Cassandra

The Fae of Gillwillan

  Book 1

  Cassandra

  by

  Nicola Shill

  Copyright 2013 Nicola Shill

  Cover Image by Danika Pittard

  Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Table of Contents

  – Prologue

  – 1 – Heatstroke

  – 2 – Adoption

  – 3 – A Vivid Fantasy

  – 4 – Home, Sweet Home

  – 5 – Idiot Questions

  – 6 – Helicopters

  – 7 – The Search

  – 8 – Pictures of You

  – 9 – Safe Harbour

  – 10 – Escape Plan

  – 11 – The Bush is Alive

  – 12 – Salvation

  – 13 – Tough Love

  – 14 – Ith and Iznaya

  – 15 – Misfit

  – 16 – Real Magic

  – 17 – A New Job

  – 18 – Gita

  – 19 – Hostile Territory

  – 20 – Eavesdropping

  – 21 – Sitting Duck

  – 22 – Discontent

  – 23 – Strategic Mistake

  – 24 – Sleazy Worm

  – 25 – Face Up

  – 26 – Interrogation

  – 27 – Gorgeous Psychopath

  – 28 – The Cetchet Game

  – 29 – Intimidation and Revelation

  – 30 – Keystone Species

  – 31 – Special Request

  – 32 – Spite

  – 33 – Adrenaline

  – 34 – A Smooth Ride

  – 35 – Zabeth’s House

  – 36 – Anthropocentrism

  – 37 – Denial

  – 38 – Acceptance

  – 39 – Ilvi

  – 40 – Special Invitation

  – 41 – The Dragonflies

  – 42 – Wings

  – 43 – Lookout

  – 44 – Intervention

  – 45 – Gita’s Excursion

  – 46 – Instinct

  – 47 – Rescue

  – 48 – Summons

  – 49 – Heart’s Desire

  – 50 – Turmoil

  – 51 – Birthday

  – 52 – Get a Dog

  – 53 – Alienation

  – 54 – Familiar Ground

  – 55 – Lodestone

  – 56 – Farewell Dear Heart

  – 57 – Desperate Twaddle

  – 58 – Reckless Begging

  – 59 – Destiny

  – 60 – An Easy Choice

  – 61 – Going to the Top

  – 62 – Welcome Wind

  – 63 – Mixed Emotions

  – 64 – Nothing to Fix

  – 65 – Reunion

  – 66 – Tampering with Nature

  – 67 – Crazy Plan

  – 68 – Making Amends

  – 69 – Redemption

  – 70 – Outrage

  – 71 – The Wrong Answer

  – 72 – Frosty Acquaintances

  – 73 – Oops

  – 74 – A Second Chance

  – 75 – Anatomy

  – 76 – The Ring of Fire

  – 77 – Resilience

  – 78 – Welcome Back

  – 79 – Coming Clean

  – 80 – Ith’s Gift

  – 81 – The Universal Spirit

  – 82 – Looking Forward

  – About the Author

  Prologue

  She leaned down and kissed her daughter’s soft cheek, savouring the sweet baby scent, even as it shattered her heart and soul.

  Nothing could fix this.

  She could blame no one but herself.

  And she had run out of options.

  She clamped a trembling hand to her mouth and stepped back from the cradle before her mind could manufacture reasons to stay.

  She began to spin, reluctantly at first, but then faster and faster until her hair streamed out around her and she became caught in a whirlwind of her own making. With a howl of despair, she flung herself out of the window.

  Inside the nursery, the cradle rocked gently and the baby, with her mother’s tear glittering on her cheek, slept on.

  Sixteen years later …

  — CHAPTER 1 —

  Heatstroke

  Had Cassandra known that she was minutes away from losing her father, she might have resisted the urge to think bad thoughts about him.

  She squinted into the sun. Low tide had exposed a wide expanse of superheated sand, but the tide had turned and now each ripple stole a little more of the beach.

  She pulled her phone out of her bag and rang her best friend.

  One ring, and then Emma’s voice croaked, ‘Get me out of here.’

  Cassandra felt better already. She relaxed back against the rough boards of her old boatshed. ‘Being dragged off to Noosa with your mother can’t possibly be as bad as having to stay home and witness this revolting display.’

  ‘What are they up to now?’

  ‘Hold on a sec while I vomit. Dad just slapped Sylvia’s bum. How old do they think they are? Listen to Sylvia squealing.’ She held the phone out in front of her for a moment and then brought it back to her ear. ‘Did you hear that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Lucky you. I don’t know how Dad can stand it.’

  ‘Blinded by love.’

  ‘Blinded and deafened.’

  They lapsed into silence. Cassandra watched Sylvia wade out into the water and dive under, imagined her getting tangled in seaweed and drowning. Oh, happy thought.

  ‘Why aren’t you with Tom?’ Emma asked.

  Cassandra didn’t know how to - didn’t want to - break the news. Normally she’d be at the back beach now, watching Tom surf. She’d have surfed, too, except that she didn’t know how because Dad was so uptight about the dangerous local back beaches that he rarely allowed her to visit them for anything more perilous than exploring the rock pools – with him.

  ‘Cassandra? …Why aren’t you with Tom?’

  ‘Tom wanted me to go with him and his mates to the carnival last night, but as usual, Dad wouldn’t let me go without an adult, so Tom decided I wasn’t worth the trouble anymore and took Chantal instead. Apparently Chantal’s parents trust her enough to make her own decisions. So now they’re a couple.’

  Emma processed this news in silence for a few seconds. Cassandra scanned the water around Sylvia, hoping to spot a shark.

  ‘It’s not as if you really care, is it?’ Emma said.

  Cassandra tried to be offended, but Emma spoke the truth. Tom had been in many of Cassandra’s classes at school and expected her to play young lovers during class time when she just wanted to get on with her work. Tom’s habit of rubbing his hair to improve his dreadlocks always pissed her off, and she hated all of his friends. Okay, so maybe she hadn’t fed the relationship. Probably an ideal girlfriend would have actually liked him a bit more, or at least found something about him to approve of. ‘Well, I’m still adding it to my tally of times Dad has ruined my life.’

  ‘Chantal’s a better match for Tom anyway,’ said Emma. ‘All boobs; no brains.’

  ‘She reminds me of everything I hate about Sylvia.’

  ‘That’s pretty broad: you hate everything about Sylvia.’

  ‘She hates everything about me, too, so it’s fair.’

  ‘Are you sure you’re not imagining that just a little bit?’

  ‘Emma, do you think I haven’t tried to convince myself that I’m imagining it? You know how good I am at sensing what people are feeling, and I’m sure I’m not wrong about this. It doesn’t make me happy knowing she hates me, but Sylvia doesn’t even try to hide it unle
ss Dad’s around, and even then she’s not smart enough to pull it off.’ Cassandra watched Sylvia prance out of the water and flop down on to her towel to bake her already deeply tanned back. Her bleached hair glowed in the sun. ‘How long does it take for skin cancer to kill someone?’

  ‘You really want your father to lose another wife? He’d never get over his separation anxiety. He’d still be following you around when you were thirty.’

  Cassandra could hear Emma’s mother calling out in the background. It made her wonder … ‘How different do you think my life would be if I’d had a mother while I was growing up?’

  Emma shouted back to her mother, ‘I’m on the phone.’

  ‘I just don’t know where I belong any more, Em.’

  Another call from Emma’s mother, louder and more insistent this time.

  ‘Sorry, Cass, I have to go … bye.’

  Emma was gone.

  Cassandra stared at her phone as though it would reveal the answers to her most profound questions.

  What was her mother like? Cassandra didn’t even have a photograph of her, but she was certain she could have been nothing like Sylvia. All she knew was what her father had told her: that she had inherited her mother’s beauty (but of course he’d say that, so it didn’t count) and her glorious wavy hair, though her mother’s hair was fairer. He invariably finished by saying, ‘You’ve got my eyes though.’ Cassandra had always believed that her eyes were her best feature: sage green with generous eyelashes; people often commented on how pretty they were.

  A girlish squeal from Sylvia roused Cassandra from her daydream and she found herself once again sitting on the veranda of her boatshed, sweating and glaring.

  A container ship had just turned at the channel marker. Cassandra loved watching the ships first appear as indistinct little grey rectangles on the horizon as they departed the Port of Melbourne and then grow bigger, bigger and still bigger until it seemed that they might actually beach themselves at her feet. Then they would swing around hard to starboard to aim for the heads and the open sea. The container ship’s wake was now breaking on the shore; for a minute or two, this beach could boast surf.

  When Dad picked Sylvia up and ran with her screaming and struggling into the waves, Cassandra could take no more. In the interest of self-preservation, she swung her legs over the side of the deck and stalked off into the ti-tree and banksia bush that tangled tightly around the sides and back of the boatshed. But she had risen too fast and that, combined with the move from bright heat to cool shade, made her dizzy and dimmed her vision. She stumbled around to the rear wall of the boatshed and slumped down to sit with her back against the boards. Dressed only in her bikini and sarong, the salty breeze blew the sweat off her skin. She closed her eyes and allowed her head to thunk against the wall while she tried to let go of hurt and resentment.

  When she felt calmer, she opened her eyes.

  A shiny black beetle ambled clumsily through the maze of twigs and branches that littered the ground. It was a cute beetle, as far as beetles went, and Cassandra was about to reach down and pick it up for a closer look when a tiny young boy, only about four or five centimetres tall, with a pair of shimmery wings folded on his back, ran out from behind the trunk of an old banksia and tried to shepherd the beetle back the way he had come. The beetle turned laboriously around and disappeared into the undergrowth with the boy skipping behind it.

  … A miniature boy.

  … With wings.

  Cassandra didn’t like what this was saying about her mental stability. Obviously, repressing all those negative emotions had taken its toll. She decided to ignore it and blame it on heatstroke. Unfortunately, her body had other ideas: before her brain had a chance to take charge, she had thrown herself on to her hands and knees and was scrambling after the boy, now vanished along with the beetle.

  The more she doubted what she had seen, the more difficult it became to risk physical harm hauling herself through the tangle of branches and grasses. She was just about to give up when she saw the undergrowth thinning a little way ahead. She pushed on and ducked under a low branch to find herself staring into a sandy glade.

  There, staring back at her, was not just one small fairy boy, but a kaleidoscope of fairies, swarming on the ground and fluttering in the air.

  — CHAPTER 2 —

  Adoption

  The crowd parted and a tiny lady with skin the colour of coffee beans, dressed in flowing crimson and purple, strode to the front, took up a belligerent stance – feet braced, hands on hips – and glared directly at Cassandra.

  Wind hit Cassandra and spun around her. Around and around it went, gaining speed. Far from being blown away, the fairies in front of her continued to exist in their pool of tranquil sunshine. The crimson lady’s glare intensified and so did the wind. Cassandra reached a hand up to hold her hair back from her face. Now other fairies were crowding around the crimson lady and each one of them was staring at Cassandra with a look of menacing concentration. The wind became so intense that no amount of effort on Cassandra’s part could keep her hair from whipping into her face and stinging her eyes. She dipped her head and squeezed her eyes shut. The dizziness returned and intensified. Her sarong felt too tight around her waist and nausea rose up in her throat.

  She began to retch.

  Then, suddenly, the wind stopped.

  Cassandra swallowed heavily and opened her eyes. When she raised her head, the world had undergone a frightening transformation: the sandy glade was now a glittering crystal field, each grain of sand as big as her fingertip, smoothed by the sea and sparkling in the sun.

  And the fairies were now the size of regular people.

  Comprehension may have dawned slowly, but when it did, it exploded in Cassandra’s mind. Her second last thought before she vomited and blacked out was the realisation that her surroundings had not grown: she had shrunk.

  Her last thought was that she hoped she didn’t land face first into her own vomit.

  Cassandra had no idea how long she had been unconscious, but she woke up in a wide hammock surrounded by winged people with expressions ranging from fear through curiosity to antagonism. Close by, the crimson lady stood so regally that she appeared much taller than she actually was. A mysterious black opal, suspended from a golden chain around her neck, seemed to hold red, yellow and purple flames trapped within it.

  Cassandra experienced incredible peace and wellbeing as she lay beneath the lady’s gaze. Noticing that Cassandra was awake, the lady began to speak. Her voice was low and melodic, eerily soothing. ‘Calije guonin …’

  She wasn’t speaking English, and yet Cassandra understood her: ‘Human girl, your discovery of Gillwillan has sealed your fate. You have been adopted into our community and, from this moment on, forbidden contact with other humans.’

  Attempting to process the incongruous clash between the gentle voice and the harsh meaning left Cassandra stunned. She felt a frightening compulsion to obey. Surely she wasn’t being held prisoner? By a band of fairies?

  ‘No! I can’t stay here.’ She tried to sit up but the hammock rocked, bringing on a fresh wave of dizziness and nausea.

  She slumped back down and cleared her throat. ‘My father will come looking for me.’

  ‘You can’t return. It’s impossible now,’ the lady said. ‘You’re no longer visible to humans, so attempting to return is not only futile but also dangerous. Your size and inexperience puts you at enormous risk should you venture into the bush alone.’

  ‘No longer visible?’ Cassandra held her hands up in front of her face. ‘I can see me.’ She looked back at the lady and the fluttering crowd beyond. ‘I can see you, too.’

  The lady frowned. ‘Yes, you have fae sight. But then, I suspect you already knew that.’

  Cassandra didn’t even know what fae sight was, let alone that she had it.

  The lady’s expression softened slightly. ‘It will be difficult to accept and adapt to your new life, but you can’t go back
now. You’ll be placed with a family who will help you.’

  How should she respond? This must be a dream.

  But it felt so real.

  ‘Tell me your name,’ the lady commanded.

  The compulsion to obey nudged Cassandra again, but she refused to cooperate with her captors, so she stared stubbornly out into the bush.

  The lady frowned, stepped forward and laid a hand on Cassandra’s arm. ‘You’re very resistant, aren’t you?’ she muttered and then, louder, ‘Tell me your name.’

  This time the answer escaped unbidden from Cassandra’s mouth before she could even consider defiance. Panic and confusion made her voice crack as she said, ‘Cassandra.’

  The lady repeated it as though trying it out. ‘Cassandra.’ It had never sounded so musical. ‘And my name is Eerin. Sleep now, while we choose a family to foster you. The gentle hand on Cassandra’s arm rubbed backwards and forwards in a soothing rhythm.

  Cassandra’s eyes drifted shut as she thought how unlikely it was that she could fall asleep at this moment.

  — CHAPTER 3 —

  A Vivid Fantasy

  Cassandra heard her father calling.

  Her eyes flew open.

  Wings.

  Enormous flaming wings filled her vision, and between them strawberry blonde hair wisping around a flawless peaches and cream face with anxious blue eyes.

  Alarm and disorientation ricocheted through her head.

  Recollection hit.

  But she was sure she’d heard her father!

  There it was again! Definitely her father’s voice.

  The hammock swung wildly as she launched herself out of it. She stood looking frantically around her, trying to judge which direction the voice had come from. She scanned the glade, trying to find the way she had come in, but at this size, nothing looked familiar.

  The lady behind the anxious eyes talked insistently, trying to make Cassandra listen: ‘Cassandra! He can’t see you. He won’t be able to find you, no matter what you do. Let him go.’

  Again, Cassandra heard her father’s voice, this time echoed by Sylvia’s. She had never imagined she’d be glad to hear that shrill voice again. She located the direction and started to run. Panic gave her more speed than she’d ever known she possessed, but the leaf and twig litter, which earlier had been no more than a prickly carpet, was now an obstacle course, tripping her, savaging her feet, twisting her ankles and jarring her knees. The long grasses and low branches whipped and scratched her face and body and tore at her hair. Her sarong tangled around her legs, hindering her progress, so she wrenched it off as she ran. Her father continued to call, but his voice was fading into the distance.

  She screamed out to him, ‘Dad! DAD!’