Violet

“Let’s go for a walk,” he suggested, smiling sweetly to her. The flask on his hip bounced as they began walking.

Allison thought, Stupid dirt… it feels like I’m stepping on chunks of silly putty.

“You are obviously new to the woods,” he said offhandedly, “I can tell because of the awkward way you are walking.” Allison looked confusedly at him. He wasn’t looking at where she was walking. “Especially because you are barefoot. You seem to know nothing of the dangers of Wonder.”

Allison furrowed her brow and let her lower lip droop. “Well I’ve only just gotten here,” she said in her defense, just before she lost her footing by stepping in a hole in the ground. She cursed quietly and hopped over what looked like melted glass on the mossy rocks. She could only imagine what that could do to your skin.

The short man laughed softly, sending a reverberating sound not unlike music. Allison looked at him in amazement. She thought he would sing like a god.

“Watch your feet,” he said as he walked into the shadow of a tree. She looked down just in time to see a large root reaching toward her with dirt-drenched claws, as if it meant to grab her and pull her under. Scary, she thought as she moved around it, cradling the purple thing encasing her finger.

“So, Embrol,” she began. Before she could even begin to ask the question that had been on her tongue, the faerie man had come directly in front of her. He glared down at her from the safety of his hat’s shadow, seeming to look right through her.

“My name is not Embrol. It is Ancriol. Ahn-cree-all.” He pronounced the last word slowly, his lips moving to the dance of the syllables.

She smiled weakly and tried again. “And-krill?”

The twisted, blurry lines of her expression – seeming both frightened and eager to please with the tone of her voice – made him briefly forget himself in giggles. The shadow on his face became less menacing and more comforting, giving the impression that his mask had fallen. His smile showed a mouthful of imperfect, almost pointed teeth. One of his incisors was chipped as gently as if a child’s nail had carved it. “Forget it. You can just call me An.”

Happy with his reaction, she continued with her inquiry. “So, An… I was wondering: how did you learn English?”

His aura glowed as he pointed to the left, indicating where to walk. He liked that she didn’t walk behind him, but rather at his side. He could feel her there, hear her moving. They ventured toward the small camp that he had built the night before, after the fae funeral had ended. “Donnie has taught me over time.”

“When did you meet him?”

“I have known him almost two and a half years.” He felt her innocent curiosity as if it were material. She was only wondering. She was about to say something else, but Ancriol smiled and lifted an arm for her to stop. Silently, he walked past her and put his palms against the trunk of a nearby tree. He looked like he was trying to make the plant grow just by touch. As she continued to watch, it seemed like the bark was moving. It was so strange that she couldn’t look away, not even when a low branch curved downward, its plump leaves shivering loudly and sprinkling the elf with a shower of bright dewdrops. It sparkled on the brim of his hat and slid backward as he lifted his chin, his hands reaching to meet the branch. With two thin fingers, he plucked a single leaf from it. He turned to her as the tree resumed standing tall, a quiet smile on his lips.

“Here,” he said, offering her the leaf. “It is sweet.”

Her blue eyes shone like sapphires as she took it from him. It was so heavy and smooth that it almost felt like a flat fruit. She could see each tiny vein in its emerald skin. “What should I do? Smell it?”

He chuckled and touched her hands, bringing them closer to her lips. “Eat it.”

She felt something heavy settle into her throat, like a fat toad of suspicion. “Why?” she asked plainly, unable to think of anything more useful in her fear of treachery.

He laughed again and took it out of her hands. “Because it tastes good.” He lifted the leaf and bit into it, chewing happily while putting it forward to her again.

Doubt wiped clean from her mind, she grabbed it and took a bite into her mouth. Moisture drowned her tongue in a sugary flavor. She almost didn’t have to chew before swallowing it; it was like a candy drink. “Wow,” she said in astonishment, ingesting another mouthful of the wonderfully-flavored leaf. Her stomach filled with pleasurable warmth as she ate the rest of it. “That was amazing. What do you call that?”

“The Akil leaf. It is quite delicious, yes?” He tapped the brim of his hat, sending the rest of the droplets flying from it, and stepped around the tree’s large body. “Here is my camp. I didn’t want to greet Donnie until I knew he was here and not travelling.” Allison came around beside him and looked to see a bag resting against the side of the tree with edible leaves, accompanied by what looked like a cape hung on a broken branch. He knelt in the moss and reached his hands to the bag, feeling around the pockets and rough sewing until he found the opening. He slipped his hand inside and pulled out what looked like a spade-shaped knife. A ray of the sunshine overhead glinted on the blade. “So, is he here?”

Her eyes didn’t leave the weapon as he twirled it in his hand. “Uh… he was last night. I woke up and he was gone.”

“Oh yes,” he said, as if remembering something that had occurred to him long ago. He lifted his head and gazed up at her through milky eyes. “Who are you?”

She hadn’t told him her name? Baffled that it hadn’t come up, she said, “Allison. You can call me Alli.”

A smile touched his lips. The sight of it made a memory rise in her mind, like a fossil from the sand of a desert.

Violet.

“I think I’ll call you Allison, if you don’t mind.”

Her cheeks filled with a blush she didn’t understand any more than the sky above their heads. “Oh… okay.”

His grin flashed again as he got to his feet. He took her arm, ignoring the flinch she gave, and pulled her close. “Shh,” he whispered, that strange smile still on his face. “Hold on tight.”

Without another word, he turned and tugged her arms around his neck. She tightened her embrace, noticing for the first time that his hair was held back with a tie. It looked like it might be longer than hers if it were let free.

He bent to grab his bag, took his cape and then stepped forward and lifted his arms to take hold of a low branch. She felt herself being lifted with him as he climbed into the tree, finding places invisible to her to reach the shade of the tree’s higher branches. Allison told herself repeatedly not to look at the ground, though in her stomach she knew that they were already over ten feet off the ground that was her friend. He stopped after a moment, pulled her off of his back, and wrapped her arms around the tree’s trunk. She was sitting beside him on a fat branch, surrounded by the juicy leaves she had already learned to love. His cloak was slung across the branch beside her, his bag hung on another. The knife had disappeared into a shadow she hadn’t seen.

When she looked at him with questions in her throat, the distraction of his finger on her lips shut her up. He wasn’t looking at her. He wasn’t looking at anything, really. It seemed like he was listening. In the shade of his hat, she saw one of his ears twitch like a cat’s. He swept the broad hat off his head and put it on hers. Then he was crawling back down the tree.

She leaned to watch, her eyes nearly covered, but instead found herself wondering how he had disappeared. There was the tree, the leaves, and the splashes of golden sunlight that decorated the green earth below. So… what, he had left her in a tree!? She had to bite her lip to keep from yelling out for him. He had told her to be quiet.

She heard what sounded like Ancriol whispering in her ear, Yes, quiet. Donnie. Quiet.

Donnie? She perked up and pushed the hat from her eyes. She could almost see something through the leaves, but it was so hard… Then she heard a twig snap, and her spine went rigid.

Ancriol had reached the ground. He was melted with the shadows of the woods, only leaving a whispering trace of his existence as he crawled toward Donnie, who was approaching cautiously with what appeared to be a spear in his hand. The faerie blinked his large eyes and smiled inside. Donnie had heard something. He was investigating. Allison was gone from the house where he had left her; that meant that either she had left, or she had been taken.

This was going to be good.