The Faery Keepers (21 page)

             
“Thanks for that. I mean it. But I don't know how I'm going to teach you two anything if one of you is at my throat at one point or another. This stuff is crucial if you want to survive out there.”

             
“Believe me, I know,” I sympathize, “but that's just how she is. You'll get used to it. Meanwhile, just bear with it. She's not that bad to be around, you know.”

             
“I'll take your word on it,” he smiles.  “In the
meantime
, since we're waiting anyways, you want to get out of here?”

             
I frown. “I'm sorry, but I don't really think that that's a good idea.”

             
“Why not?” he faux pouts. “I'll be on my best behavior, scouts honor.”

             
“You know that promise is worthless unless you actually were a Boy Scout.”

             
“Actually, I was, three years in a row.”

             
“No dice, I still don't think being alone with you
anywhere
is a good idea, cow boy. Maybe
someday
you know, in the distant future.”

             
“Cow boy? Where did
that
come from? In no way do I resemble someone who wears girly boots and a wide brimmed straw hat all day. Not to mention plaid. Yech. I
hate
plaid. In fact, we should stop talking about plaid right now.”

             
“
You hate plaid?
Who hate's plaid?”

             
“I do. It makes me look like a flag.”

             
I snort. “That doesn't even make sense you idiot. And cow boy boots are not
girly
. Hence the whole
boy
part in cow
boy
.”

             
“Let me guess, you own like three pairs don't you?”

             
“One,” I sniff. “And they are actually really comfortable.” Of all the shoes I own, not very many mind you, I don't have a whole separate closet for them or anything, cow boy boots are one of my favorites. Next to my sneakers that is.

             
“Point made. They are
girly
.”

             
“Nyla, how on Earth do you live with this boy?” I call to the kitchen and get no response. Smart woman, I think.

             
“This is where you jump in and say that it's a blessing having me here and you wouldn't be able to live with yourself if I weren't! Nyla!” Still no response. “Well. I see where your loyalties lie. Does anybody else get the feeling that I'm talking to a wall here? Because I sure do.”

             
By now I'm laughing outright. “Oh come on Derek, she can't love you that much!”

             
He glances at me then back at the door, worry starting to line his face.

             
“What? What is it?” I ask, sobering up immediately.

             
He shushes me with a finger to his lips. “Nyla?”

             
No answer.

             
He jumps up and bounds to the door, throwing it open so fast that it all looks like one blurred movement. At least he tries to open the door, but it sticks after a few inches and doesn't budge. He raises his eyebrows and shoves at it until it moves a little more
than
more. When it doesn't give much he backs up and runs at it, forcing it open with his shoulder. Finally, it's open enough for him to squeeze through sideways, albeit he's rubbing his shoulder and wincing slightly.

             
I'm going to ask if he's OK, but he's already moving past the door and looking down at whatever was blocking it.

             
I don't think I've ever heard Derek gasp, but as I'm sure you've heard before, there's a first time for everything. He swears and there's an intake of breath. Then he asks in a scary calm voice, “Kate, can you get some blankets from the cabinet in the far corner over there and spread them out on the couch?”

             
I don't hesitate and go to the cabinet he described and pull out multiple blankets, which vary in shades of brown, just as he asked and lay them out over the sofa smoothing them down carefully. The kitchen doorway is unobstructed now and Derek is there striding forward while carrying a very limp Nyla in his arms. Her head is lolled back over his arm and her raven braids dangle beneath her eerily, she looks like a limp doll. He hurries over and sets her gently on the couch and gestures for me to hand him more blankets which he tenderly covers her with, tucking in the corners.

             
“What's wrong with her?” I ask unable to stop the flashbacks of myself being in this situation no more than a few days ago.

             
“I'm not sure yet,” he admits, his voice still in that scary calm mode, flat and emotionless. He peels back Nyla's eyelid, none too gently, and the pupil behind is rolled back in her head, darting drastically back and forth in her skull. Derek swears again. “Just as I thought. Watch her, I'll be right back. Give me two seconds, tops.”

             
I barely nod and he's off up a set of stairs that was previously concealed behind a plain wooden door.  A few heart beats later he's back and slightly out of breath holding a tiny vial nearly filled to the brim with cloudy blue liquid.

             
“One drop should do the trick,” he murmurs seemingly to himself as he pries open Nyla's mouth and administers a single drop down her throat. She swallows and sighs, falling into a more peaceful sleep.

             
I swallow, shifting my eyes from her to Derek unable to find my voice for a second. “What
was
that? Was she
poisoned
?” my voice sounds shrill in my ears.

             
“Yes,” Derek says grimly, shaking his head. “But
how
? It doesn't make sense. Not much gets by Nyla . . .” he straightens from kneeling beside her and strides into the kitchen. I look at Nyla warily and follow him. When I walk into the kitchen, a tiny room with cupboards full of crockery and cups and a fireplace with a spit hanging over tiny receding flames, I find Derek ransacking the place. The only modern thing in the whole joint is a small refrigerator that is not apparent at first because the door blends in perfectly with all of the wood.  He comes over and opens the door, moving around the pop bottles and left over food dishes and a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables. A vegetarian’s heaven. One question niggles at the back of my mind, though, how do they have a fridge in the first place? Don't they have iron in them? I'm no expert but I'm pretty sure there's some amount of the metal in it.

             
Derek catches my questioning look as he looks up from it. “We had it specially made at the factory so that there were no harmful components in it.”

             
“How did you explain that? That there couldn't be any iron?”

             
“Easy, we just told them we had allergies. Believable enough, right?”

             
“Um, sure. . .”  I wasn't going to touch the fact that any given human had iron in them at all times anyways in their blood. So did that mean if we bled on a Faery that they'd weaken? Hmm . . . Interesting.

             
“What's going on in that head of yours? I know that look by now.”

             
“Oh, nothing. Hey, wait! Open the fridge back up!” It had just clicked, but I sure hoped that I was wrong. Dead wrong.

             
He did and sure enough just visible beneath a bushel of green grapes was a small, glass container with oval, orange shapes sitting innocently inside.
Not innocent by far you wicked little fruits!
“I think this is what she was poisoned by,” I say, uncovering the container and showing it to him.

             
He swears colorfully. “Chrysantha
.
I should have
known
.” He opens the lid gingerly. Sure enough, there's a little grape-like fruit that's half eaten and some that seem to be missing. How many did she eat?

             
“You see, it's not the fruit itself that's poisonous. Chrysantha has a special serum that she has injected in these for prisoners that are particularly hard to break. Then she offers them the antidote only if they cooperate. Many of them break, fearing their own death and by then they're too delusional by then to really think straight anyways. For future reference, it'd probably be safest to stay far away from anything that looks like this,” he gestures to the container.

             
“Well, that's a given. Trust me; I've learned that lesson already. The point is moot.”

             
“I guess that's a good thing. I don't think I want to go through
this
again.”

             
“Yeah, I think that would be best,” I agree. “So what do we do now? Just wait for her to wake up?”

             
“Basically,” he nods. “I mean there's not much else we can do except let the antidote run its' course. She'll be back to herself in no time, trust me.”

             
“I guess that's good.”
             

             
*We fall into an uncomfortable silence.

             
“Well, Maggie should be back sometime soon,” I offer to break the silence.

             
Derek makes a sound somewhere between a grunt and a snort. “Yeah, and
that's
comforting.”

             
“Hey—”

             
There's a loud bang in the other room that cuts me off from saying something like “don't talk about my best friend like that!” and the both of us turn and alert towards it, much like dogs on the hunt. “What's going on in here?” comes Maggie's alarmed voice from the living room.

             
“Speak of the devil and
s
he shall appear,” Derek mutters and strides out to greet her. Sighing, I follow.

             
“Hey Mags,” I greet tiredly.

             
“What the hell happened while I was gone? Did you all go to some rave and get madly drunk or something? And if so, why wasn't I invited?”

             
I shake my head. “No. And if you shut up for two seconds I'll tell you.”

             
When I'm finished Maggie's face looks tired and drawn. “Man. We can't do anything, can we?”

             
“No, “I'm sorry Derek for how I've treated you” or apologetic groveling at my feet?” Derek grumbles quietly, his eyes are to the wall. Maggie sneers at him and rolls her eyes but doesn't utter a word about it. Well how about that? I do a little victory dance in my head. Progress. Yay.

             
“Knock it off, Derek,” I scold sounding like mother hen but
someone
has to keep these two in line.  “At least she came back,” I smile at my best friend. Some things don't change, even when the whole world tells you otherwise.

             
A few weeks pass in a whirl wind. Our lessons with Derek have become an almost daily
event, much to my mother’s disapproval. She hasn't said much to me about it, but I know that she doesn't like it. Thankfully, she keeps her opinions to herself.

             
“I want to meet this boy,” she says suddenly one Wednesday afternoon after we've finished up our lunch. Well, my lunch, her breakfast. The days til the start of school are ticking off on my mental calendar with much too much speed for my liking. Summer is coming to a dreary close, the nights are becoming longer, the days cooler. Soon everything will turn orange and brown and leaves will crunch beneath my feet on the sidewalk on my daily jaunt to Nyla's house with Maggie.

             
“What?” I start; losing my grip on the plate I'm holding and sending it clattering into the kitchen sink spraying sandwich crumbs everywhere.

             
“You heard me. I want to meet him. If my daughter and her best friend are seeing someone on a daily basis is it so odd for me to want to meet them? As a mother I have the right to meet the boy. I'm not asking, Katelyn.” She adds in her strict “no funny business” tone.
I'm the mom and what I say goes
her face basically screams at me, daring me to protest.

             
I sigh, exasperated. There really is no winning with her. “Fine. When?”

             
“Dinner. This Saturday evening. I have off so how about six thirty,
sharp
. You know how I feel about punctuality.”