Fairy Thief (13 page)

Saffron sniffed. “Angel, you have an attitude problem.” Then she yelled, “Just put your damn spyglass on and
hurry up!
” Then muttered under her breath, “Angel, my ass, that stupid hiker thought she saw an angel — try ungodly, beastly twerp!” Saffron was suddenly crestfallen.
My God, is that what people see when they think they see angels?
Saffron eyed Tai in horror as he picked his nose and concentrated intently on his find.
Angel! “
Blek
,
he’s so freaken’ gross.”

“
I heard that!” Tai made some kind of gesture at her with his fingers. It didn’t look very nice.

Saffron whipped her head away from him and stared forward.

Both twins turned their backs on her and scrutinized another section of cliff. This part of the cliff was cut into more deeply by the long-since-dried-up river. The nook was so deep it appeared to be in perpetual shadow. There were a number of holes within it, and it was on these that the twins concentrated.

Several yards away, Saffron sat on a smooth, flat rock, and was suddenly startled by the scream of a hawk. She shaded her eyes with her hand to search for him in the deep, azure sky that was void of clouds from one end to the other. Before she could locate the bird, she heard a strange twitter, and looked down to see a squirrel with odd, pointy, black ears as it streaked past her. She picked up a smooth pebble and rolled it back and forth between her hands.

So, this was where Markis came from, where he went to live every summer. His father was Irish, but his mother was Native American. When they had all met at the movie theater, Saffron decided it was his mother that Markis most physically resembled.

Her back and neck began to ache. She curled up into a ball, rested her forehead on her knees, and wrapped her arms around her shins.
This is insane. How am I ever going to do this? I’m never going to find him…. What if it really does take a long time? But it’s not like I can go back without him – I’d die of worry and guilt. I have no choice.
Slowly, she rocked herself back and forth.

The hawk screamed again and startled her. She shaded her eyes and looked up.

“
You don’t have to block the sun from your eyes like that, you know.” Wo had flown up beside her. It’s just your memory tricking you to feel the pain of the blinding light. If you let yourself, you’ll feel all kinds of physical sensations, but they won’t be real. You could feel a whole range of physical reactions or you could feel nothing — it’ll be your choice. You could concentrate; you can learn to not let yourself feel the physical. It would probably be best for our journey…who knows what will happen to us?”

Saffron scoffed, “You know, I just don’t get that. It’s ridiculous!”

Wo raised his eyebrows. “Just try.”

She took a deep breath, huffed it out, and concentrated.
I will not let the light blind me. I will not let the light blind me.
Slowly, she lowered her hand, looked up wide-eyed at the sky…and yelped when the direct sunlight shot her straight into her eyeballs and speared the back of her brain like a pulse of fire. It caused an instant headache. “Ahhhhhh, now I’m blinded! I’ve got spots in my eyes!”

Wo stared at her, looking very embarrassed, not being used to such human drollness. “There’s something else. You need to learn how to make your body appear solid.”

Saffron shook her head as she ground her fists into her eyes. What did
that
mean? She hugged her arms to herself and rubbed them hard. She felt the hug, her elbows pointing into the palms of her hands, the fine down as she rubbed her forearms. She shook her head again. “I
am
solid. I can feel my arms. I’m sitting on the ground; I can feel the pressure against my butt.”

Wo crouched down and made Saffron’s eyes meet his own large, dark pupils. He held out his hands, beseeching her to understand. “Saffron, that’s your memory again. You are feeling the memory of what is most comfortable to you. You need to have the ground push you from below and you need to feel your body beneath your hands, so, you do. But really, it’s just a memory.” He pressed his lips and shrugged. “Actually, that rock is so hot right now, you would’ve jumped off it with your human body….”

“
Nuh uh.”

“
Oh, yeah. I’m serious.”

Despite the dry desert heat, a sharp chill raced down Saffron’s spine. “What are you trying to say? You mean my soul, right? I’m a spirit now — I know that.”

“
But there’s more to it than that. Really, Saffron, that doesn’t mean much to you, does it? ‘A soul’ — I’m trying to tell you what that means.”

“
Then tell me!” she snapped. She knew it wasn’t his intention but he was making her excruciatingly edgy.

Wo frowned and scratched his temples with both hands. He wasn’t cut out for this — explaining the laws of his world to a mind that was incapable of understanding. “You’ll need to learn how to solidify yourself. When you do, you’ll be like…like a movie.”

Saffron’s eyebrows shot up. She focused over his left shoulder and spoke in a far off voice. “A movie.”

“
Well, to other people, you’ll be like a movie. Yeah…” he nodded fervently, “this is how I’ll explain it to you. I’ll tell you how others will perceive you.” He clapped his hands together once and looked at her intently. “You’ll be like film. Once you learn to be solid, that is. People will accept your existence because they can see you and touch you. Like an actual piece of film, you’ll have substance. But there is another way in which you are like film.” He faltered; he was afraid this next would further disturb her. “Like a film being played,” he poked on slowly, “people will see you in front of them – they’ll be able to see you just as they can watch a person in a movie. BUT! If they touch you, it’ll be like touching the character on the screen — they won’t be able to feel your tears, your heat…. If you bleed, they would not be able to tend your wounds. Do you see what I mean? They will feel nothing but the solid shape you put on for them.”

Saffron didn’t react as he expected. She frowned, but she did not appear shocked. And she didn’t throw her usual hissy fit. She was still looking over his shoulder at some hikers that had stopped and made a picnic for themselves — two girls about Saffron’s age. One of them sat on a horse blanket, wiping sweat from her brow with a handkerchief. Saffron began to sweat. She squinted at the desert sun as it hung over the trench, casting half of the cliff wall in dark shadow. She wiped her brow with the back of her arm. “Why will I be like film?”

Wo fell back to the ground. “This is what it is to be a soul. I don’t know how to better explain. You’ll just have to see as we go along.”
Why
. He
had no idea why! “Now, when we go to these realms, the inhabitants — they’ll think you….they’ll think you’re a ghost. You must trick them; you must show them a solid front. You are going to have to learn to concentrate and summon a solid appearance. We wouldn’t want the hostile locals calling out their wise men to exorcise us, now, do we?”

Saffron shrugged. “Who cares if they do? I can run okay. I’m not in bad shape.”

Wo stood up and looked down at her. His eyes were soft and patient. Exercise, exorcise…for the love of trees, he had a long way to go with this one. “If we scare the inhabitants of these realms, we may be chased out before Tai and I can feel the land properly for our missing boys. Their magic can cause us pain, Saffron. We’ll feel their incantations like an electrical shock. Ever been electrified?”

In fact, Saffron had been electrified, and she winced at the memory. When she was a toddler, her mother was always hiding the car keys out of reach. Saffron wanted those car keys in the worst way. One morning, Audrey left them on the counter by a cooling loaf of bread. Saffron was four. She had grabbed one of the kitchen chairs and hauled it to the counter to get at the delicious-smelling bread. Her fat, baby body made the chair creak as she quickly pulled herself up to stand on the seat. But what was this? Keys! Keys or bread, bread or keys? Saffron snatched the keys and wobbled up the stairs to her room. She tried the keys in the keyhole on her antique bureau. She tried the keys in the metal buckle on her overalls. She tried the keys in her doll’s mouth. She looked at the electrical outlet.
That
hole was just the right size. After that, Saffron only remembered a loud pop and her mother slamming into the room and screaming. Now, Saffron had a healthy fear of electric shocks.

Wo clapped his hands again, making a sharp, crisp sound to snap her from her memories. “So now, Saffron, concentrate and imagine yourself solid.”

Saffron blinked several times, frowned, and concentrated. “Okay, whatever you say.” She closed her eyes and held her breath. She scrunched her eyes up tight and puffed up her cheeks.

“
No, no, Saffron. You don’t have to asphyxiate yourself; just concentrate.”

Saffron groaned and tried again, breathing this time.

And this time, Wo saw a change come over her — a subtle sign that only he could recognize. He fluttered his wings and rose slowly in the air. He watched, amazed, as Saffron struggled harder to clearly define her lines.

Suddenly, a rock larger than a man’s fist sailed through the air, right at Saffron. It went through her body and landed with a dull thud just behind her, scaring off a small lizard that had been sunning his leathery body. The girls on the horse blanket looked up from their Snapples.

“
Hey, Wo! Aren’t you teaching that chick to become solid yet?” Tai was standing on a ledge on the cliff, several stories up, and screaming down to them. Tourists strolled leisurely all around them, unaware. “Next time I throw a rock at you, lady, it better bounce off!”

“
What the hell?” Saffron shrieked and jumped to her feet. The mirage that had almost become her solid body shimmered away. “You could’ve killed me!”

“
Oh, gimme a break, you moron!” His monocle fell out as he chucked her the bird.

Wo rolled his eyes, then landed beside Saffron and took her hand. “Come on; let’s go. He’s more than his usual cocky self. I think he must’ve found the portal.” He tried to lead her along, but she yanked her hand from his grip and used it to shield the glare of the sun. She was shaking, and there was murder in her eyes. “You do know he’s an ass, right? I mean, why do you hang around with him? He’s such a jerk.” Then she mumbled something about ‘throwing freakin’ rocks.’

Wo stopped walking and spun around. “I would never leave him. He’s part of me.” Wo looked up at the ledge to find Tai dropping wildflowers on the tourists’ heads.

Every time he threw one down, a tourist jumped in shock and looked up at the empty cliffs. He howled with glee. “Hey, ya see that? That dude’s gonna go home and tell everyone the spirits of ancient Indians were showering him with flowers!” He cackled as he rolled off the cliff. He stopped in mid-fall and fluttered back up to his ledge. He almost choked when he landed. There, towering above him, was an Indian spirit, hands on his hips, staring down as cold and still as a tombstone. Tai stayed down where he was, hands and knees in the dirt, and muttered, “Sorry.” The Indian vanished before he looked up.

T
hey were spinning. Spinning from belly, to shoulder, to back, to shoulder, to belly — and tumbling forward head over heels. Saffron retched, dry-heaved and screamed. Tai kept yelling for her to ‘shut the hell up,’ and Wo was chanting low, like a yogi. Everything was grey and loud and shiny. Saffron could feel her film self rippling like a skydiver in accelerated freefall. Suddenly they shot out into wide open air.

They crash-landed in the middle of a dusty, broken street. The deserted buildings that surrounded them on all sides were smashed in and half burned. There was dust and dirt everywhere, and debris slapped around in the wind. The whole place looked war-torn. As a matter of fact, the war was
currently
in session.

Saffron heard the rat-tat-tat-tat of an automatic weapon. Instantly, she stopped moaning over her bashed behind and jumped to her feet. She looked around and saw squat buildings — broken and vacant, signs full of holes, junk flying about — all washed in a dirty, sepia light. The twins flew in the air like hummingbirds, and looked around with disbelief. They didn’t care if the inhabitants could see them, and they didn’t care if the inhabitants could see they were flying. They were ready to
flee.

“
Oh….” Was all Wo could say as he took in the destruction.

Not one of them noticed the man crouched behind the pillar over in the shadows. But, he had certainly noticed them. He stared at Tai and Wo as they fluttered on the wind — the same wind that carried the sounds of weapons, the click-clack of spent shells, and the smells of acrid metal and burning flesh.