Chapter 13
thirteen
My first trial began exactly one week later.
I was in The Forest with Liza, healing patches of earth while she trotted beside me, dirt on her cheeks, ponytail high.
It was a rare day off from my training with Seer Goddard, but we’d gone almost all night the previous night, and he’d told me to take a day of rest.
“My mom says you’re the Triune Queen,” Liza said shyly, glancing up at me. “Are you?”
“What makes your mom say that? What do you think?”
“If you are the Triune Queen, then you just are,” she said with childlike but very straightforward logic. “Are you?”
“There’s a very good chance,” I admitted. “I’m still learning what it all means. But Fae Queens usually work best with only one element. I’ve been working with three different elements, which is where the title comes from.”
“Cool. Mom says you’ll be good for us. She also says you should be prepared—they’re going to take you soon.”
“Who’s ‘they’?”
“For your first trial.”
“How does your mom know all of this information?”
“She just knows.” Liza’s gaze slid away, and for once the blunt little girl seemed evasive. “She hears things, I guess.”
Liza seemed unwilling to talk about the subject further. Though I was curious about Liza’s home life, and now her mother, I let it go. When the girl had found me at Wisteria Cottage this morning and asked if I wanted to explore The Forest with her, I’d taken her up on the invitation.
“Thanks for the warning,” I told Liza gratefully. “I’m doing all I can—training day and night with Seer Goddard.”
“Mom says the council is full of idiots who don’t want you to be our Fae Queen.”
“Has she met them?”
“No, she just knows things, like I said.”
I laughed. Apparently, Seer Goddard must have known I’d needed this day of rest. I’d been crawling into bed each night exhausted, falling asleep before Silas’s arms finished wrapping around me.
Millie fretted I was too thin; Silas echoed her concerns.
My skin had bronzed, my hair sun-lightened, but despite it all, I felt stronger than ever—focused, purposeful.
Today felt like a gift, to spend time with Liza, who was so buoyant in her enjoyment of the simple things in life that it took my mind off the rest of the world around me. Grueling training surely had its place, but taking a moment to enjoy the island that had become my life was important too.
Ahead, Liza pointed. “Let’s see what’s through there. You go first.”
Normally she bounded ahead, so her suggestion surprised me. Liza didn’t look frightened, though, so I shrugged and agreed.
Two trees stood before us, vines knotted thickly between them, dotted with huge white flowers like water lilies. I pushed the vines aside and stepped through.
“Oh, Liza, it’s just—”
My words cut off as I tumbled into darkness, falling face-first into a pitch-black abyss. I landed, shockingly gently, on a pile of loose dirt and gnarled roots. The air down here smelled ancient and clean, untouched by the world above.
A whisper brushed my mind, the same as the breezy soft voices of my sisters in The Glade. That was when I knew this was the first challenge.
“Liza?” I called, half expecting the girl to be beside me, but I remembered her guarded smile, her warning.
She’d known. Or her mother had known. Either way, Liza had led me here. Had Seer Goddard known my trial was today? Were they in on it together? Or maybe it had just worked out, in the way things were meant to fall together.
I stood and dusted myself off. Pure, powdery soil coated my clothes. I couldn’t see my own hand in front of my face, it was so dark.
Slowly my eyes adjusted. I felt like I’d fallen deeply underground, in a tunnel well below the surface of the earth. Massive roots twisted around me, above my head, along the walls, giving off the impression of a carefully constructed labyrinth of tree roots beneath The Forest.
The ceiling here was so low they pressed against my head if I straightened fully.
A wave of claustrophobia washed over me.
I felt miles beneath the earth, with no ladder, no light, no help—completely and utterly trapped.
Unlike the cave where I’d met my ancestors, there was no reassurance that this was where I was supposed to be. Now, I felt alone and terrified.
The darkness closed in around me, causing me to physically recoil. I crumpled toward the ground, making myself as small as possible, feeling the crushing weight of the earth on my shoulders. A burden that felt physically heavy stole the air from my lungs.
I wrapped my arms around my knees, noticing how thin they’d become over the past few weeks working with Seer Goddard. I didn’t feel strong enough for this, and it was only the first task. Mere minutes into the first task.
I don’t know how long I stayed paralyzed in one spot, struggling to breathe, wrapped in a ball.
The only sound was pounding silence. I’d never witnessed darkness like this, especially not in New York where light gleamed off every surface at every hour.
This place felt like somewhere the Darkest Lord would reside, not me.
What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t move tons of earth to reach the surface. Brute force was not the answer. I’d fallen down a hole, or so I thought, but even that wasn’t certain. It could have been a magical portal to another planet for all I knew.
Light. I needed light to understand my surroundings.
I focused first on my breathing, recalling Seer Goddard’s words: just breathe. For days, I’d sat doing nothing but breathing. Hearing his words cemented into my brain now made sense, like he’d been preparing me for this very moment when even breathing felt impossible.
Once I stabilized my breathing, I began to hum.
The sound came out of me softly, the tune familiar, though it was one I hadn’t thought about in years—not until I’d heard it again in The Glade.
The lullaby from my ancestors. It had helped me feel less alone even as a child, and it helped me feel less alone now.
Humming the tune on repeat helped me to get my mind off the sheer and utter darkness of the cave, to the point where I felt like, maybe, I could begin to move my body and find a way out.
Painfully, I peeled my arms off my legs and forced myself to sit in a more relaxed, cross-legged position on the soft, earthy floor. I ran my hands through the dirt, soft as sand, and focused on my breathing until it became a normal activity again, until every breath wasn’t a monumental effort.
The lullaby became a faint hum in the back of my skull; I wasn’t sure if it was me still thinking about it or if, like in the past, it was a little love note from my ancestors that they would always be there for me.
I let my hands sink deeper into the dirt, allowed my mind to reach out with tendrils of magic. I couldn’t isolate individual rocks like I had in my familiar stone circle. Down here, the earth was fluffy and loose, and I needed to move it like I moved water.
As I sat and focused on calming breaths, my hunting lessons with Silas floated into my mind. That was one of the only times I’d really accessed my magic without being in dire peril. I breathed deeply again, focusing on the sensations I’d experienced while hunting.
In doing so, I searched for those tendrils of magic I’d accessed when the kraken had attacked. As I focused, my hands began to glow. Holding my glowing hands in front of me, I rose to my feet and took a tentative step forward.
The feeling of hunting was helping me access my magic—the concentration, the sense of life or death—even if it wasn’t my life at stake, necessarily.
I used the glow of my hands to take in the underground labyrinth.
That’s what I was realizing it was, a labyrinth of knotted tree roots and compact dirt. I needed to find my way out.
Moving tentatively at first, then more confidently, I searched for an exit. I told myself over and over again that even though I was surrounded by darkness and isolation, I wasn’t alone. My ancestors were pulling for me to get through this trial.
I recalled my training with Seer Goddard, which had supposedly prepared me for this very moment.
As I moved deeper into the maze, skirting one dead end after another, a grounding energy flowed from the dirt through my body and out of my hands.
For the first time, my magic came from calmness, not fear.
Using earth magic, I began hitting fewer dead ends, sensing the cold, hard walls of dirt before I traveled down those paths. I navigated by feel, not even needing the glow of my hands, for what felt like hours. Until finally, I glimpsed a pinprick of light ahead.
Relief surged through me, and I stumbled, then ran toward the exit. Growing more confident with each step that I’d made it. Hungry, tired, thirsty, and proud, I burst through a swinging wall of vines into sunlight and collapsed onto the grass.
Eventually, Liza found me. She collapsed next to me, put her hand on my shoulder. “You did it!”
“You knew about the trial,” I rasped. “You led me there.”
“No, that wasn’t me. I mean technically it was me, but I didn’t know where I was taking you.” Liza handed me a canteen of fresh, cold water, and I drank gratefully. “It was my mom. She told me to lead you through the vines.”
“Can I speak with your mom?” I asked. “It seems like she has a lot of information that could be useful to me.”
“No. I’m sorry, but you can’t.”
I hesitated. “Why not?”
“Because.” Liza shrugged in answer. “She’s dead.”
After some water and bread that Liza had packed for me, I was feeling a lot better. We made our way to the edge of The Forest together, and I reveled in the way the sunlight landed on my face. Never had I been so thrilled to be touched by daylight after those hours spent in a pitch-black maze.
“Your mom…” I said to Liza. “I didn’t know—do you have other family?”
“Yes.” Liza looked up at me with a placating stare. “You don’t have to start worrying about me now. My mom’s been dead since we met; nothing has changed. She’s been dead for a while.”
“Do you talk to her often?”
“I talk to her all the time. Mostly in my head. She doesn’t always respond. But lately, I feel like she’s been trying to get messages through to me.”
“Like the one about the trial?”
“Exactly.”
“There’s no way that I could—”
“No,” Liza said abruptly. “At least not now, not yet. It’s not like I sit down to tea with my mom. The information I get from her comes in different ways. Sometimes through a dream, sometimes a fleeting thought in my head that I know she put there. It’s… not something I can replicate for you.”
“Ah. I see. Well, next time you can, let her know I’m grateful for her, and for her daughter.”
Liza smiled up at me. “I will.”
“And Liza, I’ve always worried about you. I care about you.”
Liza reached over and squeezed my hand. “I’m okay. And to answer your question, yes, I have family around. The Forest Dwellers are a tight-knit crew. We take care of one another. Before you get any ideas, I am happy here with my people.”
“I wouldn’t dream of taking you away, so long as you’re safe and cared for.”
“I am. I should be going back.”
Before I could wish her a more in-depth goodbye, she disappeared into The Forest. My strength was rapidly returning, now that I’d had some water and food. The sunlight helped too, as well as the sense of accomplishment that I’d successfully completed my first of three trials.
One down, two to go.
Instead of returning to Wisteria Cottage, I headed south down the western side of The Isle, following the curve of the shoreline.
I carried my sandals in my hand, relishing the feel of the sun-drenched sugar-sand against my toes.
The lap of waves against the shore. Nothing like a few hours of intense claustrophobia to make one appreciate open air and water a little more.
When I reached the bungalow, I climbed up the creaky porch and found Lily inside, mixing up potions for something or other. She smiled in greeting and gestured for me to take a seat.
“I have a question for you,” I said. “Is it possible for a little girl to talk to someone who’s dead?”
Lily looked up, obviously intrigued. “Like an imaginary friend?”
“No. Like actually talking to a dead person.”
“Should I be concerned?”
“I… don’t get that impression.” Then I carefully explained to Lily about my morning, about the first trial and how Liza had led me there. How she seemed so confident and assured and even matter-of-fact communicating with her mother.
Lily nodded thoughtfully when I finished. “There are complicated ways to commune with the dead, but I don’t think that’s what’s happening here.”
“Ironically, it seems the opposite of complicated. The way Liza explains it, her communication with her mother is the most natural thing in the world. It happens through dreams or thoughts or who knows what else, but it seems to happen without her trying.”
“It’s possible this is a gift specific to Liza. Forest Dwellers are often in tune with nature. They’re generally very spiritual people. They pass down a lot of history and lore through stories.”
“That makes the most sense to me.”
“I met my mother at my wedding,” Lily said softly. “She’s dead, and she was dead then too. It wasn’t something I controlled, though. It was a gift.”
I reached out and pulled Lily in for a hug. There were tears in her eyes at the memory.
“You’ll learn more as your powers grow,” Lily continued, pulling away from me. “The Fae Queens are deeply connected with the spirit worlds. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a way for you to communicate with them as well. It might just take time.”
“Maybe,” I said, and considering I’d just spent time in The Glade with my ancestors, I was pretty sure Lily had a point. “Thanks for letting me stop by. I should go home. I feel like I haven’t seen Silas in weeks.”
“Hang in there. Things will even out, sooner or later. You’re doing a good job.”
“What about Ranger X’s investigation?” I asked. “Has he heard anything new?”
“Nothing interesting to report, I’m afraid.”
“And Fenlon?”
“Same old,” Lily said with an eye roll.
“His following is growing?”
She hesitated. “Yes, unfortunately.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I don’t have time to think about him much. I just need to make it through these trials alive. That’s a slightly more pressing concern.”
“You will,” Lily reassured with a smile. “Now eat a sandwich and get some rest.”