seventeen

Keelie climbed the roots, her long dress bunched over her arms, thanking the aspen as she went and keeping her face in the crook of her elbow so that the bhata couldn't scratch her face or get at her eyes.

When she had her feet back on the ground, she ran, skirts lifted, grateful for the big sleeves that kept the clicking stick things from getting on her arms. Before she reached the path, a swarm of bugs came from the bridge and she veered, heading toward the meadow. The bugs caught up with her quickly, and they clung to her hair, digging at her scalp and pinching her neck.

Her skin buzzed with their magic, and she felt queasy from the chlorophyll she channeled to save the sprite. She quickened her pace, and then the queasiness turned into fear as she hit the outer edge of the Dread. Her chest felt tight, and she felt as if the woods were closing in on her.

The bhata clicked and pinched their way into her clothes. Keelie screamed and yanked the hem of her gown up and over her head. The bhata that had covered it were enfolded in the discarded gown, but others took their place.

"Sir Davey," she cried. "Help."

He turned, his mouth sagging open as he saw what pursued her. "Up here, lass. Hurry."

Hurry? Was she strolling? She leaped the last few feet and grabbed the rock, her feet scrabbling for purchase on its lichen-encrusted sides.

Sir Davey pulled her up to the top of the rock. The bhata that had been all over her had gone, but the buggy ones still hovered. Davey stared at them. "The feithid daoine. You don't see them often."

"I'd rather not see them at all. I don't know what I did to piss them off, but they swarmed me like I'd attacked their honey or something."

"Where?"

Keelie told him about the sprite and about calling on Hrok and the aspen to save it.

"And the sprite vanished, you say?"

"Yes." The wind had picked up, bringing the scent of rain.

Davey noticed, too. "This rock isn't the safest place to be in a lightning storm. We'd better get you back home."

"What is all this stuff?" The rock was covered with boxes, huge chunks of crystals with wires attached to them, and a metal disk that swirled around atop a wooden pole staked into a pitted hole in the rock. It looked like an elementary school science experiment.

"There's bad magic right here somewhere. It's elusive, and I'm trying to track it down."

"Bad magic? You need equipment to find bad magic? It chased me all the way from the creek."

Sir Davey looked up from his equipment, caterpillar eyebrows wiggling. "That's not bad magic, lass. That's just the feithid daoine."

"Feta what? I can never remember that. The stick people are the bhata, right?"

"Right."

"They started it. They hate me."

"They were probably trying to tell you something."

"Yeah, like that they hate me. Message received, loud and clear," she yelled across the meadow.

The metal disk at the top of the pole started spinning around, and the crystals started to glow. Sir Davey looked at them. "Uh-oh."

"What does it mean?"

"Incoming. Duck." He pushed her down just as lightning flashed overhead.

Keelie heard the Red Cap's maniacal song. "Do you hear that?"

"No, what?" Sir Davey was adjusting dials. "You'd better get back home, Keelie."

Keelie thought of her angry father and the awful things she'd said to him. Dad or the Red Cap? Either way, she was toast. She clutched the charred heart.

The air turned green, but it was thick, like syrup. She closed her eyes and pushed at it with her mind, and felt Hrok nearby, but nothing else. Hrok cried out a warning.

She opened her eyes and saw that the wind had whipped up forest debris, which hung in the air. Moss near her opened a mouth to cry. The bhata were being whirled around the meadow like a tornado of sticks and leaves.

Movement on the ground drew her gaze. It was Elianard, she could have sworn, but he was hurrying away through the trees. And then another movement, faster, toward her, and that smell! Cinnamon and mushrooms, two smells guaranteed to make her gag for the rest of her life. The horrid combination clogged her nose.

The Red Cap attacked Sir Davey, and they rolled off the rock and onto the ground. The Red Cap's mouth opened impossibly wide, like a giant toad's but lined with cruel teeth. Its eyes were on Keelie, laughing, as it started to suck Sir Davey's aura from him. Fog-like tendrils the color of bronze shimmered as the creature pulled.

Keelie crawled off of the rock, grabbing a crystal to bash the Red Cap with. But the Red Cap had grown powerful on his feast of Davey's life force. The bhata fell from the sky around her as their energy was sucked into the Red Cap, creating a vortex of death around him.

She fell, and a finger of lightning struck the ground nearby. The electricity made her hair prickle, and it danced on her skin. Pellets of rain beat down on her, and thunder rumbled, the sound increasing until it was deafening.

Her mouth was full of dirt. She spat, thinking of Earth magic, and her chest burned. She reached up to push away whatever was burning her, but it wasn't an ember. It was her necklace. The charred heart was glowing green, and it beat with the rhythm of forest sap, the bright glow of summer.

Keelie crawled forward and pushed the heart into the Red Cap's mouth. It screamed, gnashing its teeth, and backed away. She dragged herself toward it, surrounded by a green glow as she passed the bhata, revived and flying upwards.

She could feel the trees around her, a solid company that covered the meadow and the hills. All the trees were with her, and she grabbed Sir Davey and pushed his remaining energy into the greenness. Perhaps he would die. Perhaps he was dead already.

Beneath her, the ground trembled. She felt it ripple beneath her. What had she done?

The Red Cap snapped its teeth and stood, then with fiery eyes locked on hers, it began to sing. Keelie caught a glint of silver in its teeth. The necklace!

Behind the Red Cap, the earth bubbled, the way it had when Sir Davey had called upon the worms to frighten Elia.

The bubbling widened, and roots shot out of the earth, wriggling into the air as if something deep underground was seeking purchase in the storm.

Keelie held tight to Sir Davey as the Red Cap drew nearer. One of the roots lashed out, knocking him down. The charred heart rolled free, and Keelie reached for it. The Red Cap's jagged teeth snapped at her, snagging her sleeve and scratching her. She caught the chain and pulled it free, her arm burning from the creature's bite. Was he poisonous?

He turned, growling, and stopped as a great book appeared on the heaving earth's surface. Caked mud crumbled from the binding that glowed bright with silver, even in the gloom of the storm, revealing a design of thorns surrounded by rays. In her head, she felt her father's energy joining the trees. He channeled even more energy, drawing tree power from the surrounding mountain.

The Red Cap screamed and dove for the book. Another root slashed at him. He bit it in two.

Behind her, Keelie heard a cry and, thinking her father had come, turned to warn him. But it was Elianard, and his eyes were fixed on the book.

Keelie clutched the charred heart. No way could she reach the Red Cap before he got the book.

Throw it, Keelie. Her father's voice echoed in her head.

I can't. Sir Davey is hurt. He's dying, Dad.

You have to do this. Throw the heart. Try to hit the book.

She let go of Sir Davey and struggled to her feet, staggering from the Dread and the dark magic. She pulled her right arm back and threw the charred heart as hard as she could, her eyes on the bright thorns of the book cover. The green-glowing heart arced over the Red Cap's head and landed on the dirt by the book, then rolled backwards onto it. Silver shone green just as the Red Cap reached out and touched it.

Lightning forked to the ground, blinding Keelie. She cried in pain and flew backwards, hurled by the explosion of the bolt. Trees screamed as their roots burned, and she hit, hard. Then all was black.

Keelie came awake to grayness. She opened her eyes. The darkness was punctuated by flashes of red. Fire trucks. A crowd had gathered. Dad's face appeared above her.

"You're awake." He looked concerned and overjoyed. A weird mix.

"What happened?" She couldn't smell smoke, so the forest wasn't on fire. "Sir Davey?"

"His eyebrows are scorched, but he's okay."

"The Red Cap?" She wished she could speak in complete sentences, but her throat hurt so much she could barely croak out the words.

"Gone. Scorched. All that's left is a crater with a book cover and a red cap. We, ah, removed them before the fire department got here."

"My head hurts."

"You got knocked down pretty hard. How does your left arm feel?"

She moved it. "Sore. Okay, I guess."

Her dad picked up her arm and held it up so that she could see. A crisscross of deep scars covered her forearm. It looked like a long-healed wound.

"The Red Cap bit me. But it's healed." She stared at her forearm, amazed.

"The trees did it. It's why Sir Davey survived."

"The Red Cap was sucking his life force. Like the sprite."

"Yes, the sprite. You've made a lot of friends, daughter. The sprite called on the bhata and the feithid daoine to warn you.

"I thought they were attacking me."

"I have something for you." Dad opened her hand and dropped something into it. Something rough and rounded.

She looked into her cupped hand. A little lump of silver-all that remained of her melted chain-and the charred heart. The Queen Aspen had saved them all.