Emma and the Silverbell Faeries

by Matthew S. Cox

  “Emma, come on,” yelled Tam.

  She crept into the water until it came up to her thighs, and froze. “Oh… it’s a little cold.”

  “Don’t do it slow.” Tam slapped his hands down on the water. “Do it fast an’ it’s not bad.”

  “You’re right.” Emma took a couple breaths to get ready, and jumped forward.

  Icy water wrapped her in a blanket of needlepoints. She curled into a ball, holding her breath until the shock of the plunge faded. Feeling energized and alive, Emma kicked off the bottom and surfaced with a shriek of glee. At a bright flash from the creek’s edge, she whirled, expecting something strange and magical, but the harsh glare turned out to be Kimber’s paleness catching the sunlight as she pulled her dress off.

  Tam stared at her for a second before covering his eyes and screaming, “Aah! I can’t see!”

  After folding the dress in a neat square, Kimber set it down and waded knee-deep into the water. Emma offered a reassuring smile. They’d been to the creek a bunch of times, and more and more, she seemed to relax around the water. Emma put her feet down, finding herself shoulder-deep near the middle of the creek.

  Kimber trembled, though she seemed more cold than frightened. Her green eyes narrowed with determination, and a second later, she jumped forward. A great cloud of red hair spread out around her as she glided along underwater. Emma watched her, poised to help if she sensed panic. Kimber rolled over, facing up, and made a silly face. Bubbles leaked out of her nose.

  Emma laughed, which caused Kimber to attempt to laugh. Sputtering and coughing, Kimber stood, the water lapping at her chin. Emitting an uneasy whine, she hurried a few steps back toward the bank until the water only came up to her armpits.

  “You’re doing great,” said Emma. “Jumping in like that makes the cold not so bad. It’s awful when you try to go in slow.”

  “I’as w-w-want a b-b-bath.” Kimber folded her arms, teeth chattering. “B-b-b-aths are warm.”

  “Here…” Emma swam over to her and stood, her feet sinking in clammy muck. She held her arms out underwater. “Go like you’re swimming. I won’t let you dip under.”

  Kimber stared into her eyes for two seconds before giving a hesitant nod. “’Kay.”

  She pushed off the creek bottom and stretched out. Emma let Kimber lay across her outstretched arms, keeping her face above water. The girl shivered something fierce, but seemed comforted by the close contact. Before Kimber had been part of the family, her only experience at ‘swimming’ had been when her cruel father had held her underwater in a horse trough as punishment for not bringing home enough copper. The man had only cared about his Faeberry wine. Emma beamed from ear to ear watching Kimber dive underwater on her own. A few weeks with a real family had made a big change in her.

  “Move your arms like Tam’s doing, and kick,” said Emma.

  Kimber watched the boy swim around for a moment before mimicking his motions. Emma turned about in a circle, letting Kimber feel as if she swam through the water. Soon, she seemed to get the hang of it, and Emma started to lower her arms.

  “Don’t let go!” yelled Kimber.

  Emma braced her again. “I’m here. You were doing it. You were swimming.”

  Kimber grinned as she paddled.

  “You don’t need to be afraid here. This is just a little creek. We can stand in the deepest part and still keep our faces out of the water. If you get scared, just put your feet down.”

  Kimber scowled in concentration. “’Kay.”

  A few minutes later, Emma walked sideways, still holding her up. “My arms are getting tired. Can I let go?”

  “I’m scared.”

  “If you’re scared, just put your legs down and stand. The water isn’t deep.”

  Kimber whined a little, but nodded. “’Kay.”

  Emma let her weary arms dangle in the slight current. Kimber swam around in a lazy circle, smiling… until Tam splashed at her. She screamed. Water foamed around her as she flailed in a panic.

  “Tam!” said Emma in a loud voice, not quite yelling. “Don’t splash her. Please. She’s not ready, and doesn’t like water hitting her face.” She hurried over and took hold of the girl’s arm. “He’s only playing.”

  Kimber clung for a moment until she calmed enough to get her feet under her. She gasped, out of breath, standing shoulder deep, her face hidden behind a wall of red. Emma poked her in the forehead with two fingers, then pulled them apart, opening a heavy curtain of hair, which she tucked behind the girl’s ears.

  Tam dove under, his feet flicking out of the creek like a sea-dragon’s tail. His blurry form glided down to the bottom and pawed at the stones. Kimber relaxed, but seemed content to stand while waving her hand side to side right under the surface. Emma swept her arm across as well, and they got to seeing who could get the most silver air bubbles clinging to the back of their arm without breaking the surface. Tam popped up for a breath and went back down.

  Kimber shrieked and jumped on Emma, wrapping her arms around. “Something bit me!”

  A small hand grabbed Emma’s left ankle. She sighed.

  “It’s Tam being dumb. He grabbed your leg, didn’t he?”

  “Umm.” Kimber sniffled, and went from frightened to annoyed.

  When the boy came up again, she splashed him. He splashed her back, then gave Emma an ‘oops’ look. Since Kimber laughed and splashed him again, Emma nodded. A three-way water-flinging war eventually gave way to quiet floating once they all got tired.

  A soft hum grew into loud buzzing from the left; a trio of longflies glided over the creek, zipping closer. As the eight-inch insects neared, Kimber let out a yelp and ducked under. Emma waved at them, not that the bugs reacted. One passed close enough for the breeze from its wings to brush her face.

  Kimber stared up at her with an expectant look.

  After the longflies went by, Emma took her hand and pulled her upright. “They don’t bite people. They bite other bugs.”

  “They’as scary lookin’.” Kimber shivered. “Big as daggers!”

  Emma grasped the girl’s chin. “Oh. Your lips are blue. Time to get out.” She turned to find Tam, but didn’t see him. An instant before worry set in, she caught sight of a boy-shaped blur gliding along the creek bed.

  “Aye.” Kimber held Emma’s hand while walking toward the bank. “Yours a’ well blue.”

  Emma stuck her face in the water and yelled, “Tam!”

  He bobbed up to the surface.

  She pointed at the bank. “’Mon out. We’re goin’ ta catch cold.”

  Tam rolled around in the water and swam toward her.

  His lack of pleading or protesting to stay in longer worried her a little. If Tam was cold enough to not argue at being told to get out of the water, maybe they had stayed in too long. She reached out her free hand to take his, and guided her siblings up onto the grass beside the creek. Kimber found a nice patch of sun and flopped flat on her back to dry. Emma lay down next to her, adoring the unexpected warmth.

  “Why’s the water so cold but it’s warm out?” Tam sat cross-legged beside her.

  “’Cause the water spirit’s feeling cold.” Emma gazed up at puffy white clouds. “The water’s always colder than everything else.”

  “Oh.” He shivered.

  “Cat!” said Kimber, pointing at a cloud.

  Emma leaned left, touching heads with her, and stared up the length of her arm at the sky. With a little imagination, the cloud she indicated could be a cat. “Yes. That’s a cat all right.”

  Tam lay flat, hands behind his head.

  Water droplets tickled here and here, making Emma look for bugs every few seconds. A slight hint of pumpkin pie invaded the fragrance of the woods. She scratched at her belly, eager for Mama to call them back for the midday meal.

  “Wolf.” Tam pointed up.

  Emma hoped he’d spotted Greyfang or one of the others, but he too, gazed at the clouds. That one did look like a wolf. Though disappointed sh
e hadn’t seen her ‘other family’ for a while, she didn’t let it show on her face.

  “Yeah,” said Kimber. “An’ ’at one’s a horse.”

  Emma picked out a few cloud shapes as well, a chicken and a bull, and one that reminded her of a house. After a while, they had dried off except for the girls’ long hair. Kimber sat up and leaned to one side, head tilted, pulling her fingers through her hair to squeeze water out. Emma did the same, though Tam remained sprawled on his back searching the clouds.

  Her brother had gotten so upset over Stick Knight’s steed because of the rarity of finding a bit of a branch that had broken off in such a way as to resemble a horse… in the way Kimber’s first cloud resembled a cat. Someone lacking imagination (like Rydh) would only have seen a hunk of wood.

  I wonder if Linganthas would let me grow a root in the shape of a horse.

  “A dragon,” said Tam, pointing at another cloud.

  Emma looked up at a huge billowy mass of white. Evidently, Tam’s imagination had hers beat. It didn’t look like much of anything at all.

  “It is!” he said, a touch of whine in his voice. “You got that face on. The head’s on the right side. That bit wif the sun glowin’ on it is a wing.”

  “Umm.” She squinted, trying to see it. The boy had spent so much time with Shrub Dragon, perhaps a giant bush looked like a dragon to him. “I can almost see it.”

  A moving dark spot overhead caught her eye.

  “Wha’s ’at?” asked Kimber, pointing. “Ae bird?”

  Emma stared. Whatever it was, it disappeared for a second above a cloud. It emerged from the far end of the shapeless cloud after a second. Narrow at the front end, it widened to an oval middle, and tapered again in the shape of a tail. Wings stretched out to a span twice the length of the shadow. They flapped once and went straight and still again.

  “That’s too high for a bird. It’s over top of the clouds.” Emma’s jaw hung open. “I… think that’s…”

  The shadow flapped again, gliding overhead from west to east.

  “A dragon!” shouted Tam.

  He leapt to his feet and ran, screaming, in the direction of the house, forgetting his clothes.

  Emma stared, awestruck, until the shadow tracked too far to the right to see past the trees.

  “We’as ought’a go home.” Kimber stood and hurried into her dress.

  “Yes.” Emma leapt up and pulled the dress Nan had made her back on before gathering Tam’s tunic and breeches.

  Kimber fell in step at her side as they jogged out of the woods to the meadow. Tam jumped up and down on the porch, pulling at Nan and pointing at the sky. The old one cackled with amusement. Emma’s fear diminished, and she slowed to a purposeful walk. Soon, the boy’s fervent insistence that they’d seen a real dragon drowned out the workers’ hammers. By the time Emma reached the porch, her hair had soaked a damp spot into the back of her dress.

  “It’s true!” Tam spun to stare at Emma. “Tell her you saw it too!”

  Emma handed him his clothes. “Yes, Nan. We saw something in the air… it did look a bit like a dragon, but it was so high up it’s just a shadow with wings.”

  “Is a dragon!” Tam sat on the steps to get his legs in his breeches.

  Kimber scooted under the porch roof, as if trying to hide from the sky. “Is ’ere such ae ’fing a’ dragons, Nan?”

  Tam stared at her as if she’d said sweetbreads were bad.

  Nan sent a quick glance up. “There are dragons out there, but they don’t bother with people much. When they fly, they go very high so no one notices them.” Wrinkles around her eyes deepened with a smile. “Not many people have time to watch the clouds, so almost no one ever spots one.”

  “Is it gonna burn the town?” Tam jumped up and wriggled into his tunic, grabbing at his belt area like a knight who’d misplaced his sword.

  “’Er they mean?” asked Kimber.

  “Oh, Tam.” Nan chuckled. “No. I doubt any dragon would object to our little town being here. And yes, Kimber… sometimes they are mean, but people can be mean too. Dragons are quite smart.” She tapped a finger to the side of her head. “And they’re also rather arrogant. Some can be nice and some can be mean.”

  “Ar’gant?” asked Kimber.

  Nan smiled. “It means they think they are better than us, and they take great pride in feeling better than us.”

  “It’s bad for people to be arrogant,” said Emma.

  “Dragons are better than us.” Tam waved his arms. “They’re huge. They spit fire. They can step on houses. Only knights can stop them. Soldiers and guards can’t.”

  Emma grinned, as did Nan.

  “Shoul’ we tell Da ’bout seein’ ae dragon?” asked Kimber.

  Nan shook her head. “If you spotted one that high, whatever business it’s got has nothing to do with Widowswood. I’d not bother the man about it.”

  Mama’s face appeared in the window. “Well. You’ve got a sense of time, Em. I don’t need to yell for you. Come in and help me set the table?”

  “Yes, Mama.” Emma smiled and darted inside.

  After lunch, Emma sat on the edge of the back porch. Kimber knelt nearby, setting up a bunch of small stones in a circle around a large, flat rock. Tam tolerated sitting quiet for less than two minutes before he stood, drew his wooden sword, and held it up.

  “I have to guard. There’s goblins.”

  Emma pointed to the right (away from the workers) and gasped. “Something moved in the grass. I think it might be a goblin!”

  Kimber looked up, mouth open. When Emma winked, she went from worried to grinning.

  Tam pointed his blade in that direction. “Fear not, fair maidens. I will p’tect you.”

  He marched off a short distance into the meadow, adopting a spot-on impression of Guard Kavan’s walk. Emma leaned forward and held her hands out over the dirt between her feet. Soft clicks and scrapes of Kimber rearranging stones filled in the relative quiet between periods of hammering going on.

  Emma pictured a woody vine growing up from the ground and arranging itself into the general shape of a tiny horse. “Linganthas, please send forth some of your roots.”

  “Wha’s ya’ doin?” asked Kimber.

  A sprout of brown root emerged from the ground beneath Emma’s hands, twisting and growing. She stared at it, trying to feel its presence and control how it moved. Kimber glanced over, but seemed to notice her concentration and didn’t press for an answer. Inch by inch, the root crept up from the ground and bent into the shape of a legless horse. The main part swelled, stopping a little fatter than the handle of her broom, then sprouted ‘legs’ as big around as Emma’s fingers.

  She picked it up and closed her eyes. “Thank you, Linganthas.” After a moment of silent reverence, she smiled at Kimber. “Practicing. I asked the spirit of trees and vines to make this for Tam.”

  “Is ’at what Rydh broke?”

  Emma nodded and set the ‘horse’ on the porch behind her. “This one looks more like a horse than his old one.”

  “You’as maked it ’at way.” Kimber handed her a little wooden cup. “Tea.”

  She giggled and took the cup. “What kind?”

  Kimber sniffed a similar empty cup. “Faerie tea.” She indicated the table and seats she’d made from the rocks. “Is ae faeries’ tea party. Donnae be tae loud ’er ’ey’ll run off.”

  “Yes,” whispered Emma. “They don’t like loud noises.”

  Kimber raised her nose like a tiny noblewoman. “Me faerie friends, ’ey don min’ ’a hammrin’.”

  “Oh.” Emma pretended to sip faerie tea.

  “’Ey not same as ’a ones what come tae eat ’em treats ya made.” Kimber pretended to pour tea into tiny cups made from acorn caps. “These faeries ’er braver.”

  “Do they live in cities like Neema?”

  Kimber stooped and whispered over the rocks. “’Ey live inna woods. Sleepin’ on big mushrooms.” She stared at Emma, eyes wide with eagerness
, but trying to act calm. “Neema’s friends, ’ey live inna city?”

  “Nan said the Silverbells live like little elves. Da said the elves have cities, but even the big ones aren’t like ours. Theirs are part of the forest… he said you can sometimes walk right past an elf’s house and not even notice it. The big cities are s’posed to be beautiful.” Emma daydreamed about an elven city, full of delicate carvings, bridges, little waterfalls right in the middle of town, trees everywhere.

  “I’as wish ’em faeries would visit again.” Kimber seemed sad for a little while, but cheered up and got to whisper-talking to her pretend faeries while refilling their tea.

  Emma played along as Kimber introduced her to the king of the Mushroom Meadow Faeries and his court. From there, they talked about how these faeries spent their days having fun, playing tricks on humans, and not having to do chores.

  “Care for some more Faeberry tea?” Emma mimed picking up a teapot.

  “No!” snapped Kimber. “’Ey no’a drink ’at.” She shook her head hard. “Tis ’gainst the law in ’a Meadow Mushroom Faerie Kingdom. Anyone caught wif Faeberry is magicked ta sleep, an’ ne’er wake up.” Her expression hardened; she looked like a small queen prepared to punish someone severely.

  Emma froze, holding the make-believe teapot over the table. Does she know what Mama did? She doesn’t look sad. She pretended to open the lid of the teapot and sniff. “Oh, my mistake. It’s not Faeberry tea.”

  “’Es bad.” Kimber’s glare softened to a look of urgency. “Et make people mean.”

  She’s afraid of it… like it’ll make us all want to hit her. Emma scooted closer and put an arm around the girl’s shoulders. “No Faeberry for me. Nan said it’s poison to us.”

  Kimber clung to her, nodding and whispering, “Poison.”

  Emma hugged her back. Her tone made it seem as though she blamed the Faeberry wine for her father’s death, and not what Mama added to it… though maybe she did mean ‘poison’ in the literal sense and accepted it. Even Kimber had to know that man would’ve eventually hit her too hard one day and hurt her badly, or worse.

  At that horrible thought, Emma squeezed her and sniffled.

  “Wha’s wrong?” asked Kimber.