The Changeling- Chapter one

The Changeling

         "Lili Cassie." My first period teacher calls, "Present." I say raising my hand, my name is Lili Fay Cassie. I live with my father in Woodlands Connecticut. I am currently a junior at my local high school, my father and I live on Astrid Island in the Selene River. Everyone in town was a bit frisky because of Tomorrow, Halloween or All Hallows. The day when the connection between the supernatural and mortals is the strongest. If you can't tell from that my town was crazy. We seemed normal enough, but if you listened to the talk, you would know. 'We got a new iron crib, the last one was rusting', the townspeople are very superstitious, babies and young children were surrounded by iron to ward away faeries, when food went missing people did not get angry but believed it was brownie sprites and cleaned everything. That said there are some normal people on this island, case and point me and my father. I look around even at my age kids are wearing iron jewelry to ward off faeries. I never wore the iron adornments so I once got told that if I couldn't touch an iron necklace I would be thrown from the school. Of course I touched it and I was left alone but me and my father got weird looks for being normal. Because being normal here is strange.

         I lean back in my seat. My birthday is also on All Hallows, which only made my neighbors more suspicious of me. I listen to Ms. Reynolds drone on about algebra and formulas, if you couldn't tell I don't like school very much. Soon enough class is over and I'm heading out to my next class, gym. Today we're getting out of most of our morning classes to go hiking along the Yellowstone. I join my friends in the locker room. "Hey Maya, hey Ronnie." They nod to me as we ditch our bags. Unlike other girls our everyday clothes are actually acceptable for gym class. We head outside to the football field and sit with some of our guy friends. "Hey girls!" Cassiel says as we sit down, Mark just nods to us. We sit down and wait for everyone else to file in. Ten minutes later everyone is sitting on the outdoor bleachers when our gym teacher, Coach Nichols, comes out and we can leave. We all set off towards the Yellowstone, up Mesa Avenue and past Canal Street. We chat lightly as we walk, not in the front of the pack but not dead last either. We walk along getting to a more wooded area, I see figures running in between trees. Mark and Ronnie lag behind us heading talking and holding hands, they've been dating for a year now. We continue to walk without Ronnie and Mark, chatting about books and sports. Soon enough Cassiel and Maya head off talking together ignoring me, they began dating a month back. I was a third wheel in two relationships I guess. I wander away from the group a bit onto the woods opposite of the river, seeing flashes of movement. I see something crawling towards me and I back up into a tree. It looks up revealing a marked, aged, graying woman's face. I feel a scream bubble up my throat, a soft melody echoes through the trees. Creating a haunting song, I freeze as the creature stands and limps towards me. I try to yell but it comes out faintly as I collapse beneath the tree, a man I have never seen before runs into the clearing. He freezes when he sees me, "Bean-she, leave this woman of the faeries. By order of the heir to the Seelie kingdom." The creature or bean-she, I guess, backs away from both me and the man, bowing before fleeing.

         He runs to me helping me up slowly, I regain my composure before withdrawing from him quickly. "Are you alright Madame?" he asks me and I nod slowly, "Who are you and what was that?" I ask after a minute. He frowns, "I'm the heir to the Seelie throne, and prince of the light faeries-"I wave him off, glaring at him. "Yes, yes you've already said that and it means nothing to me. I'm also not a woman of the faeries, I'm Lili Cassie." He frowns at me, "I did not know there was a Cassie clan. And what do you mean you do not know what the Seelie kingdom is?" I shake my head sighing at his lack of comprehension. "Exactly that, I don't know what you mean!" I tell him, I glance down at my watch seeing that it is almost four a clock. He sees my watch and backs away, "How are you touching iron? You are definitely a faerie." I sigh, this again! "Who are you anyways?" I ask him. His frown deepens at my rudeness. "My name is Prince Calum of the Chattan clan of the Seelie Court. What is your name Madame?" he loses some of his rudeness, "I am Lili Cassie, daughter of none." He looks confused at my introduction.

         "Daughter of none?"

         "My parent's abandoned me, I was adopted." He looked shocked at this. "Does the one who raises you belong to clan?" I shake my head, this guy really doesn't get what I'm saying, is he from here? "As far as I know no and once again I have no idea what you mean. Also I need to get home." I tell him pointing to my watch. He glares at it, before nodding to me. "I will accompany you home then." I give him an odd look, before heading back towards the river. He pauses before rushing to catch up with me, when we get to the river I look upstream, seeing my house ahead, before continuing on. After about 10 minutes of walking I see the footbridge that crosses the Selene and pick up my pace a bit. As I go to cross the bridge I'm jerked backwards into Calum and we fall to the ground. "Are you insane? You cannot cross running water!" I glare at him before yanking my arm from his grip and walking across the bridge, before glaring back at him. "I walk across this bridge at least twice every day, so don't go telling me what I can and can't do." I walk to the end of the bridge to see him walking slowly across the bridge. "How can you walk across so easily?" he asks wearily, I shrug. Why is he so tired? When I ask this he laughs, "Only a powerful faerie could walk across as I did, I have never seen a faerie pass running water so easily." I shrug again as we arrive at my front door, when I remember my bag, "Damn it!" I say sitting on my front porch, he looks shocked at my choice of words, "I left my bag at my school, and it has my keys." I explain to him, he smiles. "Would you like me to fetch it for you?" I look at him questioningly, "I can be back here in two minutes." He explains, I nod telling him where it is and where my school is. He rushes off slowing as he crosses the bridge. I stay sitting thinking of what he had said, a faerie. I could imagine the town's reaction, I met a faerie prince who claimed I was faerie too. If I believed this I would have to believe in every town superstition, faeries, ghosts, magic, you take one you take them all. I see Calum carrying my bag running back towards me, "You did not mention that your school is made of iron." He accuses as he hands me my bag, I laugh softly, "I forgot that it mattered." He frowns but brightens up as I open the door to my house, "May I come in, we have much to discuss?" he points out, I look at him suspiciously. "Why do you need to be invited inside, are you a vampire?" He laughs, "I believe you mean a succubus and no I am not one, I am merely being polite." I blush, that makes much more sense. I open the door gesturing for him to come in, he walks in sitting down on the couch. "Well Miss Cassie, since you are a faerie I'd like for you to come to the Faeryland. Preferably permanently." I fall into a couch, holding up my hand for him to stop. "First off, what is Faeryland? Secondly, why should I go there? And lastly, why would I go there permanently?" He frowns at my questions.

         "I believe I have quite a lot to explain." I roll my eyes and he continues, "Alright, Faeryland is the natural home of the faeries. In Faeryland there are two different kingdoms, they each have one court of clan leaders. The two kingdoms are called the Seelie and Unseelie courts, there are six clans in each court. The strongest clan in each court has the head become the king or queen, it is a monarchy system. In the Seelie court the Chattan clan is the strongest so we rule that court, the other Seelie clans are: Lennox, Cumin, Bruce, Scott and Graham. In the Unseelie court the strongest is the Rose clan, they only have a queen no king or heirs. The other Unseelie clans are: Buchanan, Gordon, Drummond, Kerr and Gunn. The two courts have been on edge for centuries due to conflicting opinions. When a faerie grows in to their full powers they can choose if they want to stay with their family, clan and court or if they wish to pledge themselves to the other court and be put into one of the clans there. You could guess most stay with their family." He pauses to see if I'm understanding all of this, I nod for him to continue. "As for why you would go there, well you could learn of your powers, your birth family and be with others like you. You would probably stay permanently because you would join a court. You could always come and visit this world but you would never belong here." I close my eyes putting my head in my hands, to leave or to stay? To be judged and know that they're right or to leave my friends, family and home behind. I look at the clock, 6:40. "You need to leave, my dad will be home soon and I need to start cooking." He looks amused, nodding and heading towards the door before stopping. "You must meet me tomorrow, in the clearing at midnight." I think for a moment before nodding, he leaves waving as he walks into the woods disappearing behind trees. I rush to make spaghetti before my father gets home, I am only hoping he hasn't heard that I missed half of the school day. 5 minutes later my father comes in and I'm just putting the food on the plates. "Hey Lil" he yells walking in, "I got food!" he comes running in, still wearing his jacket. I laugh handing him his plate as we sit at the dining room table. We chat for a while before his face turns sad, "What's wrong dad?" he frowns, "Well about tomorrow I got called in to work, I have to go to an emergency summit in Washington. I'm going to be gone for the next week, I leave tomorrow morning." I frown at my plate, he's going to miss my birthday. "And because of that I'm going to give you your present now." I smile trying not to show my sadness, he walks into the living room and grabs a large box. "Here." He says handing me the box. I open it carefully, pulling the ribbon away gently, I pull off the lid revealing a load of tissue paper. I sift through it finding a white gold locket with a strange symbol carved onto the front of it, as well as a book and a note. I look up to see my father gone, I bring my presents up to my room in the box. I open up the note:

         My little Lili,

I don't know how to tell you this but you weren't exactly left at an adoption agency. You were abandoned at the foot of the bridge on the island side, I asked the adoption agency if I could keep you and they allowed it. When you were a baby you wouldn't go near iron, you never would play in the lake either. People were suspicious, I started to force you to be near iron. Your first steps were across the bridge. Suspicion died down but I was still confused. I hope you can forgive me for the half-truths and white lies. When I found you, you were wrapped in a blanket and had this necklace on. Happy birthday, Lili.

-Dad

I open the locket to see two symbols, one the same as the on the front of the locket, the other completely new to me and strange. I lay on my bed thinking, to know you aren't your parent's daughter is one thing. To know you were abandoned is a completely different. I look over at my clock after mulling over these thoughts for a while. 11:50 pm, I get up reluctantly. Changing into warmer clothes and bringing a small pack with the locket, my phone stuff, extra clothes and my money.