Autumn of Elves

by Joanne Vruno

  I carried the tray in for Grandma, then returned with two warm blankets. As I set them down I turned to the sisters. “I think everything will be fine. When Grandma and I put our magic together we’re very powerful. You’ll see tomorrow.”

  I left. I was exhausted and quickly fell asleep.

  Twenty

  It was almost ten o’clock in the morning by the time I woke up. I felt drained. The last two days had taken a toll. I walked into the living room. No one was there, not even in the kitchen. I made myself a bowl of cereal and sat at the table. Halfway through the bowl, I heard laughter from the back yard. I quickly finished the cereal before heading outside.

  Everyone crowded around where Alvit lay on the ground. Grandma, Emily, the two tomtes, Lina and Berg, along with Lunt and Alma, and the two swan sisters. What I didn’t expect was Alvit in her swan form and awake.

  “Aly, Grandma did it!” Emily said. “She healed the feather blanket. You were right. It was magic!” Emily beamed as she ran to me, grabbing my hand and pulling to Alvit.

  I joined the circle. Grandma said, “I looked in on you this morning, Aly, but you needed your sleep. Then I went to check on Alvit and found her awake. She was sitting, distraught, with her cloak of feathers in her lap. I had to try healing it. I put it on her and did one sweep of healing magic, and Avit suddenly turned into this beautiful swan. Isn’t it wonderful!”

  “It’s wonderful, Alvit.” I said with a bow. “How do you feel?”

  “Like I’m whole again! Thank you again, Alice. Aly, I hear I owe you a great deal of thanks also. If you didn’t transport me when you did, I might not have made it through the night,” admitted Alvit. “I was so afraid I’d never be found. I’m also grateful for you, sisters. If you had never found Aly and told her your fears . . .”

  The three swans wrapped their necks around each other as if in a hug.

  I was ecstatic. “I’m so happy to see you well and whole again. I never had a chance to thank you for letting me know about the colony of light elves without a guardian. You ended up saving them. I guess we all did good deeds.” I smiled at Alvit, but her feathers had lost some of their bright shine, and she suddenly looked weak. She laid her head on her sister Svanhit’s back.

  “Alvit, are you all right?” Grandma asked as she administered another dose of magic over the swan’s body. “I think we should let you rest for a while.” To us, she said, “She only needs the comfort of her sisters as she sleeps. Her body’s going to need time to recover, so, girls, let’s go inside and give her some quiet time. All this maybe was too much too soon for her. I’ll check on her later.”

  “She’ll be all right, won’t she?” asked Emily.

  “In time. She needs lots of sleep to regenerate her body. Speaking of sleep, how are you, Aly?”

  “Drained, Grandma. I can hardly move. My energy’s completely gone.” I stretched out on her recliner as soon as we were inside.

  “I was afraid of that when I saw how soundly you were sleeping. In the past two days you’ve transported a whole village, the lost elves, a swan maiden, and yourself to the new village. How was your visit, by the way?”

  “Strange,” I said, yawning. “Part of it was like going to Silver and Dolph’s village. The elves didn’t seem violent in any way. They were all so busy helping each other. Koppor was friendly. She joined me going to meet the swan maidens. She seemed concerned for Alvit, too. It’s really hard to believe she took part in exiling those elves.”

  “What was Fredek like?”

  “Friendly too. I think I impressed them when I flashed the old guardian’s amulet at the sun when they gave it to me. Lunt told me to let them know my strength. I think I accomplished that again bringing Alvit to her sisters.” Yawns kept coming. I felt myself drifting off. Before I completely succumbed to slumber, my mind flashed over all the events of the weekend in almost slide-show fashion.

  “Aly, wake up!” I heard suddenly. “Mom’s on her way to pick us up! It’s four o’clock in the afternoon! You slept most of the day. Grandma’s getting the apples. My stuff’s packed. Now you need to get your stuff together!”

  I could hardly open my eyes. I just wanted to keep sleeping, but I knew I needed to get ready. I ran to the bathroom and washed the sleep off my face. This was going to be a tough night pretending we just hung out and went to the apple orchard this long weekend. I gathered my belongings and made it to the living room with everything just as Mom opened the front door.

  “So, did you girls have a fun weekend? You didn’t wear Grandma out too much, did you?” asked Mom.

  “Beth, you know I love being with these two. We had a wonderful weekend. We went to the apple orchard and they raked up all the leaves in my back yard. They helped me in more ways I can say,” replied Grandma.

  “Glad to hear that,” said Mom. “Are you ready to head home? Chica’s been so lost without you two. Dad and I just can’t take your place with that dog.”

  “I get her tonight, then!” said Emily. Each night Chica slept with one of us. I was fine letting Emily have her tonight. I still needed some deep sleep.

  We said our goodbyes and headed out to the car. We were going back into the human world—no swan maidens, no lost elves, no new elf colony, not for a while. I needed some just-human time, though I knew Elsa and Enar would have a thousand questions for us.

  The smell of pot roast met us as we entered the kitchen. “I thought we all could enjoy a family meal. Dad and I missed you two. The house seemed empty.” Mom gave us both a hug. “I’m glad you’re both home.”

  Emily and I smiled at each other, voicing in our heads, “It really is good to be home!”

  We emptied out our backpacks, putting our dirty clothes in the laundry. I realized I better start a load of wash. I had white feathers on the sweater I wore yesterday. I pulled out as many as I could and hid them in the garbage before I put the sweater into the washing machine. Balancing these two worlds was trying at times.

  Soon we sat down to dinner and listened to Mom and Dad’s new idea to redo the family room. They must have been lonely to have such an elaborate plan formed. It sounded like it’d be grand when completed, but I knew two tomtes who would miss their television time.

  After dinner I suddenly remembered the homework I hadn’t touched and headed to my room. Unfortunately, while I was trying to solve math problems, I kept getting questions thrown at me by the tomtes. For the first time, I could actually say, “I really need to get this homework done. Would you mind asking Emily about this weekend?”

  They looked shocked that I was dismissing them. I had always shared every creature event as soon as I could with them, and this weekend I had more creature events than I’d ever experienced in one day, but I was physically drained. Getting the homework done was all I could handle.

  I felt guilty. They looked rejected as they left to find Emily. I’d make it up to them tomorrow. I studied the next math problem. I’d been away from the human world too long this time. I needed normalcy at least for one night.

  I finished the homework, took a long hot bath and changed into my pajamas. My guilty conscience led me to Emily’s room, where I found her dramatically telling the events. She was in her glory. She told every little detail. I was happy she included my exhaustion because the tomtes both smiled at me as if to say they understood. I hugged each of them and whispered in each of their ears, “I’m sorry.”

  I headed to my room for a peaceful sleep. After all, Elsa and Enar were also part of my family

  Twenty-one

  For the next few days I stayed in the human world with school and hockey practices. I worked with Emily after school on some basic guardian knowledge but nothing else. On Friday right after school, I decided Emily and I should check on Alvit, so I transported us both to Grandma’s.

  Alvit looked wonderful, her strength almost normal. She
and her sisters were talking about heading back to Murkwood. The trip would be a long flight, and without a healer to help if she had problems, they weren’t sure how to tell when Alvit was ready.

  As we were visiting, Dolph suddenly entered the yard. “Alvit, I’m not sure you remember me. We met many years ago when we were both fairly young. I’m Dolph.”

  “Dolph, of course I remember. By the shores of Lake Vättern. You were studying bird behavior and had thousands of questions for me.”

  Dolph looked a bit embarrassed. “Yes, that’s when we met. I have always been fascinated with each species of birds and water fowl. I just wanted to check on your healing process. You look healthy. How are you feeling?”

  “So much better thanks to these wonderful guardians you have. With all this care, healing has been much faster than I ever thought possible. I was so frightened after my cloak of feathers was shredded that I might never fly again. But look at me now.” She stretched out her wings.

  “That’s wonderful, Alvit. I’m curious about how your cloak ended up shredded,” Dolph said gently. “What happened to you? I don’t mean to pry. I just want to know if it was an animal or creature. If it is not too difficult to tell, could we please hear the story?” Dolph sounded caring and fatherly.

  “It’s hard to speak of, but I’ll have to face it sometime,” Alvit said with a sigh. “Swan maidens have always been treated as royalty. We’re admired. So what happened to me was such an unexpected attack. I had arrived back at Koppor’s village. She welcomed me and waited on me with food and water. I had no memory of where I came from and was a bit ruffled by that. I shared all I remembered with Koppor. We reviewed the facts, and she even wondered if a guardian might have sent me. As we visited, the sun set. Koppor left me to rest while she did her evening tasks. I decided a good swim would be good. I flew to the closest lake, which was small and secluded. I first swam as a swan while I ate, but then I wanted to be completely cleaned so I took off my cloak of feathers and enjoyed swimming as a human. I don’t know how long I was in the water. My sisters will vouch that when swimming in our human form, time just floats by. We almost go into another world where we’re not conscious of our surroundings. Instead, we just enjoy water all around us. It’s a time of complete peace and relaxation. When I noticed the moon was high in the sky, I knew to return to the village for safety. Unfortunately, I was too late for that. On the shoreline a group of a dozen or so elves were ripping my cloak of feathers to shreds. I swam underwater until I was at the shore, thinking I could grab my cloak and escape, but it did not turn out like that.” Tears fell from the swan’s eyes as she told her tale. “I was grabbed and beaten with cattail rushes. The elves laughed and said they had one less creature to deal with. They left knowing I probably wouldn’t survive the night.”

  Alvit’s sisters moved close to her and held her.

  “Did you recognize any of the elves?’ asked Dolph, glancing at Grandma.

  “I couldn’t see faces because of the darkness. Their voices were venomous with hate.”

  “What happened then?” asked Dolph.

  “I crawled to cover, dragging what was left of my feather cloak. I found a bed of ferns and fell asleep. I didn’t wake until Aly brought me here from the park and her grandmother used her healing magic on me.

  All three swans had tears flowing then.

  Dolph hugged the swans. “You’re lucky to have such caring sisters. Rest now, Alvit. I know that story was hard to tell. We’ll leave you now. I’m so pleased you survived such a terrible ordeal,” said Dolph as he motioned us to follow him inside.

  Grandma was the first to speak in the kitchen. “Do you suspect Fredek? Do you really think he’s become so vicious?”

  “I don’t know,” Dolph said, shaking his head. “Silver and I reviewed Koppor’s words about the lost elves. She wouldn’t have spoken about them unless it troubled her. We never would’ve known because we didn’t know who was in her village. Maybe the only reason she would tell us would be that she wanted us to help them, as we did. All the orders we were told about from the lost elves were Fredek’s. Not once did they say any came from Koppor. Maybe the only reason Koppor took part in was agreeing on the exile. She may have done that out of fear,” said Dolph.

  “You’re right,” I said. “Koppor also went to greet the swan maidens with me. Fredek tried to talk us out of it. He wasn’t pleased with us for going down to the creek. I wish now I’d seen his reaction when Alvit appeared, but I never looked toward the village. I was focused on Alvit and how to heal her.”

  “Only one elf can give us the truth. If we bring her here, it may set off an alarm. Aly, you need to go to the village and question Koppor. You need to do it telepathically,” said Dolph.

  “Won’t Fredek hear me in his head, also?”

  “He shouldn’t, but to be completely safe have Koppor show you around the village, and you can show her the caves. One lead elf always needs to stay in the village in case of an emergency. You’ve spent more time with Koppor so it shouldn’t seem strange you’re more comfortable with the female lead elf,” said Dolph, “That’s why you saw more of Silver at first when your powers arrived.”

  I laughed at that. “I was terrified of Silver! She was always upset with me. You never lectured me.”

  Dolph laughed back, “She does have a strong exterior, but a heart like none other inside. I didn’t know you were scared of her. You aren’t anymore though, right?”

  “Not since the tree sprites. I learned how much she cared for me. I know she’ll always have my back!”

  “She definitely always will. And Emily’s. And Alice’s.”

  Grandma said, “Time’s getting short. Your mom’ll be leaving work shortly. Aly, you must go to the village! Emily, I’ll send you home now in case you need to distract your mom until Aly arrives.” Emily disappeared in the first poof, I in the second.

  I found Koppor right away. “Koppor, I’d like to show you some places in the park,” I said. “Can you come with me?”

  Koppor looked a little puzzled but answered, “Sure, Aly. I’ll have an elf inform Fredek I’m leaving the village.” She signaled a female elf nearby and gave her the message.

  We quickly walked to the caves. Some were sealed up by the city, but an elf could fit in the small holes.

  “I’m in kind of a hurry. I need to return to home soon, but I wanted to show you some safe hiding places,” I said.

  As soon as I knew we were far enough away I surprised Koppor by speaking to her in her head. “Alvit’s going to be fine. At the rate she is recovering, she may be flying back to Murkwood by next week.”

  Koppor let out a sigh. “I’m pleased to hear that. She was so kind to come to help us. Please tell her I’m glad she’s recovering. But now, tell me, why aren’t we speaking out loud?”

  “You’re like your sister, very wise. Alvit told us about her attack. It was by elves.”

  “Elves! What elves?” questioned Koppor.

  “We don’t know,” I answered. “Is it possible Fredek ordered the attack?”

  “No, I can’t imagine him doing that. He’s done some foul things of late, but that’s way too much. Why would you even ask that?”

  “Because we found your lost elves, and we know they were exiled. If that was your idea you’d have stayed silent, but you told Silver. That tells us you may have gone along with the order, but it was not your idea.”

  Koppor started to cry. “You’re right. I felt awful about it. If we didn’t lose our guardian when we did, I would have had her return them. Are they all right?”

  “They’re safe in Silver and Dolph’s village. My grandmother and I spent a whole morning healing them. They were in very bad shape. They wouldn’t have survived much longer in the wild. Your admission to a wrong saved their lives.”

  “Thank you. I am not evil,” Koppor
told me. “I just didn’t know what to do when Fredek gave the ultimatum. I knew we needed to stay strong in front of our village, but I was shocked by his orders. Light elves save things, not destroy them. He’s changed. He’s full of anger and doesn’t want to help others in need anymore. You heard him try to have us turn around instead of checking on the two swan maidens.”

  “That’s why I’m here. Could Fredek have ordered the attack on Alvit? We need to know so we can protect you and your village.”

  “I don’t think so. I can’t imagine him doing it. Are you sure it was elves?” asked Koppor, full of worry.

  “Definitely. And Alvit said they were full of hate. She thought there were around a dozen elves. They tried to destroy her cloak of feathers, then beat her and left her to die. This is serious. If Fredek ordered or participated in this attack, we need to step in. The attackers even commented that it was one less creature to deal with.”

  Koppor was shaking. “Aly, I don’t want to believe this. I’m scared. If this is true, I really don’t know him. I can’t imagine him doing such a thing. What are we going to do if he did?”

  “We need you to stay strong and protect your elves. You are not alone. Silver and Dolph are close by. I have to leave soon but I had to warn you of possible dangers. If there’s any more strange behavior from Fredek, you need to let us know immediately. Send me a bird signal. Today, we used the caves as a reason for my visit not stir up suspicion. Tell Fredek I just remembered them and wanted to let you know where they are. I’ll walk you back to the village. Then I really must leave.”

  “Will you return soon, though?” asked Koppor.

  “I will when I can. Dolph may show up for a visit soon. I know you won’t be alone too long without some company from one of us. Stay calm, act normal, and just observe the elves in your village. Let us know what you notice. Who knows? We may be wrong. Maybe rock elves were that close to your village, but for now we can’t take chances.”