A Wish Made Of Glass by Ashlee Willis

Author:Ashlee Willis
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Published: 2015-08-10T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT

It is no use to deny Blessing’s injury is a severe one, but the doctor assures us she will live. We must keep her in bed a fortnight, perhaps more. She is not to be moved under any circumstances. Head injuries are tricky things. He gives us thorough instructions as to her care and the food she must eat and not eat. I hang on every word, determined I will be the one to see her healthy again.

I stay by her side that first night, and when her eyes flutter open, minutes before sunrise, mine is the first face she sees.

“Iz?”

“I’m here.”

Her fingers tremble at the edge of the bedclothes, and I reach to touch them.

“What happened?” She groans. “Why does my head feel so … strange?” Her lashes droop as if this handful of words is more than she has strength for.

“No, don’t go to sleep,” I say. “I’ve something to tell you.”

My sister’s eyes open again and she offers me a weak smile. “I already know what you will say, Izzy.” The pressure of her hand is on mine, light as butterfly wings. I smile at her just as sleep draws his curtain between us.

But it is enough. I know that, against all odds, we have begun again.

* * *

I tell Blessing stories as she recovers. We talk a little, but when I see how this exhausts her I decide stories are safest. I tell her the tale of the proud, cruel lord who lost his way in the wood and emerged a century later to find his kin dead and gone. I tell her the tale of the fey prince who loved the human maid and took her to be princess of his kingdom. I tell her of the mortal king laid to rest in the fairy realm, ready to rise and fight for his people when the time grows ripe. And as I tell these tales and more, the cord which used to bind my sister and me together is taken up again from where it had lain, dusty and forgotten.

In the end I give up my most precious secret, the only one I ever kept from her. I tell Blessing of how I used to dance with the fey.

I think Blessing must be able to hear the longing in my voice. I can certainly feel it, heady as wine in my blood. When I speak of the glass slippers the fey women wear, she sits up in bed, eyes bright. I laugh at her and bid her lie down. She will have none of it. She insists on knowing what the slippers look like.

The whirl of fey feet dance back from my childhood, and the light streaming from the glint of glass that is delicate as cobweb. My mother’s words sound in my mind. With every step they take, they tread upon their own hearts.

But that is what the slippers are, not what they look like.

So I say, “Moonlight.”

Blessing sighs. “Moonlight …” she whispers to herself.

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