CHAPTER EIGHT

Autumn

How all occasions do inform against me indeed.

Fallon appeared in my history class. The whole A2 class appeared in my history class. The explanation was simple: the usual history teacher was off on maternity leave, and the current unit for both our class and the A2 class was Sagean history, so Mr. Sylaeia would teach both classes together in addition to English. I knew that my look when he entered the room was one of stewed fury and betrayal, firm in the belief that he could not have thought of a crueler punishment than detention with the prince. When the latter arrived, I urged Christy and Tammy to sit on either side of me, walling me in. They didn’t seem too pleased that we had used up all the seats in our row, leaving no room for the prince, but it didn’t matter. He chose to sit on the other side of the room, squeezing in at the far corner of a desk with some of the other A2 students. I was surprised but relieved. Yet the horseshoe arrangement of the desks still meant that we faced him. I inched my chair around to the left, to face the board.

It would be an understatement to say that Sagean history was not a popular topic. A groan circulated through the room when it was announced, and I felt my cheeks flare up in shame. Even the prince’s cheeks tinted pink. He hid it well, resting his head in his hands, his elbows on the desk.

My eyes bounced back toward the desk, cursing myself for looking. There they rested until a textbook arrived. I flicked it open, finding paragraphs dedicated to customs that were second nature to me yet so alien to those around the room. I closed it, knowing that as a child, I had studied books at my previous school that mirrored these in every way, except that they were about humanity. Looking up, the prince caught my eye, a grin on his lips as his eyes darted down to the book and back up. He thought it amusing. I thought it a tragedy.

Mr. Sylaeia started with the same rhetoric about the prince as he had used while taking attendance, and when he talked about the Extermino, he was greeted with the same fearful silence . . . and my heart went just as cold.

Mr. Sylaeia wrote three words on the board: THE DARK BEINGS. “I know you all hate this topic, but it’s compulsory! So let’s start with something simple. Can anybody explain a little about the dimensions, and name the nine different types of dark beings and the powers they possess?” Mr. Sylaeia asked.

Even though everybody had to know the answer, nobody spoke up until, tentatively, I lifted my hand.

“There are nine dimensions, and humans in every one. Each dimension is a rough parallel of the rest. We all share a cultural memory, because whatever happens to the humans in one dimension happens in another, because the nine parallels of a country are one state, not nine different states. The humans and dark beings cooperate through the interdimensional council, the Inter . . .”

I trailed off to seek approval from Mr. Sylaeia, unsure whether I was explaining it clearly. Even though I was trying to ignore him, I glanced back to the prince, suddenly embarrassed that I was explaining something he probably understood better than I did.

Mr. Sylaeia nodded for me to continue.

“We live in the first dimension, and it is the domain of the Sage. There isn’t a hierarchy among the beings, but we have the strongest, most versatile magic. There isn’t much we can’t do, so long as it doesn’t drain nature too much, which is where we take our magic from if we need more than what is in our blood. We’re ruled by . . . by the Athenea, from a small country of the same name, at the northern end of Vancouver Island.”

Now I really was blushing. He should be explaining this!

“Then there are the vampires in the second dimension, ruled by the Varns in England. And yes, they are the ones who kidnapped Violet Lee. The vampires rely on consuming blood for energy and to top up their magic, which is what keeps them alive. The Damned in the third dimension are magic-users, too, but they have to make a blood sacrifice to use it . . . but by returning blood to the earth, they can use very powerful magic.”

Finally, the prince chimed in. “The fourth dimension is host to the shifters, who can shift between their human forms and spirit animals. They look a lot like ghosts when they do, and they live mostly in the mountains of Central Asia . . . before they revealed themselves a few centuries ago, people used to think they were demons.” His eyes lit up as people turned their attention to him and his more exciting explanation.

“The fifth and sixth dimensions are very similar, because more forests have been preserved compared to here. That’s where the winged people and the elven fae live . . . they are both very beautiful beings, and nomadic. They don’t have a monarchy, and they don’t use modern technology. They are so at one with nature they don’t need it.

“The wolves in the seventh dimension can transform into human-like creatures at will, and the maengu in the eighth are water creatures, who can also transform to come onto land. And then in the ninth . . . well, we call them the phoenixes, and they can only take on a human form for one month in every nine.”

He left it at that.

Like actors in a play, the prince and I only spoke when directed by Mr. Sylaeia. The rest of the class was infuriatingly silent. They knew nothing, even when Mr. Sylaeia asked them for the basics that would have been obvious to any human elsewhere.

Eventually, he gave up, turning to me, his tone much softened now. “The fas, or basic principles, if you will, Autumn.”

“The wielding of energy, preservation of the balance of nature, courtesy in respect to rank, loyalty to Athenea, and strict adherence to the Terra Treaties.”

Though Sagean was a tongue stifled beneath the other, it still felt strange to speak those words in English, when I had repeated them as a mantra in my native language as a child. They did not belong in this language. This tongue could not convey the beauty and binding power of those words.

Mr. Sylaeia pulled out the board marker that lived in his shirt pocket, scribbling out each of the fas. “The first four are quite self-explanatory: magic; a respect for nature, especially concerning diet and, more recently, climate change; etiquette; and loyalty to the Sagean royalty. Does anybody know what the Terra Treaties are?”

I could see Fallon perk up, gazing around the room as his eyes became wider and wider. His lips parted.

“Nobody?” Mr. Sylaeia clicked the lid of his pen shut with the palm of his hand. “Nobody at all?”

A chill passed up my spine at the disturbed silence. I knew there were many things they didn’t know. I knew that beyond how hot the nobility was and who was dating whom there was no interest in my people. Yet to not know what the treaties were . . .

Mr. Sylaeia answered his own question. “The Terra is the name given to a group of treaties signed universally by all dimensions and humanity in the early nineteenth century, formalizing what had previously been a set of uncoordinated laws. The Terra Treaties are the reason Autumn and Fallon are sitting in this room as guardians, here to protect the school. The Terra Treaties are what binds a dark being, under penalty of death, to never harm a human unless lives are threatened, with the exemption of the vampires—who wouldn’t be able to survive without this exception. The Terra Treaties are what essentially keep the peace that you enjoy.”

Nobody spoke. It was not a stunned silence, the quiet of a class in awe. It was bored silence. This was not achievement to them, or reassurance, it was politics: boring, mind-numbing politics that—beyond the hot prince—did not touch upon their closeted lives. I shivered at those words; I could still remember the whispered utterance that came with their mention in the classes at St. Sapphire’s: the pride that our race had negotiated stability for all dark beings. The treaties did not bring stability now. They didn’t bring anything.

“They won’t hold us in peace much longer, will they?” I said before I could hold my tongue. But I decided I wanted to continue. Why lull in a false sense of safety? “Humans are in conflict with dark beings everywhere. And situations like what has happened with Violet Lee only make things worse! Meanwhile, enemies of us all take advantage of the conflict to try and make the Terra fall apart, and cause war . . . enemies I am trying to protect youfrom,” I finished quietly, eyes bowed to my book.

The class finally broke their silence and erupted into murmurs, followed by protests about how it wasn’t the humans’ fault. Mr. Sylaeia’s eyes widened and it didn’t matter how much he rapped on the board; the room wouldn’t quiet down.

I buried my head in my hands and dug my nails into my scalp. Why couldn’t I keep my mouth shut?! Now everybody would think I hated them, and they hated me enough already . . .

I didn’t even notice the prince had stood up until I heard his voice over the hushing room.

“Autumn is right. The Terra won’t last much longer. The world has changed, and we don’t see eye-to-eye anymore. It could lead to war. But it won’t. Fate won’t let it get that far. What do you think the Prophecy of the He**ines is for?”

I pushed down so hard on the desk to stand up that the table moved with a groan and my chair nearly toppled over. I felt silly standing, but it was an old ritual from my Sagean school, and sitting made me feel small compared to the prince. “And how can a few dark beings rebuild the Terra and stop a war? What if they don’t appear in time? What if they fail?”

“They won’t,” he insisted, and for the first time I actually met his gaze. His forehead was set in a single line of frustration and I could feel my magic beginning to warm up my veins with anger.

“No He**ines have appeared yet. If the vampires killed Violet Lee tomorrow, there would be no stopping a war. What happens there affects us all!”

I waited, holding my breath and almost hoping he would try and deny my logic. I knew I was right, I had seen the threat with my own eyes: the hate of the humans, the Extermino . . . and Violet Lee, the peculiar girl I couldn’t get out of my dreams.

“You’re wrong—”

It was still early enough in the term for the coming of the bell to be something of a shock: as the shrill, uneven wail cut through the quiet, everybody jumped.

I packed up my things as quickly as I could and rounded the end of the horseshoe, wishing my feet would move a little faster so that I could get out before the prince finished what he had to say. All the courage that I had possessed when angry had fled, just like I was fleeing outside.

“Autumn!”

Turn, for Pete’s sake! I could feel him closing in on me, the rest of the class not far behind, never breaking from their packs.

“Duchess!”

Then came the call that stopped me, that turned me on the spot. It was a call that summoned from the unnatural earth roots that held me in place, prisoner, to hear what I knew was coming.

“Why do you keep calling her duchess?” It was an innocent question. Tee, joining her cousin in the ranks of the class, could not have known how much I had dreaded that very question and prayed in the last twenty-four hours that nobody would notice how the prince addressed me.

I pleaded with my lips, mouthing no, no, over and over, but when he turned to look at the younger girl and back at me, I could see in his bright cobalt eyes—they always said you could mark noble blood by the eyes—that he would not oblige.

“Don’t you know? She is the duchess of England.”

I did not wait for the gasps or the questions, because I could not bear to hear them. Instead, I turned and walked six measured paces, then took to the air.

Remember who you will one day be, child!

I do not want to think of that day, Grandmother. I do not want to think of it.

Why do that? Why be so willfully cruel? Why deny me my choice like that? At least I could run. If it had not been the end of the day, I wouldn’t have been able to escape his revelation like this. Escape him.

Though the sun created a patchwork of light and shadows below me on the town, the air was cold. The wind from the sea was caught in the jaws of the concave river mouth, funneled along the increasingly narrow valley, stirring the masts of a tall ship moored on the Dartmouth embankment. The rigging made a soft chime that the wind carried with it, an underlying melody to the beating of water that the old paddle ferry produced and the shrill whistle of the steam train weaving along the embankment toward Kingswear. It was a small village, standing in proud opposition to Dartmouth on the other side of the river, its multicolored cottages rising in uneven terraces much like the larger houses of the larger town did. Over bridges, past creeks, and below the village school, where the old-fashioned bell tolled to announce the end of the day, the train passed, eventually coming to a halt beside the smaller, lower ferry.

It was a world perfectly preserved, continuing on in its own isolated sphere, relying on its unquestionable beauty to bring in the tourists. Yet its isolation was why I suffered.

Finally, as time in my angst seemed to move much slower, I reached the other side of the river, the trees lining its bank broken and falling into the silt. It was a pity that the leaves had fallen so early—it was barely September; empty bottles, sandwich papers, and silk handkerchiefs testimony to the summer nights whose mark had not yet been erased. But that was what they got for perching on the riverbank. They were rotting. They were dying.

Why? Why did you have to tell them when I asked you not to? What have you achieved by doing that?

There was a brief respite in the chill as I moved away from the sea, only for the cold to be replaced with fog as the tower of the church near my house came into view and with it the harbor a little farther on and the salty suspension that the sea mist carried inland.

I still couldn’t comprehend everything that had happened that day. It felt as though the events since that morning had occurred over several days and were still no more than skin-deep. Yet my body hadn’t failed to note the pricking, and inside, I felt oddly numb—my mind’s way of protecting itself, I supposed.

I glanced at the clock on the church tower, surprised at how long it had taken me to get home. Time just didn’t seem to move in a constant way anymore.

Inside, the blinking light of my laptop lured me in as I placed a cup of tea on the desk and checked my e-mails. Sure enough, Jo had returned a sprawling epic that required much scrolling. Despite her confused lineage—French-Canadian and German, now serving as a guardian at a boarding school in Switzerland—her English was word-perfect, something eight years at St. Sapphire’s had given her.

The first three paragraphs were dedicated to gushing about how hot the prince was, and how I should feel lucky to be bestowed the chance to be so intimate with him. The rest added up to a warning: what I suspected of him and his family was not a light accusation and that I should tread carefully. She ended with her own theory as to why he was here, which I dismissed immediately, blushing.

I leaned back in my chair, unsure of how to reply. I contemplated telling her about losing it that morning, but decided against it, not wanting to provide any opportunities for rumors. There was no point telling her about what the prince had revealed: she didn’t know I hid—had hidden—my title.

Pushing away from the desk, I collapsed onto the cushioned window seat. Through the window, I could see the maple tree in the garden, the nearest branch just a foot or two from my window—when I was a child, reluctantly returning home from school for the weekend, I would often seek solace in the crux of its branches, where the trunk would divide into four and form a neat little seat, perfect to fold into. It was my own palace of leaves, decorated with pinned flowers plucked from the garden or dream-catchers, which I would make endlessly at the desk where the laptop now sat—some of the frail structures had survived, and were now dangling from the eaves of the window, minus the feathers. They had become rotten and mildewed, and my mother had removed them. When I had collected more gulls’ feathers to replace them, she had taken those, too.

I knew I couldn’t face school the next day. I couldn’t face the questions on top of the already mounting dread I had at the prospect of detention on Thursday. Besides, a day would act as a sort of buffer against the shock: the buzz about my title would have died down a bit by Thursday. Let the prince deal with the questions, I thought. Let him sort out what he caused.