The Emerald Staff (19 page)

“Oh,” she whispered. Her balance waning just
a little as she tried to get a handle on the feeling. Etyran
tightened his hold on her in response, to steady her.

“It takes a bit of getting used to the first
time,” he admitted.

“Does it feel like this all the time you are
bending the light around you?”

“Yes, but I’m so used to it now, I’d
forgotten how uneasy it can make you feel.”

Remembering why she was snuggly-pressed
against the hard planes of Etyran’s chest she asked, “Faen, can you
see us? Is it working?”

To her relief he responded in the positive.
Her Guardian could not see them; they were totally invisible to his
eyes.

She blew out a sigh of relief and eased
herself away from Etyran’s hold, shooting an uneasy glance in his
direction. She thought she saw disappointment flash in his eyes as
she stepped back from him, but it was gone in an instant and
replaced with his usual roguish demeanor. She shrugged the thought
off. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet, we haven’t got you in
and out to see the Gatekeeper in one piece yet.”

Faen stepped over to them and they all turned
to peek over the boulder they were hiding behind.

“It won’t be long before they change the
guard,” Etyran said. “We better make our way down there. Follow me
and be as quiet as possible.”

Faen and Faedra nodded in agreement. They
followed Etyran until they were as close as they could get to the
redcaps without being seen. It made Faedra’s skin crawl to be this
close to the grotesque creatures that were busying themselves with
guarding the entrance to the mountain. But if this was going to
work, she had to control her feelings towards them. She couldn’t
afford to let her emotions get the better of her and risk their
plan of getting to the Gatekeeper unseen.

A few moments went by and the redcaps stopped
their patrolling and she could hear noise coming from up ahead. The
redcaps that were standing by the entrance moved off ahead to greet
their replacements.

“Now,” Etyran whispered, opening up his coat
to allow Faedra to get close to him.

Faedra stepped in and wrapped her arms around
Faen’s friend just as she had a short while before. Her heart was
pounding and her throat had dried up. Etyran wrapped his arms
around her until she was snuggly cocooned against him.

“Faedra,” he whispered.

She looked up at him, eyebrows raised in
question.

“Calm down, I can feel your heart pounding. I
don’t need an accidental shock in there, it would blow our cover.”
He sounded compassionate but Faedra could see the concern in his
face.

She turned to seek out her Guardian knowing
he was the only one capable of calming her when she got like this,
as much as she hated to admit that fact.

Faen saw the fear in her face and stepped
towards her. He took her face in his hands and focused on her eyes.
He could feel the telltale tingle running through his fingers that
warned him she was having a hard time controlling her energy.

“Faedra, breathe for me, take a big deep
breath.”

She nodded and did as he asked. Concentrating
on his eyes, she pulled on his calming energy through his
fingertips and into her cheeks.

Faen could feel the tingle recede from his
fingertips as she took another deep breath.

“Good. Now Etyran will not let anything
happen to you, and I will be waiting for you right here when you
come back. You can do this, Faedra.”

Faedra nodded her head again. Her throat was
too dry to allow any speech so she didn’t even try. She knew she
could trust Etyran. She knew her Guardian wouldn’t let her go
through with this if he didn’t trust his old friend to get them out
in one piece, but nevertheless, she felt almost bereft when she
felt the ripple go through her and knew that Faen could no longer
see them.

“We need to go now,” Etyran whispered.

She looked up and nodded her head in
agreement, tightening her hold on him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Faedra swallowed hard and let her eyes close
for a long second as Etyran started moving towards the mountain’s
entrance. She put her feet on his as instructed by him earlier, and
it reminded her of why she was doing this crazy stunt and putting
others in danger, too. This was how she used to dance with her
father when she was a child. He would dance her around the floor
with her feet perched on top of his. She swallowed down a lump and
bit back a tear at the thought. She had to be strong if she had any
hope of rescuing her dad.

It quickly became obvious to Faedra that
Etyran knew what he was doing, and she was thankful they had bumped
into him in the forest. His close observation of the redcap’s
operation was key as he scooted them past the disgusting creatures,
using their distraction when changing shifts to the pair’s
advantage. It only took a few moments to make it to the mouth of
the mountain but to Faedra they felt like the longest moments of
her life, moments filled with tension and anxiety.

She held her breath as one redcap marched so
close to them she almost brushed it with her elbow. The redcap must
have sensed something was close, because it looked around
disconcerted for a moment. Faedra and Etyran froze on the spot, not
daring to breathe or move lest they arouse more suspicion. If the
redcap reached out, it would have felt them standing right next to
it, but after a few seconds, it shook its head, turned, and carried
on patrolling in the opposite direction.

***

Once inside the mouth of the mountain, Etyran
leaned up against the wall and let out a breath, even his steady
resolve was momentarily shaken. Faedra leaned into him trying to
control her energy. The adrenaline pumping through her system was
starting to make her shake and her heart was threatening to pound
straight out of her chest and into her partner-in-crime’s.

“That was close,” he whispered, then looked
down as he felt Faedra shiver against him. “Are you okay?”

Faedra shook her head into his chest but no
words followed. The encounter she’d just had, being that close to a
redcap again, had shaken her to the core. Memories of what happened
behind the hotel played a big factor. Fear mixed with adrenaline
was not a good combination if you possessed a power like hers.

Etyran could tell she was starting to lose
control. Where her hands were clinging to his back he could feel a
distinct tingling sensation. If she didn’t keep a handle on her
energy, she could accidentally shock him, blowing their cover and
they’d be in serious trouble. He didn’t want to contemplate that
scenario at the moment.

He looked both ways along the dark stone
cave, lit only by a few torches dotted sparsely along the cave
wall. He couldn’t see any guards but he knew they patrolled this
corridor, he’d seen them come and go from the mouth of the mountain
enough times on his scouting missions. To the best of his knowledge
from observing their routine, he approximated there were four
inside the mountain at any one time, which meant one could immerge
from around the corner at any second.

Faedra shivered again, her head still buried
in his chest. He had to calm her down, and sooner rather than
later; the tingling in his back was getting stronger. Etyran wasn’t
sure what to do. He didn’t have much experience with the female
variety. Everyone thought because of his looks, he had his fair
share of the ladies, and he was happy to let them think it. Who was
he to argue? If the truth be told, though, underneath all his
roguish bravado, he was actually quite intimidated by women,
especially the one he held in his arms at that moment. The
Custodian was the most important and treasured human to the fae
realm.

He thought for a quick moment about how his
friend Faen had calmed his Custodian a little while before. His
touch had been so natural, so warm, and Faedra responded to him in
a way that had Etyran fighting a twinge of envy. Etyran didn’t know
if he was even capable of such compassion, it was not something
he’d needed to use before. The tingle in his back grew stronger and
was a powerful reminder that if he was going to learn about
compassion, and calm the frightened girl in his arms, he better be
quick about it.

He moved a tentative hand up to her head and
stroked her hair in slow soothing strokes. “Shhh,” he whispered
against the top of her head. “You need to calm down. Your dad needs
you right now.
I
need you right now. You can do this,
Faedra. Take a deep breath and concentrate on holding in your
power. I can feel it on my back.”

Etyran felt her stiffen just a little. The
movement was so subtle that if they hadn’t been more or less glued
together, he wouldn’t have noticed. A moment later her shivering
ebbed, then the tingling sensation died down. He could feel it
being pulled away from him as she drew it back into her hands.

***

It surprised Faedra when she felt Etyran’s
hand on her head, smoothing her hair. She tensed slightly at his
touch, knowing it wasn’t her Guardian’s, but then was grateful when
it delivered the same calming response. She concentrated on her
breathing and the reason they were there. She could feel herself
regain control of her energy and pulled it back from her hands, up
through her arms and into her core like she was reeling in a
watering hose on one of those wheels. In fact, she imagined doing
just that and found it made the process easier.

Once she had her power under her control
again, she glanced up and gave Etyran a sheepish look.

“Sorry,” she whispered. “I’ve only had this
power a few months and I still don’t have complete control over it
yet, especially when I get frightened or angry. Right now, I’m
both, so I have double the concentration to contend with.”

Etyran met her gaze and held it for a few
long moments, then brushed an errant strand of hair from her cheek.
“No harm done.”

Faedra could feel her cheeks heat up at the
intimate touch and quickly averted her eyes.

“I’m not sure how far down this cave the
entrance to Zutherindal is, so we will just have to keep going till
we find it,” Etyran whispered breaking the awkward silence that
followed his intimate gesture. “Are you ready?”

Faedra didn’t look up. She whispered her
answer into his chest. “Ready as I’ll ever be.” She wasn’t really
ready, wasn’t ready for any of this, but what was she supposed to
say?
No thanks, I think I’ll go back home now and leave my dad
to suffer at the hands of an evil fairy princess. Thanks for
risking your neck and all, but I’ve had enough fun for one
day.

They started along the cave corridor. Faedra
found she was having to have complete faith in the man she was
glued to that she’d only known for a few hours. Given their
introduction, she had to give herself credit for trusting him as
much as she did. She was moving backwards as Etyran moved them
forwards along the cave, and she couldn’t see a thing, which to her
mind was probably for the best at this juncture.

It seemed like they’d been moving for a while
when Etyran came to an abrupt stop. Faedra felt Etyran stiffen and
in an instant her heart raced again, causing her energy to start
snaking from her core through her limbs towards her hands. Why was
it such an ordeal to keep her energy reined in? She imagined the
hose reel again and started reeling it back to her core. This was
using immense concentration and she wasn’t sure how long she could
keep this up without imploding; not a pleasant image.

A second later, she could here the metal
clanking of footsteps a little way ahead and realized why the
abrupt stop. One of the redcaps was headed their way. Etyran backed
her up against the wall, getting them as close as possible to the
cold stone without crushing her beneath him. They stood in silence
as the clanking got closer. After what seemed like an eternity of
holding her breath, the clanking noise got nearer and nearer, then
passed them by close enough that she could smell the stench it left
in its wake. She resisted the urge to gag; the urge to live
overwhelming it. Etyran pushed them away from the wall and they
started moving forward again. This happened twice more in what
seemed like regular intervals on their journey through the cave.
With each time, she felt herself getting more and more coiled like
a spring. She’d been keeping count, though, and so far, if Etyran’s
guess was accurate, that meant three redcaps down, one more to go.
They must be getting close to the Gatekeeper now. It felt like
they’d been walking for miles and her body was starting to ache.
Keeping your balance on someone’s feet was not as easy as it
looked. It required the use of muscles she didn’t even know she
had.

Just as she’d finished her last thought,
Etyran stopped again. This time though, he didn’t press them
against the cave wall. He stood silent for a long moment then
looked down at her.

She looked up. “Are we there?”

“Yes, it’s just up ahead.”

“Oh, thank goodness.” She let out a small
sigh and her body relaxed just a little.

“There is one small problem though.”

Her blood turned cold when she saw the look
in his eyes. Why could nothing be easy?

She didn’t want to ask but obviously needed
to know so she jumped in feet first. “What’s the problem?”

“You know I said I thought there were only
four redcaps patrolling the inside of the mountain, so by my count
there should only be one left now?”

“Yes,” Faedra replied, the single syllable
word laced with caution.

“Well, I was wrong.” And with that remark he
shuffled them around, being as quiet as possible, until Faedra
could see what he meant.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Faedra sucked in a sharp breath and her eyes
grew wide. She choked back a swear word that burst through her
thoughts after seeing what stood before her. Would she not get a
break on her quest to find her father?