Chosen

I knew the Fae. All my life I had been surrounded by the stories that depicted their cruel nature and the chaos and destruction that seemed to follow everywhere they traveled. I had heard tales of them separating children from their screaming mothers and cutting their throats, splattering the ground with blood. They would do so without a blink of their apathetic eyes. It seemed every song, game, or re-telling of a myth passed down to us as children hid the same message underneath the flowery delivery: The Fae were dangerous and to be avoided at all costs. As humans we were taught that no matter how strong, intelligent, or swift we became even the weakest of Fae could overtake us in a heartbeat. Most of them could do so without even trying. And so we lived our lives with that awareness, keeping our heads low, and hoped that during each reaping our villages would be overlooked.

For the most part the Fae did not mingle with us humans, and kept to their own realms. The portals to move between the Fae world and our own were rumored to be numerous but no humans knew of the locations of the portals. Perhaps if you searched high and low in the black market you could eventually find some old, wrinkled traveler to tell you where a portal might be, but most humans did not go looking, Isadora included. If she could live her whole life without running into one of the gentle folk she would count herself lucky. And so far she had been. The Spring reaping was fast approaching so Isadora spent most of her days praying that this would remain the case.

Every Spring as the snow melted away the tiny towns tucked into the folds of the mountain would breathe a collective sigh of relief that they had survived another winter. The winters in Argenon were not only long, they were brutal. Freezing temperatures swept over the land and both supplies and food became scarce. Many people did not make it through the winters. This year Isadora had. It was her third winter alone and she was well into her 19th year. Her father had passed away three winters ago from the sickness, and her mother had died giving birth to her. Her father had tried his best to give Isadora everything she needed to survive, but she had known little love or kindness. The winters and way of life here tended to make people hard and cruel, just like the glittering ice.

By now Isadora had carved out a pleasant life for herself. She lived in a small hut on the edge of the town with her tabby cat Matilda and her workhorse Rolf. The three of them made a very small but cozy family, and she had grown to enjoy her days collecting wood from the forest, and growing what she could outside of the hut. The only issue she faced was the struggle of going into town whenever she needed supplies, as her hut was so far from the towns center. While the past winter had not been easy, they had managed to make it through without too much suffering and thankfully no sickness. They had their health, and for that Isadora was thankful. And with spring on the horizon, she knew things would only improve from here on out. They just had to get through the reaping.

Isadora was fit for her age because of all the manual labour she had to do by herself, and had long fiery red hair that swung about her waist when she had it undone. Most days she kept it in a long braid down her back that swayed back and forth while she worked. She had pink lips and rosy cheeks from the cold of the winter, but perhaps her best feature were her hazel eyes that almost looked green in the sunlight. Looks-wise, she wasn’t concerned for this years reaping. There were many girls far more lovely than her in the town and she often saw them walking out and about with their gentleman suitors when she made the long trek into town.

As if the winters were not harsh enough the reapings felt like a cruel joke. Not every town would be affected and sometimes Isadora wondered if the Fae would just close their eyes, point to a map, and pick towns at random to participate. It seemed exactly like the sort of cruel joke the Fae were so accustomed to participating in. Each year as the warm whispers of spring started to tickle the edges of the town the Fae would march into four towns from the surrounding area. They would take most of the day riding into town, a long line of horses with the fearsome Fae sat atop them, and strings of lesser Fae streaming along in a line of chaos. They would rip through anything in their way, tumbling over anything that did not move fast enough.

They came with a purpose: The Reaping. Each year they would take four young girls between the ages of 14 and 24 to represent the four seasonal courts of the Fae. Winter, Fall, Spring, and Summer. While there was no saying what actually happened to these girls once they crossed over into the land of the Fae, it is said they were taken with the purpose of being wed to the king of each court, and to become one of his many human wives. It was said no female Fae could become a wife of a king by their laws, so each year they would come to the human towns and take their pick.

This year’s date was set far too soon for Isadora’s taste, and she couldn’t wait for the day to pass. The worry of the reaping took up too much space in everyone’s mind, and in the days before no one got much of anything done. The next reaping was in three days, and Isadora knew she, and much of the town, would get little to nothing done as they all waited with baited breath to see if their town would be selected for this year’s reaping, and of it was... who would be taken to the other side.