The Earl's Childe (4 page)

With a slightly labored
“oof,”
Mum slid down his side. “Good boy, Ehrwnmyr.”

“Good job,” I echoed, feeling happy at his joy.

“Thank you, Heather.” Mum gave me a big hug, kissing my cheeks. “That really was…just amazing!”

I laughed. “When my ribs heal a bit more, I'll try.” The kelpie gave me a bit of a nod. He had enjoyed himself running, too, and I could sense he wanted to share that feeling with me.

“Ehrwnmyr…” Mum mumbled, still scratching his neck. Not once did she seem bothered by—or even to notice—the tentacle fur twisting around her fingers. She chuckled. “We need a nickname.”

Nickname?

After all the bonding stuff between him and Mum, I was kind of glad she was on the receiving end of
that
tone from him.

“Sorry, I didn't mean to offend. Just…most of our horses—and I know you're not a horse—but they have short names we call them by.”

He looked at me.
Do I
need
this “nickname?”

I thought about it, opening the gate so we could head back to his stable. “I don't know. It's not really easy to say Err-win-murr.”

What would you suggest?

“Umm…” I thought some more. “Murray? Ermie?”

“Ermie reminds me of R. Lee Ermey,” said Mum, “who's this famous ex-marine drill sergeant guy. You watched one of his shows with me on The History Channel?”

I shrugged and looked at the kelpie.

I do not mind being called Ermie
. I also sensed he liked Mum's description of the actor, or whatever emotions he was picking up as she described R. Lee Ermey, whom I had never heard of before.

From the direction of the castle drive, we heard the
beep, beep, beep
of a lorry backing up.

Mum furrowed her brows and looked at me. We shared a shrug. “Go put Ermie in his stall. I'll see what that is.”

CHAPTER

2

When dealing with my own dad concerns me more than a killer faery horse
.

Ermie (I kinda liked the nickname) and I said quick goodbyes, and I told him to stay in his stable and turnout until I said otherwise. It wasn't until I was already on my way back to the castle that I realized I'd given him a good nose-rub, and hadn't even thought of his tentacle fur when I'd done it.

This would work out. It really would!

Mum was standing beside the access road that led behind the castle gardens to an enclosed, discreet area we used for storage or family parking. Her arms were folded and her face pursed as if she had just bitten into a lemon. A dump truck was spilling a pile of what looked like salt onto a tarp spread over the packed dirt. My dad was gesturing directions to the driver. Our greyhound, Isis, sat by his feet, tail wagging nervously. She saw Mum and me and gave a short
bark
.

“What's going on?” I asked.

“I'm not exactly sure.” Mum's voice was flat and distinctly Not Happy.

I waited with her until the truck was gone and Dad came over to us. “Good, you can help me and we'll get this done before the sun sets.” He gave us a huge smile.

Mum glanced at the sky. “The sun sets well after any of our children's bedtimes, sweetie. What are you planning they help with?”

“It's summer. We can be a little lenient. At least with Heather and Rowan, since it's important for them, too…” Dad, undeterred, was just about bouncing on his toes, and was talking almost twice as fast as he normally did. If that wasn't enough of a clue, he had this brightness to his eyes, which always signaled he was in a manic mood. And if I had missed
that
, Isis's nervously protective jittering also gave me a clue as to what was going on.

“What
are we doing with…I assume that's salt, my love?” I could also tell Mum was holding back her impatience. She was picking up the same stuff as I was.

“Yes! I was reading. If we put a full perimeter around the castle's foundation, along all the windows and doors, that'll do for tonight—”

“Hold up a second, Michael.” Mum held up both hands like she was trying to physically push him back. “You read what and want us to do what, now?” Mum is American and spent a bunch of time in the southern states, especially Texas. You can hear that pretty clearly when she's upset. At that moment, she sounded
very
American, a trying-very-hard-to-stay-patient American.

Dad seemed to notice Mum's emotional state and possibly my agitation. He'd just gotten over a depressed mood that had been one of his worst ever, possibly due to being near Ehrwnmyr, and now he was changing gears really quickly. More quickly than I'd ever seen him change before. He took a deep breath, made his body relax, and addressed my Mum in a more normal pace. “You lent me a pile of your books so that I could learn more about the fey since…” He glanced at me now, and I saw the worry in his eyes. “It seems we should know what's going on. I went through most of them. Creating a perimeter of salt around our home and at all levels of entry will keep out anything that could harm us, possibly all of the faerie, so we'd be safe from any attack and have a safe place to retreat to if needed. Especially if we're going to have all those kids here in your camp, we need to make sure all of
them
are safe.”

Mum took a deep breath. “Okay, I understand you now and what you want to do. I really wish you'd spoken to me first before you'd moved forward with the plan. There are a few problems with that, which probably didn't come up in any of the books I lent you.”

The lines on Dad's face, especially around his lips, deepened a little. “Like what?”

“Well,” Mum said. “What would all our neighbors in the villages have thought if we'd moved in and put up a ten-foot stockade fence and great big ‘Keep out!' signs?”

Dad frowned at her. “Last I checked, no one who lives in the villages murders or endangers anyone's children.”

“Like all the beings that share our land, I doubt all who live in the villages are human. And even if they were, not every human is good.”

Another glance at me seemed to soften my dad's face, but only a little. “You're right that we should still keep the kids' bedtimes. I can work on this myself. I'll give Lily a call shortly and make sure she doesn't stay up too late with Jenna.” (Lily is my older sister, who was spending the night with our friend, Jenna Garrity.) Dad leaned down and gave me a hug and kiss. “Goodnight, love. Sleep well.”

I kissed him back, but wouldn't release him from the hug. “I love you, Daddy.”

He hugged me even tighter, understanding. “I love you, too. And don't you worry about me. I'll be fine.”

“Are you seeing Dr. Grey again?” I asked.

He pulled away enough to look me in the face. “Aye. I'm driving out to Edinburgh next week.” He kissed my nose. “All right?”

“Are you going to tell him about Ehrwnmyr this visit?” He pulled away a little more, frowning. “I wasn't planning on it.”

“Maybe you should?”

He shook his head. “He said I was doing fine last week. We made an adjustment, and that can make things odd. I'm okay, I promise.” He kissed my forehead again. “Besides, I'm not sure exactly… You do realize most people don't believe in…faery things and magic, right?”

I pursed my lips. I
knew
that, but it seemed like a whole lot more people were okay with it than I would have thought. My best friend Joe's family—Prince Christopher, next in line for the throne, and his wife, Princess Maryan—had hardly batted an eye when they came to see the kelpie. Then again, they weren't regular people. “You could show him…”

Dad paused. “Not right now. I don't think he'll drive down here. I'm fine, though. I promise. Please, don't worry.”

Like that was going to happen. I just kissed him back and gave Isis a scritch between her ears. “I love you, Daddy. Good night.”

He sighed, and I knew he knew what I wasn't saying. After one more kiss and a very tight hug from him, then a hug and kiss and “goodnight” from Mum, I headed back in the house and got ready for bed.

But I probably wouldn't sleep for a while.

Once upon a time, according to my dad, he could keep his mood swings in check with meditation, exercise, and, well, other, more problematic, methods—but I'll get to that. Anyway, as he got older, his bipolar condition got worse, and he had to start taking medicine, which he hated because he felt he wasn't as good of an actor for not being in touch with his extremes. I don't know if that's true, but he hasn't had as many TV and movie roles as I remember him having when I was younger.

Besides his own brain chemistry, sometimes outside things can trigger his mood swings or make them worse. Like weather and pressure. When Ehrwnmyr had “moved in” to the nature reserve that abuts our property and killed two kids, Dad had gone into a serious downswing. Part of that could be because the kelpie's presence had affected the weather. When Ermie hadn't been able to kidnap our friend, Sarah Beth, he'd ended up causing a storm that seriously damaged the coastal villages nearby.

Which means his presence probably affects my dad. Like really badly.

Dad's mood was so bad after the storm that he was adding both caffeine and pot to his prescription medicine. When he was in University, he'd used caffeine and pot as a way to
avoid
going on medicine. He was really bad off, though, like I said. I wouldn't have known if I hadn't overheard Mum and him arguing. And then smelled it on his clothes once. I think he felt even worse about it, knowing I knew. He did stop and work things out with his doctor about his meds after that. And he promised Mum and me that he would never do that again.

But that doesn't mean his mood swings got better. And the fact that they were so bad was partly my fault since we had to keep Ehrwnmyr here.

Dad kept trying to tell me not to feel guilty. He'd rather know my soul and me were safe and everything, but still. And he'd also promised, because he knew how I felt, to keep me included on how he was “feeling.”

Thing is, with an upswing, he's
not
lying when he says he's doing all right. People with mania
are
very happy. They feel amazing. And with Dad, an upswing could be really awesome, sometimes, because he could make anyone around him feel like they're on top of the world with him.

On the other hand, when he's not specifically
happy
during a manic phase… Well, I'd only seen that once, and except for this most recent depressive period, I'd never before felt so terrified for my dad.

So, obviously, I was scared about what would happen with another manic swing when all he was thinking about was that his children were in danger from Faerie.

CHAPTER

3

Let's go visit Faerie! Wait, I'm not allowed. Let's do an astral projection spell to Faerie…because that totally won't get us into trouble
.

Heather!