Monsters & Fairytales (25 page)

“Sebastian! There you are!” Someone said.

I didn’t move to look. I couldn’t let go of Sebastian and risk losing him again and waking up in another strange world.

“Carlyle! How’s Father?” Sebastian asked.

He carefully turned us to face his brother.

“That is a dumb question and you know it! He’s not entirely sure whether to be angry or worried. I guess you’re lucky he's mostly worried.” Carlyle nudged his arm. It was then that he saw me. “Uh, do you know you have a human growing out of your chest?” He whispered behind his hand as if that’d make it inaudible to me.

“Yes, this is Mirabelle.”

Sebastian rushed through his words. He let go of me and I nearly fell off of him. I caught myself and steadied against the tree.

“Just curious, but your father wouldn’t happen to be worried you got stuck in my world? Because then that would mean it’s my fault and thus he’d be mad at me.”

“Your fault?!
Who is this girl?”

Carlyle chuckled. He pushed Sebastian again in that playful manner. I looked at Sebastian for answers. What was going on?
             

Carlyle stared back at me and then stiffened his back upright. He was huge; at least twice the size of Sebastian in bulk. Suddenly, I realized just how much I had been completely over exaggerating Sebastian’s build. Carlyle was the one who was seven feet tall, not to mention the muscles bulging everywhere. He was just a beast. He had a
neck that was the circumference of four average human necks, shoulders that billowed up the edge of his neck like Popeye,
arms that were the size of me, and wings that were only justifiably large due to the amount of weight they were destined to carry. His wings even curled up a few times off the ground from their sheer size. It was really something to be looking at him.

“What is it that she is staring at?” Carlyle whispered.

“She does that.” Sebastian laughed.

“Oh!” I snapped back to reality. I had completely forgotten what was going on. “Right, you said your dad was worried. I understand it’s Sebastian's job and all, but I take it that he was aware of how long he was gone for? And that would mean he’d known Sebastian had gotten stuck, and that would make it all my fault. Your dad doesn’t sound like someone to make upset.”

“He didn’t mean it-” Sebastian started to say, but Carlyle interrupted him.

“No, he is not. You are somewhat right, though, the Moreans don’t usually stay that long,
so
he was worried about that.” Carlyle said.

“Um, I thought it was pronounced mere-e-in?” I asked. I was so confused.

“No, he was just slurring his speech.” Sebastian laughed, nervously.

I saw him shake his head out of the corner of my eye. Was he trying to convince Carlyle to agree with him? Why would he do that?

“Huh?” Carlyle said. “Oh, I did say it wrong. He’s a Myrian.
Mm-hmm.
Yep.”

I didn’t buy it. He said it in a way that someone does when they finally catch on to the joke. 

“See, you’re hearing things. It must’ve been from all the transporting, or as you call it ‘apparating’. Come, let’s go see the Minakai. He’ll get you back home.”

Sebastian started to walk off. He gave a weird look to Carlyle.

“Is that like your great wizard?” I joked.

“No. It’s like our leader that knows everything.” Sebastian grinned.

He was still nervous. I rolled my eyes and looked to Carlyle. He was nervous, too. He held up his hand and made a very small wave. It almost made me want to laugh that someone three times the size of me was intimidated by me. I walked over closer to him. He hadn’t started walking yet. I stood there and just waited with my arms crossed. Carlyle laughed nervously and took a step away from me.

“Sebastian, what is this human doing?”

“I have no idea.” Sebastian sighed.

“I’m not moving until you tell me what is going on.” I said.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He laughed.

Carlyle looked to Sebastian, then to me, and then sprinted over next to him. My brain was racing. What was going on? I had to remember. I tried thinking of everything Sebastian ever told me about his race. The first thing he had said was that he was a guardian angel, then he said that was natural for humans to create fear and sometimes think of him as a boogeyman, but finally he had said his job title was actually a Maracore.

I looked at Sebastian
.“
Okay. You said you were a Maracore.

Then I turned towards Carlyle."He said you were a Morean, but you said you guys were actually Myrians. What is this?” I jumped in front of his path.

“Wow, then this must be pretty awkward for you right about now.” Carlyle said.

He patted the back of Sebastian’s shoulder then turned to walk off.

“Where are you going?” I called to Carlyle.

“Yep, this is awkward.” He said with a small squeal to his voice.

“Somebody better tell me what’s going on, or so help me!”

I plopped down on the cobblestone pathway and crossed my legs.

“I’ll explain everything once we’re there. Please, it’ll be nighttime soon. And you do not want to be on the Drybucks at night.” Sebastian begged me.

He bent down tugging on my arm, trying to get me to stand up.

“Nighttime? How much darker can this place get!”

I looked around throwing his arm off of mine.

“Huh? Brother, where’d you get this human from?” Carlyle laughed.

“It looks dark to you?” Sebastian asked me, ignoring Carlyle’s childish jokes.

He was staring very closely into my face. He looked sincerely concerned.

“Of course.
Everything is this horrid gray color. Is it not that way to you?”

I was getting worried. My heart hiccupped in my chest. Had I lost my sight?

“Our trees are a much brighter green, our sky a brighter blue, but it’s the same color scheme as your world.”

“No, no. I saw that lady. She was purple and green and yellow, and- and this is gray. Your land is all gray. You blend in. There aren’t even any leaves or grass.” I said.

“Come.”

Sebastian used his strength against me and pulled me up.

“What’s wrong?”

There was no time to play angry anymore; clearly this was more serious than a few white lies.

“Nothing.
We need to get you to the Minakai.” Sebastian said.

He started walking with his arm still on my shoulder. I wasn’t sure where he was leading us out of this circle of trees, but I was wishing he’d quit tugging on my arm that way. His hand slid down my arm and grabbed my fingers. Even with the friendly gesture, I wasn’t ready to walk next to him. I hung back as far as I could. The two of us looked more like a father tugging on his child that wanted to stay at the playground, rather than the loving couple holding hands through a park that you would have expected from our display earlier at the arcade.

“Sebastian!”

I dug my heels in to stop him. It took everything in me, but he finally stopped yanking my arm out of the socket.

“What?!”
He yelled at me.

“My purse, I left it at the arcade.” I said behind my hand that was now covering my gaping mouth. How could I forget my purse?

“Really?
Mirabelle, there are far greater things to worry about than personal belongings.” He sneered.

“I doubt it.”

I glared at him and tried to let go of his hand. He wouldn’t untangle his fingers, so I ended up crossing my arms with his still around mine.

“Come.” He commanded
.

“Oh, I’m a dog now?”
I screamed.

“No, they listen much better than you. And I’m surprised you’re not more worried about your animals at home.”

“They’ve been left at home for hours at a time. This isn’t a matter of identity theft and bankruptcy. Do you know-?”

“Enough!” He bellowed out.

I was silent. His chest was heaving through his anger. I dropped my arms. I had a feeling his hand that close to my heart wasn’t a very good idea at the moment.

“You better listen to him.” Carlyle whispered.

I looked over at him. He was still under the impression that covering his lips allowed the other person to not be aware he had said anything. Sebastian glanced in his direction then started walking again. I kept our arms as spread out as possible, but I kept our hands together. As much as my pride wanted to disobey, I followed him without resisting. Carlyle kept a pace just behind me. I wasn’t sure why he was coming along.

“You know my name, what’s yours?” Carlyle asked from behind me.

I wasn’t sure a conversation at this moment was that great of an idea, but I wasn’t going to deter the possibility of getting my mind off of Sebastian.

“You know it, Sebastian said it earlier.” I mumbled.

It didn’t work. Frustration was still the only thing that could come out of me. I had the worst temper. How my mother ever dealt with it was beyond me. She had the best patience of anyone I had ever known. I missed her. My heart hurt. The gravel road didn’t seem so uncomfortable anymore. All I wanted was to curl up and cry.

“Oh, right, sorry, a lot is clouding my mind.”

“It’s Mirabelle.”

Trying to regain some ounce of normalcy in my life, I stuck out my free hand for him to shake. He looked at it curiously then touched it. I squeezed his hand and shook.

“Mirabelle.”
He said again.

He trailed off a bit then regained his thought process.

“Am I really black to you?”

“Yes. What color are you supposed to be?” I asked.

My mind started racing with different images of Sebastian. If this whole time he wasn’t supposed to be black, but that’s what I saw, how would I react to him in another color? This was seriously weird.

“Black.”

He smiled. I stopped in my tracks. What a prick.

“Carlyle.” Sebastian whined.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you anymore. I really am black. We both are. I just wanted to try to make you smile. You seem like someone who would look a lot better smiling than that scrunched up face you’ve been displaying these past twenty minutes.” He smiled.

My brain didn’t even register the compliment. I was horrible with that sort of thing. Instead, I could only wonder what I looked like to him.

“Am I in color to you? Am I even in color to myself?” I said out loud.

I examined my arms, they were their normal peach. I held out my bangs, they were teal. How weird that I could see them and myself correctly, but nothing else. Carlyle was still staring at me.

“Yes. And I think you are very pretty. A smile does you well.” He blushed.

“You think I’m pretty? What do your women look like around here?”

Another compliment shot down within seconds. He even made it a point to be as obvious as possible. But again, I couldn’t help myself. If this handsome beast thought I was pretty, his women have to be lacking something.

“They look like us, only with womanly features.”

“Ah, makes sense.” I said. It didn’t really make sense.

I wanted to see them and compare myself to them. Not that I would honestly find anything about myself attractive, but maybe I could get some insight to what all these men lately had been seeing in me. Was it complete, utter heartache that attracted them? Did they just long for someone to hold and make better? I wish someone would want to make me better. There had to be someone out there in this world that could look at me and think, ‘I want to make her smile every day.’

I laughed. Carlyle had just said that. And Joe even said that on our date. Sebastian never did anything of that sort. But he did have this odd stare I’d catch here and there. Maybe they were confusing interesting with pretty? Was I even interesting?

“I like your lenses.”

He smiled and mimicked glasses on his own face.

“Oh, my glasses.
Thank you.”

“May I try them on?” He asked.

I didn’t want to give them up, quite honestly. My ability to stay upright was on edge enough; I was sure to fall on my face if I lost anymore sight. Besides, I could already tell how he’d look with anything human on him. Picturing him like that, he wasn’t so intimidating anymore. In fact I found him less intimidating than Sebastian; even with all his bulk. I was certain if he had been the one on my ledge that first time however, I would have had a heart attack before those violet eyes had turned maroon.

“You do trail off t a lot.” Carlyle whispered leaning over towards me.

“Oh, sorry.
Well I don’t really think blue is your color.” I smiled.

“Is that what your blue is?” He asked.

“Yes. Well, actually, it’s teal. At least I think. To be honest, I’m not sure of anything right now.”

“I understand. If it means anything, I see your colors and ours. They are combined with you.”