When the guards returned Chris to the cell, Morgan and Ryan were missing, just as he had feared they'd be. But his brother was by the bars at the front and he was smiling for some reason.
"The kids! It was—" Joe began as soon as they had a moment of privacy.
"Where are they?"
Joe helped Chris untie his hands. "That I don't know. But it was incredible. The guards and that fairy from hell came to take them away. They were pitching a fit and then, out of nowhere, they shrank, sprouted wings, and flew away!"
"They just flew off?" Chris asked. "Are you sure you didn't get your head thrown into the ground one too many times?"
"Well, I was about to go unconscious a few minutes ago, but. . ."
Chris lifted an eyebrow.
"I didn't imagine it. I swear!" Joe pointed at the ground. "Look, those are their pajamas."
Chris wanted to believe his brother, but then he would have to believe in magic and accept not only the existence of fairies but also that his children were fairies. "Great, except they're four," he said, trying to keep his voice level. "How far away from danger could they possibly get?"
Chris cradled his skinned wrist with the front of his sweatshirt and slid into a sitting position against the cave's rock wall. Then, with his elbows on his knees, he tried to massage away the pain, stress, and misery from his face.
Joe tossed a small rock in the air and caught it. "Why are you sitting? This could be our only chance to make a break for it!"
"What do you have in mind? Busting the lock open with that little pebble you have?"
"There could be another way. Maybe they brought us to fairyland for a reason. Your kids have wings, for God's sake! Maybe it's in our blood. If we could only figure out how to transform and—"
"Hello. Over here!"
They searched for the source of the small voice—the ground, the air above, the nooks, corners, shadows. . .
A tiny hooded creature emerged into a glimmer of torchlight in front of Chris's feet. She waved to get their attention.
Chris lurched to his knees and snatched the fairy from the ground before it had a chance to run or fly away. "Give me one good reason I shouldn't crush you like a bug." He brought the palm-sized creature closer to his face for a better look.
His grip loosened when she swept off the hood of her cloak. Her hair was as dark as her penetrating eyes, and her beauty seemed too pure to be real, her tiny face practically incandescent. But her appearance was not what acquired the bulk of his fascination. Her thoughts seemed beyond her, almost like fragments of images or words, but they were too intricate and numerous for him to interpret.
There was one thought, however, that she was transmitting with angelic clarity. You don't want to kill me.
Chris blinked away from the fairy's spellbinding stare.
With wide eyes and an open jaw, Joe crouched down and reached for her. He nearly touched her with his open hand, but then his fingers curled closed and his arm lowered. "Chris, put her down! Step away from the fairy princess!"
Chris didn't know what else to do. He eased her back on the ground.
"Thank you," the cloaked fairy said, her voice soft but captivatingly clear. "I can give you two reasons to let me live: I can help you escape, and I know where your children are. We don't have a lot of time, so listen carefully. . . ." she put forth, taking three fairy-sized steps closer to them. "You are Modifiers, both of you. You can be one of two forms—small like me or human-sized. Switching from one form to another requires simple imagination or deep concentration, the latter more likely in your case, but find what works for you."
She closed her eyes to demonstrate. "You are small enough to evade them. The magic is within you," she chanted, and her eyes opened. "Clear your head and think of nothing else." She rummaged through her knapsack and handed them each a brown doll-size robe and a miniature pair of boots with laces. "Hold these tight in your hands. They should still be there once you've Modified."
Joe took a seat against the stone wall next to Chris. With closed eyes and the added assistance of his knees and arms, he made an effort to block out all light. After a couple of false starts and a few deep, frustrated breaths, Joe actually disappeared, right before Chris's disbelieving eyes. He didn't think it would actually work! Not that soon. Not ever, in all honesty.
Joe's clothes fell to the ground, and after a subtle bit of rustling, he came out wearing the full-length robe.
Chris stared at his miniature brother with a mix of shock and competitive disappointment. He then closed his eyes and tried to concentrate, but it was no small feat. He saw his wife's frightened face, her blood pooled on the floor of their bedroom, and the fat beast with the tattoo sheathing his soiled blade. Then the raspy, slithering voice of the vengeful fairy queen crept through his awareness. The memory of it would never leave him. Next, he heard actual footsteps, quick in pace. His eyes shot open. It didn't work. . .
A guard passed by, glanced in, and darted off even faster than he'd approached.
"You must focus," the fairy girl said to him. "He'll return soon, and more will follow."
"Try to picture yourself wearing the little robe," Joe added. "That's what worked for me."
Chris rubbed his temples and shut out, as best he could, the strange world around him. Wearing the clothes . . . small man . . . large cavern. Small man. Small clothes. Magic. Fitting between the bars. Freedom!
Certain he'd failed again, he opened his eyes. It was dim before and it was even darker now. With the air suddenly warm and dense, and harder to breathe in, he soon realized that he was underneath his sweatshirt. Unlike in science fiction movies, where changing size or shape was often a drawn-out process accompanied by music or sound or lights—and pain in many cases— he had sensed nothing; the change had just happened from one instant to the next.
His small hands were shaking, but he managed to get the robe over his head and his arms in the tight holes. Then, with some hopping, he slipped on his boots and maneuvered himself out of the pile.
As soon as Chris emerged into the wide-open space of their cell, the cloaked fairy pulled her hood back over her head. After beckoning Chris closer with a wave, she jogged toward the front of their cage, the direction he assumed they would try to avoid. Joe, already beside her, stumbled to keep her pace on his new fairy legs.
Chris noticed both of their backs as they ran—no wings. He sprinted to catch them and checked over his own shoulder. He didn't have any either. Without the wings he'd expected, he felt even more vulnerable than before. They might be able to slip out of their cage if they were quick about it. And they could play a better game of hide and seek, but beyond that, what could they do?
Their fairy guide arrived at the bars first and paused there. She peeked down the cave's corridor in both directions. "Follow me," she whispered, easily stepping past the barriers that were no longer suitable for their new state of being.
She crossed to the other side of the walkway, leading the way through a maze of pebbles that were now the size of boulders, and the three of them ducked into a dark crevice. Chris was the last to get out of sight, and just in time. Guards the size of giants were streaming past and a fleet of small flying fairies were buzzing overhead like a swarm of angry bees.
He thought their discovery was imminent. They didn't have much coverage above them and appeared to be cornered. But their mysterious savior dropped to her stomach and slipped into a horizontal slit between two rocks that was ever so slight. Even someone of fairy size might have overlooked it. Chris wasn't even sure he'd fit.
The brothers, trailing after her as best they could, squirmed further beneath the rocky earth on their stomachs and arrived at a dimly lit clearing that couldn't have been wider than an inch or two. From the vertical rockface, the girl secured a rope in her grip. Chris followed the rope up the escarpment with his eyes until it was eclipsed by shadow.
"Got a name, Princess?" Joe asked as she was about to begin her climb.
"Cassiopeia." Her delicate but capable arm muscles slackened. "Please, call me Cassie." She gave Joe a slight smile, but when she glanced at Chris, her face returned to neutral, and she was quick to glance away.
He had threatened her life a few minutes back. Why is she being so nice? What's in it for her?
"Do you think we can trust her?" Chris whispered to his brother.
Chris had a better view of the fairy now that he was her size. He wasn't precisely her size, though. She was petite, even by fairy standards it seemed, and small-boned, just as the black-winged fairy queen had been.
"I don't think we have a choice," Joe said, making his voice loud enough for Cassie to hear, too. He winked at her when she glanced knowingly at their exchange, probably getting the gist despite Chris's attempt to be discreet.
Chris wanted to smack some sense into Joe. A pretty girl shows up, and three minutes later Joe is flirting with her and spilling things that should be kept secret. Typical.
At least she was too busy rummaging through her knapsack to pay Joe much mind.
Cassie pulled out a knife, clutched onto the blunt end of the blade, and offered Chris the handle. "Here. The last one in line should cut the rope."
Chris took it from her, examined the blade, and slashed it around to get a good feel for it. It was a little rusty, but it was lightweight and could do some damage if necessary. And Chris was good with knives. It was his weapon of choice in close quarters.
He didn't have a pocket and the belt along his waist was only made of fabric, so he went over to the pile of excess rope on the ground and cut himself a strip. "What difference does it make if some fairies have wings?" Chris asked as he secured the knife to his ankle. "Won't they be able to follow us?
"The ones with wings won't be able to fit through some of the cave's tight spaces. They'd have to climb behind us, and the rope will be gone before that happens."
"But how come—" Joe began.
"I'm sure you have plenty of questions," Cassie said, her arms taut again. "Although now we must go. I promise I will answer them later."
She started climbing at a speed that would be hard to match and quickly disappeared behind a veil of darkness.
Joe wasn't nearly as nimble as she was, and Chris was stuck behind him. There was more stopping than going, and they didn't have much help from the smooth rock face.
At last, there was a foothold. Joe was the first to take advantage of it and stood to Chris's right. Chris supported himself with his elbow and cut off the excess rope while he waited. He watched it drop out of sight. Then a pebble hit the back of his head.
"Watch it, Joe!"
He looked back up and saw Joe dangling from the rope, trying to replace his foot and tighten his grip. Chris was knocked from the ledge, just barely hanging on to what was left of the rope, when they collided.
Chris put a quick loop of rope around his raw wrist. Their sliding slowed to a stop. After waiting, though, for far too long, the pain became too much. Joe's weight was not lifting from his hands. And he had nowhere left to slide.
"I can't hold you much longer!" Chris warned.
"My hands. They keep slipping."
Cassie then came sliding down with ease and control. "Here, try this." She smoothed a handful of grit on the rope above Joe's hands. "We're almost at the top," she added, "and then there will be more hiking and less climbing."
The grit seemed to help. Joe began moving in the right direction. And it wasn't long before Cassie was offering them both a hand over the subterranean cliff. She then sat down, crossed her legs, and dug through her knapsack. She took out a pouch of matches and the pieces of a lantern. She put it together and soon had it glowing.
"It looks like springing us out of there wasn't exactly spontaneous," Joe commented, plopping down beside her.
Although Chris needed to rest, perhaps more than anyone, he remained standing. Joe and Cassie were instant friends, or close to it by Joe's standards, and Chris was already the odd one out.
"No, not exactly." Cassie rose to her feet. "There have been rumors regarding your arrival for weeks. Are you two ready? We must hurry so I can lead you into Pyxis before your pursuers would suspect."
Chris and Joe exchanged glances over the light of the lantern. "Pyxis?" Joe was the one to ask, although it was a question they shared.
"It's our underground fairy city, hidden from the natural world. We should be there soon. As I promised, I'll explain everything when we get there."
"I'm already detecting a pattern. Pyxis? Cassiopeia? Aren't those both constellations?"
"And you've met another—Andromeda—though I suppose you were not formally introduced. She's the queen and, by blood, my mother," Cassie explained.
"You can't be serious!" Joe said. "I was joking about the whole princess thing."
"The title is inconsequential. Let's just say my mother and I are not particularly close." Cassie shouldered her belongings and started walking.
"But . . . wait up," Joe pleaded as he scrambled to his feet.
Instead of following his brother and their new companion right away, Chris walked back over to the escarpment they had just conquered. The surge of hope he'd felt earlier had subsided. Now he looked down and wondered if a successful escape was what he'd truly wanted.
He spread his fingers on his left hand. Even though he was a fraction of his original size, there was still an indentation, smoother and paler than the rest of his hand, where his wedding ring had been. With the ring on the floor of the cage and the finger likely to return to normal in a few days, any solid evidence that he had ever been married would vanish. No, that wasn't true—his and Alana's children were alive, and he had to find them and do whatever it took to protect them. Chris turned away from the ledge with a new sense of purpose.
He caught up to Joe and Cassie, and focused on the dark, rocky hike. The cave's passageways were narrow and dangerous in most places and arduous enough to distract him from himself, and whatever he now was and would soon be. A dead fairy, most likely.
Not long after the exhaustion, thirst, and hunger joined his list of preoccupations, he spotted what had to be the fairy city—Pyxis—through a clearing between two boulders. It reminded him of a Dr. Seuss Christmas. Everything was curvy, pointy, or slanted. Not a single building or cliffside dwelling seemed to include a right angle. Even more curious were the little doors and windows swirling around the cave's stalactites and stalagmites. They were a pearly, off-white color tinged with orange in the city's abundance of firelight.
At his new size, Chris wasn't a good judge of dimension, but the city seemed to be in a rock crevice that was no more than a couple of feet high, though higher in a few places and much lower in others. Its width and length, however, were much more expansive. From where he stood, he could not see the outer limits.
When he stepped forward, ready to move on, an ominous multistoried castle came into view. It was by far the most prominent structure in the city. Though it was built in the same unique style as the other dwellings, it didn't remind him of Christmas. It took his breath away, and not in a good sense.
"The Aerial Palace," Cassie informed him. "That's the place we're trying to avoid."
Yeah, no kidding.
She was quick to look away and he could have sworn he saw her shudder. "We'll be staying somewhere much more humble."
"And that humble place—that's where my kids are?" Chris asked.
"Yes, the inn where I live. They flew in with Carina, a friend of mine. Someone I trust," she made sure to emphasize. Although it may have been an offer of reassurance, it seemed so painfully clear to him that his mistrust from earlier did not evade her notice. "By this time, they should have arrived."
She blew out her lantern and then led them through a narrow walkway that soon resembled a crooked fairy lane.
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Evanescence. Bring me to life.
~
"Call my name and save me from the dark
Bid my blood to run
Before I come undone. . ."