Page 17 of Mischief Maker

Chapter Fourteen

Faela

W hen I wake up again, my body feels light—impossibly so, as if there’s no weight attached to me at all.

The sky overhead is blue, a pure, bright, robin’s-egg blue, untouched by even a wisp of cloud. There’s a fresh smell in the air, as if it has only just rained, but that’s impossible.

I sit up, which takes no effort at all despite the pain I was in only moments ago.

Tall golden grass surrounds me, but it’s perfectly soft, like a cloud.

I get to my feet and find that my dress, while still looking like my dress, is clean and shining as if it were brand new.

My hands are clean, too, with not a speck of dirt under the nails.

Is this what it’s like to be dead?

I turn around in a circle, searching for any sign of Lucia. But I don’t see the goddess anywhere.

Lifting my skirt so it doesn’t tangle in the grass, I start walking. There must be something out here, some direction I’m supposed to go in order to find Kireth. Not that there are any signposts.

Picking a direction, I walk and walk, not even feeling the grass against my legs. It’s as if my body isn’t actually here—there’s no warm sun on my face even though it’s bright daylight out. There’s no gentle brush of breeze on my shoulders. It all just feels like... nothing.

The longer I walk, the less certain I become that I’m not simply dreaming.

Perhaps Lucia sent me to the wrong place.

The infinite landscape stretches on in every direction without a tree or mountain to be seen.

I consider turning around to walk the other way, but now I’m not sure which direction I came from.

So instead, I keep walking, hoping that I’m not trapped here forever in this nothing land.

Perhaps it’s only been a few minutes, or perhaps a few hours—I can’t be sure, because the sun doesn’t move—but soon the land starts changing.

Some trees appear, and the grass turns greener.

It almost feels... familiar. I can make out the shadow of mountains off in the distance, so I pick up my pace and keep going.

Perhaps I need to get there, to that range up ahead.

As I move faster, a house appears, and then an orchard. Now I definitely recognize it. This is my neighbor’s orchard, down the long road that leads into town. I sprint past the trees toward the house, looking for the older couple who live there.

But there’s no one around. The house is empty.

Perplexed, I find the road and continue toward my farm. How did I end up back here, in my village? Aren’t I dead? If so, what a peculiar afterlife.

There are cows and sheep in the pasture, and they look strong and healthy. But I don’t recognize them—none of the patterns on the cows are right. Somehow there are cows here, but they aren’t my cows.

The same is true for the crops. Green sprouts everywhere, but the stalks aren’t planted in the same order as they are on my own farm.

The house, too, looks different—clean and straight, as if it was just built.

There are no collapsing stairs or shutters falling off the windows.

It’s as if it’s been reborn, just like my dress.

As I approach, the front door opens. I haven’t seen anyone around since arriving in the village, so it takes me by surprise when a woman steps out of the house.

My breath stops in my throat.

“Mother?”

It can’t really be her. But there she is, standing in the doorway, waving both arms at me with a big smile on her face.

“Faela!” She comes down the stairs and embraces me in the middle of the pathway. “Oh, darling! I’m so glad you’re back safely.”

“Back?” I ask. “Back from where?”

“You went to the village to get some fresh bread. Where is the bread, by the way?” She eyes my empty hands, then grins in a carefree way I only remember from when I was small. “Did you see someone handsome and get distracted?”

I stare at her for a long time, not sure what to say. How much have I wished I could see her again, alive and hale, and here she is. But none of this makes sense. Is this my real mother, waiting for me in the afterlife?

She stands there waiting for an answer.

“Sorry.” I give her an apologetic smile. “I did get distracted.”

Mother pats me on the shoulder and leads me into the house. “No problem. I have dinner cooking. Are you hungry?”

Oh, how I’ve missed her cooking. I’m quite a slouch in comparison.

“Starving,” I say on reflex, and she guides me to a chair at the table. All the chairs are here, not a single one smashed to kindling against a wall. Mother returns to the pot she has boiling over the fire and stirs it, then ladles out a spoonful and sniffs.

“It’ll be a good stew,” she says, but I can’t smell anything.

I’m just so glad to see her, busying about, that I think little of it.

She looks simply radiant, full of life, and for a moment I feel like I could just forget everything that’s happened the last few years.

I could just be here, with Mother, with our strange cows that aren’t quite our cows, our crops that aren’t quite our crops, in this house that isn’t falling apart.

Soon the food is done, and Mother has been chatting the whole time about some neighborly gossip. She puts a bowl in front of me, and it makes my mouth water.

“Remember to let it cool down first,” she says with an affectionate chuckle. “I know how you like to burn your tongue.”

So I patiently wait while the stew cools, and then spoon some into my mouth.

I taste nothing. I chew and swallow, confused at how Mother’s special soup could have no flavor to it.

“Good?” she asks, her hands clasped.

I force a grateful smile. “Yes. It’s great.”

Once we’re finished eating the nothing-food, Mother pulls out her sewing.

She shows off the new dress she’s making for me so I don’t have to wear the same one every day.

It’s made of a fine yellow fabric, certainly too fine for us.

I simply watch as she talks and sews, telling me about which cows gave the most milk today, and which crops should come in first. I listen attentively, soaking up the familiar sound of her voice.

It’s as if she’s been alive here all this time.

Still, as I clean up the dinner dishes, the sun outside remains high in the sky. Shouldn’t it be setting soon? I stare through the kitchen window, an eerie tickle under my skin.

When I finish, Mother gets up and stretches. “It’s time for bed,” she says, and heads toward the stairs. “Won’t you go to bed, Faela?”

I nod, though I’m not tired in the least. Going to bed in this house, knowing my mother is safe and sound? How many days have I dreamed of such a thing?

“Of course,” I say.

We both change into our nightclothes, and once I’m under my blankets, Mother comes in to kiss me on the cheek. I let her do it without complaint.

“I’m glad you’re back,” she says, a familiar softness in her eyes. “I love you.”

“I love you too, Mother.”

She gives me one last kiss before leaving for her own room.

I close my eyes and try to sleep, even though bright sunlight is streaming in through the window.

I know this is wrong. All of it is wrong. But being here with my mother again... I see a beautiful glimmer of the life we could have had if the curse had never come. It is as wonderful as it is strange, beautiful while making me wonder what price I am paying.

Surely I came here for a reason. But what reason was that?

Soon, despite the light outside, sleep takes me.

The sun is still at its zenith when I wake up the next morning.

Mother is already outside working with the animals.

When I join her, the temperature is perfect—still and calm as a warm spring day.

My mother gives me a full, wide, wonderful smile when I appear, and hands me the chicken feed.

I had forgotten how it looked to see my mother smile in only a few short years.

Had I really started to forget her? What an awful daughter I am, to let that smile fade from my memory.

The sound of her voice brings everything rushing back, and I remember the way she turned chores into a game when I was young and once scared off a wolf by yelling and waving her arms. I remember how a boy made me cry, and Mother hugged me and made me a blackberry pie to help me feel better.

Though my heart was still tender, so were the blackberries, and by the time night fell I’d forgotten all about him.

When Mother hugs me now, though, I can’t really feel the weight of her arms. It’s like only my mind is here, and everything else is my imagination running wild. But I’m so pleased to simply be with her again, hearing her voice and seeing her face, that I brush it aside.

By the end of the day, I’m struggling to remember how I got here. Why did I die in the first place? Am I really dead? Perhaps the last few years were simply an awful dream, and this is reality as it should have been.

But there’s a tickle in the back of my mind that I’m missing something.

“Mother,” I ask after dinner. “Once you told me a story about the lord in the forest, who will do one hundred tasks for those who ask.”

She glances over while she makes a pastry. Perhaps it will be blackberry pie.

“Yes, of course!” She winks. “I have heard he’s quite beautiful. Skin like stone, bearing the horns of a ram and those of a goat, with the face of a god. But he is also a trickster. The tales all say he will try however he can to misunderstand your requests.”

“What was his name?” I ask. This is important. I know it is.

She rubs her chin. “I believe it was... Kireth.”

Yes, of course. Kireth . Surely I couldn’t forget.

“What of him?” Mother asks.

“Once you taught me the words to summon him.”

She cocks her head. “Yes. But that is a legend, honey.”

I know they were in a little book we kept. I go to the bookshelf and search for it, but I don’t recognize any of the books. Their spines are blank, and when I pull them out, so are the covers. Inside, the pages are new and unmarked.

“This is wrong,” I murmur to myself, replacing the book on the shelf. This house... it is not my house.

“What is it, honey?” Mother calls out. She’s patting the dough into a ball and fetching her rolling pin.

“Nothing,” I say, and return to the table. That bright, bright sunlight is still outside, never relenting. I feel unsettled after the blank books.

“Mother? Do you know where we are?”

Pausing, she turns to look at me. “What do you mean? We’re at home, on the farm.”

I point out the window. “How come the sun never sets?”

This time, she frowns. “Well, it’s daytime now, honey.”

Is she being obtuse on purpose? Or does she not know?

“But it was up last night when we went to bed,” I say, trying to sound reasonable.

“Well, that’s silly.” She pulls out a dish and carefully carries the dough over to it, laying it across the bottom. “The sun doesn’t shine at night.”

“I know.” I’m starting to feel impatient. “That’s why it struck me as odd.”

My mother fills the pie, but the berries are the wrong color. “Nothing seemed unusual to me.”

“Mother,” I finally ask. “Are you real? Are you dead, too?”

She spins around. “What? Honey, what sort of questions are these?” She sits down on the chair next to mine and puts one arm around my shoulders.

“We are very well and alive, you and me. Look.” She stares into my eyes, and I see my own hazel reflected back at me.

“We’re both here, together. That’s all I’ve ever wanted. Aren’t you happy?”

But something in her gaze feels off. Flat. This isn’t my real mother.

No, I’m here for a different reason, I know it. Something is pulling me away from this house, from this strange woman who looks and sounds so familiar.

“Tell me the words again,” I say to her, knowing this is important. “The words to summon Kireth.”

She frowns at me. “Now why would I do that? We don’t need him. We can handle the farm on our own.”

But I know in my bones that I need him. My heart is certain that I shouldn’t be here, that I was searching for something else. As much as I wish I could have my mother back, this house, this woman, those cows with different names—they are not mine.

“Kireth,” I repeat, turning the word over in my mind. He’s the key to the puzzle, I’m sure of it. I remember flashes of him running through grasses, bathing in the river, lying on top of me as he carefully made love to me.

How is that possible? Surely that can’t be me with an ancient god. But I can feel that it’s real—as if his weight is still pressing me down into the bed. But why is he not here? Why aren’t we together now?

Then it hits me. I’m here for Kireth. I’m going to find him and take him back home with me, to our rickety house with the weak spot in the floor. We will play in the river and tend the farm together and enjoy each other’s bodies in the grass.

Throwing away my love for him won’t bring my mother back.

I stand up from the chair and push it in. Mother follows me with an inquisitive, slightly worried expression.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I know you’re not my mother.” This must be some trick of Lucia’s to keep me from my true goal.

Mother chuckles uneasily. “What do you mean, sweet pea? Of course I’m your mother.”

“You’re not.” As much as I wish she were. “Perhaps you don’t even know it. I’m not sure what you are, exactly, but I’m not here to live out a fantasy that can’t exist.” It feels like a weight is sliding off my shoulders. “You’re dead, Mother.”

And isn’t it time that I let her go?

She opens her mouth as if to speak, but nothing comes out. Then she reaches toward me with one hand, seeking me out, asking one last time if I’ll take it.

I turn around and walk out the front door because I can’t watch any longer. Wherever I need to go to find Kireth, I’d better start looking now.