With a Kiss (Twisted Tales) (11 page)

Was that why she seemed so serious? Her heart had been bound? I kneeled next to her, brushing the silkies away. They cried out irritably, but I didn’t care. All I cared about was her, and it made no sense, considering who I was. The hag had called me a Child of Darkness. Why would the hag seek out a cold creature like me? I knew her hands. The hag had set me up from birth. Faerytales were prophecies. I was the keeper. I had no idea what that meant, but the hag must’ve known our paths would cross with this kid’s and she wanted me to hurt her. I was the one who would teach Babs that love wasn’t to be trusted.

Babs blinked up at me. I felt like crying, especially since she had no idea how bad I was for her. Sure, the faery queen had jumpstarted my heart so I wouldn’t hurt her baby, but if Babs loved, the love of mortals would fade from view. Didn’t Onagh know that if her baby loved me, the curse would destroy her child? My love wasn’t enough, would never be enough. There had to be a way to break our little girl’s curse.

I landed on my knees next to Babs and scooped her up, holding her close. “Oh, honey.” I patted her soft back. “I won’t let this happen to you. I won’t. I’ll get you out of this mess.” Babs’ little fist broke under my arm and she patted my back in return, as if she were comforting me instead.

 “She won’t lose
everything
.” Hobs sighed, probably wondering how much to tell me. I gave him a look that told him he’d better spill his guts. “You’re the one meant to be with her.” He knelt next to me, his broad shoulder brushing against mine. “It’s not like you’re helping her because you care about her, right?” I was silent, wondering if that was true anymore. “You have to help her because of that thing on your head. So
love
?” He laughed. “We don’t have to worry about love. There’s nothing to get upset about.”

I bit down, trying to think. It was hard considering how emotional I was getting lately. Hobs was right. It was probably this crown on my head that made me care so much. It made me do strange things.
Was I really worried that I would hurt Babs?
I tried to evaluate this.
Not worried, exactly.
Babs and I had the same heart disorder, that’s all. Babs blinked up at me with that perpetual faith in her eyes. I didn’t deserve it.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have her.” It hurt to say. “I think this curse is talking about me. I won’t be good for her.” It had been painful when Hobs had wheeled her down another aisle in a grocery cart. I couldn’t imagine the torture I would go through once she was really gone, but if this Muma really returned babies to parents, it was for the best.

I felt Hobs’ hands on my shoulder and he squeezed. “Then it’s a good thing you won’t have her for that long.” I knew he was working the only thing that moved me: logic, except I didn’t have much of that anymore. “It’s just an extra reason to get rid of her, right? Give her to her people, so she won’t be hurt by some human?”

What if I was that human?

Hobs smoothed out the trail of goose bumps over my arms until he found Babs’ little hands too. He played with her fingers, then pulled away to reassure me with his eyes. “Let’s figure out how to get her to her mom, alright? We’ll do it together. We’ll keep her safe.”

I knew how. Give her to Muma. I turned, but the lady was already gone. Hobs worried his lower lip. “She knows the babe’s in good hands now,” he said. “None of us have a choice. We have to go through with this. It’s the only way to break the curse.” It was like he was trying to justify it to himself. “We can’t do it any other way.”

I pressed my face into his chest, holding Babs between us. “Okay.”

I felt his arms stiffen.

Three horrid crones materialized inside my room. Hobs tried to stop me, but I was out of his hands faster than he could. Was this what he had been implying? He meant to work with these sorts of lowlifes because he thought he had no choice? The silkies had either been beautiful or kind, but these were neither. I had studied enough folklore to recognize the three sisters of fate.

“What are they doing here?” I asked. “This can’t be the usual procedure for babies.”

“Relax. It’s Urðr, Verðandi and Skuld!”

The crones stretched out their terrible fingers, their knobby knuckles knocking together as they pointed me out. Their eyes were sinister. “
Cost cost. Thief, you shall feel the cost. Reclaim. Redeem. Restore all that was lost. Lost, lost.”

Hobs gave me a weak smile. “They always say that, ever since they lost their spindle.”

“Well, tell them we don’t have it!” I tried to back away, but Hobs put an iron grip on me. I knew he had every intention of forcing me to meet up with them. “What are you doing?” I couldn’t get free. “Let me go! The last thing Babs needs is another curse.” I elbowed him hard, but his clenched jaw was the only indication that I hurt him.

“They don’t do curses,” he said tightly. “They’re Norn, the guardians of fate. And they only see the future if it’s happened before.”

That didn’t make sense until I remembered the faerytale prophecies. “Well, I don’t like it. Get them away from us. Please!”

But the crones only came closer. Hobs held Babs and me captive. I groaned, seeing a gnarled hand snake to our baby’s smooth forehead. The old woman touched a yellowed fingernail against her skin and wrote with invisible letters.
“Sweet,”
she croaked.
“Stolen from a happy home. The Queen of Hearts, you shall be known.”
Her white hair yellowed as she spoke and her pale skin smoothed out until she stepped away from us, now a beautiful young woman. I couldn’t unclench my hands. They made little fists under poor Babs’ back. I refused to let her go.

The second Fate trailed bony fingers across Babs’ weary face.
“In time, you’ll brave the winter storm. Take courage. Grow to your new form.”
Fire crackled from the Norn’s scalp and it whipped around her shoulders in a sheet of vibrant red hair, her skin coppery and golden. She smiled gently as the third Norn took her turn with Babs.

“Your heart is strong. Your smile doth nurse. The kiss of mortals breaks the curse.”

Despite being freaked out of my mind, I couldn’t miss what they were saying.
The kiss of mortals breaks the curse?
I was a mortal. All it would take was a kiss? By now I watched to see how the next crone would transform. A dark-skinned beauty touched Babs on the lips with delicate fingers—a far cry from the gnarled ones she had sported seconds earlier. With a black-eyed glance at me, she wrenched Babs from my arms with hardly any effort at all. I growled out as, instead of a gaggle of crones, Babs was now surrounded by serene guardian angels. Their hair was way too big. Not like I was jealous.

After fussing and singing over the little baby, they laid her on the soft pink blanket. The girls gave Hobs a brisk nod, then vanished. As soon as they did, I shrugged him away from me, too angry to speak. He let me go, and I hurried to Babs’ side, kneeling. I would smother her with kisses if that’s what it took to break this curse, but before I could, I hesitated. What was the usual procedure? I leaned over Babs and kissed her on the cheek. A little coldly, but old habits were hard to break. I gave Hobs a sidelong glance. “You think that did it?”

He hid a smile. “Yeah, probably.”

That meant no.
I felt helpless. Compared to everything I was fighting, I had no power whatsoever. I couldn’t stop any of this because my heart wasn’t working . . . not fully. And yet I was her protector. She depended on me. I rested my tired head against the cluttered ground next to hers. “It’s going to be okay.” I tried to give her a smile, but it came out a little weak. My own comfort felt hollow at best.

Babs startled me with a gummy grin. My head tilted to the side, so that her fingers barely missed slapping the star twinkling over my forehead. I couldn’t believe it. I got her to smile. My own turned more genuine. “Do you like that?” I asked. She didn’t answer, but wrapped her fingers around the crown in my hair. Luckily she didn’t tug. I patted her back awkwardly. “Twinkle, twinkle, little star,” I really couldn’t hold a note, but I tried to lull her to sleep with it anyway. “How I wonder what you are.”

I didn’t really know the words, but I watched her eyelids lower when sleep finally overtook her. She still had a firm grip on my hair. What the silkies couldn’t do, I did. I twisted to Hobs, feeling the rough carpet against my face. He sat on the edge of my bed, studying me like I was a fascinating science experiment. Once our gazes caught, he knelt at my side. “What is
wrong
with you?” he asked.

I laughed, but I felt a sadness I didn’t know was possible until tonight. Everything inside me was too hard to control. “You try not to be so emotional when you haven’t gotten any sleep and you’ve never felt . . . you’ve never felt . . .” I sighed. “Remember the first time you touched me?”

He nodded, his lashes hiding the expression in his eyes, but I could tell he was worried.

“This hurts worse,” I said. “My heart? I don’t know how much it will take. I’m not used to feeling things, Hobs. I . . . I’ve got to get us back faster than three days or I’m dead. I swear this will kill me.”

He set his jaw, and the warmth of his hand lingered over mine even after he left the room.

Chapter Nine

Dare you haunt our hallow’d green?
None but fairies here are seen
Down and sleep,
Wake and weep,
Pinch him black, and pinch him blue

—
Thomas Ravenscroft,
The Fairies’ Danced

F
aerytales. It was the bible of the faeries. Tales of stolen babies, witches, crown wars. This stuff was all real. I picked up the heavy book from the park bench and turned it over in my hands. I had stuffed all the scraps of Internet information I could in between the pages of the book, and it bulged with useless facts—it was amazing how much time I had when I didn’t sleep at night.

The big buckles on my white canvas ballet flats jingled as I walked through the park. The sunburned blades of grass spread out like Troll hair. Speaking of, I glanced over at Babs. She had grown overnight . . . I mean, she had
literally
grown overnight. She looked like a two-year-old. The girl had hair now, lots of it—like a little Rapunzel.

Hobs had put the quickly growing fuzz into two spiked devil horns on her head dashing any romantic notions I had for either of them. Not that I should have
any
for him. He stepped over the cracks in the cement, his hand over hers, looking relaxed in his gray pinstriped shorts. He drank me in with a leisurely look. The calm act didn’t trick me. He hadn’t slept last night either. My cry of distress that I was going to die had thrown him into a flurry of activity. He seemed to be on a mission now too. The problem was that it wasn’t mine.

That morning I had caught him typing with two fingers into the Internet search engine:
guy peels off his face at golf course.
I didn’t get it. He had ripped that off the tabloid he called useless. I was looking for a way back to Babs’ home, and he was looking for a Skinwalker. I didn’t see how they were connected. Hobs must’ve figured out how to wipe the history on my computer because after my brief glimpse over his shoulder, he cleared the screen with a snap of his fingers.

After that, there was no getting out of him what his plans were. He just watched me in that superior way of his and teased me until I couldn’t take anymore. I found myself announcing our outing to the park out of sheer desperation. I had to get out of the house. Now, if I could just get us to faeryland or to the Sidhe. Wherever. I had a whole stack of information on how to do it, though it had better not be as unreliable as the safety precautions against faeries. Faeries liked the woods. And yeah, our town was covered in firs and evergreens, but the Civic League Park was the closest thing to my house that resembled “the woods.” Somewhere in this park, I hoped to find an entrance to the faeries’ world. Then I would force it open and return Babs before I proved her undoing.

Babs toddled next to Hobs, and he slowed his stride to match hers. Her bare feet pressed into the hard, dead grass. She tripped on the hem of the overgrown shirt I had tugged over her head that morning. Hobs scooped her up from the sidewalk in one motion and spun her around. His leather flip flops slapped to the rhythm of their makeshift happy dance.

“What are you doing? You want the world to think she’s a flying two-year-old?” I eased Babs away from him and set her on her feet. She had picked up on that walking thing fast. A few hours actually. After making sure no one saw her hovering act, I smiled fondly at her. This was the next faerytale on the books, but who were we? I still couldn’t figure out whether I was the evil witch or the faery godmother.