Golden Child | ✓

6. Legend

A sound in the night woke her. Aurelie jerked awake, raising herself up to rest on her elbows. She wasn't at all cold and when the three wisps of flame danced nearer to her, she knew why. Their fire had kept her from freezing.

Still, there was the matter of what she'd heard. The wisps made no noise.

A snuffling broke the calm and sent fear racing down Aurelie's spine. Her father always said that bears could smell fear and there was no way she could outrun one.

Animal eyes appeared along the rim of the wisps' light, bright silver among the shadowy boughs of the trees. Aurelie opened her mouth in a silent cry and stretched out her hand when the wisps vanished and reappeared, slowly edging away from her and toward the wild beasts.

Heart pounding against her breastbone, Aurelie waited for her predators to pounce.

The entire forest illuminated in a blazing flash of blue. Aurelie shielded her eyes with her arm. When the light dimmed, hundreds of wisps surrounded her. They were accompanied, not by bears, but by people in long silver and azure robes with crowns of antlers resting upon their fair heads. The silver animal eyes belonged to several giant elk.

A woman stepped forward. Purple powder coated her eyelids. Her ears tapered into long points and when she opened her mouth so did—Aurelie realized with a frightened start—her teeth. "So you're the one who has been upsetting the natural balance, golden child of Thesya," the woman said.

"Who are you?" Aurelie stammered.

"We are the faerie," the woman answered, gesturing to her half dozen companions. She put her hand to her chest. "My name is Iskra. We've been awaiting your return."

Aurelie clutched her long golden braid—the one Gin had plaited the morning before—in her hands. "Why me?" Aurelie whispered.

One of the elk shuffled and snorted among the rank of faerie, tossing its bridled head. The faery holding its reins patted the beast's snout.

"You are the rare human born with magic in your blood," Iskra explained. "Your powers have truly awakened from coming into contact with something from our realm." Her elegant fingers brushed the air as if parting a veil and another blue glow winked into sight. "Our lanterns appeared at your summons."

Faerie lanterns.

"Is there anything I can do to get rid of my powers?" Aurelie asked. She held her hands out. "Can you take them from me?"

Iskra shook her head, pale white hair swaying like the boughs of a birch tree. "No, and they will only grow stronger."

Aurelie's eyes filled with tears. "I don't want to go."

The faery woman sighed. "We did not speak of going yet."

"But that's why you're here, isn't it?" Aurelie cried as she tried in vain to catch all her falling tears with her sleeve. "I'm bad luck and they can't keep me anymore."

Iskra neared her and knelt in the moss. "There is neither bad luck nor good luck in the world. That is man's way of explaining what he cannot understand." She placed a gentle hand on Aurelie's shoulder and kindness glinted in her eyes. "But the longer you stay in the mortal realm, the more painful the eventual parting will be."

"My family." Aurelie wept. She'd never eat her mother's dumplings again or listen to her father's rumbling baritone. Gin would walk to school alone and she would have no one to whisper to and exchange secrets with at night. "Can I at least say goodbye?"

"No." Iskra smiled sadly. "You would not want to leave and they would not let you go."

Aurelie fell into Iskra's arms sobbing. She beat at the faery's chest and her hands hit metal underneath cloth, but still she beat harder. "They'll miss me!" she screamed while Iskra wrapped her arms around her. The faery crooned soothing nothings into Aurelie's ear, but Iskra's voice was not her mother's voice with the faint western accent. Iskra's laugh would not be Gin's silver.

Taking in ragged breaths, Aurelie whimpered, "What will they do without me ... What about everything I ruined?"

"We will lessen your memory," Iskra said. "It will be like a fond dream for them all, and if you wish, we can encompass the past couple weeks as well."

Aurelie sniffled. "Will Connor like Gin again?"

"Pardon?" the faery asked. Once Aurelie explained, Iskra nodded. "Connor will like Gin again."

Aurelie closed her eyes, hating the words about to leave her mouth and seal her fate. "I'll go."

The faerie procession mounted their elk, but before taking Iskra's hand, Aurelie slipped the golden ribbon from her hair. She pressed a kiss to the silk. Tying the ribbon around one of the shrine's legs, she whispered a goodbye.

On the ride, Iskra assured her that they would have come to fetch her someday, prayer or no prayer. But the wound in Aurelie's heart was still too fresh for Iskra's balm to soothe.

She wasn't good luck or bad luck. She wasn't any luck at all.

The wisps had led her to the new life her father believed in, but that change meant dying to her family. In the end, perhaps both her father and mother had been right.

✧ ───── ✧ ───── ✧

Many years later, when the faerie had deemed her magic controlled enough to no longer threaten the balance, Aurelie would return for a brief visit. But Gin and her parents would be long gone, their names passed from memory.

The villagers would only remember her name, and not as Aurelie.

They'd remember a legend, the Golden Child of Thesya.

✧ ───── ✧ ───── ✧

This story was written for avadel community's Stars and Short Stories Monthly Competition for the month of September. The chosen prompt was #1 [visual prompt pictured at the heading].