Fairy Bad Day

chapter TWENTY-FOUR

What?” Emma stared at him blankly, waiting for the punch line, but when it didn’t come she folded her arms. “Come on, Curtis, stop messing with me and tell me what’s really going on.”

He didn’t look at her as he stated matter-of-factly, “I’m serious. I’m sight-blind. Plain and simple. Without these glasses I can’t see a thing.”

Emma shook her head in confusion. “No,” she insisted as she scrambled to her feet and watched him awkwardly get up and retrieve his crutches. “Those glasses were only to help you see Unseen dragons. And fairies. You told me yourself.”

He shrugged. “I lied to you. Yes, with them I can see dragons—and fairies. But without them, I can’t see anything.”

“I don’t understand. You go to Burtonwood Academy. It’s sort of required to be able to know when there are paranormal creatures around.”

“Oh, I know when they’re around. I can hear them. Smell them. Feel when they’re in the room. I can even fight them. Only problem is, I can’t see them.” As he spoke, his face was a mask that Emma found impossible to read. There was no easy smile, no chocolate eyes. Just planes and angles and grimness.

“So how did you even get into Burtonwood in the first place?”

Curtis sighed. “I told you that my dad isn’t really a fan. Well, this one time I could feel that there was something at the beach. I mean, something really bad, so I tried to tell him not to let my younger brother go surfing. I begged and begged but my dad thought I was just being obnoxious. So he grounded me and let my brother go with his friends to the beach.”

Emma gasped. “An aquafile?” she asked, since that was the most common kraken that hunted surfers.

“Yeah, I later figured out it must’ve been.” His voice was almost devoid of emotion.

“So what happened?” She felt the color drain from her face while hardly daring to listen to the answer.

“I climbed out my bedroom window and rode my bike there, but by the time I arrived it was too late and my brother and two other kids were being dragged under the waves having the life sucked out of them. I couldn’t see it but I just knew the aquafile was there and so I grabbed the scissors that I’d brought with me and jumped into the water. The thing was so bloated from what it had just done that I guess I got lucky and managed to strike a killing blow because suddenly the sense of evil I could feel was gone. I dragged the bodies onto the beach but it was too late.”

“Curtis,” Emma whispered as she instinctively reached out and gently touched his hand. “I had no idea. So is that when you decided to come to Burtonwood?”

He shook his head. “I’d never even heard of Burtonwood but the local newspaper ran a story about how I’d valiantly tried to save three kids from drowning and I guess it blipped on Kessler’s radar as a possible aquafile attack. Anyway, next thing I knew, he came to visit, and after testing me, he offered me a scholarship. I was ten, so at the time he was confident that my sight would come through, but of course I didn’t really care, I just wanted to get away from my old man.”

“But your sight never did come through.” All Emma could do was shake her head in disbelief as she realized just how different their childhoods had been.

“Nope, and with Induction looming, Kessler was in a bind. He said in every other respect I was the perfect slayer and he didn’t want to lose me. Which is where the glasses came in. We tested them on everything but they only seemed to work on dragons—”

“And fairies,” Emma pointed out.

“Yeah, though we didn’t know it at the time. Anyway, it was because of the glasses that Kessler gave me your dragon designation,” Curtis finished off in a soft voice as the truth started to really sink into Emma’s brain. “I should’ve just said no. I mean, everyone at Burtonwood knew what it meant to you, but I couldn’t bear the idea of going home. Of being helpless to fight elementals. I’m sorry, Jones. I should’ve told you sooner. I’ve been trying to; it’s just... well . . . not easy to admit that you’re a freak.”

She stared at Curtis as he looked down and kicked the ground in embarrassment. She had been right all along.

He did have a secret.

It just wasn’t exactly what she had envisioned.

She had been thinking it was because he was embarrassed to be seen with a fairy slayer or that he didn’t like her, but in fact it was about as far from what she had thought as possible.

“If you hate me, I understand. I mean, it’s my fault you lost your dragon spot. Not to mention the lying and the general ruining-your-life thing.” Curtis still didn’t look at her. For a moment Emma closed her eyes and thought of her mom and how she had longed to follow in her footsteps before finally she looked up at him and forced him to return her gaze.

“Okay, so we can just clear a few things up. The whole almost-kissing-me-and-then-fixing-my-tie thing?”

“Not one of my finest moments.” Curtis flushed. “Of course I wanted to kiss you but then it occurred to me that I would be doing so under false pretenses.”

“And that’s why you didn’t want to come down to the practice range with me?” She knew the answer but had to double-check.

“Actually, that was because I didn’t want you to find out that I couldn’t see elementals. It’s all been a lie.” He clenched his jaw and made a hissing noise under his breath. “I screwed everything up. I wish I could fix it but it’s probably too late. I’m sorry.”

Emma stared at him as she let the truth wash over her.

Curtis Green was sight-blind and the guilt had been eating away at him. Well, she had not seen this one coming. Finally, he coughed.

“Okay, so you’re not talking, which usually means bad things, so I’m just going to leave—”

“Wait.” She blinked as she stretched out her hand to him and he looked at it, as if not quite sure if she was going to touch him or hit him. “As much as it hurts to admit, you’re not the reason I lost my spot. I’ve seen you fight and you have everything it takes to make an amazing dragon slayer. Plus, as Loni has been trying to remind me for the last six weeks, I was the one who tested positive for fairies.”

For the first time since he had accidently almost walked through the Gate of Linaria, Curtis lost the haunted expression and was just looking confused. “Er, I’m not sure you understand what I’ve just told you.”

“I understand,” she assured him.

He continued to study her face before blinking. “The thing is I hadn’t really expected our conversation to go quite this way. I had pictured a lot more yelling and maybe a few I-wouldn’t-go-near-you-if-you-were-the-last-guy-on-earth kind of stuff.”

“You must be mistaking me with some other hotheaded Aries who wanted to be a dragon slayer and might’ve mentioned her eternal hatred for the guy who got her spot,” Emma mumbled as she thought of some of her previous behavior.

“Trust me, I could never mistake you for anyone else.” A small smile hovered on his lips. Then, before she could even begin to allow his words sink in, Curtis let his crutches fall with a clatter to the ground and closed the distance between them. “And now there’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while . . . Emma.”

“There is?” she croaked as she realized he had just called her by her first name. She watched in mute fascination as he tilted his head and his perfectly formed lips came crashing down on hers in a way that she had never dreamed possible. The sensation was instant as she felt herself being engulfed by his broad shoulders while her senses were filled with the smell of vanilla cookies.

His arms snaked around her back and his mouth explored hers. Emma pressed into him and felt her whole body start to tingle with the rightness of it all. It was perfect. Curtis was perfect. He was... wait, why was he pulling away . . . and why wasn’t he kissing her anymore?

“Is everything okay?” she asked in a cautious voice. “You’re not going to have another freak-out, are you?”

“There’s something I think you should see.” He gently steered her around so that she was facing the same way he was, his arms still protectively wrapped around her shoulders, as if he was afraid that she would disappear on him.

“What are you—”

But the rest of her words were lost as there, hovering in the air, just behind where she was standing, was an elaborately decorated container about the size of a backpack. The wood was so dark it looked almost black, while deep red gems were studded in the lid and glistened around it like some sort of blood-soaked halo. For an inanimate object it seemed to radiate a lot of evil. Like darkhel, like soul box, she supposed, while not finding the thought remotely comforting.

“You found it,” she croaked. “You really found it.”

“We found it,” he corrected as he stepped back and watched Emma fish the pendant out of the pocket of her shirt. The large circle in the middle of the box was a mirror image of the crystal. “So go on,” he encouraged, and Emma felt her hands start to shake.

Is this what her mom had done when she had banished the darkhel?

The idea of Curtis and her repeating history gave her a small thrill. Of course it wasn’t the same as being a dragon slayer, but at least she was following in her mother’s footsteps in some small way. Even if it had taken Emma four days and a bunch of friends to inadvertently figure out.

She took a deep breath and slipped the pendant into the front of the box. It was a perfect fit and she watched as the top opened up like a flower and a dark wisp of smoke curled out. For a moment it hovered over her head before it formed into a small, tight ball and then it went speeding out of the freezer and off into the food court.

A second later the box itself disappeared and the crystal pendant fell to the floor with a clatter. She bent and picked it up before turning back to Curtis, slipping her hand into his and shooting him a shy smile. He squeezed her hand and gave her a dazzling smile that made her feel short of breath.

There. It was done. The darkhel’s soul had been returned, and in twenty-four hours the vile creature would be banished back to the other side of the gate, where it belonged.

Emma just hoped that things didn’t get worse before they got better.