Chapter 22
We followed her into a sunlit room filled with more plants than I’d ever seen in one place, unless you counted botanical gardens. Or a plant nursery. Seriously. The lady had plants on every surface of the tables near the windows, and more on the white shelves lining the walls. Coming in a close second were the books that were stacked high in piles on the floor, and placed haphazardly on the shelves. Flowering begonias, succulent jades and unassuming violets sat atop many of the piles. The only clear surface in the room was a large round coffee table in the center of four comfy looking love seats -- each one upholstered in a different floral pattern and color. One blue, one red, one yellow, and one green.
I loved it.
This woman would definitely appreciate our Fiestaware collection.
Her tea pot cast a dignified air, a gleaming warm sterling silver, clearly well-worn and well loved, but her china was just as colorful and varied as the rest of the room. I sat on the green couch, rowan perching nearby on the arm of another sofa, while Vala settled down across from me.
“Go on,” she urged. “Choose a cup and warm yourselves up. I picked up a handmade mug of swirling blues and greens and held it out for her to fill. “Sugar? Cream?”
I shook my head, inhaling the reassuring malty aroma of a rich Irish breakfast tea. “No, thank you. This is perfect.”
“A good cup of tea can solve almost anything.” She gazed at me warmly. She poured tea for Rowan and herself, and then settled back on the sofa cradling a small dainty pink cup in her hands.
“Now, why don’t you start by telling me why you are here, Rowan.”
“Well, Siri came to me yesterday, she ran all the way to my house, looking for help. Thorn and some thugs broke into their home and took her mother, she just barely managed to get away. We don’t really know why, exactly, but my dad and Thorn are looking for Siri still, we think for someone on the Shade Council. I thought maybe you could help her. She didn’t even know she was fae until recently, and has no idea what’s going on.”
“Do you, I wonder?” She mused, peering at him quizzically over her cup. She turned to me. “Siri, is it? Did you know your name means Victory?”
I just stared at her. Hello, random much?
“Never mind. It’s odd that you were not raised knowing who you are. Who are your parents?”
“My mother is Fredrika Alvarsson. I don’t know my father’s name, but she told me he is fae. We moved here for my mother to do some security work with a guy named Frank, who’s probably also fae.”
“Alvarsson? Are you related to Jade Alvarsson?”
“Yes, that’s my Aunt. I mean, no, she’s my grandmother. Sorry, I only just found out who she is. I always thought she was just my mother’s older sister.”
“So you are light fae, I thought so.” She narrowed her eyes at Rowan. “You brought her to your father? You let them meet?”
“I…well, yes, I didn’t realize it would be a problem.”
“Faelings.” Vala sighed. “Don’t they teach you anything anymore? You Shades are the worst, the way they keep you in the Dark.”
See, I told you. They mindwash them. Miko practically yelled in my head.
“Ah. And you have a special friend?” Vala zeroed in on Miko. “Not a simple pet, eh?”
“What do you mean?” asked Rowan.
“Oh, right, Miko,” I tried to cover, glaring at Vala. “He’s pretty attached to me ever since I saved him from being roadkill.”
“Indeed. A life debt?”
“I guess you could say that,” I grumbled.
“Interesting. And you can hear him, too?” So much for my hints to Vala to keep the whole thing on the down low.
“I’m sorry, what?!” Rowan looked at the three of us in turn.
“Whelp, guess the cats out of the bag, Siri.” Miko climbed down onto the sofa, jumped onto the table and grabbed a small teacake. “How about some service here?”
“Nice, Miko. Mind your manners.” I laughed, and Vala pushed a small cup of cream towards him as if she had squirrels to tea on a daily basis.
“Wait, are you guys saying you can understand him?”
“Yeah, can’t you?” I asked.
“Um, no, I just hear crazy squirrel chatter.” He looked at Vala and I like we were nuts.
“Oh, well, yeah. He started talking to me yesterday. It kind of freaked me out, too. But he said it’s part of my natural fae abilities.”
“Yes, he’s right. You have very strong channel lock,” Vala explained, putting special emphasis on the last word. “I sensed it right away.”
“I’m sorry, channel what?”
“Tenalach. It’s a special word the Irish have for the relationship some people have with the air, water and land, a connection to the Earth so deep and close that you can literally hear the earth sing. When your tenalach is strong, you can speak with any animal. Some can even understand the trees themselves.”
“Wow.” Rowan and I said at the same time.
“Yes, it is an interesting and powerful ability. All light fae possess tenalach to some degree, but few these days can talk with the animals.”
“My mother was explaining to me that we can feel when the earth is in pain. I actually started having visions last months of an earthquake, and then it happened. My mom was working on teaching me how to control my visions.”
“Have you had more?”
I nodded.
“You have? Why didn’t you tell me any of this?” Rowan looked hurt.
“I’m sorry, I wanted to. There just hasn’t been time.”
“Wait, is that what happened when you fainted in class?”
“Yeah.”
“And at dinner when you felt sick?”
“Yep, then too.”
Rowan looked at me like he didn’t quite know who I was. Which I could totally get. I mean, I didn’t feel like I knew who I was, either. He stood up stiffly and went to stand by the window, staring out over the lake.
“Don’t worry, dear,” Vala reassured me in a hushed voice. “It’s an adjustment period for both of you. Now. I’d like to know more about these visions you have been having. Your grandmother is an old friend of mine and she is quite powerful, but even she does not talk with the animals. I think, also, that you have only just begun to uncover the extent of what you are capable of. Let’s see how all this started.”
She rose up gracefully and came over to sit by me. Each of her hands reached out to gently clasp one of mine.
Miko, I thought, is this legit?
“Go with it kid, she’s good people, I told ya already.”
“Relax, Siri, this won’t hurt. And I won’t see anything you don’t want me to. We’re just going to take a look at the visions you’ve already had.”
“You can really do that? Like, mind-reading or something?”
“It’s not really mind-reading, but more of an uplinking to the message the earth was sending you. I can, with my empathic connections, get a read on what is happening without forming a link, but this will give us a much clearer picture. Just don’t let go of my hands, no matter what, okay?”
“Alright. Are we going to meditate or something? Mom was trying to get me to work on that before…”
“No, we’re going to try something a little different. Rowan, do you see that small hand drum there on the table? Please come sit down and drum a steady heartbeat rhythm on the drum with that beater.” Rowan did as she asked, reluctantly sitting nearby on the red sofa. “Don’t worry, I know the drum looks old but you can’t hurt it. My great-grandmother was also First Nation, she made that drum herself, blessing it with the spirits of our clan animals and her Abenaki ancestors. Go on, start drumming. Nice and steady.”
Rowan began beating the drum in a steady, regular rhythm.
“Perfect, just like that. The drum will help connect us to the heartbeat of the earth. Did you know that the waves of energy that come from the earth resonate at 7MHz, the same frequency that most drums create? When we liste
n to the drumbeat, our brainwaves naturally shift from their predominant waking frequency to match that of the drum. When our brains are at 7MHz we are in a naturally receptive, creative trance state. Fae and young human children spend most of their time in that range, which is why this sort of thing comes so naturally to them, and to you. In fact, when you chose the green couch you were revealing a natural aptitude for connecting to the earth realm, whereas Rowan’s abilities have more to do with shifting people’s emotions and communication – as a water fae you’d be a great ambassador someday, Rowan.”
He looked at her in surprise, mouth open. He came to himself and kept drumming, looking away again.
“So, now, we’re just going to link hands, and close our eyes, listen to the drumming. Don’t think about anything, just let your mind go and follow the drumming. That’s it. Rowan, keep drumming until I ask you to stop.”
We sat still for a minute, her hand warm and comforting in mine. She’d said this wasn’t about meditation, but it sure felt like meditation. I zoned out, going deeper into the black behind my eyes, breathing in, and breathing out.
Breathing in, and out.
The room dropped out below me, and suddenly I was back in Rio in the early dawn light.
No one walked on the narrow stone streets, everyone was still sleeping. My heart filled with dread. Oh, no, did I really have to go through this again?
But I wasn’t alone. I felt a hand squeeze mine and I turned to see Vala standing next to me. Overwhelmed with relief, I gave her a huge hug.
“It worked!”
“Yes, it did,” she chuckled. “Where are we?”
“This was my first vision,” I replied. We’re in Rio, just before the huge earthquake they had.”
Birds took off from the eaves disrupting the morning stillness.
I gripped Vala’s hand, and the rumbling started, as I knew it would. Low and distant at first, and then suddenly all around us, shaking the ground below us. Buildings began to fall, one after the other like dominoes, the beautifully bright doorways splintering and cracking, while the muted screams of people awakening to the terror in the their beds echoes all around us.
When the dust began to settle, and the rumbling finally stopped, it was easier to hear the moans and soft cries for help under debris heaped on all sides.
“I told you. It has begun.”
That man’s voice again. I spun around, bringing Vala with me. But I couldn’t see clearly.
Rage and frustration boiled up within me and I screamed, the sound echoing from stone to stone strangely.
“You! Who are you! What do you want?”
Suddenly there was thunder and we were standing in the rain. The wind howled and roared angrily, and the landscape had changed. Rich homes dotted the hillside above me and mud rushed down in rivers. One of the homes began to slide down the hill towards us, and maniacal laughter surrounded us.
“Join us Siri,” he sneered. “If you do, you will have your mother unharmed. If you don’t, we will bury you.”
The house of glass and wood rushed at us like a living thing. Vala and I had only seconds before the home would squash us both.
“Help us change our fate, and live like a queen. Or suffer the consequences.”
I rose my hands over my head and screamed—
“Siri. Come back now. Now, Siri!” The sound of the drumming called me back, reminded me to breath. I opened my eyes and it stopped.
Vala was glaring at Rowan. “I said not to stop until I told you to, boy!”
“I’m sorry, I just…” He rushed to my side and embraced me. “Are you alright? You got so pale, and still, and then you screamed…” He squeezed me tighter and buried his head in my hair.
I inhaled deeply, comforted as always by his scent and his warm, strong body, even as my stomach rebelled against his darker side.
Vala rose and walked over to the hearth, picking up a remote and turning on the modest flatscreen hanging above the fireplace. She scrolled through the news channels until she found what she wanted. Images of broken homes and slow moving rivers of mud scrolled behind the newscaster.
“It happened this morning. Your visions are truly seen. And more than that, another Earth fae is using them to connect with you.”
“Do you know who?” Rowan asked, moving to sit beside me.
“I have my ideas. Siri, I would like to try something else with you.” She hesitated, seeing me shrink into myself.
“It won’t be the same this time,” she reassured me. “We won’t be going back into the visions. In fact, this time, you can simply relax into the drums. I will ride your energy to journey into the future and see if I can divine what is happening.”
“Okay. I could use some relaxation,” I gave a weak laugh. “But if that man comes back, I’m outta there. Deal?”
“It’s a deal. Why don’t you get more comfortable while I prepare?”
I shrugged and laid back against Rowan, propping my feet on the arm of the sofa. Miko jumped up onto my stomach and curled into a little ball, sending warm rumblings through me as he purred, overriding the slight unease I’d picked up from touching Rowan. Vala gathered her mother’s drum and sat on the table next to us. She put a lighter to some herbs in a bowl, and used a white feather to waft the incense over us. The sweet, pungent smell calmed me.
Rowan coughed. “What is that stuff? It smells like pot.”
“Everybody says that,” Vala laughed. “This is smudge. Many cultures use a variety of herbal smokes to help clear their aura and create a blessed, protected environment. Here, I’ve mixed dreaming woman, or mugwort, with white sage and some tinder mushrooms from the forest trees.”
“I like it. It smells sweet. Familiar somehow.”
“The sweetness is from the tinder conk. The herby pot smell is from the mugwort and sage. They will help you both relax and stay centered during the session. Now close your eyes, you too, Rowan. Might as well. That’s right. Just relax, and let your mind wander.”
Vala began drumming, again a steady rhythm but in her hands the drum took on a more ethereal, echoing quality.
I instantly felt transported to a lush forest, and imagined myself running through the trees. I looked to my left, and saw Miko leaping from tree to tree, keeping pace with me above. I grinned and went faster, clearing small logs easily, scrambling and vaulting over the occasional boulder that stood in my way.
Laughter followed me, and I looked around to see who was there. It didn’t sound like the horrible man from before. No, this was a deep, husky laugh that made my whole body tingle with anticipation.
Rowan, I wondered?
I kicked off a tree, spinning 360 degrees in the air, and glimpsed a dark-haired man ten feet behind, grinning as he followed.
Not Rowan.
I landed hard and kept running, my mind spinning. Who was this guy? He was shirtless, just wearing a set of loose brown shorts that blended in with our surroundings. God, he was gorgeous. Tall, lean and muscular, and even though I was running my fastest, he hadn’t appeared to be breaking a sweat. His jet black hair was fine, worn shaggy below his ears. Even from a distance, I’d been able to see his bright green eyes gleaming at me in amusement.
“You can’t lose me, Siri,” he called out. “I’ll follow you to the ends of the earth. But it’s time we headed back for dinner, are you ready?”
I stopped and turned around, catching my breath and watching him approach. My breath caught, as I stared up at him. His eyes weren’t just green. A violet ring around his pupil flared out into the green as he took a step closer and tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ears. My entire body sang at the light touch, and my heart felt like it had doubled in size, in a strange but oddly pleasant way.
“We’ll have to do something about your hair,” he mused.
And just like that, I wanted to smack him.