The city spread out like diamonds strewn on a black velvet carpet below him. To the north, bank towers and condos loomed. Brendan could make out Old City Hall, the Queen’s Park legislature, and the weird angles of the Royal Ontario Museum Crystal. To the south, the dark waters of the lake stretched away, broken only by the occasional ship’s lights and the glow from Ward’s Island. The wind was stronger up at the apex of the dome. Brendan and Charlie sat on the edge of a shell-like section of the domed roof, dangling their feet over the rim.
“Pretty cool, non?” Charlie asked.
“I guess so.” Brendan watched as BLT flitted here and there, nimbly avoiding the lunges of Tweezers. The crimson-eyed ferret leapt playfully at her from the tiled surface.
“I like this city,” Charlie said, stretching her arms above her head. “I haven’t been here for a long time. They have been busy.”
Brendan shrugged. He had no idea how long it had been since Charlie’s last visit, but even in the last ten years, a lot had been going on. The banks were constantly vying to build the highest skyscrapers as their headquarters. Probably a hundred or more condos and hotels were under construction, and the waterfront was being developed from east to west. So many people crammed into one place. He recalled his trip under the lake with his Silkie^ 34 friend Oona and the devastation she’d shown him that the city’s Humans had caused. As she carried him under the waters of Lake Ontario to escape Orcadia, Oona had pointed out the lifeless desert the lake had become due to the pollution Humans poured into it. Unless something changed drastically, even more damage to the natural world was to come. He couldn’t subscribe to the violence that Faeries like Orcadia wanted to resort to in order to make that change, but he could understand her frustration and anger.
Brendan tried to shake off his gloomy mood. The city could be beautiful, too. The skyline was a jagged string of lights. Buildings had been strung with Christmas lights as well, adding splashes of colour to the night. The CN Tower soared only a few metres away. How many wonderful hours had he spent with his family at the ball games held beneath this very dome? No, there was good and there was bad. Over the last few strange weeks, he’d been grappling with his two natures. Trying to balance them was becoming more and more difficult. He wondered if he would ever reach a place of peace within himself.
Charlie broke in on his reverie. “You didn’t seem to have any problems using your warp abilities tonight.”
“Not until you tripped me, anyway.”
Charlie laughed.
“Who says I have problems with my powers?” Brendan asked defensively.
“Friends of mine,” she answered cryptically. “But you managed okay tonight. You almost beat me in that race.”
“Almost? I was gonna smoke you when you tripped me.”
“Yes, well. You go on dreaming.” She laughed. “Either way, my point is, you were able to use your powers with ease. Why is that?”
Brendan thought about that question for a moment, staring out over the lake to where Ward’s Island slumbered, a dark, low line. The airport beside it was lit up with spotlights, although no planes were allowed to take off and land in the wee hours of the morning.
“I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about that. I don’t know what it is. Greenleaf, Kim, and Saskia, they’re the ones trying to teach me. They keep telling me I have to clear my mind and not think too much. Which is impossible! I mean, just not thinking about thinking anything is thinking about something. You see what I’m saying?”
“That’s why I thought I’d come and check you out. I had a lot of the same problems. Tonight, I didn’t give you any time to think about what you were doing. Woke you up, threw you out a window, made you angry. You didn’t have time to think. You just did it! See? I’ve been through the same struggles myself. I told you, we have a lot in common.”
“Why do you keep saying we have so much in common? Who are you, really? Where are you from, really?”
“Really?” Her eyes twinkled, deep and blue. Despite his annoyance, Brendan couldn’t help but find those eyes very attractive. “I’m not from Quebec. I am from France. At least, it’s the first place I remember. I think I was born in the fifteenth century.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Brendan asked. “You think? You don’t know?”
“Well, remember when I said we had a lot in common? I am like you. I was placed in a Human family.”
Brendan sat up. “You? You were adopted by Humans, too?” She nodded. “Who did that to you?”
“I don’t know.” She smiled sadly. “I am not so lucky as you. I never found out who my Faerie parents were. An old peasant couple raised me in Brittany.^ 35 That’s in the north of France, on the English Channel. They were hard-working people, salt harvesters. They always knew I was not a normal child. They found me on the beach crying in the rain. My real parents were nowhere to be seen. They took me in and raised me. They had no children of their own, you see. They had a son who had died young, so they called me Charles in his memory. As I grew older, it became harder and harder to hide how strange I was. People began to talk. They whispered of witchcraft and devils. The village priest became suspicious. I didn’t know that what I could do was strange or bad, and I started to feel ashamed. My parents’ life became difficult. So they did what they thought was best… ”
“What did they do?” Brendan could easily imagine what it would have been like to grow up not knowing what he was. At least he’d had Wards and glamours placed on him to hide his true nature even from himself. And he lived in a world that was a little more forgiving of strangeness.
“They put me on a ship to the New World.” Charlie’s eyes were far away. She gazed out over the lake as if she were on that ship now. “The passage was a long one. Many died but I thrived. I loved the ocean. For the first time, I felt truly at peace. I could sense the creatures of the deep swarming around the ship: the million tiny minds of the little fish travelling together in their schools like a cloud of lights in the water, the giant, clever thoughts of whales drifting far below. In the night, I would sit in the prow and the dolphins would come to me, pacing the ship, calling in their silly voices and making jokes, mocking me because I was a fish that couldn’t swim.^ 36 I found I could understand what they were saying. The sailors liked me because they said I brought luck. La Fortuna, they called me.
“We sailed across the Atlantic and into the great mouth of the St. Lawrence River, arriving finally at the tiny village of Hochelaga.”
“Hochelaga? That’s Montreal, isn’t it?”^ 37 Brendan had read his history. Canadian children had to learn all about the early explorers in school: Cartier, Champlain, Henry Hudson, and their contemporaries.
“Oui, exactement! It was not so big a town back then, just a little knot of huts at the bend of the river with a tiny church and a cross on the top of the hill. They needed people to settle there. Fur trappers and voyageurs came in their canoes, and the native people, the Iroquois and the Mohawk and the Huron, brought animal pelts in for trading. For a time, I was welcome there. I had some skills as a healer and they needed me. I liked the wilderness. I could run there and be free. I could speak with the animals and learn their language. I would be gone in the woods for long weeks learning about the wild places from them.”
“What happened?”
“Again, the priest of the village could sense I was different. He started to turn people against me. He made everyone think I was a devil and that my gifts were from Satan himself. He said I consorted with demons in the woods. The native people were friendly to me, but this only made the priest believe I was somehow evil. He put me on trial and made the villagers agree that I should be executed. Burned at the stake.”^ 38
“But you escaped.”
“Obviously.” Charlie laughed. “An Iroquois band raided the village and stole me away on the night before the burning. I travelled with them for many years and they treated me well. Their Shaman said she knew my kind. She called me one of the Old Ones. I learned much from her about how to control my powers. She gave me these.” She held out her arm to display the animal tattoos. “She told of a time when the Old Ones and the People were friends and shared the Earth, before a war between our races divided them.”
“Ariel told me a bit about that.”
“Ariel would know. He was there.” Charlie’s face darkened. “The Humans from the Old World had forgotten those times. They came to the New World with their cutting and burning and gouging of the Earth.” She shook her head. “Soon, there was nowhere for the Iroquois people to hide from the whites, and they became sick in body and sick in spirit. They forgot the Old Ways. Before that time, however, I went my own way, exploring the wild places. I found that I could come to the cities and live among the People of Metal for a while at a time, leaving before they noticed I didn’t age like them or was different. It’s easy now. The Humans don’t pay as close attention as they once did. More and more of our people came to this land. As I met more of my kind, I found a special teacher and came into my powers completely.”
Brendan was intrigued. “A special teacher? Who was that?”
Charlie shook her head, not meeting his eye. She became guarded. “One of the Ancient Ones. You will meet him in good time. He is coming to the Clan Gathering. But I’ve talked too much. The night is waning.”
Indeed, Brendan looked at the moon. The silver orb was small and low on the horizon out over the lake.
“I am going to tell you a little trick that I used when I was starting out,” Charlie said. “I learned it from the Shaman woman. Shamans are those who can see the secrets of the Faerie world. In every culture they exist: they’re called psychics, seers, and fortune tellers. The Iroquois Shaman used a drum to help her focus her sight. She taught me how to use music to do the same.” Charlie’s eyes were distant as if remembering the smoky interior of the Shaman woman’s longhouse, so long ago. Shaking herself back into the present, she turned her dazzling eyes on Brendan. “When you want to use your powers, don’t think about it. Instead, sing a song inside your head. Think about the words of the song and let your subconscious take care of itself.”
“A song? Are you kidding me?” Brendan asked skeptically.
“Ha!” Charlie said suddenly. “The Dawn Flyers are beginning! I’ve heard of this but I’ve never seen it before.” She pointed to the CN Tower above them. Brendan looked up and gasped.
He’d seen the weird extra bulge above the observation tower many times since gaining his Faerie Sight. Even now, he was amazed at how much of the city was invisible to Humans as they bustled about, completely unaware of the secret Faerie world that existed alongside them. He’d never had time to explore even a hundredth of the new locales open to him. Now he was astonished to see Faeries launching themselves from the tower high above, gliding out into the chilly predawn air.
One after another, Faeries leapt from the tower and sailed on the thermals toward the open air above the lake. They flew with gliders constructed of some silken material that caught the wind, lofting them like graceful birds in wide arcs here and there as they chased one another. He could hear hoots of laughter as they carved through the gradually lightening sky and down toward the distant mass of Ward’s Island.
“That’s… ” Brendan couldn’t contain his awe. “That’s just brilliant!”
“Yes,” Charlie agreed. “Brilliant.”
As they watched the Dawn Flyers swooping overhead, Brendan wondered what any Humans who happened to look up might see: flocks of birds hanging in the sky? He had no idea and he didn’t care. He was just glad he could see them. They were so beautiful.
Charlie stood up. “Time to go.”
“Go?”
“We have to get you home before your parents wake up and find you gone. What would they think of you running the streets with a strange young girl all night?”
Brendan’s heart began to pound. She was right. He’d been lost in her story and the glory of the Dawn Flyers. “You’re hardly young!”
“Man. You know how to charm a lady, Brendan!” She laughed and slid down the side of the dome. “Come on!” she called. Brendan cast one final longing gaze at the Faeries spiralling overhead and slid after her.
Through the dawn streets they sped, BLT trailing along behind. Through backyards and back alleys, parks and construction sites they wended their way, seeking to avoid contact with people going about their early-morning business. The odd Human they came across never saw them at all but felt a breeze, and those with sharp eyes might have detected a smear of colour in the corner of their eye. In a matter of minutes, they were slowing to a jog in the back alley of Montrose Avenue, coming at last to the backyard of Brendan’s house. The windows were still dark. There was no sign that anyone in his family was up and about.
“Where are you going to stay tonight?” Brendan whispered.
“Don’t worry about me.” She smiled. “I can take care of myself!” She spun on her heel and, with a wave, melted into the shadows of the alley.
He got in the back door with the spare key his mother kept hidden in a flowerpot on the back porch. The house was still as he climbed the stairs, careful to avoid the seventh, creaky one, his mind churning through all that Charlie had said. The girl was annoying in the extreme, and having her around was courting disaster. She could ruin everything. Still, a tiny part of him hoped she would stay around. If what she said was true, no one else in either his Human world or the Faerie world even remotely shared his experience. Except maybe for Finbar, the forlorn Exile who longed to be readmitted to the Faerie fold. But Brendan didn’t feel he had that much in common with the sad old man.
Another thing nagged at him. For all her high spirits, she seemed to have a darker side. He’d seen it in her eyes when she was sitting at the table with his family. He wanted to ask her more questions about how she’d managed to survive and who the mysterious teacher who had helped her might be.
He stopped in the upstairs hall, his feet savouring each fibre of the old oriental runner carpet beneath them. The house was silent save for the soft snoring of his father down the hall and the occasional creak of the settling house. He suddenly felt a rush of affection for his family, his home. Poor Charlie. She has never had this feeling.
He almost felt like crying. He wished he could stay in this moment forever, still aglow from the night run and cocooned in the soft warmth of the house and the darkness. He was full of contentment, his worries at a distance for the time being.
Desperate to hold on to this feeling, he climbed the stairs to his attic room. Faeries may not need sleep but he didn’t feel like working on his meditation skills after the night he’d had. He was looking forward to closing his eyes while his soul was still aglow and carrying these feelings with him into his dreams.
He was so intent on getting up the stairs, he didn’t notice that the bathroom door was open a crack and his sister’s blue eye watched him as he disappeared up the stairs into his room.
^ 34 Silkie as in the Water Folk who are related to Faeries and live in the rivers and lakes of the world. Not silky as in smooth to the touch, although Oona was quite silky to the touch. But if I’d meant that kind of silky I wouldn’t have spelled it Silkie, would I?
^ 35 Brittany is a region in France where Celtic traditions have held on to this day. They have their own language called Breton and they have lovely crepes. I like the ones with sugar and lemon, but that isn’t important right now.
^ 36 Dolphins are notorious for their sharp tongues and bad jokes. One dolphin even made it to the finals of Last Comic Standing before having to drop out because his blowhole became chapped.
^ 37 Hochelaga is indeed the original name for Montreal. It is an Iroquoian word meaning “Beaver Dam” or “Beaver Lake.” When Europeans fi rst arrived in the area, the place was ruled by a race of giant, intelligent beavers. A bitter battle was fought before the French fi nally drove the beavers out. Many a French soldier Was furiously tail-slapped and gnawed on that fateful day.
^ 38 Not all priests are so nasty, but they are by nature a little suspicious. I once did a card trick at a parish potluck dinner that earned me some fearful glances from Father Garvey.