The Seven Revels

Four

He remembered the first time he saw her. They were both five. Her brown hair was pulled up in a braid, the brown streaked with dust. She wore shorts and a tattered sweatshirt, her sneakers covered in mud. Mud was splattered across her face too, but her smile was wide. Her golden-brown eyes glittered. Her nose was covered in peeling skin, a sunburn that was almost finished healing.

"How could you?" Quill shouted, hitting him again. Stars flashed before his eyes, he tasted blood.

She held a trowel in one hand, a bucket in the other, her dirt-caked nails tapping against it. He liked the way they clicked. The sun was hanging low in the sky, the orange glow of the sunset shimmering off of her hair. He could see dust particles floating gently to the ground, forming a halo around her.

"Bastard," Quill said. He felt Quill jam his helmet onto his head. "You look good in this uniform, traitor. I'm going to kill you in it." Another sharp hit, this time just below his stomach. He collapsed onto the floor.

"What are you staring at?" she asked him. Her teeth sparkled.

"Are you a corn fairy?" he asked.

"A what? Mama and I are helping Nana harvest the corn. Only, Mama doesn't think I'm tall enough to get to it, so she sent me to dig up the potatoes." She brandished the bucket proudly and he looked inside to see ten potatoes, all caked with dirt. She grinned at him again. "Pretty good, right? I mean, Mama says there's lots more, but I gotta get them ten at a time. I can't carry any more than that."

"Can I try?" he asked.

"You tried to kill her!" He couldn't breathe. He felt Quill's foot connect with his ribcage, banishing his breath from his lungs. Then he felt the foot on his helmet, pressing his face into the floor.

"I didn't," he tried to say. The foot cracked across the back of his head. The helmet did nothing to protect him. Pain shot through his skull.

"Like hell you didn't. Why else would you even think to point a gun at her?"

"Sure," she said, skeptically glancing at his arms. "Although I'm not so sure a noodle like you can handle it."

"I'm not a noodle," he said, wanting very much to impress this magical corn fairy with her bucket of potatoes. He reached over and took the bucket from her hand. Holding it with two, he managed to lift it off the ground. "See? I can do it too."

She tapped her cheek with her finger. "If I did it that way, I could carry twenty potatoes..." she decided.

He dropped the bucket. "What?"

"Well, I only need one hand to lift that bucket. So, Noodle Boy, what's your name?"

"Are you listening to me, Burgess?" Quill snarled.

"I'm listening to you," he said. "I'm trying to tell you, I didn't mean to."

Quill's hand twisted into the back of his shirt and pulled him to his feet.

"And I'm trying to tell you that no one here is gonna buy that shit. You shot her, end of story."

"No, that's not-" Quill's elbow in his gut shut him up.

"I guess you just thought, since that helmet hides your face, that you could do whatever you wanted, huh?"

"Uhhhh," he groaned, clutching his stomach. He tried not to throw up.

"My name is Milo," he told her. "Milo Casper. I live right there." He pointed toward his home, a tall white building shining gold in the sun.

"Milo," she said. He smiled. He liked the way she said his name.