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  The Pixie's Child

  THE PIXIE'S CHILD

  BRAMBLE WILLOWDEW SPED above the upper canopy of the forest. His wings beat noisily against his back, and the sunlight glinted off their iridescent membranes. He knew that he took great risk in flying in such a way, for the hum and buzz that echoed through the wooded valley was surely heard by the treetop predators, and the colorful flashes of light flitting through the open air broadcast his position to the keen eyes of the hawks and eagles. But his task was one of utmost urgency—a real matter of life and death.

  “Must hurry! Must hurry!” he said to himself as he sped along, his toes skimming the tops of the springtime foliage. He had already lost much time trying to convince Granduncle Foxtail to send forth the Hometree Guard. He wasn’t sure why he had bothered asking in the first place, for now he was not only still alone in this dangerous quest, but he was pressed for time.

  “‘Not a matter of importance to the Hometree,’ indeed!” grumbled Bramble, imitating the voice of the granduncle in a mocking tone. “‘Pixies must look out for our own kind!’” he continued, clenching his fists. “Cowardly, selfish old ninny! Always looking out for himself, he is. Never caring about what happens in the world around the Tree so long as he gets to stay fat and lazy.”

  Bramble smiled. He knew Father Willowdew would put him to scrubbing the dishes for a month if he heard him speak against the granduncle so. But it felt so good to finally say such words, for they had been floating around in his head and heart for some time now, unsaid for fear of the granduncle’s many listening ears. Regardless of Granduncle Foxtail’s strict rules against meddling with the world outside the Hometree, Bramble thought the pixies had much magic and light and music to share with the world around them.

  He just wished that more of his folk shared his ideals and had the courage to say so.

  The shrill cry of a hawk cut through Bramble’s thoughts. He dived under the cover of the treetop greenery, alighting on a sheltered maple branch bursting with samaras. He kicked at a bundle of the seeds and watched as their papery wings spun and fluttered to the forest floor below. He was sorely tempted to grab hold of one and take a ride, but he was in too much of a hurry for such games today. Above him, the hawk made a disappointed screech and soared away, its sharp eyes searching for the next potential meal.

  Bramble waited another moment, peeked his head above the maple’s apex, and scanned the sky. The hawk was gone, its red tail disappearing into the distant horizon. He flew on, speeding toward a tall oak in the distance.

  “First the tall oak, then the secret by the stream, then Raucous,” he said to himself. “First the tall oak, then the secret by the stream, then Raucous,” he said again. This he repeated three more times, fearful that his excitement would make him forget what he needed to do, for Bramble had a tendency to be quite the scatterbrain even on a normal day.

  Bramble dipped into the leaves of the tall oak and made his way downwards, dodging through branches and twigs, always keeping an eye open for the bobcats and snakes that would love to make a meal of him.

  He finally arrived at a gaping hole within the rotten scar left behind from a fallen limb. Pressing his ear against the trunk, Bramble smiled as he heard the familiar buzz coming from deep inside the tree’s core. He knocked against the trunk with his tiny fist, plunk, plunk. He listened again, but there was no change in the sounds coming from within the tree. He knocked again, thumping the tree so hard his knuckles hurt. Again, there was no response from the creatures within.

  Bramble screwed up his face and put his hands on his hips. He’d hoped to catch some of the workers on their way back into the hive, but time was running out. He would have to do his best under the current circumstances.

  From the little pouch at his side, Bramble took out his flute and began to play. As his fingers danced across the holes, the music took shape, becoming visible and forming wispy streams of blue that floated and whirled through the air. The smoky rivulets of sound wafted into the opening and down into the tree.

  The song was a melancholy adagio that told the story of what Bramble had witnessed in the forest that morning. As he played, the music and the memory coaxed tears from his eyes. The tears, tinted with the color of the music, left pale blue streaks down his cheeks.

  He continued to play, infusing the song with the music of his heart. After the final tendrils of song danced into the tree, Bramble wiped his face and again pressed his ear to the trunk. He smiled.

  The tree was silent.

  Bramble stepped away from the trunk and waited. A few seconds later, a worker bee emerged from the hole, her hairy thorax dusty with clumps of fresh springtime pollen. She stared at Bramble with large multifaceted eyes and twisted her head in an inquisitive motion.

  Bramble made a deep bow toward the bee. “H—hello,” he said, a small shake creeping into his voice. He had never ventured this close to Queen Raybell’s colony before, but he had heard stories about the fierceness with which her workers protected the hive. And he couldn’t help but think about how quickly and easily the bees’ barbed stingers could claim his life.

  The bee approached Bramble and twitched her antennae. He tensed, but he did not move. His breath came out in little shaky gasps as she probed his toes, searching and sensing him in the mysterious way of such insects. As the groping antennae reached his knees, he giggled and flinched. The bee twitched backwards and stiffened.

  “S—sorry,” he said, his palms outward in what he hoped was a calming motion. “Quite ticklish, is all.”

  Again, the bee tilted her head and stared at him with those glittering eyes. She fluttered her wings, then resettled them against her back. His heart pounded in his chest as he put the flute to his lips.

  He began to play, this time a rousing tune into which he poured the urgency of his mission. The notes danced out of his flute in a swirling red vapor that floated toward the bee’s antennae and capered around them. As she listened to, or rather sensed, the music, she began to do something very surprising.

  She began to dance.

  It started first as a slight rhythmic twitching of her antennae, but as the music progressed, growing brighter and faster as Bramble injected it with his own confusing mix of fear and excitement, she began to move her body. Her abdomen wriggled with the music, and her wings began to buzz against her back. Bramble joined in, dancing from foot to foot and fluttering his own wings as the bee danced faster and with more intensity. As Bramble was sounding the final notes of the song, she began to pace in a figure-eight pattern, punctuated at each intersection with the same shaking and buzzing dance as before.

  When Bramble ended the song, the bee turned and disappeared into the tree. Bramble hoped that his urgent message had been received, but he dared not wait for an answer.

  “Goodbye!” he shouted as he zoomed toward the blue peeking between the oak’s leaves. Before he burst through the canopy, he glanced down and smiled.

  The branch was alive with motion as hundreds of bees spilled out of the nest and lined up in neat rows.

  “Now the secret by the stream and then Raucous,” said Bramble as he continued his flight. “Must hurry! Must hurry!” he added as he pressed his wings harder than he ever had before. He strained his eyes looking for the narrow, snaking slit in the trees that marked the passage of the broad forest stream. The sun was dipping lower into the horizon ahead of him, and he shielded his eyes against the glare as he searched.

  “Where is it? Where is it?” he asked himself, squinting into the sea of green ahead of him. “Must find it, Bramble, or you won’t be standing a chance even if all the bees in the forest come to help!”

  A sudden sound from far below him caught his attention. He came
to a stop atop a broad poplar leaf and listened. His heart pounded in his ears as he strained to hear the sound again.

  The forest below him was still and silent. And that was a very bad thing. The world beneath was no longer alive with the symphony of cackles, howls, hoots, buzzes, chirps, caws, and the other daytime noises that colored the backdrop of the forest-dwellers’ lives.

  Bramble stood above the eerie silence and listened. “I know I heard it,” he said. “But where is it now?” He listened harder, closing his eyes and focusing all his attention on his long, pointy ears. “Please still be there. Please still be there,” he whispered.

  He was about to give up hope and fly away when he heard it again. He gasped and covered his mouth. Just below him, far down on the forest floor, came the mewling cry of a human child. Bramble’s face lit up.

  He leapt into the air and played a few quick notes on his flute. A second later, a brilliant monarch floated up from beneath the cover of the forest. Bramble’s flute trilled a staccato melody. The butterfly dipped in response, and Bramble sped away.

  His heart was lighter to know that he wasn’t too late to help the child, but Bramble pressed on, sped by the knowledge that every passing moment put him that much closer to just a moment too late.

  The stream’s jagged cut finally came into view, and Bramble dove down into the shade of the forest. He zoomed upstream, his toes skating on the surface of the water and sending up a fine mist behind him. A moment later, he rounded a bend and found what he had been looking for.

  An old log, blanketed with thick green moss, lay across the stream. The cool, clear water gathered behind it, swelling into a deep pool. Bramble smiled. On many a day, he had ventured out in secret to enjoy a swim in the calm and refreshing pool. This was his sanctuary, his escape from the stifling confines of the Hometree.

  He landed by a mossy stone near the leaf-strewn shore of the pool and lifted it to reveal a hidden hollow beneath. Inside the depression was a bundle carefully wrapped in a scrap of tattered paisley cloth—Bramble’s secret and forbidden treasure. He removed the packet and unwrapped it. Inside were three shiny, polished needles held in a quiver that had been fashioned with a shred of burlap and a bit of black thread, all purloined from the home of a seamstress who lived at the forest’s edge.

  Bramble picked up the quiver, hung it across his back, and withdrew one of the needles. He had spent many hours with his sword-like needles, practicing and training, imagining himself to be a brave warrior like in the old stories he wasn’t supposed to know. He hefted the needle and gave a few thrusts, his heart pounding in anticipation of the moment that he would have to actually use his toys in battle.

  If the granduncle knew that he possessed such things or had even so much as gone within sight of a human house, his wings would be clipped right away. But Bramble didn’t care. He was called toward a life of danger and adventure with every fiber of his heart. And as everyone comes to know at some point in their lives, Bramble knew that to ignore a calling of the heart was to ignore the calling of life itself.

  Besides, he had only been seen by the seamstress’s young daughter, and he knew that no one would believe that she had seen a pixie in the kitchen.

  He sheathed the needle and took flight, zipping toward the canopy above. “Now, to battle!” he cried. “May the—oh! I almost forgot!”

  “Curse this woolgathering little head of mine,” he mumbled to himself as he descended back to the pool’s edge. “Sweet lot of good I would’ve done without Raucous.” He took his flute out once again. “Gotten myself killed nice and well for sure,” he continued to grumble as he brought out his flute.

  It took only a few notes to bring a bright golden frog squirming out from its hiding place deep within the moist duff by the pool’s edge. It stuck its knobby head out of the litter, gave a mighty yawn, and blinked sleepily at Bramble.

  “Hello, Raucous,” he said, bowing low. “Good to see you again, old friend.”

  Raucous uttered a long and throaty croak in reply.

  “I’m afraid I can’t stay long. In the utmost hurry, actually,” said Bramble, looking at the ground and scratching nervously at the back of his head. “And I don’t mean to sound rude, but I need a bit of a favor.” He hazarded a look up at the frog, who blinked his glassy, bulbous eyes twice.

  He began to play again, a brisk, hurried kind of song that floated and danced in the air around Raucous’s strange membranous ears. He stopped playing. Raucous let out another gravelly croak and leapt out of his comfortable little hole. He flopped over and came to a stop with his back facing Bramble.

  “Thank you so very much, old friend,” said Bramble. “I promise to return soon to play and dance some more. And I’ll be sure to do the one you like so much.” Bramble took the quiver from his back, dropped to his knees, and one-by-one, he rolled the needles across Raucous’s glistening back, coating each one in the frog’s oily excretions. Bramble replaced the quiver on his back and bowed low. “Thank you again, friend. I promise to be careful.”

  Bramble zoomed to the treetops and burst into the open sky, heedless of any awaiting danger. He zipped away from the setting sun and sped back the way he had come. The sun at his back illuminated the treetops ahead of him and transformed his corner of the world into a sea of glittering emeralds and peridots. So striking and beautiful was the effect that had this been any other day, he might have stopped and stared in wonder, his eyes filled with tears, until the sun dipped below the horizon.

  But this was not the day for such things. He pressed on, his blue eyes searching for the flash of orange among the canvas of green. His heart skipped as he saw it ahead and to his right. The butterfly floated and flitted above the trees, wheeling and circling to stay in one spot. Bramble altered his course and met the brilliant insect.

  “Thank you!” he said in passing as he descended into the forest. Above him, the butterfly, its mission complete, floated away into the afternoon sun.

  Bramble came to rest on the branch of a tall, straight hickory. Beneath him, mingled with the child’s persistent cries, came the sound of heavy, crashing footsteps and deep grumbling voices. He descended stealthily until the incoherent rumbles formed words.

  “A wee smash would do,” said a deep, rough voice. “Just enough to shut it up.”

  “You’d silence it, alright,” replied another booming voice. “And ‘e would have our ‘eads for it. We was told to bring the thing to ‘im whole, not smashed and squashed in a sack.”

  The other voice growled in reply, a deep and disdainful sound. The forest was filled with the sound of crunching leaves and cracking branches as the voices moved. Bramble made his way lower, following the sounds.

  Another rumble echoed through the woods. “All this walkin’ and grabbin’ and fetchin’ is hungry business,” said the first voice. “Can’t we find another snack? This one’s mum was a tasty morsel. There’s bound to be more not far.”

  Grief and anger filled Bramble’s heart as he thought of the poor, innocent child, made motherless and stuffed into a smelly old sack by this horrid creature.

  “Hrmm,” growled the other voice. “But you et the bestest parts and left me munchin’ and crunchin’ on the bones.” The footsteps stopped and began moving toward Bramble’s hiding place. “No! Finish the job first, then we’ll come back for more of ‘em.” The footsteps halted again.

  The other voice replied with a whiny rumble. “Oh, fine,” it said. The crashing footsteps began again, heading away from Bramble. “Let’s get this’n done and ‘hind us.”

  Bramble dropped lower toward the voices. He wrinkled his nose as he got closer. The smell of sour, unwashed bodies and rotten meat hung in the air. He crept along a low branch until he was within sight of the source of the noise.

  Bramble narrowed his eyes at the sight of the horrible creature. He had recognized it from his secret storybooks. An ettin, he believed it was called. It stood twice as tall as a grown human man and was four times as broad. Flies buz
zed around the back of a stained and tattered leather loincloth, the creature’s only garment. Long and greasy black hair sprouted from the two heads perched upon the creature’s wide shoulders. In one hand, it carried a wriggling burlap sack. The other enormous, hairy-knuckled hand clutched a knobby club as big as a fence post.

  The pixie flitted to a branch just above the ettin’s leftmost head and withdrew one of the needles. Suddenly, the horrid thing stopped moving and turned a head. Bramble dropped prone and pressed himself against the branch as a pair of bloodshot yellow eyes searched the foliage.

  “Oi!” shouted the other head. “I done told you we need to—”

  “Cram it!” interrupted the head facing Bramble. “I heared somethin’ in the trees. A buzzin’ flutterin’ noise, like.”

  “Come off it,” said the other. “The place is full o’ flies and bugs and birds and such.” At this, the child in the sack began to wail again, a pitiful sound that sent Bramble’s heart to breaking. The ettin jostled the sack, and the child grew quiet. “Let’s get a movin’, now. You know ‘e’s not patient.” The ettin turned, and the footsteps continued.

  Bramble exhaled the breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. His little heart was pounding in his chest. He took a few deep breaths. “Okay, Bramble,” he whispered to himself. “You know what you have to do. Don’t lose courage now.”

  He knew he would have to move quickly once he started this thing, for one swat from those meaty hands would crush him to an unrecognizable pulp. He ran along the branch above the creature’s head, stepping lightly and trying to avoid rustling the many clumps of leaves in his path. Bramble had been shocked at the giant’s keen ears, and he didn’t want to risk attracting the ettin’s attention again before he had the chance to strike.

  When the beast was just beneath him, Bramble took a deep breath, flattened his wings against his back, and dropped toward the left head’s hairy neck. As he fell, he held the needle in front of him like a shining lance. He slammed into his target, driving the needle deep into the soft tissue of the ettin’s neck. The creature roared with pain, dropped the sack roughly onto the ground, and swatted at the sting.