Page 185 of Sigils & Spells

There were so many, and each of them had features that I could have stared at for eons. Features that demanded to be remembered, painted or written about, but all I could do was back away from the arrows they had pointed at my chest.

I backed away, reaching behind me until my hand met the fur of my friend’s wolf form. When I’d been picturing the Fae, I’d expected Lord Elrond fromLord of the Rings. Ethereal, but still human. They looked so much less human and so much more fantastical than I'd pictured.

What worried me more than that though was the arrow notched in a bow and aimed straight at my chest.

I put my hands up.

More Fae came out of the woods, seeming to materialize from the shadows. Men and women alike. They varied as much as humans, but not one of them looked human. All of them holding bows with arrows point at the four of us.

They approached without words, moving in a way that corralled the three of us until we were standing back to back.

The sounds from the woods had softened, like the creatures nearest us had quieted out of fear.

Without a word, the Fae in front of us parted, letting through a woman. The woman tread over the grass as if she were floating, like her feet didn’t touch the grass under her feet. She was huge. The woman had to be nine feet tall, with skin the color of the grass under our feet and long, long raven hair that brushed the ground behind her. Unlike the others, she wore a gown that seemed to be made of gossamer. Her face was more human than the others, but her ears were long and pointed, jutting several inches away from her head. Her eyes were like two chunks of the sky had been molded into spheres. There was no pupil, no whites in her eyes, just solid, pure blue. I could feel those eyes on me. She wasn’t the tallest of the Fae, but she had a presence that made it seem like she was the only one there. Something about her made me want to launch myself into her arms or at her feet and tell me every thought I’d ever had.

Ruby must have known what I was thinking because her hand shot out and she grabbed my wrist, as if to stop me. I could see her hand tighten on Minho’s fur as well.

In my pocket, sugar glider Alice squeaked and wiggled.

None of the Fae seemed to notice.

The Fae woman looked at each of us in turn, those glacial eyes boring into me, and then Ruby and then Minho.

“Little witch,” the Fae’s voice was quiet, and more human sounding than I’d expected. “Did you forget that Maeve can always tell when humans cross into her forest? Even if” she looked at us all, a small smile spilling over her green lips, “none of the three are very human at all.”

“Oh, eat shit,” Ruby snarled. The words and the vehemence startled me, especially coming from Ruby’s sweet, round face. When she’d said to let her handle the talking, ‘eat shit’ wasn’t what I’d had in mind. “Maeve can only tell because she tapped the gates. You’ve been waiting, haven't you?”

The woman ignored Ruby entirely and took a step towards me. She leaned down a little, putting one finger under my chin. Her fingers were hot to the touch. She moved my head up and to one side. My breath came out short and fast, and I could feel my heart beating against the inside of my chest. The Fae woman examined my face with an intense curiosity that made me feel like a stuck butterfly. Like she was examining a beast of burden to buy, or like Luke Skywalker picking androids for his uncle.

“The one that got away,” she whispered.

She straightened and stepped away from me, and I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.

“Mother will want the boy.” she turned as she spoke, delicate feet carrying her back into the woods. “Take the other two to the dungeon.”

And she was gone. Not Maeve. Maeve’s daughter.

Cold fingers wrapped around my arm. One of the Fae had grabbed me, yanking me back against him. Minho growled again, the sound deep and sinister, and cut off suddenly with a yelp. One of the Fae held a spear that he’d just poked into the huge wolf’s side.

“Minho!” Ruby cried and grabbed at the wolf. “We’ll come! We’ll come just don’t hurt him.”

The spear retracted, and instead the Fae man grabbed the wolf by the scruff of his huge neck like he were nothing more than a misbehaving puppy.

The Fae with my arm started to pull me back, the opposite direction the Fae pulled my friends.

Ruby looked at me wide eyed and put a hand over her heart as if to reassure me melodramatically. I frowned and mimicked her motion. My hand right over my pocket. The sugar glider. Whatever Ruby’s spell had gotten wrong, it had still managed to protect Alice. They couldn’t tell Alice was here.

At least I wasn’t alone. Mission “De-horse Julian” had been very short lived, considering we had our feet on Elfhame grass not five minutes before absolutely everything went wrong, and scary Fae people found us.

They stopped me right in the middle of the clearing, and the Fae released my arm, standing back and to attention as the mushroom Fae woman moved in front of me. She stood too close for comfort. I didn’t know where to look, so I found myself staring straight into her eyes. They were intense eyes, and as hard as I stared into them, I couldn’t figure out which color they were.

The woman pressed her thumb into the middle of my forehead, and whispered something incomprehensible. My breath caught, and my chest swelled as if inside it my heart were about to burst out. I couldn’t help it, my eyes rolled back in my head and for a moment I thought I was about to die.

I let out a huge breath, which came out as a shrill and distressed whiney. She’d done what Ruby had, and prompted the change. I reared back. Again my body was so much bigger than it had been a moment before. But this time I had control. I kicked towards the Fae woman, which she sidestepped easily, and in one fluid motion, pulled a thin gold string that seemed to glimmer and whipped it at me, a loop at the end easily sliding over my head. She lassoed me. I wanted to kick out again, trample the Fae around me, but even though I was so much bigger than I had been a moment before, I still wasn’t any kind of match for the Fae. At least, not for Fae magic.

As soon as the lasso touched me, I felt myself stop. My heart calmed in my chest and it felt almost like I was falling asleep. I stilled, my huge nostrils flaring with a snort.

The Fae woman smiled smugly, and patted my snout.

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