"Thank you." She bowed back. "May I think about it and choose my boon later?"
"Of course." Terciel went back to eating his twigs, but then his mouth fell open and he jumped to his feet. "What is that?" he sputtered. "A fairy, in my lodge! Begone." He turned to Miszrial. "Get that foul fairy out of here."
Everyone was staring at him, astonished. He was pointing at the doorway but there was nothing there. Had a bhata come in? But wait, the elves couldn"t see the bhata.
Keelie looked down at the floor and up to the corners of the room. Nothing. Though she felt the tingling magic of the trees and bhata outside, there was nothing fairy in the building.
Then Coyote, that wily fae trickster, walked past the door, glancing in as if he weren"t really interested in what was going on, and Terciel began to gnash his teeth again.
Keelie jumped up. "A boon. I mean, I"ve thought of one.
Terciel scowled at her. "Now? Get that fairy out of here and I"ll grant you a second one."
"One was very generous, thank you. I wish to take my fae friend Coyote with me to the High Court."
The Council head"s silver hair flew out in an arc as he whipped his head toward her. "You brought that fairy dog here?"
"No, he came on his own. And he"s a coyote. I"ll need all the help I can get," Keelie said. "A fairy on my side can"t hurt. I can"t take the bhata with me, even though they"re powerful when they join together. My father told me that the High Court is a thousand times more potent, and cruel as well."
Terciel frowned, his former awe of her forgotten. "You side with the dark fae?" he thundered. "You waste an elven boon on a fae dog? Whom do you serve, Keliel Heartwood, mortal child? I doubt your motives."
"I came here to help you," Keelie insisted. Beside her, Sean rose too. Elia seemed to shrink into herself.
He"d called her mortal child as if it was an insult. The fae sounded scary, but Keelie couldn"t wait to meet them, even though she only had a drop of fae blood.
She had no idea how they would treat her, of course. She could end up shunned by both sides. Keelie thought of all the magical challenges she"d faced so far, since her mother had died. She had destroyed the evil Red Cap at the High Mountain Faire, saved the dying unicorn in the Wildewood of upstate New York, and restored the waning curse of the Dread Forest, not to mention that she"d helped cure her uncle of vampirism and reunited him with his family, and the treeling acorn she"d been given by the Wildewood was now the Queen Tree of the Dread Forest. Pretty impressive for a girl who"d just gotten her drivers" license.
She had no clue what she would encounter among the fae. If their queen was as mean and set in her ways as Lord Terciel was in his, she had a hard job ahead. With each challenge she"d faced, she"d changed a little, but she could handle it. Of course, those were probably famous last words.
Keelie stood outside of the lodge. She needed to be alone for a moment. After Terciel had stormed out of breakfast, Elia had sobbed all day and Sean, furious at the treatment they"d received, had tried to call Zeke twice. At least she and Sean had been able to spend some time with Norzan, although Elia had not left her room. When Miszrial delivered their evening meal to the lodge, the empty stone walls seemed hung with emotion.
Now, two hours before midnight, Keelie breathed in the crisp night air. Here, the stars were brighter and larger than even in the Dread Forest. Keelie looked up at them, framed by the burgeoning leaves of the comforting trees around the building.
"Are you not cold?" Norzan"s voice came from the darkness beyond the lamplight.
Keelie smiled. "Not really. It"s been a h.e.l.l of a day, hasn"t it?"
Norzan moved closer, this time holding onto a staff to help him walk. His hair gleamed the color of moonbeams. "I want to warn you of what you face tonight."
"Terciel said we would go through the portal at midnight. The others are preparing. Elia is determined to go, although I don"t think she should come with us."
Norzan nodded. "I agree. But she is strong willed. A good thing for the mother of the first elf to be born in almost a hundred years." He looked around, tilting his face as if listening to the night. Satisfied with what he heard, he continued. "The trees say that the fae are on the move. They sense you are here."
"Me? I can"t even hear your trees half the time. I have to work at talking to them."
His eyes glinted in the darkness, seeming to shoot blue sparks. "When you reach the portal, you will find that it is only a door in the midst of nothing, but when you step through, you will be in the midst of the Quicksilver Faire, where you will find the entrance to the High Court."
The Quicksilver Faire sounded like fun-the first glimmer of enjoyment she"d had so far in this dreary elven village.
"The Quicksilver Faire is the marketplace of the dark and high fae. It is dangerous, Keelie. Obey all rules, and be on your guard."
"Of course. We"ll be careful, I promise."
He regarded her gravely. "You must do more than promise. A misstep would not mean death necessarily, but an immortal lifetime trapped in the land of Fairy."
Keelie"s heart sank. She didn"t know if she had an immortal lifetime, but it would still suck to be stuck in Fairy and never see her dad again.
It was almost midnight, but Keelie could see everything clearly. They stood before the portal, a huge oak door in the forest halfway up Mount Eaton, the mountain that formed the backdrop for Big Nugget. Before her, the door"s strange silver doork.n.o.b glowed as if it had been dipped in moonlight. Life-sized polar bear ice sculptures flanked the door, each holding a revolving model of Earth with fire shooting up out of it like a volcano.
"Weirdest torch ever. It"s like something out of a theme park."
Sean leaned close to one of the polar bears and pushed his metal jousting helmet to the back of his head. He was wearing a mail shirt over a leather jerkin, and a sword belted to his waist. Not full armor, but enough to make a bodyguard statement. "It doesn"t seem cold enough to maintain this ice."
"Is this really how we get to the High Court?" Keelie asked Knot and Coyote. The cat shrugged.
"Don"t ask me. I"m from Los Angeles. This was the route pointed out to us," Coyote said. He started sniffing around the door. He"d coached them the entire way on their trek up the mountain, after their second strange and inedible dinner.
Do not eat anything while you"re there was the instruction that Keelie remembered best. It probably meant that the faire would be full of insanely yummy food. She"d have to be on guard.
Sean examined the sculptured torches. "I"ve never seen anything like this."
"Fairies, of course," Elia said. "What they do never makes sense.
Keelie glared at her. "Shut up. You"re not allowed on this mission. I can"t believe you snuck up after us." What she really couldn"t believe was that Elia had been so good at sneaking that none of them had heard her until Knot saw her flit from tree to tree and sounded the alarm. Well, the yowl.
"You couldn"t leave me back in Grey Mantle. They don"t want me there. What if something happens to you?" Elia batted her eyes.
"That only works on guys, Elia," Keelie said dryly. "And you are so not coming with us. You"re pregnant. Uncle Dariel would kill me if something happened to you and the baby. Not to mention, all the elves on the planet."
"None of the local elves seem to care." Elia said it lightly, but Keelie heard the hurt in her voice.
Sean cleared his throat. "We"re here on a diplomatic mission, Elia. Try to be nice."
"Thank you, Sean." Keelie wandered around the other side of the door. It looked the same as the front. "What if you went through it in this direction?"
"I don"t know. Maybe we"d go somewhere else." Coyote looked at them. "We need to get going. It"s nearly midnight, and Terciel said to be there at the stroke of."
"You"re right," Keelie said. "I hope he meant human midnight."
"Elves invented clocks," Elia said. "So technically it"s elf midnight."
"It doesn"t matter to you, Elia, because you aren"t going." Keelie stood in front of the door and tried to turn the k.n.o.b, but it seemed to slither free of her hand.
Sean"s forehead crinkled in puzzlement. "Do you say a magic word and it opens?"
"I can try." Keelie stood in front of the door, straightened her shoulders, lengthened her arms, and projected her voice. "Open Sesame." She had seen that in an old movie about Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. Still nothing.
"You got any more bright ideas?" Elia put her hands on her hips. "You"re the one with fairy blood."
"Abracadabra." Keelie said, in a lesser confident tone.
Nothing happened.
Coyote scratched his ear with his back foot. "It will open at the right time."
"So, I thought there was supposed to be a fancy fae town here, maybe a city, and there"s only a stupid door in the middle of nowhere." Elia scowled. "And why aren"t those polar bears melting?"
"That"s what I said." Sean studied the bears. Flames shot higher from the Earth-shaped spheres, and he jumped back. "Obviously, someone is using magic to keep them solid. Could there be a key?" He examined the ground around the door.
"Normally you keep a key underneath a doormat, but I don"t see one," Keelie replied.
"A doormat in the middle of the woods makes as much sense as a door that leads to nowhere," Elia said.
Maybe the fairies had hidden the key somewhere around the door. Stepping closer, Keelie touched the wood, and her mind immediately filled with the vision of an old forest, dark and primeval, thick with vegetation and condensation that dripped to the thick, loamy forest floor. It was the first forest, the Great Sylvus" forest.
This door had been made from an ancient oak from the first forest, an ancient oak filled with eons of memories. The tree had fallen when a meteor had crashed near its beloved forest, and the impact had sent shock waves through the Earth, ripping the oak"s roots from the ground. Grief for what was overwhelmed Keelie, threatening her with despair. Suddenly, she felt herself thrown back to the here and now.
"What"s wrong? What did you see?" Sean"s hand was wrapped around her upper arm.
"This is one powerful chunk of wood." She was breathless. She looked down at his hand. "Thanks for bringing me back."
Keelie stared at the k.n.o.b again, and it seemed different. The metal seemed to be alive with shifting movements within the surface. Could the solution be as simple as opening the door?
Coyote lifted his snout up in the air, and then turned to Keelie. "It"s almost time, and then we can pa.s.s into the fairy realm."
"How can you tell?" Elia asked. "I don"t see a clock on you, and how are we supposed to get to Fairy when we obviously can"t open the door?"
Coyote reached into his back leg fur and removed a gold pocket watch. He opened it with one black claw, then closed it. "Time to go." He placed his watch back in his furry pocket.
Elia stared, open-mouthed. Even Keelie had to admit she was impressed. She didn"t know coyotes had pockets.
An eerie jangle sounded from the forest. Keelie jumped. "What was that?"
Sean looked around. "I don"t know, but it sure sounded familiar."
Keelie shivered. She turned and searched for Peascod, but didn"t see him. She hoped the evil jester wasn"t watching her from behind his wicked mask, somewhere in the forest. If this was his home, she couldn"t wait to get out of it.
In the distance, hounds bayed. Icy dread soaked into her marrow. The Hunter. Was he looking for them? For her? She had the urge to run. "We don"t want to be late to meet the queen," she said quickly, stretching her fingers toward the k.n.o.b and glancing down at Knot. He gestured with his head as if saying yes, go ahead.
Keelie touched the swirling k.n.o.b, expecting it to be cold, but it was warm, and beneath the k.n.o.b little sparkles appeared. She turned it, and the door began to open. Bright, colorful lights and loud crowd noise spilled out; there seemed to be a party on the other side. She pushed the door farther but it only moved a few inches. Inside, someone yelped.
A frog in a Robin Hood hat peered around the edge of the door. "Watch what you"re doing."
Behind her, Elia gasped. Knot scooted through the door, followed by Coyote, who squeezed in under people"s legs.
"Sorry, trying to get in," Keelie said. Long, greenwebbed fingers grabbed the door"s edge and yanked as she pushed, and suddenly, she was in the strangest crowd she"d ever seen. The frog man was talking animatedly with a tall, skinny woman dressed in form-fitting white armor, with a tail whose end was swept casually over her shoulder, its ta.s.seled end flicking back and forth.
So this was the Quicksilver Faire.
A ma.s.sive woman swept by, yards of multihued gauze floating around her. Tall, iridescent, leathery gray wings sprouted from her back. Others in the excited crowd were more normal looking, if one didn"t look too closely. They seemed to be packed into a big wooden gazebo.
She felt Sean squeeze in behind her, the metal of his chest plate hard against her back, and Elia pushed up to her side, eyes wide.
A rabbit was fiddling a sprightly tune while standing on one of the handrails that surrounded the gazebo, and he stopped playing when a man in purple robes raised his hands and shouted "Oyez!"
Silence fell over the crowd, which shifted and shuffled and moved like a living creature that had absorbed Keelie and her companions. The man consulted a scroll, then let it snap back into a circle as he yelled, "Everyone in parade route order and we"ll begin shortly. Master Johnny O"Hare will lead us. Are you ready?"
Everyone bellowed at once that they were, and the rabbit leaped high over their heads, landing on a cinder road. He began to fiddle again, and the infectious music made Keelie want to dance.
"Magic," hissed Sean.
"I want to dance," Elia cried, and she bobbed ahead of them, doing a jig alongside a corseted pirate Amazon. Keelie and Sean hurried to catch up, not an easy task since everyone was dancing along behind the rabbit.
As they moved forward, Keelie noted their surroundings like an explorer charting unknown territory. Beyond the stone-and-timber buildings of the town, she saw an enchanted forest of huge trees that glimmered with radiant magic, flowing with waves of light just like the aurora bore alis. It was as if they"d entered a version of the Northwoods forest that was hundreds of years older.
The rooflines of the faire"s tents and buildings, along with the other odd structures ahead of them, were silhouetted against the dazzle of a beam of spinning light. The beam seemed to be coming from the center of the faire, and it called magic to Keelie like a summons she couldn"t resist: Come to me, come to me.
She pulled her gaze away and tried to take in the whole faire at once. It was like stepping back in time to medieval market days in London or Paris, only it was a market filled with unimaginable treasures and inhabitants.
A voice in the back of her mind whispered, Beware of the fairies, for they can hide their cruelty behind their beauty.
Knot and Coyote ran along at the edges of the parading crowd like fuzzy little kids anxious to get to the fun. Keelie looked back anxiously, searching for a jester hat with dangling, discordant bells, but no one was wearing one, and relief flowed through her. Strange, how she"d rather face the High Queen of the Shining Ones than Peascod. She felt trapped between two dark problems now, when she"d only expected to confront one. Maybe the High Queen would know what to do about Peascod.
Sean had removed his helmet and was looking around as if trying to take in everything at once. "This place is amazing, Elia. We may be the first elves to see it."
"Stay close to me, Sean," Elia whispered loudly. "I smell only fairies."
The man in front of her turned to give her a dirty look. Elia didn"t notice. Instead, she pointed toward Knot and Coyote"s bushy tails as they vanished around the corner of a half-timbered building. "Where are they going? Are they going to warn the queen that we"re here?"
"They"re having fun," Keelie said. "It"s good advice to stay close together, though, especially in this crowd." At least at this faire Keelie didn"t have to sell furniture, so maybe she could shop when her mission was completed. She didn"t know what currency the fairies used. Maybe it was based on magic. A thread of caution formed in her mind, weaving its way in her thoughts-always be careful when dealing with fairies. She would be.
Sean walked alongside her, his fingers laced through hers, and she could feel his muscles tense as he resisted the urge to dance to Johnny O"Hare"s magic.
She was on her way to meet the Shining One"s fairy queen. Images of the deadly Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland flashed through Keelie"s mind. Echoes of "Off With her Head" swirled in tune with the fiddler"s music.
She tightened her grip on Sean"s hand. He rea.s.suringly squeezed back. "I"m here," he whispered in her ear.
Knot and Coyote reappeared and paced in front of them, their paws stepping in equal, measured strides as if to present a united front to the fae.
Coyote turned his head to Sean. "Stay with her. Don"t let her out of your sight."
"What did you two see? Do you know where we should meet the queen?" Keelie asked.
"The queen won"t be meeting us; she"s sending an es cort," Coyote replied. Beside him, Knot"s normally wide eyes were hooded. Not a good sign.
The parade pa.s.sed the end of a lane where lanterns made of the same sparkling metal as the fairy doork.n.o.b floated in midair, illuminating the narrow, crowded streets. Jostling throngs separated from the parade and moved down the street before them, and Keelie grabbed Elia"s hand as Sean pulled them free of the parade. They were joined by a group of giggling girls, arms around each other, who looked like any of Keelie"s friends on a mall outing-except for the glistening, fluttery wings that arched out behind them.
A stout woman with a basket on her arm, who had her reptilian tail tucked tidily out of the way, pa.s.sed them. Behind her, a great hulking shape in a hooded robe plodded along, swaying side to side. Keelie was sure she didn"t want to see his face; his smell was enough to make her back up a step. Not the image of a medieval English market she"d conjured in her mind.