Faelorehn - Book One of the Otherworld Trilogy Read online

Faelorehn

  Book One of the

  Otherworld Trilogy

  by

  Jenna Elizabeth Johnson

  Copyrighted Material

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. All material in connection with Celtic myth has been borrowed and interpreted for use in the plot of the story only. Cover image is the sole property of the author. The Faelorehn font on the cover image and interior of this book was created by P.A. Vannucci (www.alphabetype.it) to be used in the Otherworld Trilogy. Any resemblance to actual persons is entirely coincidental.

  Faelorehn

  Copyright © 2012 by Jenna Elizabeth Johnson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book or its cover may be reproduced in any manner without written permission from its creator.

  For more information and to contact the author, visit:

  www.jennaelizabethjohnson.com

  This book was written with Annalee Rejhon in mind. Thank you for instilling in me a love for all things Celtic.

  Contents

  One

  Memories

  Two

  Vagrant

  Three

  Voices

  Four

  Illusion

  Five

  Samhain

  Six

  Encounter

  Seven

  Evidence

  Eight

  Familiar

  Nine

  Revelation

  Ten

  Message

  Eleven

  Rescued

  Twelve

  Answers

  Thirteen

  Attacked

  Fourteen

  Smitten

  Fifteen

  Confession

  Sixteen

  Depressed

  Seventeen

  Betrayed

  Eighteen

  Heart-broken

  Nineteen

  Eile

  Twenty

  Explanation

  Acknowledgments

  About The Author

  Other Books by this Author

  Connect with me Online

  Sneak Peek of Dolmarehn, Book Two of the Otherworld Trilogy

  Faelorehn

  -One-

  Memories

  The only reason I knew that I was awake was because of the pale green glow of neon stars staring back at me from my ceiling. I lay in my bed for a few moments, taking deep, steadying breaths while letting my eyes adjust to the darkness of my room. The remnants of a dream still danced in my mind, but as the approaching dawn light chased away the dark, it tried to slip away. Unfortunately, this particular dream was familiar to me, and it would take a lot more than my return to the conscious world to eject it from my mind.

  I turned my head on my pillow and blinked my eyes several times at my alarm clock. Groaning at the early hour, I rolled over onto my stomach and buried my head into the pillow. I guess the darkness had some claim on the subconscious world, because instead of dispelling the dream, my actions only made it come racing back.

  Huffing in frustration, I kicked off the covers and leaned over the side of my bed, scrabbling around stray pairs of shoes and forgotten socks as I searched out my current journal. Years ago the therapist I had been seeing thought it would be a good idea to keep track of these strange recurring dreams. Anytime I dreamt of anything that reminded me of my past before entering the foster system, I was supposed to write it down. That and anything strange that I saw or heard while I was awake. I hate to say it, but the visions happened more often than I would like to admit.

  Although my collection of diaries held other frivolous information alongside the crazy stuff, at least once a year, on the same date, the exact same dream was described in near perfect detail.

  I dusted off the cover of my latest journal, grabbed a pen from my bedside table, clicked on the lamp and opened up a brand new page. The dream was starting to slip away once again, but it wasn't as if I wouldn't be able to remember the details. I had written about this exact dream so many times before I could probably recite it in front of a crowded gymnasium without glancing at the page it was written on. Not that I would ever have the gumption to speak in front of a crowd. Nevertheless, I began writing:

  I had the dream again; the one that always comes to me this time of year. The fog wasn’t as thick as usual in my dreamscape, but I could feel the grit and cold of the blacktop beneath my bare feet. I looked down. Of course I was naked, but at least I was a toddler in the dream.

  I paused and thought about that. I had decided a long time ago that the dream was merely a subconscious illustration of the saga that was my beginning. According to my adoptive parents, I was found when I was two years old, wandering the dark streets of Los Angeles (on Halloween night of all times), completely nude and babbling some nonsense that no one could decipher. I know most toddlers babble nonsense, but according to the woman at the adoption agency, what I babbled was nothing like what normal human babies produced when trying to communicate with others. Oh well. Like the bizarre dream, I can’t explain that either. I was lucky, they told my parents, because the part of L.A. they found me in was notorious for gang wars.

  Somehow, I survived that nocturnal stroll only to be reminded of that night exactly fifteen times, once a year for every year since I was found. And after fifteen years, I still don't understand why this dream won't leave me alone. I sighed and got back to my writing.

  The dreamscape shifted and I noticed that my right hand was pressed up against a warm, solid shape, my fingers clinging to a wad of something rough and coarse. I could just see what it was out of the corner of my eye: a huge white dog, its bedraggled fur acting as an anchor for my small hand. The dog was massive, even from my child’s perspective. I wanted to turn and get a better look at it but something kept my eyes trained forward, as if some crazy hypnotist was twirling a black and white spiral wheel in front of me.

  The city lamps glowed an eerie orange, the only color in this black and gray world, and I leaned closer to the dog next to me. It padded quietly along, not making a sound; almost guiding me to some distant point of interest. I wondered what it all meant, but before I could make anything of it, I woke up.

  Just as I shut my journal and replaced my pen on the table, my alarm clock started screeching and I nearly had a heart attack. I had forgotten to shut it off when the dream woke me. I tossed the sheets back and hit the snooze button, not even bothering to turn off my lamp. I wished I could sleep in all day but if I remembered correctly it was Monday. I groaned. Mondays were the worst.

  After fifteen minutes of snoozing, I finally got up and made an effort to get ready for the day. I ran my hands through my hair and cringed. It was a tangled mess, but that was normal. I flipped on my bedroom light and stepped in front of the mirror glued to my bathroom door. Ugh. Sometimes I hated my wavy hair. Not straight enough to be considered elegant and not curly enough to be truly beautiful. Tully was always telling me how much she wished her hair had some curl to it. She has the type of hair that is so straight that hair spray won’t even keep it in place after she takes a curling iron to it. She has no idea how lucky she is.

  Taking a brush to the tangled mess did nothing but make it worse. Sighing, I made my way to the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face. For the only girl in a family consisting of five boys, I lucked out and got my own room and bathroom. Of course, the only reason was because my brothers were afraid of this particular part of the house, a converted basement that had served as a storage room to the p
revious owners. I think they somehow convinced themselves it was haunted, but that was only because it felt like the room was underground. It wasn’t completely sunken into the ground though; more like the foundation of the house was pressed into the side of a small hill. The one wall facing the backyard had a sliding glass door that displayed a forest of eucalyptus trees disappearing down into the small marsh that sat behind our neighborhood.

  I threw my brush back into the drawer with all the hair bands and hair clips I’d collected over the years. Staring into the mirror, I tried in vain to wish away all my flaws. Unfortunately, no matter how thoroughly I washed my face, I couldn’t seem to make the freckles disappear. At least I didn’t have as many as Tully. Of course, mine were darker. I scrunched up my nose but that didn’t help either. Besides, I couldn’t go around looking like an angry rabbit all day and it only made my nose look smaller than it already was.

  Eventually, I caught my own gaze in the mirror and cringed slightly when my eyes stared back at me. I sometimes tried to convince myself that it was my awkward height and scattering of freckles that made people turn away from me, but I knew deep down that it was my eyes. They were the windows to the soul, so the saying went. If that was the case then there must be something dreadfully wrong with my soul if people couldn’t even bring themselves to look me in the eye. I had trouble doing so myself.

  On normal days my eyes were a light hazel color, too large for my face and slanted a little. People used to fuss over me when I was a little girl.

  “Oh! What a darling little fairy, with that hair and those eyes!” they would say.

  Then they would actually take a good look at my eyes and something would cross their face. A shadow or some subconscious instinct telling them something wasn’t quite right about me. They would continue smiling, of course, but I knew, even when I was too young to really understand, I knew they had withdrawn from me.

  I crossed my arms and let out a huff of breath. It was foggy out this morning and that meant my eyes would take on a grayer tinge. Yes, they tended to change color from time to time. Something else that made people uneasy. Sometimes I tried to tell myself that that was the real reason why people turned away, because of the color and not what they sensed lying deeper within.

  After brushing my teeth, I slipped into my favorite jeans and t-shirt. My Monday clothes, because Monday mornings were just too stressful to have to worry about putting together a cute outfit. Even though I attended a private high school, it conveniently didn’t have much of a dress code. Black Lake High, in the small rural city of Arroyo Grande, was actually quite laid back for a private school. In fact, our entire town was pretty easy going on the whole, but that wasn’t unusual in the Central Coast region of California where perfect weather was a year-round phenomenon. When my parents first moved here just after adopting me, the Five Cities area was still relatively small, but over time it grew into a bustling rural metropolis of sorts. Fortunately, there was still plenty of open space to spare. I don’t think my family could have handled living in a big city with me and all my brothers.

  I was in the middle of stuffing my books into my backpack when the door at the top of my spiral staircase swung open violently.

  “Meghan, you up?” one of my brothers called from the stairs.

  “Yeah Logan, be up in a minute,” I called back.

  I quickly added a little foundation to my face (I’m not much for overdoing it with makeup), turned to give my unmade bed an accusing glare, then shrugged my backpack onto my shoulder and began climbing the stairs. I hardly ever made my bed, unless I was expecting company. That’s a joke. The only company I’m likely to have over is Tully or Robyn. Tully’s been my best friend since I moved in with the Elams and became their one and only daughter. Before that I was juggled between foster homes in southern California for the first two years after I was found.

  I have to admit I was a strange child, still am, but I didn’t know how to hide my oddities when I was that young. People were disturbed by me. Thankfully, no one ever told me I was strange and I didn’t realize it at the time. In retrospect, however, the delicate way they handled me or the small glances they would cast my way as they moved further away should have been dead giveaways. I never did anything outwardly dangerous or disturbing, like starting fires or pulling the heads off my dolls, but I unnerved almost everyone I met and it took me a long time to get used to people.

  The Elams finally took me in and were the first people to look at me as if I wasn’t an alien from some other planet. They were patient with my fits and claims of hearing voices in the trees or seeing monsters in my closet. After taking me to several specialists, they noticed my improvement. When I started spending time with Tully, I started talking about hearing voices again. They tried to separate us but that only resulted in more nightmares and visions of demons. After that, they let me see Tully again. Somewhere in the middle of it all it dawned upon me that perhaps I should keep my visions to myself. I never complained about strange voices speaking unknown languages, nor did I mention seeing odd creatures ever again. But they never quite went away; they were all well documented in the boxes of filled journals collecting dust under my bed.

  “Me-ghan!” Logan called out once more. “You’ll be late again and Tulip won’t want to take you to school anymore!”

  Furrowing my brow and pushing the dark thoughts from my past aside, I returned my focus to more normal, everyday problems. I tried to tell if my hair was staying put. I had wet it and combed it out while I was in the bathroom, but it hadn’t dried yet. Like I mentioned earlier, my hair was often at war with me. I liked to keep it long and if I treated it just right, I could get it to curl fetchingly and not frizz. Right now, I was happy with the waves that would form after it dried.

  I climbed my spiral stairs and pushed the trapdoor open. I loved that the door to my room was set in the floor and opened up into a corner of our living room. A railing of sorts surrounded it so that my brothers couldn’t sit on top and keep me trapped beneath. That didn’t mean they’d given up trying, though.

  I padded into the kitchen, carrying my shoes in one hand and my socks in another. I yawned, inhaling the smell of bacon, eggs and toast.

  “Morning,” my mom said, tossing her head so she could look at me over her shoulder.

  She kept her dark hair short and at the moment she had a dish towel draped over her shoulder. I grinned. I towered over my mother. I was only an inch or two away from six feet, and my mom was nearly a foot shorter than me. Where my features were exaggerated, hers were proportionate and well placed. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that we weren’t blood related.

  My father sat at the table, reading the newspaper as my three year old twin brothers, Jack and Joey, sat in their high chairs, throwing scrambled eggs at each other.

  “Peter, could you?” my mother said in exasperation, turning to gesture a spatula at the twins.

  Folding the paper with a quick flick of his hands, my father sighed and began speaking to my younger brothers, who only giggled at his chastisement.

  Logan was standing on the other side of the kitchen island, packing his own lunch. He was a picky eater, so he learned early on that having such high standards in this family was a curse. He fended for himself most of the time.

  Bradley, who was two years younger than Logan and seven years older than the twins, looked most like my father with his sandy hair and blue eyes. At the moment he was tormenting Aiden, my fifth brother. I never let my brothers know I had a favorite among them, and in truth, I loved them all dearly. But Aiden held a special place in my heart. Maybe it was because, of all my brothers, he was the only one with dark hair like me. I know it was silly; after all, it’s not like we shared the same genes for it or anything, but it made me feel more like part of the family I guess. Or maybe it was because my seven year old little brother was autistic. We were both set apart from everyone else in our own way. />
  I dropped my backpack near the front door and walked over to scoop Aiden up in my arms. With me holding him, Bradley would have to make a real effort to get to him and that would only draw Mom’s attention. Scowling, Bradley made a face and skipped off to occupy his time elsewhere.

  “Good morning Aiden,” I said quietly.

  He glanced up at me with his big blue-green eyes. My heart ached for him. He hardly ever spoke, but sometimes I could get him to talk to me. My brothers teased him for speaking gibberish, but I always understood what he meant to say. Sometimes you didn’t need words in order to communicate with someone.

  Setting Aiden down but keeping him close to me, I maneuvered my way around the kitchen and quickly packed a lunch. Somehow I managed to avoid Bradley and Logan as they played a game of keep away with a cinnamon roll before Dad diffused the situation by threatening to make them all stay home Friday night and watch some Halloween special on TV instead of going trick-or-treating.

  Five minutes before seven, I was heading for the door, Aiden clinging to my leg the entire way. Mom rescued me and came to scoop him up, planting a kiss on my cheek before I escaped.

  The autumn morning was cool and damp, a thick fog clinging to the treetops and making the world seem gray. I didn’t mind. I liked the fog. Taking a lungful of air, I traipsed down the driveway and started walking up the street, hoping that perhaps this day would be different than all the rest.

  -Two-

  Vagrant

  I slowly made my way down the street, knowing Tully would probably be outside waiting for me. By some stroke of fate, we both went to the same high school. Both our parents were of the mindset that the larger, public high school in town had too many gang problems and not enough resources for so many students, so they were more than willing to pay the extra money for our education. Mom taught at the public high school, so maybe she knew what she was talking about, but in my opinion they were merely paying for peace of mind. It didn’t matter what high school you attended, there would always be someone there to make your experience borderline miserable.

  I sighed and kicked a pinecone across the surface of the asphalt, watching it bounce off the curb and skitter into the middle of the road. I couldn’t blame my mom for sending me to the private school, not really. After struggling through middle school and junior high, she knew that high school would be even worse for me. I didn’t get bad grades; that wasn’t it. Like I was saying before, I was odd, different from all the other kids and I always would be. I was tested for every childhood psychological disorder known to man, but I never quite fit the profile for any of them. I heard voices and I saw things, more often than the average child, and sometimes I would go into fits of shaking or screaming and I would get terrible headaches.

  My parents tried everything: medication, therapy, a restricted diet. Nothing helped. In fact, they were so desperate that they nearly took me to see an exorcist. I had been eight at the time, and they had the whole appointment set up and everything. Before we went, however, someone suggested a child psychologist to my mother. She was located in Los Angeles, my city of origin, and something about her description must have convinced my parents because by now they had had their fair share of doctors.

  I don’t remember much about the woman, only that she had a kind smile and long blond hair. After a few visits with her the voices quieted. I no longer saw monsters under my bed and the headaches eventually went away. Yet I still hear voices whispering in the trees every now and again, whenever the wind picks up and their leaves and branches rustle together. But I learned after those sessions with Dr. Morgan that to carry on about my unique experiences often frightened those around me more than anything else. Now when I hear or see anything, I keep it to myself and this has worked for the past nine years.

  The sharp caw of a crow jerked my thoughts from my past. I glanced up, only to find something that was way too large to be a crow watching me from a pine tree in a neighbor’s yard. Maybe it was a raven but it almost seemed too big to even be a raven. But what else could it be? I shrugged and continued down the road.

  Three houses later, I spotted the giant black bird again. Was it following me? I sped up, passing four more houses before I bothered to look over my shoulder. Yes, it was definitely following me. I swallowed and felt beads of sweat break out on my forehead. Please don’t let this be another delusion, I begged. The raven hopped to the top of a dead eucalyptus tree, arched its neck, and let out a strange, low garbling sound. It sent shivers down my arms. It turned its head to eye me once, then flapped its wings and disappeared into the foggy woods.

  “Meghan!”

  The sound of Tully’s voice nearly made me scream. I looked up and smiled once my heart rate returned to normal.

  Tulip Rose Gordon was my best friend and had been since her family moved into the blue, two-storey house that stood on the corner of our long, winding street only a year after my own family joined the neighborhood.

  I took a deep breath and hurried over to give her a hug, already forgetting about the weird bird.

  “So, how was your weekend?”

  She made a face, her freckles getting bunched into the creases her frown created. Like almost everybody I knew, Tully was shorter than me and not nearly as thin. Where I’m tall and lanky, she is short and compact.

  “I spent all Saturday trying to get through just a few chapters of that boring book Mrs. Swanson assigned, only to realize I had been procrastinating all day. So yesterday I had to make up for it.”

  I laughed. Tully wasn’t a big fan of the classics, but she was determined to keep her grades up.

  “I didn’t do much either,” I admitted.

  For a few minutes we were quiet, standing on Tully’s driveway and waiting for our friend Thomas to pick us up. He lived in Nipomo, east of our neighborhood on the outskirts of Arroyo Grande but still on the Mesa, a great tall, flat-topped stretch of land that took up several square miles of our part of the Central Coast. Thomas’s mother ran a daycare out of her home so Thomas could usually borrow the family minivan several times during the week.

  Tully and I decided to play a round of rock, paper, scissors while we waited. Finally, after defeating my friend for the fifth time in a row, the gold van came rolling around the corner.

  “Sorry I’m late!” Thomas called from the driver’s side window.

  “You’re not late,” Tully piped up.

  We climbed in and buckled our seat belts. The Lagarsos were a very traditional Mexican Catholic family, so the van was decked out with the usual memorabilia: Rosary beads hanging from the rear-view mirror and a postcard featuring the Our Lady of Guadalupe tucked into the visor. Thomas quickly pushed the preset button on the stereo and the faint, upbeat sound of Mariachi music was replaced by the newest teen sensation’s latest song.

  Tully and I rolled our eyes at one another, but our grins were wide. Thomas loved pop music but he was forbidden to listen to it at home. We laughed as he started singing along, and then against our better judgment, we joined in.

  It was a whopping three to five minute drive to school from Tully’s house. We took the few side streets that meandered through the expansive, wooded neighborhoods that branched out from our own neighborhood, and then pulled out onto the highway with the rest of the early morning commuters.

  Black Lake High was situated directly off the highway in the middle of the great eucalyptus forest that covered much of the Mesa. On the other side of the highway the trees continued until they met up with the miles of dunes and farmland that comprised most of Arroyo Grande and the surrounding towns. The open space was only interrupted by the occasional farmhouse and of course the railroad tracks that were just on the other side of Highway One. There were other neighborhoods spread throughout the trees on the eastern side of the tracks, but the people who lived out here were even more scattered than my own neighbors.

  Thomas chose a parking spot and turned the key in the ig
nition, cutting off some voice enhanced teen diva in mid-chorus. I zipped my sweatshirt up tight and arranged my backpack comfortably on my shoulders. School had never been my favorite place to be. I liked learning; I just didn’t like being around other high school kids. They didn’t get me, and they weren’t mature enough yet to be polite about ignoring me. It was much more fun to point out my awkward height or make some comment about my unknown parentage. Luckily, I had my small group of friends who were just as odd as me. As long as we stuck together, I could bear it.

  As we crossed the parking lot I spotted our two other friends, Robyn Dunbarre and Will Abukara. Robyn was decked out in her usual Goth attire: black cargo pants, a t-shirt featuring a pentagram and black eyeliner plied on thick enough to make her look like some heavy metal groupie. Will was a contradiction next to her, what with his neat outfit of khaki pants, polo shirt and thick glasses. He was a walking stereotype, and being half Japanese only added to his geek appeal. All he needed was a knit Argyle vest and an overbite. Luckily, he didn’t have either.

  “Hey, did you see the homeless guy this morning?” Robyn sauntered up to us, the neon pink stripe in her hair falling into her eyes. She brushed it back with a ring-encrusted hand.

  “Is he back?” Thomas asked.

  I looked past them to see the object of their discussion. A week or so ago, this tall old man just spontaneously showed up on the outskirts of our campus. He was dressed in an old army issued trench coat, tattered and stained from years of use. He had been shuffling around one of the trashcans just in front of the school’s office building, muttering and grumbling to himself.

  Everyone had stayed away from him, not sure what he was doing at a high school. Right away, some of our more obnoxious schoolmates had gifted him with a nickname. “Hobo Bob” had not resisted when the cops finally showed up, escorting him off campus and taking him to some unknown location. Two days later, he was back, this time perched on the weathered bench that stood on the sidewalk in front of the public bus stop.

  The police were called again but by the time they arrived, he was gone. He had been making special appearances on and off ever since, never really coming onto campus but never moving on. I had no idea what he could want at our school. Most of us ignored him and I never even saw him approach someone asking for money.

  “See for yourself,” Robyn said, answering Thomas’s earlier question.

  We all glanced towards the far corner of the parking lot. He had on his usual trench coat, the hood pulled up to cover his head. The few glimpses of his face I had managed to catch had shown the weathered features of an old man facing hardship. He seemed to be staring right at us now. The prickly chill that ran over my skin proved my suspicion. I usually only got that feeling when I thought I was hearing or seeing things again. I ignored it and instead listened to my friends’ conversation.

  “Do you think he’s looking at us?” Will wondered aloud.

  Robyn crossed her arms and snorted. “If he’s some crazy schizo that’s escaped from the Men’s Colony, I’ll just have to cast a spell on him.”

  We all laughed.

  “Can you actually do that?” Thomas asked. Sometimes I thought his conservative upbringing made him a little more nervous than the rest of us.

  Robyn released a sigh and examined her black fingernails. “I’ve done it before.”

  Everyone was silent for a moment, but I only grinned. Despite coming from a very old-fashioned family, Robyn had somehow discovered Wiccan and Irish mythology our freshman year in high school. She went from being the perfect little goody-two-shoes to taking up her black garb and celebrating the pagan festivals of the ancient Celts. She always dragged us along to her little ceremonies, Thomas being the only one uncomfortable enough to feign illness whenever a solstice or equinox was coming up. I didn’t know how her family dealt with it, but I think they blamed it on something that happened in Robyn’s past. Like me, she had been adopted, but in her case I think it had something to do with extended family taking her in. Either way, we were both somewhat insecure about our identities.

  The sound of the bell screaming over the din of car engines and chatting teenagers reminded us that, unfortunately, we did have to attend class that day. As we walked down the hallways, seeking our first classes of the day, I cast one more glance over my shoulder to see if Hobo Bob was still watching us. I didn’t know if Robyn had secretly cast her spell or not, but the homeless man was nowhere in sight.

  -Three-

  Voices

  The next day started out well. Thomas picked us up again and the morning proved to be promising. I didn’t space out in pre-calculus, American history was actually rather interesting, and just before lunch I had my art class. I loved art, but only because I think our teacher was very much into letting us express ourselves. For someone like me, expressing myself in a non-verbal way, through art for example, helped soothe my psyche.

  It was during the lunch hour that things started to go downhill.

  “Out of the way homo!”

  Like a rabbit that’s heard the screech of an eagle, I jumped out of the way before I even saw Adam Peders. He wasn’t addressing me, of course, but I could very well be his next target. Besides, I knew exactly who he had been addressing, and that knowledge made me ill.

  I glanced over at Thomas, who was standing in the middle of the lunch courtyard looking for me and our other friends. In my opinion, he looked very much like a tree about to topple over. Thomas was even taller than me and a bit on the heavy side, so he always stood out no matter where he was. And apparently he was walking a bit too slow for Adam.

  “I said move you stupid fag,” Adam repeated, giving Thomas a shove.

  It felt as if someone had dug their fingernails into my skin. I hated that word. And he had pushed Thomas.

  Thomas was so stunned that it took him a while to recover before he could recede into the space between our lockers. Everyone who had been standing around him had stopped eating their lunches and talking to their friends. They all stared at Adam. He might have been the star track athlete and he may have looked like some offspring of the Greek gods, but he was a complete ass.

  As he brushed by, Adam pounded his fist against the closest locker, forcing Thomas and a few others standing by to jump. I ground my teeth. I knew Thomas was gay. So did Tully, Robyn and Will, and probably the entire school as well. We never mentioned it or brought it up for a few reasons. First of all, Thomas would deny it, probably because he didn’t realize it yet. Secondly, it would only give the popular crowd the evidence they needed to torment him even more. And finally, if Thomas ever went home and told his parents, he might just be kicked to the curb. Yes, talking about it would be suicide.

  A few minutes passed before the lunchtime chatter picked up again and Adam Peders’s insult was all but forgotten. I breathed a sigh of relief, glad it didn’t escalate into anything else. But my anger lingered. I didn’t care if Adam’s dark brown hair was always perfect or that his pale green eyes exuded flawless self-confidence. I refused to be like Rachel Thompson or Sara Hobbes or any of the other hopeless girls who allowed Adam’s good looks to cancel out his evil deeds. Besides, we had history, Adam and I. He was the first person at my high school to learn I was crazy.

  In kindergarten, those many years ago, when I first came to live with the Elams, something happened that my therapists over the years couldn’t make me forget. Not even Doctor Morgan. We were coming back from a fieldtrip, the pumpkin patch if I remember correctly. It was October and I remember because it had rained hard that week and we were all covered in mud. My teacher had been holding my hand, because I had told her I saw something frightening as we traipsed around the great orange gourds. Of course, I couldn’t really describe it but she knew about my ‘condition’; my parents had told her.

  When we returned to school, the house directly across the street was having some small trees cut down. I wouldn’t have noti
ced it at all, but I was still shaken up by whatever had freaked me out in the pumpkin patch and I guess you could say my senses were heightened. We were almost all off the bus when the shrill, soul-wrenching cries of someone in pain reached my ears. I remember freezing and trying to curl into a ball. It took a few more seconds to realize the screams came from across the street. Between the buzz of the chainsaw and the crack of falling branches, I could hear the trees crying out, sobbing in pain as they were slowly being murdered.

  I was so upset that I wrenched my hand free of my teacher’s, and sobbing, ran right across the street without stopping, screaming for the men to stop their chainsaws. I was nearly hit by a passing car. My teacher was in a panic, the entire school stopped to watch in horror, and the men with the chainsaws were so shocked at my claim that they were hurting the trees that they merely stood there, staring at me. Luckily they decided to take a break then, but I could still hear the whimpers of the two birches they had just taken down.

  I remembered two things as my teacher cradled me against her chest while carrying me back to the schoolyard. First, knowing the echo of those distraught cries would haunt me forever, and second, seeing Adam Peders staring at me with the strangest look on his face. At the time, I didn’t know what that look meant, but now that I’m older I have a little more perspective. It was disgust, and even a little bit of fear. Even at the age of five, Adam managed to find fault in others.

  “Hey Meghan, coming to lunch with us?”

  I jumped and turned to find Will staring at me, his glossy black hair a mess as usual and his dark eyes magnified by his glasses.

  “Uh, yeah, just wanted to put some books away in my locker.”

  He shrugged and moved on. We all ate on the benches provided for us on the north end of campus. There was a nice lawn with several trees circling it just in front of the school, but that was reserved for the seniors. I sighed heavily as I located my locker, and then stuffed my books in. I looked forward to sitting amongst those trees next year. The memory of my recent recollection surfaced for a split-second, but I shoved it back down.

  It didn’t take me long to find my friends. We always sat at the same bench, the one furthest away from the popular kids. I took a place next to Thomas and placed a comforting hand on his back. He glanced over at me. I could tell he was still shaken up. I pulled my lips in and gave him a small nod. We all knew what it was like to be the object of ridicule, but it was never easy for any of us.

  That afternoon, as school let out, I glanced out Thomas’s van window and spotted Hobo Bob leaning against a large eucalyptus tree on the corner of campus. I blinked as we drove past, for I could have sworn that his unusually tall frame looked less bent than usual, but when I opened my eyes again he was stooped over, examining something on the ground.

  I huffed out a breath and pushed it from my mind. What did it matter if the homeless guy had been standing up straighter? Maybe he had just been stretching his back. I turned my head and watched the other cars drift by in the opposite lane instead.

  By two-thirty I was already in my room, pulling my homework out of my backpack. I switched on my stereo, flipping the knob over so that it would play the CD I had put in last night. I smiled when I heard the violins begin their lively dance. I enjoyed a wide variety of music but when I was working on anything important, the soundtrack I preferred was strictly instrumental.

  Like any school afternoon, I was able to get a good forty-five minutes of peace before my brothers got home. Once Logan, Bradley and Aiden arrived any hope for decent early study time was over. If they got it in their minds to torment me, then I would have to wait until after dinner to finish. I was really hoping my parents would enroll them in some after school sports one of these days.

  Not today, unfortunately. I heard them arrive with the subtlety of a truck hitting a building. I tried to ignore them, but soon my mom was calling me upstairs to help get dinner ready. I sighed and set my pencil down. I didn’t feel like working on pre-calculus anyway. I turned my stereo off and climbed the stairs.

  Dinner at the Elam house was quite the production, what with there being eight of us and three of those eight being picky eaters. Mom didn’t put up with it, of course, but that didn’t mean my brothers never tried to get out of eating broccoli or mushrooms. I couldn’t blame them about the mushrooms though.

  “Meg, could you peel the potatoes while I go get Jack and Joey?”

  I nodded and took her place by the sink. The twins were just a block over at a home daycare center. My mom couldn’t wait until they were old enough to go to preschool.

  I scrubbed the potatoes and tried to block out Logan and Bradley arguing over whose turn it was to play whatever video game they were currently addicted to. They took this time with their video games very seriously and counted it as preciously as a pirate would count his gold. As soon as Mom got back from getting the twins, it would be time for homework.

  I cleaned the potatoes, clouding up the water in the sink with dirt, and then fished the peeler out of a drawer. I looked down when I felt someone touching my leg. I smiled. Aiden was looking up at me with those blue eyes of his.

  “Help?” he asked.

  “Sure,” I said, “do you know where the colander is? Big yellow bowl with lots of little holes shaped like lemons?”

  He nodded and padded over to the other side of the kitchen, then pulled the drawer open with a little more force than necessary. After a few minutes of banging around, he returned with the colander, dragging it behind him the way a smaller child would tug along a teddy bear.

  “Thanks buddy,” I told him, placing a hand on his head.

  He wrapped an arm around my leg and I just let him stay there. He found comfort in such displays of affection and I didn’t mind knowing that at least one person on this earth wasn’t afraid to be close to me.

  Peeling potatoes was a tedious chore, so I distracted myself by glancing out the window above the sink every now and again. I could see the neighbor’s house, a little higher up on the slope than ours. Behind their house, the hill tapered off into the trees that surrounded the swamp. It wasn’t a real swamp, at least not like the kind you would see in Florida or in some bad horror movie. It was just a low spot in the land that remained wet and marshy throughout the year.

  I turned my gaze onto those trees and a flash of movement caught my eye. I strained harder to see what it was. Something large and dark. It flickered in and out of view as it moved between the trees. After a while I could tell that it was some sort of bird. Finally, it landed on the branch of the nearest eucalyptus tree, then turned its head and looked right at me with dark red eyes. I was so surprised that I nicked my hand with the potato peeler. I said some sort of kid-friendly curse, and then looked down to find a stream of blood dripping along my finger and into the dirty water.

  I quickly glanced up again, only to discover that the bird was still watching me. It was the raven, the same one I saw that morning, it had to be. But I didn’t remember it having red eyes . . .

  Meghan . . .

  No way. I couldn’t be hearing voices again.

  Meghan, you must come . . . it’s been too long, we’ve missed you . . .

  I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth. My hands clenched the edge of the sink. No, no, no!

  Meghan . . .

  No!

  Meghan!

  “Meghan?”

  “Mom!” I said, looking around the kitchen as if I had just woken up from a bad dream.

  “Honey, are you okay?”

  There was a look of concern in her eyes. She got the twins settled in their high chairs and walked over to me. Her eyes widened when she saw my bleeding hand.

  “Did you do that with the potato peeler?”

  I nodded, then looked down and grimaced. The cut was pretty bad.

  “I’ll get you a bandage. Logan! Bradley! Turn those games off and come finish the potatoes for your sister!”<
br />
  The boys groaned, but obeyed. I rinsed my blood down the sink as they made their way over. Mom returned with a box of bandages and some hydrogen peroxide.

  “How did this happen?” she asked.

  I wasn’t about to tell her about the bird or the voices. Instead I shrugged. “I was daydreaming I guess.”

  She shook her head and clucked her tongue. After getting patched up, I got demoted to setting the table.

  “Be careful with the butter knives,” she said seriously.

  I rolled my eyes but was careful to take her advice.

  Dad got home ten minutes before dinner was ready and we all sat down and tried to eat like a normal family, but my father insisted on watching his favorite trivia game show and the twins proceeded to make a mess while Bradley and Logan argued over who was the better basketball player. Aiden and I remained relatively quiet while my mom shook her head in disapproval over all of it. And so, there it was, a typical evening in with the Elam family.

  When the dishes were done, I escaped back to my room in the basement and tried to complete my homework in peace. The only problem was, now that I didn’t have the distraction of my noisy family, I was thinking about the raven and the voices that whispered in my mind.

  I shook my arms out as if they had fallen asleep and turned my classical music back on, setting the volume louder than before. Perhaps I could keep the voices at bay with a piano concerto. For some reason, I felt the need to stand in the middle of my room and stare at the sliding glass door, as if some invisible force was beckoning me to look outside. It was getting dark out, and all I could see was my tall, gangly reflection staring back at me. Fearing that the raven would return, I drew the blinds and plopped back down at my desk. I needed to focus and forget about the stupid bird.

  It was ten o’clock by the time I finished my homework. I quickly brushed my teeth and washed my face, then made sure my alarm was set to wake me in the morning. I left my music on a loop, hoping that the soothing violins would not only lull me to sleep, but keep the disturbing events of the day at bay.

  -Four-

  Illusion

  To my great relief, the next several days passed by with very little drama. Adam Peders and his gang only sneered at us twice more that week, the creepy homeless man seemed to have moved on, and best of all, I hadn’t seen the raven or heard any strange voices whispering to me in the night. All in all, a great week. I was actually surprised I hadn’t seen or heard anything odd after that eventful Monday, especially considering Friday was Halloween. Historically, my symptoms always got worse during the days leading up to my birthday, so I didn’t know whether I should have been jumping for joy or terribly worried something awful was about to happen. To be safe, I walked around with my fingers crossed.

  On Friday morning, I rose early and put on my costume. I loved that we were allowed to wear our costumes to school on Halloween. Tully and I had decided to be butterflies so I wore my black jeans, a black t-shirt and a pair of antennae that we had made ourselves. My wings were yellow and black striped like a swallowtail’s while Tully’s were orange and black like a monarch’s.

  “Me-ghan! Breakfast!” Logan bellowed from above.

  I checked myself in the mirror one more time, then grabbed my backpack in one hand and my wings in another and headed upstairs. I took the stairs two at a time, reaching the door that led into our kitchen just as my brothers pulled it open. I stumbled onto the tiled floor, too stunned to take note of the Halloween decorations hanging from the ceiling or the jack-o’-lanterns grinning from the dining room table.

  “Surprise!” everyone yelled.

  I squealed in irritation as Logan and Bradley attacked me with orange and black silly string. Being twelve and ten year old boys, silly string was a staple in their collection of ammo. Picking the sticky mess from my hair, I scowled when I noticed the curls coming loose. So much for cooperative hair on my birthday.

  “Logan, you totally set me up for that!”

  My younger brother grinned and shrugged, his sandy blonde hair still messy from sleep.

  I quickly forgave them because when I bothered to look around I noticed that everyone was up and that Mom had made me a special breakfast. Aiden ran up and gave me a hug and I returned the gesture.

  “So, do you feel seventeen?” Dad asked me.

  I shrugged. “I guess so.”

  Not only did I get French toast with raspberry syrup and whipped cream, but my parents insisted that I open my birthday presents as well. The boys had pooled together to get me a basket of my favorite candies, along with a birthday card they had made themselves. Mom and Dad got me the new jeans I had wanted for months and a few gift cards from my favorite stores.

  I was grateful that Robyn was picking me up that morning, because I was running late with all of the fuss over my birthday.

  “So, you are going to the dance tonight, right?” Mom asked nonchalantly as I packed my lunch.

  I rolled my eyes. We had discussed this earlier that week. I really didn’t want to go. I wasn’t much of a dancer and it was really more for the preppy kids who thought high school was the apex of their lives. I really just wanted to hang out with my friends at someone’s house and tell ghost stories or watch some slasher flick or something.

  “Yeah Mom, but I’m not sure what we’re doing afterwards.”

  “Just be careful honey,” was all she said as she reached up and gave me a quick hug around the shoulders.

  The sound of Robyn’s beat-up compact car lurching to a stop at the foot of our driveway drew my attention away from my mom.

  “Okay, see you guys later!” I called as I grabbed my stuff and headed out the door.

  Tully was already in the front seat so I squeezed into the back. Like me, she didn’t have her wings on yet. I glanced at Robyn. She didn’t look much different than she normally did, only this time she wore a full black skirt and a black and silver bodice decorated with what looked like skulls. The lipstick she chose for today was a brilliant red color.

  “What are you supposed to be, a gothic witch?”

  Robyn snorted as she jammed the car in gear. “No, I’m the Morrigan.”

  I blinked. “The what?”

  Robyn sighed. “Hello! The Celtic goddess of the dead?”

  I arched a brow at Tully, who had turned around to look at me. She barely fought back a smile.

  “Oh, duh. Of course,” I answered with my own grin.

  “So what’s the plan for tonight?” Robyn asked, as if her sacred obsession with Celtic myth hadn’t been scandalized by our ignorance.

  I cringed. “My parents think I’m going to the dance.”

  To my great surprise, Robyn actually nodded. “We’ll just go for an hour and watch the lemmings paw at each other, then we can ditch,” she said with her usual indignant flare.

  “What are we going to do afterwards then?” I wanted to know. “My mom thinks I’m going to be at the dance ‘til ten.”

  Tully was good about checking in with her parents. It made me feel guilty. My own parents trusted me too easily. Of course, I never so much as faked being sick to stay home from school, but now that I was a teenager they ought to be a little more strict. Not that I would ever do anything too scandalous.

  Robyn grinned. “Hello? All Hallows’ Eve? We’re going to go down into that swamp near your house and light a bonfire. Duh.”

  She glanced at me in the rearview mirror, the red glitter eye shadow she’d caked on reminding me a little of that raven.

  I shivered and cast the demented bird from my thoughts and instead focused on what Robyn had just said. That’s right; another pagan festival was upon us. I wondered if Will and Thomas would join us this time. During the last ‘festival’, Will had had an allergic reaction to Robyn’s harvest cakes and Thomas had felt weird about the poem she’d recited.

  “That sounds more interesting than the dance,” I said, adding my two cents.

/>   Sure Robyn’s little ‘pagan parties’ were bizarre, but I couldn’t say they weren’t interesting. But first we had to endure the dance . . .

  Ugh, I hated dances, at least at our high school. First of all, I couldn’t dance, second of all, the music they always picked out was just noise to me, and last of all, I didn’t need some freshman or sophomore boy pawing all over me and then bragging to his friends later about how he had hit it off with a junior. No thanks. I may be one of the outcasts, but that didn’t make me immune to the truly desperate.

  “I’m in too,” Tully piped. “I’ll just have to let my parents know.”

  Robyn laughed. “Now we just have to convince the boys.”

  During our lunch break later that day, we outlined our plans for the evening to Will and Thomas, including Robyn’s idea of ending the night with a little Halloween fest down in the swamp.

  “Sure, why not?” Will shrugged.

  I returned to my lunch, not bothering to wait for Thomas’ response. As far as I knew, his parents were comfortable with the idea of Halloween but not so much so with the origin of the traditions behind it. I knew he would come up with some excuse about taking his brothers and sister trick-or-treating. We all knew his family was uncomfortable with Robyn’s beliefs and we didn’t blame him. But he must have felt rude about turning down Robyn’s invitations time and time again, because he always seemed to make such an effort to politely decline.

  “Do we have to wear a special costume or something?”

  I nearly choked on my yogurt. Both Tully and I looked at him with wide eyes. He merely shrugged off our reaction with a rather reserved look.

  “What?” he said. “I’m tired of everyone pushing me around. I’m curious to see what Robyn is always going on about. I told my parents I was going to the dance and then to Will’s afterward.”

  We were all slightly shocked. So much so that Robyn, instead of laughing out right and crowing on about her obsession with the ancient Celts, mumbled a submissive, “Well, your Halloween costume should be fine.” She warily eyed his thrown-together zombie motif. “It’s just a bonfire really, nothing too freaky.”

  For the first time in her life Robyn seemed humbled, but I kept staring at Thomas, waiting for him to fold under the pressure. But the determined look on his face never faltered. Deep down inside, I gave a little cheer. I was proud of him. Eventually I concluded that perhaps Adam’s public insult the other day was the straw that finally broke the camel’s back. Thomas was tired of being a doormat; to his peers and to his family. He was beginning to stand up to everyone and even though this was a small step that only we would witness, it was a giant leap for his self-confidence.

  After I finished my lunch, I crumpled the paper sack into a ball and aimed for the closest recycling bin, and then I leaned back against the sycamore tree, glancing up into the few leaves that remained on its branches. We had bypassed the usual tables today, choosing to eat out on the field behind the school with the few other outcasts. Normally we could spend the lunch period in relative peace, but that wasn’t always the case and today was no exception.

  We were minding our own business on the far side of the track when Michaela West, dressed in her cheerleading outfit, left the lunch tables and came sauntering over. I ignored her at first, thinking she was just headed towards the garbage can to throw something away, but when she didn’t veer to the left I started to worry.

  Michaela was short and petite, with a perpetual scowl and fake eyebrows. She wore her auburn hair pulled back in a tight pony tail and had way too much makeup on. None of us were impressed with her costume. She just used Halloween as an excuse to hike up her skirt and add extra padding to her bra. Some pale foundation and two red dots drawn on her neck suggested she was trying to be some peppy version of a vampire’s victim. She closed the last few feet between us and crossed her arms.

  “What do you want?” Robyn asked with sarcasm.

  “Just thought you girls would like to know about this list,” she said, completely disregarding Thomas and Will.

  She pulled out a piece of lined paper from a pocket and flipped it in front of us.

  “It’s been circulated around the entire school.”

  I gritted my teeth. I didn’t want to know what was written on it. It could only be something demoralizing.

  Unfortunately, Tully spoke before thinking it through. “What is it?”

  “Oh, a list of the girls Adam and Josh would never date even if they underwent plastic surgery.”

  Robyn made a sound of outrage and Tully took a small step back. I merely glared at the awful girl.

  “Oh, it gets better,” Michaela piped, flicking her ponytail over her shoulder. “People voted on who would be most likely never to have a boyfriend, too.” She paused and looked up at me, her eyes bright with malice. “Do you want to know who got the most votes?”

  Before she could continue, Robyn pressed forward and told Michaela she could shove her list somewhere where the sun didn’t shine and grabbed my arm to pull me away. I had no objections to this method of escape. Insults weren’t my forte, which was surprising since I’d had them thrown at me for much of my life. Apparently I was the catch and release type; I never bothered to dwell too much on what was said to me. Now I wished I’d tucked some of them away to use in situations like this. Luckily, we had Robyn. She produced insults the way a rabbit produced offspring.

  Michaela shouted something nasty at us but I didn’t hear her. I was trying to forget about that note she held in her hands. I know it was stupid to be upset about it but I couldn’t help it. I knew exactly who had been voted as the least likely ever to have a boyfriend, and I knew why. It was me, and the reason was because I was so very strange. No matter how hard I tried to blend in, some part of my weirdness always seemed to seep out.

  “Forget them Meg!” Robyn hissed. “They are a bunch of girls with no self-esteem and no brain cells. What do they know?”

  I nodded. Robyn was right, and today was Halloween. It was my seventeenth birthday and I wasn’t going to let some stupid, fake cheerleader ruin it. We would go to the dance tonight just to make an appearance, then we would go off and have Robyn’s bonfire. Yes, it meant I was that weird kid I didn’t want to be, but at least I would be among friends.