The Faerie Guardian

“Well, yeah, if it comes to that.” Please don’t let it come to that. “Or I knock you out, tie you up, and take you to the Guild. Your choice.”

  “Death sounds more fun,” he whispers.

  Okay, he really is as stupid as he looks. “You sure? That option’s a lot messier for me.”

  “Death for you, not me!” he cries as he explodes from the mound of dirt. His hairy hands wrap around the branch I’m balancing on, causing it to sag and creak beneath his weight. I somersault backward, my bow and arrow disappearing as I let go of them. I land on my feet, pain jolting through my injured thigh, just in time to see the goblin swinging toward me. His clawed feet strike me in the chest, knocking me flat on my back. I sit up, gasping for breath. He drops from the branch and runs at me.

  Sword, sword, SWORD! It appears in my fist—and the goblin runs right into it. It pierces all the way through his flesh. He slumps down on top of me, pressing me to the ground again. The only thing between us is the hilt of the sword, which I try to keep from digging into my chest.

  “You . . . kill us,” he wheezes, the stench of his breath making me feel ill. I try to push him off me. He struggles for a few moments, then becomes still. His eyes stare through me, unblinking.

  He’s dead. There is a dead body on top of me.

  I push with all my might, using a little magic to help me. He rolls onto the grass, coming to rest on his side because of the way the sword sticks out of his back. It still glitters faintly. It won’t disappear until someone removes it from his body. Then it will return, shiny and clean, to my invisible cache of weapons.

  I stand up, breathe deeply, and run a hand through my hair. I hate this part. The killing. Why couldn’t this damn goblin just disappear like most other fae do? Or at least have the decency to let me tie him up and haul him off to the Guild. Like that canttilee who tried to burn down the school classroom, or that shapeshifter guy with the orange hair and eyes.

  I look across the park at the human couple. They’re still standing beside the broken swing, talking softly, oblivious to all that’s happened. They have no idea what I just went through to keep them safe.

  I reach into my boot for my stylus, then pull my amber out of my pocket. I send magic to the tip of the stylus and write a message to Tora. Had to kill him. Send remover. Thanks. The words glow for several seconds before disappearing, leaving the rectangle of amber smooth and blank. I sit down, lean back against a tree, and wait. It isn’t my job to take care of dead bodies.

  Tora’s reply comes a minute later. Sorry. Know you hate that. See you before training tomorrow for report back and counseling. Sent Thorton.

  I tilt my head back and let out a groan. Counseling. That thing where I have to discuss my feelings about killing someone. Great. The list of things I’m not good at is pretty short, but discussing feelings is probably at the top. Fortunately, my kill count is low, so I haven’t had to do the counseling thing too often.

  I’ve just stuffed my amber back into my pocket when the air nearby ripples and a doorway appears. Thorton, a tall faerie with purple and black hair very similar to my own, steps out. “Hey,” he says. “Tough evening?”

  “I’ve had better.” I stand up and brush bits of leaves off the back of my pants. “Thanks for getting here so quickly.”

  He nods. “So where’s this goblin?” I point behind him. He turns to look at the large, hairy body with the glittering sword protruding from its chest. “Okay. Well, I’ll take care of it from here.” He looks back at me. “You can go and, uh, clean up.”

  I look down at myself. My black top is wet with goblin’s blood.

  Great.

  *

  An hour later I step out of the air and onto Nate’s window seat. I went home, cleaned up, and thought about trying to sleep, but the dead goblin I kept seeing every time I closed my eyes put an end to that plan. A distraction is what I need.

  The television is turned down low, and Nate is sitting on one of his couches. He has a notebook on his lap and a textbook open on the cushion beside him. He doesn’t seem to be looking at either though. He’s staring straight ahead, but not really at the TV. More like through it. Almost like the way the goblin’s eyes stared through me after it took its last breath. A shiver raises the hairs on my arms.

  I lift my hand and knock on the wooden frame of Nate’s window. He blinks and turns toward the sound. “Hey,” he says, a smile stretching almost to his eyes. “I thought you were busy tonight.”

  I hesitate. When I left here yesterday we’d had another argument about that stupid eye shape on his back. He still isn’t interested in finding out how it got there, despite the fact that malicious magic could be involved. I wonder now if I should bring it up. Should I apologize for snapping at him? Ask if the tattoo has miraculously disappeared yet?

  No. One fight is enough for tonight.

  “All done,” I say, walking over to the couch. I sit down and tuck my legs beneath me. For a moment I consider telling Nate that I killed someone tonight, but I’d rather forget about it. “It was a goblin. I got rid of him.”

  Nate smiles and puts an arm around my shoulder, drawing me closer. “Of course you did. Did you knock him out, like that troll in the labyrinth?”

  “No, we don’t stun while fighting, remember? Takes too much time to draw all that power.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that, actually,” says Nate, leaning forward to reach the TV remote. He clicks a button, and the low hum of voices turns to silence. “If you usually arrive before whatever creature is coming, then why don’t you use that time to gather enough power to stun the creature the moment it appears?”

  “Because I might miss. Then I’ll have depleted a whole lot of my power and I’ll still have to fight the creature off.”

  “You? Miss a target?” asks Nate, and for a moment the twinkle is back in his eyes. “Never.”

  “It’s been known to happen,” I admit. “On the very rare occasion.” I push the notebook off his lap so I can snuggle closer to him without getting poked in the side.

  Nate is silent for so long that I begin to feel awkward. Then he says, “You haven’t told your mentor what I am, have you? That I’m . . . a halfling.”

  I slip my fingers between his and shake my head. “That would mean admitting that I lied to her and continued breaking Guild Law by seeing you. I mean, technically I wasn’t breaking the Law, but I didn’t know that at the time.” Nate says nothing. I draw back, searching his face, trying to figure out if he’s upset that I haven’t told anyone about him. “And aside from that,” I add, feeling the need to explain further, “it’s not really in your best interests for the Guild to know what you are. They’re wary of halflings, so they’d be monitoring you closely if they knew you’re one.”

  Nate looks down at our intertwined hands. “Even though I have no magic?”

  I nod. “Yup.” I wait for him to say something, but he continues staring at our hands. Well, this is fantastic. What happened to the carefree, talkative guy I met only a few weeks ago? Now I’m stuck being the one trying to keep the conversation rolling, which is probably number two on the list of things I’m not good at.

  I grasp at the only other thing I can think of. “So . . . the tattoo of the eye—”

  “Is still there,” Nate says, his tone indicating that the strange mark still isn’t up for discussion.

  “Okay.” I remind myself that I don’t want another argument. “Then have you remembered anything from when you disappeared?”

  He releases my hand and looks toward the window. “No, nothing.”

  But there’s something strange about the way he says it. “Nate?” I reach out and turn his face toward me. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  “Nothing,” he says quickly. “It’s just . . .” He traces a zigzag pattern up the laces of my boot. “I’ve been having nightmares. It’s stupid. Embarrassing. I can’t even really remember what happens in them. Just a lot of running, I think.”

  “Well, you’re
good at running.” I nod my head toward the running shoes by the door. Nate tries to smile at my pathetic attempt to introduce humor into the conversation. I know he’s faking it.

  Ugh, I am so bad at this.

  “Okay, look. I feel like I should apologize for agreeing to find your mother for you. I mean, I know you really wanted to, but I should have said no. Then we wouldn’t have had to go through that horrible labyrinth, you’d never have disappeared, the tattoo thing wouldn’t have happened, and there’d be none of this weirdness between—” I stop. Nate is shaking his head, his eyes wide. “What? Nate, what’s wrong?”

  “You don’t need to say anything, Vi, you just—” He closes his eyes, sighs, and hangs his head. “You don’t need to be sorry,” he whispers.

  “Hey, are you okay?” He seems strangely upset considering all I did was apologize.

  “Yeah, I’m fine.” He pulls me into a hug and kisses the top of my head. “Let’s just forget about everything that happened and move on, okay?”

  “But—”

  “And Vi?” He pulls away so that he can look me in the eye. “You know I’d do anything for you, right?”

  “Um, yeah.” I’m starting to get a little freaked out now.

  “I mean, no matter what happens, you won’t forget that I lo—that I really care about you?”

  Whoa, hang on. HANG ON. Did he almost just use the L-word? “Um—I—what do you mean ‘no matter what happens’?” I try to distract myself from the scary, half-spoken word that now hangs in the air between us. My heart pounds out a nervous rhythm. “What are you talking about?”

  “I don’t know.” Nate pushes his hair off his forehead. “Like . . . what if my mother found a way out of that labyrinth and came after us?”

  “She seemed pretty trapped to me.” And what does that have to do with you thinking you love me?

  Nate wraps his arms around me once more. “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

  “I’m always—” I stop, sensing something unexpected. A surge of power that isn’t my own. I tear free of Nate’s embrace and jump to my feet.

  “Vi, what—”

  “Who’s there?” I demand, my head whipping around as I search the room. Nothing moves aside from the silent figures on the television screen. I stride over to the bathroom and push the door open. Nothing in there either.

  “Did you hear something?” Nate asks.

  “No, I felt something. A power of some kind.” I kneel down and look under the bed. It’s surprisingly clean, but there’s no one there.

  Nate stands. “The house is protected, isn’t it? Didn’t Flint put spells around it?”

  “Yes.” Slowly, I wander back to Nate’s side. “Maybe it’s . . .” I look down to where I know the eye tattoo is hidden beneath Nate’s T-shirt. Well, if that’s the source of the power, he certainly won’t want to know about it.

  “Can you feel where it’s coming from?” asks Nate.

  I shake my head. “It’s gone. It was suddenly there, and now . . . it’s not.”

  “That’s weird.” He runs both hands through his hair, avoiding my gaze. Perhaps he knows what I’m thinking.

  “Yeah.” I’m not sure what else to say. “Well, I should go. I’m really tired.” And if we get back on that couch he might start flinging the L-word around again, which, at this point, seems a whole lot scarier to me than a mysterious presence in Nate’s bedroom.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  I draw my legs closer to my body, pulling my feet out of the way of the two dwarves rushing down the corridor. I don’t know what’s got them in such a hurry so early in the morning—the dwarves around here generally like to take their time—but it’s obviously important. I stretch my legs out again once they’ve passed and lean my head back against Tora’s office door. So much for counseling and a report back. I’ve been waiting here at least twenty minutes and Tora hasn’t shown up yet.

  I stand and pull my bag onto my shoulder. I may as well get down to the Training Center instead of wasting time on a cold, hard floor. I jump over the stray vine busy sneaking its way toward the other end of the corridor and head downstairs. As always, I glance up at the domed ceiling as I cross the foyer. The swirling cloud of protective enchantments is still of the purple-grey-blue family. Ever since Flint told me they would change color if the Guild were under attack, I’ve felt the need to keep checking them. Just in case.

  I’ve almost reached the other side of the foyer when I hear an all-too-familiar voice whining nearby. “But you know me. You see me every day.” I slow down and look over at the entrance. Ryn is arguing with Basil, the day guard.

  “You know the rules,” says Basil. He crosses his arms and looks down at Ryn. As one of the few people taller than my obnoxious classmate, Basil manages this quite effectively. “Find your trainee pendant. Then I’ll let you in.”

  I turn and continue on my way, not bothering to suppress a smile as Ryn groans in frustration. I pass the dining hall—which smells so good I want to stop and have another breakfast—and several empty lesson rooms before I reach my favorite place in the Guild: the Training Center. It’s a massive hall with various areas set up for different kinds of training. Target practice includes shooting arrows, throwing knives and aiming blasts of magic. Trees, ropes, nets, a rock wall and a brick wall are clustered together in the section for climbing practice. Bars of different levels are set up in another area, and large mats meant for anything from stretching to sword fighting are strewn around the place.

  I wander over to the trainee notice boards to check my schedule for the day. Finding the list of fifth years, I scan down it until I spot my name. Whoever organized the schedules has divided my morning into Running, Fish Bowl (Opponent: Honey), Target, and Climbing. I look up at the enchanted clock face painted onto the ceiling. Ten minutes early, but I may as well get started.

  I head toward the running rectangles, passing two fellow fifth years sitting on a mat. They reach forward to touch their toes. I quicken my step. Aria and Jasmine have perfected the combined art of stretching and gossiping, and I’d rather not hear anything they have to say. Especially if it’s about me.

  I dump my bag beside the nearest running rectangle, sit down, and change my shoes. I’m already wearing clothes suitable for training. I remove my sound drops—circular shapes smaller than a coin—from a side pocket and stick one to each temple. With a wave of my hand, music blasts through my ears, drowning out all other sound. I step onto the darkened rectangle of floor, barely concentrating as I whisper the spell in my head. The floor slides away beneath my feet. I settle into a comfortable jog, matching my pace to the beat of the music.

  My thoughts turn immediately to Nate. I still don’t know what to think of him almost blurting out the big-deal L-word last night. How can he think he loves me already? He’s only known me a few weeks. I try to examine my own feelings on the matter. I know I care about Nate, but I’m pretty sure I don’t love him. Not yet. Do I? Maybe I do. Maybe being terrified that I’d lost him in the labyrinth means I love him. Would I do absolutely anything for him, just as he said he would for me? Would I . . . I don’t know, die for him?

  Ugh! Feelings suck!

  I stomp to a halt, pull my long-sleeved top off, and stretch my legs a little. I refuse to worry about Nate anymore. I begin running again, ramping up the speed with a flick of my hand. Faster. Faster. Faster still. I push myself until my legs burn and my breath scorches my throat, at which point a tiny voice in the back of my mind reminds me how monumentally stupid I’d look if I tripped right now. Good point. I slow down.

  I glance over my shoulder to check what’s going on around me. Aria and Jasmine are now shooting arrows at what looks like a stuffed version of their least favorite mentor; Rush and Asami are racing each other on the running rectangles beside me; the rest of my classmates are spread out doing various training maneuvers around the hall.

  I’m about to turn my head back when I notice Ryn striding toward a nearby mat to join his friend
Dale. Trying to be subtle about it, I wave my hand past my sound drops, turning the music off in time to hear Dale say, “Dude, you’re late. We’re supposed to be beating each other up with sticks or something.”

  Ryn drops his bag beside his friend’s. “Whatever. I got held up at my father’s.”

  Hmm, that’s not what I saw in the foyer. I slow down a little more so I can hear over the pounding of my feet. I don’t normally listen in on Ryn’s conversations, but I want to know if he’s told his friends he saw me with Nate. I know he hasn’t told Tora; she would have interrogated me immediately.

  “So, did you make an excuse for me?” asks Ryn.

  “Nah. Rowan’s the mentor in charge today. You know how chilled he is; I doubt he even noticed you were late.”

  “So what’s the big deal, then?”

  From the corner of my eye, I see Dale shrug. “Nothing. I just don’t like standing alone on this mat looking like an idiot waiting for my first session partner to show up.”

  Ryn shakes his head. “Dude, you need to stop being such a girl.”

  “Hey, I just—”

  “Morning, boys.” Aria’s sing-song voice interrupts Dale as she and Jasmine saunter over. Jasmine’s already let go of her bow and arrow, but Aria waits until she’s standing beside Ryn and Dale before gracefully stretching her arm out and watching her weapon disappear with a sparkle. Perhaps the boys are meant to find that attractive. I don’t know. She just looks stupid to me.

  Ignoring them both, Ryn sits down on the mat and pulls his shoes off.

  “So you guys missed the party at my house on Saturday,” says Jasmine with a pretend pout. “It was epic. My parents were away on assignment.”

  I focus my attention on the wall in front of me and consider turning my music back on. I’m in danger of falling asleep listening to their inane conversation.

  “Some of us had better things to do,” mutters Ryn.

  “Well, well,” says Aria, before Jasmine can respond to Ryn’s taunt. “Look who’s back from the land of the disgraced.” The muscles in my neck stiffen. I know without a doubt she’s talking about me. I concentrate on keeping my head forward and my pace steady. I will not let them know I can hear them.