Edeline flew at the front of the pack of fairies, just behind Thirza. Her side still ached from where Percy had gouged it with his claws. He flew at the very back of the group, his wing still injured from when he’d so foolishly turned his back on her.
Every once in a while, anger boiled up in Edeline. Why on earth had he thought that he’d be qualified to be king? How dared he challenge her for the position of ruler? Didn’t he understand that it was her position?
Her blood was just as royal as his. No one but him cared that she was smaller than the rest of the royals. One of the servants had called her a “throwback” when he’d thought she couldn’t hear him. She hadn’t understood at first. Only after actually listening to Sebastian did she realize that her tiny body and round figure resembled the fairies of the old world. It was only since coming to the New World that the fairies had grown tall and lanky.
Would the older fairies shrink back down once they were living outside in the woods again? No, they’d all live in the underground cave Edeline had discovered in the new kingdom. Only the younger fairies would dare to live among the trees.
Though Edeline did find that after “roughing it” for a couple weeks that she longed for her comfortable bed.
As they passed the stand of white birch—the death trees, as Edeline thought of them—she suddenly found the pain in her side growing much worse. Percy shrieked, falling suddenly, unable to fly. One of the warriors caught him before he impaled himself on a limb.
“What is this?” Edeline asked, stopping the group, landing in the nearest pines. She found herself suddenly short of breath. She pressed her hand against her side. The wounds had started bleeding again—wounds that had already scabbed over.
“We can’t stay here,” Edeline told Thirza when she came over. “There’s some ill magic in the air.” While on the one hand, Percy might die of his wounds if they did stay, on the other hand, so might she.
Thirza nodded grimly. “I wonder if it’s the Old One. Has he set his territory against us?”
“Possibly,” Edeline said. She forced herself up, spreading her wings. “We need to leave.”
She struggled to fly. But damn it, she wasn’t about to ask for help. She would make it back to safe territory on her own. Even if she did wobble, and wasn’t able to fly in a straight line.
As soon as they crossed over the death pines, Edeline found she could breathe easily again. The pain lessened.
The fairies landed in a group of tall pines nearby. Edeline rested on an upper branch while Percy and a few of the others hugged tree trunks. The sweet smell of the woods soothed Edeline further.
“We can’t go back,” Edeline announced to the group.
“The ones who are uninjured could,” Thirza said. She looked very unhappy with Edeline’s decision. She remained floating in the air, hovering using magic and not her wings, so she could face Edeline directly.
Edeline shook her head. “It’s too dangerous. The magic may have merely started with those who were injured. What if it spreads? What if it starts to take out those who are healthy as well?”
“We need to go back,” Thirza said. She glared at Edeline. “We need to tell the court that we have a new home.”
Edeline really didn’t want to let the warrior go. If she was honest with herself, she was afraid that Thirza might not return.
“Besides, those that are still in the old kingdom might also be suffering, and might not realize why. We need to bring them here, where it’s safe,” Thirza continued.
Edeline knew the warrior was probably right. It still galled her to admit it. How did she extract a promise of return, however?
“I agree,” Edeline finally said as the growing silence among the fairies turned cold and sullen. “Some need to return. Floyd, Amaranth, and Emery, you are all uninjured, yes?”
The two warriors and the royal nodded.
“Then you shall be our ambassadors, returning to the Greater Oregon Fairy Kingdom and inviting them to…to…” Edeline paused. What was the name of her new kingdom? Not Edelville. That made it sound like a small country village. Not the grand kingdom she had planned. “My kingdom,” she finally settled on.
Naming the place would have to come later.
“Why do I have to go?” Floyd whined.
“Because you represent the royals in my new kingdom,” Edeline told him. “Don’t you want to be recognized as an ambassador?”
“Fine,” Floyd said. “But I expect more land in return.”
“We can’t possibly be dividing up estates until after we understand the full territory,” Edeline countered hotly. Before Floyd could object again, Edeline added, “But your claim will be taken into consideration.”
Floyd glared at Edeline, but he didn’t push his luck further. Because Edeline might have just bitten him, then sent him along anyway.
Cornelius flew on tired wings. He didn’t know how many flew behind him. A hundred? Two hundred? Had perhaps as many as five hundred escaped?
Cornelius couldn’t count, now. He knew whatever number the total came to would break his heart.
The sun lay low to the west, though it remained hidden behind a thick bank of gray clouds. Coastal pines grew spiky and green beneath him, with occasional circles of human homes crudely cut into them. Wind blew hard from the ocean on his left, almost enough to push Cornelius from his course.
He stayed true though, heading due north, to the staging area that Sebastian had suggested, hell, just that morning. Though it hadn’t been the only time he’d talked of it.
Where was the priest? Did he still live? What of Racanta and the other warriors?
How many had survived the foul magic in the air? At first, when Cornelius had seen fairies who were barely injured fall, he’d believed it was something the dwarves had done.
Then he saw dwarves fall as well.
Something else drained them, sapped both groups of fighters. Whatever it was still tugged on him now, even this high in the air, this far away from the kingdom.
Sebastian had been right—it had turned into their tomb. They would never go back.
Up ahead lay a new kingdom, one that the younger fairies would establish. And Cornelius would help them as long as he could.
Until his poor old heart finally broke and he took that long trip across the dark river.
Distant, shrill whistles sounded through the air. Dale stopped when Racanta did, his mom beside him. Denise wheezed and clutched her side as they paused.
Dale didn’t ask his mom how she was doing. She’d just lie and say she was fine.
The trees in the orchard they ran through were almost as tall as the ones that grew up above the fairy kingdom. Though no fruit remained from the fall harvest, it had been recent enough that he still smelled the sweet scent of the apples. Sparse grass grew below the trees, pale and dry.
“What was that?” Dale finally asked quietly after they’d paused for a few moments.
Racanta looked over her shoulder. “A signal.”Though she didn’t add the word, “Duh,” to the end of her phrase, Dale still heard it clearly.
“What did the signal mean?” Dale asked. “Was it from the fairies? Or the dwarves?”
Racanta grimaced. “The dwarves. If I had to guess, they’re rallying for the next attack.”
“I’m sorry,” Dale said automatically. He felt bad that the warrior hadn’t been able to fight all day, but had instead escorted them across the kingdom.
Racanta shrugged. “I will join my comrades soon,” she said. “We’re almost to the temple. Come.”
She turned and raced forward again. Dale sighed and started jogging. He really hated this. “How you doing?” he called over his shoulder.
“I’ll survive,” his mom said grimly.
He bet she hated this as well.
Just past the edge of the trees lay an open grassy area. It looked like a great place for picnics. The sun hung low in the western sky. How long had they been down here? Did time pass more quickly in the fairy kingdom than it did up above?
On the far side of the field stood a tall, golden tower. The temple, Dale presumed.
Racanta stopped just before she stepped out onto the soft grass. She lifted her head, sniffing the air.
“I don’t smell anything too foul,” she said, scanning the dome. “Still don’t want to leave cover.”
Dale looked up. He didn’t see anything above them but a clear sky. “Do dwarves fly?” he asked softly.
“Of course not,” Racanta said.
“Then they’re not likely to attack from above, right?” Dale said.
Racanta glared at him. “Still don’t like it. Too quiet.” But she turned and started running across the open meadow.
Dale reached back and took his mom’s hand before turning and running as well. He didn’t like the way Denise wheezed. Hopefully, this wasn’t putting too much strain on her heart.
“My doctor did say I needed more aerobic exercise,” Mom muttered.
Dale grinned and nodded. Maybe they’d both have to take up jogging. Or something.
The tower loomed. It wasn’t close to an edge of the dome. Still, Dale had to believe that Sebastian hadn’t led them astray, that there was an escape route from there to the outside world.
Was the fairy magic dying? The temple didn’t sparkle in the sunlight. A low fieldstone wall surrounded the complex. Behind the golden temple lay a collection of plain wooden buildings, similar to the warrior barracks near the palace.
Did the priests sleep there? Were there any left? Or had they all gone to fight? And die?
The door to the temple stood open, but Racanta ignored it, leading them around to the side.
“Where are we going?” Dale called out. Damn it! He’d thought Sebastian had said the temple.
Racanta didn’t pause until she was standing in the doorway of a hall that connected the tower to the other buildings. “Sebastian said to ask the murals,” she told him. “Those are back here.”
“Ah,” Dale said. He looked over his shoulder once more at the golden building. It had lost its luster and grown dull, like brass. Was that because the head priest had died?
The hallway they stepped into felt cool, as if they’d just walked into a cave. The air was humid. The scent reminded Dale of his favorite stew, with tender beef, carrots, and tomato sauce. It surprised him how different this place felt than outside, as the hallway had open windows running along both sides, from ceiling to waist.
“This way,” Racanta said impatiently. She was already at the end of the hall, heading into the next room.
The hallway itself was made out of aged wood, well-constructed. Dale approved. He only had to duck his head a little—the fairies tended to build high ceilings so they could fly easily through the rooms.
The next room was dark in comparison. A huge fire burned in the hearth to the left. Half a dozen plain wooden benches were scattered around edges of the room. Cobblestones covered the floor.
Strange. This room was round, like the temple. The ceiling went up forever, ending in darkness far above him. However, from the outside, Dale had only seen a single tower.
Racanta stopped in the middle of the room, looking around. Dale went and stood beside the fairy.
“What do you see?” he asked.
She waved her hand. More light filled the area.
Dale gasped. Murals covered all the walls, except for the fireplace. But they weren’t like paintings. Instead, they had only outlines of the fairies—faint silver shimmering around their wings and bodies.
They looked different than the fairies Dale had met: shorter, fatter, and with less pronounced ridges up and down their foreheads. They wore flowing skirts and robes. Many of the women just wore paint from the waist up, their tiny breasts pointed and proudly exposed.
“What are the murals about?” Denise asked Racanta.
The fairy pointed to one picture where a tall figure knelt on one knee and handed a female fairy a basket of golden flowers. “That’s Plionius and the first Queen, Georgina.” She turned and indicated to the murals beside the hearth. “That’s the great priest Comalinka. He’s blessing the boats that carry the fairy souls to the underworld, where they await rebirth.”
Dale gasped. As Racanta spoke, the murals began to move. Plionius lifted up the basket, then set it back down again, and lifted it up again, like a slow-motion animation. The priest Comalinka moved his hands in graceful patterns, a sprinkling of fairy dust floating from them onto the waiting boats.
“They move!” he exclaimed. “How?” He didn’t see any clockwork or mechanism.
“Magic, you idiot,” Racanta said. “We weren’t always dependent on your human gears and machinery.”
“Sorry,” Dale said, though he wasn’t really. He’d seen magic, kind of, sort of, with his sister. This was a completely different thing. Not a transformation at all.
“So where’s the bolt hole?” Denise said.
Dale nodded. As fascinating as the pictures were, he’d never be able to understand them. There was no mechanism to take apart, no parts for him to learn about. Magic was a big black hole as far as he was concerned. Kind of like electricity. It just happened.
“I don’t know where the escape hole is,” Racanta said. “Sebastian said the murals know the way.”
The murals? But they looked like dumb animation, going through the same motions over and over again. They didn’t have intelligence, did they?
Dale walked closer to the wall. The outlines continued to shimmer faintly, and still moved in predictable patterns. He took a step back. Were they pointing in a single direction? No. Some moved right to left, others left to right. They weren’t looking at a single item either.
“Where’s the priest’s bolt hole? How do we escape?” Dale asked the two fairies who sat at a table and drank endless glasses of golden mead. The wings of the fairy on the right grew stronger as he drank, then weaker as he put his mug down. What did that mean? What was the story behind it?
“How do we get out?” Dale heard his mom ask another of the pictures.
But the walls remained silent.
Ivan listened in shock as his leaders reported in.
They’d been decimated.
No, worse. Much worse. Not one in ten. More like one in three were now dead. And the wounded kept dying, even up here, out of that accursed fairy hole. Erasyl raced from one injured dwarf to the next, applying compresses, muttering spells, supplying them with herbed drinks, but they kept slipping away.
Why?
Ivan stood at the mouth of one of Kostya’s main tunnels. He’d planned on raiding the human Tinker next, however he wasn’t sure that any of his men could stomach more battle. Even Mitya, his head warrior, seemed shaken. And that dwarf had a mien of stone.
Nothing had gone as planned since they’d left the old world.
Was it a sign that the gods had turned their faces against Ivan’s cause?
There wasn’t much more for Ivan to do tonight, though. He would walk one last time among the campfires, share the sorrow of his fighters, then sleep for a long, long time.
A scout rushed up.
Ivan’s stomach rolled, as it had when they’d been on the water. He clenched his teeth and kept the bile down.
Now what?
Then he looked at the dwarf who came striding up behind the scout.
Curses be.
It wasn’t one of his followers.
No, it was one of Varlaam’s.
Before Ivan could ask how the hell the dwarf had gotten here, the dwarvf called out loudly, “King Varlaam would like to meet you on the beach, to hear of your great battles.”
Ivan pressed his lips together before he ordered Mitya to slaughter this upstart.
His brother had lied to him. He hadn’t waited like the doddering old fool Ivan had believed him to be. No, he’d come here, to the New World, to see Ivan’s failures first hand. How much did Varlaam already know? How could Ivan hide his losses?
Then another thought struck him.
Varlaam on this shore also meant Varlaam’s staff. Maybe this day wouldn’t be a complete loss if Ivan could finally call the staff to him and use the power in it as it rightly should be used. Perhaps even save his men.
Ivan quickly followed after Varlaam’s follower, new plots forming.
Brett stirred as the dwarves closest to him left their posts, heading down toward the beach and their rendezvous point.
Such a glorious day! So many lives he’d tasted, drunk down, snatched away.
It was too bad those lives couldn’t sustain him. He wasn’t some ridiculous vampire, like in those human myths. While Brett was temporarily buoyed by all the power he’d absorbed, it wouldn’t last. By the morning, he’d be as ancient as ever.
And the fairies were leaving. The battle had drawn them out, but the great death toll had shaken them. While they weren’t as long-lived as Brett and his kind, they still tended to live a handful of centuries. Many of the fairies who’d beenin the kingdom had been born in the old country and traveled with the humans to the New World.
They were flying north, heading out of his territory. Soon all his land would be free of them.
There were just the dwarves to deal with, now. Their death toll hadn’t been as great. And they weren’t as discouraged. They’d come to the New World, seeking a new kingdom.
Brett was just going to have to let them know that they weren’t welcome, either.
“How many warriors did you lose?” Varlaam asked again, incredulous.
Really, how could Ivan be such a fool? How could he have failed, so? Though a part of Varlaam cheered quietly at Ivan’s losses. No warrior would follow his brother now.
“It wasn’t the fairies!” Ivan insisted. “There’s something else here. Some foul magic that drains the life out of the stoutest dwarf with the smallest scratch!”
“Nonsense,” Varlaam said. He’d never heard of such a thing.
Though he did believe Ivan when he said that he’d been fighting all day. His brother’s fine beard still held blood, and his armor bore dents. His ax had been put to good use.
But not good enough.
“I know!” Ivan said. His sudden enthusiasm made Varlaam narrow his eyes. What lie was Ivan about to tell his brother now?
“You should visit the men with your staff. See if you can heal them,” Ivan said.
Varlaam grew very still. Did Ivan know that Varlaam couldn’t reach any power under the earth with his staff? That it still felt leaden and sluggish?
“Maybe in the morning,” Varlaam said, trying to put his brother off.
“No. Now. These are my followers, hurting. Why won’t you see to them?” Ivan asked.
Even in the darkening evening Varlaam saw Ivan’s eyes held burning rage. “We’ve just arrived,” Varlaam said, stalling, “and my staff—”
“Will not work here,” came a smooth voice through the night.
Varlaam’s guards already had their axes in their hands, and brought them forward, menacingly.
Then they seemed to freeze.
“Now, now, there’s no need for that,” said the smooth voice.
A dark figure stepped into the firelight. A burned man, one whose skin was like burnt leather. He had white hair that fell down to his waist, and golden hawk-eyes.
“Who are you?” Varlaam asked, pleased that his voice didn’t stutter or break.
“They call me the Old One. O’onakie. Or Brett, depending on your mood,” the creature said with a smile that showed sharp, pointed teeth.
Varlaam shivered. He’d never heard of the o’onakie and had no idea what an Old One was. It must be some New World creature. Kostya had never mentioned it in his reports, either.
“Were you the one responsible for the foul draining magic?” Ivan said. Fear hadn’t dampened his anger as he marched right up to the creature.
“I am,” the Old One announced proudly. “You are not welcome in my territory. You must leave. Now.”
“Now see here,” Varlaam started, walking forward.
A negligent wave of the Old One’s hand bound Varlaam in what felt like hard steel.
The Old One slunk over to where Varlaam stood, trapped. Every inch of the creature promised an untimely death.
“I told Kostya that you were not welcome,” the Old One whispered. His words were carried on the wind—more magic that Varlaam didn’t understand. Every dwarf under Varlaam’s command as well as Ivan’s heard those words. “Yet you came.”
Ivan gestured behind the Old One’s back. Varlaam stared at him, distracted for a moment. What was his brother doing?
Oh. His staff. Varlaam should use his staff.
“Kostya never mentioned you,” Ivan said, trying to get the creature’s attention back on him.
Varlaam dug deeply for power, energy, even the slightest spark. He had to be able to pull up something, infuse his staff.
The Old One shrugged and turned his back on Varlaam, turning back to Ivan.
Suddenly, Varlaam found he could move. He knew it wasn’t due to his own puny magical abilities, but that the Old One had released him. But he didn’t have to tell Ivan that. Instead, Varlaam pointed the top of his staff toward the Old One, willing it to start glowing.
The fire that sprang up surprised him. He gasped, then willed more power into the staff. He’d give this Old One a taste of true power.
Denise walked from one mural to the next, pleading with each. “Please, show us the way out.” She was sweating in her rain jacket, her legs rubbery from all the running they’d done. Racanta had at least gotten them some water, but the only true relief for Denise would be to see a large sign marked, “Exit”.
The pictures fascinated her. She didn’t understand why a ghostly figure drinking unending glasses of mead mesmerized her, but it did. She found herself staring instead of asking again and again.
Dale didn’t seem trapped. Instead, he ran his fingers over the top of the fireplace mantel, down along the sides, obviously looking for a hidden spring or lever. He even tried looking inside the burning pit, but the flames challenged him, reaching out to burn him.
Racanta finally stepped up to Dale and said, “Tinker, we need to try another exit.”
Was it just Denise’s imagination, or had the pair who were drinking suddenly sat up straighter?
She thought back for a moment. Hadn’t Sebastian said something about telling the murals? Tinker?
“Yes, this is the Tinker,” Denise said, moving toward Dale.
All of the pictures shifted. They didn’t grow more solid—the fairy figures still were merely outlined in shimmering silver. But they did all change slightly.
Denise had the impression that the walls were finally paying attention to them.
“This is the Tinker,” Denise said again, more loudly, reaching out and taking her son’s hand. “And I am the mother. We need to escape. There are dwarves here, fighting in the kingdom.”
Could the murals hear her? She didn’t know. She squeezed Dale’s hand, getting his attention.
“Ah, yeah. I’m the Tinker. Sebastian sent us. We need to escape,” Dale said.
All the murals paused, frozen in mid-action. A sudden loud whoosh made Denise jump. The figures went back to their regular prescribed motions.
Instead of a huge fire in the fireplace, the hearth had grown cold and covered in ashes. At the back of the fireplace now stood a dark staircase, leading up.
“I knew it!” Dale said, turning to Denise. “In the house above the kingdom, the stairs were connected to the mantel.”
“I see,” Denise said. It would make sense that the fairies would use the same sort of mechanism.
The stairs going up looked dark, dismal, and steep. But it was their only hope.
Racanta gestured toward the stairs. “You two go up. Escape. I need to return to my people.”
Denise squeezed Dale’s hand before he replied. “You go,” she said. “Thank you.”
While the warrior might be useful if there were dwarves ready to attack them up above, Denise didn’t want to be the one who sent Racanta to her death.
Besides, Denise knew that the slightest injury would kill any dwarf. And when it came down to her and her children versus these twisted fairytale monsters, she knew which side she would always choose.
“Ready?” she asked Dale after Racanta had flown off.
He nodded grimly. “I’ll go first.”
“I’ll follow right after you,” Denise said. Though she knew they weren’t out of the hole yet, they were finally on their way.
They’d get back to the human world soon. And Denise would never, ever, come back. She’d had enough of fairies and dwarves for several lifetimes at this point.