Chatoyant College Book 7: Upon What Soil

Chapter 21: Thresholds

Corrie ran quickly back to the entrance to the art building, glancing back frequently to check on Dawn and Naomi. Naomi had sat down on the edge of the grass and had managed to get Dawn down with her. She was saying something Corrie couldn't hear and pointing downward.

She slowed down as she approached the doorway, feeling nervous. She didn't see anything here; everyone was still inside, nothing coming out of the propped-open door except light and sound. Still, she hesitated. Her keys were only a foot away from the door, sitting on the cement and glinting in the light. "Ha!" came a female voice as she bent. Corrie straightened up quickly, her heart beating hard, but it was only the girl who'd been keeping the door. She had turned away from her painting and was fanning it with a magazine. "I thought you'd be back."

Corrie snatched her keys and gave the girl a half-hearted grin. "Yeah, I kind of need these to get back into my dorm."

"Is your friend okay? She looked kind of..." The girl shrugged expressively.

"Not sure," Corrie said. "We want to, uh, get her back to her room and get some water in her, maybe." She gestured back toward Naomi and Dawn, glancing over as she did. They were poking around in the grass. Presumably looking for clovers. Naomi looked over her shoulder, catching Corrie's eye, and waved.

"Oh, yeah, good idea. See you around." She spun back around on her stool, lowering the magazine, and started to inspect her painting.

Corrie was turning back to the path when she remembered that she was supposed to look for Tom. She stepped back toward the doorway, looked to the right, and nearly jumped out of her skin.

The skinny blonde, who was in reality an antlered faerie, stood just inside the doorway, staring intensely at Corrie. Corrie took a step back and reflexively tightened her grip on her keys. There was what felt like a very long moment of silence, but couldn't actually have been, what with all the people at the party. Corrie finally cleared her throat. "Can I help you?" With the painter so close to them, she wasn't going to take the chance of talking about faeries.

"Stay away from me," he said. His voice was a growl.

Corrie nodded sharply. "Just as long as you stay away from me. And my friends."

"Fine."

She nodded again and tried to look past him, nervous. She had no idea why he was just standing by the doorway. Maybe he didn't want her to come back in? He couldn't be trying to prevent her from getting to Tom, could he? In the crowd, she couldn't find him. Finally she sighed. "Do you know Tom?"

The faerie raised his eyebrows. "I know a few people named Tom."

"I think you know who I mean." Corrie gestured with her keys. "About this tall. Smiles a lot."

The faerie shook his head slowly.

Corrie shifted, looking around the faerie some more, but still couldn't spot Tom. "Mind getting out of my way so I can look for him and, you know, stay away from you at the same time?"

"I don't think so."

She didn't want to argue. She lifted her keys again and took a step toward the door. The faerie backed away a step. Corrie took another step forward, making sure to stay to the left, as far away from the faerie as possible and with iron in between the two of them. But as soon as she walked through the door, the faerie jumped toward her and grabbed her hard by the upper arm.

Corrie let out an undignified squeal (it was definitely not a scream) and tried to wrench her arm away. At the same time, the tall stool the painter had been sitting on crashed to the floor and the girl shouted. "Lora! What the hell are you doing?"

The faerie twisted around, pulling on Corrie's arm, seeming to want to drag her farther into the room. Corrie dug her heels in to the floor and tried to hit the faerie with the keys in her hand. But with the grip on her arm, she missed. Then she was suddenly wrenched forward again as someone else grabbed the faerie's other arm. It took her a minute to figure out that the other person was trying to help her, not drag her further in.

She swung with the keys again, and struck this time. The faerie gasped and loosened his grip just enough for Corrie to pull free. Red scratches appeared on the faerie's arm, and the air around it seemed to waver. Corrie backed up hastily. Everyone else near them seemed to be focused on calming him down. She ran out of the building, stopped just outside the door to glance back, and when she decided she wasn't being followed, she ran back to Dawn and Naomi.