Nada's Escape

54- Butterflies.

Lying over the covers my mind is a-whirl with all that has happened this day. Finley leaving, making preparations for the next escape, the revelation that I can't break the oaths sworn to the Huntsmen. We won't be taking Penny, Liza or any of the other ex-Seveners with us. We are not leaving tonight, nor most likely the next, I remind myself in an effort to calm my thoughts for sleep.

I do however have to be well rested for tomorrow, where we'll hike out to the far reaches of the gardens and plan out of the reach of Huntsmen eyes. If the others agree, tomorrow night we'll go scope out the garage security.

Feeling the faint tug of tiredness, I let my eyes fall shut. But in the thick darkness behind my eyelids a shiver runs up my spine. I jerk awake, distorted images flashing before my eyes. Shards of fear taken straight from this morning's nightmare cut through me even as I note the half-light streaming through the window. I left the curtains open.

I sit up slowly, warily. Listening to every rustle, searching every lumpy, dark corner. I find nothing and still my heart pounds. I turn my attention to the window, to the halo of lamplight past the little front garden. It could be nothing, just nightmares rising like zombies from the memories of the things I've seen since Seven, the things I've had to do. Or maybe I heard something I just haven't processed yet.

I reach into the bedside table, for the little knife I'd insisted we all plant there. I curl up against the headboard, shivering as I slowly realise that the knife is no comfort. Despite my straining I can't hear a rustle in the garden filled with dead leaves, or the poltergeist creak of the front door. There is no one here, no one to stab.

I take a deep breath, struggling to calm myself. I put the little knife back in its drawer and try to shove the memory of my nightmare in behind it. I suppress another shiver as I retreat back to the centre of the bed, keeping my mind in check, starting the wheels turning on plans instead of fears. I recite the little list from this morning. Transport. Food and water. Navigation. Did a feyfly put the symbol on my hand? Can I really break magical oaths?

I mentally erase the last question: I cannot break oaths.

Even though I've beaten it for now, a thread still connects me to the memory of the nightmare. It feels like the shadow of a shiver, sitting at the top of my spine and waiting for weakness to let it in. I refuse to let it in, so I can't sleep. Instead, I get another idea.

I step outside into the shadows of the shrub garden and open the tiny gate. Slinking under the glow of the lamp, I tap on its wrought iron pole.

"What do you know about how this mark appeared on my hand?" I ask.

No response.

"How did it get here and why is it here?"

"Only the Warrior Mage..." It's a tiny voice that replies, fading away towards the end. A wing presses close to the glass, creating a uniform glow for a moment.

"Bullshit! I didn't see the Warrior Mage; I saw one of you. Icy blue eyes, half silver, half gold wings?"

"Boreas?" One whispers in a voice wavering with shock.

"The messenger?" Whispers another.

Tired of talking up at feyflies I can't even see, I cast about for a leg up to lamp level. The wattle in the front garden has been brutally trimmed back around the lamp on this side and I wedge my foot on a sturdy inner branch, hauling myself to eye level.

"Who is Boreas? Who does he carry messages for?" I demand. The feyflies don't reply, just hiss and circle inside the frosted glass.

"Why won't you tell me?" I whine. One stops on the glass panel before me.

"I'm sorry." I think it's the still feyfly who answers, kinder than the other two. "Only Boreas can answer for himself. You must ask him."

"And where do I find him? Which lamp have they put him in?" I press and the feyflies titter, wings moving in blurs of light too fast to see.

"Boreas flies unchained. You won't find him anywhere near these brutes. Apart from that we have no idea." The kind voice replies. I clench a fist; how are creatures so tiny so frustrating! I refrain from hitting the glass though, mostly because I might topple from my perch. I cock my head to the side, examining their outlines so close within the lamp.

"If I let you go, could you find him and ask from me?" I ask.

A hiss, "If one can find him." It's the larger feyfly at the back who flutters its wings this time.

"If you can't, you don't have to ask. But if you tell him... Tell him I have a message for him. Please."

"And who is asking?" The kinder feyfly asks.

"Nada." The three repeat my name over and over in a discordant, tinny whisper.

"Nadanadanada, Hunterhunterhunter."

Rearranging myself to open the lamp, I half fall against it, hand slapping against the glass.

"I'm not Huntsmen. Human. Tell him that." I fumble open the catch, on the other side of the lamp. The feyflies don't reply, just continue chorusing my name.

"Nadanadanadanada..."

One wheels back towards me from the others, halo of light bright against the darkness. The fineness of its living gold scrollwork dazzles me as it hovers in close. I notice the clear membrane between one wire-thin line and the next and the fiery stones that pulse softly, each like a tiny heart. I feel it brush against the tip of my nose, and my eyes flutter in the breeze of its parting.

With the feyflies released I feel a tiny glow of success within me. My room seems blue in the dimmer light coming through the window, but also calmer. I curl into the blankets again, forgetting the nightmare locked away in my memory.

In the swirling time of dreams, I must accidentally brush against it though, because when I wake, tossing in tangled sheets, I'm scraping along a stone crevice, salt on my lips, terrified of the monster behind me. I shake my head for long minutes before I rip myself from the jaws of terror, gasping like I've run a mile.

My room is too dark for daytime, but there's a whisper of dawn creeping through the window. Still shaking, inside and out, I gather the right clothes and pull on a pair of runners. Massaging a green apple against my aching forehead I make for the gardens, drinking in the open space with slitted eyes. It's instinct that leads me to the edge of the bluff and I let the endless, wild calm of that place leak into me.