The Quicksilver Faire (13 page)

"Heal is a mighty strong word. I can get everyone talking together. It'll be a start."

"Talk accomplishes little. The situation calls for quick action and strong magic."

"Strong magic? They don't need to be charmed in order to talk, do they?" Keelie could see herself in his shiny black eyes. Images of goblins, ancient and wrinkled buglike creatures, and red caps filled her mind. She smelled the earthy smell of loam and for a moment felt homesick, until she heard the faint and familiar discordant jangle of a jester's bell. Peascod.

Keelie suddenly felt cold and vulnerable. She wanted to find Sean. She needed him. There was no telling what or who the creature before her really was.

His voice changed, becoming deeper, but kindness was there along with need. "Keliel, you must leave this place. The queen's plans will put you in great danger."

She stepped away from him. This was a trap. The queen wanted Keelie to betray her, to put Keelie in a bad spot so that she would do whatever the queen asked. Never trust the fae.

The jangle came closer and Peascod stepped out of the crowd. "Master, I have seen the elves, the cursed cat, and Coyote, but I have yet to find Keliel Heartwood." He stopped suddenly, staring at Keelie.

"As you can see, she is here, with me." Her dancing companion didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with Peascod's presence here, and Keelie stiffened in his arms as she realized that the jester had called him "master."

"Are you following me, jester?" she asked Peascod. "I see you everywhere. Did you come here from the Redwoods?"

"I go where I please, stupid mongrel," Peascod snarled.

Her companion opened his mouth, but before he could speak Keelie whirled to face him. "He called you master."

The mist at the end of the ballroom vanished and the queen stepped out. "I thought I smelled your familiar evil stench, Peascod."

Keelie stared from one to the other.

Queen Vania snapped her fingers and the snow started up again. Dancers swept around them, and whorls of lights from the aurora borealis swirled through the room.

Keelie felt the room's magic flow through her body, along with the tension of their group, facing each other in the center of the dancing merrymakers.

"Your friends are protected," the queen told Keelie. "They're with Fala and Salaca."

"What about Knot and Coyote?"

Vania pressed her lips together in a tense line of displeasure. "Lesser fae who think they're above their betters. They're with your friends, and as long as they behave, they'll be fine."

Peascod stepped forward warily and stood beside the fake elf. Keelie recoiled.

The queen's eyes narrowed. "Herne, take your pet and get out of here."

"Herne?" Keelie's mind reeled. The fake elf couldn't be the Lord of the Forest.

Then, as she watched, his ears shrank and his form buckled and throbbed, lengthening to become the stagantlered man she'd seen in the clearing. A thick crown of vibrant green leaves sat on his rich chestnut hair, twining between horns that seemed to sprout from his forehead. He turned his handsome bearded face to hers.

"Lady Keliel," he said, his voice thick as velvety moss and ringing with the echoes of bugling elk, "heed my warning." And then he vanished, taking Peascod with him and leaving Keelie with the Queen of the Fae, who glared at her in displeasure.

So that had been Herne, the Unsidhe, Master of the Wild Hunt Herne. Keelie stared at the spot where he'd been. She'd always assumed that Herne was old-like a grizzled wizard, or maybe more skeletal, like the grim reaper or the Timekeeper. And she'd only seen him from afar when he appeared beneath her window in Grey Mantle.

Queen Vania pursed her lips, resplendent and cold in her sparkling gown. She'd removed the swan mask and now wore a crown of quicksilver leaves. In the background, the green and red lights of the aurora borealis glowed brightly, casting an alien light around them. "He knows it annoys me when he comes here," she said. "He's forbidden, of course, but he couldn't resist coming to catch a glimpse of you."

"I'm ready to help, Your Majesty. Where do we start? The elves said they're ready to talk about the magic that's leaking." Keelie thought it was better to get straight to the facts, given that fairies liked to play cat-and-mouse games. She hoped her face projected concentration and unwavering strength, because on the inside, her internal organs quaked in fear. She laid out her agenda, as she'd seen her mother do when preparing a case for trial. "First, we identify all the parties involved. The High Court, of course." She bowed her head to the queen, congratulating herself on her diplomatic presentation. "The elves, the dwarves, and who else? Is Herne one of the parties involved in the rift?"

The queen stared at her as if she were speaking nonsense. "The rift will not be resolved with identification. It will take raw magic and targeted power, and you and I are the only ones who can accomplish it. Follow me."

She whirled and headed out of the hall, her beaded skirts clicking and flying.

Momentarily at a loss for words, Keelie followed, wondering at her words. Herne had said something very similar, about raw magic and power. This had probably gone beyond name-calling, and she was starting to feel outclassed. Maybe Norzan would be a better choice of diplomat.

They passed endless chambers and cold, elaborately tiled halls. Queen Vania suddenly stopped.

Keelie looked around, but the high-ceilinged room was empty. "What are you going to show me?"

The queen smiled and ran a finger in a straight line, down to the floor. A door appeared in the air. "Come to my chamber, and I will show you."

Keelie followed her into a small, circular room lined in crystals that throbbed with the colors of the aurora borealis. A polished stone table stood in the middle of the room, strewn with papers and ink pots. No wood anywhere. Keelie felt very alone.

The queen opened a box and pulled out a quicksilver chain, from which hung a fat crystal with many sides. She reached up to hang the crystal from a hook that protruded from the low ceiling. "Now you will see my pain. Now you will learn what fear is."

She touched the crystal and a view of the Earth appeared before them, real enough to touch. "We cannot mend the rift with talk, Keliel. The rift is not a misunderstanding. It is a crack in the magic that holds the world together. And this is what you are uniquely able to help me repair, the leaking of the magics into the mortal realm."

"I'm just a girl," Keelie said. "You're more powerful than me. What can I do?"

"True, the power I wield is more formidable than most, but power and strength alone will not restore the boundaries. The blood of fairy flows through you, along with your human and elven blood. You, yourself, are balanced in the three, and my counselors tell me that this is what is needed to restore the magic."

"Well that makes sense, but I'm not powerful enough."

"I will show you."

Keelie turned away, overwhelmed. This was not what the elves had led her to expect. She couldn't help with a deep magical problem. She was just a kid.

"If you don't help me, Keliel, the boundaries will collide and Earth as you know it will be gone."

Keelie spun around and stared at the queen. "What will happen?"

"The magic is spilling forth now, and humans who have fairy blood flowing in their veins can feel it. Many have traveled toward it in answer to an unspoken supernatural summons. It's changing them, they will eventually evolve into a different species."

"You're afraid of humans being able to wield magic like the elves and the fae."

Queen Vania frowned. "The elves are bad enough, but to have humans wielding magic is far worse. They are childlike and cannot control their compulsions."

"You mean like changing people's clothes and giving cats pom-poms in their fur?" Keelie lifted her head high and stared directly at the queen.

"I punished Salaca for his disrespect."

"You scolded him."

She shrugged. "He is old, and I cherish that he keeps his playfulness." She looked at Keelie for a long moment. "You did not know about the rift. You thought you were here to parlay."

"Lord Terciel said I was to convince you to come to Grey Mantle, to join him in talking to the elves about who was allowing magic to overflow into the human lands." Maybe Terciel was truly ignorant of the crack in the atmosphere, but Keelie wondered if she'd been tricked into surrendering herself to the fairy queen.

"Lord Norzan, the tree shepherd, told Terciel of your fae blood. Among the barren elves, the child of a tree shepherd is unique, even if contaminated by human blood. The trees count you among their brethren, and that gives you a deeper connection to the Earth. This connection could be key in mending the crack. Add to that your fae blood, and you are crucial to our solution."

The queen hadn't answered Keelie's question. The fae couldn't lie, but they were good at redirecting conversations. Keelie felt as if her ancestry was taking a beating, too.

"You said if I don't help you, then the Earth as I know it will be destroyed." Keelie didn't know what she could do to help mend this crack. To her, the idea seemed preposterous.

The queen pointed to the pulsing lights of the aurora borealis. "Do you know the scientific explanation for these lights?"

Keelie thumbed through her brain for the answer. It had to be hidden deep within her brain cells. She vaguely remembered something in science class. "It has to do with the magnetic fields and solar wind."

"Very good." Queen Vania smiled as if Keelie had answered a question correctly on a test. "If magic keeps spilling out, then the magnetic fields will weaken. The protective atmosphere will be destroyed, and eventually the solar flares will burn your human world. The polar ice caps will melt and flood your coastal cities. Your weather will be un predictable. Therefore, no crops. Humans will starve, and with their connection with nature destroyed, the elves will perish as well."

Chilled, Keelie thought of Earth with no trees, no people. "What about the High Court and Under-the-Hill?" she asked. "How will they be affected?" She wanted to know what the fairy queen had to lose. "I would think that if humans were destroyed, you could then rule the Earth."

Queen Vania shook her head. "We cannot exist if the others do not exist."

"You need us to survive."

The queen smoothed out an imaginary wrinkle on her dress. "Yes. But we all need each other."

"What if I can't stop the magic from spilling forth?" Keelie's heart raced at the huge responsibility the queen was presenting.

"If we fail, then it is the beginning of the end."

Visions of the end of the world flooded Keelie's mind. She'd seen lots of disaster movies with Laurie.

"Let me show you what I mean." Queen Vania waved her hand, and the image of the sun and the planets whirling around it appeared, in three dimensions, hanging suspended in midair. Keelie wanted to reach out and touch Mars' powdery red surface to see if it was real, or one of Saturn's icy moons. If she squished one of the planets, would her hand go through it or would it explode into small bits? She had to hand it to Vania; she was great at visual displays.

"What does this harmony have to do with Earth?" Keelie felt like a celestial astronaut gazing at the jewels of the sky.

The queen waved her hand and the Earth zoomed closer to them, making Keelie back up. Something was different about Earth-it was tilting farther on its axis. Queen Vania pointed left, toward the image of the sun. Huge solar flares exploded from the surface and blasted out into the solar system, engulfing Mercury and Venus. But when they hit the Earth, the flares bounced off as if some invisible force held them at bay, then continued on their way deeper into the solar system.

The queen motioned with her hand again, and the image of the wobbly and discombobulated Earth zoomed closer to Keelie. As the solar flares hit the Earth, she could see it was as if the planet was encased in crystal, but in some areas the glassy surface was breaking and flares were shooting through.

"What is that? I've never seen that crystal cover on any Discovery Channel documentary."

"It is Gaia's Dome, the physical manifestation of our combined powers." Queen Vania pointed a long finger at the Earth. "Look."

A great crack had formed along the crystal. Directly below it, on the surface of the Earth, another crack was forming. Keelie could see lava bubbling up, ready to break free and wreak havoc with its destructive force.

"If we do not repair the crack in Gaia's Dome, the rift in the Earth will worsen. This a sample of what will happen," the queen said, her voice was harsh and raspy. She pointed to the sky, where satellites were falling out of their orbit, then to the Earth, where the lights along the East Coast of the United States winked out. Underneath the crust of the Earth, the continental plates shifted, while farther down, at its molten core, the heart of the Earth spun faster and faster. On the surface of the planet, earthquakes rumbled, volcanoes erupted, and hurricanes formed over the oceans in response to the Earth's spinning heart.