ABBY
Samuel leads me down the street and around the corner. The buildings continue to look identical, all an earthy beige with dark glass windows I can't see through. There aren't even any numbers on the buildings, and it makes me wonder how the faeries know where they're going.
My feet feel loud as they slap against the pavement, especially compared to Samuel's practically silent movements.
"Where is everybody?" I can't help but ask.
Samuel peers at me over his shoulder. "It's mealtime. I imagine they're eating."
Everybody here eats at the same time? That's peculiar, and I don't see how that can be convenient, but I don't voice my thoughts. The faeries clearly found a way to make it work, and I'm not trying to insult their culture.
Do they eat together? I hope not, and I might combust if Samual leads us to some giant meal hall.
Samual stops before a pair of glass doors and pulls them open. Quiet piano music pours out from inside, and I'm relieved when Samual enters first. I wasn't going to volunteer to be the first to go inside the dim, spooky building.
The interior is dark, and it takes my eyes a brief moment to adjust. The magic swirling through the air stands out more in the dim lighting, the tiny specks reflecting the light pouring down from the ceiling.
Despite all the differences between our realms, I recognize this place as a restaurant. There's a host desk directly in front of the doors, and behind it are tables. Tall privacy walls separate each eating area, so I can only make out the corners of tables and the occasional elbow.
The privacy, coupled with the dim lighting, makes this place feel intimate.
My heart races, and I practically hide behind Samuel as he approaches the man behind the host desk. I want to stay out of sight until I have a better grasp of this world.
"Table for two," Samuel says.
I look up, trying to pinpoint the lights, but the entire ceiling seems to be glowing a deep amber haze. It's beautiful, and I spare a glance behind me to see what's going on with the windows. As I suspected, I'm able to see the street from inside.
That's good to know, and I'll keep from lingering too long in front of them in the future.
The host steps out from behind his booth, and I nervously grab my backpack straps as I look him over. He's got the typical blond-white hair and purple eyes, and just like Samuel, he's wearing earthy-colored linens.
I hold my breath as the host's gaze falls on me, but he keeps his expression flat. He doesn't show any emotion as he gives me a quick once over, and after a brief pause, he spins and leads us to a table.
We pass the openings of the eating areas as we walk, and it takes every bit of willpower I have not to peer in and gawk at all the faeries. I want to so badly, but that'll only be inviting them to look at me in return.
The host stops in front of one of the small eating areas and steps aside, and Samuel and I quietly lower ourselves into the seats on opposite ends of the table.
I expect the host to say something, maybe that our server will be with us in a moment, but he simply spins around and walks away. I watch him disappear before turning back to Samuel.
"You never told me your name," Samuel says, not hesitating to start conversation.
I know I haven't, and I've been avoiding doing so.
Should I lie? I don't know how much access the faeries have to the human realm, and I don't want to give him my name and risk him looking it up. That would bring them too close to finding information about Lill, and that's out of the question.
I refuse to expose her.
"Abby," I say, purposefully leaving out my last name.
There are millions of Abby's in the world, and he won't be able to find anything with that. Especially if he doesn't know exactly where I'm from.
Samuel nods, and I practically jolt out of my seat when the center of the table lifts. A circle the size of my open hand raises about a foot in the air, and it continues upward until another platform with menus appears from underneath and fills the gap.
Nothing connects the two platforms, and my jaw drops as I watch the first one continue upward to the ceiling before smoothly sliding away.
Is it tied to a string? I don't see anything, and I scrunch my eyebrows before swiping my hand over the new platform. There's nothing there.
Samuel remains silent as he watches my shock but doesn't say anything about it as he grabs a menu.
It's a small slip of paper, and I force myself to relax as I grab the second one. Samuel and I don't speak as we read over the options, and I spend the entire time thinking through the questions I want to ask. I need to learn a lot in a short amount of time, and I need to do so without making Samuel any more suspicious of me than he already is.
An easy task.
"Where is Janta?" I eventually ask, setting the menu in front of me.
Samuel said several vehicles would be traveling between there and Elora next week for something called Praxis.
"And what is Praxis?" I continue.
Samuel peers at me over the top of his menu before reaching into his pocket and pulling out a shard of glass. It's frosted and about the size of his palm, and I cock my head to the side as he sets it on the table between us.
He then taps the top twice. The magic flecks around us begin to swirl and funnel into the glass, and I blink several times to ensure I'm not hallucinating as it glazes over and turns black. The blackness spreads, continuing until it takes up a decent portion of the table, and then it shifts upward to form a terrain.
I've never seen anything like this before, and to say I'm in shock would be an understatement.
"I need to get one of those," I mumble.
Samuel lets out a quiet laugh.
"Humans can't yield magic. This would be of no use to you," he explains.
I hope that's not going to be a common theme here. It makes sense that faeries would have much of their technology centered around the magic surrounding them, but that doesn't bode well for me.
Humans do exist here, though. They've got to have some things we can use.
"This is where you are now," Samuel says, pointing to a spot near the bottom of the map.
The land below it is flat, and I assume it's where the prairies I landed in and traveled through are. The town we're in now is relatively flat, too, but that changes almost immediately north of here. What looks like giant mountains and ravines stretch up the map, continuing until they reach what appears to be a massive city.
"That's Elora," Samuel explains, seeing where my gaze has fallen. He then directs my attention to another small town right above the one we're currently in. "And this is Janta. It's about a day's walk from here."
Oh. The walk to Janta doesn't look too bad, but there's no way I could get to Elora on foot. It's too far.
"This is the Elora forest," Samuel says, gesturing to the wild terrain between Janta and Elora. "It's swarming with trolls and wild shifters. You have to go around."
He drags his finger in a large arc around the outskirts of the forest.
"This is the road. You can't walk it, so you'll need to find transportation once you get to Janta," Samuel continues. "Praxis begins next week, so there should be plenty of vehicles available."
I nod, still eyeing the map. I wish I had my phone so I could take a photo of it.
"What's Praxis?" I ask.
It must be a big event to have so many people travel for it, and I want to know what I'm getting myself into before getting there.
Samuel hesitates, seemingly not knowing where to start.
"It's hard to explain," he eventually says. "Let's order our food first. Do you know what you want?"
I'm unfamiliar with the food on the menu, and I don't bother trying to pronounce it as I point to the first item. Samuel peers over to see, and with a curt nod, he taps the floating center of the table twice and sets the menus on top.
I stare, shocked, as it rises into the air and is replaced with a new one holding two glasses of water.
"How did you tell it to do that?" I ask.
Samuel shrugs. "It's impossible to explain. The concept is too foreign to humans. We tell the magic what to do, and it listens."
I grab one of the glasses of water and gulp it down.
"We have magic in our world," I say. "Not physically, but we know of it."
Samuel laughs, and I can tell he's finding humor in my lack of knowledge. I'm still suspicious of him, especially since he's not asking who I am and where I'm from. It's the first thing I'd do if I were him.
"The magic humans believe in isn't representative of what we have here," he says. "I'm happy to explain it to you, but we might run out of time."
I so badly want to know more about magic, but not if it will come at the cost of learning more essential information. I can't use it, so hopefully, that means nobody will expect me to know much about it. Not like they'd expect me to know about the faerie realm.
Even if I'm not a faerie, I'm still living here. It's weird for me not to know about the traditions.
"Why are you doing this?" I ask.
Samuel purses his lips and sips his water, avoiding eye contact.
"Magic is the life of our world. It's something we intrinsically know how to manipulate, but there are limits to what we can do with it. Those limits vary from faerie to faerie," he explains. "I have a low tolerance for magic, and the other faeries can sense it."
Okay? Samuel being a faerie outcast doesn't explain why he's helping me.
"Women don't want to risk being my mate, so I'm not often allowed to touch them," he continues.
Oh. Well, that's sad. He's being nice to me because he wants to touch me.
"Aren't mates supposed to be super special?" I ask.
That's how it's always perceived in the books.
"They are," Samuel confirms. "But the bond isn't triggered until the touch is initiated. Many feel that being mateless and settling for a partner with status is better than being trapped with a mate who can't provide."
Things grow quiet between Samuel and me, and I let out a sigh of relief when the center of the table lifts and another with food emerges. They're both in bowls, and one looks to be a type of stir fry while the other is a soup.
Samuel takes the soup, so I assume the stir fry is mine.
That's good. I don't know when I will get another meal, and I need to fill up while I can. I'm happy to have a distraction from our conversation on Samuel's failed love life, and I don't hesitate to begin eating. I'm starving, and the flavor is amazing.
I've never had anything like this before, and the sauce is incredibly sweet.
Samuel eats slower than me, and after scarfing down a few bites, I force myself to match his pace. I don't want him to know I'm hungry. For all he knows, some elder brought me here and sent me on my way. It's none of his business that I've spent the past day and a half tromping through a giant prairie.
The map he created is still up, and I try to memorize it while I can.
What if I can't get a ride from Janta to Elora? There isn't enough time to walk around the giant forest, but I also don't want to take the risk of walking through it. Especially if there are trolls and wild shifters out there.
Lill's never mentioned shifters before, but I assume they're going to be similar to the books I've read. Lill's told me before that most mythical human stories came from somebody who had access to the other realms, so while the details have been changed along the way, the general premise is correct.
"So, what's Praxis?" I ask after a few minutes of silence.
Samuel finishes chewing before answering. "To make a long story short, some nobles tried to stage a coup a few hundred years back. They made agreements with the gods, which backfired."
I lean forward in my seat, soaking all this in.
"When the gods realized the nobles weren't holding up their end of the bargain, they decided to punish all of us. There's a portal in the center of the forest that leads to their realm, and the gods made it so it seeps a magic killing death we can't get rid of." Samuel pauses and points to a spot on the map. It looks unassuming. "Royals also now have to meet with the gods before being crowned. If the gods approve, the death slows."
There's no way this is real.
"It picks up again when the gods decide it's time for a new ruler. It's begun to do so in the past five or so years, so it's time for the prince to meet with them. Praxis is what we call the royal send-off, and since Janta is the closest city to the portal, that's where it's held."
That's a lot of information, and I chew quietly while I run Samuel's explanation through my mind a few times. I have no less than a million follow-ups to what he's just said.
"We need to get going if you want to get your gloves," Samuel says before I can formulate my questions. "The stores will be closing soon."
I completely forgot about the gloves. I'll need them to get into Elora, so with a sigh, I shovel my last few bites of food into my mouth and finish my water. Samuel grabs my bowl once I finish and sets it, along with his, on the platform.
He then closes the map between us, the black landscape shrinking until it's replaced with the small, clear shard of glass it started off as. It looks so unsuspecting, and Samuel taps on it a few times before shoving it back into his pocket.
"Are you ready to go?" he asks, standing.
Did he pay? I assume that's what all the tapping on his glass was for, and I clear my throat before rising. I need these gloves, and then I need to get to Janta as quickly as possible. I need time to sort out transportation, and I'd like to do it before Praxis is over and everybody is gone.
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My parents just visited me for a week and now I'm all discombobulated 🧍🏽♀️
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