The Book of Dreams (65 page)

Edane let out a little cry. Dana was stunned. Having steeled herself for a straight yes or no, she wasn’t prepared for complications. She was staggered by the proposal, the price to be paid. How could she give up her birthright? Her glorious inheritance? And yet she yearned to be human, to live out her life, to be reunited with Jean and her family and friends.

For every dream to exist there must be a sacrifice.

As difficult as it was for her, so too would it be for Jean and
grand-père
. They would lose a part of their souls to become human again; all the wildness and freedom of the
loup-garou
.

Kneeling beside the two wolves, Dana bowed her head against theirs. All three were shaken to the core of their being.

The High King of Faerie gazed upon them with compassion.

“Each of you is free to choose your own destiny. One decision is not bound by the others. But choose you must, between your magical selves and your humanity.”

I
t was still Halloween in the Earthworld, for both the Plain of the Great Heart and the Land of Faerie were beyond time. Gabriel stood beside his wife on the streets of Creemore, laughing with the crowd as the Headless Horseman disappeared down the road. Suddenly he found himself elsewhere. It was a place he recognized instantly: a forest in Ireland, in the Wicklow Mountains, on a high ridge overlooking a narrow road. The trees were a tangle of old oak and holly. He was sitting on a fallen tree trunk, his silver flute in his hand.

Bewildered, he looked around him. Was this a dream?

Then she stepped out of the trees and walked toward him. Her gown was pale and shining, her feet and arms bare, and her head was wreathed with a crown of white blossoms. For a moment he thought she was Edane, his first wife, but her hair was raven-black. Then he realized with a shock that the glimmering girl was his daughter.

“Gabe … Da …” Her voice echoed with a touch of sadness and regret.

He felt a sharp ache in his heart. Despite his confusion, he knew what this meant, the thing he had always secretly dreaded. She was going to leave him, his fairy daughter, even as her mother had.

As Dana reached out to him, her hands spilled golden light.

“This is what I am, Gabe. I can’t hide it anymore and I can’t protect you from the truth. I’m going away for a while. Something has happened and I’m no longer able to live in both worlds. I’ve got to choose one or the other. I need to think about it, but I promise to return and let you know my decision. I don’t want to hurt you, but you know it’s my life and I’ve got to be the one who makes the choice.”

Gabriel dropped the flute from his hands. His heart was breaking. Yet even as he looked at her with love and awe, he knew her words were true. She was more than a child.

“I love you, Da. Take care of yourself and Radhi and the baby.”

With tears in his eyes he held her tightly, hoping it wasn’t for the last time.

“You’ll always be my baby,” he murmured, “my firstborn.”

• • •

By the time Dana caught up with Findabhair and Finvarra, they were in their hotel room in Toronto. Finvarra had removed his shirt so that his wife could change the dressings on his wounds. The sweet scent of fairy herbs wafted on the air.

“You should’ve stayed in the healing tent.” Findabhair chided her husband, but her voice was gentle, as was her touch.

“You have power of your own,” he said with a smile. “And it is best we go back onstage as soon as possible. Our honor must be restored. We broke our pledge with the tour.”

“The show must go on,” she agreed. “A makeup concert should fix things. We’re not the first musicians to go astray.
All’s well that ends well.
”

• • •

Neither looked surprised when Dana appeared beside them. Both were saddened to hear her news.

“You must know the full consequences if you choose humanity,” Finvarra told her. “You will be banished from the Land of Faerie. Once you lose your immortality, you cannot return.”

This was the reason she had come to see them. She needed to talk with someone who understood her dilemma.

“But I’ll still be able to see fairies, won’t I? If they show themselves to me? Like Clan Creemore? And my mother will visit me and show up in my dreams?”

“That’s the theory,” said Findabhair.

She and her husband exchanged glances.

“I need to know the truth,” said Dana, sensing that they were holding something back. “To help me make the right choice.”

Findabhair sighed. “The bottom line? Fairies are flighty. You know that yourself. Life is a game for them, feasting and frolic, music and dancing. They never grow old and I’d say they never grow up. And that’s another thing. Time. Because of their immortality, they don’t notice it passing in their world or ours. They don’t mean to forget to visit, but years can pass before they remember. You need to understand, Dana, that if you choose to be human, you’re not in for a penny, you’re in for a pound. Faerie will play a very small part in your life. It may even disappear from it altogether.”

Dana’s eyes filled with tears. This was her worst fear.

“But the others, like Gwen and—”

“It is a different thing for the Companions of Faerie,” Finvarra explained. “They have right of passage to the Realm and are ever a part of it. For you and me and any other immortal who falls out of the Great Time, the door is closed. We are exiles in this world.”

Life is a peregrination through a foreign land.

“Is it forever?” Dana asked. She held her breath.

Something flickered in their eyes. A glimmer of light.

“Actually, that’s something we don’t know,” Findabhair said. “Immortals who have fallen—like humans who hold no belief—face death as a mystery.”

“Hope is still on the wing,” Dana murmured, releasing her breath.

• • •

Georgia was asleep when Dana arrived at her house. Instead of waking her, Dana slipped into her friend’s dreams. She found herself outside a ruined building in a darkened city near a river. Georgia crouched nearby with a gun in her hand. As shots rang out, Georgia stood up to fire back, then hunkered down again. She didn’t look surprised to see Dana. After all, it was a dream.

“What’s going on?” Dana hissed at her. Explosions sounded across the river.

“Don’t you dream you’re on secret missions fighting some mysterious enemy?” said Georgia. “No wait, that’s your real life.”

She stood up to let off another round, but she had run out of ammunition. Crouching again, she reloaded.

“According to dream books, I’m fighting the dark side of myself,” she commented. “So far, we’re even.”

Dana snickered. Even in her dreams, Georgia was hilarious.

“Could we go somewhere quiet?” Dana asked her. “We need to talk.”

Now Dana found herself perched beside Georgia on a high wall overlooking a hilly countryside. The sun shone on their faces. Their legs dangled over the warm stone. The wall stretched away on both sides as far as the eye could see, rising and falling with the roll of the land. There was no sign of habitation or people or animals, only brown soil and green bushes and the wall going on forever.

“Wow,” said Dana. “Is this the Great Wall of China?”

“Yep,” said Georgia, banging her heels off the stone. “Isn’t it neat? I love this place, but I can’t always get here. Lucid dreaming is tricky.”

“You’re not actually dreaming
me
,” Dana said. “I’m really here.”

Georgia sat up straight, her look serious.

“Is it all over, then, the battle and everything?”

Dana nodded.

“Great-granny said the dragons went,” Georgia told her. “But they didn’t come back yet to tell us what happened.”

“They were brilliant. They saved a lot of our army.”

“That’s great! So, how come you’re not keeping this news to brighten an otherwise boring day at school?”

Dana saw the concern in her friend’s eyes. Georgia might be hilarious, but she was also very smart. Dana hesitated. In that pause, Georgia’s worry turned to fear.

“Did you die? Is that why you’re here?”

When Dana paused again, Georgia’s eyes filled with tears.

“I’m still alive as a fairy,” Dana hurried to say.

“It’s not the same!” Georgia cried. “I thought we were going to do the best-friend thing: you know, graduate together, go to university, be each other’s brides-maid. All that corny stuff.”

She started to cry. Dana did her best to comfort her, explaining the situation and the choice she faced.

“Well, that’s easy.” Georgia sniffled, recovering quickly. “Do the right thing. You were born here. The human option is the only option.”

“Then I won’t be special anymore,” Dana pointed out. “Isn’t that why you picked me for a friend in the first place? Because I was like your great-granny?”

“Yes and no,” Georgia argued. “I just wanted someone I could talk to about that stuff. Someone my own age. It’s lonely having a secret you can’t share. I can still do that with you as a human.”

“This is so hard,” Dana murmured.

She stared down at the ground far below her and found herself thinking of Humpty Dumpty. There were other elements to the choice she hadn’t mentioned to Georgia. The question of Jean. If he remained a wolf, it would be easier for both of them if she stayed a fairy. She could shapeshift into a wolf herself, whenever she wanted. But what if Jean chose to be human? She knew from her father and mother that mortal and immortal didn’t work. But though Jean’s decision added to her dilemma, Dana was aware of the deeper truth. No matter what Jean did, she had to choose her own destiny.

“I’ll lose so much if I stop being a fairy,” she pointed out to Georgia. “And what do I get in return? Old age, sickness, no power over anything …”

“Hey!” her friend interrupted. “Don’t forget the other things, Ms. Glass-Is-Half-Empty. Friendship, love …” Georgia waved her hand over the vast expanse of wall. “All the wonders you can find in
our
world. These belong to
us
. The lowly mortals. Not them.”

Dana smiled. “I knew you’d be a help.”

“Speaking of love, how’s our
garçon
?”

Dana was about to answer when she stiffened. The sound of an alarm clock rang through the air, like loud bells.

“I’ve got to go. It’s time for you to wake.”

“Whatever you decide, don’t forget me!” Georgia cried. The two girls hugged good-bye on the Great Wall of China.

• • •

Laurel made her way to the High Queen’s solar. It was an airy chamber high in the palace, overlooking a vast rose garden and ornate fountains. Honor was reclining on an embroidered couch. Beside her was a lacquered table with a china tea set, a plate of seedcakes dripping with honey, and a bowl of red berries. The High Queen nibbled restlessly on the tidbits as she gazed out the window. When Laurel entered the bower, Honor jumped up with delight.

“Here you are at last!”

The twins embraced joyfully.

“I was looking for you, but I couldn’t find you,” Laurel told her.

“I was out and about with royal duties. It’s not all party-party, no matter how it looks.”

Honor smiled at her sister proudly as she poured the tea. “I knew you wouldn’t abandon us.”

Laurel sighed. “It seems you can take the girl out of Faerie, but you can’t take Faerie out of the girl.”

Honor laughed. “And did I see you walking in the garden with the Summer King?”

Laurel wasn’t ready to discuss that subject yet. “What do you think Dana will do?” she said, changing the subject.

Her sister’s face clouded. “I was dwelling on that matter just before you arrived. She has so much to gain and so much to lose. My heart goes out to her.”

“Can’t you help her decide? You, more than anyone else, can understand her position.”

Honor disagreed. “It was different for me. I didn’t have a choice. In truth, I’m glad I didn’t. How can one choose between two worlds? Two homes?”

• • •

On Iynu lands in northern Quebec, where the snow lay white and glistening in the dark of night, they waited for Dana in Grandfather’s kitchen. Roy leaned against the wall, too restless to sit. The great black wolf that was Jean lay in front of the stove. On either side of him sat two old men, smoking their pipes.
Grand-père
was a stately gentleman with short gray hair and the same wintergreen eyes as his grandson. He wore a big woolen sweater over his trousers. From time to time he looked at Grandfather and they would nod their heads through the curl of tobacco smoke. The Old Man was cloaked in his black-and-red blanket. All of them remained silent, in the stoic manner of men who didn’t talk when there was nothing to say.

Outside in the cold night, high in the clear starry sky, Dana was playing with her mother in the Northern Lights.
Aqsarniit
, soccer trails, was what the Baffin Islanders called the shimmering strands. One moment the lights were swirls of silver, the next sheets of green and lilac rippled like veils. The sky was the playing field for a game of soccer in which thousands of spirits took part, singing and laughing as they raced across the firmament.