Matchbox Girls by Chrysoula Tzavelas Read Free Book Online Page A

Tinker Chime, here to—what? What?” Marley was giggling.
    She fell back onto her bed, still holding Neath to her chest. “Chime? Like, a bell? I love this dream!” He looked so affronted that she had to work hard to stop herself from bursting into peals of laughter. “Sorry, Chime, you were saying? Here to...?” And she snickered again, unable to stop herself.
    The great fairy Tinker Chime hovered over her head, near the canopy of the bed. “You’re not very nice. I’ve probably found the wrong dream and you’re not the one with the important destiny.”
    Marley gazed up at him thoughtfully until the pain from Neath's claws forced her to shift her grip. The cat squirmed away from her and stalked to the edge of the bed, where one of the posts led up to the canopy. Chime shot out from under the canopy and up to the ceiling.
    “She can’t fly, glitterbrain,” Marley called after him.
    “Yet! She can’t fly yet !” called back the piping voice.
    “Oh, come on. Tell me about this great destiny. Fair warning: You probably do have the wrong person, though. Action Girl’s down thataway.” She pointed yonder .
    A tiny pair of intense violet eyes peeked over the edge of the canopy. “To be honest, at this point, we’d take even a decent destiny. Maybe even a mediocre one.”
    “Desperate times!” She watched Neath crouch, her tail lashing back and forth. “You’d better talk fast.”
    Chime somersaulted into view, hovering beyond the bed. “My lady, you are called on to rescue—”
    And the dream shattered, torn asunder by the gouge of pain in her back and gut. For a moment, she saw Chime’s mouth moving, before he and the bedroom around him shriveled like paper in a fire. Then it all blew away, nothing more than dried wisps of grass. Beyond stretched a desolate sunless wasteland, where nothing moved. A thousand eyes watched from the heavens and the moon was a clockwork machine with a face she could not read. She took a step forward and fell through, into stars—
    Marley opened her eyes. One twin had her head butted up against Marley’s back, while the other had her feet planted in Marley’s stomach. One of them was snoring lightly. She hadn't noticed them crawling into bed with her, and she wondered vaguely when they'd done it. Neath was nestled next to her head.
    She sighed and adjusted herself and the children so she wasn’t in danger of twinjury, and closed her eyes again. She could remember the dream with Tinker Chime clearly, more real than a childhood memory. But when she tried to recapture the light-hearted state of mind and return to the dream, all she could see was the wasteland, and all she could hear was Neath’s growl.
     

-seven-
     
     
    T he children dragged Marley from bed far too close to dawn, ignoring her sleepy complaints. Branwyn, already up, laughed at her.
    “Did you encourage this assault?” Marley settled onto the barely used sofa bed, legs crossed, and ran her hands through her tangled hair. Her eyes fell on the box one of the fairy dolls had arrived in, and she remembered her dream again.
    She picked the box up and turned it over. There was a picture of each doll in the toy line on the back, but they were all girls. No little fairy boys, which she thought showed a lack of imagination.
    Neath settled into her lap. Marley blinked. Branwyn was talking. “Yup. I also fed them breakfast while you were sleeping the morning away.” She was already dressed and ready for work. The twins, Marley noticed, had made their own dressing choices: Lissa was in one of Marley’s own t-shirts, dress-sized on her, while Kari had chosen a violet swimsuit.
    “Thanks,” Marley said grudgingly.
    Branwyn continued, “The wildfires are worse today. They’ve started talking about evacuating certain areas. Keep an eye on it. I’m taking this—” she hefted a duffel bag “—to work, just in case.” With that, she left, abandoning Marley with the two preschoolers.
    The morning passed. Chaos