Destined

Chapter 4

Though Laurel’s eyes were open when her alarm rang, its shrill buzz still made her jump as it cut through the early morning half light. December 22. Normally this was a day she would spend helping her parents in their stores, or putting up last-minute decorations, listening to Christmas music, maybe making some holiday treats. She suspected this year wouldn’t be nearly so festive.

The sky was still murky as Laurel opened her closet and reached for one of her faerie-made shirts — it seemed fitting today, when she was truly fulfilling her role as an agent of Avalon. As she slipped the pink peasant top over her head, it felt more like armour than simple, gauzy fabric.

Just outside the front door, Laurel was met by a green-clothed sentry she didn’t recognise — there were just so many of them now! — looking very much like he wanted to stop her. “Sun’s coming up,” Laurel said, without waiting to hear what he had to say. “And I’m going to Tamani’s. You can check up on me in about five minutes. Now move.”

To her surprise, he did.

She glanced at the house as she was backing down the driveway, eyes lighting on her parents” darkened window. She still hadn’t told them what was going on, but that couldn’t last much longer. “It’s almost over,” she said, hoping she was right.

After a short drive Laurel knocked on the apartment door and waited for someone to let her in, bracing herself for the possibility of Shar answering. Not that it mattered; Shar was here somewhere, and she would have to face him eventually. But later was better than now and Laurel was relieved when Tamani’s face appeared behind the door.

“Everything go OK?” Laurel asked as she ducked in, keeping her voice low.

“If by OK you mean uneventful, then yes,” Tamani replied, looking down at her with a warmth in his eyes that she hadn’t seen since they captured Yuki. She wondered what Tamani and Chelsea had talked about and if there was any way to request they talk about it more often.

“I guess that’s OK,” Laurel replied, dropping her backpack on the floor. But she knew they were all hoping something would happen. It had now been almost eight hours since they’d first captured Yuki. It felt too long — and Klea did not have a reputation for tardiness.

Chelsea was sitting in a chair near Tamani, looking tired — still in her rumpled dress — but sporting a smile. Tamani had lost his bow tie, shoes, and jacket — though because of Yuki, not his gloves — and his shirt was unbuttoned halfway down his chest. The two of them looked like they had been at an all-night party rather than sentry duty.

The sound of running water reached her ears and Laurel realised Shar must be taking a shower. Six months ago such mundane, human-like behaviour from the captain might have made her smile. Instead, every moment she spent eyeing the door to Tamani’s room ratcheted up the tension in her neck and shoulders. How could she face him again, knowing what he had done to her mother?

“I’ll stay with you when he comes out,” Tamani said, his breath tickling her ear. She hadn’t even noticed he’d stepped so close.

Laurel shook her head. “You need sleep too.”

“I dozed here and there. Trust me,” he said, his fingers soft on her shoulders, “I’m fine.”

“OK,” Laurel whispered, feeling inordinately better that he would be with her.

They both turned as Shar emerged from the bedroom, his hair still damp. He paused when he saw Laurel but met her gaze evenly before she lost her nerve and looked down at the floor.

“Anything happen in the past five minutes?” Shar asked, placing his hands on his hips as he stepped into the front room of the apartment.

“Not a thing,” Tamani said, mirroring Shar’s posture. Laurel suppressed a smile at how reflexively — and likely unconsciously — Tamani emulated his mentor.

Shar turned and looked at Yuki with a strangely neutral expression. Laurel wasn’t sure how to read him at all. At times he seemed practically emotionless. She knew there was more to him than that — Tamani had told her stories, stories that made the both of them laugh to tears. But the faerie now observing his prisoner — so focused, so unaffected — made her question how anyone could get close to him.

“How much longer do we wait?” Tamani asked. “I’m starting to wonder if we were right the first time; that Yuki is nothing more than a distraction and Klea is letting her sit while she does… whatever it is she’s planning to do.”

“Unless Klea’s plans threaten the gate, or Laurel, they are of no concern to us. We have Laurel under constant guard, and to truly threaten the gate, Klea needs her,” Shar said, pointing — almost accusingly — at Yuki. “So until she comes to retrieve Yuki, we can assume the gate is safe. As safe as it ever is,” he amended. “Our place is here, doing just what we’re doing now.”

“Do you think we should tell Jamison?” Laurel asked.

“No,” Tamani and Shar said in unison.

Yuki looked up at them with a strange, focused expression.

“Why?” Laurel insisted. “It seems like he, of all fae, should know.”

“Come with me,” Shar said, turning back toward the apartment’s lone bedroom. “Watch the Bender for a few minutes, please, Tam.”

Laurel’s throat tightened. She felt the soft fabric of Tamani’s glove as his hand slipped into hers.

“I’ll come stand in the doorway if it’ll make you feel better,” he whispered.

But Laurel shook her head, swallowing her anger as best she could. “I’m okay,” she said, willing it to be true. “He’s still the same Shar he’s always been, right?”

Tamani nodded and squeezed her hand before letting it slide from his fingers.

“I’m going to go,” Chelsea said wearily, before Laurel could follow Shar.

“Thanks,” Laurel said, hugging her friend. “The house is unlocked.” One bonus of having so many sentries surrounding her house was that Laurel never bothered to lock her doors anymore. “Try not to wake my parents. Trust me; you don’t want to have to explain all this to them.” She swallowed. The inevitable explanation would be her task, soon enough.

Chelsea nodded, stifled a yawn, and headed out the front door; Tamani bolted and chained it behind her.

Laurel walked into Tamani’s bedroom, not bothering to flip on the light. The sun was halfway over the horizon now, casting a purplish glow through the curtainless window. It illuminated a sparse room where a single wooden chair draped with various articles of clothing sat beside a double bed with a mussed blanket on it. Laurel stared; it was Tamani’s bed. It was strange to think that this was the first time she had seen it. The first time she had been in his room at all.

“Please close the door.”

Laurel did, meeting Tamani’s eyes for an instant before the door shut between them.

“We can’t tell the other sentries what we’ve learned about Yuki, and we cannot go to Jamison,” Shar said. He stood with his face close to hers, his arms crossed over his chest and his voice barely loud enough for her to hear. “For several reasons, but the main one is that we can’t risk going anywhere near the gate. The only thing standing between Yuki and Avalon is that she does not know its exact location. As soon as she does, everything is over.”

“But Klea worked with Barnes. She must have. She’s got to know where the land is already.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Shar said brusquely. “Short of cutting down that entire forest, the only hope she and Yuki have of accessing the gate is if they know its precise location and how it’s disguised.”

“But we could send someone. Aaron, or Silve, or—”

“And if they’re followed? That could be the reason Klea has waited this long to rescue her protégée. She could be waiting for us to go for help.”

“And what if she never shows up?” Laurel snapped. “We can’t keep Yuki chained to that chair forever, Shar!”

Shar drew back.

“Sorry,” Laurel muttered. She hadn’t meant to speak so sharply.

“No, it’s fine,” Shar said, sounding bemused. “You’re right. But it may not matter. As far as I’m concerned, the only way this ends well is if we keep Yuki as far from the gate as possible.”

“So we just sit round?”

“We’ve come to a fork in the branch. Right now, all we have is one Winter faerie and a lot of strong suspicions. Say we go to Avalon. Assuming Klea doesn’t know where the gate is, we might lead her to it. If she does know, she may have set traps along our path. Either way, we stand to lose a lot more than we stand to gain. And even if we make it to Avalon safely, what then? How will you feel if Queen Marion orders us to execute Yuki?”

Laurel swallowed.

“Believe it or not, that’s probably the best we could hope for,” Shar said grimly. “Our other choice is to wait here,” he continued. “The circle will hold as long as it’s unbroken, but make no mistake, it is a fragile thing. One wrong step and Yuki is unleashed on us all. The only way to guarantee our safety is to put a knife in Yuki right now.”

“What? No!” Laurel couldn’t keep the panic from her voice.

“You’re starting to see the problem,” Shar said, his voice just a touch softer. “Yuki is clearly dangerous, but I don’t think she’s done anything worthy of death. Not yet, anyway. But no matter what we do, at some point it will almost certainly come down to us, or her. The only hope I have is that Klea does need Yuki, and that she will come to rescue her. And if we can just last long enough — if we can find some way to neutralise Klea here—”

“Then we confirm our suspicions, the gate stays safe, and nobody has to die,” Laurel finished in a near monotone. She didn’t like it, but she didn’t have any better ideas. They were only three faeries and two humans trying to stand against Klea and whatever forces she had at her disposal. What would they face? A dozen trolls? A hundred? More faeries?

“Do you understand now?”

Laurel nodded, half wishing she didn’t. She had to grudgingly admit that Shar’s plan was, in all likelihood, the best one. For now. Without a word, she turned and left the room, Shar close behind.

“So… how does this work?” she asked, surveying the apartment and trying her best not to look directly at Yuki.

“We just sit. Or stand. Whatever you want,” Tamani said. “Shar and I watch the door and the windows. I try to ask her questions, but that generally goes nowhere.” He shrugged, the gesture seeming to be directed at Shar more than Laurel. “It’s pretty boring, to tell the truth.”

Yuki snorted, but none of them acknowledged her.

An electronic ding! sounded from Tamani’s bedroom, followed by a murmured exclamation from Shar.

“Beastly, frost-blighted—”

Laurel smirked; Shar detested mobile phones, and every time one went off, he swore at it. Quite creatively, most of the time. His dark mutterings were swallowed by the bedroom as he went to retrieve his “human trinket” from where he had almost certainly accidentally-misplaced-it-on-purpose.

A knock sounded at the door and Tamani sprang to his feet. “Chelsea probably forgot her keys again.”

Shar stepped out of the bedroom carrying his phone. “It says Silve’s name. What does “text two” mean?”

Tamani pressed his eye to the peephole.

“It means you have two messages—” Laurel began.

But Shar’s wide eyes were fixed on the back window of the apartment. “Don’t!” he shouted, turning back to Tamani.

With a crack of gunfire, the door exploded.