Friday
Picture 2
Muse Calliope's Choice: Picture 1
Title:
Most of the time, Kelebek loved being a pixie. She loved being small and delicate and graceful; it made dancing with the swaying grasses and fluttering cherry blossoms so much easier. She loved playing in the forests and making friends with the wildlife; there was always someone else to get to know, somewhere new to explore.
Most of all, Kelebek loved to fly. Her wings, a deep, dark purple that lightened to silvery edges and were covered with an intricate, fine-lined black design, were of the butterfly persuasion with curling tendrils at both tips and a ragged cut in between like that of a maple leaf. They were her pride and joy and, best of all, they allowed her to fly! To sweep and swoop and twist and turn and whirl and twirl through the air with only her skill keeping her aloft and only gravity’s flimsy hold tethering her to the earth. It was joy. It was peace. It was wild. It was exhilarating.
It was the only thing keeping her from being eaten.
The raven chased her with far more determination than she merited as a meal and, about the time the little bugger passed up a rather idiotic and particularly chubby mouse in favour of pursuing her, Kelebek got the distinct impression this wasn’t your average raven. Beating her wings as fast as she could, Kelebek ducked around tree trunks, dove through bushes, looped around branches but still the raven followed her, its deadly sharp talons grasping for her over and over again and coming much too close more than once.
When the second raven swooped down and tackled the first that distinct impression became more of a cemented certainty.
Kelebek was in really big trouble.
“Kelebek?” A woman’s voice suddenly drifted through the forest, soft and musical like a distant melody. The ravens screamed and squawked at each other, hissing as beak and talon scored flesh, but still the voice called clearly, pulling at Kelebek, attracting her like a flame would a moth.
This was the strangest night of Kelebek’s life. And, since Kelebek was coming up on her five hundredth birthday, that was saying something.
A woman stepped out from behind a maple tree. No, wait, that wasn’t right, the woman had come out of the tree itself, almost like a dryad, except one look at her made it clear she was a sun elf. Sure the woman had a dryad’s short, slim body type, but her skin was a dusty golden tan instead of the greys and browns and greens of tree bark and her hair was brilliant, blood red instead of new leaf green. Most tellingly of all, her eyes were the ebony velvet of the night sky, complete with stars, instead of a dryad’s soil brown.
Too bad sun elves were supposed to be extinct.
“To be fair, I’m only half sun elf,” the woman admitted in perfect Turkish, an unusual lilting accent to her words.
Kelebek paused, hovering uncertainly while the ravens still tangled behind her. The woman smiled reassuringly and took a step closer. “Don’t fret about the vampires. Tru hasn’t lost a fight not ever, not yet. We just happened to be in the neighbourhood, a wonderful stay in the neighbourhood, looking for a certain someone, someone. Who? That someone.” She stopped, blinked, shook her head, and took a deep breath before continuing at a much, much slower pace, as though considering each word before letting it out. “I felt your distress. Came to investigate. Why would a vampire be chasing you?”
Kelebek glanced behind her again, reassuring herself that the crows still squabbled, before answering. “I have no idea. It just came out of the blue and started to try and capture me. Who the hell are you?”
The woman sighed and shook her head. “I’m still a work in progress.” She frowned, thinking hard, her gaze going distant. “The pixies …something about …pixies…hiding, hiding, hiding … pixies hiding what can’t be hidden … pixies, pixies, pixies, oh, my frakking gods!”
The woman moved so fast she blurred, even to Kelebek’s sensitive Fae eyes. In less than a second, she had one of the birds by its throat. “Bad, bad, bad little vampire. What you’re looking for is mine, mine, mine and not for you and yours, not for anyone but me and mine, mine, mine. But what to do? What to do? Kelebek is not the one, is not of the one, but will you and yours hunt, hunt, hunt until you find the one and so many of mine could get …hurt, hurt, hurt.”
The free crow shifted, its feathers rippling like an image on the water as a human form unfolded. Handsome and pale with dark slate-hued hair and red eyes, the vampire looked like a vampire. Kelebek hissed on principle but the vampire ignored her, focusing on the woman.
“Lumina mea, you are spiralling,” he informed her wearily in Romanian. “You must focus if you wish for us around you to understand.”
The woman shook the crow, shook it hard. “You will turn into a man, Vladimir,” she told the crow slowly, her voice frigid, “And you will explain your betrayal. Tru, do not let the pixie leave; her queenling will want to know what Vladimir is about to share.”
The man-shaped vampire sighed and, faster than Flash, darted out one hand without even looking to snare Kelebek by her wings. Clever vampire; she couldn’t risk struggling for fear it would damage her wings. She was well and truly caught. She hissed at him again, this time in anger.
Now, the vampire, no doubt the son of one hell of a bitch, grinned and gave her a disapproving tsk before returning his attention to his companion. His companion who now held a very, very well known vampire against the nearest tree by his throat.
Kelebek cursed. The woman was right; the queen was definitely going to want to know what Dracula was doing chasing one of her pixie through the forest. Damn.
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