"There you are! I've been waiting for you forever."
I scarcely have time to look up at the figure standing before me before she slips her hand into mine, and it feels like the most natural thing in the world.
It feels so natural, in fact, that I let her lead me along, not caring where she's taking me. I catch a whiff of ginger that tickles my nose and makes me giggle. She leads me away from the crowds and down a dark alley, where the low-hanging sun casts long, stretched-out shadows on the ground in front of us. I grin at the dark, elongated version of myself and give it a little wave.
She stops in front of a wooden fence, pressing her hand against a knot in the wood. I gape when a spiral of light swirls out of the knot, growing until it's just larger than she is tall. The sparkling, blue light enthralls me; I barely notice when she pulls me through it. The light feels like tiny bubbles on my skin, like swimming through a sea of champagne. It smells like peppermint and bubble gum and cinnamon and cloves--the symphony of scents giving me a sense of euphoria.
We step out in the middle of a dark, dense wood, the light behind us disappearing in a dramatic flash. She pulls me deeper into the woods, and I can't help laughing as I stumble through the undergrowth. We come to a clearing that's lit by tiny, dancing specks of light.
She stops in the middle of the clearing, where fireflies weave around us, winking in and out of the brilliant, starry expanse. She drops my hand, and suddenly my euphoria snaps like a rubber band, flinging me out of my foggy mind and back to reality.
I stumble backward in shock. "Who are you?" I demand. "What did you do to me? Where are we?"
She grins, a wide, ecstatic grin that nevertheless looks slightly off. "I've been waiting for you forever," she repeats, but this time it sounds menacing, rather than welcoming.
"That doesn't explain anything!" I glance around wildly at my surroundings, hoping to get some clue as to where I'm at. But even the river of stars stretching across the sky looks unfamiliar.
Her grin never falters, my shock and dismay seeming to not even register. "I've been waiting for you, Nell," she says again.
I shudder at the sound of my name coming from her lips. "Who are you?" I ask again.
"I am Eilidh," she says, her name sounding both foreign and familiar. "And I have been waiting for you."
"Yeah, I got that," I say dryly. "Why have you been waiting for me?"
Her grin grows even wider than I thought possible, her teeth seeming impossibly white in the darkness. "Because you are the sun."
"Excuse me?" I blink. "Hate to break it to you, Ay-lee, but I'm a girl." Even as I try to say her name I can tell I'm not getting it right.
Still grinning, she shakes her head, throwing her arms out wide. "You are the sun." She throws her head back and spins around. "You are the Radiant One, the light in the darkness, the Daylight Star." She stops and holds both her hands out to me. "You are the sun."
My jaw drops, and I start to wonder if this girl is high on something. Then I remember the way we traveled from alley to woods in an instant. So not high, just magical. And insane. "Oookay, I'm just going to go now," I say, backing away slowly.
Quick as light she has taken my hand again, and the fog creeps over my mind again. But this time I realize what is happening, and barely have the presence of mind to snatch my hand out of hers. The fog clears again, and I hold my hands to my heart. "Don't do that!"
"You cannot leave," she says, her grin slipping for an instant before she plasters it back on again. "It is not allowed. You are the sun."
My heart plummets as I realize my situation. She is right--I cannot leave, for I have no idea how. And the one who does know is not willing to take me.
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