Page 54 of Why Broken Wings Fray

Not of my own will, I started to walk towards them, until a burly hand grabbed mine and yanked me back around the corner. It was with a scream and a hiss that I found myself back in the alley, pinned to the wall by Killian’s body.

While the two strangers had been large and sculpted in neat, smooth ways, Killian was tremendous and solid in a brawny, rugged type of way.

I shook my head several times, the fog that had lured me out of the street and towards the strangers passing with every second. “What… Who…”

“Fairies,” he whispered, his voice hoarse as he kept me pinned between his two hands that met the wall behind me. “Stay quiet.”

Fairies!

Last year, Killian had given me a few quick rules while in Saoghal. At the time, they had been simple with: don't show anyone my ears, don’t trust anyone, but most importantly, don’t mention fairies.

Yet here they were. Two of them in broad daylight, strolling down the street, matching slacks with their hands deep in their pockets. No wings, no trail of magical dust behind them, no outlined glow. Just human-looking creatures with that strangeness to them that made me want to investigate.

Killian remained as stiff as a rock, caging me in, until we saw the two fairies pass by the entrance to the street. Once they did, Killian’s eyes lolled and he let out a sigh, finally releasing me from my imprisonment.

“But… Why couldn’t they see us?” I asked as he nodded and allowed us to exit the stingy back alley.

“It probably would have been fine if they saw you. But not me.”

Killian’s stern face suggested he thought that was explanation enough. Perhaps he didn’t know me as well as he thought, because I took to pouting and frowned. “Why not?”

“The history between us, our two kinds, is not a pleasant one. And I do not mean like the kingdoms of Saoghal with their disagreements and their small fights. I mean from the moment the earth sprouted and fairies and pixies sprouted with it, we have longed for the extinction of the other.”

My frown remained as I guided us across the roadway and took to the narrow path that ran along the top of the hill, overlooking the ocean beyond. “But why? Why hate one another?”

To that, Killian shrugged. “If you ask me, I don’t think a single one of us remembers why we hate the fairies. When I was young, I asked my mother and father, and they gave me the same answer that their parents gave them and theirs gave them. No one remembers. We just do.”

I couldn’t help but to roll my eyes. “It’s silly, isn’t it? You pixies are… Well, you know how to hold a grudge. Between the constant fighting of the kingdoms of Saoghal, then the Rachainn, you’d think that perhaps the feud with the fairies could be forgotten. One less thing to worry about.”

To my surprise, Killian actually nodded along. “I agree. But we’ve reached somewhat of an understanding. The fairies dwell in the human realm, taking to your sizes and your mannerisms, and we remain in Saoghal. There was a place, once, where we all existed alongside one another.”

“Like Saoghal? But bigger?”

He nodded.

“The Aos Sí, Redcaps, Pixies, and Fairies. There were Elves and Gnomes and Sprites, too.”

I gulped before offering a small admission of my year off. “The Aos Sí and the Fairies, are they not the same thing?”

Killian’s grin grew wide as he looked down his shoulder at me. “You’ve been reading about us, haven’t you?”

Among other things.

“They are similar, but not always the same.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

He shrugged as we continued along.

“How did you know they were fairies? They just looked like… handsome men?”

I made my pixie companion laugh at that, the small creases along his face tightening. “Is that what made you walk towards them, Olivia? Because they were handsome men? I don’t recall you walking towards me in the same way.”

My face blushed a putrid shade of red and I dipped my chin so that my hair could cover it. But Killian reached over and tucked that hair right back behind my ears, his fingers skimming the rounded ends of them.

“Do not be embarrassed. Fairies have a very unique type of magic, a magic of the mind and the emotions. They cannot burn you with fire but they can convince you to fall on your own blade. That pull you felt towards them? It is as natural to their being as the need to breathe is. They cannot help it and you cannot resist it.”

“But you can?”