Betty’s voice is solid in the air. “Then don’t say it. Saying it gives it power. Good night.”
Betty must be annoyed at me, I think, because that’s abrupt even for her. I go into my room and change out of the silly dress-up clothes Issie and Cass made me wear and put on some flannel boxers and a Luka Bloom T-shirt. I pull the covers up to my chin and stare up at the Amnesty International poster on the ceiling. I can hear Betty sniffling downstairs. She’s crying softly, trying not to let me hear it, but I’m a pixie now and I do. I do hear her. I hear and know so many things I’d rather not hear and know … the weakness inside people, the soft squish of snowflakes hitting the roof, the ache in my grandmother’s heart, and the ache in my own.
4
Law enforcement officers have imposed a curfew on all Bedford residents under the age of eighteen. At a press conference held at Bedford City Hall today, Sheriff J. Farrar explained, “The majority of the disappearances have occurred after dark. We are advising that everyone only travel in groups. Do not go into wooded areas alone. Do not accept rides from strangers.”
—NEWS CHANNEL 8
I spend the day planning out strategy with Devyn, who comes over after lunch. He insists I catch up with AP Lit and AP Bio first, and a couple other of my harder classes. It all gives me a headache. Schoolwork is not at the top of my list right now, even though it has to be, because if I survive all this, I do want to go to college someday. I can’t imagine going into the interview and explaining that I failed out of high school because of a pixie invasion. Right. We set up camp in the living room. Devyn moves stiffly because of his old pixie injury, but it makes me so happy to see him walking without help in front of the woodstove and pacing past the couch and coffee table as he pontificates and goes into professor mode. Betty is still at some craft fair with Mrs. Nix, her best friend and our school secretary.
We spend some time trying to figure out the anagram my dad once wrote in the margin of his Lovecraft book until Astley texts me his mom’s name and we start to type it obsessively into various search engines. We come up with some mentions of her at antique shows and clock symposiums throughout the world, but nothing that pins her down, let alone an address.
While Dev surfs the Web, we talk and I keep walking toward the windows, looking out, searching the woods for signs of pixies. It’s like I can’t keep still. I wonder if this is some sort of pixie-change side effect.
“They aren’t attacking in the daylight anymore,” Devyn says. “Not after the Sumner bus incident and a couple after that.”
“What are people saying?”
“That there’s a serial killer.” He groans. “There was a news crew from Boston up here when you were off changing. Some federal agents have been sniffing around too. People think Nick’s parents sent for him to get out of danger. Some people think there’s an alien apocalypse coming. You missed a lot, Zara.”
I am silent. I can tell by how he says the word “changing” that he’s still having a hard time dealing with it. I can’t blame him. I’m having a hard time dealing with it too. I touch my fingertips to the cold pane of the glass. “The world is so white. It hurts my eyes, you know?”
He doesn’t answer, just stands up again, moaning a little bit as he does.
“You feeling okay?” I leave the window and scoot over to him. “Does it hurt much to stand?”
“It hurts. It’s worth it, though, to be able to do it.” He sneezes. “Sorry. Allergies.”
“Allergic to pixies?” I joke.
“Ha-ha,” he says sarcastically. “I have to go soon. My parents are geeking out with the experiments now. They want me to help. They said thank you for offering to give more blood for them to use. It’s good of you.”
That makes me turn away from the window. “Good of me? I’m hardly good, Devyn. We trapped people in a house. That’s illegal. It’s technically kidnapping. We fight them. That’s assault. I beat one guy up after the dance. Plus those two girls …”
“Pixies, not people. Pixies, not girls,” he corrects.
Pixies, not people.
“I still feel like a person, and I don’t feel good. Fighting makes me feel evil,” I mumble.
Devyn gathers his stuff up to leave.
“Seriously, though,” I continue, more forcefully. “Do I have fewer rights, less importance because I’m not a human? Do the laws suddenly not apply to me?”
“Animals don’t have rights,” Devyn snaps. “And that’s what I am half the time. I can’t even begin to imagine what would happen if regular people suddenly knew that people like me were out there.”
“How would you like it if people called you a shifter or a were instead of a guy?”
He cracks his knuckles and slugs on his backpack. He grimaces as he straightens his back. “I would hate that.”
“So you understand why I hate it?”
“I do.” Rubbing a hand across his face, he steps toward the door. “I’m sorry, Zara. It’s just so much to get used to, and with Nick gone … I know I haven’t been fair.”
“Yeah, well, it’s complicated, I know. And I can’t blame you. I just miss you. I mean, you are right here, but when you don’t totally trust me, it feels like we’re …” I struggle for the words. “Disconnected?”
He pats my shoulder and steps into the cold. I follow him out because I don’t want to be alone just yet. He says, “You know, Nick is out here somewhere.”
The thought of it makes me squee. I jump up and hit my head on the porch roof. Snow tumbles down around me and suddenly the tension is broken. I can’t believe I can jump so high. I roll on the snow giggling, and Devyn just cracks up watching me. I chuck a snowball at him. I swear if Nick could see me now, he would crack up too, and fall down next to me and probably smoosh snow in my face. Or maybe not.
Dev wipes the snow off his face and reaches a hand down to help me up. “You are such a goofball, Zara.”
“I know.”
He studies my face, squinting at me. “What happened? Your expression just changed.”
Swallowing hard, I decide to just say it. Maybe if I can say what worries me, Devyn will really see that I’m still Zara. Maybe I’ll see it too. “Nick hated pixies. I’m not sure he’d ever believe they could be good, not after seeing the evil some have done. I’m not sure if he could ever love me now.”
“Zara …” Dev’s hand tightens around mine, but there’s no comfort he can offer here.
Charging on, I say, “I changed so I could save him, but that change could ruin us. I know he’ll think it’s ruined me.”
My lungs seem to crumple into tiny tight balls just thinking about it, about how maybe I made a mistake.
“He’ll figure it out eventually.”
“Figure what out?”
“That you’re still you.” Dev squeezes my hand and lets go. “I mean, if I can catch on …”
“It’s taken you forever,” I kid, because I don’t want this to be some greeting-card kind of moment.
“Less than seventy-two hours since the initial transformation, give or take twelve hours either way.”
“Wow. That’s longer than I thought.” I nudge him with my elbow. “And seriously, Dev, I’m not even sure who I am anymore. How can I expect other people to just be okay with everything?”
We say good-bye. He drives away in his parents’ big ol’ Buick. Once he’s gone, I step outside and sniff the air. It’s cold. I can’t smell any pixies, but I know there are some out there, hiding, waiting, just outside the realm of my senses. I wonder if they are Astley’s pixies keeping watch or bad ones waiting to attack. Not that I’ve really met any of Astley’s pixies except Amelie.
Eventually, I stand up and go in the house and do a little more research and planning. Betty comes home before her shift. She turns tiger and patrols the area, then scratches at the door to come inside. I let her in and step back as she enters. I know she still loves me when she’s human, but I’m not so sure about her tiger self.
The
cold air rushes in, so I reach around her to shut the door. At over four hundred pounds, she fills up the space between the door and the stairway. All ten feet of her bends and faces me. She opens her mouth. There is blood on her teeth and her breath reeks like copper and Dove soap. She has killed.
“Got one, huh?” I say, trying to sound flip. “Right outside?”
She bobs her head up and down and brushes past me into the living room. Her massive paws trail snow inside.
Something in my stomach feels sick. “How do you know it was a bad one? And, um, not a good one?”
She doesn’t answer, just plops down in the middle of the room and lifts her right front paw. There’s a piece of wood splintered in it.
“You want me to take it out now? Before you turn?”
She just looks at me with those massive amber eyes. Her head is so huge.
I breathe in deeply and sit on the floor in front of her. “Do not bite me.”
She rolls her eyes.
“What? You’re all tiger now … I don’t know.” I smile at her so she knows that I’m teasing—kind of.
I take her paw in my hands. It’s so huge, easily as big as my entire face. The claws are about three inches long. Examining it better, I can tell that the splinter is a piece of branch slanted in. It’s lodged in pretty deep from the pressure of her walking on it.
“You’ve pushed it in pretty good. I think I need both hands.” I lift my knees up and rest her paw on them for stability. With both hands I grip the branch. “On three. One … two …”
I yank. She yowls, but the wood pops right out. I slam my hand against the wound and apply pressure. Her fur is cold and wet and thick.
“There. That wasn’t so bad, was it?” I give her a smile. “Does it hurt much?”
She purrs and then pushes her paw through my hand into my chest, knocking me down on the floor. She stands above me, all four hundred pounds of her.
“Gram?” My voice is embarrassingly high-pitched.
Her head comes down to mine and her tongue darts out, licking the entire length of my face. She bats her paw against my hip and purrs again.
“Eww. Wet.” I laugh and she leaps over me, heading into her bedroom, where she’ll change back into human. I watch her fine tiger self go. She wiggles her tail.
“Grandmothers.” I grunt loud enough for her to hear me, but she doesn’t respond.
When she comes back into the living room, I’m still cruising the Web on her computer looking for clues about Astley’s mom.
“Any luck?” she asks. She’s wearing her uniform.
“What’s the cliché Mom is always saying?” I ask.
“Needle in a haystack.” She sits down next to me and leans forward to peruse the screen. Then she turns and examines my face. “Thanks for the help with my paw.”
“Glad to see you brushed your teeth.”
She laughs. “Had to. Pixies taste horrible, like soap.”
“Good to know. And you’re sure it was a bad pixie and not one of Astley’s? Because—”
“It was stalking Devyn.”
“Oh. Not protecting Devyn? Like trailing him to keep him safe?” I offer.
She grunts and crosses her arms over her chest. “Zara, I could smell the need on it.”
“Okay.” Shuddering, I stare at her wrinkled face, those bright, active eyes, her soft, short gray hair. “You’re so beautiful as a tiger.”
“Not as a human, huh?” she teases and slaps my thigh.
“Shut up.”
“Did you just tell your grandmother to shut up? Brat,” she jokes back and stands up, stretching as if her human form is just too confining. She grunts. “I should have been a cop.”
I have no idea where this comes from, but I go with it. “Why?”
“Because then I could be out patrolling instead of stuck at the station waiting for an ambulance call.”
“Can’t you just take out the ambulance?”
“Keith is on duty tonight. He’s the driver. You know we can’t go out alone.”
“Can’t you just tell Keith?”
She sighs. “I don’t know. How do you tell a guy like Keith that you’re a weretiger and that you need him to drive the ambulance around so you can hunt for pixies?”
“You just tell him,” I suggest, pushing myself away from the computer and giving her my full attention. “And then you show him.”
Her face closes up and she looks suddenly fragile and old—and very human.
“You are very human, Gram.”
She smiles. “You say that even after seeing my paws and my teeth?”
“Yeah.” I fake shudder and mock the lines from Little Red Riding Hood: “What very big teeth you have, Grandmother.”
“All the better to eat pixies with,” she plays along and smiles.
I grab the throw pillow on the couch and hug it.
She reaches over and kisses the top of my head, then whispers so faintly that I can barely hear her, “You are very human too.”
“I hope so.”
She harrumphs and stands up. “How about I burn us some dinner before my shift starts.”
End of conversation.
5
One missing Maine boy has been found alive but with amnesia and serious injuries after having disappeared for more than two weeks. Parents hold out hope that their missing youngsters will see the same outcome. —NEWS CHANNEL 8
A noise startles me out of my super-long couch nap. I groan and stretch. Someone knocks on the door. The sun has set and the clock says it’s seven. Even early in the evening our town seems deserted and haunted. The roads wander around dark corners. Trees crowd the edges. Snow reflects the moonlight like a silent white mirror. I peek out the window, and for a moment I think it’s Nick, but that is impossible.
When I open the door, Astley simply holds out his hand in the darkness. I take it and step outside almost hypnotized, not really even caring that I’m wearing this extra-large gray L.L.Bean sweatshirt and the bunny pj bottoms that Is gave me. I just go with him into the snowy cold. Something about the dark trees beyond our lawn makes me twitch a little. My foot slips on the snow. Anything could be out there.
“Betty’s in the shower,” I whisper. “What are you doing here? Did you see the Frank guy? Or my father? Are they lurking out there?”
“No. I have not.” He clears his throat awkwardly. “There has been no sign of your father.”
I guess I’d been holding my breath, because it all comes out of my mouth in a big rush. I don’t know if I’m upset that he’s missing and maybe dead, or relieved, or scared, or what. My feelings about him are so jumbled. He was manipulative and weak, but he tried so hard to be good. He let my mom go free, without turning her. I know he did.
Astley waits for a second before he speaks. Maybe he can tell that I’m trying to get a handle on my emotions or something. He glances toward the house and takes a step away from the door. “I want to show you our people.”
“Our people?” I say as his fingers tighten around mine. The world seems to shift on its axis, tilting me into a more confused state than I’m already in. “I’m not sure I really want—”
“You are our queen, Zara. It is time you met your pixies.” His other arm wraps around my waist. “We shall fly.”
“We have to be quick. Betty will—”
He nods. “I know.”
Flying is cold and swift. We swoop over the tops of trees and through the snowflakes. It has been snowing lightly for days and it still hasn’t stopped. I honestly don’t think it ever will. I long for the warm streets and bright sun of Charleston, my old home. I can almost smell the flowers, see the poinsettias that everyone along the Battery puts out for Christmas, the bright white lights along the porticoes. Life was so much easier then. I push the longing away. Below us the roads cut through trees. Town snowplows hustle as quickly as they can, clearing the way for cars and people. I hang on to Astley as he brings me to a clearing in the woods that’s not too far away f
rom the high school. When we get closer, I can spot headstones of varying heights, in white, black, and gray. It’s a cemetery. The pixies are gathered in between headstones. Some even stand on monuments. They each seem to have some sort of light source. It’s a dizzying array of shadows and fabric, movement against the stark white snow. Fear pushes into my throat. As we start losing altitude, everyone turns away from us as if refusing to acknowledge our presence.
“They know I have difficulties with landing,” Astley explains, clearing his throat. He smells embarrassed somehow.
I remember those difficult landings, but it’s still weird seeing this mass respect for him, saving him from humiliation. If it were me, my friends would tease me endlessly about it and pointedly stare while I fell, for full laugh effects. “They respect you, so they turn around?” I ask.
“They are kind. Hold on.” He drives into the snow hard, feet first, and then plops over backward. I land half on top of him, half to the side, and the look on his face is so frustrated and embarrassed that I can’t help laughing. I give Astley my hand and help haul him up. Once he lets go, I start brushing the snow off my pajama bottoms and sweatshirt. He does the same. Oh, man … I’m in bunny pajamas meeting pixies. This is so not right. A soft laugh echoes under my breath at the absurdity of it.
The pixies surround us. Most are in regular clothes. None have bunnies on them. They wear jeans and cords and a couple have on those rugged brown construction pants with a lot of pockets. They wear leather and down jackets. One woman has a long royal purple coat. There are a couple dresses and a kilt, all of which look crazily inappropriate. They are glamoured in all skin colors and ages, except none are younger than high school. Many of them hold flashlights pointed down, making cones of light on the snow. Some have candles.
I touch Astley’s arm, overwhelmed. “There are so many.”
“These are only the ones who are here with me. There are hundreds more.” He stops brushing at the snow on his thighs and instead reaches out as if to touch my cheek. I step away. His hand stays in the air and then he makes a grand sweeping motion. “Turn around, my people, and meet your queen.”