The others bickered good-naturedly as we ate our fill, and I tried to get a good take on them. In some ways, they were remarkably alike. They all had spirit and energy, although that might have had something to do with the magic running through all of them. In other ways, they differed immensely. For a start, they looked nothing alike. The two girls both had blonde hair, although where Azia’s was dark and curly, Blaise’s strawberry-blonde hair flowed in waves around her shoulders. If someone had told me they were sisters, I wouldn’t have thought anything about it. Castiel, however, had jet-black hair and dark eyes, which contrasted with the golden ring around the iris. Deon looked like someone’s good-natured big brother. He was taller and built thicker than the wiry Castiel, with thick arms and a smile perpetually on his face. Of all of them, he was the one I trusted the most. There was something about him that made me feel comfortable. He seemed easygoing compared to the others, but he wasn’t stupid; he just let the others have their say before jumping in with his own observations. Blaise talked the most, chattering about her life in Atlantice. I had a feeling that after a few hours in her company, I’d need a rest. Azia was obviously the leader of the group. I noticed that she kept the others motivated, while Castiel sulked a lot.
By the time I’d finished, I felt more energized than ever. Azia had made it very clear to me that they’d put looking for Fae at the top of their priority list.
“I have to go pack,” I said, standing up from the table.
Azia stood too. “I’ll walk you out.”
I bade farewell to the others and walked back through the inn to the main entrance with Azia by my side. She slipped her arm in mine, and for the first time, I felt that maybe I did have a sister. I couldn’t express how nice it felt.
“I just wanted to say how sorry I am about Fae,” she said. “I know I said it in there, but I understand how painful this is for you. I almost lost my brother thanks to this… whatever it is. It was the worst feeling of my life. I can’t even imagine what you are going through right now, but you know something? I can feel her.”
“You can feel her?”
She looked to the side as we stood in the entranceway. “I didn’t want to say anything in front of the others because I didn’t want to upset you in case you thought I was being… weird… but there’s an energy between us. Our magic binds us. I’ve felt it strengthen with each one of us I’ve met, but when I met you, I felt it doubly. I felt Fae’s energy too. Don’t you feel it?”
I thought about what she was saying. I had felt an energy, a connection between Fae and me, but I’d put it down to being her mother. I hadn’t associated it with the energy I felt from the strangers.
The strangers… I was going to have to think of a different term for them. They would be strangers no more.
“You think she’s magic?”
“Maybe not yet, but I think she has the potential to be. Whatever it is that marks us as different, she has it too.”
“But her eyes. They don’t have a gold ring like ours. They look like her father’s more than mine.”
“My mother once told me that the gold ring only appeared around my irises when I was two or three. Perhaps she’ll get hers when she’s older.”
She pushed the inn door open, and we stepped outside. Zacharina immediately trotted over to us.
“You said you feel her. Do you...” I couldn’t bring myself to say the final words.
“Yes. I think she’s still alive. I know she is. Do me a favor. Close your eyes.”
Normally, I would have thought it a strange request from someone I didn’t really know, but Azia was different. I closed my eyes and Azia took both of my hands in hers. The energy ran through us like electricity through a closed circuit.
“You can feel my energy, right?”
I nodded. I could barely feel anything else.
“It’s different from yours. Can you feel the difference?”
I paid close attention to the new feelings rushing through me. At first, it was just one massive, overwhelming rush running through my body, but as I concentrated, the energy became strands. Two different strands of the same energy.
“Keep going. You’ll soon be able to feel Blaise, Castiel, and Deon. Their energy will be much weaker because they aren’t touching us and they’re inside, but they are there.”
The magic pulsed through me, and the strands separated again. Three small strands peeled off, and then another—smaller, much faster, familiar.
“I feel Fae!” I said excitedly. “Does that mean she’s close?”
I dropped my hands and opened my eyes. The energy dropped away.
“I wish I could say it does,” Azia said. “I feel lots of strands. I feel them stronger when I’m close, but I also feel them stronger when their emotions are running high. It could be that you feel Fae’s energy more than mine because you’re her mother. I can still feel her, though. I feel that she is well, but I don’t feel her close by. I told you before that I think this will end in Urbis. We are pretty sure it started there with our births. I’d bet the whole kingdom of Draconis on her being there.”
My excitement faded. Urbis was a long, long way away.
7
19th May
My stomach squeezed tightly as I stood at the front of the hospital, not quite daring to step up through the large front doors.
I’d committed the ultimate sin in my mother’s eyes. I’d left without taking my guards, without telling her I was going. I was in no doubt that Avery and Williamson had told her that I’d gone looking for Fae with Zacharina, but when I’d set off, even I didn’t really know where I was going to look or how long I’d be gone. I certainly hadn’t expected to take all day. The clock had long since struck midnight, which brought me into day three without my daughter. Three days I’d gone without seeing her face, without feeling her little body next to mine.
Did Rumpelstiltskin know how to keep an infant as young as Fae alive? Was that even a concern of his? It was all well and good Azia telling me she could still feel Fae, but what did that mean?
When Azia had left me outside the inn, I had tried feeling Fae’s energy again. Without Azia’s help, it was lost to me. That was another reason I was prepared to fight with my mother to be allowed to go with the strangers… my siblings. I needed their magic. I needed to feel Fae, to know she was alive.
It was going to be the fight of my life. My mother had never intentionally let me out of her sight before, not without guards, at least, and even then I’d been permitted no further than Shipley or the meadows surrounding the castle. She was already going to be angry with me for leaving her today… yesterday.
I pulled my shoulders back and took in a deep breath as I climbed the stone steps to the hospital entrance. The reception area was quiet as I walked through. A woman at the desk desk looked up and smiled as I walked past, but let me go without comment. The only other person in the reception area was a man with his head in his hands. Judging by the ball of bloody tissues in his hands, he’d been in some sort of fight.
The corridor to Jay’s room was empty and deathly silent. The lights were dimmed, and the usual hubbub of activity was absent due to the late hour. The nurses would be up soon checking the patients and delivering breakfasts, and then there’d be visitors. I preferred the quiet. It was the calm before the storm.
Most people would have assumed my mother would head back to the castle when she realized I wasn’t coming back, but most people didn’t know my mother like I did. She knew me well, too, and would expect me to come and visit Jay before even thinking of going up to the castle.
Outside Jay’s door, I breathed in again, ready for the tirade that I knew was coming. Holding my hand up to his door, I was about to push when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to find my mother. My eyebrows shot up at about the same time that she held her finger to her lips to shush me. Taking my hand, she walked me to the room I’d been in while Jay was having his surgery. Empty cups littered the table, and a blanket rested
on the sofa next to a pillow.
“What happened?” I asked, panic filling me once again. “Is it Jay? Is he all right?”
“He’s perfectly fine,” my mother whispered. “I couldn’t exactly sleep in there with him, so the hospital administrator offered me a room and a bed. When I told her I couldn’t possibly take a bed from a patient, I was offered a blanket instead. I figured you’d come back here, eventually.”
“I’m sorry, I...”
She took both my hands in hers. “Don’t. Just don’t. I don’t want to hear any more apologies. You have nothing to apologize for. I’ve kept you locked up for far too long, and I wouldn’t expect any less of you than to go out searching for your daughter. If it weren’t for the fact that your father is out looking for Fae and there’s no one but me to lead the kingdom at the moment, I’d be out on flying unicorns looking for her too.”
She gave me a warm smile. It was so full of love that it brought tears to my eyes.
“I didn’t find her. I didn’t find any trace of her.”
She put her arm around my shoulder and sat me down on the sofa, pushing the blanket to one side. “I know. You wouldn’t have that look on your face if you did. You look exhausted. I think it’s about time we both went home and had a good night’s sleep. We’ll get all the maps of the kingdom out and plan a strategy of where you can go looking. I’m guessing that you’ll cover a lot of ground on a flying unicorn.”
“You want me to go looking… alone?”
“You’re so tired that you probably didn’t notice Williamson and Avery’s absence outside Jay’s room. They’re out looking for Fae too. They are needed far more out there than in here. Jay doesn’t need them, and neither do we. So yes, I expect you to go out alone and bring our girl back.”
If I had any tears left to cry, I’d have been bawling, but I was cried out. The few droplets that managed to escape fell down over my cheeks.
“What about Jay’s plan to send people to all the bars in Shipley and pretend to be down on their luck to capture Rumpelstiltskin?”
“I think we both know it wasn’t the best of plans. We don’t have any people left to send out. They already are out; they’re looking for Fae.”
I knew it. I was just surprised that she knew it. She’d been humoring Jay, just like me.
I nodded. “I went to the strangers,” I said as I stood back up.
“Who?”
“The people that claimed to be my siblings. I went to see them. They practically foretold this. They knew something was going to happen.”
She sighed deeply, as though she knew this was coming. “You are going to tell me that you want to go with them, aren’t you?”
She didn’t seem upset. Weary maybe. She folded the blanket and laid it neatly on the sofa.
“They have magic,” I said. “I felt Fae when I was with them. I think she’s magic too, or at least will be when she grows up.”
“They spoke of magic, but you aren’t magic, Eliana.”
I cast my eyes down to the ground. “I’ve been speaking to the unicorns… actually, speaking with them. They understand me. I can converse with them through my mind when they’re not nearby too. I’ve been able to do it since the day Fae was born. I thought I was going mad, but now I’m not so sure.”
My mother didn’t even look surprised by this announcement. Maybe she was too tired to be surprised about anything anymore. “Come on. It looks like we have a lot of talking to do, but first, we both need sleep. You can visit Jay tomorrow. I’ll leave a message telling him you’re home safe.”
I stifled a yawn. I’d never felt so exhausted in my whole life. The nights I’d stayed up feeding and cuddling Fae were nothing compared to this. I felt it in my bones, in my soul, like I could sleep for a thousand years and it wouldn’t be enough. Outside the hospital, it became apparent that all the guards had left my mother to search for Fae. Zacharina was our only way of getting home. My mother hoisted up her skirts and jumped on Zacharina’s back like a pro. I followed suit, and before long, we were in the air.
Once home, I fell asleep in my clothes, not even bothering to undress for bed. Sleep came more quickly than I imagined it would, though it was filled with nightmares of Rumpelstiltskin grinning at me and snatching Fae away again and again. I woke covered in sweat, my heart beating wildly. Outside my window, a songbird announced the dawn. My eyelids were still heavy, and my body ached, but I knew that I wouldn’t get a real night of sleep until I held Fae in my arms again. I dragged myself out of bed and showered quickly before heading out of my room. It was strange to walk the corridors without guards watching my every move, especially Avery and Williamson, who had been at my side day in day out for so long. The castle was eerily quiet, reminiscent of the hospital the night before. Even the staff who cleaned and fetched and carried were going about their jobs in silence.
I found my mother in the breakfast room. The strangers were with her, all seated around the table eating.
“I didn’t realize you meant to leave so soon,” my mother said, passing me a plate. Tears were forming at the corner of her eyes. She’d spent her life waiting for the day her daughter would be snatched away from her, and here it was, just not in the way she’d expected. Because I was going freely. “Your, er... they knocked on the palace door about ten minutes ago. The least I could do was to offer them a warm meal before they left.”
“I’ll come back,” I said quickly. “Once I’ve found Fae, I’ll bring her straight home.”
She nodded and dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief. “I know you will. I was just talking to your… siblings...”
“Possible siblings,” Castiel corrected her. “We aren’t a hundred percent sure what our connection is yet.”
“Possible siblings. They agree that your magic together is stronger than when you’re apart. I think that’s encouraging. I can’t say I know much about what is going on. I never took much stock in magic. My only dabbling in it led me into hot water, shall we say, and I’ve steered clear of it ever since. But I’d be foolish to think that you aren’t all connected to this somehow.”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out,” Azia said, throwing a buttered bagel to Nyre, who was sitting on a seat of her own rather than someone’s shoulder.
Nyre tossed her head back and opened her wide jaws to catch the bagel, swallowing it whole.
“If Eliana is part of… this—” my mother waved her hand around the gathered guests “—whatever it is, I’d at least like to know what you know and what your plans are.”
Azia was the one to speak first. “Our magical powers seem to be coming in at different rates, starting after we all turned eighteen. Mine was the first. After me, Blaise found her powers. They’re affecting the adopted sons and daughters of the leaders in order.”
“What order?”
“Alphabetical, strangely enough. Whoever named us did it in alphabetical order, so I was the first to find my abilities, and I was the first whose kingdom was affected by the bad magic.”
“Bad magic?” Deon said, raising an eyebrow.
“Whatever it is. We don’t know yet. Each of us has had problems come back from our past. For you, it was Rumpelstiltskin, but each of us is battling a different foe. Around the time of our births, a whole load of witches, imps, faeries, whatever, were all defeated. Peace came to the kingdoms. We happened to turn up on everyone’s doorsteps a bit later. That’s our only connection.”
“And the golden eyes,” I reminded her.
“Yes. We can guess from the pattern which kingdom will experience a magical malady next.”
“Prince Fallon of Aboria,” Blaise added. “He is the son of the king and queen there. His name begins with F, and the photos we’ve seen of him show he has eyes like ours.”
“Then Princess Gaia of Badalah, I assume?” my mother said. “I met her once. She was very young then. I can’t say I noticed her golden eyes, but then, she did have them in a book the entire visit.”
“Actu
ally, we’re mostly going to see Fallon because we have to pass through Aboria on the way to Urbis,” Azia said. “Urbis is our final destination. I’m sure of it.”
My mother regarded the information. “And you think Fae is there?”
“I don’t know for sure, but I believe so. I think Fae was taken because Rumpelstiltskin couldn’t get Eliana, or Eliana wasn’t interesting enough to him anymore now that he could take her baby. I wish I could tell you more, but we’re piecing the whole thing together as we go. I feel that this is moving so quickly that whatever is going on will come to a head before the year is out.”
“It’s only May,” I said, feeling bile rise in my throat. “Fae is only weeks old. The end of the year is over six months away.”
“I’m sorry. I hope I’m wrong,” Azia said, lowering her eyes. “We’ve been trying to cut this magic off before it hits, which is why we can’t waste any time getting to Aboria. Maybe if we can cut it off, it won’t get as far as Urbis.”
“You don’t believe that, though, do you?” I said.
She shook her head. “I think we were born in Urbis, and I think that this whole thing had to do with our birth somehow. It’s ridiculous to think that there are twelve siblings, but...”
“Twelve?” My mother sat forward in her chair.
“There are twelve kingdoms. We’ve been researching as best we can on the road and pooling our information. Some kingdoms have presidents or other rulers, but this is what we know. If we discount the five of us here, you next have Prince Fallon in Aboria then, as you said, Princess Gaia in Badalah. There is no prince or princess whose name begins with H as far as we can tell, but President Alice of The Forge has twin daughters. One is called Pearl, and one is called Ivy which gives us our letter I.”
“Twins? How does that work if we’re siblings?” I asked. “Unless Pearl was renamed at some point and originally was called Helen or Heather or something. But why would the two women drop two babies there?”
Eliana: Remembering Rumpelstiltskin (Kingdom of Fairytales Boxset Book 5) Page 29
