Into the Wildewood (7 page)

“Probably Elianard.”

Dad arched an eyebrow and the corners of his mouth lifted into a smile. “Isn’t that the Plumpkin suit that Vernerd wore last year?”

She gave him a wide-eyed look. This was the moment she needed if she was going to milk sympathy from Dad. “Yes, it is. Can you believe they’re making me wear this? From what I heard he had lice, too.” Dad didn’t have to know that Elia was the source of this bit of information.

Dad stroked his chin, a pensive look on his face. “I think I remember hearing about that.” He started walking toward the campground.

Keelie easily kept up with his long stride. Like father like daughter, she thought. “So?”

“So what?”

Subtlety wasn’t working. “How could you let your only child wear a stupid dragon suit that’s infested with lice and smells like puke? Where’s the concern? Where’s the love?”

“I know Finch had the suit dry cleaned; so it’s no longer infested with anything. As for the smell, there’s nothing I can do about that other than possibly asking Janice to recommend some herb or essential oil to vanquish it. Let’s hang your costume up at Sir Davey’s camper. Maybe it just needs a little airing.”

“A hurricane wouldn’t help this mess.” But maybe Janice could help. She could work miracles with her herbs. “Can’t we bury it, and tell Finch it finally died? Besides, if we air it outside, then everyone in the campground is going to know I’m Plumpkin. I can’t wait to get the tent up. Being inside the Swiss Miss Chalet is not going to work.”

“Bad news about the tent. I pulled it out to air it, and it was covered in mildew. It even had mushrooms growing on one side. Luckily, Davey says we can bunk with him.”

Keelie almost forgot about the stinking purple disaster she was holding. Hot showers! And no sleeping in a moldy tent or, worse, in the fairy-tale outhouse on wheels.

Zeke smiled. “Wearing this purple dragon suit will teach you a great lesson, more than anything I can say or do.”

“Yeah?” What was it with parents and life lessons?

“Not to go around making impulse buys and not thinking your decisions through to the end. By the way, I made the three-hundred-dollar deposit for your custom boots. Now you have to work it off, and pay off the balance, too. That means you have to wear a smelly purple dragon suit. Welcome to responsibility. And I need you at the shop, too. I just heard from Scott. He isn’t going to make it.”

“What? I can’t do both jobs.” She had a mental image of herself at the Heartwood shop, selling furniture while wearing the hideous purple dragon costume. Then what he said sank in. Scott, her father’s apprentice, was a little stiff, but he was one of the good guys. “Is Scott okay?”

“Finch gave me a couple of messages. Scott’s accepted a position at a Faire in California, and won’t be fulfilling his apprenticeship with me.”

“That turd! He’s gone and left us high and dry. Are you going to hire someone else?”

“Not unless the right person comes along. I have to feel the trees’ approval.” Dad made furniture only from downed trees. He soothed their passing into a new form, giving his furniture a spiritual glow that was apparent even to the mundanes.

“You know, Zeke, that sounds very woo-woo even for you.” Despite everything that went down with the Red Cap in the forest outside the High Mountain Faire, Keelie still wasn’t totally comfortable with her newly discovered elven heritage and magic.

“I noticed I’m back to being Zeke.”

“As long as I have to wear this suit,
Zeke
. As for the trees’ approval, hire someone until the right person shows up.”

“What can I say, Ke-li-el?” He emphasized all of the syllables in her elven name. He shrugged. “I am the Tree Shepherd. And the trees love you, Keelie. You are the natural choice to aid me. Besides, I don’t have to pay you.”

“Gee, I’m so lucky. Can’t I just work for you, and skip the Faire job?”

“No. You’ve committed yourself to the job, and you’re going to see it through. By the way, the other message was for you. Your friend Laurie called. She’s coming in on the eleven o’clock train next Friday.”

Keelie looked at the smelly costume draped over her shoulder. She had two jobs and lived in an RV with a dwarf, an elf, and Knot—or whatever he was when he wasn’t being a cat. Laurie was the only person who remembered her old life in Los Angeles, a life filled with tennis lessons, private school, and mall shopping. She was going to have a good laugh when she saw Keelie’s new life. Keelie hoped they could laugh about it together. Laughing with a friend was so much better than getting laughed at.

The suit smelled awful. There was no getting used to Plumpkin’s stink. Keelie stood just outside the Faire gates, surrounded by milling wenches, knights, and bleary-eyed Merry Men. The Faire workers were supposed to interact with the gathering crowd, getting them excited about the coming fun. Some of the Merry Men were clearly not up to it.

Lulu, dressed in a white gown and white gauzy fairy wings, was handing out candy to little kids, some costumed and some dressed in everyday clothes. They danced around her like little butterflies drawn to a cluster of sweet-smelling flowers. Keelie enjoyed watching the kids, but that was as much interaction as she wanted to have with them.

Lulu had a unicorn puppet on her shoulder, one of the ones that was weighted to seem as if it were perched on her. She used a long, hidden wire to move its head. The little unicorn glittered in the sunlight. As if Lulu knew that Keelie was staring, the ivory-horned head twisted to look her way. It closed an eye in a slow-motion wink, then turned back to the children.

Keelie blinked, wondering if she had really seen that or if it were a trick of the light. The puppet lady was really talented—and the kids seemed to love her. She moved on, still surrounded by her little followers, except for one girl who, fairy wings askew, was staring off into space.

Keelie stepped aside to allow a family to walk by, and Lulu’s little unicorn turned its head again, its black button eyes staring sightlessly right at her. Okay, this was getting creepy. She wondered how Lulu did it. Maybe she could work at the puppet shop and find out. Anything would be better than being Plumpkin the dragon.

Sweat dripped down Keelie’s back; she’d worn a leotard and yoga pants to keep her body from touching Plumpkin’s fuzzy insides. Irritating globs of glitter from the scales had drifted down inside her bra, and she itched. She couldn’t scratch. A huge crowd had gathered outside the gates, and it was still thirty minutes before the opening trumpets. Keelie rolled her eyes. They should go get a life, a latte, something.

Several little girls in pink tutus, pink leotards, and tie-dyed fairy wings rushed toward Lulu, almost knocking Keelie over.

She was desperate to scratch. Even though Zeke (she was still mad at him), Finch, and several other Faire employees had reassured her over and over that there were no lice inside the suit, Keelie wasn’t convinced.

This could be her last day on earth. She might die from itching combined with claustrophobia. She could see only through the mesh in the dragon’s mouth. She certainly wouldn’t die from hunger, because the vomit smell had permanently eradicated her appetite. She’d never eat again. She’d have anorexia, and it would be Zeke’s fault. If he’d let her withdraw her inheritance money to pay for the custom-made boots, then she could be helping him at the shop. She hoped he was swamped with customers today.

She turned her back to a skinny maple tree and rubbed up and down, using the zipper’s hard edge to quell the itch at her shoulder blade. It felt so good she almost moaned; then she stopped, horrified. She was acting like Knot. Something was squashed up inside the suit, under her right foot. She wiggled her toes against it. A cloth something.

A group of mothers talked in the shade of a tree, surrounded by a herd of small children and babies in strollers.

A little boy dressed in black plastic armor stared at her and shouted, “I’m going to kill you, mean dragon.”

Keelie had been instructed by Finch to make exaggerated gestures, like a cartoon character, when engaging with obnoxious kids. They loved it, as did the parents. Keelie stepped back and held her hands up as if she were afraid.

Plumpkin was a wuss!

With the mood she was in, if Keelie had been a real dragon, she’d roast the kid. A man dressed in beggar’s rags stumbled toward her. He smiled.

Ew!
Those cavities in his front teeth didn’t seem fake. “Hello, Dragon.”

Keelie sidled away. He followed her.

“Dragon, wait up.”

Keelie stopped and turned around, and put her claws on her waist and tapped her foot, the one with the cloth wadded up in it.

The beggar came closer. “I’m Vernerd the beggar. Just wanted to ask if you might have found any personal items inside the suit?”

Keelie shook her head. Plumpkin’s googly eyes rattled in their plastic sockets.

Vernerd cocked his head. “Ah, good. Let me recommend something. Don’t let the Merry Men push you around on the Bedlam Barrel ride after the Faire-is-over party.”

She didn’t speak, hoping he didn’t know who was inside the suit.

The minstrels gathered at the side of the clearing and began playing a sprightly Celtic tune. Vernerd smiled, again exposing his rotten teeth. Keelie made a note to use extra floss tonight.

“That’s my cue.” Vernerd hobbled away.

A knight walked past Keelie. He stopped and spun on his boots, then walked in a circle around her. He was nice to look at, with long dark brown hair pulled back in a tie. He wore a long green tunic over green tights, and black leather gloves covered his hands. “Ye dragon, begone from Sherwood Forest, for the good folk of Nottingham must deal with evil more vile than thee.”

Keelie held up her hands in mock surrender. The knight removed his sword from his scabbard and pressed the sword tip near Plumpkin’s neck. “Should I kill the dragon?”

There were shouts of “No!” from the crowd. One little voice rang out louder than the others: “Kill the dragon.” She knew who it belonged to. The little brat in black armor.

“Dragon, what say you?”

Again, Keelie held up her hands, or rather, her purple claws, in mock surrender. She could hear the black plastic eyes spinning round and round inside the round clear covers as she shook her head, pleading for her life. Maybe if the knight killed her now, then she wouldn’t have to do the parade. She’d better still get paid.

The handsome knight motioned toward the crowd. “Good people, your kindness allows me to let this dragon live, but evil Prince John will not be so fortunate.”

A fanfare erupted from atop the wooden gate. Long, pointed banners hung from the yard-long golden trumpets that the trumpeters blew in one direction, then another.

The handsome knight ran and hopped atop a stone. “Good people of Sherwood, be forewarned, rumor says that evil Prince John brings his new bride-to-be, the Princess Eleanor of Angouleme, to our fair town. You are safe, however. The Merry Men and I will save the good people of Nottingham from the treachery of Sir Guy of Gisbourne and the Sheriff until Good King Richard returns. So say I, Robin Hood!”

Loud clapping erupted from behind Keelie. She scooted to the side and ran into one of the Merry Men, who shoved her out of the way. She would’ve landed on her butt if she hadn’t grabbed the trunk of a maple tree. The branches reached down to steady her just as a breeze kicked up. Keelie looked up, and the branches in all the nearby trees began to sway. Good cover.

Thank you
, Keelie thought.

A comforting green filled her mind. She didn’t sense any anger, or other emotional issues, from the maple like she had from the oaks.

A man in red, probably playing Will Scarlet, shouted, “Dragon, are you with the Merry Men or Prince John?”

How the heck did she know? She hadn’t read the script, and she hadn’t taken any improv classes, either.

From atop the wooden platform, Tarl, the former Muck and Mire man, waved to the crowd below. He was now dressed in royal velvet finery. He cleaned up well, but Keelie shuddered, remembering his naked, potato-shaped silhouette on a tent wall when he’d been “entertaining” a Faire goer at the High Mountain Faire. She’d be scarred for life—the image was burned into her mind.

Cheers erupted again.

Tarl raised his arms. “Greetings citizens and visitors, to the Wildewood Faire. Today is a most joyous occasion; for it is the day my betrothed arrives. Let us give her a Wildewood welcome.”

Another round of fanfare.
Yeah, yeah, get on with it.
Keelie hoped she’d have a moment to slip into a privy and remove her bra. That might help the itching. Through her mesh mouth-netting, she saw an ATM and suddenly remembered her ATM card. If she could find her old card, she might be able to withdraw enough money to pay Zeke back as well as the remaining amount on her boots.

Whack
! Something hard hit her on the knee. She almost toppled over from the pain. She looked down, and saw that the sniveling little brat in plastic armor had hit her with a wooden sword. Now the little cretin was running back to his mommy.

Keelie leaned against the tree, trying to ease the throbbing in her knee. Another fanfare blared overhead. Keelie watched as Princess Eleanor and her ladies-in-waiting joined Prince John on the platform. Elia looked beautiful. Keelie took in every detail enviously, from her sweeping skirts to her sleek, braided hair.