Becoming Fae
The Vale, Pt. 1

My hands shook as I looked at the seemingly harmless forest in front of me. It didn’t look like a magically deadly forest. It wasn’t at all as creepy as the Malokian Woods and I could hear the birds and saw a pair of squirrels chasing each other around a tree trunk. I could feel it, though. It was a heavy presence that felt like something sentient. And it hated us.

“I don’t like this place,” I said, rubbing the prickles on my skin.

“Pretty sure the feeling is mutual,” Harmon muttered, his wings shifting uncomfortably.

Mal and Naz stood on my sides and Harmon was on Mal’s other side as we all stared into the Vale. It was early morning and as much as we knew we needed to go in there, none of us were exactly itching to take the first step.

“Do you feel anything, Naz?” I asked and he shook his head.

“Only the forest,” he added. “I don’t think that will change once we get in there.”

“So, we won’t know which way to go,” Mal sighed.

“I can feel the same curse that was on the box,” Harmon said, drawing all of our attention. “It lingers over this place like a fog, but... It’s like the Vale is fighting it to keep it from settling over it.”

“That’s good, right?” I tilted my head slightly.

Harmon just shrugged and I looked back at the forest. The one that looked all too happy to devour us and leave no traces behind.

“This is a terrible idea,” I sighed and stepped forward, my feathers shaking with the dark, sticky feeling that washed over me as I made it under the shade of the first trees.

-----

I had no idea how long we’d been walking. Hours? Days? My feet said months. We hadn’t eaten anything or dared drink even the dew that formed on the leaves of the trees around us. It was silent now, too. The sounds of the birds and the other creatures you’d find in a forest were oddly absent, though I did occasionally see one or two. The only sound was the creaking of the trees as a breeze we didn’t feel blew.

“Something is on my back,” Harmon muttered, wiggling his shoulders. He looked behind him and shouted in alarm, jumping and scrambling on the ground when he fell. “What are those things!?”

“They’re wings,” I reached out to touch one, but stopped short. “They look like angel wings.”

“You have wings, too!” he shouted and pointed behind me and I peeked to see black feathers.

“Oh. They’re so dark,” I touched the feather behind me. “And pretty.”

“These are pretty,” Mal said trailing a finger over the markings on my arm. “What do they mean?”

“I don’t know,” I frowned, something tickling at the back of my mind. Something important.

“I have a tail,” Naz said, holding it in his hand and watching as the end of it flicked around. “I don’t know how to use this thing.”

“Your wings are sparkly,” I giggled and touched Mal’s glowing wings that were so thin, they looked almost like living glass.

“They aren’t sparkly,” he made a face, and I frowned as that tickling in my mind grew a little more persistent.

“No,” I said slowly and looked at Harmon. “He’s Sparkles.”

“I know that name,” Harmon paused in his experimentation with his wings. “Why do I know that name?”

“You wear shiny armor,” I said, sure of it.

“What?” he looked confused. “Why would I do that? It’s heavy stuff and so hot.”

“Wuss,” Naz scoffed, then cursed when his tail slapped him in the face.

I groaned and rubbed my temples where they were starting to ache with a pounding kind of pressure.

“Why does my head hurt?” Mal grumbled. “It doesn’t even feel like it’s my head that’s hurting. Like a shadow in my brain.”

“Bond,” I whispered, feeling my head cracking with pressure. “It’s the Bond. King. A King. No, no. The king. My king. Demons.”

“Nasty creatures,” Naz shuddered.

“Not nearly as terrible as angels,” Harmon scowled. “They tried to kill me, once.”

“What?” I asked him.

“I...,” he frowned and rubbed his forehead. “I don’t know.”

“I’m not a king,” Mal frowned.

“You are,” I nodded as the pain faded and this odd fog lifted from my mind. “You’re my Bonded. It’s why your wings glow.”

Mal looked at me critically, his lips twisting to the side in thought.

“You are kind of pretty,” he finally said, and I gave him a flat look.

“We’re going to have a discussion about your image of me after this,” I narrowed my eyes at him.

“You feel familiar,” Naz said his hand hovering near me with his face pinched in concentration.

“I’m Immail’s more recent descendant,” I told him. “That’s why we’re in this place.”

“I don’t like it here,” Harmon made a face as he petted his wing that he had moved in front of him. “It feels like it wants to eat me.”

“It does, trust me,” I snorted. “Something in here is messing with our heads.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Mal laughed. “That would mean magic is real and it’s not.”

I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose, getting the feeling that no matter how logical I try to be, it won’t help. I’d have to figure out how to get them out of this... confusion.

“Why don’t you have wings?” Harmon asked Naz, poking around on his back. “Everyone else here does.”

“I don’t like heights,” Naz scowled and swatted at him.

“Could you have wings?” Harmon tilted his head to the side.

“Magic doesn’t exist,” Mal rolled his eyes.

“I cannot,” Naz shook his head, then frowned. “How do I know that?”

“I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but that creepy old fart with the bats may have just the thing to say right now,” I muttered, then mimicked his voice. “Clear the fog.”

I felt like there was something else, though. Something else that was very important, but I couldn’t remember what it was. I shrugged and rolled my shoulders, getting ready to prove Mal wrong about magic by getting rid of the cloud in their minds. The best thing for getting rid of fog? Sun and a stiff breeze. I might not be able, or at all willing, to mess with the trees in this place, but I could manage a breeze. A breeze full of magic that would counteract whatever it was that was messing with us.

I threw out my hands, blasting the area around me with fresh, magic wind. I’m not sure how, but it worked, judging by the confused looks I got, followed by understanding. Then, the dread came.

“What did I just do?” I whispered, wide-eyed, as a furious roaring sounded from all around us and the ground shook under our feet and the trees and air around us trembled.

***A Note From Aly***

I'm super sorry about the inconsistent updates recently. My youngest is sick and I just haven't had a spare moment to do much of anything that doesn't involve having her attached to me.

Not to worry, though! She's getting better and that means we'll be back on schedule now! Thank you, sweet and precious readers, for sticking with me and I hope this is the last time we have a set-back like this (I'm finding gray hairs, which I am entirely too young for, despite what my driver's license might have to say on the matter).

Happy Reading!

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