Chapter 8

• A Kind of Madness
• [Faye]
• “What did you just say?” I shout. Her story is too much for me to take in. I know I need to calm down, but after hearing about her “great love affair" I am shaking with anger, confusion, and grief. Was any of it real? Was my family and our happiness a lie?
• “I can’t believe this! Please,” I pinch my nose beneath my glasses. “Just tell me, is he my real brother?” I pause. She doesn’t say anything. “How long did this go on for, mother? Please, please tell me that my new boyfriend is NOT actually my brother!”
• “You are not related,” she attempts to reassure me. “I was never unfaithful to your father.”
• “At least while he was alive,” I respond cruelly. I know I’m being petty but at this moment I don’t care. I want her to feel pain.
• “Faye…”
• “Just tell me, Mom, did you even love him?” My fists are clenched at my sides, my fingers turning white. “Did you ever really love Dad?”
• “OF course I did, I…it's just…that.” She takes a big breath. “Love is complicated. Life is complicated. Over time you will…”
• “No,” I scoff. “It's not that complicated. You either love someone or you don’t.” I glare at her, my heart starting to crack around the edges. “And if you love someone, you don’t marry one person while wanting another.”
• “Faye Evangeline Archer,” my mom’s voice changes, sounding tight. “I will not justify myself to you anymore. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I’m sorry that you had to find out this way. I am sorry that the way this all played out is causing you pain.” Her gaze now burns with her own inner fire as she makes eye contact. “I never wanted you to find out this way. When Gunner took me home with him, I thought I’d be meeting his son, somebody I had no connection to, as a way to introduce myself.
• “I would have much preferred we could have discussed this calmly over brunch and I could have introduced you to him slowly. It was never my intention to shock you both this way, without any warning. But I will not let you make me feel bad for loving him. I will not let you make me feel bad for being with him, for making hard adult decisions. I put off marrying someone I love deeply for ten years…stayed separated from him for ten years….”
• She looked at me, unblinking. “I will not ask forgiveness for loving him. As for your father, of course, I loved him. I loved him very very much. I….”
• “You just loved Gunner more.” I finish for her.
• The room falls silent. I pull open the door with too much force, and slam it into the wall, leaving a dent. My mother flinches.
• As I leave I hear her whisper. “No, I just loved them both differently.”
• I march down the hallway towards the elevator, my heart broken along with my trust. As the elevator doors open, my glass lenses fog from the heat of my tears, my sight so blurry I can barely read the numbers on the buttons.
• Somehow I make it out of the building, but I can feel the eyes of strangers watching me, judging me without knowing what just happened. In my mind I shout “LEAVE ME ALONE!” although no words left my mouth, pushing through the crowd between me and the large rotating door. The woman in front of me jumped, startled, moving to the side as I ran forward, out the door, across three lanes of traffic, to the lake beyond.
• I break into a sprint. I’m not the only person running along the lake at this hour, as this lake, around 3 miles in circumference, makes an excellent running trail. When I reach the northern edge of the lake I leave the lake and walk past a large old-fashioned theater as I make my way uptown into Berkeley. I need to take a walk to clear my head.
• My mind is racing. The clouds shift above me as my feelings grow darker, hiding the last rays of sunshine. As my mood continues to grow dark, rain starts to fall, heavily, dampening my spirits even more. I feel the temperature drop and it begins to hail. It is early December, almost the last week of school, and while this weather is not out of season, this storm came up suddenly, surprising people on the street who rushed inside or under awnings, packages, and purses held overhead as makeshift umbrellas. I don’t bother to find shelter. I let the water cover me, washing away my pain.
• I am not sure how long I wander before I look up to see it is now twilight, just before true dark, when the shadows begin to fade into black. I look up. I am nowhere near home.
• Oh gods, where am I?
• The rain stops, but my glasses are so watermarked that they do not serve much of a purpose on my face beyond looking decorative. They are my favorite cat-eyed frames, edged in amber crystals, contrasting nicely with my lavender eyes. I take them off and put them in my pocket while I look in my bag for my case. It’s not there and I’m not even sure when I lost it…
• “Damn it.” I cover my eyes with my palms, and I take a deep breath in an attempt to ground and center myself.
• Opening my eyes again I can see that I’m on the greenway that runs underneath the elevated train tracks between Berkeley and Richmond. Now that I know where I am, exhausted both physically and mentally, I turn around and head in the right direction towards my apartment.
• The street lights placed along the trail are mostly bright enough to see, although there are entire sections where the lights have broken, leaving sections in permanent darkness. It’s quiet, the sound of dinner and families walking their dogs singing in the background as people settle into their evenings. I pull my phone out of my bag, thankfully still dry after all that rain to text Arthur.
• ME: Hey there.
• ARTHUR: Hey GF, what’s up?
• I smile at my phone. He’s such a dork.
• ME: Nothing really, I just don’t want to go home tonight. Do you want to hang out?
• ARTHUR: Dinner at my place?
• ME: What about your dad?
• ARTHUR: He’s AWOL until Tuesday.
• ME: Meet me at my place in 20.
• ARTHUR: OK, GF. 20
• I am smiling at my phone, grinning like a fool when I stumble in the dark, tripping over a broken piece of cement. My open bag goes flying, scattering its contents behind me as I brace myself to fall. Anticipating the pain of scraped knees and elbows I am surprised when I fall into the well-muscled arms of a stranger.
• They smell like cloves and chocolate. Looking up I see a face that is partially shaded by the brim of a tall top hat. Their eyes appear brown through a pair of rose-colored sunglasses. As they take a step back and ask “Are you okay, Miss?” I hear a voice that sounds light and airy, more of a soprano than the bass I had expected.
• I began to assess this person more closely. They have a well-developed figure barely contained within a black velvet coat and leather riding breeches. Buttons strain along the edges of a tightly bound chest. Their tall, stiffly starched collar is held in place by a scarf of green silk matching the actual color of their eyes, which are now visible as they remove their sunglasses in an attempt to wipe away the rain. That alone is strange. Who wears sunglasses at night? Not to mention velvet and silk in a rainstorm?
• They remove their hat, their French braided silver-streaked black hair falling forward as they perform an elaborate bow, like something from a classic play about nobility. Now that the hat has been removed, I can see their perfect cheekbones, strong, full eyebrows, and full lips above a blocky chin. They are a beautiful person, presenting somewhere between masculine and feminine, a delightfully enticing combination of both.
• I felt a rush of blood to my cheeks as our eyes met.
• “Did you just come from a play?” I ask, trying not to sound rude.
• Laughter echoes through the corridor, ringing like wind chimes. “No, why do you think so?”
• “It's just, no offense meant, but your clothing seems a bit out of place.”
• They raise a single eyebrow “Is that so? I thought this was quite modern compared to my usual attire.”
• I gulp, realizing how judgemental my question must have sounded.
• “But I am being rude. I haven’t even introduced myself. Devona Alestra Avalonia,” they intone, continuing where they left off as they resume their exaggerated bow. “Lord Merlin of East Avalon.”
• “Merlin? As in THE Merlin?”
• They laugh again.
• “What?!” I feel my cheeks grow red. I feel like they are laughing at me. “You know what, right now, I just can’t. This has been a hell of a day, so if you don’t have anything else to say or do other than laugh at me, I’ll be on my way.” I try to move around them, picking up my bag and wallet and leaving the rest as I hurry to get away. I feel a hand on my arm, holding me in place firmly.
• “Please wait.”
• “Why?” I struggle to pull my arm out of their grip.
• “I come to you with a message. It is time you come home.”
• I sigh. “That’s what I was trying to do before you ran into me.”
• They reach forward.
• “She” Devona responds as if she heard my thoughts.
• “What?”
• “I am very much she,” Devona explains, “and yes, I can hear everything you think.” She pulls me into her arms, into her hard chest “Everything.” I struggle at first, but as I inhale her fragrance I find myself relaxing.
• “Now come, My Queen. We don’t have much time. The Queen Mab will be waiting for you, and until you are ready to rise, to take your rightful place, I need to take you somewhere safe.”
• “And where might that be?” I pant.
• “East Avalon,” Her gloved hand moves a strand from my eyes, placing it behind my ear, a simple kindness that suddenly feels so intimate, so sensual, I feel my knees buckle. “I might need to transform you into a bird for a while, but you’ll be safe in my rookery with my soldiers.”
• “This is absolute nonsense! Rookery? Transform!” I scoff, pulling away. “This is madness.” Her eyes seem wild, and frantic as I back away into the shadows of one of the broken lights. “You are insane.”
• “Faye…”
• “No!” I shout. Her body tenses as I move away from the light and deeper into the shadows. “I don’t know you!” My voice strains and cracks, as if edged in electricity. “How do you know my name? Who are you?”
• It's at that moment that I see the faint tip of her ears pointing through her braided hair.
• “WHAT are you?” I demand.
• I take a step back. She takes a step forward. I put my hands out defensively in front of me.
• The next thing I know, Devona is flying through the air. She stands up, about 50 feet away, and dusts off her coat. I can see two hand prints burned into her front.
• “Oh My Queen,” she sighs, taking a step forward. “A spark.”
• I frown, taking another step back.
• “I can see you are confused, but I need you to trust me,” she explains. “You can come with me now or the shadows will take you by force and I cannot guarantee your safety. If the darkness claims you, the Queen.....”
• I don’t wait to hear what she has to say next, I just turn and run away, into the darkness. When I reach the end of the block I turn around.
• She is gone. A single raven feather shines in her place.
• Was she ever really there?