You Let Me In

by Camilla Bruce

  Fabia caught my mother’s eyes, motioned discreetly to her lower region.

  “No, no, no,” Mother shook her head, “it’s far too early for that.”

  Fabia gave me a lingering look and pulled a pair of yellow rubber gloves from the pocket of her apron, started filling the trash bag with gifts.

  Mother stood before me, towering above me. “Is that all?” she asked in her sternest voice. “Talk to me,” she implored when I just stood there, wringing my hands in my skirt. “Why won’t you say something, Cassie?”

  I shook my head, looked down at my toes.

  “No excuses? No apologies?”

  I kept shaking my head. Why should I have to apologize for what Pepper-Man did? I even felt a bit sorry for him, all his lovely gifts tossed and burned.

  “Maybe your teacher is right,” Mother said in a quiet voice when Fabia left with the bag. “Maybe you ought to see a doctor—the special kind.” She made it sound like a threat. “I don’t know what to do with you.” Her hands were on her hips now, fingernails like claws on the slick navy fabric. “I give you everything a girl could want, a lovely room with lovely toys, a wardrobe filled with dresses, and what do I get in return? Dead frogs and brown leaves, a goddamn forest under your mattress—”

  “I don’t want your stupid toys,” I told her, lifted my gaze and met hers. Suddenly I was furious, outraged at the unfairness of me being punished like that, all my things scattered and tossed, when he was the one who did it. He was the one who brought the gifts inside. He was the one who said to hide it.

  “Well, I can see that,” said Mother. Even in her rage, her curls stayed all in place. “You would rather have eyes for marbles and rowan sticks for dolls.”

  “They are pretty,” I muttered, eyes on the floor again.

  “They are dirty and crude, and sometimes they rot.” She was referring to an incident that same spring, when a discarded crow’s corpse went bad behind a set of classic fairytales. “Why won’t you just stop?” she sighed and sat down on my stripped bed. For a moment I almost felt sorry for my mother then, she looked so tired and vulnerable, eyes so honest and blue. But pity was a feeling I just couldn’t afford.

  “Why won’t you leave me alone?” I raged, pulled the white ribbon from my hair and threw it at her. It landed like a silken snake across her navy thighs. She picked it up and let it slide between her fingers, a thoughtful expression on her face.

  “I put that in so you would look nice tonight,” she told me. “Father’s business associates are coming, you know that. I want us all to look our best.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s important that Father makes a good impression.” She reached the ribbon back to me. “Put it in … Go on…”

  “I’d rather wear a turd on my head,” I said and stomped my foot, to no dramatic effect on the white carpet.

  “I know you would.” Voice weary. “But just for tonight, Cassie, please be your best—”

  “Maybe you should just hide me away up here,” I said. “Maybe you should leave me alone!”

  “Yes,” she said, rising from the bed, lips a thin red line. “Maybe you’re right, maybe you should stay here for a while and think about what you’ve done.” She crossed the floor, paused in the doorway. “Put everything back in order,” she said, looking at the torn-up room. “You will be spending quite some time up here.” She went outside and closed the door. I could hear her footsteps as she disappeared down the hall, and later when she came back, jingling with the set of keys, heard her turn one in my door. Locking away the embarrassment that was me. I am sure she let out a breath of relief.

  Unbidden tears formed in my eyes then, and I was sobbing as I hauled the mattress back onto the bedframe, dripping salt down on the bloodstains. I could hear the preparations downstairs: furniture pushed across the floor, bottles clinking together while they were put out on display. My father’s dark voice was a murmur through the floorboards, and young Olivia’s cheery voice giggled at something he said.

  I shuddered.

  I sat down on my unmade bed, pulled up my knees and cried, looked around at the mess Mother’s search had left. The books on the floor and the contents of emptied drawers: coloring pencils, notebooks, a collection of seashells and marbles littered the white sea of my floor.

  I fell asleep on the bed, hugging my pillow.

  I woke up due to the smell.

  The room had grown dark around me; night had arrived. A cold draft came in through the window. Downstairs, I could hear them all, laughing and talking. Glasses clinked together; cutlery met china. But it was the peppery scent that engulfed me, and kept my attention enthralled.

  My friend was with me, sitting by my side.

  When Pepper-Man saw I was awake, he lifted a hand and put it on top of my head, tousling my hair in silent sympathy.

  “They tore everything up,” I told him. “They threw all your gifts away.”

  “Not to worry,” he said in my head. “I can make new gifts.”

  “She will only find and throw away those, too,” I said.

  “Then I will make even more.” His black lips split in a grin; his murky eyes blinked. A wreath of blackthorn twigs rested on his white, white hair. He took it off then, and placed it on my head instead. “You are my princess. It does not matter what your mother says or does, you will always, always have me.”

  I smiled and touched the wreath he’d just given me, felt the prickly thorns against my skin. “They’re having a party downstairs,” I said. “But she has locked me up—I can’t go.”

  “Would you like to?” His fingers were on my knee, caressing it softly.

  “No, it’s a stupid thing. But I would like to eat. And I really need to pee.”

  “Come with me, then, we will have a feast of our own, down by birch and brook, deep in the stones.”

  “But I am locked up.”

  “We won’t go through that door.”

  “How will we go, then?” I looked at him wide-eyed.

  He nodded to the window.

  “It’s too far down. I can’t jump, I’ll break a leg.”

  “Ride on my back, then,” he told me—and I did. I clung to his scrawny backside as his spindly legs entered the windowsill and the cold night air hit my skin. Pepper-Man crouched there, with me on his back, then he swung us both into the night.

  * * *

  A word on faeries, because I think you might be confused: they are not what you think they are. It always baffles me to see faeries in films and recent novels. Either they are happy elementals, strolling about in the woods looking after all living creatures like guardians of the earth, or they’re an alien race living among us since time immemorial, hiding behind some veil or deep underground; monsters, pagan gods, and stuff of nightmares. The latter is the more correct approach, of course. People used to be afraid of them; they stole milk and children, abducted brides and handsome men, tricked and cursed. Nothing to love. Fairytales were warnings, not an invitation.

  Faeries are neither alien nor truly inhuman, though. They are just no longer alive.

  Not that all dead people are faeries. I have come to believe that it’s all about the will to life, the strength of the Ki, the power of one’s essence. They are not the walking dead of movies, either, but spirits that have transformed and morphed into something new, a different kind of being. Faeries rarely remember ever being human; some barely look like people anymore. They live in the wild and feed off the land, attach themselves to life like leeches. They adopt traits and manners from their sources of life: trees, brooks, animals, us. They are a ragged band; some ugly, some strange. None of them are shimmering, unless they live near water, few of them have gossamer wings, unless they feed off dragonflies. I have never experienced them as particularly wise or kind. How clever can a farmer from the seventh century be, even after some hundred years living as a fox-hugging faerie? Still, they retain some humanity, a root. Desire, for one, a drive to reproduce—hence all those storie
s about faerie children and maidens lost. Hunger for riches is a human thing too, and vengeance is another. Those who live on humans are of course better at acting—and looking—like one.

  Knowing what living humans want.

  My Pepper-Man claims to have lived mainly on birch trees and ash before he found me. It was through his transformation that I realized how it all had to be. I will tell you more about that later, but for now, let’s continue further into the woods.

  VI

  That first time I slipped into the woods with Pepper-Man, I thought it all such a grand adventure. I felt proud to have escaped Mother’s punishment and her unfair accusations. I can’t recall being afraid at all, though the woods were dark and the destination unclear. I did have faith in my Pepper-Man, though. He walked beside me like a graveyard wraith, his dry hair whipping my face when the wind caught hold of it, his tattered clothes coiling and writhing around his skinny legs. I remember the full moon hanging in the sky, its pale light filtering through the branches. Even though I had known the trees in those woods my whole life, climbed them and picked their leaves, they looked like strangers to me now, draped in darkness and icy light. The path before us—one I ought to know like the back of my own hand—curled like a black snake through the underbrush. Even though I had no reason to think so, I sensed somewhere deep inside that it would lead me to places unknown.

  And it did. Or it forked. And suddenly my path was no more.

  The shift was subtle, like the beginning of a rainstorm with oncoming mist. My trees gave way to strange ones, taller and wider, older by far, thick roots curling at their trunks. Their branches brushed my head as we walked beneath them, felt like fingers with very long nails. The path beneath my feet shone dimly in the faint light, scattered with fist-sized leaves, it was like walking on glass or silver, or on a frozen stream. Toads appeared on the path, singing toad songs, loud and croaking. They scattered as we passed through, jumping in among the ferns. An owl hooted somewhere nearby, and I squeezed Pepper-Man’s hand when the bird suddenly appeared in front of me, large wings chasing the air. Its eyes shone when it looked at me, just for a second, before it flew away.

  “Nothing in here will hurt you,” Pepper-Man said.

  “Where am I, then?”

  “Visiting with friends.”

  “Are they like you?” I felt my heart racing.

  “Not at all,” he replied, and then he laughed. It was a hollow sound, that laughter, dry as a husk and dead as winter.

  “Where are you taking me?” I tried again.

  “Somewhere you are safe, by brook and birch, deep in the stones—”

  “Where is that?”

  “In the mound. Where I come from—you will see.”

  “Are there other girls there?” My heart was fluttering with hope.

  “No,” Pepper-Man said. “You are the only one.”

  We walked for what felt like hours, the landscape around us changed again, the air smelled like water-drenched moss, a hint of iron and Pepper-Man. Beneath my naked feet, the ground turned soggy and moist; the trees were drooping shapes with clusters of leaves brushing the ground. I slipped on wet soil and mushrooms, large red toadstools and bigger brown ones that split open when I stepped on them, emitting clouds of spores. The toads were still there, behind us now, like a train of noisy followers. There were slugs, too, and a viper. I could see black bird shapes in the trees; none of them made a sound. The wind was all gone now. The air was quiet but for the toads’ throaty voices. I tried not to look at them, kept my gaze trained on the path before us, holding on to my friend, as if his hand were an anchor, safety in the midst of a vast, black sea.

  Finally, we came to a halt by a circular shape in the landscape, a grass-covered mound studded with jutting stones.

  “Is this it?” I asked, looking up at the towering shape. I could vaguely recall it, from Sunday strolls or maybe just from dreams. “But how do we get in?” I was yearning for that, getting inside, away from the dark woods, the viper and the toads. I pictured a feast of epic proportions: roughly heaved tables, pigs roasting on spits, like the ones I had read about in my fairytale books.

  “It’s easy,” Pepper-Man said and pulled me along, and off we went, circling the mound counterclockwise, one time, two times, three times … My feet were beginning to hurt by then, and I fought to keep up with his strides. Twigs and thorny underbrush whipped my calves red and my stomach ached with hunger. Still, I trusted Pepper-Man and felt sure some great reward would follow at the end.

  He had said so, hadn’t he?

  As we completed the third circle, a rumbling sound rose from the ground, and the mound split open like a ripe plum, a gash ran down its side, wet dirt fell in clusters from the edges, and stones and vegetation came tumbling down. I cried out and hid my face against Pepper-Man’s body, flinging my arms around his waist.

  A chuckle purred deep in his chest, and his hand landed on top of my head.

  “Welcome to the mound, little princess,” he said. “Fear not, but look at the wonders.” I dried tears from my face with the back of my hand, looked up at him, my tall, pale friend, and tried for a tiny smile. “My tribe is here to welcome you, all the brothers and sisters of the mound.”

  They came climbing out of the broken earth then, carrying torches and gifts. Limbs long and thin, hair ragged and braided. Fur and claws, teeth and nails, feather and bones.

  The faeries.

  First came a tall and spindly woman, carrying a wooden bowl. Her head was bald but for a single white braid, her body shrouded in silk. Her eyes glittered like black jewels; a brown spider spun by her pointed left ear.

  “I bring you milk to drink, child,” her soft voice said in my head. She placed the bowl by my feet and took a few steps back.

  Next came a man with a long, narrow face. His eyes were slanted and golden brown, his hair a thick mane of red. His clothes, or whatever was left of them, were brown and torn at the seams. A bushy tail hung between his thighs. In his hands, he held a silver tray stacked with soft white cakes.

  “I bring you cakes of morning dew,” he said inside my head. His voice was dark, like thunderstorms, his teeth were sharp and very white. The fingernails that touched the tray were curved and very black. He placed the tray at my feet and stepped back.

  The next one to approach me had a wreath of wild roses. She was as small as a child, but had the face of a crone. Her dark eyes peered up at me from a wrinkled face, brown as a nut. A roughly woven scarf hid her hair. Her stubby hands held out the wreath to Pepper-Man.

  “A crown for our maid,” said the woman, and smiled.

  I rose my gaze, looked at them: a half circle of beings I had never seen the likes of before: tall and small, hairy and bald. Some of them were antlered and others had tails. A few of them were like Pepper-Man, gnarled and tall, some were small, much smaller than I was. All of them looked at me expectantly; animal eyes and human eyes, birds’ eyes and blind eyes.

  Pepper-Man planted the roses on my head. “Eat,” he said. “Drink.”

  He lifted the wooden bowl to my lips. The milk was sweet and thick.

  He picked a cake from the tray and laid it on my tongue; it melted like sugar when I bit into it, tasted like honey and blueberry jam.

  “Now you can enter the mound.” My Pepper-Man laced his hand in mine.

  They parted for us when we approached. Smiling faces, glimmering eyes. Hands that patted and touched.

  Inviting me into their nest.

  Into the dark, dark earth.

  Inside, the mound was hollow, as such things are. There was a circular hall with smoking hearths; white stones paved the floor. Torches set in sconces in the dirt wall emitted circles of dirty light. There was a woman there with glowing eyes, playing a wild rhythm on a drum of hide. Birds’ feathers stuck out of the ragged clusters of brown hair that hung around her face. She was completely naked and her breasts were milky white. My cheeks reddened, and I looked away, unaccustomed as I was to things lik
e that. Her golden gaze followed me as I stepped into the hall, clinging to Pepper-Man’s hand. A man in a wig like a French duke spun out in front of my vision; in his hand was a flute of yellowing bone. He lifted it to his lips and played a shrill tune, falling in with the drum. I watched him as he danced away, the frayed brocade of his waistcoat, the faded blue silk of his trousers.

  “Dance with me, Cassandra,” said Pepper-Man, grabbing my free hand with his, spinning me slowly around. “Later we will have more cake but for now, let us be merry.”

  The rest of the party was pooling in behind us, to that dank, hot cave in the earth. One by one, they fell into the dance, moving their bodies in swirls and steps. Swaying and turning, tossing and shaking.

  We danced too, spun and flowed across the crowded room, and wherever we went, the others parted for us. Pepper-Man led me with sure steps, lips curled into a lopsided smile. Danced, until there was nothing but the dance. Nothing but the night and the heat, the rhythm and the flesh. Pepper-Man lifted me high up in the air, spun me around, above the crowd. I looked down at the writhing mass of bodies, the horned and the antlered, the feathered and the furred, and I lifted my hands to the cavern’s dark roof and let the music take me.

  * * *

  I certainly didn’t know then that by drinking that milk and eating that cake, I had allowed them all into my life. Not a day went by after that without a faerie peeking its head from the bushes or staring back at me from the mirror when I tried to untangle the knots in my hair. It wasn’t just Pepper-Man anymore—although I certainly belonged to him; there were others, too, meddling and distracting. Some I liked, others not. Most were just there at the edge of my vision, dancing, laughing, snarling, and snapping.