thin as silk but much more fluid, starting at one shoulder and skimming down over my chest like I was emerging from a hot bath with the steam clinging to my body. It continued down all the way to my feet, where it pooled out, quite literally, to form a sort of liquid train that slunk behind me, clinging to the floor and probably cleaning the carpet as I walked. At the one shoulder where it started, it swirled up and around my face, becoming almost transparent, like a shifting, sparkling veil which trailed off into nothing.
