Betrothed (37 page)

‘I love you, Leif.’

‘I know, and you will not be apart from me for long. When your freedom is announced, I want you with me in Faera.’

‘Promise you won’t forget me?’ I asked in a quiet voice.

Leif watched me for a long moment, brows furrowed. ‘Surely you do not doubt me, Marla. On my honour I will be back for you before the assembly.’

It wasn’t really Leif I doubted, but the idea that King Telophy would ever allow me back into Faera now that I was out. But there
was nothing I could do, so I forced a smile to my face and said, ‘Of course not.’

He returned the smile and bent to kiss me. ‘Did you like the things I packed for you?’

‘I haven’t looked.’

‘Have a look when you wake up. I have to go; meeting with you like this uses energy I need to conserve right now.’

‘Come back quickly, Leif.’

He kissed me then and was gone.

The next day I woke up feeling itchy. The rashes were already returning to my body. And I was starving—I hadn’t eaten since I left Faera. Mum had boiled me a fresh batch of rice. A bowl of it was sitting on the shelf in the fridge, a plate of stewed apple alongside it. I groaned as I contemplated the food—how could I possibly get used to this again? Oh, for a steaming dish of delicious Faeran soup, or just one bite of my grandmother’s chocolate cake. I attempted to shut down my tastebuds as I shovelled the mush into my mouth, wishing there was some other way to get it from the bowl to my stomach. Then, when I was halfway through, I remembered Leif’s bag. I leaped up from my seat and hurried to my bedroom to get it, tugging at the drawstring as I returned to the living room.

It was full of food—fruit, pies, cakes, coffee and . . . chocolate! I pulled out a chunk. The mouth-watering aroma wafted up my nostrils. I bit into it, rolling the delicious, melting morsel around my tongue as I continued digging through the bag. Tucked down the side was a small book covered with rainbow silk. I took it out and opened it. Inside was a photo of Leif, smiling and gorgeous. I paused for a while, stroking his face, before flipping through the
rest of the album. It was full of photos of my family, together with messages of love from my grandparents—Leif must have gone to them while I slept. The last was the photo of me with my brother Lysander. My heart instantly filled with yearning. Oh, how I wanted to know him.

‘Are you coming, Ash?’ I called as I waited by the front door for my sister. She’d been uncharacteristically quiet since I got back.

‘Just a minute,’ she said, as she went to the kitchen to get her lunch. She packed it into her backpack and joined me at the door.

‘Are you okay?’ I asked, as we walked down the stairs.

‘I’m all right. What about you? You were so upset yesterday.’

‘I was just being stupid.’

‘I know how that feels . . . I feel like a moron about the whole Jason thing.’ She kept her eyes on the ground as she spoke. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you.’

‘Don’t worry about it, I shouldn’t have interfered anyway. I knew Jason was a jerk, but how could you? Besides, when love comes into the equation . . . ’ I raised my eyebrows meaningfully.

‘Don’t you mean lust?’ she corrected, as we crossed the road.

‘Yeah, damn teenage hormones.’

‘I should have known he wasn’t really into me,’ she said, her voice laced with insecurity.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ I stopped on the footpath and grabbed her arm. I knew what she was getting at and I wasn’t having it.

‘Well, look at him. He’s this popular Year 12 guy and I’m just—me,’ she said, staring at her feet and shrugging.

‘Don’t even go there. You are
way
too good for him!’

‘That’s why I’m the one who got dumped,’ she muttered.

‘Makes no difference, you’re still too good for him,’ I assured her.

‘You have to say that, you’re my sister.’

I reached out and hugged her; the Faeran love of physical contact must have rubbed off. My human family weren’t often tactile and Ashleigh gave me a strange look, reminding me. I released her quickly.

‘That’s right, I am your sister and I don’t want to hear any more of this crap about us being different species. But that’s got nothing to do with it anyway. Jason’s nasty. I don’t care how popular he is.’

‘He
was
pretty cut when you dumped him.’

‘I had every right to break up with him—nobody owns another person.’

We started walking again.

‘I’m over it anyway. I was just upset about what he did to you.’

‘Have you seen him since?’

‘I have but it’s like nothing’s happened, I don’t even seem to exist to him any more. Not in a bad way,’ she said, glancing my way, ‘but, like he doesn’t even know me. It’s so weird . . . And he’s gone freakishly quiet too. He wanders around at lunch time looking lost half the time.’

I recalled Lorsen sending one of the guards to confuse Jason and knew it had to have been a greater power than his to have caused such a drastic change in my ex. I wondered when Leif had found the time to pay Jason a visit and just how much of his mind had been altered because of it.

‘If I tell you something will you promise not to tell Mum and Dad?’

My sister looked at me. ‘What’s up?’

‘No really, you have to promise because if they find out, they will freak.’

‘Okay, I promise.’ Her face was all impatient curiosity.

‘I wasn’t really at church camp—I was in Faera with Leif.’

‘Oh. My. God!’

‘I know and I got to meet some of my family. Want to see photos?’

‘Yes!’

We stopped in the middle of the footpath under the patchy shade of a gum tree and put our bags down. I took the album out and slowly went through the photos of my family. I reached the last and Ashleigh said, ‘Oh cute, I love twins. Who do they belong to?’

‘That Ashleigh, is a photo of me and my
twin brother
.’

‘No way!’ she gasped.

‘Way,’ I said, smiling at her surprise.

‘OMG! Does that make him my brother too?’

‘It
so
does.’

‘I always wanted a brother,’ Ashleigh said, her voice wistful.

‘Same.’

‘What’s he like?’

Heaviness filled my heart. ‘He’s lost, Ash, like I was before Leif found me.’

‘Here on Earth?’

‘I don’t know—probably.’ I packed the photo album away and slung my schoolbag over my shoulder.

‘We have to find him,’ Ashleigh announced, as we started walking again.

‘I know. Got any ideas how we might do that?’

‘Hmm, we need to think about it.’

I left Ashleigh at the school gate and went to find Hilary and Jack. They were sitting under our tree in deep conversation. I had the strangest feeling as I watched them, like I was standing
on the outside looking at a scene from the future, of when I was no longer a part of their world. They looked so content that I wondered if I would even be missed.

Finally Hilary glanced up and noticed me standing there. ‘Marla, you’re back!’ Her face wore a smile that included me instantly and I knew that our friendship would endure no matter what. She stood and gave me a hug. ‘Ash said you’d be away for a week.’

‘I came back early,’ I said, suddenly not wanting to be anywhere but with my friends.

‘Don’t suppose you and Leif have broken up?’ Jack asked, getting up.

‘Sorry, Jack.’

The hope slid off his face.

‘Oh, I wouldn’t worry about him,’ Hilary said, with a grin that couldn’t be misinterpreted.

I gave him a surprised look. ‘You’ve been getting busy while I was away, Jack?’

He shrugged. ‘No reason not to.’

‘He went out with Stella the other night and they’ve got another date planned for Saturday.’

‘She
still
after you, Jack?’

‘Can you blame her?’

‘No, not really,’ I said, smiling. ‘But how did it happen?’

Hilary was looking from one to the other of us, confused.

‘She’s been at me to take her out for years, as it happens. I thought it was about time I made her dreams come true.’ He finished the statement with a grin.

‘And you never told me!’ I was too shocked to make some comment about how much he loved himself.

He looked at me, one eyebrow lifted. ‘You’d be the last person I’d tell, don’t you think?’

‘So . . . do you like her, then?’ I asked, doing my best to deny the tightness in my chest.

He was quiet for a minute, holding my gaze as he considered. ‘I do, but ask me how much after Saturday. She has a lot to live up to.’

I smiled at the compliment.

I told Jack and Hilary the story of my kidnapping and short stay in Faera during the morning’s double English period, and later, when we sat under our tree looking at the photos of my Fae family, we considered how we might find my twin. We spoke of contacting adoption agencies and looking up old newspaper articles and lurking around allergy clinics, but we all agreed that the logical first step was to contact Lena. I made the call then and there, only to discover that she was away for two weeks and I would have to be satisfied with making an appointment for when she returned.

I couldn’t think of my brother without feeling like a squally mess and it must have shown because after the disappointment of the phone call, Hilary changed the subject.

‘What do people do in Faera, anyway?’

‘Whatever they want,’ I told her.

‘What do you mean?’ Jack asked as he plucked bits of grass from the ground and made a tepee from them. ‘What about work, survival—all that?’

‘It’s different from here; when something needs to be done, everyone just pitches in—if they want to that is—they don’t have to. And survival’s not a problem because everything is shared—not that the Fae seem to need much.’

‘So if you wanted you could sit on your butt all day and still get everything you needed?’ Jack asked.

‘Well, I suppose . . . but who would want to?’

‘Plenty of people do,’ he pointed out.

‘Maybe, but I don’t think they want to. I think if the pressure was taken off and people had the means to do what they enjoyed, they’d soon get busy. Besides, there’s no such thing as unemployment in Faera so you haven’t got all these people feeling bad about themselves because they haven’t got a job.

‘What will you do, Marla, when you go to live in Faera?’ Hilary asked.

‘
If
I go to live in Faera,’ I said, trying hard not to think of it as a given, ‘I guess I’ll do the things I’d like to be able to do here—art for sure. But there’s no formal education, so I wouldn’t go to uni to do it.’

‘How would you learn then?’ Hilary asked.

‘When I said everything is shared in Faera, I meant everything. Experts teach novices and enjoy doing it because the only students they have are the ones who actually want to learn.’

‘Wow.’

‘Faera’s an amazing place . . . But what about you? Make any decisions while I was gone?’

‘You were gone for three days,’ Jack laughed.

‘A lot can happen in three days,’ I pointed out.

‘I’m thinking law,’ Hilary said.

‘You’d be an awesome lawyer, Hil.’ Hilary would be willing to defend the most hardened criminal.

‘Well, it’s something mathematical for me,’ Jack said with a perfectly straight face.