Reckonings (7 page)

“You going somewhere, lad?” Kenny asked.

“I think you're right,” Tim replied. “The only way I'll get a grip on this magic thing is if I face it dead on.”

Kenny nodded. “And what do you intend to do?”

“Get some answers. Or at least, try to. I think to figure out who I am, I need to understand where I came from—how I happened.”

“That's a way to begin,” Kenny said.

“So I think I'll go have a little talk with Mummy Dearest. It's time to return to Faerie.”

M
OLLY O'REILLY GRIPPED THE
pitchfork and tossed soiled hay onto the growing pile behind her.
Keep focused on your task
, she thought.
If you start thinking too much, you'll get angry all over again.

“But I have a right to be angry,” she muttered. “Grown-ups are complete dictators. Kids have no say in anything.” She grunted and pitched another forkful of hay.
Fine, I broke my curfew and snuck out while I was grounded. They acted like I killed somebody! And I wasn't even with Tim, which was what they were so worried about.

So now I'm in exile. Sent to Gran's farm out here in the country. Miles from London. Miles from Tim. Not even a chance to say good-bye.

Molly stood the pitchfork upright in the ground. She leaned on it, wiping her dark wavy hair away from her sweaty face.
As if Gran isn't a
bad influence
, Molly thought,
with all of her fairy stories and so-called encounters with the wee folk. Though I guess I shouldn't scoff anymore
, Molly realized.
I've had close encounters of the weird kind myself lately.

Molly yanked the pitchfork out of the dirt, leaned it against the side of the barn, grabbed a bucket, and started pouring water into the horse troughs.

“Bless me, child, don't you ever slow down?” Molly's granny Fiona appeared in the barn doorway. “I get tired just watching you.”

“Then don't watch me,” Molly grumbled.

“None of that cheek,” Gran warned. “I know you're unhappy about the situation, but that's no cause to be rude to one who's done you no harm.”

Molly sighed. “I'm sorry, Gran. You're right. None of this is your fault.”

Gran crossed to Molly and put her hands on both of Molly's shoulders. Gran was thick and short, no taller than Molly, so she could gaze deeply into Molly's eyes. Her lined face grew even more wrinkled as a frown creased her forehead.

“You're pale, lass, and out of sorts. Take Turnip out of the corral and go for a ride. Get some wind in your hair, color in your cheeks.”

“I don't feel like riding,” Molly protested.

“Are you telling me that you feel like doing all
my chores several times over? And moping the whole time while you do so?” Gran took a step back and laughed. “Why, if that's true, then you are more tetched in the head than I am!”

“I'm not!” Molly protested. “I just…”

“You want to keep busy, I know, gel. But there are ways and there are ways.”

Gran turned away, leaving Molly puzzled. Did this mean that Molly was being ordered to go for a ride? Or did it mean that a ride was merely a suggestion, and she could go back to mucking out the barn?

She liked that word. Muck was exactly how she felt.

“All right then, lassie,” Gran declared, picking up a knapsack she'd brought in with her. “Ready you are.”

So it had been an order after all.

“I packed you a nice lunch and goodies for the fairies. Maybe they'll join you for tea!” Gran chuckled. “You should take your picnic up to Leanan Hill. There's wisdom up there.” She left the knapsack in the doorway and trundled off.

“Fairies,” Molly grumbled, picking up the leather knapsack. “Oof. That's heavy. I guess fairies are big eaters. Who knew?”

Molly trudged out of the barn to the corral. Turnip, a large bay mare, stood grazing, her tail
whisking away flies. Molly dropped the knapsack inside the wooden fence, then clambered up and over it. She dropped down into the corral with a soft thud.

“Like a ride is going to solve my problems,” Molly complained. “But do I have a choice?” she continued, her voice growing louder as she got angrier. “Oh, of course not. Darn Gran.” Molly kicked a rock. “Darn all grown-ups!” she shouted.

Startled, Turnip whinnied and trotted away. “Darn you, too, Tim!” she called after the retreating horse. Realizing what she'd said, her face flushed. “Turnip,” she said through gritted teeth. “I meant Turnip.”

She stormed back to where she'd dropped the knapsack and rummaged through it. “Mmm. Let's see.” She felt around until she found a carrot. “Brilliant. Gran, you think of everything.”

She stood back up. “Turnip!” She held the bribe over her head and waved it. “Yo! Turnip. I've got a carrot for you. Carrot!”

The horse eyed Molly, then clip-clopped back to her. Turnip nuzzled her to get at the carrot, and Molly let the mare take it with her big teeth. She stroked the horse's velvety nose and thought of the beautiful unicorn that she had met with Tim.

Tim
. She shook her head, as if trying to dislodge him from her mind, and led the horse to the
fence where riding gear waited. She slid in Turnip's bit, and slung the saddle over her high back, tightening the girth. Placing a foot in a stirrup, Molly lifted herself up onto the horse. “Well, let's go, if we must.” She jingled the reins, and pointed Turnip out of the corral and onto the road to Leanan Hill.

Why is Gran making me do this anyway?
Molly wondered.
Dad would say it's because she's touched in the head
. Molly recalled some of the stories he'd told about Gran. Like all the times he'd come home to find her dancing around the house with a skillet, swatting at the invisible fairies. Whenever Molly's father was particularly angry at Molly, he'd warn that she was becoming too much like her crazy gran.

“If that's what constitutes the definition of daft, I suppose I am,” Molly declared. “I've seen fairies. Well, not anywhere around here, and they weren't invisible like the ones Gran seems to do battle with. But I have seen them.

“Actually,” Molly continued, “to be exact about it, I've seen people from the land of Faerie. I wonder if that's the same thing.”

Molly felt a slight chill as the thick foliage of the tall trees created a canopy that blocked the sun. “If Dad really thinks Granny is such a loon, would he have stuck me up here with her? I don't think so.”

The path wound its way through the quiet woods. As Molly listened to the birdcalls and felt the soft breeze ruffle her hair, she began to grip the reins less tightly. Tension eased out of her, the soft sway of the horse beneath her lulling her into something approximating peace.

Maybe Gran isn't so kooky after all
, Molly thought. She considered trying to work herself back up into her bad mood, just to prove Gran wrong, but then decided that would be stupid. Even stupider than talking back to her parents after she was caught sneaking out again—which was how she landed here in exile. “One of those dumb things you do that doesn't hurt anyone but you,” Molly said.

Soon she emerged from the wooded area and saw the large, mysterious stones that marked the top of Leanan Hill. She headed Turnip up the path.
It really is beautiful up here,
she noted. She breathed in the scent of heather and noticed that the grass sparkled emerald green in the late afternoon sunlight.

“Here we are,” Molly told Turnip. She swung down from the saddle and took off the knapsack. The horse immediately began munching on the grass. “Enjoy your lunch,” Molly said, giving the flank a pat. “I wonder what Gran packed for me, other than carrots.”

She reached into the knapsack and felt…paper? Had Gran included a note? She pulled out an envelope. No, it wasn't a note; it was a letter from Marya.

Molly sat back against one of the tall stones to read, enjoying its warm solidity. The sun's warmth had been baked right into the rock, and it relaxed Molly's tight muscles even more.

There were stories about the stones on Leanan Hill. Some said they were put there back in the days of the Druids for their rituals. Others claimed that the stones actually
were
those same Druids, now transformed and lending power to the spot for magical workings. Gran had always told Molly the stones were people who had crossed the fairies. After seeing Titania, the Faerie Queen, in action, Molly could well believe it.

But right now the stone didn't feel like anything other than a good sturdy support. Something she was in serious need of.

Dear Molly,
Marya had written:

 

I don't know how to tell you this, because I think you will be upset, but I also know I must. I ran into Tim yesterday while I was out walking the puppy, and he looked truly terrible. He was upset and admitted he was confused. After I left him, I realized that he knew the puppy's name was Daniel! I didn't figure
it out at the time, but the only way for Tim to have known that was if he had somehow been there that night and saw the Body Artist work her magic. Which means…

 

Molly crumpled the paper, unable to read another word. She knew exactly what that meant. It meant that Tim had heard everything she and Marya had said. That he now knew all about what he might grow up to do. And he knew she was thinking of breaking up with him for it.

Molly dropped Marya's letter and covered her face
. He must feel so awful
, she thought. Tim felt things so strongly, and with all he was going through now, finding out that he might grow up to be evil—that he could become a dragon—might push him right over the edge. “And I'm not there for him to talk to,” she murmured. Then a new thought chilled her. “Will he even talk to me after what he heard me saying? And can I be brave enough to talk to him?”

She pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged them tightly. Why hadn't she just been honest with him and told him all she knew when she had the chance? To find out this way was so much worse. Tears sprang into her eyes. “Poor Tim.”

What must it have felt like to have overheard
that conversation?
Like betrayal, that's what.
To have to listen to someone you trust talking about abandoning you like that. A total stunner. And worse, he'd been given no way to defend himself to her.
And worse than that
, Molly thought, stacking up worse and worsers,
must have been hearing that he could grow up to be evil!

Molly found herself standing, pacing. “I have to talk to him.”
But how?
She stopped abruptly.
It's not like Gran's wired for telecommunication. She doesn't even have a phone, not to mention e-mail. And it's not likely that Tim will come strolling up the lane out here
. “I wish he would. Or I wish I could go see him.”

Wishes. Didn't Gran always say you could ask the fairies for wishes?
On the top of Leanan Hill, as a matter of fact.

She tried to remember everything her gran had ever told her, all those stories she had dismissed as, well, fairy tales. There were nursery rhymes and bedtime tales and strange little folk sayings, and now Molly scolded herself for not paying more attention. Still, she couldn't be too hard on herself. How could she possibly have known that Gran might have been on to something—that all those stories might be real? Or realish.

Molly thought about the little sprites Gran
had described, and then recalled Auberon and Titania, the King and Queen of Faerie. Were they the same species as Gran's little fluttering winged mischief makers? It didn't seem possible. Titania and Auberon hadn't seemed like the types to grant wishes, either. Gran's wish-granting sprites must be of a different order; related but different. Kind of like the difference between house cats and panthers.

“I think I'm supposed to make an offering,” Molly recalled. “Maybe there's something in the knapsack I can use.”

Molly stood and Turnip snuffled her elbow, perhaps in search of another carrot. “Hm.” She gazed at the horse for a minute. “I'm not too sure how little fairy creatures feel about horses.” She walked around the horse and gave it a sharp whap on the rump, shouting “Hah! Go! Go home!”

Turnip took the hint. The horse galloped down Leanan Hill and headed toward the woods. Molly stood with her hands on her hips, watching it go. “Granny's fairies had better be as real as Tim's,” she muttered. “I'm going to be pretty cranky if I have to walk home without getting a few good wishes first.”

Molly was bending down to look through the knapsack when she noticed the ring of toadstools in front of the stones. It triggered another
memory. “That's called a fairy ring,” Molly said, getting more excited. “Gran always warned me to never sit inside a fairy ring or I'd end up kidnapped by the wee ones. Excellent. Now I know where to put this offering—if I can find one.”

She rummaged through the knapsack.
Gran was very thorough in putting together this picnic
.
She actually packed me a picnic blanket
. She pulled it out and laid it over her knees, suddenly feeling stupid. She sank back onto her heels and shook her head. “How pathetic am I? I'm actually trying to invite a fairy to tea so that it will grant me a wish.”

She placed the blanket in the center of the fairy ring. “I'm sure glad there aren't any witnesses up here. I'd never live it down.” She eyed the monumental stones looming above her. “You're not going to tell anyone, are you?” She laughed and shook her head. “And now I'm talking to rocks! I think I'm the blockhead here.”

Gran was probably making it all up
, Molly thought, her hope flagging again.
Besides, fairies probably don't like tea. They probably go for dewdrops and flower nectar or something.

Her fingers closed around a tiny object. She pulled it from the knapsack and stared at it.

In her hand was a tiny, elegantly carved teapot! Painted a pale blue, it was designed to
look like a flower, and it was just about the size of a thimble. And, Molly realized, once she opened the tiny top, it even had tea in it!

I guess Gran wasn't kidding after all
. Molly carefully placed the delicate teapot in the center of the picnic blanket. She pulled out several beautiful flower-shaped cups and saucers, each painted a translucent pastel color.