Fey at Heart

By Emily R. Bryant

Chapter Two


The first thing Alex noticed when awareness started creeping back into 
her addled mind was that it was warm. Surprisingly warm for that matter, 
considering the fact that, last she had checked, it was winter. Mentally 
shrugging, her face automatically buried itself back into the pillowy-
softness that was surrounding her arm, an action that shifted her glasses 
so that they were pressing uncomfortably against her face. 

Grumbling, the girl lifted her head and squinted against the pre-dawn 
light that beat against her eyelids, shifting the lenses one-handed 
further down her nose. They probably had smudges on them now, something 
she confirmed by managing to ease one eye open enough to see through 
the slightly-curved rectangular panes. How in the world could she have 
forgotten to take them off before she fell asleep? She must have drowsed 
off reading, but that didn't make sense with the feeling of firm ground 
underneath padded clothes. 

Her eyes finally snapped completely open, her arms instinctively rolling 
her onto her back and sitting up. Even so, she winced slightly as she put 
weight on her still half-asleep limbs, looking around cautiously. 

Okay, first things first. She was in a forest clearing. That was consistent 
with where she had been last, although she had been expecting a cold cement 
ditch, not dew-soaked loam and grass. One hand even now went up to brush 
some cold moisture from her face, then set to work brushing the same from 
her mussed mouse-brown hair, some of which had escaped its braid in the 
wild and crazy dash down the hill. 

Second, she was most assuredly alive. A bit tender, likely bruised, but 
no broken bones. That was a plus. 

Third, it was starting to get warmer, so she was already yanking off her 
coat and groping about for her pack, and garments more suitable for warm 
weather. 

Fourth, Adam was no more than twenty feet away, and quite all right, going 
by the volume of his snores. Relieved and annoyed, Alex set to work removing 
her snow-appropriate garb, replacing it with a t-shirt and jeans, hiking 
boots taking the place of snow boots. Her coat, which would probably take 
up far too much space in her pack, she tied around her waist. 

Fifth, no psychotic murderous stepfather, which left her feeling much better, 
although lack of worry over her own continued existence left her mind free 
to be occupied with fears of the same nature regarding her mother. 

'Mom won't have any idea what is going on!' Alex distressedly reminded 
herself. 'Oh my gosh, what if Bill decided to take his anger at Adam and 
I out on Mom?! She could be in danger, or dying, or dead, or-' 

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAARG!!! DON'T SNEAK UP ON ME LIKE THAT, YOU BOOGER!!!" At 
her brother's worried touch to her shoulder, Alex had promptly spazzed. 
Now she was heading dangerously towards hyperventilation. 

"Yeesh, Al, tense much?" Adam quipped, but he couldn't quite keep his 
concern over his elder sibling off his face or out of his voice. Her 
concerns, for all that they hadn't been voiced yet, had already occurred 
to Adam in the time between his sister's movements waking him up and his 
trying to bring her out of her funk. 

That was one of the most contrary things about his sister, Adam mused. For 
the most part, she was calm, collected, and perfectly logical. He actually 
admired the way she had gone about investigating the situation with Bill, 
as well as her orchestration of their escape plan, for all that they were 
now apparently lost. What worried him the most about Alex, however, was 
her tendency to suppress all emotion, which would explode one way or 
another if she were startled particularly badly out of her little bubble 
of calm. Most times she pulled through admirably, but lately she had become 
more touchy. He suspected that their father's abandonment had hit Alex far 
worse than anybody else in their family, for all that it had been twelve 
years. Their mother's second marriage hadn't helped any, either. Alex had 
been insistent from the moment their mother had started dating again that 
Dad would be back, that Mom was betraying him. She had gotten even worse 
after Bill started hanging around, but then, so had he. There was just 
something about that man that rubbed both of them wrong, but Melanie 
Andersen kept pushing aside their concerns, putting it off to jealousy 
at Bill's suggestion, which he supposed, in hindsight, should have sent 
off warning bells there and then. 

Alex had only gone quiet again shortly before the wedding, and only then 
because their then-dying, now dead, grandmother had insisted that all it 
was doing was upsetting their mother, and that she deserved some happiness. 

That hadn't stopped them both from having an oddly strong urge to object 
to the union at the ceremony when the minister had asked. Granna's glare 
from the pews at Adam beside her and Alex standing next to their mother 
as a bridesmaid was the only thing that had kept either of them from 
saying anything, but only just. 

Alex's breathing finally slowed down, and her face lost its panicked 
look. One last calming breath, and she was back into her Vulcan-esque 
logical mode. 

Now that he thought about it, Adam wondered if that utter calm was doing 
more to damage his sister than help her. But now was clearly not the time 
to bring that up, as Alex took charge of the situation. 

"Okay, first of all, we obviously aren't in Big Bear any more, and we 
equally obviously didn't die when we went flying into that ditch." Alex 
paused, frowning in thought. "So the first thing we need to do is figure 
out where we are, and how to call Mom and make sure she's okay." 

Adam raised an eyebrow. "I'm wondering more how we got here, wherever 
'here' is." He perked up at a thought. "Hey, maybe that ditch was an 
inter-dimensional time-space wormhole that spat us out into an alternate 
universe!" 

Alex groaned, saying, "No more Sliders re-runs or DS9 tapes for you, 
mister."

Her brother responded by elegantly gracing her with an outstretched 
tongue and a loud raspberry. 

Rolling her eyes in annoyance, Alex declared that the toboggans were 
far too bulky to bring with them, not to mention useless without snow, 
and the two shouldered their packs and headed in a random direction. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was rather lucky that brother and sister left when they did, because 
no more than half an hour later a swirling inter-dimensional time-space 
wormhole erupted into being about fifteen yards from where the teenagers 
had awakened. Far more disturbing than the glowing portal, however, was 
the figure that stepped through. Cricking his head from side to side, 
William Beard's eyes narrowed, focussing in on the two pale-blue plastic 
toboggans resting abandoned off to one side, then zeroed in on the scuff 
marks left in the rich grass-covered dirt by man-made boots, leading away 
through the trees, his sharp mind taking note that the tracks disappeared 
as their makers left the rich woodland and crossed into the much drier 
dirt of the meadowland. 

Tracking his now-dead wife's children would be a bit more difficult out 
there. 

Taking the safety off of his high-powered sniper rifle, he proceeded to 
chamber a fresh round. 

"I do so love a good challenge," he murmured to himself, a maniacal gleam 
in his eyes as he set off after his quarry. 

No sooner than the madman had left the clearing, a small, twisted figure 
crept out of its hiding place up in a tree, where it had fled after noting 
the impending wakening of the two young strangers, and had stayed until 
now, driven by the instinct that was more than instinct, the hand of 
Fate and Destiny. 

Giving a long look after the two newcomers, the Fey grumbled to himself 
one sentence before popping out of existence, hopefully to reappear 
ahead of the youths. 

"Bluebeard's come back; may the Lord and Lady have mercy on us all." 

*************************

Author's Notes: Sorry I've been so silent on the writing front of late; 
writer's block is quite annoying. But, before you guys get all cheering 
and stuff (I hope!), I'm being a bit cheat-y here. The prologue and 
first four chapters were written in November (2003); I honestly kinda 
forgot about this story when I conceded defeat with NaNoWriMo. 
Nonetheless, I plan on putting out a chapter of this a week until either 
I've got everything so far up, or my writer's block backs off on 
something else. Either way, you guys win. 

As always and forever, thanks go to Rhonda-sensei, my muse, and God. 
And on the reviews front...

ice_4_a_spirit- Thanks! Glad you like my writing style! I hope you keep 
reading, though I am unfamiliar with the story you compared mine with. If 
I ever get around to finishing "Mists of Avalon" and the other stuff I've 
bought but haven't gotten around to reading, maybe I'll look up this "I 
am Morgan Le Fay". 

Anyhoot, thanks to y'all, and if you liked this chapter, please leave me 
a nice review or e-mail. Who knows, maybe reviews will kick start my muse. 

-- Rosy the Cat
rosythecat@yahoo.com
2-25-04