My aunt had warned me that I couldn’t expect the perfect man to drop from the sky and land in my lap. Even after my betrothal parchment was signed, she tried to be motherly by lecturing me on the effort it took for a woman to remain attractive to her husband-to-be, never failing to imply that a display of my unnatural abilities would ruin my chances of securing him. My aunt’s warning was very nearly disproved, except a well-placed maple broke his fall.
I had been charging through the trees, mad at the world, with tears obscuring my vision. Despite not being in much of a state to notice anything, the leafy crash above my head demanded attention. Skidding to a halt, I ducked in fear of being flattened by whatever had fallen from the sky.
Squinting into the bright green foliage, I made out the form of a man. As I blinked away tears and my eyes adjusted to the sunlight streaming down, I could see that his skin, the color of dry earth, was more covered with burns and char than clothes. A tatter of exquisite gold and green cloth hung from his shoulder, embroidered with an intricate design swirling around a crescent. Evidently, his plunge through the upper treetops had been arrested when a slender branch had skewered him through the middle. Immediately, the blacksmith’s forbidden tales of magical creatures that once inhabited the islands sprang to mind, but he was too big to be a fairy.
With a low groan, he made a half-hearted struggle to escape, just like the animals I freed from my cousins’ poorly made snares. The sound chased the fantastical stories from my thoughts. As I grasped the rough bark of a low hanging branch, horns sounded the hunt in the distance.
I had only succeeded in hauling myself onto the lowest branch when someone barked, “Chiara!” reprovingly. I nearly fell in my effort to get down. When I reached the ground, I shook worse than the leaves of the tree. I hated the heart-pounding fear, but I knew the rules and his tone told me I had broken them. My uncle towered, thunder flashing in his eyes, “What do you think you’re doing?” he asked, followed by, “You’re a promised woman now,” his voice balanced between scandalized and angry.
I kept my mouth shut and hung my head. I couldn’t afford to lose the protection of my aunt and uncle—not yet. If I followed the rules for a little longer, by next harvest I would be off this farm for good. For now, my family protected me from my parents’ fate. Spinning me away and giving me a shove, my uncle ordered, “Get out of sight before you disgrace us.” Again, I added silently as the crashing in the underbrush grew louder.
Sliding into a spot between two hickories and concealed by a lilac bush, I settled in to watch. He hadn’t said I actually had to leave. A handful of townsmen, including my cousins, broke into the clearing to join my uncle. At his direction, my older cousin, Clint, scrambled into the maple. Making his way to the man from the sky, Clint whistled, “It goes clean through him.” He put a hand on the branch in question.
“Is he dead?” his brother, Henry, called before the man let out a pained cry and made a weak effort to break free. “Guess not,” Henry muttered to himself.
Handing up a hatchet, my uncle told Clint, “We’ll just have to take care of that later.”
The sound of metal chipping wood was drowned out by a throat-tearing scream from the man in the tree. I had to sit on the desire to go to his aid. Angry and confused, he sounded no different from a badger I’d recently freed. The poor thing had been so blinded by pain that it raked its claws down my arm. Without thinking, I ran my hand over the long red scars that overlaid older white ones. I knew pain, and wouldn’t wish it on anyone.
Before I could give away my presence, I slipped out of hiding. As soon as I judged myself out of earshot, I ran, not stopping until I reached the farmhouse. Not a single one of my relatives could have compelled me to do what I did next, but for the sake of a poor injured stranger, I stepped into my aunt’s kitchen unasked.
Catching sight of me, she surged to her feet, wooden spoon in hand, eyes blazing like the coals in the stove.
Breathless, I backpedaled, “An injured man—uncle—sent me—” I gasped out enough of the story that she dropped the spoon to her side with a scowl at not having a reason to use it.
“Well, don’t just stand there, lazy girl, chop some firewood,” she barked, “We’ll need it for heating water.” Obediently, I turned, but not before I heard her mutter, “Silly thing never knows what needs doing, just like her mother…”
From the woodpile at the back of the house, I couldn’t see the path to the forest, couldn’t see them when they brought the stranger in—and they couldn’t see me, which is how my aunt and uncle wanted it. Because if they didn’t see me, maybe they wouldn’t remember I was there. Wood chips flew as I took out my anger on the woodpile. I couldn’t help what the power inside me chose to do.
When my muscles were laced with fire and the sun had fried my neck, Henry came out with a plate of food. Handing it to me with a sneer, he said, “Pa is worried that the plow horse might have hurt himself. He wants you to eat your dinner in the barn and keep an eye on him.” Releasing his grip, Henry tried to twist the plate out of my hands, but I was too quick, holding the sliding potatoes on with a hunk of bread. Foiled, Henry returned to the house.
Leaving the steaming plate on a bale of hay, I went to check on the plow horse. As I opened the stall door, I wondered about the dinner guests. Probably the neighbors who hadn’t liked me since I was five. When their daughter pulled my hair, I lost control of my power and ghostly yellow orbs leapt from my palms to chase her home. They needn’t have worried. I’d learned that night from my uncle that I was my parents’ child, and if the Guardians found out, they would come for me. The Guardians kept the islands safe, and people with power were dangerous, because eventually everyone lost control. Whatever became of those taken by the Guardians, they didn’t come back.
This knowledge didn’t change who I was; I just worked harder to hide it. Experimenting with my power, I learned limitations—using too much would exhaust me—but I couldn’t always control it, try though I did.
Spreading both hands against the horse’s hide, I reached for the forbidden spark of light. I nudged it toward the old horse, feeling the strain in his body. He wasn’t injured; the weakness amounted to nothing more serious than a good rest could cure. Not that I was surprised.
Returning to my dinner, I ate most of it, feeding the scraps to the barn cats. As the evening sky lost its last bluish tinge and the stars began to appear, strewn across the heavens like a handful of bright tears, I took my plate to the pump.
Voices drifted on the chilly breeze, “—can’t do anything!” My aunt bit out desperately. “His clothes bear the emblem, can you imagine the price if we let one of them die?”
“Surely you can’t believe he’s—?” My uncle’s voice trailed off as they moved from the window.
Moments later, Clint nearly ran me over coming out the door as I went in. “Pa wants you.” He retreated hastily to avoid being within arm’s reach like he thought I would incinerate him or something. I guess the dinner guests had gone.
I found my uncle in the back bedroom that had belonged to his daughter before her marriage. Keeping my eyes averted from the motionless form on the bed—now covered by a sheet—I asked neutrally, “You sent for me, sir?”
Tone sizzling with anger, countered by the apprehension in his eyes, he told me, “Fix him.” He marched out, the door slamming behind him.
For a moment, I stared at the place he had vacated. Fix him? All my life, I had fixed things and been punished. Everyone I lived with pretended my power didn’t exist because it scared them stiff. My aunt believed that I would lose control of it and follow my mother’s dark path. I shivered inwardly. They said the more I used it, the closer I came to spiraling down into madness and destruction, and now they wanted me to fix him?
I turned to face the stranger on the bed. Sure, I’d helped a squirrel here and there, that badger in the bear trap, animals around the farm, but this was a man—what if I killed him?
But my uncle hadn’t left room for failure when he’d ordered me to fix the stranger. Cautiously, I perched on the edge of the bed. I would just have to think of him as a largish less-than-fluffy kitten and go from there. I could do this. Maybe I could prove that I wouldn’t be lured by the intoxicating call of power. Mindful of my uncle’s words in the forest, I folded the sheet back to expose the man’s nearly bare upper body. He didn’t look much older than me and could easily fit in among the hardy farmers’ sons. Sweat beaded on his creased forehead. Pulling a twig out of his curls, a shade darker than his skin, I assessed the damage.
A foul smelling bandage rested below his ribcage, binding the wound from the tree limb. Undoubtedly it had been doctored with well-meaning concoctions of my aunt’s. Scratches and scorch marks covered the rest of his earth-colored skin, with the exception of his upper arm, which bore a different mark, a tattoo or brand in the shape of a vine twisted around the same crescent that had been on the tatter of cloth. However, his flushed face and his shivers concerned me more. Fever meant infection.
I touched my fingers lightly to the bandage around his middle. The man whimpered. I tried to relax and think of him as a wounded animal. Just another day, spent thwarting my cousins’ schemes. It would be easier if I couldn’t see a man laid out before me. I closed my eyes.
With one last panicky doubt, I dove in. Reaching for the pool of light that I kept hidden inside myself, I let it flow down my arms to my fingertips. The bandage hindered the light no more than air. Soon enough, I felt waves of pain echoing from the shreds of skin. I sent soothing tendrils of power to obliterate the pain and encourage the body to heal.
Slowly, because I had never practiced on a human being, I wove the torn edges together. I felt along the seam for pieces that had once been whole. At first, it all looked the same, but if I focused I found tiny variances that showed where they had interlocked and could connect again. I didn’t completely fuse the repairs. The body could heal itself, and I knew better than to leave traces of my work. I might have been asked to fix him, but they wouldn’t appreciate a completely healed man when he had just been on death’s doorstep the night before. I had no desire to bring down the Guardians on myself.
Through my inner vision, I could see yellow-gold light tying the tissue in place to give the wound time to heal. Satisfied, I opened my eyes. The pain lines on the stranger’s face had eased. Still, chills crept across his flesh, although the night air had not yet cooled the room. I felt his forehead and wasn’t surprised that his skin was on fire. If the infection remained, his healing wound would do no good.
Placing both of my palms on his chest, I sent out a ripple of cleansing light. As power swept through his body, I thought I felt an answering flicker. It was so faint and my focus was on the infection that I thought perhaps I imagined it. When I finished burning out the sickness, the spark inside him was gone as though it had never been.
I felt drained, my eyelids heavy. The animals had never taken this much out of me. The stranger would have to deal with the remaining scrapes and burns, none of which looked life-threatening, on his own. As I straightened, my back protested the movement. I started to turn away, but the room tilted as my vision swam. My legs turned to jelly, and I collapsed senseless.
Feeling stiff and uncomfortable, I came back to my awareness with a start, thinking I had napped too long in the hayloft and uncle would surely tan my hide. I scrambled to my feet without thinking, and blushed fiercely when I realized that I had been lying across the legs of a half-naked stranger. With a few deep breaths, I resisted the urge to cower from my uncle’s harsh curses echoing through my memories.
Light had begun to creep up on the horizon and the stranger rested, although more fitfully than before. His arms and shoulders twitched strangely, and I touched the back of my hand to his forehead with alarm, but the fever hadn’t returned. His skin was as cool as mine.
As I drew my hand away, he groaned, a deep rumbling sound, and opened his eyes to emerald slits. After a few dazed blinks, they opened completely and locked on me. His jaw worked a couple of times before he croaked out, “Where am I?”
“My uncle’s house,” I responded, immediately realizing that the information would mean nothing to him, so I added, “They found you in a tree.” In an attempt to lighten the shadowed fear lurking in his eyes, I asked, “Were you trying to fly?”
He took me seriously instead, brows drawing together before he turned terror-stricken eyes on me, “I-I don’t know—I don’t remember.”
“That’s okay,” I soothed. “How about your name?” He’d had that longer, perhaps it remained.
He closed his eyes. For a moment, I thought he’d drifted off, but they reopened and he said uncertainly, “Mearthandanon? Mearth. I think?”
I nodded. That would be quite a mouthful to make up, and did it really matter if he was wrong? Having a name, any name, would give him something to hold onto as he pieced together the rest of himself. “Nice to meet you, Mearth. I’m Chiara.” I introduced myself as though we had met under normal circumstances.
With a half-hearted smile and drooping eyelids, Mearth said, “Thanks,” and fell into a peaceful slumber.
As I finished tucking the sheet around his chin, my uncle burst in, swept the two of us with a glance, and barked, “Chores!”
My feet responded to his orders with a few steps before I remembered the flicker of light that I might have only imagined from the man lying on the bed. What if he had power, but didn’t know or remember? My family protected me from the Guardians, but him, a stranger? They’d kill him.
As my feet faltered, my uncle shot me a dark look and growled, “Do you need something, girl?”
I shrank but held my ground, “What if he gets worse?” I ventured, “Shouldn’t I stay?”
His hand cracked across the side of my face, and I fought to remain on my feet as tears sprang to my eyes. He towered over me and bellowed, “What could you possibly do?”
Keeping my head down to hide the hot tears streaming down my face, I mumbled, “Nothing, sir,” and stumbled blindly from the room.
I didn’t stop until I reached the barn where I dried my tears and started my chores. It was full daylight as I dragged my exhausted self through the routine motions, knowing that I could make no excuse for leaving them incomplete. When I finished, I retreated to the hayloft where my family rarely ventured. I was asleep almost before my head hit the prickly bale of hay.
A hoarse voice repeating my name woke me. “Chiara,” Mearth shook me gently. He crouched next to me, my cousin’s clothes hanging loosely on his wiry frame.
“What is it?” I asked, sitting up for a better look at him. His movements seemed stiff and careful, but the healing had clearly helped.
Rocking back on his heels, Mearth told me brightly, “I think maybe I can fly.”
I raised an eyebrow. Why on the islands would he want to be different? Didn’t he know that the Guardians came for those who were different? If the village caught wind of this, they would toss him from the bluffs to see if he was right.
Focused inward, Mearth wasn’t paying attention to the look of concern that was undoubtedly flashing across my face. He continued, “I dreamt I could fly, maybe it’s a connection to who I am.” His eyes returned to mine, full of hope and desperation.
Before I could warn him of the dangers of saying such things or point out the unlikelihood of the connection, a shout from below interrupted, “Chiara! Ma’s gonna kill you!”
I scrambled down the ladder, losing all thoughts of flying, and jumped the last three rungs, landing next to Henry.
He glowered, brandishing a bundle of blue cloth, evidently annoyed at his inability to find me. “Reid’ll be here soon. Ma sent this,” he shook out the cloth, revealing a faded dress that had belonged to his sister, now married to a rich old farmer.
My mind raced, calculating how long getting ready for my suitor would take, as I reached for the dress. My fingers brushed the fabric as Henry swung it away into the cow pen. I clambered after it as the dress floated to rest in the muck. When I snatched it up, the fabric was covered and completely ruined.
Shaking with rage, I jumped the rail fence, noticing Mearth peering down curiously from the hayloft. Henry had doubled over with laughter. I wanted to wipe the smirk off of his face, but I knew I couldn’t. As I clutched the ruined dress in one fist, gold flashed behind my eyes, coursing down the other arm toward my fingertips. Without thinking, I flung my hand at Henry, and golden orbs of light leapt in his direction.
They hit him and he yelped, stumbling toward the door. “I’m tellin’ Ma!” As soon as he reached the open air, he ran as though demons were on his trail. I looked down at my hand. Perhaps they were. “MA! Chiara threw fire at meeeee!!!”
I took off after him, knowing that even if I reached him, my aunt had already heard. I had no other direction to run. Not yet. I tried when I was eleven, but I didn’t even make it off the farm. I shivered at the memory of three days in the cellar.
I reached the kitchen steps behind Henry. “Chiara,” my aunt snapped, waving the wooden spoon in my direction. I shrank back as it passed inches from my nose, “Terrorizing Henry? He’s just a baby,” she scolded. “Do you want to end up like your mother?”
“M’sorry, ma’am,” I mumbled as her ‘baby,’ scarcely two years my junior, glared at me from behind his mother. “It won’t happen again.”
“It better n—” She saw the dress, dripping muck splats on her clean kitchen floor. “What have you done?” my aunt wailed, “The best dress in this house—ruined.” The former was hardly true, but as I was taking blame for the latter, I couldn’t argue.
Studying my bare toes, I repeated, “M’sorry.”
“What did you do to your face?” She swooped down, tilting my head for a better look. Her eyes glittered dangerously.
I chose my words carefully because I would bet the farm she knew whose handprint marked my face. “The cow kicked me,” I said flatly without looking down.
Pushing my chin away, she continued briskly, “Clumsy girl. I’ll cover it up with powder and find a new dress. You can’t be an embarrassment,” she plucked the ruined dress from my hand. “You have to be presentable. We know Reid isn’t marrying you for your looks.” No, he was marrying me because they’d offered to settle a land dispute in his parents’ favor just to get rid of me.
I scowled darkly at the splatters on the floor. At least a reminder of company distracted her enough to forget her rage at me for lashing out at Henry.
An hour later, I sat in the parlor with my face freshly powdered, wearing another hand-me-down dress, slightly more worn than the last. Lanky Reid, a head taller than me, arrived on time and ducked through the doorway. He sat across from me and bobbed his head in greeting, “What are you making today?”
I held up my knitting, “Still working on the socks.”
“Oh,” he nodded with the blank appreciation of one who has never knitted, “They look great.”
Poor Reid. He never wanted to marry me. But I had to marry someone eventually, and I would rather it be him. Marriage offered freedom from my current life, and I was thankful that he was a decent man. Kind and good-hearted, Reid would make a wonderful husband, who would protect me from the world. But he would never love me.
His heart belonged to the blacksmith’s daughter, Fiona—poor as dirt, but lovely as moonlight on the bluffs. She and I used to be friends. After my betrothal, I couldn’t confide in the smith’s daughter, nor could I listen to her father’s tales. He had traveled the mainland in his younger years, and he told wild tales of a great battle waged between dragons and a fleet of a thousand ships for possession of the islands. He shied away from any mention of the Guardians, and I had never had the courage to ask directly. Now I never would. I wanted out of this household too much to sabotage my betrothal.
With genuine concern, Reid asked, “Chiara, are you okay? You look pale.”
I forced a thin smile onto stiff lips, “I didn’t get enough sleep last night, that’s all,” I lied with practiced ease.
Reid didn’t push it, but continued glancing at me worriedly as he told me gossip from town. Absent was any mention of the smith or his daughter. I didn’t ask either.
Clint stuck his head in and called us to dinner.
When we arrived at the table, I noticed an extra place had been set. Mearth slipped into it as my aunt came from the kitchen with a basket of rolls. Henry was missing, and didn’t come in until the food was on the table and my aunt had begun to fidget with concern. He opened the back door and slunk in, trying to hide the beginning of a black eye. I knew from experience it wouldn’t work.
My aunt nearly fainted when she saw him, and my uncle demanded, “What happened to you?”
Without meeting anyone’s eyes, Henry muttered, “I fell down.” I could have told him being kicked was a more believable reason.
“Oh, you poor thing!” my aunt fussed, giving him extra potatoes.
I recognized the half-circle created by a fist. Someone had hit him, but if it had been his brother Clint, Henry would have happily laid the blame at his feet. That left one other possibility.
I watched during dinner as Henry glared daggers at Mearth. Mearth, on the other hand, acted completely natural, exchanging pleasantries and complimenting my aunt on her cooking. I wanted to wring his neck.
After dinner, Reid told us he should be getting home, and my uncle went to help him with his horse. When Mearth offered to rinse the dishes, I volunteered to help.
As soon as we were alone, I hissed, “You hit him, didn’t you?”
Mearth shrugged easily, “He had it coming for treating you like that.”
Furious, I demanded, “Why did you go and do such a fool thing like that?” I only had to bide my time until my marriage, then I would be free. Unless Mearth went and ruined it by riling my cousins.
Mearth’s emerald eyes flashed with a fire that matched mine. “Chiara, I may not know who I used to be, but who I am now can’t stand around while the people who call themselves your family treat you like dirt.” His eyes glinted with the light of the setting sun.
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
“They took me in,” I scrubbed determinedly at the plate, mustering what sincerity I could, “raised me, and gave me everything.” I knew because I had heard it repeated so many times. Corrupting power was part of my nature, passed down like sky blue eyes. If it weren’t for them keeping me in check, I probably would have destroyed the island by now. “I’m grateful because they’re all I have.” My parents were gone.
Mearth’s expression turned incredulous, “If you believe that pack of lies, then you deserve what you get.”
Hearing the door open, I sighed and muttered, “I really wish you hadn’t hit him.”
My aunt arrived with more dirty dishes, effectively ending the conversation.
The consequences of Mearth trying to defend me didn’t emerge until morning. My aunt rattled off several errands for me to run. Heading down the lane, I passed Clint coming in from the fields. He brushed against me, planting his booted toes squarely on my sandaled foot. I bit my lip to keep from crying out. Leaning close, he said, “Where’s your champion now, Chiara?” and shoved me. Foot still pinned, I landed on my backside in the dusty road. Clint turned and stalked toward the house.
I stood, cursing Mearth’s noble idea of threatening my cousin. I had been down that road many times, and I never came out on top. I limped the rest of the way to town.
Running the other errands first, I avoided the blacksmith’s shop for as long as possible, hoping to get the smith rather than Fiona. He remained kind despite my betrothal to the man his daughter loved. But I missed his stories. As a child, they were one of the few ways of escaping my dreary life into a world where dragons soared through the sky defending the islands against an invading fleet of sorcerers from the mainland. Too old for stories, it was on me to achieve escape through marriage.
The front section of the smith’s workshop was walled off, creating a small store. When I arrived, no one was in sight, so I browsed, finding the nails that my uncle favored on the bottom shelf.
Fiona moved behind the counter as I straightened. She watched me through dark lashes that veiled angry eyes. “What’ll it be?” she asked sharply. I couldn’t blame her. We used to confide in each other, and I had betrayed her trust.
“Just these,” I handed her the nails, trying to focus on business and forget we used to be friends.
As I moved closer, she looked startled, probably noticing the handprint spread across my face. By now most of my aunt’s powder must have worn away. Fiona’s delicate features settled into a determined lack of sympathy as she named the price.
Feeling alone, I handed over the coins and took the nails.
As I turned to leave, she stopped me, “Chiara?”
“Yes?”
Fiona’s heart was in her eyes, “Couldn’t you just leave?”
I couldn’t hold her anguished gaze, “I’m sorry, Fiona. I have nowhere else to go.” Knowing that I’d just twisted the knife, I hurried out. I felt completely alone, like I had murdered my last friend. The limping hike home only served to amplify the feeling.
I stopped at the barn to drop off the nails. As I went inside, a hand clamped over my mouth. Clint stepped up and grabbed my shoulder with bruising force. “If you ever call your tree man down on us again,” he warned, “we’ll make you regret it.” Even if I could have responded, they would never have believed that I hadn’t asked Mearth to defend me.
Henry took his hand off my mouth and shoved me at the horse’s stall. I tried to catch myself, but missed, landing hard on the ground. I stayed there to catch my breath. It hurt to move, but it would be worse if my aunt didn’t get her purchases. Standing, I took a deep breath, and tried to act as though nothing had happened. I’d done it before.
My cousins didn’t confront me directly after that, but the tormenting didn’t stop. Any time they were inconvenienced or slighted because of me or Mearth, they took it out on me. It was never visible, so they had no reason to quit. With my wedding nearing, I couldn’t afford to fight back. Instead, I tried to dodge my cousins as much as possible.
I did my chores, endured my aunt’s tirades, and avoided Mearth like the plague. Part of me didn’t want him to know and the other part wanted to kill him. Neither part was interested in seeing him. For some reason, my aunt and uncle seemed to feel obligated to look after him until he’d returned to full health, so I wasn’t likely to be rid of him any time soon. I hadn’t been this miserable since I had first come to live on the farm.
By the time Mearth cornered me in the barn, his wounds had almost healed. He was helping my uncle half-days in the fields, but still couldn’t manage a full day’s work. I had been checking on the old plow horse again when Mearth planted himself outside of the stall, blocking my way. “You’ve been avoiding me,” he accused, in a tone more puzzled than angry.
I shook my head and started to brush past him. He reached out, catching my arm to stop me. Even his gentle grip on my bruises caused me to wince before I could pull back.
“Chiara, what’s wrong?” He dropped my arm as though it had burst into flames, and asked with concern, “Did I hurt you?”
“Yes!” Bottled up rage burst out as I answered truthfully. “You did!” I jerked back my sleeve and waved a multicolored forearm in his face. “I told you not to interfere! Are you happy now?” I demanded, hot tears springing to my eyes.
Mearth looked appalled. He captured my arm for closer examination. Tracing a fading bruise, he asked in a small voice, “They did this—because of me?”
“Yes, see why I told you to keep your nose out of my business?” I snapped, snatching my arm back. “I wish I had never met you,” my voice boiled as my eyes fell on my abused arm.
Mearth rocked back as though I had hit him. When he didn’t say anything, I glanced up to meet emerald eyes as sparkling wet as my own. He stared at me with a devastated expression making him look so forlorn and alone. I knew the feeling. As angry as I was, it wouldn’t help to shatter him with guilt. It would change nothing. My fury melted. He was once again a poor wounded animal. Only this time, I had inflicted the damage. I was afraid I had driven it deeper than the hole the tree branch made in his gut.
“I’m sorry,” I breathed, “I didn’t mean that.” Stepping closer, I put my arms around Mearth and held him tight.
Burying his face in my hair, he returned my embrace, murmuring, “I’m sorry too. I never meant for you to get hurt. I wanted to help.”
“I know,” I told his shirt, but my words were drowned out by a crash echoing through the barn.
We sprang apart as my aunt shrieked, “What do you think you’re doing?!” She advanced, stepping over a spreading pool of milk. She pointed to Mearth, “You’re unattached, but you—” she rounded on me, “Isn’t one man good enough? Just like your mother, you have to charm them all.”
My face drained of color as I followed her words to their logical conclusion. I stammered, “Nothing was—you don’t—we—” but I didn’t have a ready explanation for the situation.
“Quiet!” My aunt’s palm hit my face with enough force to knock me from my feet. Before I could scramble away, her wiry fingers clamped on my bruised arm, causing fresh tears to spring to my eyes.
Through the blur, I saw Mearth’s horrified expression. He had frozen mid-step in agonized uncertainty. I was used to unjustified punishment, but not to having someone else feel guilty on my behalf. I begged my aunt to stop, listen, let me explain. Instead, she hauled me up and dragged me to the house. In the kitchen, she opened the cellar door and pushed me inside. I stumbled down the stairs as the door closed, sealing me in darkness. Squeezing my eyes shut, I concentrated on breathing to stop the walls from closing in. It didn’t work. It never did.
Thrown back to my childhood, I was a tiny point of existence trapped in circular stone, dripping, cold, and wet. I shivered, terrified at the fear in my father’s voice as he said he loved me for the last time. Tears tracked down my face as I tried to understand. Focusing on the tiny circle of light overhead, I pressed my hand over my mouth because my father had told me not to make a sound. I tried not to hear the crashes and the screams.
But I wasn’t a child anymore. No light shone from the top of the well; no kind hearted blacksmith would fish me out.
Light flooded the cellar, and I squinted to see my uncle framed in the doorway. He clumped down the stairs, not bothering to close the door. Tears streamed down my face as I begged, “Please, just let—”
His sharp fingernails bit into my wrist as he jerked me to my feet. He shook me roughly. “Is this how you repay us? Do you want us to leave you to the mercy of the Guardians? You’ll ruin your marriage before it’s even begun.” I bit my lip and squeezed my eyes shut, but it didn’t stop the tears. His mention of the Guardians trapped me with one foot in the past. My mother’s smiling face flashed before me, her blue eyes sparkling. Then her image shifted, eyes filling with terror as her lips formed the words, “Hide her!” Her face faded as my uncle continued, “I refuse to allow you to disgrace this family. You will not be like your mother. You will marry your betrothed, and you will stay away from that young man.” With a shake, he released my wrist, and I crumpled to the ground. Leaning over, he forced me to look up, “Do you understand, girl?”
I nodded. I knew the rules. I had messed up, and this time, I wasn’t the only one in the line of fire.
“Say it.”
“It won’t happen again,” I choked out. I never wanted to see that look on Mearth’s face again.
He left, plunging me into darkness. I cried until there were no more tears. Then, without my anger to focus on, the sensation of being trapped underground descended around me. I gasped for air as it seemed the ceiling would collapse at any moment. The well was too smooth and high to climb. My parents were gone. No one would come for me. I was alone.
My mind held nothing but panic when the cellar door opened. My aunt came down carrying a comb, powder, and a dress. Silently, she powdered my face, ripped through the knots in my long blond curls, and handed me the dress. I changed numbly and followed her up the stairs. I had forgotten it was Reid’s day to come to dinner.
Every time I winced from a bruise during the meal, Mearth flinched as though I’d hit him, which only made it worse. He had tried to defend me. Was it fair I held my family’s reactions against him?
That night, I crawled into bed wishing I could fly. It was the only practical way off the island of Giauzar. I didn’t know if marrying Reid would be enough. The Guardians could find me anywhere on the islands. They had found my parents, after all.
I hadn’t asked for this power, and I would give anything for it to disappear. If I could fly, I would throw myself from the bluffs and soar across the sea.
After my uncle’s scolding, Mearth and I actively avoided one another. I caught him giving me apologetic lonely looks. He helped in the fields and kept to himself, as though one misstep would cause the world to come crashing down. The tormenting from my cousins dropped off, and I assumed they had found some other amusement.
As I kneaded dough in the kitchen, I overheard Clint tell my uncle that Mearth felt under the weather and wouldn’t be in the fields today. I didn’t think anything of it until Mearth missed midday meal and dinner. He had seemed his usual glum self at dinner the night before. Then, Henry volunteered too quickly to take Mearth his food. Thinking over the day, I couldn’t remember seeing both of my cousins in the same place at the same time. Usually, they were inseparable.
I hurried through dinner and evening chores, and stuck my head into the spare room that Mearth had been using. The bed was empty, the covers undisturbed. I hadn’t seen him all day. What had they done with him? And why?
With suspicions flying through my head, I closed my door and slipped out of the small window in my bedroom. I hadn’t been able to bring a lantern, but the moonlight shone down, illuminating the path to the forest. Whether they’d run him off or worse, the forest was where he’d be. The farm wasn’t big enough to hide a man for a day, and they couldn’t have gone farther without raising suspicions.
As soon as my feet hit the dirt, I realized the stupidity of trying to find one lone person in the forest, all by myself, in one night. He could be anywhere. But then again, my cousins could have done something awful to him because he had defended me. His lonely eyes haunted me. My life had always been a mess, but I didn’t want to ruin someone else’s. I couldn’t just leave him there.
I sat down on the cold earth with my back against an oak tree to think. Closing my eyes, I breathed deeply. Surely, if I could stop a man from dying and throw fire from my fingertips, I could narrow my search. But I didn’t understand my power. Most of the time, things just happened.
Dipping into the pool of light, I drew out a thread and cast it into the forest. First, it touched an owl. I threw it lower and farther, trying to imagine it widening to cover more ground. A raccoon dug at the base of a tree, and a bear turned in for the night. Without pulling it back, I stretched the thread wider. At its very edge, I felt a faint presence that didn’t belong to the forest any more than I did. It glowed with a light I had felt before as a mere flicker. I had found him.
I concentrated on the thread of light, moving it more firmly into place as I opened my eyes. Glancing at the sky through the leaves, I saw the moon had climbed high to join the Shepherd. I had to hurry if I didn’t want to be missed.
Setting off at a brisk pace, I followed the thread, but the dense undergrowth of the forest slowed me down. I felt the end of the thread nearing when I came upon a hunter’s shelter blocking my path. I didn’t see anyone around. Slipping up to the door, I removed the bar fixed to the outside, clearly not designed to keep people out. Moonlight filtered in through a half-shuttered window revealing leaves covering the floor. In the corner lay a crumpled form, bound hand and foot, unmoving.
Cautiously, I approached, dry brush crackling underfoot, “Mearth?” When I had felt his presence, he had been alive. Gently, I touched his shoulder, repeating his name.
Flinching away from my fingertips, he tried to raise his head, “Chiara?”
“It’s all right,” I soothed, “I’m here.” I loosened the rope binding his hands, trying not to do more damage to his raw wrists. He whimpered as I pulled the rope free. I tugged the knot on his ankles loose as he struggled to sit up. When I finished, he draped his arms over his knees, massaging his wrists. His chin rested on his chest, hiding his face.
Scooting closer, I used my thumb to tilt his head. I drew a sharp breath at the sight of his swollen and bruised face. “Was this because of me?” I ran a finger down his jaw. He started to shy away, but my finger glowed yellow-bright in my eyes, easing his pain.
Closing his eyes, he moved to shake his head, but stopped with a groan. “No. Although I’d deserve it for the trouble I caused you. They want to know who I am.” A bitter smile twisted split lips. “So do I.”
“They don’t believe you don’t know?” I brushed my fingers across his lips, sealing the cuts.
Mearth cocked his head to the side, “Are your cousins involved in some shady dealings?”
I shrugged, taking his wrist in my glowing hands, “It wouldn’t surprise me.”
“Well, I’m pretty sure your uncle thinks I’m someone important and is keeping me until he finds out who to ask for a reward. If he doesn’t, he gets a field hand. That I can understand.” His brows drew together, “But your cousins have determined that I was sent by someone—wealthy, powerful or both—from the city to threaten them or keep them in line.”
“Funny way of showing their concern.” I switched to Mearth’s other wrist, but my vision faded out and the world tilted.
Opening my eyes, I found Mearth leaning over me. His arms prevented me from dropping. “Maybe you should stop.” He folded his hand over my glowing one, but I wasn’t sure he knew I had been healing him. People didn’t usually see the light unless I lost control. “They haven’t done anything to me that won’t mend itself,” he added. As I sat up, he studied me through narrowed eyes. “Chiara, how did you find me?”
I shrugged, “I went looking.”
“It’s a big forest.”
“Luck?” I suggested.
“No way.”
I looked down. “I don’t want you to hate me too,” I told him in a small voice.
Sighing deeply, Mearth returned, “I promise not to run away, scream, or attack you.” With a wry smile, he added, “Mostly because I can’t.”
I had never actually explained my power to someone. They usually didn’t stop running to listen. “When they found you in that tree? You were dying. I healed you.” I picked at the hem of my dress.
“You threw fire from your hand,” Mearth added quietly.
I nodded. I’d forgotten he was there for that.
“And just now, that wasn’t your expert massaging that made my wrist feel better,” he ventured.
“I healed you,” I confirmed, “Overdid it, I guess.”
“That doesn’t explain how you found me tonight,” he prompted.
“I threw a thread of light—power—into the forest. I followed it to you.” I watched him closely for a reaction.
His eyes unfocused and his forehead wrinkled, “This seems familiar, does everyone have power?”
I shook my head, “No one is supposed to. My parents did.” I bit my lip, but the words tumbled from my mouth, “I think you do.”
His eyes widened momentarily before he said, dismissively, “Surely, I’d remember that. Right?”
I shrugged. I wasn’t the authority.
“Is that why I’m supposed to hate you? Because you have a wonderful gift of healing?” He displayed his wrist as evidence.
I stared at him. No one had ever called what I did wonderful.
“Why are they afraid of you?” Mearth asked, curiously.
I shifted uncomfortably, “Mainly because I blew up the shed when I was seven, but I don’t think they liked me before that.”
I glanced up to find Mearth’s eyes laughing at me.
“They didn’t like my mother, and they didn’t want another mouth to feed,” I explained.
Mearth’s eyebrows drew together, “What happened to your parents?”
“The Guardians took them.”
“Guardians?” Mearth’s expression focused inward.
I nodded, “They take people with power before they hurt anyone.”
“You’re not a bad person,” Mearth told me firmly.
“Do you hate me?” I asked.
“No.”
“I don’t frighten you?”
“No, but just to be on the safe side, I’ll stay out of the shed,” Mearth grinned and I found myself smiling in return.
I glanced out the window and saw the sky had lightened. “Can you make it back?” I didn’t have anywhere else to take him, and I couldn’t leave him here alone. Besides, he thought my uncle wanted to keep him safe, so that should protect him from my cousins.
Mearth nodded, and I helped him stand. We made our way slowly, stopping several times to rest. Halfway there, I knew we couldn’t make it before the farm woke up. I didn’t tell Mearth. I could survive my family’s wrath, but the way he was leaning on me, Mearth could not survive the forest alone.
As we broke from the trees, my uncle advanced with my aunt and cousins in tow. “How could you, you ungrateful wicked girl?”
When I realized what they must be thinking I’d done by spending the night alone in the forest with a man who wasn’t my husband, I started to explain, “Nothing happened, he’s hurt—”
But my uncle’s next words stopped me cold. “—Sneaking off with a Guardian?”
“What?” I took a confused step away from Mearth who stumbled before clutching the fencepost for support.
“You saw the mark of the islands on his arm,” my aunt insisted. “You must have known.”
I shook my head, looking at Mearth—the Guardian—in horror.
I was still staring disbelievingly at him when my aunt said firmly, “Guardians can’t forget what they’re made for. I didn’t call this one—he’s been playing games with you.”
“Stupid girl, you fell into his trap. How could you?” my uncle asked. My mind still reeled from his revelation, and his backhand across the face took me completely off guard. I dropped hard to my knees, but his hands clamped onto my shoulders and dragged me to my feet. “Haven’t I knocked some sense into you?” He shook me roughly, nails biting into my skin.
A Guardian. Here. They hadn’t protected me. They hadn’t even told me. And his hands were hurting me. Rage burned down to my toes, and yellow flames licked out from my shoulders to dance across my uncle’s arms. Face bathed in an eerie golden light, he yelped and dropped me like a hot coal. The flames vanished as he stumbled back, and blood rushed to his face and neck.
He charged back in my direction, and I found myself sprawled in the grass with a split lip before I even knew what hit me. The fencepost broke my fall by connecting with the back of my head, sending my ears ringing and dimming the world. I watched with detachment as my uncle, sputtering with rage, drew back his foot.
Mearth—the Guardian—slammed into him from the side before he could complete the action. Some part of me that cared thought Mearth in his weakened condition was no match for my enraged uncle. But the same thought flew around and around my mind: A Guardian was here, and I needed to run.
My uncle tossed Mearth off with a kick to the gut. Mearth grunted as the foot connected. My uncle stepped purposefully toward his curled form. Mearth rolled onto his back, scooping a handful of dirt in his opponent’s direction. If the dirt was aimed at his eyes, it missed, hitting him about knee level. My uncle laughed and tried to take another step…but couldn’t.
Since my head was below knee level, I saw the problem. As the dirt rained down, it grew into a finger-thick honeysuckle vine, firmly rooting my uncle to the ground. He growled in frustration, and Henry ran to assist him.
Flicking a glance at me, Mearth jumped to his feet and threw out his hands in a defensive gesture. Something bright and…leafy?…hit Henry and he fell with a scream.
Mearth looked down at his hands and back up, panic in his eyes. Like a startled animal, he bolted. My head throbbed, but I rolled to my feet as my aunt went into hysterics. Some part of me wanted to go after Mearth. But my aunt’s and uncle’s words echoed around my head. He was a Guardian. He knew it and had the power to protect himself. I needed to protect myself from him. I needed to run.
Without hesitation, I took off blindly in the opposite direction, but Clint cut across my path, grabbing me around the middle. I fought to be free, but he was stronger, dragging me into the house and dumping me down the cellar steps.
The door slammed shut, dropping a blanket of darkness. I scrambled up the ladder and pounded on the unforgiving wood. They couldn’t leave me here, trapped, waiting for the Guardian to collect me. It had happened before. My father had put me in the well and disappeared. It was only luck that the Guardians hadn’t found me then.
I thought my heart would pound out of my chest and I couldn’t breathe, trapped in my worst nightmare. I screamed myself hoarse, Guardians spinning through my mind. When my voice was gone, I crawled down the steps and wrapped my arms tightly around myself, trying not to think. But the shouts of my parents intersected with doubts about every interaction I had had with Mearth in the past few weeks and fear of the unknown fate of those taken by the Guardians.
My mind started to spiral down from memories to nightmares. I wrenched it away. Couldn’t I use my power to get myself out? I reached for the pool of light, but it flickered, evading my grasp. I felt the cold walls closing in to embrace me, the ceiling descending as the floor rose up to meet it. Trapped, I gasped desperately for air.
“Chiara?” called a voice muffled by the door, “Are you down there?” The lock scraped above, and the door was thrown open to reveal the silhouette of a petite woman, not the right size or shape to be my aunt.
Lost in my head, I didn’t respond.
Footsteps tapped lightly down the stairs. I heard the rustle of fabric and remembered my mother hugging me for the last time. They had told me she was corrupted by power, but I only remembered her love and determination to protect her daughter.
“C’mon, Chiara, we need to go,” Fiona’s voice couldn’t quite cut through my memories.
I didn’t move.
“If not for yourself, will you fight for someone else?” Fiona explained, “That’s why I came for you. Your uncle has been telling everyone that his farmhand is a villain who tried to run off with you last night. They’ve all turned out to hunt him.”
The mention of Mearth got my attention. “He can protect himself. He’s a Guardian.”
“What? How do you know that?” Fiona asked, startled.
“Because he wears the islands on his arm. He’s here to take me away,” I added.
“You? Why would the Guardians want you?”
I took a deep breath and told my once-friend, “Because I have power.”
“Everyone knows you have power, Chiara, they might choose not to see it, but they know. That doesn’t explain why they would want you.”
“They took my parents,” I pointed out, “They come for people whose power corrupts them.”
She frowned, “No, Guardians recruit people with power to protect the islands—how else do you think they call down dragons from the sky? Your parents refused to join them because they didn’t want to leave you, and the Guardians forced them to go. Even my father couldn’t make sense of why they didn’t leave your parents in peace. Maybe your Mearth was going to ask you to join them.”
“If that’s true, why wouldn’t he tell me? Or at least explain what the Guardians are?” My heart wanted to believe her. I remembered his terror-stricken eyes when he’d first woken up and couldn’t remember his own name, his hope-filled face when he told me he could fly. But the Guardians had haunted me all my life. I couldn’t suddenly trust one on Fiona’s word. “Why are you here? Why not help Mearth yourself?”
“I can’t. I don’t have the power. You do.”
I studied her, “Are you manipulating me, Fiona?”
She smiled thinly, “I want everyone to be happy. If that means you leave with the Guardian, I can’t say I’d be disappointed. But only if you want to go.” She sighed, “If marrying Reid is what you need to do, I understand. But if you don’t want Mearth to die, we need to go. They’re trying to corner him on the bluffs, and there was murder in your uncle’s eyes.”
Mearth. I didn’t care if he hadn’t been telling me the truth. Whether he remembered who he was didn’t matter. He was the only person who had ever tried, however misguidedly, to defend me. I wasn’t about to let him down when he needed my help. “Can you take me there?”
Fiona nodded and led the way out of the cellar. Outside stood the blacksmith’s horse. We rode double, cutting through the forest to reach the bluffs in time. I didn’t know what I would do when I got there—all I could think was what if we were too late?
Fiona guided the horse to where the crowd of villagers had gathered, and I leapt off before she finished pulling up on the reins. I pushed between my cousins to the front of the ring of armed men. Mearth, breathing heavily, stood hemmed in by the men and the sheer drop to the sea. Like a hunted animal, his gaze swept across the crowd as he inched backward.
A bow twanged, followed by an arrow sprouting from his hip. I shouldered between the last two men blocking my path. Mearth took two jerky steps and flung himself into the air.
“No!” I raced to the edge, knowing I could do nothing but watch him die. A hand grasped the skirt of my dress, but I pulled free. I dropped to my knees, skidding to a halt, and peered over the edge of the cliff.
My tear-filled eyes locked on the small form hurtling toward the rocks below. Guardian or not, Mearth couldn’t survive the fall. The form began to grow larger. I blinked furiously, thinking it a trick of the moisture in my eyes. But no, it was definitely rising.
Confused, I sat back. Powerful wings beat the air, bringing me nose to nose with a dragon straight out of the blacksmith’s tales. Its scales ranged in color from dark brown to the green of new leaves. The familiar emerald eyes swirled with exhilaration, and the voice that spoke in my head belonged to Mearth, I remember—everything. He bumped against my shoulder with his snout. Landing next to me, Mearth looked at the villagers, Do you want me to eat them for you, Chiara?
I glanced back. Mearth seemed exuberant, but he wasn’t much bigger than a large horse, and every arrow was notched and pointed in his direction. Some things even a dragon couldn’t survive.
“Kill the monster!” someone bellowed.
“No!” I stepped between Mearth and the villagers, gathering my power until my fingertips glowed. “I’ve only ever tried to fix things, but I can break them just as well!” I flung both hands out, releasing tiny darts of light. Bows shattered, strings snapped. “I suggest you run before I decide to break you too,” I growled.
They ran.
Except for two. Reid remained rooted to the spot, and a little farther down the slope stood Fiona, holding the horse’s reins.
“Just a minute,” I called to Mearth and ran over to Reid. Giving him a quick hug, I squeezed his hand, “You’re free.”
Stepping back, I nodded to Fiona and called, “Thanks.”
She waved in return, “Good luck.”
I clambered onto Mearth’s shoulder and threw my leg over his back. Hang on. Obediently, I wrapped my arms around his neck.
With a few running steps, Mearth launched himself from the cliff. I squinted against the wind. Spreading his wings, Mearth beat against air, and we soared into the sky.
Author Notes: This story began as a something of a backstory for another project I was working on at time and never finished. I had also been reading a bunch of anti-fairy tales or new twists on fairy tales, and I noticed an annoying pattern where the fairy tale prince charming would always turn out evil or awful (or both). Instead of going that route, I wanted to think about a scenario where both parties of an engagement are stuck in their roles and what they might do to get out. Trying to depict a hand holding magic on the cover was tricky, and I’m still not entirely sure how I manipulated a picture into the yellow sphere, but the hand is mine!
Beth Powers 