Magic in the Key of Joy (A Wylde & Cray Adventure) UIC2022

Chapter 11 - Thingh Can Only Get Better

Have any of you ever been betrayed? And I'm not talking about your average, everyday "I've been sleeping with your {insert shocking s.o. or relative or non-human heartthrob here} for the past year", viral social media bombshell type of betrayal – oh, no (said in Miss Coco Peru's deepest voice.) I'm talking your mike-dropping through the floor, SCOTUS nominees lying about their stance on Roe Vs. Wade, J.K. Rowling transphobia sort of Andrew Lloyd Webber-esque operatic EPIC BETRAYAL.

If you're a single gay man in your 30s or older, you've been here before, right? Am I right? The young college student saying he's found someone who's more in tune with his generational needs (he's found a sugar daddy); the soap star who tells you he's not ready for commitment of any kind (there's a casting director he needs to get to know better); the straight married man who tells you, 4 years into your affair, he's just 'experimenting' and is happily hitched (and – ha! – he's really a top); and the who-knows-how-many thousands of years old gorgeous, sexy Sidhe stud who actually just wants you dead and done with.

Oh, wait – that's just me. Gaga, give me strength! They made my skin cover my mouth, like something out of a Clive Barker film. But that didn't stop me. Sang that facial foreskin right off! I'm getting the hang of my musical mojo. I think. I look up and see Sunny and Luna licking Baelena's bleeding arms. Why are they all here? Then I see Mara, the uber-scary demon that I turned into a baby, only now she's a little girl who somehow seems familiar. And not quite as misshapen or ugly as I remember her.

Baelena stands, and yikes! She's got a hunched back, and two long front incisors that are very Hell-Boyish. And her hair, what there is left of it, is spare, grey and kinky. Mara walks over to her, raising her arms, and Baelena picks her up.

"I'm not going back there," I finally manage to croak out. "I'm rather fond of being alive." At which point, Sunny starts singing the first verse of the Sondheim song that bears that name. I have to laugh, because of where we are, and who's doing the singing. He's got heart and souls, but I guess ferrcats must be naturally off-key. "You've been holding out on me, friend," I tell him.

"What do you think of the Shadow Lands?" asks Baelena, who's getting an earful of happy giggling from Mara. I look around and, besides being a chiaroscuro of blacks and greys, where in Sidhe-Town (to use Baelena's term) there would be technicolor, it looks very much the same as the world above. Which makes me wonder...

"Bae, are we underneath..."

"No," she answers, "we're alongside where we came from."

It takes a bit for me to understand that. I decide to attempt writing my name in the air, but it's my left hand that rises. Which means that...

"We're a mirror image?"

"Yes, and that is the truth that Selrach Windar denies, to the doom of every last living thing in my world. And could very possibly be doing irreparable damage to yours."

Now I'm stumped, whether due to the fact that I'm currently a rainbow man stuck in a monochrome world, or I've been betrayed by that 'once in a lifetime' guy, I'm not sure. "Could you be a bit more vague, for my sake?"

If you were to die here, what do you think would happen to the you on the other side?" Baelena walks down a winding path. Mara runs on ahead.

"I would die? Again?"

"Yes, but it would take hundreds of years. First, you'd go insane, then you'd become monstrous, and finally you'd fade away. For each Sidhe there is a Sluagh; for every Sluagh, there is a Sidhe. All, save one. Here we are. Welcome to my humble Seer's home."

It was a simple yet elegantly set up cottage, centered inside a circle of flowers and vegetables, ringed by tall Oaks – and all in whites, greys and blacks. Mara plays hide and seek with the ferrets, and Baelena puts on tea as she continues her explanations.

"There's only one Seer, so that the Future can be foretold without bias. When we had the Schism..."

"Here's where I am clueless. I've heard of the Schism, and then the Sundering. Please, explain."

She sighs. "The Schism is where the Fae – as a united race – split the Mortal plane in twain, with the main percentage of the physical Earth occupied by humankind, and the majority of the ethereal plane occupied by the Fae. The Sundering is where the Sidhe banished the Sluagh to the Shadow Lands, which were created by further splitting the ethereal plane in twain."

Sunny chirps, "The plane in Spain stays mainly sliced in twain..."

I glare back, and guffaw. "You have been spending way too much time with me."

"Nah," he responds, "I think it rubbed off when you resurrected me!"

As Baelena pours us cups of odorless tea, she continues: "My nephew was born after the Sundering. This is important, because Cray and all those born post-Sundering are unaware of this one Sidhe to one Sluagh correspondence."

"Why?" I ask. The tea is also tasteless. Starbucks, I think, would fail utterly here.

"Selrach. He asked me about the future should the Sundering succeed. When I told him, he said I was insane. He and the rest of the Council spelled me to silence regarding it."

"How is it that you can tell me?"

"You're human, you silly man," chitters Luna, as she curls up in my lap. "Not Sidhe."

"Selrach wants to kill the Sluagh. And by pushing the Sluagh into the Shadow Lands, they are farther away from the physical plane, which makes them weaker. And that means..." Baelena again pauses, waiting for me to do the mental hop-scotching.

I'm quicker this time. "...that the Sidhe are also weaker, so they need to visit my plane more often, hence Cray and his Department. And if Selrach and his super-charged cohorts go up against the Sluagh, thanks to the law of correspondence, it's self-annihilation."

Mara runs in, and leaps into my lap, startling poor Luna, who launches into the air and somehow manages, catlike, to end up in Baelena's lap. Mara opens her hand, and brings it to my face. Inside it is what looks like a greyish seed. She taps my left hand, which she turns palm up and places the seed in it. She curls my fingers over it. I feel a tingle, and open my fingers, to find it has vanished. Mara kisses my cheek, and runs outside.

"What did I do to Mara, Baelena? She's Sluagh, but in college literature I was taught that the Sluagh are hideous, murderers, and pure evil! That their realm is one of pain and suffering, torture and gruesome horrors. They consume blood and flesh, brains and bones, souls and children. How do I reconcile that with what I have seen here so far?"

Suddenly a decapitated head appears in front of Baelena, who takes the spoon from her teacup, scoops out some brains from the open skull, and chews them. As she swallows and belches, it all vanishes. "Was any of that real?"

I shake my head.

"Would you have been afraid if you'd seen me without knowing anything about me?"

I nod.

"The Sluagh relish and feed on fear. Conversely, the Sidhe relish and feed on laughter and joy. As for Mara – she loves you for restoring her, making her whole again. Her Sidhe counterpart was killed during the Sundering. Mara was drawn to you, and you in particular, because of your unbiased magic. By offering her life instead of death, she began anew. Somewhere, there is a Sidhe Mara once more."

I think of the elf-child on the beach. "Is Cray under Selrach's control?"

Luna answers: "Not entirely."

Sunny enters, panting from all the running around young Mara has made him do, and adds, "He loves you, Wylde. He also loves his job, and seeing that the Sidhe are kept safe from the Sluagh. I don't know how Windar will explain his actions today and keep Cray on his side."

"How can we stop this unintended self-genocide?" I ask, afraid of the answer I know I'm going to get.

"First, you must undo the Sundering. Then, you must get Windar to confess. The hardest of these will be the confession, for Selrach is the most powerful Fae alive." Baelena looked at him with worry etched into her regal face (even with the Hell-Boyish incisors, she is regal.) I hate to add to that worry.

"You're wrong about that," I correct her, "because to undo the Sundering, I'll have to face Cray."

Sunny hums "The Impossible Dream" from Man of La Mancha. Even off-key, it makes me hopeful, but only a little bit.