Pie is gravitating towards my statue, but I pull her back and lead her around the other side of the inner chamber. “This is where I go when I’m in here.”
And as we get to the back of the statue, everything in front of us becomes forest.
“How big is it?” Pie asks, her voice a hushed whisper now.
“There is no end to these woods. It might actually be some kind of circle, because if you run for long enough, you’ll end up right back here. But then again, maybe that’s just magic.”
“Wow.” Her voice is still low. Almost reverent. “It’s so dark.”
“Yeah. It’s always dark in here. But I don’t mind it much. And if you’re worried about tripping—”
“After all that climbing?” She laughs. “No. I get it. My new hooves are pretty good at keeping me upright. Where do you go when you come here? Do you have a house?”
“No. Not a house, but I do stay in a little clearing. And there’s a huge hollowed-out tree. But I mostly sleep outside. I hope it’s not too rustic for you. That cottage of yours is downright luxurious compared to my home.”
She takes my hand and entwines her fingers with mine. Her eyes are lit up a little. Kind of… smoky blue now, like a fog or the glow from lights at night. “Sleep?” She looks up and around. Even though there’s not a lot to see at the moment, the sense of wonderment is all over her face. “I don’t think I’ll get a single wink of sleep tonight.” Then she looks at me, shoulders shrugged up to her ears. “I can’t believe I did it. I can’t believe how easy it was.”
“I’m worried about that too.”
“Worried? Oh, I’m not worried. Today might be the first day in my entire life that I feel…” She lets out a long breath. “That I feel… powerful.”
This statement is both sad and uplifting. I hate that she spent her life feeling inadequate. And if she’s not human, then that’s even worse. Because someone trapped her inside that human body and just… left her there. To be abandoned.
“I think I’m really good at this spelling stuff, Pell. I think I really can break your curse. I think… I think all I have to do is rewrite the poem over the doors and then—”
I place a fingertip on her lips and she stops talking immediately. “Tomorrow, Pie. It’s been a long day. And maybe you won’t be able to sleep—I’ll stay up with you, if that’s the case—but maybe, after I’m done with you, you’ll be so exhausted you’ll pass out and have the best sleep of your life.”
She reaches up, takes my hand, kisses the tip of my finger, and pushes her body into mine. “Take me there. Take me to your little clearing right now or I won’t be able to stop myself.”
There’s a part of me that wants to keep the banter going. I like that about us. I like teasing a blush out of her, and I like the way her innocent reactions heat me up from the inside out.
But instead, I take her hand and lead her deeper into the forest. My hooves follow a path carved out after thousands of years of travel. It is well worn, and smooth, and comforting as it weaves its way around giant trees and through cracks in ancient slabs of granite.
Finally, the clearing is in front of us.
“I can’t see anything, Pell.” Pie whispers this. Like she’s afraid we might wake something up.
“It’s OK. Just follow me.” I’ve still got a hold of her hand, so I tug her a little. Being her eyes.
“Can you see in the dark?” Pie asks.
I stop and turn, then look her up and down. I don’t really know what darkness looks like because I’ve never seen it. Not the way others describe it—a void. A blackness. Utterly empty.
I don’t see blackness in the dark, I see a faint lavender glow. It’s just a touch of light. And I’m not even sure it is light. It feels like smoke. Like air. Like mist. But it’s not any of those things. It’s just a tiny bit of glow.
But to my eyes, it might as well be the sun. That’s how well I see in the dark.
Right now, Pie looks like an ethereal being. Some kind of fairy, maybe. Not the human-sized ones that walk between worlds. The tiny, sweet kind that live inside the cups of blooming flowers or the dip down the middle of a broad leaf.
Not for the first time, I wonder what kind of chimera she really is. Because she seems like so much more than the woods.
“What?” she says. “Why did we stop?” She probably can’t see me, but we’ve been standing here for several seconds in silence, so it’s getting awkward.
“Fairy blood,” I say.
“What?” She laughs this word out.
“I think you have fairy blood in you.”