Chapter one

Having money doesn’t exclude you from being trailer trash.

Not that I have anything against trailers.  It is a long-held belief in some parts of the South and a stereotype in the North that to be a Southern person, you need to live in a trailer.  That’s what I still believe, that those who walk around in Dixie Outfitter shirts just because they live south of D.C. don’t really know what they’re talking about. 

Before my mother met my stepfather, she lived with me in a trailer.  Now she fights with my stepfather like they’re both trailer trash.  I don’t know why.  They just do. 

It starts out as anything, the way dinner was prepared, the place Daddy put his shoes, the way Mom wears her hair, the things Daddy watches on TV...  Anything about each other sets them off like a volcano, and then it doesn’t stop until Daddy leaves the house, slamming the door, and Mom is left crying in the bedroom.

They're arguing like that now, and I’m slipping out that back door.  I have a sleeping bag, a dagger I bought at the flea market, a book, a flashlight, and a CD player loaded with my favorites.  It’ll be awhile before they notice I’m gone, probably not until school tomorrow.  By that time I’ll have gotten a fair night’s sleep and some reading done, without listening to the breaking china.  They might come looking for me in the house, to bring me into the argument, but I doubt it, and if they do, they’ll just argue about why I’m not there until I’m forgotten.

Sometimes, I guess, even arguments are blessings.

My name is Drusilla.  My father owns a bank, my mother designs dresses.  We pass for rich in Brickwood. 

That’s kinda funny when you think about it.

I am the shadow on the wall, I am the girl you try to ignore when you walk into a classroom.  I am the one lingering in the corner during a pep rally, draped in gothic jewelry, all silver and set with rubies.  I am the apparition, trying not to be noticed as I run my fingers down the dragon-coin necklace, watching the masses gallop around in their knots of threes and fours, pretending that they are my superiors because their sense of taste is “superior”.  I am the one laughing at them, because they are all alike, while they laugh at me because I’m not.

We are not your typical richer than Fort Knox family.  My brother does not where a blue blazer to school, aside from black lipstick, I hate makeup.  My parents try to spend a lot of time with us, but this doesn’t change the fact that they argue constantly.  If you saw us walking down the street, you probably wouldn’t turn your head, except maybe at me, because I look like I stepped out of the nearest Hot Topic.  It isn’t like we walk around wearing gold bars.

But of course, this is Brickwood.

I’m not into witchcraft.  I don’t summon demons, I do not try to read the future.  Aside from a sleepover where we messed with an ouija board (which we didn’t contact anything but our own deranged senses of humor, despite stories Daddy told me), I haven’t messed with any supernatural powers.  There are two many books and movies on what happens when you mess with things you cannot explain for me to get involved in that kind of thing.

But that isn’t to say I don’t have an interest in the paranormal at all.  I like stories, strange tales.  The Salem witch trials, the haunted legends of any town, fairies sighted on Scottish moors...the less likely it seems, the more I want to read about it. 

I have a book on paranormal phenomena with me right now, tucked under my left arm with a red, insulated sleeping bag and a camping light.  I jut finished something on Area 51, the next part in the book is on mythical creatures.  Nessie, the Mothman, and such.  I plan to sit beneath the old oak tree in the back yard and read it, until the insects get too thick, attracted by the camping light.

Checking to make sure I brought plenty of bug spray, I shine my handheld flashlight onto the ground ahead of me and step out into the night, passing a sorrowful glance back at the house.  Something expensive just broke.

There is a chill wind in the air, damp with a touch of drizzle on it.  It may rain soon, because of all the bad weather over the ocean, but I hope it won’t.  I’d rather not be driven back into my house because of rain, because the storm’s only going to play into it somehow.

Daddy’ll storm out into it (haha, Drusilla made a pun) and Mom’ll worry that he’ll crash into a tree, flip into a ditch, and not be noticed for three weeks.  I haven’t figured that part out, because she screams at him like a banshee when he’s around.

I didn’t bring a jacket, just a raincoat to spread over me and what I don’t want getting wet, just in case it’s only a slight drizzle, and raincoats are never warm.  I hope it won’t be too cold.

The woods are dark and quiet.  The animals are either asleep or hiding from the rain, so there is no noise other than the trees shaking themselves.  It almost sounds like they’re whispering to each other.

Who is this human-child that comes to our domain so late at night?

Peace, she’s driven out by her family unit.

Humans are such strange creatures...they display affection with violence.

Not always, I think, pausing to brush a scar on my forearm with my free fingers.

The old oak is about two hundred years old, maybe a little over.  Daddy showed it to me when we moved in with him, when I was a little kid, about two weeks before they started fighting.  He said it’s the only one like it in the forest, it never seems to die in the winter, like others do.  It is green almost year-round.  Acorns always litter the ground, but not in the dirty, unkempt way trees in the park do.  These are picked up by squirrels and other animals and eaten before they go bad. 

It’s a good tree, old and strong.  From what I read of English fair folk, it may have an elvish creature living in it, which would explain the greenness.  I always feel safe here, regardless.  I think it’s the aura of strength the old boy has.

I tentatively pat his bark and set up my sleeping bag, curling inside it and snuggling down with my book and turning on the camping light.  The tree almost seems to shiver at my touch.  I smile, reading the chapter in peace.

Dryads are vengeful spirits.  Any who dared trespass upon their domains seeking to do harm are punished in the harshest manner.  Reports of what happens are unclear, because many who suffer the reprisal of an angry dryad rarely return to tell the tale.

Below the paragraph is a picture of a female dryad, one rumored to inhabit this region.  She’s not like fairies are normally presented.  She has no visible wings, but she has cat ears perched on top of her head and curving goatlike horns around where her ears shoulda been, if she was human.  Around her neck is an amulet shaped like an oak leaf.

She’s pretty, but I don’t think I want to cross her.  The picture is at least as old as the tree, from the dating, but still shows the no-nonsense air she has in her cold smile and slitted eyes.

Slitted eyes.  Now that’s a nice touch.  What colonial-era person would stand close enough to a dryad to get that kind of detail?

I pause a moment to change CD’s, but the dagger I brought slides out of my hand on falls onto the ground.  I grab at it so fast that I cut myself, not deep, but deep enough that blood wells freely from the wound. 

Cussing sharply, I cradle my injured hand and mark my page with a bent corner and a few drops of blood, preparing to go back to the house to get some bandages and Neosporin.  I stand up, but misjudge the motion with my hand and put it against the tree for balance, leaving a red smear and filling the cut with bark fragments.

That earns two cuss words.

Anyone with a zit knows how uncomfortable infections are.  It wouldn’t be fun to have one on the palm of my hand, the one I have to write with, no less.

Taking the easy route, I shove everything but the flashlight into the sleeping bag and grasp it tight with my left hand, holding onto the flashlight loosely with my right, dripping crimson spots onto it. 

I take two steps before I hear splitting bark.  The back of my neck prickles and my ears twitch upward involuntarily, like when you hear a sound out of one ear, small and annoying but enough to grab your attention and my book falls onto the ground, opening.  I turn around to see...

I have no idea.

The trunk of the tree split open, revealing a hollow chamber.  A boy sits on the ground, staring blankly ahead of him.  But not just any boy, his long hair is bright green and his glassy eyes are slitted.  His ears are on the top of his head, pointed cat-ears, and bone-white horns curl around the spaces where his ears should be.  He wears a loose green tunic over green breeches, accented by a hardy leather belt and boots, beside witch curls a tail that seems to fade from furry to scaly, randomly but fluidly.

I look down at the picture in my book, then back up at the boy. 

He makes no noise, no motion.  He does not acknowledge my presence, but I can see him breathing.  He’s breathing pretty hard, like he just got the shock of his life.

For minutes, hours, days, I stare at him, his pretty features, his thick, glossy hair, almost black in the faded light.  He is a thing of beauty, like all fairies, with fine-cut features and big, shiny eyes. 

Those eyes, a size or two bigger than normal, twitch, turning in my direction.  Dazed, surprised, startled, he reaches for me, twitching long, clever fingers decorated by a silver and emerald handflower, matching one on his other hand and a decoration in his leaf-colored hair.  Those jewels make his hands look long and graceful, falling over the backs elegantly.

He falls forward, catching himself on his left hand and crawls to me.  Common sense would have told me to back up, but I didn’t.  I watch him inch closer, until he was inches away.  His face hovered over my sandals for a few seconds, and then he collapsed on my feet, panting in the dirt and gently holding my left ankle with his right hand.

The thing in the picture is female, and her expression is different, but they are the same, could almost be siblings. 

A dryad...

A/N: For the record, there’s a difference between someone who lives in a trailer and trailer trash.