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Alden was beginning to feel a bit like the line of a heart monitor—shooting up and then plunging desperately back down. He was flat lining now. It was in her face, the nervous flash of her eyes, the subtle pitch in her voice: she resented his company; it made her uncomfortable and wary. He suppressed a melancholic sigh, and tuned out from his second internal crises that night to focus in on what she was saying to him. She was asking where he lived, suspecting the woods. A flicker of panic licked his heart, but he set it aside. “On the other side of the docks; there are a few old fishing houses down there.” In his attempt to be truthful, he had only corned himself into a lie anyway.

[i]I thought only the herbal lady lived out there?[/i] It took him a moment to grasp that the ‘herbal lady’ she spoke of was their guardian, Hazel. Is that what they called her here: herbal lady? As if her knowledge of the earth’s ins and outs was something unusual enough to grant her a moniker. Humans were strange in the way they rejected what the world had to offer. Herbal lady Hazel’s knowledge of remedies and afflictions had been privileged to her from the Fay, as it had been to her mother and her mother before her, and before her, and so the list went on. Or so Alden had heard. He had not known the guardian’s family, barely knew the guardian herself. The queen did not like the courts to acknowledge her existence in their forest. Other creatures knew her, though, and would occasionally have a story or two to tell about her. Her hair was like wheat, eyes like pale jade; she liked to sing and to garden; she was kind, and to break her smile was a true accomplishment; a daemon in the form of a stoat had chosen her when she was just six. Pointless bits of information about her were all he knew. The Fay did not regard her, and it sounded like her own kind did much of the same. Alden felt a pang. He felt sorry for himself because he could not find acceptance in a world he did not belong—how would he feel if is his own kind rejected him? 

When Carla pointed out the pessimism in her remarks, Alden crooked a small sort of grin. There seemed no easy way for him to reply, so he opted not to. Instead, he shifted, stretching his legs straight out in front of him. It was not the admission that she did not see the fair as he did that ‘bummed’ him out, it was her. It was her fortified walls that blocked his every approach; it was the gloominess that clung to her like a shadow. It seemed to bleed onto him, stinging him with a hollow sort of sadness that tried to choke his own happiness. Suddenly, he was homesick for the comfort of family. In his mind’s eye, he could see his sisters and brothers, like little hummingbirds, peacefully asleep. It was late, he was long due for sleep, and it weighed down upon him like a thick fog.

Carla went on to tell the reason behind her predicament. Quiet fell on them for no more than a few seconds, but again, she was bothered by it. He wondered why silence rattled her. With a tenuous laugh, she revealed what had crossed his mind a time or two since meeting her. Pondering the merit of her statement, he cocked his head to gaze at the few people milling about the sidewalk opposite of them. A girl only a few years younger than him picked at cotton candy with a friend. Her eyes were wide and bright; her teeth were bared in a wide smile as she spoke eagerly about something he could not hear. Would he have been better off if he had introduced himself to her instead? Would he be the reason she smiled so big? 

After a time, he spoke, “Perhaps, but I didn’t choose someone else, I chose you; maybe you don’t have to believe in fate to believe that means something.” His eyes turned back to her; he smiled sweetly. Despite their tumultuous interaction and his resulting inner turmoil, Alden was glad that he met her. She was special. Dark and distant, but his first friend in this strange land all the same.

A car’s bright headlights illuminated his eyes suddenly. He squinted against them. By the way the vehicle slowly roamed the road, Alden knew that it belonged to the brother who was picking her up. “Looks like that’s my cue to leave; I don’t want to inspire any protective-big-brother-wrath.” He laughed softly and picked himself up off the ground. “It truly was a pleasure meeting you tonight, Carla. I’ll wish you goodbye, but hopefully only for now.” Dusting off the seat of his pants, he waited just a moment for her response before dipping back into the shadows of the boardwalk. “Oh, and don’t forget to charge your phone next time; you never know what crazy stranger you’ll meet around here!” He chuckled at his own joke and walked until he could no longer see her or the car.

When the boardwalk stilled of human life, Alden shrunk himself down and buzzed carefully home. After a night of questionable success, he was eager to get back to the comfort of home and sleep until a new day began.
 
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[center][b]~*~Next Morning~*~[/b][/center]

Pretty rays of light tinted pink by thin curtains danced across Hazel’s closed eyelids. She murmured and turned away, eyes flashing open to see Sinis curled in a rock-like slumber next to her on the pillow. Smiling, she rubbed her eyes and slipped from the cozy grasp of blankets that wrapped around her like a hug. The new day brought with it tremendous healing. Listlessness and despair no longer pecked at her skin. So long as she strayed from thoughts of the tragedy of the fallen fay, or of Hale’s betrayal, her mind was at peace again. Horrible mistakes had been made, as was the curse of being human, but she would not let herself fester over them—that would accomplish nothing.

Every step she took to the kitchen was marked by the groans and creeks of her aged wood floor. The noise eventually pried open the sleeping eyes of her stoat; he stumbled into the room as she filled a kettle with water and placed it on the stove, looking like he hadn’t slept a wink in days. He hopped up next to her on the counter and displayed his dagger-teeth in a massive yawn. While she waited for the water to boil, she picked some berries from a bowl and offered one to him. He took it from her with his mouth and chewed slowly, eyes snapping shut every second or so as if he were actively fighting sleep. By the time the kettle keened, his energy had made a miraculous recovery. He skittered to and fro around the house; the teeny scratching of his nails across floor was a familiar melody as she sat at the table and drank her tea. 

Midmorning found them both on her porch. He dozing in the sun while she worked. Humming an old forgotten lullaby that had suddenly surfaced in her brain, she swept away a layer of dust that had settled on the steps. The grime would only return by the time she was back from work, but it was the effort that counted. She pulled errant weeds from her germinating flowerbeds, and then watered the plants she wished to grow there. It wasn’t until Sinis, ever the watchdog, shot up from his perch on the banister and gazed stonily behind her that she became aware of an approaching presence. 

Her surprise was not because the person near her property was a faerie, but because of who it was, or rather, was not. She had expected the queen to pay her a visit, as she always did when an error was made on Hazel’s part. A radiant, maternal-looking woman, the queen was kind but a master at hiding insults in her compliments. She did not approve of Hazel as guardian, and never visited without subtly implying once or twice that she should forfeit the position.

The particular fay that approached was unfamiliar to her, as most of them were. He sat atop a splendid creature she had only had the pleasure of viewing once before in her life. It was unusual for an official member of the court to visit her; unusual indeed, and she found her head spinning with the implications behind this man’s visit. Morphing the surprise on her face into a friendly smile, she finally made her approach. 

“Hello,” She greeted. Her head craned back just to make eye contact with the stranger. “Can I help you with something?”