Changeling
Text © 2006 Delia Sherman
First published in 2006 by Viking, a division of Penguin Young Readers Group.
Original illustrations © 2007 Theo Black, The Black Arts,
and Pat Conway at Wanna in El Paso, used by permission

Chapter 5
Spiders aren't trapped
by their own webs.
Neef's Rules for Changelings

I was out of that tree before I knew it. I felt like I was flying, but I couldn't have been: mortals don't fly, either. I landed on a big furry something that roared and grabbed at me. But I was too quick for it.

The moment my feet hit the grass, the music caught me up like a newspaper in the wind.

The knot of mortals was just on the other side of a garland of nymphs, but I couldn't get to them. My feet had developed a mind of their own. For about a heartbeat, I swear I caught the beat. Everything — the trees, the grass, the stones, the stars, the City, the Folk, the mortals Outside — was part of the same dance, and it never ended. What had been and what was to be were the same as now, and always would be. I forgot about the changelings; I forgot that I'd ever been lonely or angry or even mortal.

And then it all fell apart. Suddenly, I had two left feet and neither of them had the beat. The mortal changelings were nowhere in sight. I bumped into dwarves and elbowed trolls and stepped on a blue demon who might have been Peg's friend Blueberry. Werebears growled at me as I stumbled in front of them; fox spirits barked and snapped. I wished as hard as I could to be home asleep in bed with the curtains drawn, but like all wishes made when it's too late, it didn't come true. All I could do was grimly keep on dancing and hope I didn't get trampled.

And then I found myself face to face with the Green Lady.

When she's happy, the Green Lady of Central Park is as beautiful as the most beautiful thing you can imagine. She has greeny-brown skin, long dark-green ropes of hair, and deep-set eyes the color of new leaves after a rain. But she can change shape , and not all of her shapes are beautiful.

As soon as she saw me, her dreadlocks lifted and began to weave around her head and hiss like snakes. Emerald fire smoldered in her eyes and her lips lifted over teeth that had grown suddenly needle-like.

"Can the music, boys," she yelled. "We have a situation here."

The music fell silent and everyone stopped dancing, just like that. All I could hear was the panicked thumping of my own heart and some noisy panting that was probably the mortal changelings.

The Lady said, "Do you know what you have done?"

She used the voice the Folk use to ask ritual questions, magic questions, questions you better answer carefully or you're history. Questions asked in this voice are never as simple as they sound. I licked my lips nervously. "Um. Could you repeat the question?"

"A question is not an answer," the Green Lady said, the snakes weaving around her head. "You must say yes or no."

"The thing is," I said, "it's not that simple. I mean, I know what I did, but I don't know why it's a big deal. If that's what you're asking."

The Green Lady burst into howls of nasty laughter that were echoed by what sounded like every Supernatural in New York. It was a horrible sound, full of the promise of blood and crunching bones. I looked around for Astris or the Pooka or the Water Rat or even a friendly moss woman to rescue me, but I was surrounded by open mouths and pointed teeth, tongues of red and blue and purple and black, eyes like red sparks and eyes like soup plates, all of them hungry, hungry, hungry.

"You're a pistol, kid," the Green Lady said at last. "You knew you were doing something wrong, right?"

Another trick question? I wrenched my mind from the hungry eyes and tried to concentrate. Sure, every benevolent supernatural in the Park had warned me away from the Solstice Dance. But I'd never thought about whether I might actually be breaking a rule. So I'd be lying a little, whether I said yes or no. I thought it might be safest if I shrugged.

The Lady's hair-snakes all twisted around to get a good look at me. My stomach turned over. "I didn't mean to do anything wrong," I explained.

"Geddouttahere," the Lady snapped. "You think I was born yesterday? The squirrels tell me you've been breaking rules right, left, and center since spring cleaning day. Besides, it doesn't matter what you meant. It only matters what you did."

"But what did I do?" I meant to yell, but it came out more like a sob.

"What did you do?" the Green Lady echoed back at me. "You just broke the geas I laid upon you at your Changing, that's all."

I felt like I'd opened a door and gotten bonked by a brick. All I could think was It's not fair and I want Astris.

Something cold and wet touched my hand. I jumped about a mile and screeched. The Green Lady and the Wild Hunt howled with laughter.

Astris patted my knee with a small, pink paw. "Hush, pet. It's only me. I did my best to keep this from happening, but mortals are so curious. Didn't I warn you that curiosity killed the cat?"

Her voice was brisk, but her whiskers were worried. I let my legs fold and put my arms around her.

The Green Lady smiled graciously at us. "What a good fairy godmother you are, Astris. Aren't you going to fill your changeling in on what's going down here?"

Astris's whiskers twitched angrily. "Perhaps the Lady will recall that she laid a geas on me, too."

"Not to speak of Neef's geas in her hearing," the Lady said helpfully. "Too bad you remembered. The Hunt would have had a ball with the pair of you." She turned her leaf-green eyes to me. "Okay, kid, here's the scoop. The Hunt loves to hunt mortals. But mortal changelings are under my protection. So we have a deal. I put a geas on every mortal changeling that comes to the Park, and when—er, if—they break it, the Hunt gets a crack at them."

I couldn't believe I'd heard her right. "Are you telling me that the Wild Hunt is going to chase me down for breaking a geas nobody was allowed to tell me about?"

"Technically," the Lady said, "breaking the geas only removes you from my protection. But since my protection is the only thing keeping the Wild Hunt off you, yeah, that's about the size of it."

The Wild Hunt cheered. My throat felt tight. Astris pressed against me, warm and furry and solid. The Hunt loves the taste of fear, I reminded myself. Freaking out would just bring them down on me faster. I swallowed hard.

"Get up," the Green Lady said, and I did, shakily. She lifted her slender hand and her voice rolled like a bell over the mob of New York Folk. "The changeling Neef, having broken the geas laid upon her at her Changing, is no longer under my protection. She is without home, without sponsorship, and all the paths of the Park are closed to her. And this I swear by my Name and hers."

At the last word, she disappeared, taking Astris with her.

The Wild Hunt began to circle widdershins, against the path of the sun. No surprise: it's an unlucky direction. With every rotation, the Hunters got a little closer to me and I got a little closer to breaking down and running until they'd had their fun with me and were ready for dinner.

Another circuit, and I could smell their blood-breath, hear their eager, hungry whines. My jaw hurt from clenching it; my legs trembled. I couldn't stand it any more. I opened my mouth and took a breath so I could scream and get it over with.

And that was when a big, black thing came swooping down, grabbed my shoulders in strong, sharp claws, and carried me away.

That did it: I screamed like a banshee. The Hunt leaped up after me, but whatever had nabbed me rose even faster. We spiraled smoothly up and up, neatly avoiding the dragons and garudas and pigeons and other winged Folk who had been dancing in the air. Soon we were so high that I could see the whole Park spread out below me with the buildings of the City clustered around it like a stone forest around a green lake.

I screamed some more.

The whatever-it-was plunged down through the center of the Hunt, leaving my stomach behind. It wheeled and flew east over the Metropolitan Museum, and suddenly it dawned on me that maybe I was being rescued.

I stopped screaming, but I didn't relax. How could I? I was about twenty stories up, dangling from a pair of really sharp claws that belonged to something that might be taking me home so it wouldn't have to share. Not to mention that I was heading out into the City. For me, the City was something to look at, not visit; for me, the City was even more dangerous than the North Woods.

We swooped down towards a pale building crowned with glittering gold. I closed my eyes, and waited for the crash. But there wasn't one. I touched solid ground with my feet, the claws released my shoulders, and I collapsed, shaking all over. Then I was scooped up, in somebody's arms this time, carried a little way, and dropped onto something soft and sweet-smelling.

We were there. Wherever "there" was. And I was still alive.

Read an introduction to Changeling by author Delia Sherman that talks about her inspirations for this story.

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