“Poison!” Ayloo screamed before gently putting Vince in his pocket. He then placed his hand as he did earlier, an arrow made of light appeared from thin air, he aimed it at the silver soldier and let go of the powerful arrow. The soldier jumped out of the way and went to stand in front of Lion’s cell, the arrow made a large hole on the side of the prison, taking many elmers and leprechauns with it. Ayloo hurried towards Pinly
“Wait, my brother!” he screamed but was knocked out by Ayloo.
Chapter 38
Alone, again
P inly woke up as the gate to Jahny was being sealed
“No!” he screamed as he attempted to pass through, but the gate had already disappeared. He waved his hands trying to touch something that wasn't there anymore. His eyes swept through the crowd of fairies until he found Ayloo “you bastard!” he charged at the winged boy, they rolled onto the ground, Ayloo dodged the hits coming at him before pushing Pinly off “what's wrong with you? He was there, right in front of us!” Pinly screamed, the whole crowd was watching them
“What is wrong with me? You almost killed us all with your selfishness! And still you do not care!” Ayloo replied
“What are you talking about? I was doing what we had gone in there to do, save my brother!”
“Was sacrificing us part of the plan too?”
“What are you on about?!” Pinly shouted
“Vince almost died!” Ayloo screamed, there was a long moment of silence as they glared daggers at each other. Then Pinly remembered, Vince was in bad shape back in the prison, it all came back to him “he is dying, they poisoned him…”
“Where is he?” Pinly asked softly
“Why? There's nothing you can do for him now”
“I want to see him!”
“I won't let you…”
“All I wanted was to save my brother”
“I thought we were your brothers too... is that what you do? You sacrifice one brother for another? You are worse than poison, I don't want to be your brother anymore” Ayloo turned around and walked away
“Ayloo…” Pinly sobbed. He knew he was in the wrong. Vince was dying and he couldn't even see him. He felt terrible, his heart was torn apart by the thought of Vince on a deathbed and Lion still trapped in Jahny. He screamed in anger and tears fell once again, even though he had promised himself to never cry again. He felt a strong, but gentle hand rest on his head. He looked up “Atili?” Pinly frowned, not sure why Meno's father was here, but then he remembered that Cammo had sent fairies after them.
“He is just angry, give him time to calm down” he said before taking his hand off,
“What about Vince? What have I done!”
“We will save Vince, do not worry” As unexpected as they were, Atili’s words were comforting. Pinly looked around and recognised several of the fairies from Bonhill, within the hundreds of new faces, including Meno who stood proud, his chest puffed up like a peacock as he showed his battle scars. Pinly sat against a tree where he put his head in his arms and knees. Atili spoke to the crowd of fairies in Mendian, whatever he was telling them was long. Pinly didn't care about what was being said, even if he could understand he wouldn't have listened. He had too much on his mind. How on earth was he going to get Lion back now? The silver soldier knew they had come for him. Who knows what he was going to do to him now. And what was going on with Vince? How had he missed his other brother almost getting killed? He could not bear the thought of losing anyone else. It all seemed so reckless and badly planned now. Maybe they should have waited for Miss Poli, she definitely would have got Lion back, but how long were they supposed to wait? She probably still hadn’t reached Mendy yet. Had she even escaped the wizards in the forest? There was a storm like noise and wind as Atili finished talking. All the fairies were taking off. Atili approached and crouched down to his level “let us go home” he said, Pinly shook his head
“I can't”
“You cannot stay here, they could come out anytime”
“I'll join you later then, I want to stay here for now” Pinly replied, Atili stood up
“We will not fly too fast” he said before taking off to find the others. With everyone else gone, it was suddenly very quiet. The only noise came from leaves gently swept by the wind. Pinly finally stood up, he was about to join the others. He needed to at least make it right with Ayloo and Vince, before trying anything else, but as he lifted off, he heard someone sobbing quietly behind the trees. Pinly turned around and stepped behind the trees to see who it was. Benji, the burgundy winged boy from earlier was crying over a pair of black wings, detached from its owner
“Opa” the little boy sobbed. These were the wings of his father. Pinly recognised the word Opa as meaning father, he had heard many fairies called their father that back in Bonhill
“Benji?” Pinly approached, the young one looked up at him, his eyes red and full of tears. Benji spoke in Mendian. He kept crying as he pointed at different parts of the village “I don't understand Benji, I'm sorry” the boy stood up and tapped twice on his chest and waved his arms over the whole village
“Home” he said,
“This is your home?” Pinly asked, the boy nodded “I'm sorry” he said, Benji nodded, he then pointed at Pinly
“Home, where?”
“My home is far” Pinly moved his arms around to convey distance “my Opa and Oma” he said tapping on his chest “killed by skulls” he pointed at where the gate was, the boy seemed to understand “Lion is Aru” he said Aru meant brother in Mendian
“Sorry” the little fairy repeated
“Come with me, let's find the others” Pinly pointed at the sky, in the direction of the group. The boy hesitated, looking at the wings of his father. He then nodded and they both took off. It took Pinly and Benji quite a while to catch up with the flock. They all flew in little groups. Pinly wished he could feel like the ones who were smiling or the ones who flew close to the relatives they were finally reunited with. For a moment, he wondered why everyone was so happy, but then he remembered they probably had had as much time as he had had to mourn their deceased and they were finally out of Jahny, anyone would smile at that. He was the main reason they were out of Jahny, but he didn't feel like celebrating the victory for he had lost everything apart from his life in the process. He had now lost three brothers and hadn't even managed to kill the silver soldier. He had dreamt of crushing his skull more than once, but had failed at that too. Every time Pinly tried to fly close to Ayloo, the winged boy would flap his wings away from him. Vince was sleeping in Ayloo's hand. Pinly wished he could tell them how sorry he was or even do his part and help Ayloo carry Vince. It was really hard to catch a sight of Ayloo within the thousands of fairies flying with them, some of them also had black wings like him, so he spent the first few days of the journey with Benji. They taught each other words from their respective tongues. The little boy cried very often and Pinly had to comfort him. He knew all too well what Benji was going through, at least he was there to stop him from ever blaming himself. Every so often, he would catch a glimpse of Ayloo; the winged boy was angry, he was even painting his face red again, but this time there were two grey lines at the edge of the red mask, when Pinly asked Benji what it meant
"Angry...” he replied pointing on his own face where the red was “sad…” where the grey lines were. After five days on the road, Vince had woken up. It was during a break that Pinly first saw him and as soon as he did, he ran towards him, a big smile on his face, but before he could come close, Vince turned around to look at him, then turned back to Ayloo. That was one of the biggest blows to Pinly, he stopped moving for a minute, then turned around to sit back down where Benji was. “Family... fight every time” Benji tried to comfort Pinly with the few words he now knew, Pinly didn't reply, he only nodded.
“It's all his fault” Pinly said, Benji looked puzzled, he didn't understand those words “the silver soldier” Pinly said, the boy nodded
“Dragmar bad! Very
bad” Benji shook his head
“Is that his name?” Pinly asked
“Yes” Benji confirmed “powerful fairies work with Dragmar”
“Wait what?! Are you sure of that?” Pinly rose to his feet, Benji nodded vigorously. He knew that there had to be more fairies involved in all this ever since they fought the skulls at Count Rixo’s weather farm “I've got to tell them” Pinly paced towards his brothers “guys!” he said, but they didn't reply “guys listen to this!” Ayloo and Vince walked away, there was nothing he could do to get through to them, they just wouldn't give him the time of day “Dammit” he kicked dust off the ground. He walked back to Benji for more information “how do you know about those fairies?”
“I saw” Benji said “Aura” he added “big, big aura, like you” Soon the flock was up again. They flew past places the boys hadn't been to on their way to Jahny. Atili was leading the pack and he seemed to know Mendy like the back of his hand. No wonder they had caught up with them so fast and a good thing too. There were times where Pinly felt incredibly lonely and sad. Benji wasn't always there to keep him company. It was a good pass time to try and understand what he was saying as he spoke of everything that went on in Jahny. He said that he was like a pet to them and fairies were treated like animals, beaten, tortured and killed every day for the leprechaun’s entertainment. When Pinly asked how he had received the scar that was on his face before, Benji told him that he had fought and killed three leprechauns before he was stopped by the silver soldier. he said that he had lost hope completely, until he saw Pinly and the others and that he would be forever grateful to the three of them for saving him. Then sometimes Benji would go around fairies he knew and stay there for hours, leaving Pinly feeling all alone again.
“Pinly” a voice called out from behind. It was sun bud, he was flying over with a few other fairies from their city; Soubrey. Pinly recognised all of them, but had never really spoken to them before “I didn't think you had made it” Sunbud said “I'm sorry, I wish I could have helped you get Lion back”
“Don't be silly Sun, you got out alive, that's all you needed to do”
“Still... Where did you learn to fight like that?”
“Miss Poli for the most part" he didn't want to mention Ayloo just yet
“Miss Poli!” Sun bud gasped “the old fairy that lives on the same tree as you?”
“Yes and she's not a fairy, she's a witch” Pinly said, Sun bud snapped his fingers
“I knew it, people said she was... anyway, thanks”
“It's alright Sun”
“Are you ever going back to Soubrey?”
“I don't know, not as long as I don't have my brother back”
“I get that, the few of us…” sun bud nodded in the other’s direction “we thought we'd stay here, we've lost everyone back home and it's safer here”
“I don't know about that, the leprechauns managed to get their skulls here too” Pinly replied
“But at least here fairies are powerful and Mendy is vast... This is where we belong, not Soubrey” there was a moment of silence “I mean look at that” Sun bud pointed at the other flying fairies “we didn't even know fairies were meant to have wings, we've been living in our little bubble knowing nothing at all”
“I guess they tried to protect us from some of it too…” Pinly began
“Protect us?!” Sun bud broke in “they might as well have put the blades under our throats, tie us up and send us to Jahny… We weren't protected from anything” These were thoughts that had come to Pinly's mind a few times. Mendy was more than ideal for the fairies from his village to come and live rather than to hide and never leave Soubrey. They were living a lie there. Maybe they would have been better prepared if they knew the outside world.
It took them seven days to arrive in Bonhill. Spending most of that time alone, Pinly had been thinking about the real reason this was all happening. There had to be another version, other than what most fairies were saying. Everybody seemed to think the leprechauns only wanted revenge for being chased out of Mendy all those years ago or that they wanted to steal fairie’s powers, but to Pinly that didn't seem enough. He hated to admit it, but from what he had seen, leprechauns had nothing to envy Mendy or fairies. Their country was as beautiful as any if not more. Their powers were impressive too and on top of that, there was what Benji had told him; fairies were working with the leprechauns! The issue was a lot deeper than anyone was really looking to dig. If anyone was going to do it, it was him, this had taken his parents and was still holding on to his brother. Pinly would not rest until it was all over. They arrived with a lot less fairies than they had started the journey with, only a couple hundreds were still there, not including the ones native to Bonhill. All the others had decided to go back to where they were from; all parts of Mendy. Some decided to find a new home, far away from the south and others; mainly young fairies kept following, not knowing what to do or where to go, that included Benji who walked very close Pinly, almost hiding behind him.
“Benji, let’s go see Caleen, she'll find you a place to stay” Pinly pulled the boy forward when they arrived in front of her. She was surrounded by dozens of young fairies who had lost their parents too. She crouched down, Benji wasn't really short, but that's just something people did when talking to children, particularly vulnerable ones. She began speaking in Mendian. At the end of the sentence Benji replied saying his name and she said hers. Caleen continued, he nodded to her twice, another time he looked at Pinly then said something back as he looked back at her. The young fairy was a lot more shy with her than with Pinly, the words from his mouth came out almost like whispers. Caleen stood up again
“I will take him with the others, there is an empty island not far where everyone will go, until everything is ready” she said
“Ok” Pinly ruffled Benji's hair absentmindedly, not that he didn't care about him, but he swept the village with his eyes to find Ayloo and Vince. He looked everywhere; their nest, Cammo's, he asked everyone, even Meno who sent him away with a dismissive gesture. There was no trace of them in the village. He waited by the edge of the nest for hours, watching everyone settle down below, the golems worked harder and faster than the usual as they tried to accommodate the new comers, building new nests where there was space, including Ayloo’s lonely tree. Pinly suddenly frowned as he realised where the two others were. He bolted up above the trees, then set course furiously towards the archipelago. Once he was above it, he dropped down and landed on the island, where Ayloo, Vince and he had their first drink together and there they were, sitting at the exact same spot. They didn't even turn around to acknowledge him. “It's unfair!” he shouted “you can't ignore me forever…” he took a few steps closer to them “I've been selfish, I know…” his voice was breaking, heavy with pain “Lion told me, you too Vince, now you Ayloo... I didn't do it on purpose” they still wouldn't move around to face him “I've lost too much to lose you too guys, that's why I'm going again, but alone, all I want is for you to forgive me before I go” he began to cry uncontrollably “I'm sorry! Dammit all I do is cry” he said as he turned around and began flying away
“Crying is a normal thing to do” Vince grabbed him by the ankle, Pinly landed again to face them, they were finally looking at him again
“That is all we wanted to hear” Ayloo approached
“P we knew what we had signed for, but it doesn't mean you get to risk our lives every time you see red and you never even apologised for it... until now that is” Vince said
“We are brothers, forever and we will never let you go there alone. Never" Ayloo said
“I told you P, I'll be here until the end” Vince put an arm around ayloo's neck and around Pinly’s “it's us against the world”
“Us against the world” Ayloo repeated
“Us against the world!” Pinly said.
Chapter 39
The judgement
T he boys were already in their respective booleafs, when Pinly saw
shapes landing on the nest. He took his head out at the same time as Vince and Ayloo. Ten fairies armed with spears were staring back at them. Meno was unsurprisingly leading them.
“What do you want Meno?” Pinly asked even though he knew what they were here for,
“Do not talk to me that way,” Meno pointed his spear at Pinly, the pointy end stopped an inch away from his face “we have been told to bring you to Kali's pyramid right away, all of you” he waved his spear back and forth in front of the boys. The three boys looked at each other before opening their booleafs. They followed Meno up, the other fairies circled them as if they were dangerous prisoners. They landed on one of the golden pyramids. Meno kept glancing back at them with a sadistic grin. Pinly knew there wasn't any good news waiting for them up there. When they arrived, there was a flock of fairies sitting in a circle, he recognised fairies that had been freed from Jahny, some were from the village, including humming fairies, but mainly Cammo's family and other new faces. Meno gestured for the threm to sit in the middle of the circle.
“What is this all about?” Pinly asked
“Young Pinly, you will wait for the elders to speak first” Cammo said before clearing his throat, he stood up and began circling them, his large multicoloured wings dragged behind him “your little adventure caused quite a stir... Tell me, why Jahny?” Pinly stood up
“I was looking for my brother”
“And did you find your brother?"
“I did”
“He is a liar, they just wanted to be heroes!” Meno shouted from the back
Made of Magic and True Grit Page 27