Chapter Four - Mitonka's Fairytale

A bit of afternoon sunlight filtered across Emma’s face, and she blinked irritably against the intrusion. 

Squinting briefly at great glass panes, her eyes slid shut again, as a lingering dream fanned at the edges of her mind filled with bodiless arms, purple mist and colored pieces of rainbow clinging to her clothes.

A voice nearby whispered, “Time to wake up.”

“Five more minutes,” Emma mumbled and made to roll over.

And couldn’t.

Her arms and legs felt like dead weight, so she tried again and panicked herself fully awake because her body wouldn’t follow her mind when she tried to sit up.

And still couldn’t, earnestly trying again and again.

“What the hell!” she screamed and fought harder.

“Emma, stop struggling,” the voice said calmly, “we have you bound in place for your own safety.”

Emma saw that she was sitting semi upright in a dark, leather chaise at the very center of an enormous library.

“I assure you, the binds are quite secure.”

“What binds?” she hollered back, staring down at herself and saw no ropes or tape or anything, “There aren’t any!  What the hell did you psychos shoot me up with?!”

“We didn’t shoot you.”

Emma whipped her head around, which was thankfully NOT bound, and glared at the super model a moment before shifting her gaze away to analyze every inch of her surroundings, “Why am I here?” she demanded.

Shade leaned forward from a nearby wingback chair, “We just need to explain a few things, that’s all.”

Emma heard Bander’s voice in her head from their many days of personal defense training, “Always ascertain before you execute, Emma.  Know and calculate before you choose.”

“Where am I?” Emma shot back evenly as she studied the vast room of shiny, mahogany floors, filled with bookshelves and littered with cozy sitting areas that were perfectly decorated with tables and reading lamps.  World maps in heavy, mahogany frames hung on beige colored walls and two gigantic stone fireplaces that sat opposite each other completed the room, “because nothing this elaborate exists in Kettle Hill.”

“You’re perfectly safe here.”

“Here being where, exactly?  And don’t start blathering about realms again,” Emma insisted while searching for a door to escape from.

Shade hesitated then answered, “You’re in Dr. Mitonka’s home, this is his study.”

 “His study?” Emma snorted with disbelief, “This cavern is as big as the New York Public Library!  So how about the truth this time! Where am I?!”

Shade managed to look somewhat embarrassed and then shrugged, “I’m not lying, this is Mitonka’s home, and this is his private study.”

“I absolutely don’t believe you, so just start explaining why I’m here!”

“We will, when you calm down.”

“Calm?  You’re not some private investigator’s assistant, are you?  Were you scouting me out the other day for your buddy, right?  Did you figure I was easy prey for some human trafficking?”

Shade sighed, and tried to sound as comforting as possible, “I wasn’t scouting or preying – and I know it seems that way, and as strange as everything appears, we truly mean you no harm.”

“You saying that over and over doesn’t make me believe you!  Harm comes in many forms, lady!”  Emma spat back, still absorbing the height, size and width of the massive room, and continued hunting for exits.

“Please stop, Emma,” Mitonka interrupted behind them, “there are no doors that you are allowed to see, no way out,” then slowly walked forward until he was standing directly in front of her.

Her angry eyes fixed on him as she chucked her chin at his filthy leather jacket and grass-stained jeans, “There is always a way, Doc.”

Mitonka shrugged, “If you say so,” then crossed his arms and considered her for a long moment, “I’ll make it easy for you then.  The price for your freedom is to simply listen to what we have to say.”

Emma glowered intently, “Then you better start talking.”

“Very well,” he said, turning away and grabbing a nearby leather chair and dragging it back so that he remained directly in front of her, “My name is Dr. Nathaniel Mitonka and this is Shade.”

“I already know that.” Emma fumed through gritted teeth.

He drew a calming breath and regarded her with appraising eyes, “Yes, but what you don’t know is that I was born in 1672 on the Caribbean Island of St. Kitts to my wonderful parents who were slaves on a sugar plantation.” 

Emma’s face remained unchanged, “Your lookin’ pretty good for 340 years old.”

He smiled at her sarcasm, “I’m a mere baby compared to Shade, who stopped counting at least four centuries ago.”

Emma’s face softened into restrained boredom, “You expect me to believe she’s older than you? You’re an antique.”

Mitonka’s smile faded, “It’s the truth, but let’s not get sidetracked, and back to St. Kitts, where I worked that plantation with my parents as a child and then remained there until I was an old man myself.  Then one night, in August of 1732, a stranger came to my home and woke me, and admittedly, scared the crap out of me.”

“Intruders tend to do that,” Emma agreed sarcastically, “even way back in good ole 1732.”

He stared back dully but pressed on, “My fear was quickly eased as this ‘intruder’ explained that I had been chosen for a new life and told me a wondrous tale and then showed me with just a simple touch of her hand.”

When Emma stared at him with open disgust, he continued, “I supposed I didn’t really have anything to lose, by accepting her offer, and just like you, we traveled through the purple mist to this place, the Mending Realm.”

Mitonka stared at Emma expectantly, but when her mood remained unchanged, he prodded, “Any questions?”

“Where’s the bathroom?”

His face grew stiff, “Unavailable.”

“You don’t pee here, in the Mending Realm?”

“I’m afraid you’d use any opportunity to escape right now, so you’ll just have to wait.”

"Do I have to wait 340 imaginary years?”

“Would you find it interesting that if you did have to wait that long, you’d look exactly as you do right now?”

“Trapped on a chaise lounge?” she asked snidely.

"In age!” he retorted, “You would not have aged!  That is how Shade is older than me but doesn’t appear so.  Because she was brought here at a younger point in her former life, if I was thirty years old when I came here, then I would still appear thirty years old.  Now, don’t you find that even slightly fascinating?”

Emma stared at him dispassionately and said nothing.

Mitonka pressed on, “You stopped aging the moment you arrived here too.”

Emma threw her head back and stared up at the ceiling, “Do you realize how insane you sound?” she asked in an exasperated sigh, “Mending Realm…Earth Realm… not aging?  Are you going to bust out Thor’s hammer and fly around your study?”

“No,” he replied pulling his Barring Line from his breast pocket and grinning, “This is what we use to fly,” and watched Emma’s gaze settle on the metallic cylinder as he held it up for inspection, “It’s not quite Mjölnir, but incredibly powerful all the same.”

She squinted at it suspiciously and shook her head with disgust, “Your penlight makes you fly?  Dude…seriously…”

He stuffed it away and decided on another approach, “Fine, let’s start with the very basics.”

“Which is what?”

“Explaining the vastness of life and how shit really works.”

Emma offered him a giant eye roll, “Those are the basics??  Your fairytale is ridiculous.”

“I think we need a visual here,” ignoring her remark and standing up, “Maybe something as rudimentary as your brain.”

“Mitonka!” Shade admonished.

“What?” he replied, “She’s being deliberately dense and close minded!” then shot Emma a purposeful look, “Try not to crap yourself,” and then tossed his arm backward and pointed to the place behind him and said, “I would like a freestanding chalkboard, please.”

A blue shimmer appeared and then disappeared leaving a large chalkboard encased in a wood frame behind.

He raised an inquisitive eyebrow at Emma, who looked stunned and more than a little horrified, “Do I need to throw the chaise out or have you got a hold of yourself?”

Emma stopped staring at the chalkboard and glared at him, “You’re really starting to piss me off.”

“I bet, but as long as you don’t do it on my furniture, then we can continue,” and then turned around and studied the blank canvas for a moment, stroking his beard and said, “I’ll try to keep this unbelievably basic.”

And began to draw.

Shade and Emma watched on in strained silence as he created his scene and then began labeling everything and after a few minutes turned around and stared at them expectantly, “Well, Shade, what do you think?”

Her emerald eyes less than impressed, “She’s not a primate, Mitonka.”

He shrugged, “All the same, I’ve dumbed it down.”

"For a neanderthal,” she muttered back, so he gave her a quelling stare and she shrugged indignantly, “you asked.”

He dismissed her and refocused on Emma, who was studying the strange diagram until he deliberately blocked it from her view with his body, “I need you to pay attention, can you do that?”

“I’ll try,” she snipped.

“Good, I want you to consider a large circle, like an orange,” he started, “the fruit, and not the color.”

“I know what an orange is!” Emma bit back.

“Then follow along, and in your mind, I want you to cut that orange in half.  Think of how it looks inside, how the carpels, or individual slices take up their own space.  Then consider the very center of the orange and how that white, dense core holds all the sections together.” 

He finally moved aside and pointed at the diagram, “In this example the ‘core’ represents the Mending Realm,” he explained tapping the ‘core’, "and the eight individual ‘slices’ or Realms that are attached to it, including your Earth Realm.”

Emma stared at the diagram and cocked an eyebrow at him, “So, you’re telling me that the orange itself represents the vastness of life and how shit really works, and that the Mending Realm is at the very center of all of it, and that the Earth Realm – my realm – is just a slice of it?”

He looked slightly impressed, “Well done, any other observations?”

After considering his drawing for another moment, she nodded with a heavy frown, “Yes.”

“Go on.”

“It seems to me that if this Mending Realm is at the core, and you claim to live there, then you probably believe you and your penlight are some kind of god, which outta qualify you for a three-day psych hold.”

Mitonka spun about and studied his drawing and then demanded, “How the hell did you come up with that?  The center is the center because that is the structure!  I have nothing to do with it!”

And so, they all stared at the chalkboard thinking wildly different things.

 “It does sort of sound like you’re some powerful creature living in the center of the universe…” Shade offered helpfully.

Mitonka swung around on her in frustration, “Then I would be in the middle of a crate of oranges!  Not just one orange!”

Shade shrugged, “Your rudimentary drawing wasn’t coupled with a rudimentary elucidation.”

He pointed to the spot next to him, “Then come up here and blow my mind with your explanation.

“Sure,” she smiled, taking the piece of chalk from him as they passed each other and he flung himself into her chair as Shade considered the drawing for another moment and then winked down at Emma, “Do you like magic?”

Emma stared back at her blankly for a moment and then rolled her eyes and looked away.

“When Mitonka conjured the chalkboard – that was startling, but a little exhilarating, right?”  When Emma remained fixed and staring out the window, Shade pressed on, “What would you think if I said you are capable of doing that too?”

“I’d say you were bat crap crazy, lady.” Emma replied dryly.

“And yet Mitonka is covered in grass stains…”

Emma’s head snapped back and glared at Shade, “You’re saying I did that; I made him fly through the air?”

“A couple of times,” Shade confirmed with a smile.

“How?”

“Because you wished for it.”

“Lady, I’m wishing for a lot of things right now, but I’m not back home and you’re still here irking the shit out of me, so I think you’re deluded.”

“Your wishes aren’t working because we haven’t shown you how to yet,” Shade clarified, “when we are asked and agree to come here, we enter into training to become Menders.” Then pointed back to the diagram, “See?  Mending Realm…” then pointed to herself, “Mender…that’s what we’re called, get it?”

And Mitonka rolled his eyes before Emma did, “I thought she wasn’t a primate,” he sneered.

“Neither of you are helping at this point,” Shade countered and then continued to explain, “nobody’s wishes work very well when they first arrive, so I think mostly you were able to toss Mitonka away like that on sheer emotion.”

“Ya think?”  Emma snorted, “And you’ve just shot a big, fat hole in your own story, lady.”

“How?”

“Because according to you both, you are asked to come here and must agree to come here.  Neither of which happened to me, so that makes you liars and kidnappers!”

Shade looked immediately uncomfortable, “Your situation is a little different than ours.”

“Of course, it is.”

“We were chosen to become Menders, you were not.”

“Perfect, problem solved, so send me home!”

“You are home.”  Shade answered plainly.

“Oh my God, you’re not making any sense!”

Shade held her hands up gently, “Calm down, it will all be clear very soon, I promise,” then pointed back at the diagram, “Mitonka used to live here,” pointing at the Realm of Earth, “and he was chosen to become a Mender by Fate, who relays that choice to the Mending Elders.”

“Elders?” Emma questioned with heavy annoyance.

“Think of Elders as senior Menders who have graduated to become special leaders.”

“They’re a little more than all that, Shade.”  Mitonka interjected.

Emma’s eyes grew huge with disbelief, “How is any of this helpful?”

“Just stay with me, both of you,” Shade replied calmly, “and we’ll use Mitonka as an example, and the opportunity he was given back in 1732 by an Elder to come and live here, to train in the Mending ways, so he could go back to the Earth Realm afterward and use his new gifts to heal in his former kind.”

Emma finally felt a little compelled, “Whatdya mean heal?  Like sick people?”

"Not just physical healing, but mental and emotional as well. Or small adjustments to their life paths... a nudge."

Emma turned to look at Mitonka, who appeared thoroughly unimpressed, “You’re doing a shit job back in the old Earth Realm, eh?  Plenty of disease and mental illness to go around.”

He gave her a hard stare, “We only tend to those that Fate calls us too, we don’t just go running around at will and do as we please.”

“Oh, I see,” Emma nodded feigning interest, “so it’s ok if Fate says to heal Joe Blow, but poor old Jane, she’s screwed I guess,” and shook her head in disgust once again.

Mitonka rose from his chair and towered over Emma deliberately, looking beyond annoyed, “Fate studies the Web of Life, ya know, the real universe!  The one where there is a crate full of all the oranges everywhere, not just the Human slice inside one single orange!”

“Really?” Emma retorted, “And why do you keep referring to her like she’s one being?  Fate consisted of three goddesses in Greek mythology.  And what about the god of fate himself, aren’t you forgetting about him?”

Mitonka rolled his eyes for the second time and stalked off to a sideboard and poured himself a liberal helping of something before responding, “Do you really want to revisit the scrolls of 2^nd century b.c. and rehash the origins of HUMAN Greek mythology?  I thought you wanted to go home?” 

“I’m just pointing out the blatant discrepancies in your fairytale, but by all means, keep piling on the bullshit.”  Then chucked her chin at Shade and reiterated, “So let me get this straight, the Mending Realm is not the center of the universe BUT clearly sits at the very center of this orange and all the other slices attached to it, so I’m sure that’s significant.”

“It is-”

“AND you’ve explained that Fate chooses you lucky buggers and offers to let you leave your shitty little slice and come here to live and in return, Fate gives you all kinds of nifty gifts and powers and wishes – once your trained of course – and then she sends you back to your former slice – BUT you only get to use those gifts and powers and wishes the way Fate says so.  Have I got it right so far, lady?”

Shaded nodded and started to say something, but Emma cut her off again, “THIS does not apply to me though, right?  I wasn’t chosen to come here, so how can I possibly have any of those nifty gifts to fling Doctor Nathaniel Mitonka around with?”

“We’re not completely sure yet,” Shade admitted, making Mitonka slam his glass down and stalk across the room.

“Go sit,” he insisted, holding his hand out.

Shade hesitated before giving the chalk back and resuming her seat.

Mitonka turned his back to them and tried to collect his temper, which for some reason was becoming a struggle, and tried to relax his shoulders as he spoke, “My apologies, I’m afraid I’ve been awake too long and it’s making me grumpy.”

“We’re all tired,” Shade assured understandingly while Emma snorted derisively.

He turned around and shook his head wearily at Emma, “Your attitude is absolutely not helping.”

“Then get to the effing point already and then keep your word, old man – and take me home!”

“Home?” he spat back, his temper reigniting and then he unleashed it on her, “You insufferable brat!  Home?  What about all the homes that were destroyed because of your parents?”

Emma glared back at him, “Parents - that I’ve never met!”

“Your parents are the reason everything is broken!”

“So go find them!  What the hell do I have to do with it?”

“You have everything to do with it!  You are the product of their crime!”

“Mitonka!” Shade warned gravely, “She was an innocent-”

He pointed his finger at her, “Be quiet!  Neither of you are innocent!” swinging his arm and pointing back at Emma, “You, young lady were born to parents that fled their shitty little slices, as you call them, and came here with the help of that Mender!” flinging his arm back on Shade, “And hid themselves so that they could be together illegally!”

Emma arched a sarcastic eyebrow at him, “So, they weren’t chosen either, just a couple of lowly stowaways?”

“Hell no, they weren’t chosen!  And they hid here for a hundred years with her help,” thrusting his finger at Shade purposefully, “but guess what?” he demanded, shooting both arms wide with a maniacal smile, “They got caught!  Because Fate will always correct the Web of Life no matter what the consequences – consequences that have devastated our little orange!”

“Well, if they got caught – then go yell at them!” Emma shouted back.

“If only I could!” he railed, “Your father got sent back to his shitty little slice and is probably dead for the crimes he committed and your mother – well, Shade made sure we couldn’t find her – and do you know why?”

Emma continued glaring but said nothing.

"Because of YOU!” he shouted even louder, “YOU were the one impossible thing that happened that made Shade take you and your mother back to the Earth Realm to PROTECT you!”  He turned around and began hacking away at the diagram with his piece of chalk.

“In the Mending Realm, where all things are CREATED with our nifty gifts.  If I wish for it, it becomes reality.  Nothing here is BORN or reproduced!  The animals wandering about DO NOT MAKE BABIES– they are here for us to enjoy and look at!”

He worked at the chalkboard furiously and ranted while the chalk piece changed color in his hand, “But here you are, INCLUDED into this most prestigious realm, by a pair of criminal parents, so that’s why you weren’t CHOSEN by Fate Emma Qwinn!  Because you were BORN here!  The Mending Realm IS your HOME!”

“Get it?” he demanded, spinning about on Emma, who would have shrunk away from his angry face if she could, “No?” he demanded crazily when she didn’t answer, “Do you need MORE?!”

And began hacking away at the diagram again as he shouted so hard his voice became hoarse, “You are the first naturally born Mender in all of our existence!  A product of a shitty slice from the Realm of Elves and another shitty slice from the Realm of Earth and culminating TOGETHER HERE!”

He shoved at the chalkboard hard, making it skitter back several feet as he glared at it, “You’re nothing but a MONGREL with THREE hideous hides!”

Mitonka spun around again and advanced on her, “So, yes, we kidnapped you!  Because you don’t BELONG in the Earth Realm with the other simple Humans because you AREN’T ONE!  We kidnapped you because it’s high time all of this damn treachery is exposed!  We brought you here so that your EXISTANCE can be shown to the Head Elder and ALL the Elders of the Chancel so they can decide what becomes of you!  And me!  And Shade!  There is a PRICE WE WILL ALL PAY!”

He threw the chalk across the room and stalked back the sideboard, and this time poured a full glass, while Emma stared at what he’d done to the chalkboard.

 Something urgent began to stir inside Emma and the need to leave became paramount.  She knew this lunatic was never going to take her back to The Crypt or Kettle Hill or even her crappy house. 

He was convinced she was already home.

She felt Shade’s hand on her shoulder, “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, staring down at Emma with tear filled eyes, “I had no idea he was harboring such animosity – towards both of us,” and approached him at the sideboard.

Emma strained uselessly against her invisible binds and grew even more upset until tears of her own began to form and the thought of poor Abraham, waiting by the door, wondering where the hell she was, certain his anxiety would be too much for his old heart.  And it was with that thought, that she screamed out at the top of her lungs, “Let me go!  I want to see my dog!  I want to go home right now!”

A loud crack thundered behind her, making Emma go instantly silent.

She felt a strange prickle inside her chest and became certain the old goat had just shot her but didn’t see any blood when she stared down at herself.

A soft, sucking wind lifted her hair and pulled it backwards, making her turn her head to see the edge of a dark, blue vortex growing behind her… and the tingling intensified in her chest as it began pulling at her, chaise and all, right into it.

“No!” Shade and Mitonka shouted almost simultaneously, but it was too late. In the span of just three seconds, the dark blue mass had appeared, enveloped Emma Qwinn and taken her away…

For several moments, Emma floated weightlessly inside the dark mass, where shimmers of sparkling light danced all around the bubble, and the moment she realized her arms and legs could move, began to thrash wildly about, kicking the chaise away, spinning it off only to send it bouncing back at her.

She tried to duck it but couldn’t and they became pinballs in the confined space.

Suddenly the dark shimmer began to pulse and with no warning, spat her back out, sending Emma flailing wildly through the air and landing roughly onto a long stretch of sandy beach.

She tumbled over several times before rolling to a stop as the chaise whizzed by and landed farther away, then slowly picked herself up and sat back on her knees, wondering what the hell had just happened. 

And where she was…because nothing looked familiar.

Her eyes searched the endless beach, with crashing waves to her left and thick, tangled grass to her right, and not a single, living soul in sight.

No boats, no people… and she felt so utterly alone and confused that she shouted at the blue sky, “Why is this happening to me?  I don’t understand!  I want to go home!”

And then the tears finally overwhelmed her until she lay back down and curled into a ball and ugly cried for quite some time.

'Get up’, her inner voice demanded, ‘stop being a baby, this solves nothing!’

Emma’s crying slowed, but she didn’t move, so the inner haranguing continued, you think this is going to get you home?  Back to Abraham?  Finally, she sat up and harshly brushed the tears away.

The sun had just begun to sink, sending pink rays against the puffy, white clouds and if she hadn’t been so lost, she might have felt the calming beauty of it all.

She’d just decided which direction to start walking when the tangle of weeds to her right began to rustle and she stared at them cautiously.

Convinced a charging elephant was about to appear, Emma slowly pulled her legs under her, “Or who knows what…” she muttered to herself and eyed the distance she would need to run to the ocean.

The weeds rattled harder and began untangling themselves until she was staring up at the tallest and thickest grass, she’d ever seen in her whole life – and then they began to shake madly from their roots to their forty-foot tops.

“What the…” she whispered, not feeling a lick of wind, and then the twenty-foot section directly in front of her, lashed forwards, sending a plume of sand at her as it struck the beach and Emma spun quickly away toward the water.

Turning around when she felt safe, she stared up at the grass again, as it lifted itself and Emma watched each individual blade grow tighter, sharper somehow and she jumped back when they violently struck the beach again, leaving heavy marks in the sand.

Then, in each direction, down the endless beach, the grass continued untangling itself until it created an impenetrable wall, but only the grass closest to her seemed concerned and aggressive.

So, she turned and began hurrying down the beach, causing each section she was parallel to grow terribly stiff and then lash out at her.

Emma ground to a halt while it whipped at the sand over and over, while remaining carefully out of its reach, until it began to wither and look exhausted, “Enough!” she yelled, “You can’t get to me and you’re only hurting yourself!”

And to her utter astonishment, the whomping, rattling and shaking stopped all at once.

While every blade of grass shot back, for miles in each direction, became straight and tall.

She gaped at it, as a silence settled in except for the crashing waves and then Emma grew more confused when the very tops of the grass wall bent, from left to right, like they were bowing to her.

“What in the hell?” she whispered, a piece of her wanting to go forward and inspect them and another part that felt like it was a trick, and sided with the latter and continued, hugging the shoreline.

For twenty minutes she trudged on with no signs of life, just a brilliant blue green ocean against pink skies and prisms of yellow that bounced on the clouds all the way to the horizon.  There was the faint chattering of animals beyond the giant grass, like birds or monkeys, but otherwise there was nothing.  So, her brain began mulling things over.

Emma’s pace slowed as she tried to come to grips with what had happened since she was kidnapped from The Crypt and didn’t know what to believe except one thing – that Dr. Nathaniel Mitonka was bad news and his sidekick, Shade, wasn’t far behind.

“So, let’s sort this out logically and deal with what is true,” Emma spoke out loud to herself, “he did throw that stupid penlight into the ground behind the Crypt and there was all that purple mist and arms… you didn’t imagine that.”

“And he did go flying through the air every time I told him to go away…”

She frowned, “Ok, now let’s assume everything the old goat said was also true,” she reasoned, “that means your father came from one realm and your mother came from another and they hid here… and had me.”

Emma shrugged, “Ok, so they had a baby…in a place where nothing is conceived but conjured… with their nifty gifts...whatever the hell those are.”  She looked over at the tall grass again, that kept bending at its tops as she walked by and then straightened after she’d passed, like a military procession. 

“Why do you keep doing that?” she called entering a small bend in the shoreline where the wall of grass continued on so far that it blended away.  But then something else caught her eye and peered hard at it - because it looked like there was a small house sitting all alone on the beach.

“Finally!” she shouted with relief and began running like mad towards it.

“Shit…” she muttered defeatedly minutes later when she drew close enough to see the rickety porch and sagging sides of the white cottage with bent shutters tapping and banging against broken windows and the dull sound of a battered windchime hanging on by two frayed strings.

Emma slowed to a walk, knowing there wasn’t anyone there to help and then stopped dead in her tracks as a furry face slowly picked up its head from the porch and looked her way, “Abraham???”

The golden retriever stared back through the broken slats of wood and seemed unable to believe his eyes either, so Emma called again and began running.

Abraham scrambled in haste on to all fours and barreled down the worn steps, killing the distance between them with long strides and Emma had never been so happy to be tackled by him in her whole life.

He pinned her to the sand and licked her face, which Emma normally hated, but at that moment nothing else mattered to her. 

She had Abraham. 

Finally letting her sit up she sank her fingers into his soft jowls and stared into his brown eyes happily asked, “How are you here?  Which realm are we in?”

He panted into her face and licked it several more times.

Emma flipped her hands up at him, “Do you know?” then frowned to herself, “There was no purple mist, so doesn’t that mean I’m still in the Mending Realm?  But then how can you be here?” 

He pulled back gently and turned toward the house and barked at her to follow.

Gazing at the rundown house, she gave him a skeptical look, “Are you sure it’s safe?   Cuz I’m not sure how much more my brain can take.”

Abraham barked again and tore off toward the house and hopped back on the porch, so she took a moment and then approached hesitantly.

Climbing the creaky stairs, she saw nothing but broken palm fronds and debris everywhere. 

The front door stood slightly ajar, which Abraham charged through, but her manners prevailed and knocked before pushing it open, making the rusty hinges screech, “Anyone home?” and the doorknob fell apart at her touch and rolled off. 

“Sorry!” she called pushing the door wider, while Abraham barked at her from inside.

When no answer came, Emma stepped haltingly into a small foyer and frowned at the mess as she stepped over a small table that was lying on its side, and the sound of broken glass crunched loudly under her boots. 

Piles of rotted fabric and feathers were heaped into the corners, while the remains of a grand clock lay shattered, its hands frozen at 11:11.

Emma wove around broken shelves as she entered what was once a living room right off the foyer. 

And called out again, “Hello?” and still her question was met with silence. 

The living room was quite large, with dingy white walls and plank floors the color of faded beechnut. There were two great windows facing the ocean and two more on either side of a stone fireplace, their glass panes missing altogether in places. 

Everything appeared ransacked and deliberately torn to shreds, not just by weather or animals, but by anger. 

Emma could almost feel it still clinging in the air. 

“Abraham!” she called, “Quit barking already!  Where the hell are you?  And mind the glass, you’re going to split a paw open in here!”

He reappeared from the next room, a quaint kitchen and then he started rummaging through the broken cupboards that lay everywhere, “What the hell is that?” she asked him, shoving a bit of the debris away, exposing long hash marks that left deep grooves in the wooden floor.

“Somebody was pissed,” she commented, staring at the same hash marks that filled the counter tops and a back door that stood wide open.

Emma peered into the large yard behind the cottage and saw a broken picket fence surrounding what must have been a sizable garden, a gate laying in the grass nearby and tangles of weeds covering every inch where its original contents had long rotted away. 

Then she stared up at the tall grass, which was still standing erect, but noticed this grouping was much shorter, maybe only 15 feet high, but the tops bowed nonetheless, and Emma spun away from the door.

“I feel like Alice in Wonderland…” she muttered and strolled into the next room. 

Or what was left of a dining room.

A white, wooden table lay cracked completely in half, its chairs lay splintered and broken all about – with more deep gouges impaled into the floors around it.  Glass, debris, and feathers hugging every corner.

Emma moved next down a short hallway that led to the front bedroom, which appeared remarkably empty and undisturbed compared to the rest of the house. 

It needed a good cleaning, and the french doors that lead out to a small patio, was filled with sand and overgrown weeds, but otherwise looked unexceptional.

Back in the hallway, it made a small ‘L’ and offered two more doors that had been hacked away at.

The first, a large bathroom with the most enormous wooden tub Emma had ever seen, but it had felt someone’s anger, along with the long vanity and the entire floor was covered with shards of a broken mirror, “Bet that got somebody more than seven years bad luck…” 

She moved to the last room in the house, at the end of the short hallway, and found what had once likely been a grand bedroom, but it hadn’t just been hacked and ransacked – it had been burnt.

Every single thing that had been in the room had been deliberately piled into the center and lit on fire. 

The walls, ceiling and floor were scorched black and just bits and pieces of fabric and furniture could be seen in the pile of ash that remained.  And how the fire hadn’t moved through the rest of the house was a complete mystery.

There was another kind of residue in the room that made her uneasy, so Emma pulled the door shut and made a hasty retreat to the kitchen, with Abraham right on her heels.

She gave him a quick smile and said, “Well, I didn’t see any dead bodies, that’s a good thing I guess, unless they’re under that pile of ash back in that bedroom.”

Accidentally disturbing a small, unbroken glass bottle, that slid into her foot, so she crouched low to examine it, “Weesper, for the Prigg,” she read showing it to Abraham and held it up to the fading light outside the window, “looks like little, black beans to me.”

“Prigg?” she asked, “What the hell is a Prigg?  What the hell is Weesper?”

Abraham started barking furiously.

“Stop, seriously…no more barking.”

He shifted his weight and sat down and whined instead.

Emma sifted through some of the nearby debris and uncovered several more bottles strewn about the kitchen floor, some broken and unreadable while others were completely intact and read ‘Moon Hair’ for Sleep and ‘Witter Weed’ for Sadness all in the same perfect script, so she set them carefully on to the wooden counter and wondered about the owners and what in the world had happened to them.

Emma picked her way back into the living room and was immediately drawn to the fireplace because someone had taken a piece of driftwood and crafted it into the most amazing mantle. 

Carefully honed and polished smoothly, its dark wood stood bare against the white walls with strange symbols carved into its face and she wondered what they meant as she traced her finger along its edge. 

Taking another step closer, the sound of snapping glass under her boots made her look down at several portraits they lay decimated against the cold hearth. 

She crouched low and poked at the debris, looking for some evidence about the homeowners, but everything was so weathered and torn it was difficult to make any sense of them.  “Well, that’s a shame,” she muttered, “it would have been interesting to see what these used to look like…I wish this poor, little house wasn’t so broken…”

And suddenly a flutter of soft wind blew through the open windows, tossing the tattered curtains forward and Emma stepped cautiously backwards as pieces of the portraits swirled off the floor and slowly upward and became suspended.

“What the hell?” she whispered as Abraham grabbed the hem of her shirt and pulled at it hard, dragging her into an empty corner of the living room and then pasted himself against her knees so she’d stay put.

Her hair began to lift, like it was electrified as a hazy blue mist leaked through the walls and filled the room and grew thicker until it occupied the entire house.

“Oh, hell no!” She cried out and made to bolt for the front door, but Abraham grabbed her shirt again and stopped her, then flung her with incredible strength back into the corner, making her fall.  “What’s wrong with you?  We gotta get outta here!” she demanded as he crouched low and then growled an inch from her face, making Emma swallow hard and back away from him.

And there was no time to digest that her lifelong companion had turned on her as the pale blue mist grew darker and she retreated further into the corner as the anomaly began repairing not just the photographs, but the entire house.

It gained speed and intensity making Emma cough and cover her head as dust billowed from every nook and cranny, while the sound of broken wood and glass being fit back together filled her ears.

Abraham spun around and barked out a warning when the blue shimmer grew too close as it repaired the windows, walls, and curtains near the corner Emma sat in; and it obeyed, leaving the dingy walls behind her untouched.

Emma jumped as a violent racket came from the kitchen and could see the broken glass bottles speed off the floor and become whole, with their contents and labels were restored and then hovered while they waited for the shelves and cupboards to do the same; and in a flash they were set in place.

For a full minute, all she could hear was the loud racket of the house being restored, and as it drew further into the back rooms, the noise became less and less intense until it finally drifted out into the back garden and dissipated.

And then everything grew eerily silent.

Emma waited and didn’t move but felt Abraham’s nose nudge at her and then tried to force himself into her lap, but for the first time in her life, she didn’t trust him.

And shook her head at him.

His agonizing cry that followed broke her heart, as he tried again.

“Stop,” she whispered, still shaking her head, “I don’t know what just happened, but you got really shitty with me… and I need a minute to think about that.”

He laid down and flipped over, and when that didn’t work, he soldier crawled back until he was close, but not touching her, and whined pitifully.

She gave him a hard look, “It’s not even been ten seconds, Abraham.”

The whining stopped and he got up and walked to the fireplace and sat down, staring at the small crackling fire that burned cheerfully away in the repaired fireplace.

Emma remained fixed to the floor a little longer and looked about the room.

Gauzy drapes hung in the repaired windows and the floors shone under the lamplight at the end of an overstuffed white couch and as she slowly rose to her feet, the grand clock in the foyer began to chime. 

Her eyes glided back to the mantel, which was now adorned with small photos and drawings.  Curiosity finally won out and she approached the display and stood next to Abraham.

She stared at the tiny faces in the black and white portraits. 

First, an elderly woman with kind eyes embraced a teenage girl, and then they appeared together again in a grainy group photo joined by two young looking men and an older gentleman with a very tall hat. 

Another portrait of the same teenager, now a young woman with long dark hair and laughing eyes, with one of the handsome men from the previous picture, and he gazed down lovingly at her and in the very bottom corner of the picture it said, “Us” – Winthrop, MA – 1892.

“Winthrop, MA…” she muttered in stunned confusion, “isn’t that near Boston?” 

Her attention moved on to an assortment of drawings on strange, yellowed paper that were bound in homemade frames of braided twine and appeared to progress in order down the top of the mantle.

The same woman, sketched in various scenes.  First her wading in the ocean and in the next holding a freshly caught fish, her eyes filled with a look of sheer triumph. 

Then in a garden intent on her work and then the very last drawing was the woman sitting on the front steps of a house, holding a baby.  “This house” Emma murmured, “Your house,” noticing the wind chime was in the drawing with her. 

She reached out and touched the image of the woman very lightly with her finger and a flash of pain ripped through her entire body making her stumble backwards and waited for it to subside.

“Oh, no…” Emma whispered brokenly, the puzzle pieces in her mind latching together almost too quickly as tears welled up in her eyes, “the kidnappers said my parents hid here and had a baby…me…are those my parents??”  her mind whirled as the tears fell down her face and she got angry, “Wait a minute!  I shouted at that jerk and the super model that I wanted my dog and that I wanted to go home!  And then that blue thing appeared and brought me here!  Why?  Was this my home – just like that old goat said!?  Is that why Abraham is here?”

The dog turned his head around at her for a moment, his eyes filled with sadness and then looked back to the fire.

Emma dropped her head into her hands and cried for many minutes as she reeled between truth, confusion, dismay, and anger.  “How did you get here, Abraham?” she demanded on a hiccup of breath and when he remained vigil, she hissed, “I wish you could TALK!”

The instant the words left her mouth, a dark blue shimmer reappeared, this time around her beloved dog, and she screamed, “NO!” as it encompassed him, “I didn’t mean it!  Leave him alone!”

Abraham struggled against it for a moment, sending strange sparks across the room, then seemed to give up and in a whirl of blonde fur, the blue shimmer disappeared and so did her dog, leaving a short, leathery brown creature sitting in front of the fireplace.

Part of Emma wanted to run out the front door, but when the creature turned around and looked at her with almost shameful eyes, she became instantly perplexed instead, her eyes wide with wonder, “Holy shit!  I remember you!  You would come to my room every night when I was little and crawl into my bed…and tell me stories!  I thought I imagined you!”

“I was always real,” he replied in an even baritone, “I became the shape of a dog when you became too old and too inquisitive.”

“BECAME the shape of a dog?  What the hell does that mean?  You said you were a baby dinosaur!”

“No, you said I looked like a baby dinosaur, and I just didn’t disagree with you.”

 “You do look like a baby dinosaur!”

 “I assure you, Emma, I am not.”

 “Well, what are you then?  Clearly not the dog that’s been with me most of my life!”

He bowed his round, bald head briefly then answered, “I am called a Prigg, my kind come the Realm of Baylor’s Moon, and we are shape shifters.  I can transform myself into anything of equal size and smaller.”

Emma chucked her chin at him, “Prove it.”

He spun at once, like a tiny brown tornado and became her golden retriever once again, then did it again, this time choosing the shape of a small sparrow and flew around the room for effect and then spun back into his Prigg form and blinked at her, “Satisfied?”

She shook her head and back peddled several steps, “The bottle in the kitchen, Weesper for the Prigg…that was for you…you were here with my parents?”

“Yes.” 

Emma said nothing and stalked off into the kitchen and began searching for something in the cupboards.

“What are you looking for?” he inquired, watching her intently.

“A bottle of wine!  Or a fifth of anything at this point!”

“Why don’t you just wish for it then?”

She slammed the last cupboard shut and reappeared in the doorway, “What do you mean?”

He shrugged, “You wished the house was fixed, you wished me here – which is an assumption on my part – you wished for me to speak…seems to me you can wish for whatever you want.”

“No,” she refused hotly, shaking her head, “that Shade lady said I had to be trained!  When Menders are chosen, they must be trained for their nifty shit to work!”

“You weren’t chosen,” he explained, folding his small clawlike hands together and tipping his head sideways, “I’m hoping they explained that part, right?”

“Oh, you bet!  That Mitonka guy lost his crackers!  He said that I’m just a product of criminals!  And that my parents destroyed everything because they lied and that he had to bring me here to be exposed and brought to justice!”

The Prigg frowned, “That’s not entirely true… but it sounds like you’ve had a rough time, so why don’t you just try my suggestion?”

“Because I don’t know how!”

“Sure, you do, just focus on what you want and then ask for it.”

 She dropped her head into her hands again, this time in frustration, but did as he said and murmured between her fingers, “I’d really like a bottle of Goldschlager.”

“Interesting choice,” the Prigg replied as the bottle appeared on the counter next to her elbow, “would it be too much to ask for a plate of grilled cheese sandwiches?  I’m quite hungry considering you haven’t fed me since last night.”

 She gaped at the bottle and then at him.

Thirty minutes later, with a quarter of the bottle gone, Emma was still in the kitchen, but had calmed down enough for him to ask, “If it’s all the same to you, I’m quite uncomfortable in my Prigg form, do you mind if I change?”

She remained leaning against the counter but took another swill before she asked, “Into what?”

“Well, the dog would prevent me from speaking, so unless you don’t want to talk…”

“No dog.”

“Very well,” he sighed and spun into the form of an eight-year-old boy, “will this do?”

Emma almost choked, “You look like that kid from TV!”

“Yeah, he’s pretty cool.”

“If you’re from the 1970’s!  Pick something else!”

“Hey, you left the TV on for me while you were at work, so I’m just going with what Human images I got!”

And for some reason, that made Emma laugh and she kept laughing until she cried and then she kept crying, until she slid all the way to the floor and sobbed.

He approached her cautiously, then knelt, “Don’t cry, Emma, it will be ok.”

“How?” she asked hopelessly, “I’m so confused…”

“Because I love you,” he answered and crawled into her lap and hugged her, “and I’ll never let them hurt you – no matter what.  And I’ll explain what I’m allowed to, so you won’t be so confused anymore.”  Then whispered against her head, “I can make it a little better, I promise.”

Very slowly she raised her arms and hugged him back and cried a bit longer before she managed on with a ragged voice, “On one condition.”

“What’s that?” he asked, sitting back and petting her head like a small child.

“That you stop looking like Bobby Brady…”

And he laughed, “I’ll change into anything you wish for a plate of grilled cheese sandwiches.”

She smiled through teary eyes, “Deal.”

He stood and offered out his hand, “Time to get off the floor, Emma Qwinn.”

An hour later, they were still sitting at the dining room table, the plate of sandwiches gone and almost half the bottle of Goldschalger, and Emma was feeling sedate but slightly irritated as he dodged her last question, “You’re not answering much, Abraham.”

He ran his hand through his spikey brown hair, his white tee shirt popping against the tiny brown, leather jacket and cuffed jeans that hugged his short legs swinging under the chair, “I already told you, I’m bound by old Elfin magic…if I tell you everything…I could split apart and die right here in this chair!”

“Because my father bound you with one of his weird experiments, like he did to the forty-foot-tall grass outside.”

“Yes, just like the Guardian Grass.”

“Because my father is an Elf.”

“Yes.”

“And he stole you from Baylor’s Moon…another realm, another slice of Dr. Mitonka’s orange.”

“They all do it,” Abraham reasserted, “your father didn’t have a choice… remember, the whole Elf coming of age thing I explained?  ALL males Elves are taken to Baylor’s Moon by their fathers to see if they can catch a creature and because they don’t want their sons to die, they seek out Priggs.  Your father’s task was no different than thousands of others.”

“An Elf,” Emma snorted, taking another sip from her bottle, “you expect me to believe that my mother fell in love with some three-foot high, Santa Claus present-wrapping, pointy-eared, reindeer-loving ELF!”

Abraham rolled his eyes, “The only part you got right was the pointy ears!  Elves don’t live at the north pole, Emma!  Santa Clause is a Human concept!  The Elf Realm isn’t so different from your own,” he explained, “they have rules, governing bodies…their young go to school…they work and farm!  Stop thinking small!  Elves appear in the Old Norse text and Human literature as far back as your Earth year 1485.”

“That’s folklore!”

“Is it?”  he demanded, raising an eyebrow at her, “I’ve already explained how the Realms are connected, and how your father spent loads of time in the Earth Realm trying to escape his own troubled life – and that’s how he met your mother.  Elves have been connecting with Humans for centuries, so enough with your folklore bull crap!”

Emma sighed and shook her head, “You are asking me to believe the impossible.”

“And yet you’ve already seen the impossible with your own eyes.”

She grew quiet after a long minute, rubbing her thumb against the bottle she was holding, “I’m tired.”

“You’ve drunk a half a bottle of hooch; I’m shocked you’re not lying on the floor.”

Emma smirked at that before shoving the bottle away and stood up, then grappled at the wall for support, “I think I’ll just go in here,” she said veering unsteadily into the kitchen and toward the living room.

“Hang on,” Abraham called, catching up to her and chucking his arm around her waist for support as she tried to navigate the distance to the couch, “I’ll catch hell from Shade if you fall and bust your face on the coffee table.”

She hit the cushions hard and immediately curled into a ball, “Shade…” she slurred groping at a pillow and stuffing it under her head, “that kidnapping super model will never find us here.”

Abraham watched Emma for some time after she’d slipped into a drunken slumber then quietly went to a heavy, wooden trunk that sat under one of the windows and pulled a blanket from inside and as he covered her gently, whispered, “This will be the first place she looks, Emma, and the grass knows her.  I’ll bet money she’s here before you even wake up.”

And he was right of course.

Shade found Emma, sound asleep with a strange looking Human boy, curled up next to her on the couch.

So, she took up a seat next to the fireplace, summoned a cup of coffee and waited for one, or both, to wake up.

Emma turned her head against the pillow and heard the crashing waves outside as her mind left strange dreams and slowly remembered that she was no longer on Steel Lily Lane in Kettle Hill.

She looked down at Abraham, who had coiled himself protectively in front of her on the couch, still wearing his jeans and little leather jacket, and pushed his spiky hair away from her chin.

Something didn’t feel right though, like she was being watched, and her silvery blue eyes quickly settled on the super model, sitting six feet away, in a cozy chair next to the fireplace.  Her long legs neatly crossed in tight black pants and tall black boots, holding a cup of coffee against a flowy green tunic.

Emma chucked her chin lightly, “If you move an inch closer to me, I swear I’ll wish you into a frog and throw you in the ocean.”

Shade smiled kindly at the threat and lifted her cup in a small toast, “I promise I’ll stay right here.”

Pushing herself up onto her elbow and pulling Abraham closer into her chest, Emma peered about quickly, “Where is your lunatic sidekick at?”

“Not here,” Shade assured, “the Guardian Grass will not allow him to pass.”

Emma’s lip curled, “Then at least my father got that right.”

“Your father did many things right.”

Emma frowned, “Do you see this deranged Prigg dressed up like some miniature Fonzi?  Pasted to me like it’s his job?  Because it is his job – but only after he was STOLEN from Baylor’s Moon?  A slave for the rest of his life?  Is that something you think my father got right??  All you buggers are a bunch of sick twists if you ask me!”

Shade’s smile broadened, tipping her head sideways and asked, “Why don’t you tell me what you’ve learned since you left us so unexpectedly last night?  Clearly the Carrier obediently complied and brought you home…as you so demanded.  But I’m curious to understand how this little cottage has been set back to its rightful splendor and how your Prigg is here – when last I knew – was back in the Earth Realm.”

Emma’s eyes filled with distrust and then answered, “Because I wished it…and I didn’t even know I could…so that’s what I’ve learned since I saw you yesterday - is that I really can turn you into a frog.”

The super model’s smile slipped as she took a sip of her coffee and contemplated her words, because this creation of Fate was aware, even if in the smallest degree, and that made her incredibly dangerous, so Shade spoke to Fate in her mind, “Help me, show me the path so we can all move forward.”

And Fate spoke loudly inside her mind at once, “Have no fear, she is mine.  Take her to Elder Mary.  Confess and be free.” 

Shade’s head dropped into her chest with such a heavy sigh that Abraham stirred next to Emma and blinked his eyes open and stared at her bent head, “I knew you’d be here.”

She leaned back and gave him a smile, her emerald eyes filled with tears, “It’s good to see you again, Prigg.”

“Why are you crying?”

“Because Fate has finally spoken, and it’s been a long time since I’ve heard HER voice.”

He pushed himself up against Emma protectively, “And what does She say?”

“That everything is going to be okay.”

He relaxed some and twisted his head around at Emma, his cow brown eyes full of love, “See?  I told you Shade wasn’t a bad one, she’s a friend.”

“No, you didn’t,” Emma snapped, sitting up and sliding away from him on the couch, “all you said was that she helped my parents leave the Earth Realm and bring them here, and then she helped my mother escape when they got busted.”

“How is that unfriendly?” he frowned with confusion.

“Because you didn’t ask what was in it for her!  Ever wonder why she did all that?”

Abraham thought about it for a moment, then looked at Shade with renewed interest, “Yeah, why did you help them?”

Shade conjured a hanky and dabbed at her eyes, “I’m not a liberty to say, Prigg.”

Emma rolled her eyes and stood up, “See?  Just more secrets and bullshit,” and with a disgusted shake of her head stalked off, “If you’ll excuse me, I need a damn shower.”