Up the Coast

First, we had to set her house on fire. Yeah. Can you believe that? This is how Madaam’s plans usually went. She might as well be working for the Phoenix. It is common knowledge that my sister has electrical problems. Sometimes the ON switch for the toaster gets stuck or a piece of aluminum makes it into the microwave.

Surprisingly, aggressive music is her living. Usually this involves some sort of electric interface. For her, however, she plays acoustic guitar and percussions while singing bombastic lyrics. She was the underground influence to rap music back in the days of acoustic blues. Bob Dylan and Freddie Mercury saw her live under two different pseudonyms in two different eras. She was a muse for both of them. Russel Simmons tried to sign her on the East Coast, but she refused. Instead she pointed him out to the whole Fresh Jive bunch, all of them inspired by her styles. On the West Coast she started a group called NWA and faded out before they cut an album. She bangs. Most recently she pointed a group called Korn out of Bakersfield into the rap rock fusion technique. I think Phoenix was a precursor to the lead. All the familial abuse is totally the Bird’s style. She also got on with Ani Difranco, but we don’t like to talk much about that.

Despite all the notoriety my sister never got famous. It is against the code. The folk are perpetually living in the shadows of the talented. We have to. Just think if we did make it in the public spotlight. The repercussions would be tremendous after about 20 ageless years. After 50 the impact would be astronomical. The dividing line between faith and knowledge of the mystical is the difference between our power and our demise. If they know we exist, they no longer have faith. If they no longer have faith, we fade.

I guess the most popular example is Santa Clause. People have faith that he exists and does all these amazing things. This is why he can do them. If people knew, I mean really knew with scientific reason, he could do them, then it would no longer be faith. His power would curdle like centuries old milk. Nick was once an actual human during a veil opening. He did do all of those candy in the shoes Christmas things while he was corporeal. After his ruling fae immortalized him with sainthood, he kept on doing them in less corporeal ways. He incites the spirit of the season. Not until the middle of this past century when he started making deals with some cutthroats from the corporate netherworlds did the winter solstice get nasty. Because the spirit changed, the season changed. It all culminates on the 25th of December, a terrible deadline. The rush and bustle and stress pays off with a single day of cheer. It was his only demand to the compromise. He gets one day with all the malls closed for people to be with their families. Of course they agreed. They play The Loophole, a good friend of mine, but shady as they come. Loop has deals all over town with lawyers and the Easter Bunny. Nick traded his name for Clause when he realized what he overlooked. Many people do not like their families and are forced to be with them. This is where the bars come into play, the hinge stipulation, the Clause. The stores are closed, but the bars stay open. Did you know Christmas Eve has the highest suicide rate than any other day of the year? Combine that with alcohol and everyone else being happy the whole day and you get one big Thanks, Mr. Clause.

I wish I could say I watched the downfall of Morning Star, the first half fae human getting too big for his britches, but I am not that old. This is some dawn of time stuff. Lucifer set the bar for the corruption of Halflings. Materialist Greed. Somewhere along the way it always kicks in. You always want more. There are exceptions. Not only humans get greedy. When the Folk get a taste of the world, they want it too. This is why they stole children and left logs in the crib. Back in the day they were called changelings. Now, the scientific community of doctors and orphaned parents, who need explanations for weird medical anomalies, call it crib death. I wish I could say there were faerie laws against that sort of thing, but there aren’t. We have a hard time following rules and regulations, which is why the Code exists. The bindings of the Code are simply just a manner to be known throughout the world. There are no punishments for not following it with the exception of reputation. In our world rep is everything. A creature who dismisses it and does their own thing will more than likely be viewed as the Wicked Witch of the West or the nameless Gingerbread Lady.

Fortunately for me, I guess, there is nothing in the Code about burning your sister’s house down or kidnapping her.

“There has to be another way.”

“Can you think of one?” Mill gave me that reproachful eye for questioning their supposedly well thought out idea. The pause was just long enough for me to respond, but not vacant enough to quickly problem solve a new plan. “I did not think so.”

We waited outside her Point Loma condo on the beach for the sun to dip far below the horizon and get ready to spring back up again on the other side. Madaam insisted on the time. She flips her coffee maker on and jumps in the shower every morning at the crack of dawn. I hate to use trite clichés like that, but she owns that one. Among the loud cacophonics of our legendary storms when the fam gets together, privately she makes a small inaudible split when the sun first tips the horizon, hence the expression. This is when we strike.

I heard the break before I saw the sun. If we were on the East Coast it would have been simultaneous. When the first rays trickled out across the bay in that pre morning blue, I heard the water start up running through the pipes. People say storms are unpredictable, but this girl ticks on the schedule. I perspirated up the balcony and through her swung wide French style balcony doors. The HOA would be pissed if she had not hid them behind various plants and ornamentation. They like things to all look the same in their individuality. Condos in San Diego can be so like the suburbs. From the porch I dripped across the living room carpet to the kitchen appliances. A little water here and there in the low tech circuit board of the percolator was all it took to start sparking. A few sparks next to these newly installed wood cabinets quickly made a flame. I filled up the room with steam to make the fire seem more dramatic. Then, it was. I did not count on the walls being freshly painted. I was supposed to hide in the sink until she came downstairs freaking out, then jump her, gag her, and throw her in the nonexistent trunk. Instead, I tried patting out the trailing combustion along the walls with an oven mitt, when she walked down and the gig was up.

“Daudi?” she said in a half naked lavender bathrobe from behind me.

I turned around quick, trying to conceal the decorative flower latticed among new scorched soot oven mitt to my back. I stopped the flames that I attempted to stop, but there were many more than that getting away from me.

“Hey, Mekkhala. How are you?”

“I am fine. What are you doing?”

“The, uh, coffee maker just started flaring up when I walked in. This must be one of those older models without a safety cutoff.” I casually tilted the machine in observation to make it look a little more believable. She did not buy it. Rage irradiated more from her than the tiny beasts spreading onto the curtains of a small window overlooking the park. She was going to be pissed. Making a thunder faerie pissed is never good. I closed my eyes, waiting for her to lay into me.

She took a tremendously deep breath, “I am going - to go finish - my shower.” Her words drolled out slow and patient with agonizing pauses between them. Fury filled the silences. “Make sure - you put that out - and brew us up - a couple of cups - the old fashioned way.” I opened my eyes, unbelieving. Nobody gets away with stuff like this. Not with her, anyway. The anger subsided. “It is good to see you, Daudi.” Her sentiment was genuine. I could hear her walking up the stairs back to the Polynesian inspired bathroom. From the dainty footfalls on the natural parquet steps I heard her shout, a little more like her usual self in a situation like this, “And cut out all that steam. You are going to give my gnomes cancer.”

I focused the special effects into multiple streams, where the fire went a little out of control. The damage was mild, comparatively. The incendiary sprites born from the incident sizzled and awed past embers to wet black soot. I hated to get their hopes up in this area. Firelings dream of being born in Southern California. The beaches, the dry wood, arid forests, homes baking in the sun. All this water so close at hand makes it something of an adventure challenge to them. She creaked down the stairs once again as I finished up. With two cups in hand I met her at the breakfast nook.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, still holding back the temper.

“We have to go see Fox.”

“Why?” she did not look happy about this. I did not expect her to be. I wish I could say her brain was recapping the already planned itinerary for the week and wondering where she would fit this little excursion in, but she was not wondering where to fit it in. She had not yet decided to go.

I started to explain, but a plane drowned me out overhead. It was a good thing too. I had no clue where to begin and no answers to give her. In the morning light of the front door appeared Millixent taking the lead and Madaam close behind.

“He is having a Naming.”

“What?” The surprise was simultaneous. Mekkhala looked at me with envy.

“Relax, Mekkhala. He did not know either. You are being told at the same.” Lore warned against letting one sibling know before another. Jealousy of favoritism was sure to follow. Within families that never ends well. It starts feuds that tear apart the whole community for generations to come. Kaine and Able. Isaac and Ishmael. Hatfield and McCoy. The gnomes were wise for choosing this course.

“As uncle and aunt to his child you are required to give a blessing.”

This is why Kings and Queens named faeries as Godmothers or neglected to tell their witchy first cousin out in the sticks they were having a baby. She would show up anyway wielding disguised curses. Prick your finger and you sleep for a bit until Prince Charming comes to wake you with a kiss. If you are family and in the know, you are required to offer a toast like the best man at a wedding. Only family though. Outsiders bring presents.