Indra nodded. “The enchanted shell is for the rest of the Fae to go and experience earth. The blue door is only for… special missions.”
Okay, I could get past that. But what I really want to know was burning a hole in my tongue.
“Tell me…” I hedged, “who are the Sons of Darkness? My mother spoke of them just now, before she…” I couldn’t say died, I just couldn’t. But I was a natural scholar, born with a book in my hand as my mother would say. If there was new information to learn, I would seek it out. Even in these dark circumstances, I had so many questions and needed answers to move forward.
Indra nodded, clearly taking the lead before the others. “The Sons of Darkness are a … rebel faction. They are a product of the Dark War, and near the end they tried to take over Faerie. They envied our way of life and power, and they struck when we were weakest.”
I shuddered; we did not speak much of the Dark War but for a week in Fae history class. My people were an advanced, loving, and levelheaded race. Many human rumors of Atlantis were actually stories of Faerie and my people. Talking about the times we fell into war, rape, and greed was something I’d rather not relive. The Dark War lasted a hundred years and was the reason the majority of our lands were eaten up by fire and ocean and disease. This small pocket, here under the shield of protection, was all that was left of Faerie. It was the only Faerie I’d ever known, but our aged Fae told us it was a sliver of what once was.
I simply nodded. “Where did they come from? What do they look like?” She’d called them a “product” of the Dark Times. What did that mean?
Indra squirmed, her wings flitting just a bit to let me know she was nervous about answering. “They go by many names. Beasts. Monsters. Demons. Dark Fae.”
Dark Fae? My heart picked up speed in my chest, knocking at my sternum so loudly I was sure the elders heard it. They… they were rumors. Right?
“Dark Fae? Are they… like us?”
Indra and Aubin shared a look before shaking their heads unanimously. “No dear. They are more like the creatures that lurk beyond the dome. Abominations.”
I shivered.
Aubin, the Winter Court elder stepped forward with a generous smile. “The Sons of Darkness are only male. For whatever reason, female babies do not survive their childbearing.”
Oh gods.
“How will I know if I see one?” I was beginning to get really scared that one of these … Sons … was going to be part of my mother’s life work. What if I had to seek them out and kill them? I’d never killed anyone before.
“Men that can transform to an animal with a simple thought.” Indra snapped her fingers and I jumped. “Creatures that need blood to sustain themselves.”
What the what?
Trissa shifted in her seat next to me.
“It’s the men with black wings that cast shadows twenty feet off their bodies that you need to worry about,” Trissa added. “The ones whose wings smoke and flame. They are the most powerful. The leaders.” My mother had been going on “missions” to Earth for two decades and she always reported back to the elders at the end of every mission. They knew everything my mother would have known…
Chills ran the length of my arms. This was not taught in my Fae studies. I also noticed how the elders conveniently left out letting me know where they came from. Rose, the Spring elder of my people was meek and did not speak much, so I kept directing my questions to Indra.
Black wings, shifters, blood drinkers? She’d just described the wild, made-up stories humans liked to read. “Sounds like something out of a human fairy tale,” I mused, wondering if this night would end in a bottle of tequila. I still had some from my Vegas Earth trip with Elle.
Indra’s voice was serious: “It’s very real.”
A headache began to throb at my temples. “Tell me what else I must know. What was my mother’s life’s work? Must I seek these Sons of Darkness?”
Indra clicked her tongue. “No child. You must try to avoid them at all costs. It’s the crystals that you seek. The seeds of the Tree of Life.”
She gestured to the courtyard, and as if the tree knew we were talking about it, the leaves rustled in the wind. One of the large branches looked sick, hanging limply off to the side. My gaze went to the base of the tree and I saw something I didn’t notice earlier. A purplish-blue crystal. A gasp left my throat. I’d seen one of these before, in my mother’s bag when she came home from work one night. She was late and had blood on her face and was very rushed. She’d picked me up from Elle’s house and told me we needed to drop something off at the elders’ home before we could sleep. I’d fallen asleep on the flight over. I was six at the time.
Without realizing it, I stood and walked towards the tree. There were six purplish-blue crystals, all situated on little copper discs in a circle, around the base of the trunk. Half of the discs were filled. Six empty discs stared up at me.
What was it my mother said? I found six of them, you will need to return the rest? Was she talking about these?
“You may touch them. Only a seeker or a Son of Darkness can touch the crystals. The Tree of Life brings death to anyone else who would try to contain its power.”
My hand froze midair. What if she was wrong and I was about to die? But the thrumming just beneath my fingertips called to me, like a magnet pulling me closer. It wanted me to touch it. The second I stroked the cold purple surface, all tension in my shoulders eased. The crystal pulsed a short burst of light, as if communicating with me.
A collective sigh resounded behind me and I realized I had an audience. Were they relieved I could touch it?
“These crystals…” Indra gestured, “are like sentries guarding the barrier of our world. All twelve were stolen the night the Dark War ended, and they were brought to Earth. Your mother brought back one that very night and was able to save Faerie from completely self-destructing.”
Holy shit.
I knew nothing of this. Why? This should be all over our history books. Or at the very least my freaking mom should have told me!
“She found all six?” I gestured to the crystals, knowing already that each one was something my mother had worked desperately to find over the past twenty years.
Indra nodded, her orange hair moving about her head, resembling the flicker of a flame. “These six are the only thing that has kept the shielded walls of our protections standing. Without the remaining six, we will succumb to the darkness and Faerie will be lost forever.”
I swallowed hard. “But surely you have a backup plan?”
Because if the fate of Faerie was in my hands, we were fucked.
She shook her head. “As you know, the Dark War wiped out ninety-percent of our kind. You and your mother are the last seekers we have. Were the last…”
Yeah, I knew that. It’s also why my mom didn’t have some huge battalion of guards. There were a grand total of three trained warriors in Faerie: Trissa, my best friend Elle, and a young Fae who was a whopping twelve years old.
Elle. She was going to shit glitter when I filled her in on all this.
“So, I am to seek these Tree of Life crystals? That doesn’t seem too bad.”
I was trying to be positive, because my emotional state was fragile right now.