THE FAIRIES’ CAVE
“A book is a mirror. When a monkey looks in, no apostle can look out.”
Georg Lichtenberg
I
There was a hint of magic in the air that morning.
The little girl hopped from stone to stone along the path by her father’s side. Macy so loved those Sunday walks whenever the weather was nice. And it was nice. Nice and sunny and warm. She looked out across the pond. Laughing boys ran across the banks chasing each other or set their miniature boats to water. Men hauled out their fishing lines. They were all so cheerful.
In her hand she held a lush bunch of wild flowers. Every now and then she stopped to add another growing alongside the road. They would look great on the kitchen table. The girl chuckled and arranged the lavish bouquet. Mother would be pleased. She set out to jump again, humming a catchy chorus from a song he mother loved to sing along to, skipping one stone each leap and trying hard to keep her balance flapping her arms. Then something swift caught her eye.
It quickly moved from left to right and back in front of her, made a full spin and then dashed off, disappearing into the shrubs. Another feathery creature launched from the green at high speed. Was it a little bird that had come out to enjoy the day? It was so small and so quick she had trouble keeping track of it. She froze. Where did it go? She turned round and spied on every single thing that got to moving.
There was another... And another! They were everywhere around her.
“Daddy, daddy, look, daddy!”
Daddy was busy conversing with a friend over a cigarette and did not respond to her jerking his hand and pointing at the tiny firefly-like beings.
“Later, honey.”
She pouted and was again engrossed in watching the strange creatures. Were they leaving? She gently removed her slender hand from her father’s grasp. One by one they retreated into the wall of plants and left her sight. She did not want them to go. The last of them circled her head a single time then rushed off into the bush. Impulsive as she was, she plunged after it, tearing off her pretty petty coat in the hedge, head first into the green.
And so the legend unfolds.
II
“Wait, wait, little bird!”
She cried after it, but it kept speeding up no less. Running as fast as she could she tried to catch up to the dazzling creature. Her fancy black varnished shoes slipped off and got lost in the high grass of the field, but she paid them no mind and just kept hounding the butterfly, stretching her tiny hand out to it until she could almost reach it, managed to touch it. She poked it with a fingertip and pulled back quickly. It was warm.
The little creature stopped and turned to look at her. Now she could see that the feathers were not feathers at all but long thin green leaves bound together into some sort of dress with a miniature green hat.
It was like a tiny woman, radiant and beautiful, with an oval face, long hair, pointed ears, big, dark eyes and the bright wings of a butterfly.
“What a strange bird you are.” The child said. Fearlessly.
The elfin woman startled. The girl turned to face the park. It was so far away she could barely see it, just a green spot in the distance. Then she noticed that the butterfly-woman was hurrying away as fast as her little wings could carry her.
“Wait!”
The girl kept her eyes on the butterfly-creature and chased her, tripping over everything in her way. Green smudges formed on her beautiful freshly-washed Sunday dress. Her little bonnet slid off her head and released an abundance of wild curls. Smeared with grass and dirt she followed the butterfly-girl across a meadow full of fragrant flowers, buzzing with pretty birdies in the sundriest attires, as if they were trying to blend in with the foliage. They popped up to look at her, whispering to each other and pointing.
“Can she see us?” She heard them gossip in their high-pitched voices. “I swear, she’s looking right at me!” “It couldn’t possibly be.”
To her right, just inches away from her hand, another was staring at her with open mouth above the blossoms.
“Oh, hello.” The girl murmured in a cheerful tone.
The little being hid behind a leaf shyly, then peeped at her from the sides.
“Don’t be afraid. I won’t hurt you.”
The little one giggled and showed her tiny head, before hiding again.
“It’s okay, you can come out.” The girl said, kneeling down slowly. “I’m Macy. What’s your name?”
She gently slid the leaf out of the way with a fingertip. The elfin creature gasped. “Are you a monster?” She asked in a voice as small as her posture.
Macy laughed her child’s laugh. “Who, me? No, silly, I’m a girl.”
“Are you going to eat me?”
“Why would I eat you, you don’t look particularly tasty and you’re far too small.” She teased. The butterfly-girl sighed in relief and stepped with upright toes unto the girl’s pointing index-finger. Macy raised her hand to watch the creature more closely.
“What a peculiar butterfly.” She said puzzled.
“Butterfly? I’m not a butterfly, and I’m not peculiar either, I’m a fairy!”
“A fairy?” The girl said, pondering. “I’ve never met a fairy before.”
“Then how can you say I’m peculiar?” The fairy bent over to look at her. “You look pretty strange yourself.”
“I don’t think so.” The girl muttered, suddenly self-conscious and a little offended.
The girl chuckled and reached up. “Your ears are funny.”
Macy covered it with her other hand. “Are not!” She whined. The little one giggled.
Another fairy called out a strange word she didn’t understand. “Eyla!”
“Oh.” The butterfly-girl cried out, arching back. “We’re not supposed to talk to humans.” She seemed a little nervous, keeping her eye on the others who kept beckoning her persistently.
“But...”
Around them the buzzing slowly but surely diminished. Everywhere minute bundles of light disappeared into the distance. The fairies were leaving. They motioned at the little one.
The fairy startled. “Good grace, they’re calling me. I have to go. Bye.”
“No, wait... I...” It was no use. With a final wave, she headed off towards the horizon.
She watched the last of the fairies vanished and stood there forlorn in the middle of the meadow. She should go back to the park. Daddy must be out searching for her by now. He would be angry. She looked down her stained dress. Mummy would be too.
III
The little girl looked back one more time and sighed. Ah, what an adventure. How quickly it came to an end. She made her way back reluctantly, shuffling across the grass. What would she tell her parents? That she got lost? She wasn’t supposed to wander off like that. And she couldn’t tell them she followed the fairies... They would not believe her. She could say she followed the butterflies though. Technically, that wasn’t even lying, well, sort of... Yes, she’d tell them she followed the butterflies!
She sprinted and then jilted to a stop. Where was the park? There was not a hedge in sight. She’d been so focussed on the fairies that she paid no mind to her surroundings and now there was no telling which way she'd come. She was lost.
She shivered in her summer dress and clasped her arms around her tiny body for warmth. The little girl looked up at the sky. The sun was already setting. It would be dark soon. She sniffed. What was she going to do? The girl broke into a sob. Where could she go? There was not a single house in sight, no road, no people, no lights.
Her tummy started making strange noises, louder and louder. She rubbed it. Her eyes were getting so very heavy, it was difficult to keep them open. The girl rolled up into a ball on the ground and did her best to make a nest out of a patch of low ferns, humming comforting songs to herself, all alone in the wild.
The stars shone brightly and she wondered what her parents would be doing. Were they looking for her? They had to be worried. Her mother would be sick with concern for her right now. “Mummy...” She whimpered.
In the distance a threatening howling emerged. She gasped and started sobbing more forcefully, spooked by all the frightening sounds of nightfall around her. She tried to bury herself in dry leaves for warmth and hiding.
She closed her eyes and imagined herself at home, by a warm crackling fire, wrapped up in a blanket by her parents feet with a cup of her mum’s hot coco while they read her a bedtime story. Another faraway bark started up. She crawled deeper in her layer of camouflage, shivering.
IV
With the world pitch black around her, the cool night air digging its teeth deep into her skin, Macy raised her head and peered into the darkness. The night was not quiet like she was used to, but full of noises and life. The slightest hint of movement startled her; rabbits hopping by, squeaking insects, tall trees wavering in the wind, all was magnified. A bird flew over uttering a most distressful cry. The little girl buried her face in her hands and started crying incessantly.
“I wish I could go home.” She moaned softly.
Then she heard a buzzing sound behind her. She sprung up and looked around. There was nothing to see, but the enervating tone gained force. It was as if a mosquito was zooming around the back of her head.
She made a full turn, waving wildly at the invisible insect. Now she heard it by her right ear, she turned towards it, then her left, in front of her again.
“What you doing?” A little voice said.
She made a few pirouettes, but she could not make out anyone in the meadow with her. “H... Hello?” She said, swinging at the buzz.
“Hey, stop hitting me!” The voice cried out.
She got up and stood perfectly still, perplexed, where did that voice come from? “Who are you?” She asked, confused.
“My name is Tuli.”
She turned towards the sound, but saw only darkness. “Tuli? What a strange name.” She bent over and checked the grass. Nothing. “Where are you?”
“Right here, silly!”
She looked up. A tiny little boy with wings that resembled a bee’s as well as a fairy’s, was humming around in circles in front of her.
“Oh, there you are. Hello, I’m Macy.” She shook the boy’s hand with her pinkie and dried her tears with a final sob.
He popped up in front of her so close to her face it made her leap back. He looked gigantic from that angle. “Why you crying?” He asked in his high childlike voice. When she started sobbing more vigorously and made no reply, he put his tiny hand on her shoulder. “What is it?” He implored with genuine concern. “What is the matter? Maybe I can help.”
She sighed and sniffed again. “I’m crying because...” She stammered, dabbing her eyes. “Because I can’t find my way back home.”
“Oh.” Said the tiny boy and pondered it over for a minute in silence, before getting overly excited. “But you can come with me, you know, I could take you to the Fairy Court. Princess Hämarik will know what to do.”
“Really?” She asked hopefully.
“Don’t worry, everything will be alright, just follow me.” She smiled. Suddenly he turned back towards her. “Oh, a word of caution: you have to make sure to stay right behind me the whole time. The pass to Faery is tricky and dangerous when it gets dark, it is very easy to lose your way.”
She nodded and wiped her eyes with her sleeve.
“Alrighty then.” He exclaimed in high spirits, floating off.
The little bee-boy babbled on incessantly – she could hardly make out all of the words – and started humming a cheerful chorus when she stopped replying, winding sideways to the melody. The light of his tail dancing in the sky lit the way and she kept her eyes on it, crawling over rocks and tree trunks after him through the dark, into the densest forest.
V
They headed out through the woods that never seemed to end. It was difficult for the little girl to discern the paths the fairy-boy led her over. She could hardly tell one thing from another and everywhere she looked, there were long creepy shadows forming. The woods were alive with trees, plants, no less than predators about to launch at her, their branches claws reaching for her skin. She shuddered and drew nearer to the fairy’s light.
“Is it... still far?” She asked her tiny little guide in a shaky voice.
“We’re almost there.” He replied cheerfully.
She sighed. That was what he said over half an hour ago. She was beginning to think ke may be lost.
She leaned against a tree to rub her feet – they were so terribly sore from walking – and yawned, ready to keel over vast asleep any minute. She gasped as she noticed them; bluish balls of light lurking behind the stems of trees, following wherever they went at a distance. She kept very still and tried to make them out. Three, four, five and more behind. Could they be fairies? For a moment, she hoped it with all her heart, but they were so unlike any she’d ever seen, so frightening. Not bright and clear they were, but almost transparent muddled shades of blue and green that lingered on in aerial smudges like smoke. She swallowed heavily. They were starting to encircle her.
She stumbled back and ran until she tripped over a root, they moved with her. She fumbled around anxiously to free her foot and scrambled up, staggering on. She could hardly make out which way she went, let alone if it was still the right one.
She ran and ran to catch up to her guide, stretching to see even the faintest glimpse of his tail light, but he had been swallowed up in the dimness of the forest with even his song died out.
“Tuli?” She implored with tears in her eyes. “Tuli, please answer me. Where are you?”
Not a breath of his reached her. She was all alone and from every side the lights crept closer. If she kept quiet and disregarded the sound of her own rapid breathing, she could hear them whisper things in foreign tongues, no more than strange moans to her ears.
“H... Hello?” She muttered. “What do you want from me?” She sniffed, wiping the frightened tears away. They swelled into long vague shapes of grey.
One bustled past an inch from her ear uttering a blood-curdling hiss. “Haaassssssssa.”
She dashed off blindly, fell again, crawled back up in a haze, tearing her clothes at the edges and scraping her tender flesh against the hard ground of rock and root. They soon caught up to her, hissing, and leapt at her from both sides. They crashed into an invisible barrier and retreated between the trees, sizzling.
“Leave me alone!” She cried at them with all her might, curling up into a ball. She covered her ears and pinched her eyes shut. “Go away!”
A gentle light pierced through her lids. She looked up, carefully. At the side of the path a figure lit up between the trees. A smiling auburn-haired woman with a kind face, warm eyes and dressed in all white garments beckoned her. “I’ve been looking for you. Come, child, come, grab my hand and we’ll go home.” She said.
Macy quickly got to her feet and stretched out her tiny hand towards the brightly glowing lady. “Mummy...”
“Come.” The woman nodded in encouragement, reaching out to meet her fingers by the side of the trail. A few inches still separated them and the lady made no inclination to come any closer. “Just a little further, my child.” She said in her sweetest voice.
“Mummy...” Macy whispered again when she lifted her foot up from the path and put in down on the mushy forest grass, completely fixated on the figure before her.
“No, Macy, don’t!” Tuli screamed out of the blue and flew up to pull her hand with all his strength, but Macy kept staring ahead. A whistle resonated, slicing through the solemn night. For the blink of an eye, Macy was attracted by the sound and turned away from her mother, instinctively retracting her foot from the hostile darkness.
“Don’t leave the path, you silly human!” Tuli said in his soprano voice.
“But...” She muttered, staring at the figure before her; that same pallid dress was flowing in the wind around a tall figure, that was now so unlike her beloved mother.
The grey creature still had its skeleton claw reaching out for her, the epitome of all things hideous. Its entire flesh was decomposing, the skin peeling off, its clothes were raffled and its face... Its face made her blood freeze in her vein, the expression there was simply vicious and void at the same time in eyes black as coal and filled with ill will. She trembled, sure it would’ve eaten her alive.
The thing opened its mouth and let out a deep, angry throat-gurgling, going at the barrier with its long, grabby nails and fists.
Macy shrieked. The hideous creature covered its ears squeaking and made off swiftly, hiding its horrible face and head in a hooded grey cape of shreds. With a final whoosh, it disappeared into the darkness. At a distance, she saw a ball of light appear and float away, the others in its trail.
“What was that?!” She managed to pronounce, out of breath.
“One of the reasons you must never leave the paths at night, human child.” A voice, other than Tuli’s, answered the question. Tuli just stared ahead, dumb-stricken.
At the end of the circle of light, a pair of gold gleaming eyes appeared. The girl stumbled back in fright. Was this another monster? Around the lustrous gold a tall, slender figure emerged from the shadows, the aura of magic around her like a halo, and stepped forward on the path enlightened by the shimmer of her own body. Macy looked up at the divine form, her mouth half-agape. From the darkness the Daughter of the Moon strode forward, accompanied by the faint sound of tiny bells at her ankles.
“We call them the Eksitaja.” Her voice sounded like mystic midnight wind gongs swaying in a gentle breeze.
“Eksi-taja?” Macy repeated the strange word with a quizzical look. She studied her every movement.
“Yes, damned spirits. They lived selfish, immoral lives and are now cursed to haunt the earth until they fulfil their quota of lost souls to take their place once they gather up the right amount to buy their own freedom. They are prisoners of their own fate, scanning these woods at night for victims, but they cannot enter the pathways of our people, they are covered in fairy dust. You nearly lost her there, Tuli.” She said gravely to the poor disheartened fairy.
“I’m sorry, princess.” Tuli responded with a remorseful bow.
The figure was fast approaching them with sure steps and a stern look. Macy hid behind Tuli, though she knew he was far too tiny for such a purpose.
“Don’t be afraid, Macy, it’s only princess Hämarik. She’s a fairy, like me. She means you no harm.”
The princess gave her a benign look. She had an intimidating sternness of manner but a kind, melancholy smile, the sort that concealed more than it revealed; as elusive and mysterious as the moonlit night itself. “You had us worried there for a while, little girl. The entire hive’s been out looking all night, but there was no trace of you anywhere! You must have wandered about for miles to have escaped our search area.”
She just stammered something indiscernible, completely in awe of the strange young lady before her. She was so brilliant Macy could see herself reflected in her skin, glistening in the moonlight, as if she was looking into a mirror.
“Are you an angel?” The little girl asked.
The princess smiled and bent down before Macy. “No child. I’m just a fairy and guardian to this forest and lost children. I’ll take you home.”
Unlike the fairies she’d met before, this one was full-sized like a human and apparently had no wings, at least the girl couldn’t see any. She could easily pass for a regular human teenager, if it weren’t for the characteristic pointed ears and the inhumanly slight and angular built, especially that distinctive triangular shape of the face all fairies had. This princess had royal, high and very prominent cheekbones, like most of her breed, and slant-eyed, but her eyes were brighter, less dark and bigger than the dark marbles she’d seen with any of the others. Hers were more like liquid gold and emerald, her lips a slivery shade of blue.
She wore a long, stainless white dress that glittered whenever the moon touched its fabric and a garland of lilacs upon hair tied in a ballerina-nod. On her head, a small golden tiara glistened in the moonlight and she held a white sceptre almost as long as she was, which she planted into the ground with every step by which the emblem of the sun on top flared up a little.
“Come, little girl, you must be tired.” She pinched the girl’s cheeks. “Oh, dear, you’re cold to the bone! Let’s get you inside quick, so you’ll be nice and warm.”
“Yes, please.” The girl responded eagerly, but still unsure of what to make of the entire situation.
The fairy princess banged the staff twice on the ground and it emanated a light so bright the girl had to blink a few times before she could look at it. The same emblem lit up on her forehead and made her eyes flash gold.
The princess set out to lead the way. Macy looked at Tuli questionably.
“Don’t worry. We’re really close by.” She made no reply. She’d heard him say that one too many times before. “Princess Hämarik knows this forest far better than I do, and she’s the strongest elf around, apart from the king and queen, of course. She’ll keep us safe from what creeps around in the dark, no doubt about it! Nothing can take on our dear Hämarik! Hä-ma-rik...” Tuli burst into another one of his cheerful chants and sang from the top of his lungs.
“Tuli, don’t make so much noise, you’ll just attract more night-stalkers.” The princess said in a clear matter-of-fact kind of voice.
Tuli immediately broke of his singing mid-verse and came to fly closely alongside Macy, peering nervously from side to side.
“There are more?”
“Not all of them are harmful though. Some are just curious.”
“And that thing we...”
“Oh, that Eksitaja? Well, that is a nasty little bugger. They’re vengeful spirits, you know.” Tuli said in a low voice. The tone of his words alone was enough to send shivers down her spine, despite the already atrocious impact of the fresh memory. “They have the ability to mirror a person’s heart and turn into any shape that person desires.”
“Like my mother.”
“Was that who you saw? They take on different profiles depending on their beholder, but each viewer sees them differently. After all, they can’t tell what’s in the other’s heart, only the spirit can. They generally appear as ghost balls to everyone but their victim.”
“Why do they do something like that?”
“They try to trick people into leaving the path and following them. Then they lead them to their deaths and feed on their life’s energy.”
“That’s horrible! Was that what it was trying to do to me?”
“Most likely. It would have created the illusion of your house over a cliff, a swamp or a stream of some sort and had you walk right towards it. Whoever is taken by the Eksitaja, returns from Limbo as one of them.”
She shivered.
“But don’t worry, you’re safe now. We’re with you.”
“Thank god it left so easily.”
“Sudden unpleasant sounds, they ward them off, because they divert the attention of the person the spirits have tapped into away from them, breaking the connection between them. That way they lose their hold on their prey’s heart and their mirroring capacity, forcing them to reveal their true form. Bright lights usually drive them away too, because they blot out their own. If you stay in the light, they can’t touch you. For them to see into your heart, there must be utter darkness and the only light shed must be their own. That’s why it is important not to leave the enlightened path at night and tread only on earth mixed with fairy dust.”
“I heard a whistle, did that chase it away then?” She said, pondering the whole thing over again, pushing low hanging leaves and branches out of her way. The path was almost completely overgrown with vegetation from the sides.
“Ah, yes, that was Hämarik’s. Good thing she came around when she did, or... Well, anyway, it’s good she was there. Hä-ma-rik.” He started clapping his hands to the rhythm, Hämarik threw him a warning glance over her shoulder, he stopped immediately and sighed. “These nightly walks are just no fun at all.”
“Aren’t you... aren’t you scared of the, uhm, Eksistaja?” She said confidentially.
“Nah, normally they don’t go after elves or fairies – we have light of our own – but you are a tempting catch, human child.”
“I’m sorry.” She muttered. “I should have listened to you when you told me to follow you.”
“It is we who must apologise to you, young one. It’s our fault. We should have taken better care of you from the beginning. In our defence, we are just not very used to humans seeing us.” Hämarik spoke in her clear, melodious voice, laying a warm hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Do you understand?”
She didn’t understand a single thing this strange princess was trying to tell her, but she nodded anyway completely in awe.
Then as the suspense wore off a little a stabbing pain in her soles distracted her. Her feet were blistered. She wished she could fly too. She watched Tuli swaying along to his silly hum. Would his wings hurt as well after a day of flying? She should ask him sometime, maybe he could...
She bumped into Hämarik’s back and looked up at her. Why did she stop in the middle of the road?
“We’re here.” She said.
“Where?” Macy replied, looking around. She could see nothing out of the ordinary, only forest and the same as they had been passing through for hours.
Slowly, one by one, tiny little lights started dancing across the sky. In the forest more and more of those twinkling lights appeared. Tiny voices resonated from all around her, giggles and chuckles from behind the trees, constantly moving in circles around her. They popped up from behind trees, in branches, the ground, the left, the right. For a minute fear came over Macy, but they were smaller and brighter, less scattered than ghost balls. They had a clear centre from which the light originated; they were fairies. They darted out from what seemed to be a rock between the trees. Macy bent down. Apparently it was a aged fossilized tree stem sticking out from the ground. She touched it. It was damp and completely overgrown with moss. Hämarik greeted the out coming fairies with a gentle smile.
“It’s Tuli and princess Hämarik.” One cried to the other. More and more fairies came out of the hive to see what that fuss was all about.
“Have you found her?” A fairy asked.
“Have you found her?” Another joined in.
“They’ve found her! They’ve brought the girl. Tuli’s found her!” They all said in chorus in their small high-pitched voices. “Tuli’s brought her home!”
“Yes, the child is finally safe and sound. Welcome, little Macy, to our humble home.” The princess nodded welcomingly and gestured towards the pair of trees over the broken stem, interwoven in a wilderness of branches so thick it was hard to tell which mass of green belonged to which tree.
VI
Hämarik pulled some of the green aside. Behind the curtain of ivy and leaves was a big rocky moss-grown stem with drops of water trickling down with a jingling sound.
Macy threw the princess a questioning glance.
Hämarik brought a finger to her cheek and lined her chin, one hand on her hip as if she was contemplating.
“What are we going to do about...” She muttered and then snapped her fingers crying out: “Ah! Got it!”
She pulled a poach from her long, wide sleeve and sprinkled a handful of powder out of it over Macy’s head, then touched her forehead with the emblem on the staff.
Immediately everything around the girl started spinning. She closed her eyes and shielded her face with her hands, drowsy and nauseous, waiting for it to stop.
She opened her lids carefully, first one, then the other, fighting the sickness in her stomach. What had happened?
The whole setting had changed. Was she still in the woods?
All around her were so many colours and the ground had changed texture. It was spongy and thick. And the smells, there were so many odours in the air. Behind her was a gigantic rock full of holes, with pebbles and stones piles up in it like stairs, platforms and balconies. Just before her was a huge cave, leading right into the heart of the cave. A stream of water gushed down in between the stones and grooves, from top to bottom, and formed a brook in the earth.
Where was she? She could not remember seeing this before. She turned around, looking for a point of orientation.
Before her was a big tree of a peculiar pale colour, with leaves in a shade of white. It seemed to go on forever, she could not even see the top.
All of a sudden, the tree moved and broke in half. The breaking point just missed her and hit the ground with a loud thud. She leaped back.
Only now she saw that it was in fact a gigantic Hämarik bending down. She was smiling and held out her hand before her with the palm up. Did she want her to step onto it?
The girl cautiously climbed on the hand and held on to the upright thumb. Hämarik carried her towards the waterfall.
Macy looked at the water pouring down at high velocity with its harmonious, yet forceful noise. What did they want her to do? Were they deceitful ghosts after all, that tried to drown her?
She stared at Hämarik puzzled. The latter smiled reassuringly and nodded in encouragement.
Left and right from her, the fairies that had seemed so tiny to her before, were no less than her own height and rushed by, their wings battering. They disappeared into the water at a quick pace.
The last to rush by was Tuli. How big he was now! Almost as tall as she was. She watched his fiery tail get swallowed up. Not long after, his head reappeared from the water and his hand beckoned her.
She pointed at herself. He nodded energetically.
With an insecure gesture, she put out her hand and reached for Tuli’s through the water. With their palms locked, Tuli gently helped her through the divide. Macy pinched her eyes shut and fumbled around with her foot for solid ground on the other side. In one big step and a long squeal, she was inside the cave, warm and dry.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Tuli soothed her, tossing aside the leaf he had held over her head to keep her from getting wet. He himself passed through the stream perfectly dry, and so did Hämarik, who quickly followed them in her own fairy form.
She was dressed in a translucent kind of sparkly moss green and gold fabric with glitters. It fell around her form in a refined swirl of folds and splits down to just above the knee. From her shoulder blades shiny butterfly-wings sprung up as if they had been carved from diamond with all the care of a master-sculptor. The same colour as her lips they were, the colour of dusk, bluish with a silver shimmer like the moonlight. Her deep green eyes glistened in the dimness like aventurin. Under her thick dark-brown hair was a tiara from which a milky white crystal pendulum fell down over her forehead. It lit up in the shadows.
Macy stood amazed of this mystical beauty before her. If she would be a fairy, would she too...
“Well, dear, welcome to our humble abode.” The fairy princess smiled, clapping her wings playfully. The girl was still blinking. Everything was so bright so suddenly.
As her eyes adjusted, she found the inside of the stem a spacious cave full of a buzzing vivacity that both intimidated and fascinated her.
“Wow.” She said, dazzled. “No wonder you call this a hive.”
The high limestone ceiling was curved and high, like in that splendid cathedral her parents once took her to see in London, and was imbedded with magic stones that flared up on their own and dimmed down, spreading a festive, flashing light. It reminded her of Christmas. Inside, it was warm, a little humid, but very pleasant in atmosphere.
From the rock, festoons of mysterious lights – like strings of scores of delicate candles – and garlands of moss, creepers and flowers drooped gracefully, as if the hive was nature’s ballroom. Everywhere fairies rocked to and fro laughing or snoozing or playing a flute in swings and hammocks made of all things green and laced with the widest variety of blossoms.
The walls were half-covered in modest fairy dwellings of a charming kind.
Here and there, drops of water trickled down along the stalactites and caught in crystal fountains of finest design, in which some fairy or other was letting down a hand to cup a sip. It seemed the grooves in the rock ceiling were carefully etched out for just this sophisticated purpose and led all incoming water to a proper fountain.
Overgang fairies; barefoot, four fingers and four toes. Even Hämarik was no exception in her fairy form.
Field fairies swarmed in from every side, carrying baskets and sacks of goods from the human world. Most brought with them nectar, or honey, which they deposited at large storage rooms, were everything was neatly labelled and catalogued by benign-looking little men in green suits and glasses.
“So, three millies of daisies, four of rose and two of lily.” One of them said, sticking an etiquette on each jar. “Splendid. A good year too, this is.” He said, pulling up his breeched. “Let me tell you that. Plenty of rain and sunshine.” The two fairies exchanged a friendly smile and then the clerk ran his finger along the shelves and stashed the bowls away on their proper places, while his feather and ink kept count of whatever he summed up by checking the goods on a parchment inventory list.
The sound of voices called her attention. She looked at Hämarik. The young lady gently guided her towards it. Only now she noticed the magical ring of tiny bells at her ankles, jingling whenever Hämarik made another nimble step.
The tone of conversation grew louder.
A curtain of the same light cloth hung from the rock and shielded a passage from her eye. She grabbed it. It was smooth and cool and its glamorous twinkle reminded her of a starlit sky, except more yellow and orangey in shade. She pulled it aside.
There was a ledge before the door which gave way over the bottom of the cave. She shuffled towards the utmost end of it. From this high point looking down, she could see the entire fairy realm unfold beneath her, a merry spectacle. It was beyond her understanding to grasp how an entire world could fit into a fissure beneath the ground like this, shielded from outside eyes and claws.
There was so much light. She looked up at the rock ceiling. It had cracks, but none where deep enough for sunlight to seep through, yet the entire cavern was clear as day. And warm, a bit humid, but pleasant in atmosphere.
There were lanterns that lined the walls, but no electricity. All along the rock there were flat, broad mushrooms, all piled up into clusters. With her current size, the edges alone were quite big enough to stand on. And that was apparently what they were for. Small houses, more like huts, were built on top of them in which the fairies lived. Smaller mushrooms formed sets of stairs, all the way down.
The entire bottom was covered in juicy green grass and soft, spongy moss.
She leaned forward. There were valleys, mills and in between a stream ran through the cave.
Up on a platform?
Beyond the stream was a gigantic glasslike palace, transparent and bathing in light. It was radiant like the moon. Around it were middle-sized stone houses in dark grey brick that were built leaning against the palace walls. The torrent went right up to the front gate of the castle, and dawdled there in the form of a miniature lake, then bent away, disappearing in the distance. There was a bridge across the water that was lowered down invitingly.
Scattered out across the plain were smaller wooden houses, which looked like forest hoods, their roofs crooked and covered in moss.
And then the fairies themselves. They did not fly once they were inside, which gave her a great opportunity to study them without them bouncing all over the place. Most of them were quite colourful, with wings like butter- and dragonflies in all possible shades and combinations. Some burst out in an abundance of shockingly bright tones, others were more flushed in hue, but all were luminous and beautiful.
They had all sorts of hairstyles, some had garlands in their hair, others leaves and berries, various pins, ribbons, laces that crossed their locks or forehead and twisted everything into crafty buns, tails and braids. Their way of dress also varied considerably, all sorts of models of dresses and skirts, shorts, shirts, tops, trousers in fabric they seemed to have plucked from outside and mended or the more refined glistening textile Macy had never seen anywhere else.
They were a cheerful lot. Musical. Song and dance seemed to run in their blood. They clapped to the music of strange instrument in groups, their little bells tolling to the melody perfectly synchronic, as if they were the belly dancers of old, moving to some ancient rhythm, so swiftly, winding to the beat as if it was that of their very hearts’. As if it came naturally. It was quite a sight, watching them spiralling and banging prehistoric drums and things they made from sticks and plants, whistles from leaves and reed. The younger ones sat on the ground in circles, playing games with stones and sticks.
She bent closer over the ridge to have a better look and lost her balance. She was just about to tumble down when she felt two pale arms close around her and pull her back.
“Careful now, human child.” A deep melodic voice said in her ear.
She turned around and found herself in the arms of a tall young man, about the same age as Hämarik.
“Macy, this is my brother, Yucca.” The princess introduced him.
His warm smile chased off all verbal skills in the young girl.
“N... N... Nice t… to meet y… you.” She muttered, relying on Hämarik for guidance on her way down the path which was carved out of the rock wall.
As clear and chilling as midnight bells her voice broke through the quiet and chased all other things away.
“Tuli, why have you brought her here? It is not safe for a child. You should have left her where she was and come back to fetch me instead.”
Standing on a ledge of rock above the fairy dwelling,
VII
Macy stood perplexed in the centre and watched the strange revolving world around her. It was a land where magic was as common as the air you breathe. It was in the rustle of the leaves when there was no wind, in the swaying of the lower foliage when something mysterious and invisible passed through, in the richness of the air, the scents, the melodic sound of the water and the music, all around. It was all so lush and lustrous, this land, and lay basking in the clearest sunlight.
She closed her eyes and felt the breeze on the soft skin of her cheek running nimble airborne fingers through her hair. The wind was so full it whispered sweet and gentle stories in her ear.
Everything that was in this land, was there abundantly. Everywhere she looked grew immense trees so much overladen with the greenest leaves, the richest, brightest blossoms and the ripest fruit she’d ever seen, that they all seemed to simply break together with the weight of it all, their own splendour. Macy reached up high and pulled the reddest apple from a branch just overhead, as if the tree itself offered it to her. Eagerly, she bit into it and astounded; it was the sweetest, juiciest and tastiest thing she ever ate. Its sap seeped down her chin as the little girl joyfully ate it all up sporting a truly wolfish appetite.
“Well, well, poor girl”, she heard Hämarik chuckling benignly behind her, “you must be famished. Come inside, my dear, we’ll have a feast ready for you in the dining hall.”
The little girl nodded and smiled eagerly as the snickering princess gently guided her back up the hill towards the cave. A splash and loud laughter caught their attention and they turned back towards the lovely scenery below them.
The leprechaun stood on the banks, flushing a deep angry crimson and was violently jumping up and down while shaking his fist at the trio in the water, cussing and cursing. He didn’t even bother to pick up his pride and joy, his fine green hat that had unluckily landed in the grass when he sprung up so aggravated.
She shook her head. “That boy is a disaster. I fear he will never change for the better. Over the years, he only gets worse.” She clacked her tongue disapprovingly. “ genuine trouble-maker.” She sighed and straightened her shoulders. “Please do excuse me dear, but I have to put an end to this escapade first, before that foolish boy spurs the entire kingdom into a riot.” She muttered, shaking her head.
“Now, now, Silas, calm down.” She heard her say to the gnome in her most soothing tone. “You just got a little wet, no real harm done. Let’s not exaggerate things.”
“We HATE the water!” The little man exclaimed, wringing his soaking wet coat. Other leprechauns near that had seen the whole incident concurred fervently.
Macy wondered if that meant they never washed either. She thought it likely from their universally shabby appearance. She looked down. But not the shoes, they were all rubbed shiny and spotlessly clean.
Hämarik helped the poor dishevelled gnome straighten and brush off his clothes, picked up the hat and put it properly back on the redheads bouncy knotted hair. “I promise I’ll talk to him, Silas.”
He plucked his beard in irritation, still panting with rage. “I know you will, dearie, but I wonder what good it will do.”
With this sneer, he turned his hat around crookedly with a vigorous spin and marched off with his nose wrinkled in annoyance.
“Oh my, I suppose I’ll better have him send a fruit basket and a formal letter of apology.” She whispered to Macy, who had come to stand beside her, as she watched the gnome disappear and slam the door of his humble cottage shut so hard a flower pot fell off its hinge and crashed to the ground. “Now if I could only get that wretch of a brother of mine to sign it. YUCCA!” She screamed along the banks. “You better come back here right now!”
As Macy watched her go, she could not keep a faint smile from curling her lips. Maybe this fairy world was altogether not so different from her own.
The boy came towards them, shaking the glistening drops of water from his waving hair, that lit up with a golden hue in the sunlight. Hämarik raised an eyebrow disapprovingly at the bombshell newcomer.
“Macy, this is my brother, prince Yucca. Yucca, this is our little guest, Macy.” The girl curtseyed, blushing. Yucca grinned crouching down to shake her hand.
“Well, it is a pleasure to meet you, little Macy.” She giggled.
“Yucca, are you coming or what?” His friends implored impatiently behind him, one of them patting him on the back hard and prompting.
“You and your lot leave him alone, Pratty Priestley, you’ve caused enough mischief for one day!”
The boy smirked. “What, is our little prince afraid of a little challenge or does he need official royal permission before he can go for a trip on the lake with his friends?”
Yucca grinned. “Never and you know it!” He playfully knocked his friend on the shoulder and ran off with his wayward whelps.
“Yucca, don’t you dare! Come back here, right now, young man!” she staggered after him, raising her finger warningly.
He turned back to her, drying his neck with a towel one of the village girls handed him. “Sorry, sis, but I wish you’d stop nagging at me so much, you’re not mum!”
“I wish you would quit being so irresponsible for once and grow up already. You are of royal blood and nearly 700 years old, for crying out loud, start acting like it!” She cried after him.
“Yeah, yeah!” He said dismissively over his shoulder.
“Oh, sometimes I’d just want to...” She grumbled, wringing her hands simmering. She looked at Macy sideways and sat down on one of the steps observing the valley. “Are you an only child, Macy?”
She nodded, watching the boy run off with his friends.
“Well, no matter what everyone tells you, pray to your god it stays that way.” She muttered through clenched teeth, getting up. “I’m going to go tell mum. I’ll be right back.” She strode off inside.
The Fairy/Faery Paradox; paper on environmental thought experiment; human dwelling with zero impact on the surroundings.
The Spirit of the Forest/Valley often appears as a large Sheppard dog by Macy’s side to ward off evil or lead her back to safety when she’s gone astray, comes to her rescue.
Smiles. I appear as people like to see me, in whatever form makes them most comfortable. Sometimes it is a child, sometimes a man, sometimes a woman and sometimes a deer or a dog.
End: fairy festival, wears her out, Hämarik kisses her cheek/forehead (third eye) to lull it back to sleep and take her memory (but some remains in her dreams, can’t shake this peculiar sense of familiarity). Has a minor obsession with all things fairy, ever since she was a little girl, room full with fairy ornaments. Carries her home after the festival to celebrate the return of the Sun. (Phoenix = sun god).
Then just resume the same ending (mother coming in finding Macy asleep).
Resume the end scene as a prologue, then skip to ten (?) years later and resume, giving a presentation on the fairy paradox/hypothesis and her return home to a room filled with fairies.
Lustrous, dew-drop
Guards.
Steps were carved out in the rock.
She turned back to Hämarik, her eyes aglow with childlike fire. “Can I please go down and see it?”
Hämarik smiled and bent over to her. “Sure, child, just don’t wander off too far.”
Light and airy like a veil, it concealed and hinted at the same time, swaying gently in a breeze from without.
The girl slowly reached out to pull the curtain aside and gasped at the splendour which she beheld. Beyond the fabric in the door a whole new world unfolded.
She stepped onto the balcony out of the cave and found herself ....
“The Valley of the Blessed, home of the Seven Tribes of Faery, the Fey.” Hämarik clarified.
“It is beautiful.”
The Seven Tribes were a busy lot, always working and playing in the lustrous land that they call Faery.
From left to right and all the way to the horizon the girl saw nothing but the deepest, most succulent shade of green laid out over the lushest valley she ever set eyes on. Somewhere below, the green was crossed by a crystal clear creek which jingled by evenly, carrying on a peaceful sounding melody of its own.
The girl stood awed at the grandeur only hinted at in her mother’s story books and something she could not even have conceived in her wildest dreams.
“Is this the Magic Kingdom?” She asked Hämarik over her shoulder.
The princess smiled and whispered to her. “As far as the eye can see.”
She strained her eyes to the fullest to catch a glimpse of the outskirts of the realm. Beyond the water where the sunlight kissed the farthest peak, the landscape sloped slightly in the same evergreen tones. In the uttermost corner she saw a dark spot.
(Or does she see it with Theodore’s telescope)
Tea?
She shook her head. Theodore scratched his chin for a moment. “Ah!” He cried out, raising his finger as if he had just cracked the law of the universe. “How about some hot coco, hmm?”
She giggled. “I’d like that.”
“Of course you would.” He said, bringing his clumsy form over to the fireplace to brew the much sought after beverage. “It’s quite a delicacy here in Faery, you know, human sweets and chocolate.”
Looking through the eye-glass she made out the contours of a barren mountain of rock and dirt, with treacherous clouds hanging overhead enveloping the whole desolate place in the deepest kind of dimness. A sudden lightning bolt made her start. The sky above the peak cracked over and over. Not a ray of sunlight penetrated its aerial screen. Watching it for a while at a time, she could clearly see it tremble, if she but closed her eyes, she could hear the mountain rumbling like a waking volcano all throughout the valley.
“Theodore?”
“Hmm?” The scholarly troll replied enthralled in one of his big dusty books.
“What’s that?”
He took of the ludicrously tiny reading glasses for his big robust form and peered through the telescope.
“Oh, that. Not to worry, little girl, it is only Black Mountain.”
“Black Mountain?” She looked at the thing, so unlike the rest of the valley. “Is that still part of Faery?”
“No, it is where the Svartalfen live.”
“What are those?”
Theodore through long and hard for a moment, toying with his glasses and rubbing his brow pensively.
“Well...” He started. “Moth-people. In origin, they have roughly the same descent as the fairies, the butterfly-children; you could call them sibling races, twins even. But one race heeds the call of day, the other cherishes only darkness.”
“Are they... evil.”
He hesitated for a minute, staring earnestly at her face, afraid to scare her needlessly. “Yes.” He finally admitted. “They are, which is why they are in Black Mountain in the first place. It is their prison, their residence there their punishment. And a well deserved one at that.”
At her puzzled, thoughtful look, he did his best to immediately set her mind at ease. “There’s no reason giving yourself a headache over them lot, dear girl, you will never meet a Svart as long as there is the light of day in Faery. If things only stay the way they are, and have been for centuries, there will be nothing rotten in the land of Faery.” He gave her a comfortable smile, which she warmly answered.
A knock of the door drew their immediate attention. Theodore removed the heavy bolt and the entrance flew wide open, revealing Hämarik.
“Hello, Theodore,” She smiled, spotting Macy. “We seem to have lost our little human guest, I thought she might end up here.”
“And so she did.” He called out to her. “Come on, love, be a good girl run along with the princess now.”
Theodore lives in a hollow tree, moss-grown, covered in klimop.
Branch of Mistletoe (names it the Tree of Wishes) with tree leafs on it.
Chandeliers in the palace.
They all had slanted eyes, as deep and dark and round as black marbles
Squint-eyed
Some of us eat fruit and nectar, but most of us just live on light, young leaves sap and dew-drops. We keep an undemanding diet.
Hämarik secretly loves chocolate, which is a human product that has to be smuggled into Faery.
See, you do it.
It’s only chocolate, it’s perfectly harmless! Unlike that potent brew that you insist on drinking!
King and queen have stiff collars.
Story – cu153795
And took her hand. Come along, dear, I’ll take you home.”
Her voice sounded like mystic midnight wind gongs swaying in a gentle breeze. It was soothing. Drowsily, the girl nodded and sunk away in the fairy’s arms. Queen Hämarik, fairest of fairies, picked the girl up and rocked her carefully, like something precious and fragile. There was a faint hint of lilacs about her. Macy smiled. It reminded her of her mother. With a slight rustle, they lift off and floated through the heavens, all the while Hämarik hummed softly lullabies of old, as aged as the earth and as soft as the murmurs of the sea on the quietest of days. Macy slowly dozed off.
Hardly even did she notice the familiar softness of her own bed and the imprint of a fairy’s kiss on her cheek.
“Goodnight, dear fairy.” Macy whispered.
“Farewell, darling human child, may you be blessed and dream only sweetness from now on.”
She briefly tapped the bed and it began to rock the child to sleep like a cradle, to the rhythm of her own deep breathing.
With as faint a noise as cane bending in a summer breeze, she dissolved into the night air, spread out with the leaves in the wind.
Fast asleep, the little girl did not hear the door crack and her mother slip in, relieved to find her daughter safe and happily lost in the land at the other side of the rainbow, where pixies live and dreams come true. The land you can only see, once your eyes are closed.
With a final glance and tug at the fairy mobile above Macy’s bed, she tip-toed out of the room, smiling.
Macy, tugging the Phoenix like a teddy bear, must make it through the nine riddles and challenges to pass the nine gates of the underworld, kept by the nine legendary guards.
Has to prove virtues? Seven gates? 7+2 of kindness and humility
4 cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, restraint or temperance, and courage or fortitude, and the 3 theological virtues of faith, hope, and love or charity; these were adopted by the Church Fathers.
The 7 Deadly Sins, also known as the Capital Vices or Cardinal Sins, is a classification of objectionable vices that have been used since early Christian times to educate and instruct followers concerning fallen humanity's tendency to sin. The currently recognized version of the list is usually given as wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony.The Catholic Church divides sin into two categories: venial sins, in which guilt is relatively minor, and
Tuli/Hämarik: lost because of gluttony (chocolate?), Yucca lost at test of humility/pride. She’s the only one left.
Yucca could use a lesson in humility.
