Эприлинн Пайк: Wings

David laid Tamani in the backseat and tried to make him comfortable, but Tamani brushed his hands away. “Just get me back to Shar. Hurry.”

David held Laurel’s door open, but she shook her head and, without looking at him, slid into the backseat with Tamani.

Laurel settled Tamani’s chest and head on her lap and he clung to her like a child, groaning each time David drove over a bump. His face was pale and his black hair slick with sweat. She tried to get him to open his eyes, but he refused. As his breathing grew more and more ragged, Laurel glanced up at David, who watched her in the rearview mirror. “Can’t we go any faster?” she pleaded.

David pursed his lips and shook his head. “I can’t speed, Laurel. It’s too risky. What do you think a cop would say if he pulled us over and saw Tamani?” His eyes met hers in the rearview. “I’m going as fast as I dare — I promise.”

Tears filled Laurel’s eyes, but she nodded, trying not to notice that Tamani’s grip on her arms was getting looser.

The road was mostly empty, but Laurel held her breath the entire way through Crescent City and then Klamath as they passed close to several other cars. One man even looked over at her, and she wondered if his sunglasses covered mismatched eyes. Just as she felt sure he was a troll sent to finish them off, he looked away and turned down a side street.

Finally the driveway came into view and David pulled off the road. The unpaved drive was bumpy, but Tamani didn’t protest as the car bounced over ruts. Laurel’s breath stuck in her throat as David reached the end of the drive and shifted into park.

“Please hurry, David,” Laurel begged in a whisper.

David ran around to the other side of the car and helped her ease Tamani out. They dragged him past the house and down the now-familiar path. As soon as they passed the tree line, Laurel began shouting in a sob-strained voice, “Shar! Shar! We need help.”

Almost instantly, Shar stepped onto the path from behind a tree. If he was shocked, it didn’t register on his face. “I’ll take him,” he said calmly. He lifted Tamani from David and Laurel and slung him gently over his shoulders. “You can’t come any farther,” Shar said to David. “Not today.”

David’s brow furrowed and he looked to Laurel. Laurel threw her arms around him. “I’m sorry,” she whispered and turned down the path.

David caught her hand. “You are coming back, aren’t you?” he asked.

Laurel nodded. “I promise.” Then she pulled her hand away and hurried up the path after Tamani’s limp form.

As soon as David was out of sight, other faeries stepped onto the path, adding their shoulders beneath Tamani’s weight — a parade of unbelievably beautiful men, several clad in camouflaging armor. Each faerie who appeared made Laurel feel better. Tamani wasn’t alone now — the faeries would find a way to make everything all right. She had to believe it. They led her down a twisted path that looked strangely unfamiliar and came to a stop in front of an ancient tree that, even in the chilly late-autumn air, had not changed color.

Several of the faeries took a turn placing a palm in a shallow hollow on the tree’s trunk. Finally, Shar lifted Tamani’s limp arm and placed his hand on the tree. For a few seconds, no one moved and nothing happened. Then the tree began to sway and Laurel gasped in surprise as a crack appeared at the base. It widened and grew, pushing the trunk out, molding it into an archway. The air glimmered and sparkled until it was almost too bright to look at. Then a brilliant flash shone and Laurel had to blink. In the instant it took to close her eyes and open them again, the shimmering air had turned into a golden gate snaked with brilliant white blossoms and glittering with millions of sparkling jewels.

“Is that the gate to Avalon?” Laurel said breathlessly to Shar.

Shar barely spared her a glance. “Bar her way; Jamison’s coming through.”

Spears crisscrossed in front of her and Laurel realized she’d taken several steps forward. She was almost overwhelmed by the urge to push through the spears and run to the shining gates, but she forced her feet to stay where they were. The gate was moving now, swinging slowly outward in an arc as all the faeries backed away and made room. Laurel couldn’t see much as she strained against the spears, but her eyes found an emerald-green tree, a sliver of cerulean sky, rays of sunshine that sparkled like diamonds. The thick aroma of fresh earth rolled over her, along with a heady, intoxicating scent she couldn’t identify. A white-haired man in long, flowing silver robes waited on the other side of the shimmering gate. Laurel couldn’t help but stare as he made his way forward to stand by Tamani. He ran a finger down Tamani’s face and looked back at several other faeries carrying a stretcher.

“Take him quickly,” he said, beckoning them forward. “He’s fading.”

Tamani was transferred onto the soft white stretcher, and Laurel watched helplessly as he was borne into the shining light that poured from the gate. She had to believe he would be fine now, that she would see him again. Surely no one could enter a world so full of wonder and not heal.

When she looked up, the older faerie’s eyes had settled upon her. “I assume this is her,” he said. His voice was too sweet, too musical to be of this world. He walked toward her as if he were floating on air, and the face she looked up into was so beautiful. He seemed to glow, and his eyes were soft and blue and surrounded by wrinkles that fell not in the uneven crevices she saw on Maddie’s face but in exact, even folds like perfectly hung drapes. He smiled at her gently, and the pain of the last twenty-four hours melted away.

“You’ve been very brave,” Jamison said in that sweet, angelic voice. “We didn’t think we would need you so soon. But things never go quite as planned, do they?”

She shook her head and looked back through the gate, where she could just see the top of Tamani’s head. “Will he…will he be all right?”

“Don’t worry. Tamani has always been stronger than anyone expected him to be. Especially for you. We will take good care of him.” He placed a hand on her shoulder and beckoned her down the unfamiliar path. “Will you walk with me?”

Her eyes stayed locked on the gate into Avalon, but she responded instinctually. “Of course.”

They walked in silence for a few minutes before Jamison stopped and invited her to sit on a fallen log. He joined her and sat close, their shoulders almost touching. “Tell me about the trolls,” he said. “You obviously ran into trouble.”

Laurel nodded and told him how Tamani had been so careful and brave. Jamison’s eyes glimmered with respect as she described how Tamani refused to talk even after being shot. She hadn’t expected to tell him about herself, but she began speaking of how she’d held the gun and couldn’t bring herself to shoot the monster until her life depended on it. And even then it was mostly an accident.

“So he got away?” There was no judgment in his voice.

Laurel nodded.

“It’s not your fault, you know. Tamani is a trained sentry and he takes his work very seriously. But you, you were made to heal, not kill. I think I’d have been disappointed if you were able to kill someone, even a troll.”

“But he knows now. He knows who I am.”

Jamison nodded. “And he knows where you live. You must be on your guard. For your parents’ sake as well as your own. I am appointing you as their protector. Only you know the secrets that can keep them alive.”

Laurel thought of her father lying in his hospital bed, perhaps even now taking his last breaths. “My father is dying, and in a few days there will be no one left but my mother and me. I can’t be what you want me to be,” she admitted in a shaky voice. Her face dropped into her hands and desperation washed over her.