The Star Child (The Star Child Series) (16 page)

When we first laid eyes on a purple cat, I learned my lesson. “Loo–”

“Shush.” Calienta slapped my hand.

“Sorry,” I replied, which led to another hand slap.

We continued on and the landscape began to change as we made our descent down the mountain. Slowly, the wooded forests gave way to boggy marshland. Fortunately, there was an overgrown footpath to walk across the landscape, but that didn’t make me feel any easier about it.

I’d made it to the end of the path when two things happened at once: The first was that I suddenly found myself in new, rather tight-fitting clothing, sporting a red coat and a hat. The second was that an animated human skeleton appeared in the middle of the road. It seemed unbelievably authentic and smelled of rotting human flesh. I started to cover my mouth and Calienta stopped me. It looked like Brigid’s protection was kicking into gear.

“What do I say?” Nothing had prepared me to actually speak to a one of them.

“Leave it to me.” Calienta’s calm voice was a promise. “Far Darrig, I command that you show yourself. I am not interested in your petty practical jokes.”

My voice sounded impatient, so I did my best to take on the stance of someone who seemed both ambivalent and annoyed at the same time. I crossed my arms in front of me as a loud popping sound rang through the air. The skeleton disappeared, only to be replaced by a little man in a red cap and coat, who couldn’t have been more than three feet tall.

“I have business here.” My voice was stern though fear permeated my skin. Although in my human form I was three feet taller than this little man, he had powers that I didn’t understand. I was intelligent enough to know when I was outmatched. What if we were found out? My heart was slamming against my ribs, and it seemed to me as though everyone could hear it.

“Come with me, my friend, and we will find the mortals. They will give us good sport this day,” Far Darrig cried in a nasally voice. He raised his hands to perform some sort of magick, and I wasted no time improvising. I hoped that it was the right way to go.

 “It is I, your master. You will leave this place at once or suffer the consequences.”
There, take that, punk
.

The little man put down his arms and started to shake in his boots, but he didn’t move from his spot. He seemed rooted in place.

“I have business here.”

And then with a bow and a pop, the little man turned into the rotting skeleton again and skipped down the path, giggling to himself, no doubt searching for his next victim. I breathed gently, taking air back into my lungs as I returned to my previous height and disguise.

Calienta’s words were a whisper. “We mustn’t linger here.”

“Good. Those leather pants were pretty tight. Nice job with the creepy voice, by the way, I had no idea what to say.”

Exhaustion began to plague me as I suddenly wondered how long we’d been at this. I looked at my watch. It was three o’clock, but I didn’t know whether it was a.m. or p.m. I assumed a.m. However, as Calienta had pointed out, time was different here in this world below my own, so it could have been a week later for all I knew.

The bogs gave way to forest again, but the trees were more spaced out, easier to navigate. The sun was out, or what I assumed was the sun, though we were underground. Learning from our earlier mistakes, we kept fistfuls of salt ready in our pockets and walked in tense positions, hands at the ready in case we needed to protect ourselves. We wouldn’t stop to rest, and I didn’t ask about it. Calienta would want to keep going. So onward we went.

After a time, the woods were overcome by darkness, and the odd shapes and sounds started to give me the creeps. This impression I kept to myself; I was a brave warrior, after all. When she produced a small lighted lantern from who knew where, I tried not to let my relief show. I took the lamp from her. The path wound familiarly in front of me.

In a heartbeat, I found myself lying flat on my back. Although the path seemingly continued on for miles, the way was blocked. Upon closer inspection, it appeared as though a glass window was preventing us from going any further. Anxiously, I looked at the path through the glass. The path was visible but we were unable to follow it.

Calienta whispered, “There is a password. I don’t know what it is, but we must wait for others to come whom we can follow in.” My own concerns were put on the back burner at the tone of frustration in her voice. She pulled me behind a tree that lay off the path.

“Do you think we should guess?” I suggested.

“No. A wrong password could take us somewhere that we definitely don’t want to go.”

Slowly, we sat down on the soft grass. The events of the day were catching up with me and I was sorely tempted to go to sleep. However, I was very concerned about Calienta. What must she be feeling, wondering if her own father would live or die?

“I want you to know that I do realize that you didn’t have to come with me.” Slowly she reappeared before me until I could plainly read the worry on her face. Her eyes burned into mine. The only sound was that of her quiet breathing; I was holding my own breath.

“Yes, I do. Don’t take offense, but that’s a ridiculous statement.”

“No, it’s not. We barely know each other. We’ve only met and yet here you are. You could have stayed behind.” She looked down at the ground, not meeting my eyes.

Lying down, I propped myself up on my side, leaning against my elbow in the cool, damp grass. With my free hand, I pulled her down to the ground to mirror my position. “It is ridiculous, because I love you.”

She stared at me in disbelief. Words seemed to have escaped her.

“Wow, I thought it would be much harder to tell you that.” The words were always there; they were only waiting for me to say them.

“You love me?”

“You must know that I do.”

“When did that happen?”

“I’m not sure, but it did. All I know is from the moment that we first met I didn’t want to be apart from you. Not ever.”

“But we’ve planned out your life for you. As I watch you make this journey I realize that, while I may live, it could cost you your life.” She was insistent, leaving no stone of doubt unturned.

“Yours would be a worthy cause to die for.”

She started to cry; quiet tear tracks streaked down her face as she let my arms envelop her. She felt so right there; my arms were made to hold only her.

“And would you grieve for me if I were to die during this journey? Would you feel the same devastation that I’d feel if I lost you?”

She didn’t speak for a moment and I worried that I had asked too much of her. I was mortal; she was a goddess.
What if I’d imagined there was more between us than there actually was?

“I would lose part of my soul. I’ve always known that there could be no one else for me.”

My heart was trying to pound its way out of my chest. “Even without the Pagan prophecies?” This had been a silent fear of mine from the beginning. We were really laying it all out on the table now.

“The prophecies paved the way for us to be together, but I wonder if I’d have found you even without them.” Tenderness colored her words.

“You’ve no idea what you’ve given me. Before you came into my life, I was on my own. The world was gray and unfeeling. There was no sense of belonging for me, no welcoming home. Only Gran’s home was a refuge and one that I rarely had the privilege of seeking. I met you that day on the beach, and you brought light and warmth into my life. I wanted you. You gave me this incredible sense of belonging. I can’t explain it.”

“You don’t have to. I understand.”

“You’re everything that I could ever have imagined for myself and more.” I thought briefly about the journals and drawings that I’d dedicated to Calienta. When this ordeal ended, I’d show them to her and give them to her as a wedding present, if I had the opportunity to marry her.

Suddenly, we were kissing as though every second could be our last. In the brief periods where our lips were apart, we spoke.

“You kept me going,” I told her. “You helped me to become who I am in so many ways. You and Gran, you both saved me.”

“Saved you from what?”

“From becoming my father.” I tried not to sound bitter.

“No. You don’t understand. You were never going to become him.”

“How could you know what I’d become?”

“Because too many things have happened to you; terrible, horrible things have happened. Yet you always chose the path of goodness and you didn’t let these things change you. I think it’s because you have much of your mother in you. Even if you had never met me, even if you did not have your gran, you would have become the man you are.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE TROOPING FAERIES

Before I could respond, there was singing and the pounding of what sounded like a herd of wild horses. As I cautiously looked out from around the tree, I was shocked to see a large group of small men and women in green jackets riding tiny white horses across the wood.

“Trooping faeries,” whispered Calienta.

Though I stared at the tiny crew transfixed, my attention was pulled away by Calienta’s quiet laughing. I guessed that my appearance had changed again.

Turning, I looked at my reflection in the shaded pond behind us. In the water, I looked about two feet tall and was clothed in the same riding gear of a hunter: green vest and pants. Across my face were speckles of glitter, and my now violet eyes almost glowed with excitement.

I must have been leaning too close to the water, because Calienta called my name in warning. It was no good, however. Two claw-like hands reached out of the water and pulled me in. I fought back, kicking and punching, but the creature started pulling me to the bottom.

The small pond was pitch black even in the breaking light of the early morning, and I could see nothing except for a pair of red eyes that were peeking out at me from behind the underwater plants. I continued to fight but I was running out of air and energy.

A new pair of hands grabbed me and pulled me upward, toward the light. As my head broke the surface, I gulped air, letting the hands pull me to the shoreline.

“There, there. You should not have gotten so close to the water. Are you all right?” Expecting to hear Calienta’s voice, I frantically wiped at my eyes when the words were spoken in a high-pitched, almost girlish voice. Sputtering and blinking on the bank of the pond, I tried to gain my bearings. It was a challenge not to cry out when I finally raised my lids, for before me stood a troop of little people. Their expressions ranged from indifference to hostility to concern.

“Greetings, and thank you,” I heard myself respond as I was hauled out of the water.

“I am Dagné,” said the faerie that had first spoken to me.

“Hi, Dagné. I’m…Manuel.” It was the best I could come up with on short notice.

A blond faerie gave me the once-over. “Manuel, an unusual name, certainly. You have lost your troop. Please come and join us at our home for a feast.” Though the last sentence was an invitation, the tone of voice made it a challenge. I could tell already that some of them didn’t trust me. There would be no choice but to go with them.

“It would be an honor.” Unsure of the appropriate response, I bowed to him. I realized that may have been overdoing it, but what could it hurt? Several of the faeries smiled in approval so I must have been on the right path.

One member of the troop, a girl by all appearances, winked at me from the back of the group and blew me a kiss before conjuring another white pony from thin air.

“Thank you.” Smiling, I climbed on the back of the animal, wondering how I was going to get out of this one.

“Eat or drink nothing.” Calienta whispered this in my ear as we started to trot the animals toward the glass barrier. My eyes widened as I searched my peripheral vision for her, but I gave no additional sign that I knew she was there. Calienta had made herself invisible when the faeries arrived so I doubted it was safe for her.

“Cali.” A little man in the front of the group spoke. Would Calienta have been able to hear that?

Instantly the glass vanished and the troop began to pass through. As I took the opportunity to ride in with them, I only hoped that Calienta, in her invisibility, was behind me. There was certainly no way that I’d be able to look for her without being conspicuous as we passed through the glass and out into an open field. There were high blades of grass dancing in the wind, which had picked up into a cool breeze now. The air smelled of lavender and some other scent that I didn’t recognize.

The scene should have been calming and relaxing, but it did nothing for me. I needed to think about a way out. Closing my eyes, I tried to sense whether Calienta was with us. So in tune was I with her emotions that I was certain I’d know it if she wasn’t with me. I kept forgetting to ask her why that was.

Nothing.
She wasn’t there. Suddenly, my world came crashing down as I realized that I was alone with the faeries. They seemed benign enough, but they’d turn on me if given the slightest inclination.

“We will go to our palace and have a feast, Manuel. You must tell us how you got here.” The blond man on the horse in front of me had spoken. There was suspicion in his tone and I wondered how I was going to answer his question.

“Si.” God, I was such an idiot.

We continued across the fields. In my memory, I couldn’t remember ever having been this hungry or exhausted. The tension was making my body ache. I wondered at first if this was because I’d shrunk in size, but then I remembered that this was only an illusion; I was still really my normal size. Looking down at the small white pony on which I rode, I noted that he seemed more winded than the other horses.

Our group cantered through the field until the female who’d fussed over me finally spoke. “Welcome to our home.”

An open field spread before me. There was no house there and absolutely nothing remarkable about it. Yet the group dismounted and walked briskly in the direction of nothing. Dismounting as well, I walked through the tall grass, which came to my shoulders.