Enchanted Revenge (4 page)

“Yes.”

“Good.” He grabbed my hand and together we walked into the triangle.

Being in a porta was nothing like being in a tripudio.

It was like I was in a triangle tunnel. The walls were angled to a point at the top. But everywhere around me was glass. Or at least it looked like it. Like stained glass, with tiny, rectangle tiles forming the walls. The colors were amazing, breathtaking. Rubies and emeralds, sapphires and amethyst. They all blurred together and wove within one another behind the glazed wall.

It was as if the colors moved, like beyond the wall was an ocean of different hues and pigments all swirling together. Brilliant silky water flowed and pulsed behind the glass.

“It’s so beautiful,” I said, more to myself than to him. Though he answered me anyway.

“Yes it is. I’ll never forget my first trip through a porta. I was in training to become a Realm Guard, and we had to prove our ability to efficiently navigate a porta.”  He paused to look down at me. “Apparently it is difficult for
so-ome
.” He drew out the word ‘some’ to make it two syllables, then he winked.

“Ha!” The laugh shocked me more than I could’ve expected.

I mentally added cocky to my list of adjectives to describe this strange fairy. Still, the distraction was proving strong.

Really, if I didn’t try to add some humor into things, I would go crazy trying to believe everything I was already seeing. They say ‘seeing is believing’, but sometimes even when you
do
see it, you still can’t believe it.

“Can you portal to anywhere in your home?” He looked back at me to speak, but I added on before he could correct me, “I mean, other than the Floating place.”

He smiled again and said, “You can enter and exit a porta, only at a porta. As I said, it is a place of strong magic. So we will exit through another porta. You cannot portal to Kamalani because there isn’t a porta there. It’s in the air above us. In the sky.”

“Oh,” was all I could think to say.

From the darkness inside the tunnel, despite the flowing colors beyond the glass walls, it was obvious to see the exit as soon as it appeared. It was another bright, white triangle, far off in the distance. It looked like we would have to walk another ten minutes before we would reach it, but Alec stopped walking as soon as I noticed the white light.

I could barely stop the urge I had to yell,
Don’t go into the light
! But I wasn’t sure if fairies watched
Poltergeist
and I really didn’t want to sound like a freak.

“We have arrived.” And though we stopped moving, the white triangle grew, just as it had back in Texas.

I tried to see through the white triangle, so that I might be able to see the fairy world, but I could only see white. When the triangle was about three feet long, the light got so bright I had to close my eyes. It was like I was looking directly at the sun, in the middle of the afternoon in the dead of summer. Even with my eyes closed, the lights burned through my eyelids, and I could only see red.

I still felt Alec’s hand in mine. And when he started walking forward, I made my legs move with him despite my fear of the unknown.

At first I just stood there and felt out my surroundings. It was not cold, and I felt an insatiable urge to strip my jacket and beanie off. There was a light breeze and the suns warmth beat down on me. Birds chirped in the distance and a few other things rustled the leaves, like squirrels or some other tiny animal scurrying around in the trees.

It smelled fresh. Like spring and summer combined. I could smell flowers, plants, and the dirt that gave them life as if I was in the middle of a huge garden with every kind of flower blooming all around me. I could smell everything; it was like freakin sensory overload. So many smells combined as they rushed into me.

My heart beat increase and my hands began sweating. And I even got a nauseous, rolling feeling in my stomach. If it was this overwhelming with my eyes closed, how could I ever open them? This place that apparently I had come from. This place that was my parent’s home. How could it ever be my home?

Alec moved in front of me and grab both of my arms, just above my elbows. Heat from his body brushed into me.

“Open your eyes, Lily,” he breathed into my ear. The warmth from his breath caused goosebumps to pop up under my many layers of clothes, and I almost shivered despite how warm I was.

Still, I obeyed him.

All around me I saw green and brown. Brown and green. Bright green, dark green, blue green and yellow green. Reddish brown, and yellowish brown. And grayish brown and blackish brown. So many different colors, but still only green and brown.

It was obviously a forested area I stood in. The leaves that hung from the branches were so numerous and plentiful that I couldn’t even see a sliver of sky beyond them.

I turned in a circle, and all around me were trees. Aspen and Pine Trees. Oaks and Birch. Giant Redwoods and tiny Dogwoods. So many, everywhere I looked. And then I stopped twirling and recognized the thin dirt path to my left to be a trail. A destination. A course to follow. And I remembered my conviction. My promise.

I turned to Alec and my jaw dropped at his appearance. He must have shrunk a lot, leaving him only an inch or two taller than me.  His blond hair was whiter than before, creating a halo around his face. His eyes shone like emeralds in the sun, despite the sunlight being masked by the tree tops. And his lips looked fuller and pinker.

He now wore khaki pants and a light blue button up shirt, with a dark blue blazer over it. Over his left breast he wore a medal of some sort.

But even more astonishing than those miniscule changes were his wings. Wings! They were huge. Not like a birds wings, there weren’t any feathers. They weren’t colorful like a butterflies wings. Instead they were gossamer thin, and nearly see through. The intricate designs woven throughout them were marvelous, I felt certain I could have spent all day studying them, and still there would be more I hadn’t seen.

“Beautiful,” I murmured, before I could stop myself.

“Yes, it is beautiful here,” he said, mistaking my words. “Welcome to the Empyrean, Land of the Fae.” As he said it he lifted his arms, as if to showcase the landscape like a masterpiece of art. “Welcome home, Lily.”

“You have wings!” I said, because once again I couldn’t stop myself. He chuckled as I stated the obvious.

“I am Sylph. All Sylph after the age of seventeen grow wings. I could hide them if I needed to, though it’s not common practice. Depending on where you are, anyway. They are something to be proud of, they explain your past. Sometimes even your future. You’ll understand better after your birthday.”

“But you didn’t have any before,” I said, arguing at the insanity of it all. “Just a minute ago, you looked normal, with no wings. And now you have them.”

“I was cloaked, as all Fae are in the Mortal Realm.”

“But…” I felt the urge to argue. To explain that I needed explanations. To make him understand that all of this, the tripudio, the porta, the wings, it’s all crazy.

All of it.

“Why do you even travel between realms? What is the point of it? When you could live in a place like this…” As I said it, I too motioned with my hands at the surrounding beauty. “Why would anyone want to leave this place?”

He shrugged his shoulders before he answered me.

“Some are banished to live as mortals, after their magic is stripped from them as a form of punishment for one crime or another. Some choose to live there, still with their magic, but cloaked as I was.”

I didn’t understand it. Everything I had seen so far, and it wasn’t much, was beautiful. Amazing. How could anyone choose to leave? Why would they want to live as an other- someone different and foreign, like I was- when they could choose to live here, among their own kind?

“And then some live there in hiding,” he continued, oblivious to my internal debate. “I’m guessing that was the case with your parents. I don’t know who they were, but I feel as though I should. I could sense something intrinsically good and important about them.” Then he seemed to think harder on his words.

“Why would anyone need to hide? My parents are…were good. They were the best people ever,” I reiterated, my determination to avenge them stronger than ever.

“I believe that, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t have enemies. Though the Empyrean is beautiful and wonderful, not everything about it is perfect. Not all Fae are good.”

“Are there like, light fairies and dark fairies?” I asked, thinking more of the light elves and dark elves of the paranormal stories I read.

“No. There are four kinds of Fae. I’ve already explained this to you.” His voice took on an edge like he was already losing his patience with me.

“Yeah, I remember. Land, air, water, fire… I get it. But then, what could possibly be bad with this place?”

He sighed and then started looking around the forest we stood in, as if trying to get his bearings or to decide where we would go.

“That is a loaded question. I’ll explain as we walk. Deal?” he offered.

I nodded and motioned with my hand for him to lead the way. He started walking toward the single path I noticed.

“Please, wait one second,” he said to me, after we had only just started on the trail.

He stood in the center of the trail, which was maybe four feet in width. He placed his hands to his side, then lifted them up, palms up, before he put them back, palms down. It looked like he was pushing air up, then pushing it back down. I didn’t ask him what he was doing though, because he was doing his serious concentration thing again.

“Yes, this is the right way. They came through this way. Well, at least some of them did.”

I nodded. “Okay, then that’s the way we go.”

He turned and looked back at me, a question in his eyes like he was trying to figure something out about me.

“What do you plan on doing when we find them? Do you have some skill in hand-to-hand combat that I haven’t noticed? Do you wield a concealed weapon that I haven’t sensed on you?” The implied accusation that I was incompetent and incapable struck a nerve. It was the same way I’d felt my entire life.

“I’ll do whatever I have to. I’ll avenge my parents.” I tried to make my voice sound strong and sure, but I don’t know how well it worked.

“Hmm,” he murmured and then nodded once. “Well, I suppose I have my work cut out for me. This won’t be a fast, easy trip, you realize? There is probably a long road ahead of us.”

I nodded. I didn’t care how long it took, or what I had to do, I would find whoever stole my parents from me. I had nothing else to live for, even if that sounded dumb. I had nothing back home awaiting me. I didn’t even have a home to go back too.

“Ok, well let’s get started then.” He started walking into the trail, officially starting my adventure into this strange new world.

It felt like we had been walking for hours. My tennis shoes crunched the leaves and dirt beneath my feet. The wind rustled the leaves above my head. The birds sang softly, while the squirrels jumped from limb to limb.

Shortly after we arrived, I changed my clothes. I took off the hat, sweater and jacket and replaced my long sleeve tunic for a short sleeve blouse. I took off my boots and wore the more comfortable tennis shoes Alec had packed in this magical velvet bag.

And thank God he did, because it was killer to walk forever in the heat. Even with the shade the trees provided, I would guess the temperature was at least in the nineties. And I might’ve enjoyed the walk, if I was in better shape and wasn’t constantly thinking about where I was going, or who I was looking for.

Alec and I didn’t talk much for a while. Every time I wanted to say something, he always looked to be concentrating too hard for me to bother him. So I just followed behind him, one foot in front of the other. Like Dory, except on land. Just keep walking, walking, walking.

Really though, this place didn’t seem too different. The trees were brighter, and the leaves greener. The animals looked the same. When I saw a herd of deer run across the trail in front of us, they weren’t purple or anything. Everything was the same. Just brighter, stronger, prettier.

When a fox dashed past I whispered to the furry creature, “Hey, so what does a fox say?” totally hoping he would jump up dancing and sing, “Ringa-ding-ding,” or something stupid like that. But he was just the same as the foxes back home. As soon as he noticed me, he scurried away.

It was kind of unnerving, because that’s when it started to get quieter. The leaves stopped rustling because the wind stopped blowing. I didn’t hear the birds tweet to me anymore, or see any squirrels or deer. It got so quiet my own footsteps started to give me the creeps. That’s when I finally decided to talk again, even though Alec looked so serious and focused.

“It’s really quiet.”

“Yes. This area of Ardennes is not nearly as inhabited as it once was.” He didn’t turn to look at me as he said it. He just kept on walking in front of me, on guard like he was expecting some crazy monster to jump out at us at any moment.

Before I could ask him to elaborate, he did so on his own. “We Fae like to stick together, usually anyway. We live in villages, much like your towns in the Mortal Realm. But many Nymph have moved to the Central Village, leaving these outer regions on their own.”

“Why? And what is the Central Village? Is it like the capital or something?”

“Sure, I guess you could say that. In each of the Provinces, there is one Central Village. There are other villages too, but the Central Village is the largest and where the Lord and Lady of that Province preside.”

“Okay. So why did everyone go there?”

“We are almost at a village now,” he said. “You’ll understand better when we get there.”

Whatever that was supposed to mean. Ever since I met this guy, the words that came out of his mouth frustrated me more than they relieved me. They brought up more questions than answers.

But I didn’t argue, because I was getting tired of walking and would
so
like to find a village with a place to stop and rest.

The trees thinned out the further we walked. I could see for several feet before another tree showed and then even more feet between that one and the next. The grass was still thick, with weeds and flowers blooming abundantly, but the trees weren’t as constant anymore.

And then, at the end of our trail, there was an opening of sorts in the trees. Something more obvious than the trees just thinning out.

When we walked out of the trail, my jaw fell so low it almost hit me in the chest. In a way, it was the most beautiful sight I had seen. But in a way it was also the saddest.

The trail opened up into a wide circle clearing. In the very center of the circle was what appeared to be a large fire pit. It was a circle of green marble with the inside sunken in around the edges and a pile of wood in the middle. There was even a ring of marble benches around it to match. It was something I could imagine a group of people sitting around and telling stories, like me and my parents did when we went camping and roasted marshmallows. Only much larger than the campfires we made. The circle was so large, I imagined at least thirty or forty people could easily sit around it.

Maybe it was just a place for them to congregate or something. But the pretty fire pit wasn’t the most astonishing thing.

All along the edge of the clearing were huge trees. Not so much tall, as they were wide. The base of each tree around the clearing was at least ten feet wide, and in the center was a door. No kidding. A freakin door in the middle of each tree. Like the cover of a children’s fairy tale book.

It was so beautiful, but so empty. It was obvious there was no human…or rather fairy life. It was abandoned. A ghost town.

Hollow. Vacant.

Dead.

Like me.

“Are you coming?” he asked, rather impatiently. I hadn’t realized that I had stopped walking, but how could I not stop and stare?

“Yeah. Sorry,” I mumbled, as I tried to make my feet move me toward him. Unfortunately my eyes didn’t get the memo, as they continued to gawk at the amazing trees. They appeared to be real, actual trees. But still so perfectly made, with those doors on the front of them. The shapes were not uniform, but the doors were always in the center, right in the front.

He sighed and shook his head slightly, but then kept walking. At least he was finally walking at a slower pace. My eyes drifted back to the center fire pit, the one we were getting closer to, and then to the benches that beckoned to me, or at least to my feet.

Alec walked right passed them. But I couldn’t. I stopped and reached my fingers out to them. The stone benches looked so smooth, so pristine. Even in the waning sunlight, they sparkled.

“There is a residence here we can use for the night,” he said, after he stopped and looked back at me to find me staring longingly at the beautiful benches. “I know you’re tired. We’re nearly there.”

I only nodded. But before I turned away, I did place my hand on that bench. The green and brown and white woven throughout it was the most beautiful marble I had ever seen. The smoothness caressed my hand, its warmth filled me from my fingertips all the way up. It was almost silky smooth, like a silk shirt that had just been worn and then discarded. Soft, still warm, and no longer in use.

Finally I withdrew my hand, after another sigh came from Alec’s direction. I followed behind him, trudging across the fresh grass. He finally stopped about ten trees, or houses, or whatever they were, down. He took a deep breath and then went to the left.

The tree house thing he went up to wasn’t very different from the other hundred or so. It was wide and smooth, but still strong and pretty.

“We can stay here.”

I nodded again, no longer wanting to say anything. Now that I was so close to the tree, I could see that the door didn’t actually have a handle on it. It was the same texture and color as the rest of the house, with the same bark patterns and everything, like it had been carved right from this very tree. Right in the center was a strange looking window. I couldn’t see through it, but for some reason I felt as though you could see out of it from the other side. It was diamond shaped and grayish-blue in color. Alec reached up and placed a hand right on the diamond, and the door opened.

I could tell that no one had been here in a while. The scent of fresh dirt, stale air and dust immediately penetrated my nose.  After walking through the doorway, I took two steps down into a living room that was impossibly too big for the tree it was within. Logically there was no way that a room that size could fit into the tree that I had just walked into.

The ceiling was high, and the room wide, and off in the back I could see a hallway that led to more rooms.

Who needed logic anyways? I mean, I walked through the sky to get from Kansas to Texas, and the dude walking beside had wings.
Wings
! So whatever… a tree house isn’t that strange, considering. Still, I didn’t understand it. I had to know how this could be possible.

“How?”

He turned and looked at me, the wary look gone from his face and replaced with a look of confusion, eyebrows scrunched together. “How what?”

“How is this possible? We just walked into a tree, and now I’m in the middle of a large house. It even looks like a normal house, minus the dirt floor and leafy roof.”

He chuckled and shook his head once. “Sometimes I forget that you haven’t been here before, or that you don’t remember when you were. It’s magic, of course. All homes in The Empyrean are like this. Small on the outside, and much larger on the inside. The more powerful the Fae that owns the residence, the larger and more grandeur the home inside is.”

“Then whoever lived here must have been very powerful,” I guessed. The room was huge. The chandelier in the center was sparkling from the last bit of sunlight through the windows. Which was weird, because on the outside there were no windows, except that diamond in the door.

“They were very average as far as magic was concerned, though they were strong, loyal Fae.” The somberness in his tone made me realize that he must have known who lived here. I wondered if they had been friends, or if he had a girlfriend or wife.

One thing I did know, whoever had lived here before, wasn’t here anymore. They were gone. Just like my parents.

“You knew them?”

“Yes,” he said, but did not elaborate, and I got the feeling even if I asked him to, he wouldn’t. I understood. If someone asked me about my parents right then, I wouldn’t wanna talk about them. But at least I could relate.

“I’m sorry.” And I meant it. I don’t know who he lost, but whoever it was, he had been close to them. He closed his eyes and nodded, as if saying
thank you
.

“Come. I’m sure there is still something to eat here.” And then he turned away from me and headed down the hallway. Before he turned away completely, I was almost positive I saw a tear slip down past his eye. And it made me even more curious about this impatient, handsome fairy boy that had vowed to help me. Maybe he was so willing to help me in my vengeance, because he too was seeking vengeance of his own.