The Faery Sickness came about when I read an article about a small village that still believed in the fae. They didn't have modern medical exposure or help and so, when babies died, they were said to have been "taken by the faeries". When medicine did arrive in their village, and the babies stopped dying, they were asked what they thought. Their response was that the faeries weren't taking so many babies now. They didn't really associate the fact that medicine had played a big role, just that the fae were appeased somehow. So, I started thinking, what if the fae really were taking the babies, and what if someone tried to defy them and find out exactly why. And Vala was the perfect person to do that.

CHAPTER ONE - THE FAERY SICKNESS

Vala Kalei clutched at the medallion about her neck, her eyes closed as if that could block out the sounds coming from the building next door. Soft voices, both commanding and encouraging, grunts of pain, gasps of breath. She shuddered as a sudden scream tore through the air. Then silence. Dreadful silence. Vala opened her eyes, her breath caught in a throat gone dry. Where was the squall of a newborn? The exclamations of joy? She waited for long moment, then sagged at the sound of weeping. The baby had died.
     Vala's breath escaped her in a sob, and she threw herself atop the straw mattress in the corner of the shed. Her tears wet the tattered blanket and she hugged close the thin shawl, burying face and heart in the memories it held. It had belonged to her mother, the last woman of this high mountain village to bear a child who had lived.
     Vala rolled onto her side, her sobs wracking a body too thin, and too small. All of her prayers had gone unheeded. The sacrifices she had made in the quiet solitude of the woods had gone unanswered. It wasn't fair! But then, the Gods rarely listened to her. If they had, her life would not be so dismal.
     Her gaze shifted over the small room's contents, barely visible in the light of a single candle burned too far down. There wasn't much - the mattress, a small table and the trunk taken from her parents' house. Yet, she supposed she was grateful for even the humble room, for it afforded her tenfold more protection than living alone. She shuddered and curled up tighter. Her life had been one dark event after another following the death of her parents.
     She had been ten years old when the plague had swept through the village and claimed many lives. She was not the only child orphaned, but she was the most well known. No one had wanted her. Not even her own uncle. He had taken her in only because the church had pressed him to do so, and only until she could find other arrangements. But he had never considered her a human, had always referred to her as fae-spawn, something that had continually mystified her. Her mother and father had been born and raised in this village, had courted here, married here, had started their family here. Had died here.
     Yet he had never lost an opportunity to take out his frustrations and anger on her - she had often borne welts inflicted by his walking cane. And he had never lost an opportunity to remind her that she shouldn't have lived, that she didn't belong, that she didn't look like the other villagers.
     I do have different color hair and eyes than the other villagers, Vala thought, sitting up. But how did having blue eyes and blonde hair make her less human? She leaned against the wooden wall, pulling her mother's shawl tighter around her bony shoulders. The medallion pressed into her bosom, and she pulled the amulet out to look at it. Even in the absence of direct light, the red stone embedded in the silver glistened. The silver chain showed no links, no beginning, no end, yet it moved like liquid against her skin. She stroked it now, taking comfort in the familiar feel. She couldn't even remember when she had first become truly aware of it. It seemed she had always had it, from her earliest memories. The medallion had been a gift from the Outsider, the man who had saved Vala from the faeries.
    She leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes. Her mother had told her to keep the medallion with her always, though hidden. And she had done so, most of the time. Except for that one time when she had placed it in her trunk for safekeeping. That one time. She shuddered, forcing the thoughts aside, and concentrated on the medallion. She turned it over now and silently read the four words inscribed on the back. Elthea Gannabribriel, Ithys Kjvali. She had no idea what language they were in, or what they meant, only that she had been forbidden to speak them aloud. Yet, just thinking them, mouthing them, brought her a sense of place, of belonging.
     Voices brought her alert. Voices she recognized. She turned her head and pressed her ear against the wall separating her room from the others of the house.
     "Why, Revered?" Tyrs, the father of the child, spoke. "Lawanda is healthy, strong. Why did our child die?"
     A woman, most likely one of the elderly birth attendants said, "The faery sickness is--"
     "There is no such thing as a faery!" The voice of the Honorable Revered interrupted. His voice was strong, authoritative, and firm. It broached no argument. "There are only demons. And they are at work here to be sure. They have been at work in this village for nineteen years."
     There was a long silence, in which Vala's grip tightened on the medallion. She had heard of the Revered's sermons, even though she had not been there. He had denounced the existence of faeries, telling all that fae was yet another word for demons, minions of the devil, antithesis to the one and only God. Yet, for all of his pronouncements, all of his assurances, Vala did not believe his words. There were faeries! She was sure of it! The fae were no more demons than...than she was. Still, she could not explain all of the deaths. She knew only that for centuries the citizens of the high mountains villages had believed in the Faery Sickness, and that the fae had often taken children. Vala's mother had told her it was an act of kindness, that the fae took only the children who were stillborn, or too ill to survive in the world. But in the past nineteen years all of the babies had died. All except Vala, and that was only because of the actions of the Outsider. She had been born blue, with no life, but the Outsider had only to kiss her small lips and she had been wrenched from the fairies' grasp. Some had claimed he was fae, but now some declared he must have been a demon.
     The very thought of a demon saving her life left Vala weak and sickened. She shuddered. All was quiet in the adjoining room and Vala surmised that the elders had either left or moved to another part of the house to talk further. She rose, hid the medallion beneath her blouse, pulled the shawl closer, and slipped from her room into the darkened hallway. "Tyrs?" she called softly. There was no answer, and Vala went into Lawanda's room. A candlelamp burned, sending flickering yellow light dancing on the walls and ceilings. Lawanda turned her head, and began to cry, then beckoned Vala closer.
     "Oh, Lawanda," Vala murmured and approached the bed.
     Lawanda held the infant, swaddled in a soft woolen blanket. Her voice was barely above a whisper. "Isn't she beautiful? Her skin is the color of milk, her hair like the fire in the sky at sunset. And Vala, her eyes are blue. As blue as yours. I know they are." She paused, looking down at her baby.
     Vala studied the infant, grief stalling her speech. The baby didn't look frail at all, but rather robust and healthy. She appeared to be only sleeping, her cheeks still pink and warm.
     Lawanda curled a strand of red hair around her finger, then closed her eyes. "I am old, Vala. With each child that dies, I grow older. Soon, I will die...my heart cannot stand it any longer."
     Seized by anguish, fighting back tears, Vala whispered, "You will not die, Lawanda. I...I'll find your babies and bring them back to you."