By the time I reach the edge of the forest, my legs feel like they’re about to collapse beneath me.
I catch my breath for a moment under the shade of a huge oak tree, trying to process everything that just happened.
I ran into Bea. I tried to speak to her. Then she burst into flames and disappeared.
Impossible. Just… impossible.
It’s hard to accept the finality of what I saw. I need to know for sure whether or not that thing was really Bea. Even if it means I might be putting myself in danger.
I step out into the road, looking down Greenbriar Terrace. Bea lives just a short walk away, in Arlington Heights, neatly sandwiched between the forest and the Japanese Gardens. During the day, she’s usually one of two places – managing the Rose Inn, which is on the front of her property, or doing random hippy stuff at her cottage hidden away at
I’m standing alone on a beach at night.A cold winds blows around me, whipping the dark ocean into a roaring maelstrom. My whole world is sand and sea and the freezing air, but my mind is lost in the distant patterns high above me.I lift one hand to point at the black sky, tracing a curved line between five glimmering stars to form a perfect ring.Silver flame snakes through the distant spaces where my finger passes.The heavens are burning.The stars are screaming.“Silver circle,” I whisper.I wake with a start, bolting upright in my bed. I’m having a panic attack. My heart is racing; my skin is cold and clammy. I must have been crying in my sleep, because my cheeks are wet with tears.Struggling for breath, I try to remember what happened and how I got here.A hand touches my shoulder,
I break my “no creepy mysterious stuff for one afternoon” resolution almost immediately.Within seconds of me arriving at the Night Owl, I hear Mrs. Leyton calling my name across the room. I can see my friends waiting for me at our usual spot – Jamie’s newly-dyed bubblegum pink hair has its uses – but they haven’t spotted me yet.I’ve already kept them waiting thirty minutes. A few extra won’t make much difference.So I put on my best fake smile and walk towards Mrs. Leyton’s window-side table. The wealthy elderly widow has been a regular customer as far back as I can remember – every single afternoon since her husband died, she sits at the same table with a slice of cake and a cup of tea, and writes.She’s known locally as a “colorful character”, which is really saying something in Portland, home of The Vacuum Clea
I hurry over to where Jamie, Zee and Grace are sitting at our usual spot near the Night Owl’s stage.“Oh my god, finally!” Jamie exclaims, jumping up and pulling me into a tight hug. “We were getting worried. What with your fainting habit and all. Your coffee’s probably cold by now, and Zee ate half your cranberry muffin.”I give Zee and Grace a quick hug before flopping down into a faded burgundy velvet armchair.“Sorry,” I say, taking a sip of my lukewarm but still delicious coffee. I steal a quick glance back behind me. Mrs. Leyton and her spidery suitor have left. Thank god. “I got sort of… caught up in something.”“Oooh, do tell!” Jamie says, her eyes widening. “It doesn’t have anything to do with five super hot boys you’re mingling with, does it?”I hesitate for a mom
Netflix and a box of caramel doughnuts can mend most things in the world, even a broken heart.Jamie, Grace and Zee are snuggled under a blanket on the sofa next to me, our feet propped up on the glass coffee table in front of us. My mom’s always freaking out that we’re going to break it someday, but seriously, it’s the perfect height for a footrest.We already watched three episodes of Friends, and after it started getting dark the girls got permission from their parents to sleep over, except Jamie, who doesn’t need it. Her mom probably wouldn’t notice if she went missing for a month.Sometimes I think that Jamie’s attention-craving personality – her love of the limelight, and her desire to be loved and adored, by her friends, her Instagram fans, and the inaccessible hot older guy who she can never have – all stem from her inattentive, constantly absent mother.
It’s 8.45pm.Today’s Thursday, which is always a busy night at Biblio. So the earliest I should expect my parents back is 11pm. That gives me plenty of time.Walking quietly up the stairs so that my friends in the living room don’t realize where I’m going, I try to picture the last time I rummaged through mom’s jewelry box. I would have been a kid back then, maybe five or six years old.I clearly remember one sunny afternoon in Fall, left at home with gran while mom and dad were at the restaurant. While gran was in the kitchen making our lunch, I crept upstairs to my parent’s bedroom. I went for mom’s makeup drawer first, smearing first my lips, then my eyelids, with her pale silver eye shadow. Then I took the talcum powder from her dresser and sprinkled it all over my head, watching the snowy clouds of talc floating behind me in the mirror. I think I was trying to tur
Red and yellow leaves float down through the air like rubies and gold coins drifting underwater, a pirate’s treasure trove carpeting our front lawn in lustrous Autumn splendor.I’m sitting on the window seat in my parents’ room, looking out through the misty glass panes. I clutch Funnybunny, my favorite stuffed toy, against my chest, and I begin to sing the song we learned in kindergarten yesterday.The blackbirds in the tree outside gather on a branch near the window, bobbing up and down, trilling in time with my rolling melody.My song finishes, and the birds take flight, cawing their goodbyes on the breeze.There’s a delicious fragrance in the air – a quince and pear pie baking in the oven downstairs, gran’s idea of a healthy lunch. As she says, it’s mostly fruit, after all.But I’m not hungry yet. There’s something I must do.
The silver circle. The ring in mom’s jewelry box. The five princes. Bea. The sea witch. Try as I might, I still can’t quite piece together the mystery I’ve stepped into. Words, tunes, images and ideas swirl through my mind all the way back to the cabin, as I puzzle over the greater meaning – but I’m still as lost as ever. From time to time a bird or a squirrel darts through the leafy labyrinth of branches overhead, scattering the early morning sunlight and bringing me to a standstill. Even now, I feel like there’s someone or something following me, just a few steps behind at all times. I turn around every few minutes to check, but all I see is green, and more green. My parents were surprisingly relaxed about the shattered coffee table. I thought they were just trying not to make a scene in front of my friends, but they didn’t even mention it after Zee and Grace drove off with Jamie (who w
CRUNCH.Kitty takes a bite of the apple, and then… nothing.She doesn’t faint or vomit or turn purple. She just takes another bite, seeming to savor the apple’s crisp, sweet flesh.“Mmm, just what I felt like,” she says. Her face suddenly creases with concern. “Are you ok Ash? You look sort of… freaked out, or something.”“I’m fine,” I say, breathing a sigh of relief. I guess the apples were ok after all.I notice that Kitty’s wearing nothing but slippers and a very flimsy wine red silk dressing gown, almost perfectly matching the roses curling behind her. It clings provocatively to every curve, showing off her supermodel figure in a way that normal clothes just can’t.I look self consciously down at my own outfit – denim shorts, sandals and a plain white cami.
Time passes. Maybe minutes, maybe hours. I stir to wakefulness, rising up out of a deep and dreamless sleep. The room is dark. I can hear Felix’s voice, soft and muffled. He’s singing Déjà Vu. Where is he? I sit up in bed with a jolt, wide awake, trying to trace the source of the sound. It’s distant, yet somehow very close… far away, but definitely in my bedroom. In fact, it’s in my bed. Silvery light bleeds out from beneath my pillow, a soft glow seeping into the dark. I lift my pillow and I almost can’t believe my eyes – it’s my long-lost phone. It’s been missing for ages, since my birthday. It purrs softly in my hand, and in a split second I’m both relieved to have finally found it, and bitterly disappointed to realise that the singing
“Let go of me!” I hear Jade shout.It takes me a moment to make sense of the scene before me.The helicopter is hovering above us like a swollen obsidian dragonfly stirring the sky with metal wings, a rescue ladder dangling down, held by the scowling lady in black.She’s shouting “GO! GO! GO!” in the general direction of the boys.Kitty is half way up the ladder, her dress billowing around her legs.A huge man in a black suit is holding Jade back. Jade’s yelling Kitty’s name over and over, fighting to break away.For a moment Kitty stops climbing. She looks back over her shoulder at Jade, and I can see the pain written all over her face.But the lady in black looks up at her and shouts “DON’T STOP!”, and Kitty hurriedly turns her back on Jade and continues climbing, before disappearing int
“Nothing’s over,” Jade says seriously, turning to face Kitty with a solemn expression. “I’m getting you out of here. We just need to find someplace quiet. Away from people. Where we can figure this whole thing out.”“'’Tis too late for al' dat,” I hear a soft Irish accent right next to my ear. ”We’ll 'av ter leave.”I snap my head around, face to face with the pretty girl in the pink dress. The girl who is so unusually strong, and whose lap I’m sitting on. The girl with Lyall’s voice. Lyall’s soft brown eyes. Lyall’s gentle bittersweet grin I know so well, sweetly smiling at me right now.“Lyall?!” I ask. My hands move faster than my manners - I pull the glittery pink mask away from his face and over his head.“Surprise,” Lyal
They are upon us within seconds.The sound of screaming drowns out my thoughts, and I watch dazed as girls close in from all directions, their arms outstretched as they yell Felix and Alastaire’s names.The ground seems to shift beneath us, and the air all around us shimmers, vibrating with tension.A girl just a few feet away from me hold up her phone and takes a photo, and for a moment the flash blinds me, sending a sharp pain searing through the backs of my eyes.I tremble, the hysterical fangirl shrieks shuddering through my chest like the buzzing of a million bees.And as in any swarm, a queen leads the charge.Beth Donklin, our school’s undisputed Queen Bee, leader of the three B’s, Her Royal Bitchiness, is just a few feet in front of me.
“Felix,” I say, the sound of his name sweet as honey on my lips.“Took you long enough,” he says, pulling me closer. His crooked smile is wickedly dark, and I can just make out the scent of the forest on him – midnight pine, icy moss, night-blooming flowers.Mystical and arcane – a deep dark mystery that has me firmly in its grasp.“What are you doing here?” I ask, trying to detach myself from him, but finding that somehow, I’m unable to.I have no control of my limbs, and my hand refuses to unclasp his; my feet glide gracefully over the grass in a perfect waltz.“You really thought I’d miss tonight?” He asks.
A pair of gleaming yellow eyes. Bristling fur, black as coal.And a row of teeth like little white knives flashing towards my throat.I jump off the bench in a heartbeat, and I hear the sharp snap of the wolf’s jaws closing on thin air, in the exact spot I was a moment before.I land hard on my back, knocking the air from my lungs. For a second everything’s a blur; I see the stars swimming in and out of focus between the swaying tree branches above me.A shadow moves into my vision, blocking out the starlight.I need to move. Now.But before I can spring into action, strong arms are around me, wrapping me up, lifting me onto my feet.“Are you ok?” A familiar voice asks.It takes a moment for my vision to clear.I step back, ready to bolt.The face I see
The bright golden moon hangs low and heavy in the black sky.Jamie, Grace, Zee and I make our way from the Huntson High car park towards the lawns, where a large, colorful crowd is milling about on the moonlit grass.In the distance, I see turrets, and I recognize the plywood castle backdrop from last year’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It’s been reworked into some sort of makeshift stage, complete with amps and overhead lights.I’ll be on that stage in an hour. In front of all those people. Somehow I’m not even nervous. Just extremely, utterly excited.“Walk faster ladies!” Jamie shrieks, tugging Zee behind her. “We’re gonna miss the chance to see Alix getting kissed by all the moms and grandmas! Maybe even grandpas! C’mon! Hurry!”“E
Warm. It’s so soft and warm here.I’m curled up on my side, cozy as a caterpillar wrapped up a cocoon of velvet sunshine, sleepily waking up to greet the new day.It’s a new day.I bolt upright in bed, the events before I passed out rushing back to me.I was in a clearing in the forest with Felix. He kissed me. And he changed, or at least he appeared to – he became the figure from my dreams, the dark prince from Gran’s fairy tale.What the hell is happening to me? Was I hallucinating? Having some sort of vision?He called me a name – Odin or Onion or something – and then… nothing.It all went black.And now I’m back in my bedroom at home, far from the forest and the cabin and (hopefully) Felix.He must have carried me here after I f
Wait.My voice sounds hollow and distant, like it’s coming from far away. Felix hovers over me, a darkness dawning in his eyes as I speak.“Wait, Felix,” I whisper. “This isn’t… I can’t do this.”His dark hair falls in front of his eyes, and he pushes it back as he nods, releasing me as he sits up, leaning his back against the trunk of the tree we lie beneath.I stay on my back for a few moments, trying to catch my breath as I stare up at the canopy of brilliant bright red leaves overhead. As I watch, a single, delicate leaf drifts down, landing on my breast like a drop of blood.Felix reaches for it with a faraway look in his eyes, his fingertips leaving echoes of prickling electricity where they brush my skin.He holds the frail crimson leaf up into the silver moonlig