Love Charms (54 page)

14: The
Golden Rules

As the golden shimmer grew nearer, the
woods darkened again. I looked back at the road, trying to keep my bearings.
Maybe I'd get lucky and starve to death before anyone actually found me. Or
thirst, I guess. You died of dehydration faster. I certainly couldn't accept
food or drink from anyone, remembering Alice's debacle in Wonderland. At least
no one was trying to impregnate HER. Eat me, indeed.

The light began to resolve into a human
shape. Okay, I could deal with that. Fairies had wings, theoretically. I could
only assume that human mythology was based on the real deal. How far I'd come
from Boston College's chemistry program, all science and facts, experiments
with certain cause and effect.

But the face was familiar, the shoulders,
the petite frame. I stopped cold. What sort of cruel joke was this?

"Grandma Gem?" I finally
squeaked out. "Is that you?"

Had Grandma been trapped? Could she still
be alive?

Grandma held out her hands. "I
recognized your light, child. How long I have waited for you to come."

I didn't want to believe it. Everything
here was a trick. But it wouldn't hurt to hug her. I had accepted my fate. I
might as well have a few last good minutes.

I stepped into her embrace. Her golden
luminance faded into normal color and shadow. She even smelled like Gem, all
primrose and garden dirt. Most of my scant memories of her were digging in
Mom's flower bed, the few times she visited before she and Grandpa were killed
in a car accident when I was very small.

"Tess," Gem said. "We
haven't much time. I need to undo what I have done."

"I'm not Tess," I said.
"I'm Jet, her daughter." I pulled away.

Gem searched my face. "I recognize
your light. How long I have waited."

Hadn't she said that before? I stepped
away. "Grandma, are you okay?"

"I was wrong, Tess. I told you when
we marked your baby as a nix that this was the right thing to do. I know I
frightened you. But I was wrong."

Gem walked in a circle, wringing her
hands. "When I was killed, I sent this doppelgänger to the spirit world,
in hopes you would find it. I didn't dare leave one with the humans."

Okay, so this was a hologram or
something, like what Caleb made for the party.

"I must teach you the spell that
will fix Jet's enchantment marker."

I touched my hand to my forehead.
"What are you talking about?"

"Listen carefully and memorize the
words. When you go back to your little girl, sprinkle her with Poison Lyceria
— I know — it's normally deadly, but you must trust me. Then say
this incantation."

Oh, geez. Memorization.

"Amun alonza. Hidiay exponentia. Say
it back to me."

Might as well humor her. "Amun
alonza. Hidiay exponentia," I repeated.

"Good. Once more."

I had no idea if she could really hear or
understand me, but she surely hadn't been telling every ferret that walked by
about the spell, so the doppelgänger clearly had some awareness. I repeated the
words again.

She nodded. "If you were tricked
here, there are three portals in the border woods. One is by the rainbow
mushroom, near the white woods. It is the easiest. One is inside the fairy
grove. Not too bad if the fairies are in a good mood. The last, of course, is
inside the lair of Martel himself. I wouldn't try that. He is the one who
murdered me." Gem clasped her hands. "I felt you should know. He
never got over Dei Lucrii's failure to be birthed into a golden bloodline, so
despite my age, he came for me. Your father was so brave, Tess. He fought him
until the end."

She wiped her eye. "There are six
doppelgängers in the forest. They will only speak to your light and token. We
all say the same thing, but if you need this message again, find one of the
others. This one will now dissolve. Take care, my dearest Tess. Let your
daughter's light shine. Only on the edge of death did I realize how much we
might need her. There are so few Golden Enchantresses born to this world. We
should not live in fear, but accept the danger that comes with our
legacy."

The image began to disintegrate, falling
like sand into a sparkle that slowly burned out.

I backed away, trying to understand
everything she had said. I had been mismarked. I wasn't a nix at all, but what,
a Golden Enchantress? That sounded big. Now I knew why Dei Lucrii wanted me,
and why he'd gone for my mother. He had known somehow. He'd used her to get to
me.

How powerful was a Golden Enchantress?
What could I do?

My headband hummed, and I realized that
was what the doppelgänger had recognized. The message meant for my mother had
come to me.

Now I had to decide what to do about it.
A portal by a rainbow mushroom on the border of the white woods. I would find
it. I would not talk to fairies. I would get away.

To my home. To my dad. And to Caleb, who
had been right all along. He was my match.

15:
'Shrooms

If only I had a wand and a lumos spell. I
tramped through the dark woods, trying not to trip, heading toward the brighter
trees. I probably couldn't spot a rainbow mushroom if it bit me on the ankle.

But my purpose was a hell of a lot
clearer than it had been. I had been hidden all my life, kept secret, and now I
had a choice: Keep my nix marking or reveal myself. Poison Lyceria. Even if I
knew what it was, I probably couldn't find it in the dark.

Still, I couldn't help but think the
ferrets and fairies might be more receptive to a Golden Enchantress than a nix.
I touched the silver circlet buried in my hair. "Headband, come on. I've
endured your crappy hairstyles for three days. Throw me a bone here. Lead me
toward the psychedelic 'shroom."

Nothing. I needed an interpreter for it,
a narrator who would say, "And the headband, knowing that use of magic
would alert the evil overlord to her whereabouts, declined to help the fair
maiden."

Maiden. Ha. I was as soiled as the black
earth at my feet. Someone should have told me to save myself for my match.
Hopefully the Great Big Enchanter in the sky would just chalk my experience up
as necessary dalliances.

I stopped. Something glowed up ahead. I
ducked behind a fat tree, trying to make it out. Another doppelgänger? An evil
fairy spy?

Instead of gold, this one emitted
multicolored light. A rainbow. I didn't need to know the shape to realize it
was what I was looking for. The prismatic mushroom.

I ran.

The trees surrounding it were definitely
brighter than the ones I'd just left. I knelt beside the enormous plant,
luminous and large enough to sit on. I dropped to my hands and knees, brushing
aside leaves and needles. Where was that portal?

Little bodies scurried in the brush
nearby, but now that I knew about the ferrets, I didn't even pause. Faster, I
pushed through the messy forest floor. Where was that thing?

Then, I saw it. I put my hand on the cold
black ring that had probably once been silver. This portal had been destroyed
as well.

I kicked at the mushroom. "Shouldn't
you have been standing guard?" I sat down on it, blowing loose hair out of
my face. Gem's message was almost twenty years old now, and the carriage driver
had said there were only a few portals left. I knew of two others. Both were
bad choices. Fairy spies and the man who had murdered my grandmother.

Hell, I was destined to die or die
breeding. Might as well take down a bad guy while I was at it. I looked at the
trees around me. Many were tall and straight, but a few had branches, like the
one I'd climbed before.

I found a candidate and scrambled up. I
avoided looking at the ground as I ascended the luminous trunk, not pausing
until I was high enough that the view was broad and clear. I could see brighter
trees stretching to my right, the dimmer ones leading to the dark woods to my
left.

My view could not penetrate the
blackness, although my instincts told me Dei Lucrii would probably have ridden
to his father's house and therefore was deep on that side.

I leaned back against the trunk and
stretched my legs, my first rest since I'd gotten up that morning, or maybe by
now it was yesterday morning. I didn't think I was up for walking all the way
back.

I peered into the white woods. The trees
became a diffuse glow in the distance, but the light was broken by a few
structures. One looked to be a cabin, not quite human sized, but close, maybe
eight feet high. Farther off, a gap in the white light glowed green, as though
the trees there were a different variety. I stared at it and began to make out
bits of yellow light, blinking like fireflies. Fairies. I bet anything that was
the fairy grove.

Bah. Rock and a hard place indeed. I
began to head back down. There was no big imposing castle of doom like I'd
expected. No Oz-like munchkin land. Even a river of Styx would have been
useful. A person could plan an attack around a feature like that. But it was
just me, some fickle fairies, and an army of turncoat ferrets.

I paused once more by the rainbow
mushroom. "Some help you were," I said.

And right before my eyes, just like I'd
asked, came a sign. On the uppermost curve of the mushroom cap, clear as a
marquee, were the words "Eat me."

16:
Tricksters

Oh, man. I'd never been a big fan of
eating fungi. Picked it right off pizza. Pasta dishes always wound up with
little hat-shaped leftovers.

And, of course, the whole thing could be
a trick. One bite and I'd be Sleeping Beauty. Or was it Snow White? Whatever,
another dame on her back, waiting for some bloke to slip her a little tongue.

Maybe THAT'S where enchanter babies came
from. I broke out in a cold sweat.

I felt around the mushroom, trying to
figure out how exactly to remove a bite. The top was pristine, unharmed, and
seemingly impenetrable. On the underside, though, I could feel that bits had
been pulled off. I stuck my fingers inside the squishy flesh and tore off a
small chunk. The mushroom shuddered beneath my hand as it surrendered a piece
of itself. I clutched it in my fist and backed away. The topside no longer
showed the words.

I held the mushroom to my nose, trying
not to throw up a little.

"I wouldn't eat that."

I turned so suddenly toward the voice
that I smacked into a tree. A little dot buzzed around my head. Great, a fairy.
"So, you found me," I said.

"Was I looking?" The light
rested on the mushroom and took the shape of a small boy with long slender
wings. Or, I assumed a boy by the short hair and sharp nose and heavy eyebrows.

"Of course you were. The ferrets
found me first."

"Ah, yes, the furry beasts."
The fairy stood and walked along the curve of the mushroom. "So shall I
lead you to the portal? You will want to get back to your father."

Did everyone here know everything?

"My Grandma Gem — you might
know her? She told me never to trust a fairy."

"Now, that's a lie." The fairy
plopped back down. "Golden Enchantresses are the holders of light and
beauty. They never say a negative word."

I snorted. "I think you've been
living in the spirit world too long." But now that he mentioned it, I did
remember Gem in the dirt, moving every worm and spider with care, as though
each creature had a right to share the garden. She hadn't even minded the
weevils eating through the leaves.

I faked a sigh. "Okay, you got me.
So where are we headed?"

"To the grove." The fairy
jumped up and became a blip of light again.

"And why shouldn't I eat this
mushroom?"

"Because you are allergic. All nixes
are."

The fairy flew ahead, but I refused to
follow. "Why would nixes be singled out?"

The fairy flitted back. "You're one
nosy nix. Don't ask questions. You're not allowed to move around without being
monitored."

My headband buzzed, and I knew exactly
what to do. I bit the mushroom immediately and swallowed, trying not to retch at
the sour mealy taste. "Martel's house," I said.

Instantly I stood outside a stone door.
The carriage and horses waited just outside, and I ducked behind them to assess
my new location as well as test my new skill. Stupid fairy, giving away the
game. It definitely paid to keep my real identity hidden.

But now, to figure out the rest. Did the
mushroom work one bite per location? "Up a tree," I said. Nothing
happened.

Right. One bite, one move. I should have
gotten more of the mushroom. I took a tiny nibble. "Up a tree," I
said.

I moved closer to an oak nearby, but not
up. Great. One LARGE bite.

"If I were a portal, where would I
be?" I whispered to one of the horses. He blinked at me with a dark brown
eye. "Right, someplace private, a bedroom or the lair, like Mom's and
Caleb's were."

Then I had an idea. Why not just go home?
I bit the mushroom. "My bedroom," I said.

I was inside a room, but not in my own
house, one with stone walls and rough-hewn furniture. A large four-poster bed
was surrounded with heavy red drapes just like in a Regency romance. I hurried
to a window. Outside, below, I could see the front where I'd just stood near
the horses.

I was inside Martel's house.

I turned back around, looking for bowls
or silver rings. The surface of a dresser held only a brass hairbrush. In front
of the grand bed, a dress was laid across a bench. I picked it up: white with
crystal beads. A wedding gown.

Oh, boy. The mushroom hadn't taken me to
my old bedroom, but my new one. "Thanks for the vote of confidence,"
I muttered.

I opened my hand. The last piece of
mushroom was small. I'd only moved within the spirit realm using it, and now I
suspected it could not transport me back to my own world at all. If it could,
Gem would have said so in her message, not talked about portals.

The heavy door stood slightly ajar. I
tiptoed over to it and peered through the crack. A long hallway led to a
staircase. Rather than waste my last bite of mushroom, I decided to head out
old-school. I squeezed through the door and down the corridor.