Fae

Chapter 9

The first thing Kaden noticed was the cold, next she saw her skin. Her skin was a moonbeam, silver and pale, cool to the touch. Her fingertips were a faint shade of pinkish purple, almost as if she were getting hypothermia or the early stages of frostbite. Her ears were cold, and upon reaching up to warm them, Kaden found that they were now extended and pointy, holding true to stereotypical fairy lore.
    She rose up out of the solution, the crowd long gone now. As soon as her foot touched the ground outside of the pool, a woman came to her side. The woman worked silently, using her hands and arms to measure Kaden all around. The woman's pale green skin glowed faintly when she finished, and she went swiftly behind the screen where her clothes had been destroyed. When she came out she held a form of bodysuit or armor in her hands. She held it out to Kaden and gestured for her to put it on. Kaden found the almost imperceptible zipper and began putting on the bodysuit.
     It was the same shade of silvery gray as her skin and had hard pinkish purple blades that looked like fins on the forearms and on the calves of her legs. The entire midsection of it followed a scale-like pattern, as did the head-piece. There was also a hood on it that sat thick from her collarbone to the middle of her back, Kaden felt that this would be very heavy on her head, so she left it alone. Even her ears were covered in thin scales that led to what appeared to be gills at the sides of her cheeks.
      The suit was surprisingly light and cool, though Kaden was just grateful to have on clothes of any form now. The suit fit her perfectly, snugly hugging her every curve. It was tailored to the highest of standards. The woman smiled at her handiwork then motioned for Kaden to follow her.
Kaden walked along behind the silent tailor woman out of the amphitheater, out into the city. Everyone stared at her in horror and pain as the women passed by on the street.
"Why are they staring at me like I'm disappointing them?" Kaden whispered to the woman.
"You walk and not in the regal manner. They expect either a regal walk or for you to use floatation," She answered matter-of-factly, though not using her mouth, she spoke in Kaden's mind.
"You people expect a lot of me.." Kaden mumbled.
"You are one of us. You will learn, or die trying." She replied.

Kaden was taken to a room that strongly resembled a classroom and the woman gestured for her to sit. Kaden sat in one of the desks that faced a much larger desk, and the woman left. For a while, Kaden was alone. No one told her what to do, or forced her into anything; She just sat at a desk in silence. She could almost pretend she was back to normal. She imagined that at any moment the school bell would ring, and she could rush out to her car to see her little brother waiting impatiently to get out of there. Nothing was normal anymore though. Those days were over, and she was dead to Leigh. She was dead to everyone and everything she'd ever known. Kaden wondered how big her funeral was, how many people came, if they cried or not, but did it really matter? Death was death after all, it wasn't her eighteenth birthday party. Or her twentieth. She slowly shook her head at how much time had apparently passed. It felt like maybe three days, not three years, surely she hadn't been gone that long. Had she?
       Her thoughts were disrupted by the entrance of a large woman. The woman was older, her hair pulled back in a tight bun, revealing thin lines of age on the corners of her eyes and mouth. She wore a simple black piece of fabric that wrapped around her body like a towel and had one thin strap, almost like overalls, that reached over her shoulder and connected in the back. The woman's skin matched Kaden's in color, and she smiled thinly as she set her eyes upon Kaden.
      Kaden watched the older woman walk over to the larger desk and pick up a textbook, then she kicked the desk over onto its side. She walked over to Kaden's smaller desk and dropped the ginormous book on it.
    "I'm Flora, current reigning Queen of the Mond, and I'll be teaching you history, language, spells, and regality. Since you are to be my replacement,...." She trailed off, waiting on Kaden to introduce herself.
"I'm... Fae." Kaden said quickly, remembering the name she'd provided earlier, to Floaty.
     "Fae," the Queen tested the name on her tongue. She smiled, finding it suitable, "Well Fae, I expect that tomorrow you will not be late to my lesson. Leave now, you have to meet for training."
    "Training, your Highness?" Kaden inquired.
  "You must learn to win wars, Fae."