The Changeling's Ghost (Thirteen Gates #1)

A Haunting

     Patrolling without Asher kind of sucks.
   
     I'm not used to patrolling alone... it's not that I can't, given that I've been in situations of no company and bad company both (Noritorisk's Gatekeepers wouldn't even let me enter the town unaccompanied, and by 'accompanied' I mean I had three guards with guns who were definitely not there for my safety), but it's the kind of work I can't get used to. The streets look different two levels down, sure, but half the difference is that I'm well and truly alone.

     The air is thick with nervous energy, with a haze of fae dust holding over the gray sky and speckling everything gold. The streets are grown over with ivy and imps play in them, cackling and chasing each other in the main road. The weak life force of mortals shivers like a candle, and sinister forces lurk in the alleys, running their fingers down the sides of buildings. I can only imagine there are wraiths here. With a gatekeeper force this poor, people probably enter the gates all the time, then get stuck there until either they deplete into something barely resemble a human or they get eaten like the last bowl of ramen in the Academy kitchen.
Sheryl's right. We'll do everyone here a favor just by fixing the place up.

     Unfortunately, there's not much here I can kick in the face, just some minor spirits doing boring minor spirit things like cackling maniacally and shouting "Deal? Deal?" at civilians who can't hear them, anyways. There are a lot of specifics to how deals with the fae work, but one of the more interesting contingencies is that it's easier to see the fae the more well-informed you are... and the more isolated.

     I'm getting the creeps.

     Despite the haze in the air, I can still see a few lights, most of which are off in the distance. Areas of strong magical presence tend to be clearer and better lit on the second level, which makes tracking down... irregularities... so much easier. Of course, the levels aren't necessarily uniform, with different cultures having different effects to their levels (this is part of why gatekeepers are advised to return to the main floor between excursions, because crossing between two different sets levels will drive you "absolutely bonkers", as Asher would say), but things follow patterns. Picking up on those patterns and using them to your advantage is part of the job.

     I follow a winding, overgrown road out of the main city, pollen sticking to my lungs. I sense some particularly mischievous fae, probably sylph by alignment, eyeing me from the bushes. Their face split open in rows of teeth.

     "We can fix your person problems, laddie," one calls down to me.

     "Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah," join in a row of other sylphs, their wings twitching with excitement.

     The bravest cries, "What's your name, fella?"

     "Sam O'Nella," I tell them, and their faces flash mutinous with hunger.

     "Well, Sam..." begins the leader, but it occurs to him only then that the name doesn't work, that I do not convulse to his will.

     Just as quickly, a nunchuck slams him in the face, and his body begins to boil. Others flock away, though I manage to catch a few with one side of the nunchuck. I swing it around a few times for good measure, lazily looking around, and find that no more fae appear to take their place.

     I was one of the few kids at the Academy who never ended up on the wrong side of a fae deal, one of the few kids who never had to be saved. Funny, but they could never offer me a thing I actually wanted.

     I approach a house that is so conspicuously fae that you could not have made it more obvious magical affairs were happening within if you had put a giant sign on it that said SHIFTY FAE MAGIC HERE! INQUIRE WITHIN. It's wood, with several trees in the front year basically covering it, and the shingles are painted. The windows are adorned with dreamcatchers, trinkets, and herbs, and there are birdhouses in the front where fae, mainly the 'fairies' or sylph, are snoozing. The whole building is slanted just to the right, which probably breaks as many mortal laws as the rest of the house breaks Gatekeeper law.