Foul is Fair
Authors: Jeffrey Cook,Katherine Perkins
Foul is Fair
Book One of the Fair Folk Chronicles
by Jeffrey Cook and Katherine Perkins
Cover by Clarissa Yeo of Yocla Designs
Text Copyright © 2015 Jeffrey Cook and Katherine Perkins
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either imaginary or used in a fictitious manner.
All Rights Reserved
Chapter 8: Mazes of Words … and Ice
Chapter 10: The Queen and her General
Chapter 13: A Semi-Restless Night
Chapter 14: Venturing into the Wilds
Chapter 15: The Unfordable River
Chapter 22: The Sword is Drawn
Chapter 24: Escape from Findias
Chapter 34: Implementing the Plan
Chapter 35: Charge for the Sword
Chapter 36: Quest for the King
Chapter 38: Return of the King
Chapter 39: Resolutions and Revelations
Chapter 40: Private Performance
Chapter 1: Attention
Lani may have been saying something about “a matter of life and death,” but Megan couldn't hear her for sure over her medical timer. Four o'clock meant the orange pills, 40 mg total. The multicolored ones in the other bottle were for the morning. She took 80 mg of those with breakfast. That was a different timer, of course.
“Really?” Lani asked. “You're going to take that right now?”
“Need to.” Megan downed them with a whole glass of water, as directed.
“You need medication, yeah. You were already on medication before. Then she kept switching doctors until one would... you were doing better! Your grades were already going up on the old dose. Remember?”
Megan supposed she did remember. 40 mg of the multicolored pills in the morning, 40 in the afternoon. Lani would generally remind her during the first break in their afternoon study sessions. The second break had been for art projects and stuff. Yeah, that had happened. The grades had gone up a little.
“It still was hard. Still had symptoms,” Megan said as she picked up a composition book with just one streak of orange marker across the cover.
“It's going to be hard. That's a thing that happens! And doodling is not a sym—” Lani sighed. “I'm sorry. Can we talk?”
“Can't we just get on the phone tonight?”
“When your Mom's home?”
“She doesn't mind a phone call as long as I'm in bed on time. So we can talk then like usual.” Megan put pencil to paper.
'[(x-h)
2
/a
2
]—[(y-k)
2
/b
2
]=1'
“'Usual' has gotten really relative lately, Megan. And this is urgent, and ...” Did Lani normally stop in the middle of sentences like that? Megan couldn't remember.
'[(x-h)
2
/a
2
]—[(y-k)
2
/b
2
]=1,'
she wrote.
“There's some things you just aren't supposed to hear first over the phone,” Lani said.
“I've got a lot to do,” Megan said.
'[(x-h)
2
/a
2
]—[(y-k)
2
/b
2
]=1'
“That conic sections stuff for math.” Math had never been Megan's strongest subject. She'd always understood the basic concepts, at least once they were repeated for her, but little mistakes crept early into her calculation and threw everything off. Best way to fix it, she now figured, was repetition.
'[(x-h)
2
/a
2
]—[(y-k)
2
/b
2
]=1'
The upcoming conic sections project was a big deal. She might get her first A+ outside art or music classes in a long time, if she stuck to the plan and didn't blow it. Not that she'd gotten any + in art class this semester, what with whatever problem Mrs. Chang had these days that made her keep asking Megan if something was wrong, but that was beside the point.
Lani was still trying to talk. “But—” but Megan was already getting to work. ‘
[(x-h)
2
/a
2
]—[(y-k)
2
/b
2
]=1'
* * *
Lani stood there for a moment, in a room silent except for pencil scratches. She looked at the bookshelf. She looked at the bottle of multicolored pills. She looked at the neat little row of composition books, all of their covers drenched in various colors of marker. Lani knew the margins of every page were filled with drawings of trees and butterflies, rough doodles and intricate patterns. Even Megan's posters followed the theme, hand-drawn landscapes and blown-up photographs decorated every wall. None of them were new. All of them were made before Ms. O'Reilly had found a doctor willing to 'finally fix it properly.'
Lani also knew that the composition book Megan was working in now had doodles only on the first two pages. Then the pencils marks were solely class notes, and the markers were only for highlighting.
Lani looked at the bottle of orange pills. She looked at Megan, whose right hand occasionally rose to brush the long, auburn curls out of her face while she worked. Megan copied the same set of equations over and over and over again with her left hand, trying to commit them to memory through sheer mechanical tenacity.
Lani looked at the clock. There was still plenty of time before Ms. O'Reilly came home. There was technically plenty of time to tell Megan what she needed to know. Part of Lani felt sure that if this emergency had arisen sophomore year, they'd already have a plan right now. Granted, it would possibly have been three half-plans and two intricately illustrated visual aids, but it would have been better than standing here knowing nothing important she said would be heard or recognized.
Lani left the room. She left the off-white little house on 47th. Her own place wasn't a long walk, though the steep hills of West Seattle made for good exercise and the early evening air helped to clear her head. She checked in with her mother and made sure her little brother was too occupied with his LEGOs to come spy on her, though she intended to listen for any calls of 'Makani Noa Kahale, get back in here this instant,' just in case. Then she headed into the backyard. She spent the last minutes of proper daylight walking around the multi-tiered garden, passing through the pair of wooden trellises and archways that decorated the carefully laid-out path, before settling into the gazebo in the middle of the rock garden, next to the small decorative fish pond. The limited lots of the neighborhood didn't leave a lot of room, but, true to her family's usual style, every inch was filled with something, and somehow, they'd made it all fit.
No strangers were likely to peek into the backyard. If they did, they wouldn't be likely to look into the gazebo, as they'd be busy wondering why such fancy garden structures were built for a bunch of pumpkins grown with more enthusiasm than skill. If anyone had looked, however, they might have seen the short, stocky sixteen-year-old sitting on a bench and staring as a crow flitted down from above and landed on the railing of the gazebo. The bird looked at her quizzically, while Lani paid more attention to the butterfly perched on the crow's head.
“We're out of options. If we're going to tell her, she's going to have to listen. Do it tonight. The orange ones, right side of the bookshelf.”
The wind rustled through the trees.
“Just the orange ones. I'm not going to get in the way of her being a functional human being.”
Lani looked at the crow as it started to take off again. “You know what I mean,” she answered what no stranger would have heard.
Megan woke to her mother's voice. “Why is the window open?” Megan unburied her head from under her pillow, squinting at the light filtering in as the curtains waved erratically.
“Don't know,” she admitted.
“Well, try to be more careful. The rain getting in would be a problem. Rise and shine. It's the bus today. I can't give you a ride because of event meetings with three potential clients. Let's go. We've had a good schedule going for weeks, so let's keep at it.”
When her mother left the room, Megan finished working herself out of bed, moving to the mirror and untangling her mop of reddish curls. She normally wouldn't wish her mother's hair, long since trained to her severe buns, on anyone, but some days, it'd certainly make brushing easier. As soon as she had her hair tied back, she checked her pills. Five minutes left on the timer meant five minutes to get to breakfast. Megan figured it was a good thing she'd finally adopted her mother's habit of laying her clothes out the night before, like she was supposed to.
The timer went off just as she got to the kitchen table. There was no getting out of eating. Megan poured her cereal, added milk, picked up the spoon, and took a breath. Bite by bite, she shoveled it into her mouth, chewed, and swallowed. Breakfast was the most important meal of the day. For one thing, the multi-colored pills functioned better with food. She wouldn't need a timer at lunch, at least. There was the school bell to remind her to eat then.
Megan made the bus stop just in time. Lani was already aboard from her earlier stop. She got up to let Megan have the window seat, as always. Megan took it with a “thanks,” then stared ahead for a moment before remembering to get out her composition book.
“So...how is…everything?” Lani asked.
“Okay. I want to work on the next type of conic-section graph for math.” The new formula was
[(x-h)
2
/a
2
] + [(y-k)
2
/b
2
]=1.
Megan would need to keep straight which shape was which. She'd been thrown off so many times before. She started writing.
“Okay, that's...okay. Need any…help?”
“No, thanks.”
School happened. Megan took notes. Her latest art assignment had not done well, and Mrs. Chang looked sad handing it back. Megan didn't know why. Her butterfly pictures had always gotten good grades before. For this one, she'd drawn a dozen identical butterflies, in even rows of four. Megan had no idea what Mrs. Chang's problem was.