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I had a dream, which
was not all a dream
The dread of vanished
shadows.
- Byron
TEAGAN’S SENSES CAME back to her slowly. First, she noticed a tingling in her toes and in her fingers, then a twitch in her back and a crick in her neck. Her nose itched, and she wanted to scratch it, but she couldn’t make her limbs function. Dead weights, that’s what all of her appendages felt like. Shear mush. Her brain pounded out a Latin tempo inside a skull that felt two sizes too small to hold the band having a fiesta inside it. Earth, musky and clean, overwhelmed her senses as she lay on the damp, mossy ground.
She struggled to open her eyes as if waking from a deep sleep. Disoriented, she thought maybe she’d fallen asleep under the old oak? She let out a long sigh. Hell, maybe she was waking up from one of Doc’s hypnotic sessions. Maybe everything that’d happened in the last twenty-four was a dream. Maybe everything was normal. Maybe Colin wasn’t real, and she hadn’t met the gorgeous black-haired man. Maybe said man hadn’t really followed her to another country and then showed up at the inn she where she’d been searching for her missing — okay, gone — father.
As Teagan lay there, a faint buzzing caused her to groan softly. Her eyes flickered open. The last thing she remembered was something grabbing her arm and pulling her through the stones. A blinding light had hit her, and some kind of vortex had opened. Next thing she knew, she was being magically catapulted through time and space in a painful, mind-numbing way. Now, she was lying on the ground trying to ignore the lingering pain. Teagan knew the truth was she wasn’t under the oak anymore. She was somewhere else, perhaps in another dimension, but she definitely didn’t think she was in Ireland anymore.
“We’re not in Kansas anymore Toto,” she said, trying to make light of her situation, but she would’ve felt much better if she’d actually had a little dog there to say it to just like Dorothy.
Maybe if she kept her eyes closed, pretending she was sleeping, or clicked her heels three times, the forces that brought her here would just send her back.
“Teagan.” The call was soft, like the feeling of floating on a fluffy cloud of marshmallow. Then it came again, stronger. Sticky. “Teeeagan.”
She knew that voice. She remembered it. It was part of her dreams.
“I’m coming,” she called out but not knowing to whom she spoke.
Her eyes came all the way open as she surged to her feet, fully recovered from whatever had immobilized her. A wave of nausea flooded her senses, and she hunched forward holding her knees and trying not to retch.
“The travel can be quiet an overwhelming sensation for someone not used to it. We call it sifting.”
“What— What did you do to me?” Teagan questioned the familiar voice.
“I didn’t do anything to you Teagan. You brought us through the stones.”
“I did what?” Teagan stood up and almost screamed.
Two apparitions stood in front of her staring at her. Both of them exactly alike, except one shimmered in and out of visibility. Although ghostly in appearance, she could make out long flowing copper locks, the same defiant upturn of the nose, and the same sparkling iridescent eyes. She looked deeper at the brighter of the two, and almost cried out as she recognized the apparition.
“Mother?”
The two ghosts exchanged a look she thought was curious.
“I am,” the brighter of the two said and moved toward her, “Aisling. I loved your father very much. I loved you, though I wasn’t given the chance.”
Teagan shook her head.
“What have I said?”
“He didn’t love me enough. He left me with her. He left me.”
Years of frustration, of unknowing, of self-inflicted guilt raced through her, and Teagan’s tired body gave out. She fell to her knees sobbing, the tears seemly ripped from her exhausted state. In an attempt to hide her shame, she moved to cover her face with her hands, but the slightest movement stilled her. There, above the mossy grass, tiny little flies flitted about buzzing noisily and seemed to be catching her tears. The smallest one, about the length of a common dragonfly, had beautiful shimmering wings that protruded from the upper body of what appeared to be a tiny human. The bottom half was more animalistic with it’s raptor-like hind legs, tail, and claws.
“What are they?” she breathed.
Aisling’s laughter tinkled out of her like water over a rocky creek bed. “They are dragonfae. They gather and repair magic.”
“But why are they taking my tears?”
Aisling’s smile was warm. “Magic.”
Calmer now, Teagan stood and looked around the verdant forest. Trees the size of mountains surrounded them, the branches overhead almost blotting out the sun in places. Flowers bloomed abundantly, some looking like bleeding hearts, others looking like little humming birds. Everywhere around her the little fae flies danced and hummed. Teagan could feel the magic of the place thrumming through her veins.
“Where are we?” she asked in awe.
“You’ve brought us to the In-Between. The veil between the Fae realm and the human realm.”
Teagan took a step.
“You’re the one that’s been in my mind since I was a small girl?” she asked the familiar voice.
“Yes, I am Aoife, your mother’s twin.”
“I don’t understand any of this.” Teagan put her hands on her head and looked up at the treetops. “Why?”
“I was dying,” the ghost of her mother said.
“And I was dying,” Aoife, her aunt said. “We knew you were in danger, so I merged with you to try to keep you safe.”
Teagan stepped back. “You mean, to try to keep yourself safe? Because I saw it. I’ve seen it all, remember? Your visions, they’re mine now. I saw you fall to your death, at the cliffside.”
“You’re not wrong.”
“But how,” Teagan spun, taking in every strange, fantastical thing around her. The purple sky, the odd creatures, the stunning flora, and the feel of magic that seemed to hum about her very being. “How is any of this possible? I’m not crazy, then?” It was almost an afterthought.
“No, you’ve never been crazy. Come here.”
“Why?” she still didn’t know whether to trust the voice.
“Just come.”
Somehow, she couldn’t deny the request and felt herself moving forward. The one named Aoife, reached out with her see-through hands and grasped Teagan’s face, more firmly than one would expect to be grabbed by a ghost. What hit her next could only be described as a multitude of memories. A flood of good, bad, funny, desperate flashbacks. They all belonged to her aunt. These were the recollections she’d seen in her dreams since she was a little girl. Relief washed over her with the sudden understanding that she wasn’t crazy and never had been. Somehow, her aunt had used her body as host for two decades.
“What are you?” Teagan asked.
“You mean, what are we?” Aoife pointed at Teagan.
Teagan nodded, the lump in her throat too thick to swallow down as she waited for the answer.
“I am the lost Fae princess.”
Teagan gulped down the lump.
“Fae? As in Sookie Stackhouse kind of fae?” They looked at her oddly. “The HBO series?”
Both of them shook their heads.
Teagan threw her hands up in exasperation, the pop culture reference lost on them.
“All will be revealed to you my daughter. For now, know that the Guardians of the Fae are here to help you. Your task, although not an easy one, is to take Aoife home to Faery where she can reunite with her body.”
“And how will I know how to get there, follow the yellow brick road?” It was so absurd she nearly laughed, but the pun was once again lost.
“Aoife will show you the way.”
“Right, because she’s been really helpful so far,” Teagan grumbled and looked at the ground when she saw the hurt look on her ghosty auntie’s face.
“You don’t belong here!” The shrill screech came at her from out of nowhere. Then a howling wind rushed around her. Teagan reached out to her aunt, unsure of what was happening. “You bring great danger to my son, to everyone around you. Get out!”
“Aria, you are out of line,” her mother yelled at the blinding light that shimmered in front of her and then seemed to form a body.
Teagan shielded her eyes from the glare and the wind.
“You are no longer a queen. You’re nothing here in the In-Between. You’d do good to remember your burden and bear it wisely.” Aria spoke rudely to her mother, then spun around and addressed Teagan again. Teagan was blinded by her beauty and found herself straining to keep her eyes open. “You don’t belong here. Leave now.”
“Who is your son? I assure you I mean him no harm.”
“You’ll mean no-one harm, and yet, you are the crucible of danger. You are hunted by shadows you cannot dream to comprehend. You are sought out by the queen. You are a harbinger of death. Those who stand beside you will fall.”
“You’ve seen this?” Teagan asked, still shielding her eyes.
“You haven’t?” The one named Aria was looking at Aoife who’d come to stand beside her.
“Go!”
“This is going to hurt kid,” Aoife whispered in her ear and snapped back into her like an elastic popping her brain. Teagan staggered a few paces, and then found herself falling through darkness.