All the way back on Seabrook Island, Makenna Delling agreed to give Ash Crusader back, but that was after they sought out Caleb at the crab dock. She led him, Evelyn, and Silvey down Seabrook Island Rd. and increasingly became even more annoyed when Ash constantly pointed out things and asked her what they were.
Every time Makenna answered, “It’s a house! It’s a tree! It’s a mailbox!” another layer of anger threw itself on top of her voice. The last thing Ash noticed before they turned onto the road that took them to Creek Watch Villas and the crab dock, was a car.
A streak of silver steadily made its way down the road, and the Wizard Fairy pointed at it. “What’s that?!” he yelled. Immediately, he leaped onto the road and sprinted towards the car. Makenna yelped when she saw this and quickly hid behind her hands. She couldn’t watch this. When the car’s driver noticed the boy running towards him, he screeched to a stop, so he wouldn’t hit him, and skid marks bled onto the road. He stopped a little too late though. Ash was too close to him, but he was lucky. He didn’t get hit because Silvey managed to save him. She couldn’t save him from the Devil’s Heir, but she could save him from a car. Her ribbon-like feelers stretched fifteen feet in front of her and wrapped around the teen. Silvey dragged him back over to Makenna and Evelyn just in time. She tossed him into Makenna’s arms, but because Ash was a teeny bit bigger than her, she fell back when she caught him. The two of them landed on the grass behind them, which sat just in front of the woods.
As they rested on the ground, the driver of the car rolled down his window and yelled at Ash, “Watch where you’re going, son! You could have been squashed into a pancake!”
“Wha-What’s a pa-pancake?” Ash asked him, but the driver didn’t answer him. Instead, he pressed down on the gas pedal and took off again.
Makenna and Ash waited until the car vanished before they stood up. Evelyn floated next to Makenna’s head as she stood first.
Once up, she grabbed hold of Ash’s arm and dragged him to his own feet. “Just what do you think you were doing?” she yelled at him, “You could’ve been road kill! You’re almost as bad as Tracey!”
“Tra-Tracey?” questionably asked the Wizard Fairy, “Who-Who’s Tracey?”
Makenna opened her mouth to speak – to ask a question, but a blast of cold wind, like the one she felt on Coutarine Island, rushed through her hair and caused goosebumps to stick up on her arms. “What’s that?” questioned the Metamorphic Fairy as she turned to the woods. Silvey joined her while on the other hand, Evelyn landed on Ash’s shoulder.
There was a moment of silence, and then Makenna heard it.
A crack in the woods, and a second blast of cold wind blew by her. “Is somebody in there?” she asked the woods, “Show yourself!” Nothing did. Makenna must have been hearing things. She was just getting ready to join Ash and continue on to the crab dock when heard something even more mysterious. Singing. It was coming from the intersection in front of her, Silvey, Ash, and Evelyn. Only one thought came to mind when Makenna heard the singing. “Tracey!” she yelled, but it wasn’t Tracey at all. It was another voice.
The owner of the beautiful voice was... Makenna saw him. It was a teenage boy, about Ash and Tracey’s ages, who stood in the intersection of the road. He had black hair and brown eyes. Hair covered the mysterious boy’s right eye. He was dressed in a yellow and blue hoodie, which was over a long-sleeved, blue shirt, jeans, and dark blue high tops. He looked strangely familiar.
Every single hormone in Makenna Delling’s body exploded to life. She felt that she herself had just turned eighteen.
Hearts appeared on her eyes, and she yelled, “Whoa! Who’s that?” at the sight of the boy. Her entire face turned red. Silvey confusingly peered up to the Metamorphic Fairy and bumped her. What on earth was going on with her? “Cupid has struck a bullseye!” Makenna continued.
Evelyn looked up from Ash and asked her, “What are you talking about, Makenna?”
“That boy!”
“What boy?”
“Over there!” Makenna pointed at the boy standing like a statue in the intersection.
Evelyn, Silvey, and Ash looked with her, but they didn’t see anything. “I don’t see a boy.” Evelyn admitted, “You must be seeing things, Miss Delling.”
“No I’m not! He’s right there!” However, when Makenna pulled her attention away from Evelyn and focused it on the intersection again, the boy had vanished! “What the?” yelped the Metamorphic Fairy, “He was there just a second ago!”
“I think you may just miss your brother.” Evelyn suggested, “Don’t worry though, honey, we’re going to the crab dock right now. Lead the way.”
“But I saw a boy!” Makenna complained, “Argh! Cupid has snapped my heart in two!” She was just getting ready to lead her friends forward when she felt the blast of cold air again. Then in a blink of the eye, the mysterious boy once again appeared in the intersection! “There he is!” Makenna gasped, and she quickly pointed forward for the second time.
No matter how hard Ash, Evelyn, and Silvey looked in the direction she was pointing, they could not see the boy. “There’s no boy.” Evelyn spoke, but Makenna knew there was.
Why her friends couldn’t see him, she had no idea, but she tried to knock some sense out of him, “Who are you? What do you think you’re doing, standing in the middle of the road?” The boy didn’t answer. He merely held his hands behind him and smiled at Makenna. After a moment of silence, he gestured for her to follow him and turned onto the road that led to Creek Watch Villas and the crab dock. “Wait!” Makenna yelled. She leaped into a run and chased after him.
“Makenna, wait!” Evelyn yelled from behind, but Makenna didn’t turn back. This young man was way too mysterious.
Silvey tagged along the closet as she chased him down the road. Marshland surrounded them on either side.
Seabrook Island’s fire station was a little further up on the right. “Just tell me who you are!” Makenna yelled at the boy. She stopped dead on her tracks, though, when another car appeared from Creek Watch Villas entrance and headed straight towards the mysterious young man! They did not slow down. Did they even see him? “Watch out!” shouted the Metamorphic Fairy. She quickly grabbed Silvey and pulled her off to the road’s side. Evelyn and Ash, who were following her, moved too. The boy Makenna saw standing in the intersection before stopped right in the middle of the road, in the path of the car, and turned to her. “Move!” she shouted, but he didn’t. Something very strange happened after that. The car reached the boy, but it drove right through him! Eyes widening, Makenna’s jaw dropped to the ground. She didn’t hear anything – a thump, a scream, etc. Once the car passed her and Silvey, the boy still stood in his exact same spot – totally unharmed! Makenna rubbed her eyes to make sure she wasn’t seeing things. She wasn’t. Sure enough, the car had driven right through the boy! Nobody though could escape getting hit by a car without a single scratch or death unless…!
Makenna gave Silvey’s head a pat and gestured for her to wait. She, Evelyn, and Ash watched as the young fairy crept forward, towards the mysterious young man, and stopped in front of him. The boy stared as she lifted her hand and moved it towards his chest. He followed every movement she made.
Behind, Evelyn glanced at Ash and asked, “What’s she doing?” Ash’s only answer was a shrug, and he crossed his arms. He had no idea what was going on, and neither did Evelyn and Silvey.
Makenna’s hand edged closer and closer to the young man’s chest. When she reached it, her hand went right through him! It appeared on the other side of his body. Makenna’s entire arm was in him, but she didn’t feel any innards.
All she felt was coolness. “You,” she mumbled after a bit, “You’re a ghost, aren’t you?” Sweat fountained down her temples and onto her cheeks. It was here she realized how translucent the boy’s body was. He nodded yes with his head and focused his attention on the girl’s arm in his body. When she pulled her hand back out, her entire face had whitened, and her voice was extremely shaky, “A ghost.” She saw Breena’s ghost back on Coutarine Island, sure, but she had never been this close to one before. “What are you doing here?” she asked the young man, “I thought ghosts didn’t like sunlight.”
“That is just a myth,” a voice suddenly spoke in her head. It was the ghost! Just like with Tracey, he had the power to communicate with her telepathically. Why did he speak to only him and her though? Why was it that Makenna and Tracey were the only ones who could see him? The questions exploded like a bomb in Makenna’s mind, but she found no answers to them. “I personally love daylight,” the spirit explained, “It helps me to not think about death.”
Makenna was having a difficult time wrapping her head around the fact that this beautiful, young man was dead. “Why are you here?” she shakily asked him.
“Because I know where your friend is.”
“Tracey?” The Metamorphic Fairy felt her heart skip a beat.
“Ah, so that was his name. Tracey. I love that name. Don’t you?”
“Um.” Makenna had no idea how to carry on a conversation with a dead person. She didn’t talk with them often. The only ghosts she’d seen except Ash’s sister were ghosts in movies, books, and TV shows. Most of them had been portrayed as evil – devils who wanted to haunt the living.
The Metamorphic Fairy didn’t notice Silvey, Ash, and Evelyn creeping up on her from behind. While she was distracted, Ash slowly and carefully reached his hand to Crusader, which Makenna wore on her back again.
“Your friend stumbled upon mine and my parents’ island a few days ago,” the ghost explained to her.
“Your parents?” Another layer of fear threw itself on top of Makenna’s voice.
“Oh, don’t worry. They’re still alive,” the ghost sweetly spoke when he saw she was nervous, “They’ve been begging ever since I died to have a new son just like me. I think we got lucky with this Tracey dude. He’s just the sweetest, little thing who loves to sing. I heard him mention you and where you live when he was sleeping. That’s what led me here. He said all he wanted in his life was a girl named Makenna Delling, singing, and the ability to fly again.”
“Fly? Wait, do you know?”
“Know what? That he’s a fairy? Of course. He’s not the first fairy that’s visited our island.”
“He’s not?” Makenna moved off to the side so she could see the ghost better. This led to Ash missing the sword when he grabbed for it. Frustrated, he clenched his fist and stepped behind the young lady’s back.
The ghost saw him but carried on with the explanation, totally ignoring him, “Of course. I wasn’t alive at the time when a fairy first visited the island, but my parents always said the legend has been passed down and down in our family’s history. It was a little over a hundred years ago. This beautiful, young fairy – maybe about ten years old; she visited her sister in Charleston and one day took a flight to the Bermuda Triangle. During her journey, she found the island and met my mom’s great grandfather and grandmother. They became the best of friends.”
Makenna had stopped herself from speaking. She was so hooked to the ghost’s story that she didn’t feel Ash finally grab hold of Crusader’s hilt.
The spirit continued, “The fairy helped them fix up the island. It had almost been completely destroyed by a disastrous storm that came from the Triangle. Some rumors say Poseidon created it.” The name caused a shiver to run down Makenna’s spine. Poseidon. That jerk. She didn’t say anything though. “Legend has it,” explained the ghost, “that the fairy stayed two full weeks on the island and brought light and life back to it. People visited it during that time. Business was great. It was the most fun my great, great grandparents had in so long. After two weeks though, the fairy had to leave. She said she had to return home, but she promised she would come back. Before she left, my ancestors gave her a present so she could always find her way back to them. However, she never came back.”
“Because she died.” Makenna found herself saying that out loud, but it had started as just a thought in her head.
The ghost nodded his translucent head, “Yes. Rumors say she died in the Triangle, but I don’t think that’s true. My ancestors fell into despair when they learned the one child they really loved had been sacrificed to Atlantis. To Davy Jones’s Locker. To the Bermuda Triangle.” A lump formed in Makenna’s throat. She wanted to ask a question, but she waited until after the ghost finished his story, “Everything turned gray on the island. The business shut down, the town became a ghost town, and most of the plants died. My mom’s great grandparents gave up everything, all because they couldn’t accept the fact the fairy had died. To this day, it is said their ghosts haunt the island, and they are waiting for the day she’ll come back – or someone like the fairy. Someone like you or Tracey.” A jumble of new questions formed in Makenna’s mind the second he said that, and she frightfully stared at him. Yep, this person definitely was a ghost. He was beyond creepy. “Yes, Makenna,” he said, as if he had read her mind, “I know you’re a fairy too. Well, you’re half fairy. Tracey is full-fledged. I don’t want to scare you. It’s just a bit complicated.”
“No-No kidding.” Makenna’s voice was super shaky now. Her hands were sweating like they had been in a toaster oven. Was Tracey all right? Was he still on the island? Where was he? She held her breath on these questions for now and just asked the one that had been nagging in the back of her head, ever since the ghost mentioned it, “Sir, what exactly did your ancestors give the girl when she left – the fairy who brought light and life to the island?”
“Ah, yes,” the ghost said, after taking a moment to understand her question, “I was waiting for you to ask.” Here, he leaned his translucent body very close to Makenna Delling. She gulped. What was he going to do to her? Was he going to possess her? What if he was just like the other ghosts she’d seen in movies, books, and TV shows – evil? “A necklace,” he whispered in her ear. Makenna’s eyes widened. “A costate shell necklace,” the ghost continued, “It came from the Bermuda Triangle itself. That’s why I was always so interested in it when I was alive. I thought I could one day find the necklace and bring the fairy back to my mom’s great grandparents, but I never did.”
“Because you died.” That was all Makenna could say. With her hand, she shakily covered not her horsehead-shaped necklace, but the necklace she found at the bottom of the coral reef. Silvey gave them back to her when she, Ash, and Evelyn approached her at the Gator Pond.
Makenna wanted to confirm with the ghost if the shell necklace she wore belonged to the fairy who brought life and light to his island, but she wasn’t able to because she heard something behind her.
“Makenna!” soon yelled the voice of Evelyn.
The Metamorphic Fairy snapped out of her trance when she heard her and asked, “What?”
“It’s Ash!”
“What about him?” Both Silvey and Makenna whirled around to face the Scottish Wizard Fairy, and their jaws dropped.
Ash held Crusader in his left hand. He covered his eye with the blade. Evelyn hovered next to him with her jaw dropped too. A shadow appeared from Creek Watch Villas shade and headed towards the magical beings, but it wasn’t a car.
Within seconds, Crusader’s blade flared to life. It glowed up and gave off a blast of wind that blew Ash’s hair. The remarkable phenomenon quickly fell flat on its face though. An intense wave of pain covered Ash’s injured brain! It nearly split his head in half! The young fairy yelled and fell flat on his butt in the grass. What was going on?
“Ash!” Makenna shouted. She jerked Crusader’s scabbard off her back and threw it. It was like she had just discovered a bomb on her.
The scabbard flew through the ghost. A hole appeared in his tummy when it did. “What’s wrong with him?” he frightfully asked the Metamorphic Fairy.
“I have no idea!” she shouted. Makenna fell to her knees next to Ash and grabbed his shoulder, “Ash! What’s wrong?! Is your head bothering you?”
He could not answer her. The pain was too great. He thought about letting go of Crusader, but Evelyn encouraged him not to. Ash needed the sword. He painfully clutched his head with his right hand and closed his eyes. Tsunamis of images flooded his entire brain. The images were his memories.
Ash saw the Scottish Highlands. It was a beautiful, breezy, spring day. A young girl stood in the heart of a magnificent meadow filled with blue and yellow flowers. Surrounding her on either side were mountains. The girl looked to be about ten years old. She had long, blonde hair and pretty, blue eyes. She was dressed in a medieval-style, gold-trimmed, pink dress with shoulder pads and boots. She was a very pretty girl. Ash noticed she wasn’t ordinary. She was special. A pair of gorgeous, silvery-white wings stood up behind her. The girl was a fairy! Who was she though? Why did she look so familiar? Leaning down, she picked a flower in the meadow and sniffed it. Her wings gave off silver sparkles as she flapped them and lifted into the air. Her long, pointy ears were well exposed behind the two tufts of hair that danced in the breeze.
The girl flew over to a little boy further down the meadow who was playing with some Highland cattle. He had to be no more than four, but he looked exactly like her. His blonde hair danced in the breeze, and his small sideburns in front of his own long, pointy ears joined in on the fun. Just like the young girl, he too had a pair of fairy wings on his back. His wings were translucent and light green. The girl flying to him was obviously a bit older.
When she reached him, she pulled him away from the cow he was trying to milk and flew in circles around him. It didn’t take long for the boy to start playing again. Laughing, he and the girl embraced and rolled down a flower-covered hill in the meadow. They sat up in a cluster of blue flowers and tall grass, and the girl waved her hand. A pair of bagpipes appeared in front of her, and she grabbed them. The girl faced the little boy and closed her eyes. She rested her fingers on the bagpipe’s keys and shared a soothing lullaby with him. Cows continued to graze, but every once in a while they looked up and focused their attention on the two, young fairies. Petals blew off the flowers and engulfed them. They merged together to form a new image – another memory. This one was not as happy as the last one though.
Yells were heard as forces from two different clans collided. Unlike the last day shown in the Highlands, it was dreary. The two forces colliding were an interesting bunch. One clan was human, but the other one…they were all fairies! How was that so? The fairies attacked from the sky, but the humans slashed them to the ground with their swords. The non-magical beings even had guns, and they used them too. The battle took place in front of an old, broken down castle which sat on top of a hill. Within the crowd of fighting warriors flew two, small figures: the girl fairy and her little brother. The boy wore a child-sized shield and sword on his back.
He was a little older in this memory. “Breena!” he shouted as he and his sister flew for their lives. She tightened her grip on his hand and soared towards the castle on the hill, but humans and fairies collided there too. Nowhere was safe. There was no peace. Behind the castle and down a little way was a huge, sparkling lake, or “loch” as the little boy would call it.
As soon as he and his sister made it to the castle, they became caught in a violent episode of the battle and were separated from each other.
“Ash!” screamed the girl, but she disappeared in a crowd of humans and fairies. Wait, did she just say “Ash”? Was that him? Was Ash himself the little boy he saw in the image?
He noticed the boy had hurt his wings a little bit after numerous fairies and people tossed him all over the place. He couldn’t fly. The castle grew smaller and smaller as he fell towards the magnificent lake, or loch. Just before he could hit it though, a loud roar came from the water. A shadowy head with a long neck stretched into the air and caught the falling fairy. “Nova!” he shouted in his tiny voice. Wait, Nova? That sounded familiar. Did Ash say “Nova” before? His memory was coming back as fast as a bullet. Nova was, Nova was…hold on! She was the only friend he had when he lived in the Scottish Highlands! Nova was the Loch Ness Monster! As soon as she caught the little boy, a wave of water washed away her image and replaced it with a new one.
The boy was seven years old in this memory, but he no longer was in the Highlands. Instead, he was on a bare beach. The day was just as dreary as the memory of the battle. Only he and his sister sat on the beach, but his sister was not in good shape. She was critically ill. The boy knew she was dying. Just recently they had lost their parents. It eventually got to the point his thirteen-year-old sister could not walk anymore. Her brother helped her onto the sand and held her in his small arms. He took her hand and begged for her to hang on. He told her he was going to get help before it was too late, but it already was. His wings dropped behind his back, and he watched his sister turn paler and paler. Everything lost its color, including her clothes, hair, and wings.
The little boy hugged her cold hand to his cheek, and tears splashed onto her knuckles. “Stay with me, Breena. Please,” he begged, “I can’t lose you too.”
“Ash, it’s okay,” his sister weakly told him. “I’ll be all right. You have a mission to find Coutarine Island. Remember what Mom and Dad said. ‘No matter what happens, we’ll always be here with you, even if you can’t see us.’”
“Don’t talk like that. Please.” The boy’s voice turned more and more choked with every passing second.
“Ash.” Breena slowly lifted her shaky hand and rubbed the tears from her brother’s cheeks with her pale finger, “I never realized how much we look alike. Please, I’m begging you. Take this.” She dropped her hand and picked up her other one. This hand held a slingshot.
Breena held it to her brother who asked, “Your slingshot? No, Breena. Please! I can’t accept it! This is telling me you’re giving up!”
“Take my slingshot like it’s a lesson,” she choked out, “It will remind you that no matter how tough things get, you will never be alone. One day when you are ready, we will be together again. I promise.”
“But, Breena.” More tears ran down the little boy’s cheeks. His sister set the slingshot down in his hand and took his chin. She pulled her hot forehead to his, and they gently bumped each other. The young boy closed his eyes and tightened his grip on his sister’s slingshot. It wasn’t long until he felt her head leave his. Opening his eyes, little Ash gasped when he saw Breena fall limp on the sand. Her eyes were open, but she no longer blinked. Her body was motionless.
Her little brother put his palms to his mouth and shook his head, “No. Breena, please! Please don’t leave me!” He tried to wake her up. Little Ash shook her shoulder and attempted to perform CPR, but he received no response. His sister was gone. “No! No, please!” he choked out. The child burst out sobbing. In just one, short week he had lost everything: the Scottish Highlands, Nova, his home, his parents, and now his sister. He stood next to motionless Breena and used his thumb and forefinger to close her eyelids. That was after he looked into her bright, blue eyes one last time. Once he did, he pulled her to a sitting position and sobbed into her shoulder. “I just want you back,” he choked out.
A blast of wind soon found its way onto the beach. It picked up dead leaves. The leaves blew over to the little boy and his sister and circled the she fairy. Her brother still hugged her. He refused to let her go. It wasn’t long until her body turned into ash. Her legs were first, and then the fading away moved slowly up to her hips, waist, and upper body. Seven-year-old Ash rocked her until her entire body had vanished. Along with the dead leaves, her ashes wafted into the dreary sky. Her little brother was left alone on the beach – orphaned and scared. How could he find Coutarine Island without his sister’s help? Another group of leaves soon appeared and engulfed him like he was in an inferno. The image of the beach faded. After that, the memories went by really fast.
The Folly Beach pier was the next image he saw – the place where he first met Makenna Delling,
“Do ya know a girl named Makenna Delling?” He saw the rocks where Makenna transformed into a Crystal Metamorphic Fairy. This was where he protected her against the Octopus Man and slashed his arm with his sword – with Crusader. Ash saw Tracey. He remembered the time on Merlin’s Island when he placed a spell on him to ease the effects of the Octopus Man’s curse, “Ah, so you’re Merlin’s apprentice. I’ve heard so many wonderful things about ya. Now listen, Tracey.” Image after image sprouted in all parts of Ash’s brain. He remembered his concussion, the time when he helped Makenna fight off the Kraken’s mirage on Coutarine Island, and even when he and she discovered the Wizard Fairy’s note on Celt Tip. Next, the image in his head changed to when he saw Breena’s ghost on the other side of the Tip’s bay. He then remembered his and Makenna’s fight. After that came the Devil’s Heir, but Ash remembered no more after it knocked him out, because that was when he died.
The final image/memory he saw also took place on Coutarine Island. The time was late afternoon. Ash was standing in the area of the jungle where Makenna, Raeven, and Silvey went to seek out the Crusha Fruit. The berry-covered bushes and waterfall sparkled in the rays of the setting sun. Selene and Merlin the Great were there. They faced Breena’s little brother who was his age now, eighteen, and stared into his own bright, blue eyes. He was dressed in a battle uniform this time around: chainmail armor and a new tunic.
Merlin the Great approached him and gently said in his wise, old voice, “I’m assuming you know why we’ve come to you, young Ash? It is time. You need to start your training.”
“Why me though?” the young fairy asked with a touch of fear in his voice, “What if I can’t do it? What if I fail, like how I failed to save my sister? It’ll be my fault the human and fairy worlds fall into the hands of Poseidon! Yer aff yer heid!”
It was Selene’s turn to speak, “We know you’re scared, but don’t you see, dear? You have to do this. You’re the only one who can. Unlike Merlin and I, you know what it’s like to face a catastrophe. You experienced that trauma in the Highlands. It grabbed you and dragged you into a world of fear and sadness, but you found a way to escape that world. Breena helped you, sure, but remember it was you who found Coutarine Island in the end. You did not give up. You relied on not only your fairy instincts, Ash, but also a firm belief that everything would turn out all right in the end. Your experience in the Highlands is what helped you become the amazing wizard you are now. If you think about it, Poseidon is pretty much just the history of your childhood repeating itself.” Ash tried to take this all in.
When he finally spoke again, his voice sounded a bit braver, “So what you’re saying, Master, is that ya want me to teach the two fairies how to overcome a catastrophe, with very few negative thoughts and the fear they’re going to fail?”
Selene nodded, “Yes. That’s exactly it. The Octopus Man may be powerful, Ash, but he is not invincible. He can be defeated but not just by Special Spells. In fact, Special Spells are only an inkling. The true weapon here is something both you and your sister share, even to this very day. It’s what you felt the second you laid eyes on each other when you were born. The two fairies felt this too when they first met each other last year.” Understanding her, Ash gasped. He tried to speak, but he couldn’t find his words. Selene continued in a low voice, “You must help them understand what this weapon is. Remember, my young apprentice, Special Spells are called ‘Special Spells’ for a reason. Magical beings that feel the same way you do with your sister are the only ones who can perform them. The Bermuda Triangle is home to people and magical beings who are just like you and the two fairies.” Ash listened carefully.
He watched as Merlin the Great stopped directly in front of him and finished for Selene, “For the next month, Ash, I am going to teach you the mysteries and answers behind the Triangle itself. I will share strategies with you that will help the two fairies understand they don’t need to use violence to overcome The Defeat. Violence isn’t the answer to everything. Honestly, it isn’t the answer to anything.”
Nodding, Ash seriously spoke, “I won’t let ya down, sir – Master. I promise.”
“We know you’re going to succeed.” Merlin told him, “We never doubt you, Ash. You indeed are Coutarine’s Greatest Warrior. The two fairies can defeat Poseidon. They just need some help getting there. You understand, right?”
Ash stared at him and his master for just a little bit longer. He then reached back and pulled Crusader free from her scabbard. The Wizard Fairy held her blade up to the rays of the setting sun, and they caught her. Right when they did, the blade glowed up, and sparks of light hopped around Ash, Selene, and Merlin’s surroundings. This phenomenon was Ash’s way of saying he was up to the challenge. It was kind of like his way of signing a contract. Just as Crusader’s blade stopped glowing, the image faded away behind another group of flower petals. Officially, Ash’s memory was back.
The Wizard Fairy felt Makenna Delling’s hand still resting on his shoulder, and he gasped, “Makenna! Whe-Where am I? How-How did I ge-get here?” He leaped to his feet so fast he knocked her down. The bridge of his glasses tilted on his nose, “Wha-What’s happened to Coutarine Island?” Strangely, when he looked in the direction of the ghost, he could see him. Ash couldn’t see him before, but now all of a sudden he could? “Wha-What’s a ghost do-doing here?!” he stuttered.
“Calm down!” Evelyn shouted at him. Poking Ash’s cheek with her finger, she hovered in front of him and added with, “You’re at Seabrook Island, kid. This is where Makenna lives. Dr. Snugglekins gave you the task to find her today.”
“Dr. Snugglekins? But he couldn’t have! Yesterday, I remember seeing a huge, scary face! It looked like the Devil! Then everything went black!”
“It was the Devil’s Heir you saw, dear.” Evelyn gently told him.
“The Devil’s Heir?”
“Why is he so confused?” Makenna frightfully asked. She watched as Silvey shuffled over to Ash and sat down next to him. Crusader escaped his hand and touched the grass next to him. Her blade no longer was glowing. Evelyn gulped and slowly shifted her body in the direction of the Metamorphic Fairy.
It was time to tell her the truth, but her voice quivered when she did, “Miss Delling, I know you’re not going to like this news, but you have to know the truth. Ash couldn’t remember you, Tracey, or anything related to his childhood and Coutarine Island before the attack because…,” She gulped, “because he died.”
A thousand knives stabbed Makenna’s heart. Not only did she give Ash a permanent brain injury, she killed him! She really was a murderer! Last year it was Tracey and now this year, it was Ash! Makenna fell quietly onto the grass next to him and stared at the marsh. She refused to meet eyes with any of her friends. The emotional pain inside her was excruciating. She closed her eyes and buried her face in her hands, running her now dark blue fingertips through her long, brown hair. The ghost settled down next to her and peered gloomily at her hidden face.
From the shadows of Creek Watch Villas emerged a figure. It split into two the closer it came.
To Makenna’s surprise, she heard a familiar voice, “Makenna! What’s wrong?!”
Then another one, “Don’t tell me you’re dying! Oh, this is horrible, horrible, horrible! Makenna Delling can’t die!” Caleb Delling and Raeven the Megabat had returned.
They hurried towards Evelyn, Ash, Silvey, and distressed Makenna, but they didn’t see them, nor had they heard them calling the Metamorphic Fairy’s name.
Her head shot up from her knees, and she glanced at Evelyn with her tear-stricken, rosy face. “Are you meaning to tell me,” she shouted, “that Ash is a ghost?!” She shivered as the ghost of the black-haired young man appeared next to her shoulder.
Evelyn inhaled a breath of air and admitted, “He’s not. Not yet, but he is trapped – trapped between two worlds, between life and death. This isn’t because he was resurrected though. It’s his brain injury.”
When Makenna finally spoke again, her voice sounded even more choked than it already was, “We can’t just sit here then, Evelyn! We’ve got to help him! Let’s take him to a hospital!” As she said this, Evelyn lifted her hand and tried to cut her off, but Makenna babbled on, “Are you saying his brain injury is fatal?! Please! We can’t let him die! I had enough trouble with Tracey last year!”
In a gentle voice, Evelyn explained, “I’m afraid it’s not up to me to make that decision.”
“What do you mean?”
Just before Evelyn could answer Makenna, Caleb and Raeven jogged up from behind and together yelled, “Makenna!”
As if he didn’t notice them, Ash remained on the ground and fidgeted around with his fingers. It was like he was holding an invisible fidget spinner.
Now that Evelyn had mentioned it, he did look like he was trapped between life and death. His body was a teeny bit faded and in a way, ghostlike. His skin, clothes, and hair were a bit paler than usual, and he constantly was looking into space. It was like he saw the land of the dead and the land of the living at the same time. His brain cried out in pain, and Ash quickly reached for it.
Breena’s words echoed in his mind, “‘One day when you are ready, we will be together again. I promise.’” And at this point, Raeven and Caleb officially joined the fantasy crowd.
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