The sky was a murky evening orange, but there was enough light to see the pale blue house—one in a long row of similar buildings, each a different color. Why were human houses always so tall? Rowen approved of the colors and pretty eaves each house sported, and many boasted sprawling vines and flowering window-boxes, but there weren't nearly enough windows. Human houses never had enough windows.
Still, Chelsea's home suited Rowen's personal preferences more than many of the dwellings she'd seen so far in the city. Chelsea herself answered the door with a cheerful exclamation and a hug for Tamani. She stepped forward as though to embrace Rowen as well, but Rowen took a step back without conscious intent and then felt bad when Chelsea's expression revealed hurt feelings. Before Rowen could cobble together some sort of apology—any words at all, really—Tamani was covering her gaffe by shuffling them all inside.
A large man stood from a chair at their arrival, and though Rowen had to swallow down a pang of fear at the sight of his furry, bear-like face, she managed to smile when Chelsea introduced him as her husband, Jason.
"Today was the big day?" Chelsea asked, directing the question to Rowen. But she sounded ... hesitant. Probably because of the awkward moment on the porch.
Rowen nodded silently, feeling both exhausted and grumpy, while Tamani shook Jason's hand and smacked his shoulder. "We were at Scazio all day," he said in explanation.
Jason made a whistling noise between his teeth; Rowen was immediately jealous of the ability. "Scazio, eh? Good luck to you."
Rowen averted her eyes.
"Jason's sister used to dance," Chelsea said, pointing them through a doorway. "So he knows more about it than I do."
"She made it to the top six today," Tamani said, and Rowen couldn't help but smile at the pride in his voice. "They said they'll be in touch."
"Did they say when?" Chelsea asked.
"No, but classes start in two weeks, so it'll have to be soon, I imagine," Tamani said.
"Well, I'm so glad you two are spending the night," Chelsea beckoned them toward a couch. "We've hardly seen you since Laurel took leave this spring."
"All the better to fake a pregnancy, I'm afraid."
"She hasn't stooped to wearing a fake belly, has she?" Chelsea asked.
Tamani laughed as Rowen sank into the couch, utterly baffled but grateful to sit down. After sitting in the car for half an hour her legs somehow felt more tired rather than less. What kind of people made windowless dance studios, anyway? Rowen needed the sun.
"No, sprouts come in the season when they're ready, so there's no way to time something like that." Tamani leaned forward, grinning. "Imagine looking eight-months pregnant for six months."
But Chelsea snapped sober. "That would be a problem," she said very seriously. "What are you doing instead?"
"Only you would consider this a real problem." Tamani sat back and waved a hand in the air. "She's just staying close to home. Avoiding company, which is usually her preference anyway. Nothing to hide from her parents, nothing to hide from her best friend. And she's on the land—it was always easier to conceal things there anyway."
As they prattled on about things of no meaning or importance to Rowen, she pulled her knees up to her chest and studied the person Chelsea had introduced as Jason. It was so odd to see hair growing right out of his face. And he didn't seem embarrassed in the least.
Or maybe ... as she watched him he started darting his eyes toward her in apparent question. Maybe he was embarrassed, a little. He certainly squirmed under her gaze.
She tilted her head. The hair on his chin went up along the side of his ears and connected to his hair. Maybe he considered it an extension of the hair on his head? She had seen a few other pelt-faced humans in the city, from a distance, but she couldn't figure out why some of them looked more like lions and gorillas and bears than others. There had been hairy trolls in Avalon, but asymmetry—like hair growing in odd places—was characteristic of their species. Did some humans also have fur on their backs, perhaps? Or their bellies? It was a disconcerting thing to imagine. Was that why humans insisted on wearing so many clothes all the time? To conceal how embarrassingly mammalian some of them were?
"Did you have a question for me, Rowen?"
Rowen straightened in surprise at the sound of her name. Jason was talking to her. "What? No."
Jason paused and for a moment Rowen thought he was going to return to the conversation with the other two. Instead he said, "You're staring at me."
"Staring?" She laughed. "Hardly. I was just watching you."
He locked eyes with Chelsea, who raised one eyebrow. "Is that not the same thing?"
The entire group was quiet for a long moment before Rowen heard something from upstairs and everyone's head turned toward the ceiling. Chelsea broke into a grin and said, "That'll be Zander. I'll get him."
Jason glanced at Rowen one more time, but as he apparently didn't like being observed Rowen watched Chelsea go, if only to pretend she wasn't intrigued. It really was amazing how much humans resembled faeries and trolls. It was impossible to breed a troll and a faerie, but if you could, the result would surely be something like humankind.
Chelsea came down the stairs a few minutes later, holding something wrapped in cloth. It was making snuffling noises. "Would you hold him while I make a bottle?" Chelsea asked, proffering the bundle to her husband.
A look of adoration spread over Jason's face and he took what Rowen could now see was a small human. He spoke to it in a high, affected voice, accompanied by some facial acrobatics worthy of the Summer stage.
"Let me see," Tamani said, holding out both arms. "It's been, what, three months?"
"You keep better track than I do," Jason said with a smile, handing the bundle over the low table between their seats. Tamani also made a number of shocking faces at the little human. The small one's hands flailed in tight fists and Rowen immediately understood. The poor thing was damaged. She wondered why no one had warned her.
Tamani rested the thing on his knee and turned it to face its father, making it painfully apparent that Rowen was right. The thing didn't look like it could even stand, much less walk. Its face was full of lumps and bulges and a clear liquid was dripping from its protruded lower lip.
Disgusting.
Tamani seemed determined to make the best of it and he rubbed its head and said, "He's got twice the hair he had last time I was here."
Was that an accomplishment? Perhaps for something so ... inadequate.
"He sits on his own now," Jason said, beaming. No truly, beaming. "He'll be crawling in another month or so."
Sitting? Crawling? The poor thing really was in bad shape! To have one that couldn't walk at all must have come as a terrible blow to its parents.
Tamani apparently noticed her intent gaze because he grinned and said, "Would you like to hold him?"
Was this a test or...or...a joke? Rowen wasn't sure what her trickster uncle was up to. "Um—"
"Don't worry, it's easy." Tamani placed the lukewarm lump of blankets on her lap and wrapped her hands around its sides. "There, just like that. Bounce him a little if he cries."
Rowen stared in horror at the thing sitting on her thigh. It looked so nearly fae... and so very not. His rose-tinged cheeks were huge and he'd jammed a clenched fist into his mouth as though he though his own body was a food source. His wide eyes were a deep, dark brown, like a cow's eyes, and when those eyes met hers, he grinned and revealed a mouth with only two teeth.
Where were it's teeth?
But Tamani went on spewing praises, and Jason continued beaming like he'd just put on the performance of his life. Perhaps this was a form of human politeness Tamani had failed to mention?
Well, she might as well try, for Tamani's sake if nothing else. "Are you well enough to speak?" she asked the poor thing softly, and when he didn't answer, she tried again in Gaelic.
He let out a sound at that that might have been a strangled laugh, and Rowen almost had time to wonder if he'd understood the language of the fae before a stream of white liquid burst from his mouth, splashing hotly over Rowen's bare arms.
"Gross!" Rowen yelled, shoving the thing away from her in disgust. The room exploded into activity as Tamani's arms shot out, almost too fast to see, and caught the human before it hit the floor. Rowen was trembling with fright, desperately wiping her arms against the upholstered seating. Lenore had once told her that some humans could spit acid, but Rowen had assumed it was a myth!
Somehow Tamani must have transferred the thing to Jason because now his hands were hard on Rowen's shoulders, holding her still, his face etched with a fury so intense it made her core shake with fear.
"I can't believe you just did that," he whispered harshly, and Rowen stared up at him in confusion until she caught sight of Chelsea, just over his shoulder. Chelsea was standing in the doorway, something in her hand, her face so white it could have been ash bark, tears streaming down her face.
The next few minutes were a blur; Rowen stood silently in the entryway as Tamani hugged Chelsea, whispered something to her and Jason, then practically shoved Rowen out the door and into the car.
"Tamani, it—he—"
"Don't," he said, his hand slicing sharply though the air. "I can't—I'm so angry I can't even talk to you."
Rowen wanted to argue, but she had never seen her uncle like this—and she had seen him in some terrible, terrible times. They stopped to feed the car only once the building had thinned out a little. Without a word, Rowen found her way to one of the human's odd tiled lavatories and used a huge handful of coarse linen—seriously, it was practically paper—trying to wash away the sour smell that lingered from whatever had come out of the little human. Not acid, apparently, but Tamani didn't seem in a mood to explain. The water did little to purge the smell but Rowen didn't dare try the harsh chemicals that passed for human cleansing serums. Laurel had warned her about those.
Rowen thought Tamani might be ready to talk about what had happened once they got back on the road, but two hours passed without a word. The sun was fully down and it was so dark that Rowen could barely make out the surroundings flashing past her window until Tamani bumped the car slowly off the road and onto a ragged dirt path that didn't seem to lead anywhere.
"Follow me," he said softly.
He lead her along a darkened but well-worn path, into a forest of giant redwoods. Rowen trudged after, trusting but confused, exhausted by the emotions and events of the day.
When Tamani abruptly stopped in a small clearing, Rowen almost bumped into him.
"Do you have any idea what you did?" Tamani asked, his back still to her, hands on hips. His voice was a whisper so quiet she wouldn't have been able to hear it if they'd been any closer to the road where other cars occasionally flew by, roaring their mad roars..
"What I did?" Rowen said, aghast. "I was afraid I was going to lose an arm! You're the one who handed me the poison-spitting thing without a single word of instruction. Without—"
"Thing." Tamani laughed, low and quiet, and Rowen felt a chill creep into her core at the sound. "What do you think that thing is, Rowen?"
"It's clearly a bad sprout," she said, needing to defend herself. Tamani was a faerie! He'd understand if she could only find the right words. "Or whatever humans call it. It's a little human that's obviously damaged and I feel a great deal of sympathy for it. I do."
"It's a baby," Tamani said, his voice still that scary quiet that made her insides quiver. "He is not damaged at all. And he is as precious to Jason and Chelsea as any sprout could be to any faerie couple."
Rowen felt like snorting at such a dubious claim, but the anger still simmering in her uncle's tone held her back. Some. "It's clearly under-developed. It couldn't walk, or talk, it didn't even have teeth."
"That's how human babies are. They don't come into this world as developed as faeries. They need more help." He turned to her and Rowen was glad she couldn't see his face clearly in the dark. The waves of fury coming her way were almost palpable. "That infant is one of the very best parts of Chelsea and Jason's life and you threw him on the ground."
Rowen was struck utterly still by the violence in Tamani's voice. "You caught him," she whispered.
"Thank the goddess. You could have killed him, Rowen."
They were quiet for a long time.
"I should have treated it with more care," Rowen mumbled.
"Him. His name is Zander and you should have treated him with more care."
"Him, then!" Rowen shouted. "But it all turned out fine. I'm sorry I acted without thought. I was scared, okay? Why are you so angry?"
Tamani stood with his arms crossed over his chest, studying her until she had to look away, feeling guilty for reasons she didn't understand. "You feel faeries are superior to humans, yes?"
"Everyone knows that."
"Why?"
"What?"
"Why?" Tamani repeated, his voice piercing.
"Because we're faeries."
His hand cut through the air. "Not good enough. Why?"
"We're plants."
"And plants are just better than animals? Your potted plant at home is better than the bees that make your honey?"
She considered that for a second. She loved honey; she'd trade her honey for her potted plant any day. "Perhaps not that precisely, but we're special."
"What makes us special?"
"We have magic."
"You've seen the technology, the human magic, in my home," Tamani replied. "And that's only the stalk above the soil. Humans can send messages across the world in seconds, create chemical solutions that would make a Mixer weep, and launch a team up into space to walk on the goddess-blessed moon, Rowen." He lifted his chin and looked down at her. "You can change how your clothing looks. Tell me whose magic is better."
"I—" No one had ever insulted her magic. It couldn't have stung more if he'd thrust one of his knives into her core. "There are so many of them."
"Oh, so numbers are important," he said. "That means that you're better than me, because you're a Sparkler and I'm a Ticer."
"What? No!"
"And as a Mixer Laurel's better than both of us. Is that what you're telling me?"
"Of course not. You know I don't think that." The hot burn of shame swelled in her chest that her uncle would think she was so elitist.
"Then what, Rowen?" Tamani shouted, his arms spread wide, his voice echoing off the enormous trees. "What the hell makes you so special that you can look down your nose at seven billion people who have complex lives and feelings and emotions just the same as you?"
"I—"
"You couldn't even hack losing your special Summer faerie status in Avalon, how do you think you could survive in a world where you're literally one in a billion?"
The tears were on her cheeks before she could choke out another word. She was so furious, so hurt, she couldn't even speak. She would have been less surprised if he'd slapped her face instead.
"You asked this world for help. Not me," Tamani hissed. "Not Laurel. Not really. You asked this human world to help you find yourself, rediscover your self-confidence, whatever it is you couldn't do in Avalon, and you have the audacity to treat them like they're the dirt beneath your feet?"
Rowen opened her mouth to retort, but couldn't find any words to speak. So she closed it again. Long minutes passed with nothing but the sound of their breathing.
"Come on," Tamani finally said, putting a soft hand on her shoulder and turning her back toward the car. "I'm not going to lecture any more tonight—we've got a few more hours left to drive and you should sleep. Just understand this," he said, looking down at her, his face so close she could see every detail, the depths of the sorrow in his eyes. The pity. And she didn't think it was pity for his human friends. "If you can't let go of this, this arrogance you have toward humans—I can't let you stay. I won't do that to them."
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Thank you for reading! If you liked this chapter, please give it a vote!!! Hopefully two chapters next week!!!
<3A.