Page 24 of Fairies Don't Fall

Once I got to the top city, I ran, not trying to be stealthy, needing to get to the fairy before he bled out. I followed the thin, buzzing, hazy threads of his mind until I reached a gate in the golden wall that surrounded the city. Above me was a stretch of road with the roaring cars thundering above, rushing through the wall and across the wide river. The lights, the sound, it was all very distracting, but I held onto that slippery mind as I dashed through the gate and headed south, on the walkway beside the street that followed the curve of the river.

I found him beneath another massive car bridge, between the wall and the cement. A metal bridge was suspended above the terraformer where he curled up in a pile of rags and rubble.

I put my hands on his face and called on the night, the moon, the stars behind the filmy wisps of clouds, to bring him peace and rest. Then I put my palm over the cut in his neck and the gash in his chest and called his blood back into him and commanded the flesh to smooth together. He smelled like garbage mixed with sticky-sweet syrup. He smelled worse than Max’s beast, by far.

He sat up abruptly, covering my hands with his as he stared at me blankly. Most fairies couldn’t see in the dark without some effort. “My Queen?” he whispered, the exhale of his breath like a punch in my nose. Gag. His breath was putrid.

I flinched before I smiled. “Princess.”

It was his turn to flinch. He tried to scoot away from me, but he was already between a rock and a hard place. “What do you want?” he whispered. “Have you finally come to punish me for deserting your army?”

I stared at him, the fear and panic in his eyes mixed with hopelessness. He wouldn’t fight me. Of course not. Only an idiot would fight the death fairy. “Who stabbed you?” I finally asked, because that was the priority.

He shrugged and glanced past me into the darkness before refocusing on my face. Was it glowing? Probably, because the moon was out, and that kind of thing happened. “I don’t remember.”

I sent the image of the girl who had stabbed him into his mind and he gasped and flinched back again, this time hitting his head on the golden wall behind him.

“You’re really in my head,” he whispered, horror in his eyes and across his face. “They’ve been saying that they could hear you, but I never thought the Queen…Princess would want any of my thoughts. Are you really terraforming werewolf caverns? Why?”

“Who stabbed you?” I repeated.

He blinked rapidly. “Apologies, Princess. Her name’s Shotglass. She’s been here a little less time than me. I was one of the first, came here directly after I left Fairyland during the war. Are you going to execute me? It would almost be a relief after all this time.”

I wanted to poke his forehead or shake him. Yes, I came to heal you so I could execute you. Idiot. “Your thoughts are very hazy. Why is that?”

He blinked at me. “Pixie dust. They say that not even the Queen can touch our minds when we’re riding the stars.”

“Pixie dust?” That’s what Max thought I was doing. Riding on the stars? “Explain. You can use words, or, if you’d rather, I can get it out of your thoughts.”

He shuddered. “No, Princess. No need to pierce my mind. I will tell you all. Pixie dust makes life sweet, bearable, and it is the greatest treasure you can find.” His eyes were sunken, like his cheeks. He was in terrible shape, even worse than I’d been when I came here, sick, my own thoughts blurry.

“What is it?” I repeated. “What is it made out of? Where does it come from? Why aren’t you eating? Is it the death-sickness that makes you look this way?”

He blinked at me, confusion written on his face. “You are not what I expected the death fairy to be like when she came for me. So many questions. The pixie dust is a drug that changes the mind, however bleak the reality. But it wears off and you need more. There are dust dealers, and some fairies work for them for their supply. I did for some time, worked for a sorcerer, but that was long ago, before the fall of Song, and then the recent rebuild. The death sickness isn’t as bad as being cut off from Fairyland. But none of us will ever go back,” he said, suddenly fierce.

“Why not?” I asked, curious.

He stared at me. “Why not? Because we’ll be executed by the death queen.”

“Princess. And I didn’t kill all the werewolves when I had the chance, just sent them away. Why would I execute my own?” I shook my head. “You make no sense. I guess that’s the mind-altering pixie dust for you. No one is going to force you to return to Fairyland. If you’ve committed a crime, you’ll be tried by law. But fairy law doesn’t do executions, just exile if your crimes are truly horrible. You’ve already exiled yourself.” I frowned as I studied him. “You should stop taking pixie dust and eat real food instead. We need your mind. If you aren’t going to live well, at least find someone who you can pass your wisdom to before you expire. Or I suppose you could write it down. Or put it in a tree.” Yes, that would be doubly useful.

He stared at me. “Are you mad? You must be. Write down my knowledge, when it has been so carefully hidden for so long?”

I shrugged. “Who else is going to want to terraform caves? Or shells? Preserving the knowledge is more important than hoarding it. Now then. Other fairies have whispered that they heard me. Are any of them competent enough to perform a spell that could bring a cave down on my head?”

He stared at me, unblinking for a long time, before he finally shook his head. “No one would be so foolish as to try and harm the Queen of Death.”

“Princess of Death. Of course not, but is there anyone here with the skills to do so?”

He blinked at me. “Of course. There are not many pure-blood fairies from Fairyland, but there are many, many of mixed blood who call themselves fairies. They have the wings. The mayor is one of those. His magic is strong, and he studied at some academy for light creatures, so he probably has the knowledge. There are others, fairy descendants who are studied, and might not know who you are and what it means to threaten you.”

“How many fairies from Fairyland are in Singsong?”

“Less than a hundred. More than fifty. They come and go. If you want to see them, I can take you to the docks, where they gather for gruel.”

“Gruel?”

“The alpha werewolf brings breakfast to the homeless who live on the river banks. You didn’t know? I thought that might be why you were terraforming the caverns for him, to return the favor he’s done for fairies for the last seventy-five years. He’s kept more alive than I can count. Still, he’s terrifying, and if he catches you stealing from him, or causing trouble, he’ll take you and rehabilitate you.” He shuddered theatrically. “No more pixie dust,” he cried mournfully.

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