Fey at Heart

By Emily R. Bryant

Chapter Three


"Call me crazy, but I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Totoro." 

Adam rolled his eyes and groaned appropriately at his sister's declaration
 even as he fervently agreed. The small rustic town, which looked more 
suitable for Medieval Europe, with some liberal dashes of Tudor England 
and Renaissance architecture, was most assuredly not of their world. As 
interesting as it was, in a Ren Faire sort of way, it was hardly reassuring. 

The next thing they knew, they would probably be overrun by pitchfork-
wielding midgets or something. That was just how weird their life had 
become, that he would be able to picture something so utterly ridiculous 
and out of the ordinary without any doubt in his mind that it was within 
the realm of possibility. 

He mentioned all of this to his sister, which got him a blank look, 
and then a chagrined admission that those thoughts had gone through 
her mind as well. 

Alex sighed, firmly reinforced the determined look on her face, and 
took a step forward towards the town. Her progress, however, was halted 
by a slight "pop!" sound and the appearance of a small, wrinkly man with 
a long white beard, dressed in a shirt, tunic, and trousers, with little 
curving-toed shoes that brought into mind Santa's elves at the mall 
during the Christmas season. She and Adam both blinked in surprise, 
'What the blue heck...?!' running through both of their minds. 

If their age difference were not so obvious, and their hair color not 
different, one might think that they were twins, the way their thought 
processes were so similar. 

"Well," chirped the odd little man, who was so short that he couldn't be 
classified in the teenagers' minds as a midget, but neither was he small 
enough to be a pixie, as they understood such things. The top of his head 
barely reached Alex's knees, which was saying something regarding his 
height, considering how short Miss Andersen was. "Newcomers in our lands! 
How interesting!" The smile that graced his wrinkly face did not change, 
although Alex noted that a calculating sort of gleam had entered his eyes. 
It was vaguely disturbing, and enough to put her on guard. 

"And what would the young gentles' names be, I wonder?" Striking a thinking 
pose, The Little Guy tapped one long, knarled finger against his chin. Alex 
was about to tell him to go away and mind his own business when Adam stepped 
into the conversation. 

"I'm Adam Andersen, and this is my big sister Alex. Could you tell us where 
we are, please?" the boy asked politely. This got an "I'm going to smack you 
upside the head at the first opportunity" look directed balefully at him via 
his sister. 

'HOW many times have I mentioned the whole "you're not supposed to tell magical 
creatures your name" concept from Books of Magic?! Gah! Why do I even bother 
sharing my literary interests, anyway...?' 

The Little Guy, for lack of a better name, was now staring at both of them 
intently. "Andersen? By any chance would you be of any relation to a Hans 
Andersen?"

Adam shrugged, and said "Granna once said that we were related to Hans 
Christian Andersen, if that's who you're asking about. But it's only on our 
mom's side of the family. Dad took Mom's family name when they got married." 

He likely would have said more, except that Alex clapped one hand over his 
mouth and hissed, "T-M-I, Adam, Ti-Em-Ai!" 

The Little Guy merely chuckled at the girl's actions, smiled wryly, and made 
his first offer of information. "You are quite wise in your actions, young 
Mistress Andersen, but you have nothing to fear in me, for I suspect I know 
a good deal of your story that even you have not been made aware of." He 
paused, looking intently out over the landscape beyond the town in the 
direction the siblings had come from. "However, might I recommend we save 
all further discourse for within yonder public house? I have it on good 
authority that the two of you were followed from whence you came." 

Wary about going into a pub, Alex nonetheless followed The Little Guy 
towards the town, motioning Adam to follow as well. However, once inside 
the small entryway that led into the common room, she leaned down and 
tapped The Bearded One on his shoulder, bringing his attention back to her. 

"Considering you know our names, it only seems fair to me that we know yours, 
Mister." 

"Quite!" He of the Extremely Vertically Challenged chirped, then, in a small 
flash of light, a completely different person was revealed. 

"You have the distinct honor and privilege to be in the presence of one 
Rumpelstiltskin, a sidhe lord of the Unseelie Host."

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

The teenagers' shock at having met a literary character allowed the Fey 
lord to lead them quickly and discreetly to a quiet, out of the way table 
in the back of the pub's common room. However, even in a state of complete 
confusion, Alex's mind was more than capable in reevaluating their newest 
acquaintance. 

Far from being short, or old, or bearded, Rumpelstiltskin, formerly known 
as The Little Guy, was approximately six and a half feet tall, looked to 
be about twenty-five years old, though most definitely older considering 
the age of his story in her world, and clean-shaven. Or maybe he just 
didn't grow facial hair, like elves in fantasy books. The only thing that 
had stayed the same between his two apparent forms was his white hair. In 
any case, even a social recluse like Alexandrea Andersen, unofficially 
voted in high school most likely to convert to Catholicism just to become 
a nun, was fully capable of firmly setting him in the physical appearance 
category of "Umm, *WOW*". 

That last thought finally driving her out of her silent contemplation of 
the random unpredictability of the universe (or was that multiverse now?), 
Alex shook her head. You would think she had never seen an attractive man 
before, for crying out loud! 

"My *dad* was *way* better looking," she muttered to herself, trying to 
reestablish some logic in her little world. Unfortunately for her, their 
host, or guide, or whatever, overheard that last little comment and barely 
hid a light blush, hiding a smug grin in his tankard of ale, which the 
serving girl had just set down in front of him. The serving girl in 
question finally stopped trying to catch the sidhe's eye, and turned to 
her two younger customers. "What will you be having, then?" 

Thinking quickly, Alex looked up and smiled, saying, "Some tea would 
be fine for the both of us, thank you." 

The serving girl nodded, shot one last flirtatious look at Rumpelstiltskin, 
and flounced off to the bar to fetch their drinks. 

The three sat quietly, Rumpelstiltskin occasionally taking small swallows 
from his tankard, until the serving girl returned with the tea. This time, 
however, she paused long enough to give an odd look to the boy and girl's 
odd, for that world, clothing. 

Once the serving girl had left, Rumpelstiltskin sighed and set his tankard 
down, then stared at his two table mates. Finally, he smiled slightly, and 
said, "You two remind me of him, you know. Your father." 

Both of the others' heads snapped up in complete attention at that. 

"You know our dad?" 

"Where is our dad?"

"Why the bloody damn heck did he bloody damn leave?!" Alex paused, blinking 
owlishly from behind her glasses, blushed, and muttered, "Sorry, my 
Britishness gets worked up when I'm upset..." 

Adam, who had taken a tentative sip from his just-cooled tea, hastily 
swallowed and said with a smirk on his face, "That's for 'bloody' sure," 
which got him a whap upside the head from his sister, and a "watch your 
language, mister!" He stuck his tongue out in response. 

Rumpelstiltskin laughed outright at their antics, the sort of laugh that 
could get an entire room laughing along, even if the entire room didn't 
know what was so funny. It was just that infectious. His laughing fit 
finally wound itself down and he wiped tears of mirth out of his eyes. 
However, a moment later his face was completely serious and devoid of all 
emotion as he said quietly, "Get down under the table, both of you; your 
lives depend on it." His tone was the sort that brooked no argument, though 
Alex looked on the verge of trying anyway even as Adam dragged her under 
the piece of battered furniture. 

It was just as well that Alex hadn't had a chance to argue, because she and 
her brother both stiffened in recognition and fear at the person who entered 
the pub right then. 

"Bluebeard," Rumpelstiltskin hissed angrily under his breath, and Alex 
absently noted that the Fey lord had resumed his, now that she thought 
about it, more recognizable form. She inched back a little bit further 
away from the edge nearest the door, staring fixedly at those black boots 
she had seen tramping through the Northern Californian snow so many times. 

"I," Lord Bluebeard began in that ever-so-pompous tone he had that Alex 
hated ever so much, "Am hunting two youths: a young man yet young enough 
to not have had a beard grace his chin, his hair shorn close to his head 
and the color of ripe summer wheat, and a young maiden, hair long and waved 
like a painted sea, though the color of the hair on a dormouse's back," 
that comment about her hair driving the slightest of growls through Alex's 
throat, though Rumpelstiltskin's foot tromping sharply on the end of her 
braid and her brother grabbing her arm to keep her from lunging at the 
murdering so-and-so, "And on her face she wears spectacles. Tell me where 
they hide, and you may all live to see another day." 

Adam and Alex stared at each other in horror. No matter how much neither 
one of them wanted to die, neither of them wanted to sit back and watch 
their stepfather murder a roomful of innocents. Just before either of 
them could move more than an inch or two away from their positions, 
however, one of the pub's patrons spoke up. 

"What is the matter, yer lordship? Virgin brides become a bit too much 
of a challenge for yer in your old age?" 

This pronouncement, which came from a large male brown bear in the back 
of the room, sent up a small wave of tittering laughter. Bluebeard fumed. 

"Nay, Master Bear," chimed in a red-orange fox, "Mayhap his Nibs chases 
these young'uns because they be master mages, set to drag him back to 
the courts to stand trial. 'Tis a shame, truly," he said slyly, "When 
a lord of the land is driven into exile and is so weakened thusly that 
he fears barely-weaned kits more than the whole of all the armies in all 
of the kingdoms!" 

That suggestion roused roars of approval and guffaws of laughter. 
Bluebeard went red in the face, shouted something that just got those 
near him laughing harder, fumed, and stomped out of the pub. 

Once the room had settled down, Rumpelstiltskin changed back and motioned 
for the two on the floor to get back up. 

"Well then," he said brightly, "I suppose now would be a good time to 
explain things, then?" 

"Aye!" called the fox on the other side of the room. "Ye have us *all* 
curious now, good Master Fey. Tell on!" 

"A story! A story!" cried the other patrons as they moved themselves closer 
to the table, even as the serving girl refilled Rumpelstiltskin's tankard. 
The two teenagers, for their part, looked a bit overwhelmed, though no less 
curious about the Fey's tale. 

"Well..." Rumpelstiltskin drawled, followed by quaffing a good-sized draft 
of his ale, and then starting on the story. 

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

"As most people know, the Fey folk are divided into two courts: the Seelie 
Host, or Glittering Throng, and the Unseelie Host, which once was solely the 
Slaugh, who are considered the worst of the worst, the Dark Sidhe's greatest 
threat. The Seelie, however, are the far pickier of the two, and only take 
into their ranks the most beautiful. The Unseelie, as their balance, take in 
everyone and anyone; there go those cast out of the Glittering throng: cursed 
children, undesired half-breeds and the like. 

"But that is not to say that all of the Seelie are good and shun contact 
with others, nor that the Unseelie are all cruel monsters. Each group has 
its flaws and favorites. 

"Now, no kinder or open-hearted, nor better skilled with a dueling blade, 
sidhe ever walked the blessed halls of the Courts than Lord Rhodry ap Cedar, 
son of Lady Morgan of the sidhe and Cedar, a pixie." 

It was at that point that one of the more gutter-minded patrons called out 
the question of how such a union was managed, to which Rumpelstiltskin 
replied that Cedar had been "Big enough", which had gotten more laughter 
and guffaws, and a massive blush from Alex. 

"Now then, as I was saying, young Rhodry was well-liked and welcomed by 
both courts, which is how I gained the good fortune of earning his 
friendship. 

"Years went on, and word got to circulating around that Queen Vivian of 
the Seelie Host, who had fifty years before lost her husband in a duel, 
was looking for a new consort, and possibly husband, if he could get her 
with child. Rhodry, of course, being the well-liked handsome devil that 
he is, was a top choice of Queen Viv. Now, most lads would have jumped 
at the chance, naturally, but our Rhodry, he had a bit of the wanderlust 
to him. Late one night, Her Majesty paid him a visit in his chambers, 
offering then and there to make him Royal Consort. Rhodry, however, had 
other ideas. 

"He'd been long curious about the Mortal Realm, had Rhrodry, but only 
those chosen by the royal pairs ever got to go on information gathering 
missions for the courts through the Gateways. He asked Queen Vivian for 
one favor, a boon, if you will, before he gave her his answer. He wanted 
to be the Seelie court's representative for the next mission, and his 
queen agreed to his terms. 

"That was a good twenty years ago, now," Rumpelstiltskin said, looking 
around the room while somehow skipping over the Andersens, whose minds 
were awhirl in thought. "Twelve years ago, however, with Rhodry years 
overdue, Queen Vivian finally got fed-up and sent her personal guardsmen 
through the Gateways, fetching him back assumedly for his impending 
betrothal to Her Highness-ness. 

"But, things did not work out the way that the Queen of Light had planned. 
No sooner had the Guardsmen brought Lord Rhodry into the throne room, and 
the Queen declaiming their agreement to the court, than Rhodry's voice was 
raised in refusal of his queen's suit. He was already married, he told her, 
to a young mortal woman of the line of Hans Andersen, and had fathered two 
children upon her, and thus requested that he be returned to his family. 

"Almost instantly his lady mother, Morgan, cried out that, surely, such a 
union did not count as a true marriage, and that he should put all thought 
of such things out of his head straightaway. 

"But he wouldn't, good Fey that he was, he stood up even straighter, even 
taller, and said, 'I swore to love my wife until the end of time, and to 
only seek the bed of another if death should part us. Would you have me 
be an oath-breaker? An adulterer? The worst of the worst?' 

"And, sure enough, none could counter his words. But that did not curb 
Vivian's rage, for it is as fierce as the light of a desert sun, and 
she forbade him to return to the Mortal Realm, that he might stay here, 
in the world of Fables, until his mortal wife should die, and then she 
would take him as consort." 

Rumpelstiltskin finally stopped his narration, pausing to take several 
long, much-needed gulps of his ale, which gave the crowd enough time to 
make some small comments on the narrative, with several young women, 
including the serving girl, exclaiming about how romantic it was of Lord 
Rhodry to deny the Queen in favor of his wife and true-love. Alex and Adam 
were just staring at the Fey lord, pondering the connotations of the 
story and how it affected them. 

After finishing off his tankard, and having it refilled by the serving 
girl, Rumpelstiltskin looked back up into the crowd, and said, "As for 
what happened in the eight years in-between, you'll have to ask the 
youngsters here for that part of the tale, for I certainly wasn't there, 
nor am I Rhodry's beget, thank the Lord and Lady." 

This last proclamation sent the room into a tizzy, demanding answers of 
Rumpelstiltskin and the brother and sister alike, focussing on the latter 
two when it was clear he wasn't going to say any more. 

Finally, Adam took charge by sticking two fingers in his mouth and letting 
off a sharp whistle, quieting the crowd almost instantly. Glaring around 
for a few more moments, he said, "Yes, our dad's name was, or is, I suppose, 
since he's apparently still alive, Rhodry. He took our mom's family name 
when they got married, and we certainly had no clue about all of this before 
now, but my sister, Alex, will have to be the one to fill in the blanks, 
because I was only two when Dad left." He nodded slightly at Alex, who had 
finally lost most of that look of being completely overwhelmed, cleared her 
throat, and began. 

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

"Well, before I start on the actual story, let me just apologize for any 
lack of story-telling ability. The most experience in the field I have is 
from school and reading bedtime stories to Adam, here. 

"Okay, first of all, most of this I either wasn't alive for, or I just 
don't remember it because I was a little kid and you don't start remembering 
things until you are about two or three years old, in most cases. So a good-
sized chunk of this story is what my mom told me when looking back on things, 
so be alert for rose-colored glasses filterings." This got some smiles and 
chuckles along with the expected confused expressions, which was better than 
Alex had been expecting. Rumpelstiltskin, she noted, was smiling slightly, 
though he had a rather intent and focused look to his face as well. He 
obviously wasn't going to miss much, if anything. Smiling a bit herself, 
she continued, marginally reassured. 

"My parents met while Mom was starting her last year of law school. She 
was studying law so she could work for civil services, helping people 
who didn't have enough money to afford their own lawyer, things like 
that. Dad told her he was from Wales, and that he was just in California 
on vacation, or something along those lines." Alex paused here, smiling 
in a clearly sardonic manner. "Obviously we all know that wasn't true. 

"Anyway, they started dating, and, eventually, they got engaged. 
Personally, I think that Dad must have told Mom something about his 
being all fairy-like, because she certainly wouldn't have gone off 
and slept with him until she became pregnant with me otherwise. She 
just wasn't that kind of person. 

"So, one year after meeting, my parents walked down the isle in an off-
white wedding," a comment that got giggles from the other females 
in the room, "And seven months, two and a half weeks, later, I in 
all of my utterly blah bundle of joy-ness came into the world. I had 
Mom and Dad to myself for almost four years, and then this freakish 
loony was born!" Alex was grinning slyly for the last part, and deftly 
dodged her brother's ill-aimed whap upside her head. That got some 
laughs. 

"Okay, joking aside, that's pretty much it as far as my parents' story 
goes. You have already heard the rest. Dad told Mom that he'd be back, 
ten years at the most, but, well, he didn't come back." Alex's voice 
trailed off as she stared down at her empty tea cup, one hand clenching 
into a fist as she thought of the one person who, ultimately, was to 
blame for her not having a father around while she was growing up. 

Grr...

"So," the Talking Bear from before, who was apparently Papa Bear of 
Goldielocks and the Three Bears fame, offered, trying to get back to 
the story telling. That Alex girl was kinda scary, all growling like 
that. That one definitely had a good dose of Fey to her. "Where does 
his Nibship come into the story? Or has he really slipped so bad that 
he's hunting random kids?" 

Being of the opinion that his sister had slipped into Vengeance Land, 
Adam was the one who took over the story. "He's our step-father."

Double Grr...

Several people, including Rumpelstiltskin, gave the two "You Poor 
Things!" looks. It seemed that Lord Bluebeard had extended his M.O. 
to include single mothers and their children. 

"And we're pretty darn certain that he was using drugs or pills or 
something to manipulate Mom from the beginning, because she didn't 
even want to start dating again when she did, but one of her friends 
talked her into a double date, and she met Bill..." Adam joined his 
sister in glaring down into his tea cup, then ground out, "Both of 
us felt something was wrong, or off, or something like that, about 
the whole thing, though Alex picked up on it first, and, oddly 
enough, she kept insisting that Dad was going to come back and, 
considering we didn't know all of that stuff about fairies and 
marriage and...umm, stuff, even odder that she kept saying that Mom 
was betraying Dad by dating, and later marrying, Bill, and that it 
was breaking their marriage vows, because they never got a divorce. 
Dad just left." 

After all of that, Adam looked away, his hands fidgeting nervously. 

What were they going to do now? 

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

Author's Notes: As always, thanks go to Rhonda-sensei, who is spiffy 
to the uber-max. Also, to my reviewers, Scott and Veralindaine 
Sarrasri: Thank you both so much! How nice you are! 

Now that you've read, please review! 

-- Rosy the Cat
rosythecat@yahoo.com