if mama

could talk

she would talk

good girl

good girl

good girl

clean up your room.

-Lucille Clifton

sept.

There were books in the library, back at the Institute, about all the alumni in the school’s history and what they had gone on to do or become.

I remembered once, when I was bored and lonely in the library because Jimmy and Harry were off practicing music and I my fingers hurt too much for me to accompany them, that I had gone and looked at a period of the Institute’s history.

It had been one of the more recent volumes.

The biographies of the students had been short and dull. The only one that caught my interest was of a male pixie who was named Blackthorn. His short biography said he’d had a number of detentions and numerous violations while he was at the school, and that he had gone on to start an underground cult when he graduated from the Institute with honors.

The obvious connection I now made was that Blackthorn had changed his name to Crevan when he left the Institute.

I stepped on the grass, smirking sadly to myself at this realization which now made perfect sense.

The sun was setting, lighting up the trees so that the leaves looked like they were on fire, giving into the earth’s anger. Night would be coming soon and I wasn’t partial to the thought of searching for this centaur by moonlight.

I had never before initiated conversations with the trees. They always spoke to me of their own accord, whispering their warnings and tales in their strange, weary, gentle voices that only fairies and pixies could hear.

But now, I had no choice. I walked to the nearest tree and stroked the bark, hoping it would accept this as a gesture of peace and friendliness.

It did, and the branches came down around protectively, swiftly, yet the movement so subtle that if a human watched they would think the wind was the cause of the bending of the tree.

“When night falls, wolves come out little one. And you are a tasty treat indeed.”

The branches receded, as if the tree was gesturing that that was all it had to say. I knew it had more though, and I pestered it, verbally.

“I’m looking for a centaur. Crevan sent me, only to tell me to look in the North. Do you know of any centaur?”

The branches of the tree swayed gently with the push of a breeze.

“There is only one centaur left these days. But he will not see anyone, no matter who they are, fairy.”

The tree had no reason to lie. For me to directly disobey the tree would anger it, and soon the other trees would know and impede my search for the centaur. But going back to Crevan almost a few minutes after he sent me out would be detrimental to our relationship. He would consider me a lazy failure and cast me out into the wilderness, where I’d be too fragile to survive.

So I merely replied, “Oh.”

But I thought quickly. “Could you tell me which way’s North? I’m looking for someone.”

Technically, it wasn’t a lie, and I somehow felt better about that.

“It’s to your right, little fairy. Look carefully for who you seek. There are dangers awaiting all creatures in the night.”

I shrugged off the warning and thanked the tree, bidding my helper adieu.

I walked towards my right with an ill placed confidence that came out of determination to prove the tree wrong and to prove myself to Crevan. Even though I knew it was futile to run off of this childlike stubbornness, I pushed myself on, looking for rocks on the ground that would lead me to a cave.

My body wasn’t built for long walks in the woods and I had to stop every thirty minutes to catch my breath. On the fourth break I stopped in a little clearing. I stroked the trunk of a weeping willow that was near a small, muddy pool of water. Weeping willows had always been one of my favorite breeds of tree because of their graceful figures, as if imitating the ballerinas of the stage.

I corrected myself, remembering Fjord’s comment about the Kanevian teaching us to be like humans.

The ballerinas imitated the weeping willows.

The long, whip like branches of the willow encircled me, teasing my hair. This time if a human saw the tree branch sweeping through my hair, they would know it wasn’t natural.

Except it was.This was nature not hiding its magic from those who could never understand.

I giggled at the flirty gesture of the willow, despite the impending danger of nightfall. This tree could obviously tell who I was.

I asked for protection, for a hint of where to go for safety.

At once the branch receded from my dark, long curly hair.

“There is none my dear.” The voice of this tree was decidedly deeper, more masculine than those of most trees. “Not even we can protect ourselves from the wolves any longer.”

(uh oh)

At that moment, a wolf wailed a piercing cry from not far off.

I froze in place with terror. For a moment I could not breathe, could not move. I think I actually forgot who I was, what I was, that I was alive. My mind was a dirty piece of parchment with fear written all over it. And even then, I could not read what it said.

The trees rustled around me restlessly, wrought with anxiety. The first coherent thought that returned to my mind involved climbing up into the willow and hoping that the wolves would not sense me.

But I knew they would.

And besides, even though I was dangerously underweight by human standards, I still weighed enough to break the spindly, stringy branches of the willow.

So, I looked left and right and was astonished at how quickly night had fallen. Everything seemed tinted black, purple and blue. Dark colors, blending together and inking everything ominously.

A stick snapped behind me. I screamed a small shriek and whirled around, terrified at the prospects of what I might find.

It was a boy a bit older than me. He looked to be about seventeen, but his eyes gleamed almost yellow in the rising moonlight. I could feel the supernatural aura seeping in and out of his blood. He was probably a morpher.

Or more specifically, a werewolf.

I took a step back, put off by my sudden realization and by the fact that he was leering at me.

He smiled at my retreat, and in the dim light I could faintly see that his teeth were slightly more pointier than normal.

“Watch your step,” he whispered, his voice scratchy. Like a growl.

I looked behind me to see what he meant and shrieked. There was a huge wolf behind me. It bared it’s teeth and growled forcefully, it’s pupils dilating with adrenaline.

I completely forgot about the boy behind me from the shock of the wolf. I backed away from it stupidly as it advanced, crashing straight into the boy, who grabbed me with a malignant chuckle. The wolf lunged at my figure which was flush against the boy.

He merely laughed again, and pushed me away from him to the ground, reaching out to stroke the wolf’s ears.

I stared at the bizarre scene that lay before me. In a way, it was oddly picturesque. Absurdist picturesque. The wolf, stretched out full length was almost the same the size as the boy.

I remained on the forest floor, sprawled most unbecomingly before the idea to run away hit me.

I slowly, quietly began backing away on the pads of my feet and the palms of my hands. When I was under the willow I swiftly rose and ran as fast as I could.

And promptly screamed when I realized that I had run straight into the small brown pond.

I cursed my own stupidity in my head vehemently and meant to jump straight back out and run around the willow the other way, but something grabbed my leg from under the water.

It was slimy, but it’s grip was firm. The force of the grip increased so much when it seemed to realize what it had grabbed that I let out a loud acknowledgement of the pain.

“Well, well, what do we have…”

The boy’s husky voice trailed off absently as he was looking at something. I was so distracted by the thing grabbing me from under the water that I didn’t much care about whatever the boy was doing. I tried to step out of the water, to pull my leg from the thing’s grip. Whatever had grabbed me did not relinquish its hold but I pulled my leg out enough to see a black tentacle.

I looked up to the willow, trying to ask for help, but I received none. The trees howled in the wind, probably from horror. I pulled at my leg again but the tentacle yanked me and I was pulled farther into the water.

I screamed again.

As I was about to fall into the dangerous water face forward, I felt a pair of arms wrap themselves around my torso. My arms had been violently flailing before the boy had grabbed me so they accidentally hit his head, and I felt his grunting exhale of breath against my neck.

He tried to pull me from the grip of the black tentacle but the tentacle increased it’s grip even more so that my leg felt numb from pain. I cried out and the boy pulled even harder, so that now my upper body was in pain too. Unrestrained tears burst out from pain and panic.

Through my sobs and the boy’s aggravated grunts I heard a growling from behind us.

The wolf. I had forgotten about the wolf.

Apparently the boy had as well. I felt his head turn towards the growling against the back of my neck.

His head turning against mine was such an odd sensation that I stopped crying for a moment and shivered.

I’m not sure what he did or said to the wolf, but it came forward and lunged into the water, burying its huge head under the muddy water. I assume the wolf bit the tentacle in half because as the boy gave another pull filled with effort, I came with him, and it sent us reeling back to the dry ground under the willow, with me on top of him.

He grunted underneath me in pain but I still felt something unpleasant on my leg. I looked at it and shrieked. The half of the tentacle that had grabbed me was still wound around my leg, wound so tightly that my calf was pale again from lack of blood circulation.

“Stop screaming,” the boy snapped from under me, pulling himself to the side. He looked at my leg and under his breath muttered, “Oh.”

The wolf came from around the willow, sopping wet. It launched itself at my leg and I screamed again, louder than ever. I stupidly thought the wolf intended to bite my leg off, but it grabbed the tentacle off of my leg in its mouth and hurried away to the other side of the boy to eat it.

Panting from emotional exertion I looked at my leg and noticed how rudely disrupted the golden tan of it was with coils of pale white. Fine lines of golden brown began to seep into the pale as circulation resumed in my leg. I still couldn’t feel it.

I looked a bit farther down my leg to my foot and noticed that I had lost my shoe.

I began crying again, most likely from exhaustion, with loud despairing sobs, muttering nonsensically. The tears turned to crystal drops and thudded down my face to the forest floor beside my hands which supported my body upright.

The boy was suddenly closer than I remembered him being.

“Be quiet,” he hissed. I paid him no heed, because in my emotional state I couldn’t.

“Do you want to get us killed?” he hissed again. “Be fucking quiet. You’ve caused enough noise anyway. Crevan’s cronies will be out soon.”

Even with the mention of Crevan’s name I still paid him no attention, continuing on with my crying and haphazard mutterings of relief. I sat up and positioned my face in my hands without really being consciously aware of what I was doing.

The boy irritably snapped at me to shut up. I only cried louder, completely oblivious to his growing agitation and the threat of what he might do to me.

And when I finally became aware of the situation it was because his lips were pushing against mine.

He pressed me to the ground aggressively and now my head was added to the long list of parts of my body that hurt.

I could feel his fingers digging into the bare minimum amount of skin there was on my shoulders, clawing almost desperately.

The ground felt even colder since he was warm. I shivered from the temperature contrast.

His pointy teeth gnawed on my lips which had closed out of reflex when my body realized before my mind that he was kissing me. They bit more harshly, more insistently and when my mouth opened under his so I could whimper from pain, he shoved his tongue in.

It was an odd and unpleasant experience.

His hands pulled me upright with a jerk and our heads knocked again but still he persisted with his kiss. He bit against my bottom lip so hard that it drew blood and I grimaced against him, uttering out a muffled whine of pain. His tongue moved out of my mouth to lick my lips, tasting me.

Sadly, throughout the entire ordeal, the thought to push him away never even occurred to me.

He finally pulled away, audaciously smirking at me with eyes that I now saw were amber, from underneath wispy brown bangs.

“Shut up,” he said, getting off of me.

I did not stand up immediately, staring off into the space where his eyes had just previously been.

“Who are you?” I managed.

“Peter,” he said, offering me his hand. I did not take it, but I turned to look up at him.

“What was that?” I asked, indignation beginning to seep in with the jumble of emotions.

“So you would stop crying,” he replied in a matter of fact tone. “Now get up. We need to leave before Crevan’s men come to investigate.” He seemed to think for a moment before adding, “Fairy.”

He bent down and pulled me up by the hand closest to him that had propped me up during the kiss. As I took a step forward I let out another noise of pain.

“Shut up,” he hissed fiercely. “Can you walk?”

I was gradually coming to fear him more and more. I wasn’t sure where I stood with Crevan, but surely he wouldn’t appreciate his de facto heir being fondled in the forest by a teenage werewolf. I decided to stall.

“I don’t think so…” I made my voice sound extra pitiful.

“Shit,” he exclaimed.

But why make him wait with me for Crevan? He’d saved me, so he was entitled to some sort of reward. The kiss could count as such.

“You know, you don’t have to wait for me. You could just leave me.”

“What?” he asked incredulously.

“Yeah. I’ll get caught because I can’t walk. But there’s no need for you to get into trouble as well. What did you say your name was again?”

“What the hell is wrong with you? Don’t you have any idea what could come after you at this time of night? Hell, there’re even drunk humans wandering about this part of the forest. And I already told you, it’s Peter. My name’s Peter.”

“Peter?” I looked at the wolf. “And a wolf? Like, Peter and the Wolf?”

(oh gods, don’t laugh, don’t laugh)

Too late.

I began giggling.

“What the hell?” he snapped quietly, fear beginning to seep into his throaty, scratching voice.

I began humming Prokofiev, staring at a spot above Peter’s head.

His eyes latched fiercely onto mine and he said, venomously, voice laced with absolute hatred and loathing, “Shut. Up. Now.”

There was yet another stabbing of pain against my head and then all was dark.

When I woke up, I was staring into the wolf’s eyes.

Thankfully, the boy’s anger had a lasting effect on my subconscious and I didn’t scream though I had wanted to. I merely looked back at the wolf, wondering why it did not growl. After a few moments it got bored of looking at me and looked away.

I was in a completely new environment. Or so I thought. The wooden structure which so resembled a dilapidating cabin was behind me. It was only after I heard the boy’s voice again did I realize where I was.

“What happened to you?” he asked.

His question did not even have anything to do with the situation. He knew what had just happened to me with the tentacle and the wolf; he had saved me. But his voice brought back memories of things not rendered important during a conscious state.

I ignored him for a moment, looking at the back of Crevan’s aboveground headquarters.

After regaining some composure, I turned to look at the boy with the amber eyes and the wispy bangs that got in the way of his leering, pompous gaze.

“What?” I asked softly, confused at which of my past experiences he wanted to know about.

His shoulder raised itself a little as if he was about to shrug but the motion was not completed.

“The scars. On your back. Where you must have had wings. And I know you’re a fairy because of your tears. And you taste like it.”

“Taste like what?” I asked looking at him.

“A fairy,” he said, averting his gaze to the ground. “You taste like magic. And all sorts of junk that represents good in the everlasting fight between good and evil.”

I noted that his answer wasn’t terribly eloquent, which either meant he was dumb or I had an effect on him.

“Oh,” I said, interrupting the awkward silence that had almost started. “My back. Well, when I was a girl…somebody took my wings off.”

He looked at me again, from his position above me. It always seemed like I was on the floor when I was around a boy or a man.

“Who took them off?” he asked, curious. The harshness was still there in his voice, but it was because his voice was naturally throaty. It was no longer because he was angry because of my incessant hysterics.

I breathed in a little, unsure if I should say. But who did I have to hide from now? And what did I have to hide?

“Humans.”

We met each other’s gaze, holding it, suspending an understanding of suffered pain. In his eyes was something close to remorse and I wondered what sad story he had to tell.

“Thank you,” I said suddenly.

“For what?” he asked, his head tilting naturally to the side.

“For saving me. From the tentacle thing.”

Neither of us mentioned the kiss and as I thought of it, I felt myself begin to blush a little. I was aware of how I was sitting, in a dress a little too short with my legs spread a little too wide. I consciously pulled my legs back towards me and settled them underneath me. His gaze followed my legs for a bit before realizing what he was looking at and then he looked away at the trees.

“No problem. You were just…in the way.”

There was an awkward silence, stifling and uncomfortable from the event shared between us.

I broke it. I always broke the silence.

“What was that thing?” I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, trying to make myself a little proper.

“A premature kraken. It’s Crevan’s pet. He calls it Charybdis.”

“Oh.” My statement came out with a whoosh of breath of fear and relief.

Peter looked down awkwardly at the spindly patches of grass beneath us.

“Crevan’s men found us. He said he was looking for you.”

“What?” I asked, a little put off. Had Crevan thought me completely incapable? Why had he even sent me away in the first place if he was going to look for me so soon after he shooed me to look for a centaur in the impending night?

Peter looked back to me.

“He said you were his daughter.”

His eyes seemed to be asking for confirmation of the claim.

I shrugged. “Yes. I am.”

I remembered how rudely he had told me to shut up, in obvious fear of being caught by Crevan’s men.

“So, who’s side are you on?” I maintained a neutral tone, sounding completely innocent.

“I’m on Crevan’s now,” he said grudgingly, quietly, bitterly turning his head down to gaze at the grass.

I belatedly realized that I hadn’t told him my name.

“Sorry, my name is Brindille.”

I stuck my hand out automatically like they had always taught us to at the Institute. He looked at it, bewildered for a moment before he realized what I wanted, and then said something that oddly hurt me.

“Crevan said you would be weird.”