by Edrei Cullen
And then it happened. Finding the determination, the courage and the faith of her pure young heart, she drew the remnants of the drying tears from her cheeks and mixed them with the elf dust in her palm. Words she had never learnt and would not remember flew out of her mouth as she held the tip of her ear between her thumb and forefinger.
The cries of pain from Shrinkification deep within the well were heard by Granny and Grandpa and Ella’s father and Mr and Mrs Snoppit, all of them clambering down the hill towards the pile of molten junk.
chapter 26
lizards & long drops
Dixon looked with stupefaction at a tiny Ella and a tiny Charlie. ‘You’re not supposed to be able to do that either,’ he said weakly, holding his tummy. ‘Clever Ella-Bella.’
Suddenly he collapsed against the tunnel wall.
Ella caught her breath. ‘Dixon, what’s wrong?’ she asked him, the sight of the pixie in distress throwing her courage completely.
‘It’s the pollumification from all the rubbish up there,’ said Dixon, not a rhyme in sight. He began to gag.
The Nogmashers’ light was growing dim as the little purple creatures began to explode all over the place. The effects of the rotting rubbish above, staved off temporarily, were too much for them as well.
Ella froze. She couldn’t believe she had been so cocky and sure. How could she have forgotten the effects of pollution on pure Magicals? She looked at Dixon, whose legs had now given way entirely, and wanted to kick herself for being such a useless friend. Weren’t friends supposed to look out for one another? Hadn’t Dixon looked out for her every single day since he’d appeared in her solitary life? There she was, getting all carried away with how she was the saviour of everybody and such a special Flitterwig and all that, while her only friend in the world endangered his very life!
Charlie had been gazing down at his own miniature body in astonishment. Now he gave her a nudge. ‘Um, hello!’ he said. ‘Don’t we have some Dewdrops to find?’
Ella stared at him, and then back at Dixon, who had collapsed flat on his back.
What was she to do? A vision of the Queen, lying so frail and helpless inside the willow tree, flickered through her mind. Wrinkles’ face, all hopeful and helpful, flashed before her eyes. The words of the dewdroplets’ messages echoed in her memory.
What was she to do? What was more important? Was she supposed to leave Dixon in this dark tunnel, all on his own? She couldn’t take him with her any further, that was for sure. He needed help. He needed fresh air!
Suddenly Ella was just a little girl again (albeit shrunk to the size of a pepper mill). She was just a little girl, stuck at the bottom of a well with a strange boy who was shrunk to the size of a pepper mill too, and a creature she had thought was a figment of her imagination until he’d persuaded her that he was more, so much more than that. She thought of the other Magicals she’d met, still trapped here on Earth, getting weaker and weaker, just as Dixon was now. She must keep going. She had been entrusted with the goal of getting them all back to where they came from, and that was what she must do.
Dixon coughed. She knelt down beside him and touched his forehead. He was burning up! He was really ill.
Ella’s throat began to constrict and she struggled for breath.
‘Suck on your inhaler, you silly moo, poo, you,’ Dixon whispered with all the jollity he could muster.
Ella pulled her inhaler out of her pocket and took a puff. Air flowed back into her lungs. As she grew stronger, her mind became clearer. How could she possibly leave Dixon? Even as he lay on the ground, growing weaker and weaker, he was thinking of her.
She turned to Charlie. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she told him. ‘Dixon’s my best friend. And he’s been by my side every weird step of every weird minute of these last completely weird few days. I can’t leave him here. I can’t.’
In spite of his Protector’s instincts, Charlie was not sure what to do either. ‘But we’re nearly there,’ he said simply. ‘The Dewdrops are down there. You said.’
‘I know,’ said Ella. ‘But Dixon’s life is in danger.’
Dixon began to choke. Ella took his head in her hands and raised it off the cold, wet floor. Whispering a heartfelt ‘I’m so sorry’, she began to gather him up in her arms.
Charlie, understanding, edged around her and lifted Dixon’s feet. Together, he and Ella began to stagger towards the base of the well, carrying the now unconscious pixie between them. The smell of cinnamon and rain had all but vanished from the tunnel, and without the light of the Nogmashers, it was dark. Horribly, scarily dark.
‘I’m so sorry,’ Ella called out again, hoping the Dewdrops could hear her. ‘I can’t just leave him.’ She would love to save the whole of Magus, she really would. But she was just a little girl, and her first friend was helpless right now, and she needed to save him.
Suddenly there was an explosion of light. Up through the darkness and right along the dank, man-made cavity burst a shimmering sparkle of dewdroplets. Down the grey gloom of the tunnel they darted, filling the emptiness with their magical smell. Ella and Charlie dropped Dixon in fright.
‘Ooya! Watch it, you two! Rhymes with, um, poo,’ Dixon groaned, coming to. The dewdroplets formed themselves into a perfect miniature silver sheet of paper. On it were these words, sparkling in the dark:
Although so close to your quest’s end
You chose to save your pixie friend.
The final proof, dear Clearheart soul,
That love, not glory, is your goal.
This final test you’ve surely passed.
The Dewdrops’ trust is yours at last.
The dewdroplets shone once more, extra brightly, before gliding beneath Dixon. Gently they carried him off, like a patient on a stretcher, along the last slippery stretch of the tunnel towards the well and daylight.
‘Oh, clever magic!’ Dixon croaked as he disappeared. ‘Magicallymagicallymagic!’
Charlie shook his head about ten times and blinked to make sure he was seeing properly. Life was getting so stupid these days that he might as well resign himself to the fact. He looked at his miniature Protectee, and, putting his hands on his hips, said, ‘Now what?’
Ella was shaking with relief. Dixon would be all right now, she knew it. As she gave herself up to the dippy, happy feeling that magic’s presence always brought with it, she started to giggle.
‘We’re going down that ridiculous little hole to find the Dewdrops, I suppose,’ she said cheerfully, pointing back along the tunnel.
‘Okay,’ said Charlie.
Standing side by side at the edge of the drop, Charlie and Ella looked at one another, clasped their hands together, counted to three in unison, and jumped.
Ella’s hair billowed out, slowing their fall. A shoot of energy, a tremble so powerful it was almost painful, burst through her shoulderblades and made her arch her back in shock. She tweaked her ear and grabbed at the wall of the shaft until she caught something firm to hold on to.
Charlie let go of her hand, tried to grab it again, fell past her, but managed to seize her foot just in time.
‘What the heck are you doing?’ he called up to her.
‘There’s something coming out of my back, Charlie. It’s really freaky. There is something coming out of MY BACK!’ Her shoulderblades were on fire. ‘I can’t stop it. I need you to rip my T-shirt and get it out. NOW!’
Charlie couldn’t believe it. They were clinging to the sheer side of a bottomless black hole and she wanted him to rip her T-shirt! This Protector thing was very demanding.
Hauling himself up, he pulled at her T-shirt with a strength he didn’t know he had until there was a loud Rrrrip! and the fabric gave way. As it did, something gauzy but strong slapped him in the face. The something started flapping, and Charlie lost his grip again.
‘You’ve got wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiings!’ he yelled as he disappeared down the hole.
Ella threw herself after Charlie, head first. She g
rabbed at him as she swooped past, bending him almost in half and dragging him behind her. She was flying! She couldn’t believe it! She was flying!! This way and that she swooped, whirling wildly to the left, flipping weightlessly to the right, swirling here, fluttering there. She was about to try to right herself when she landed, smack bang, on a moving heap of slithering, slimy, scrambling creatures.
Ella squealed.
‘Don’t be a goose!’ Charlie yelled to her. ‘It’s just a bunch of water lizards. They eat rubbish. I learnt that at school!’
Remembering her wings, Ella fluttered upwards, finding her shattered bearings. Charlie ran on the spot so fast that his legs spun as a wheel might, keeping him upright.
‘Now what?’ he called out to her. The noise of water falling in sheets somewhere close by was deafening.
‘The smell of magic is coming from over there,’ she shouted, pointing towards the sound. Charlie nodded, and took off towards it like a rocket. Ella flew clumsily after him, the sensation of flight thrilling her to the core. She caught up with him, and found him balancing before a cascading waterfall.
Ella closed her eyes and flew straight through it. Charlie closed his eyes and followed.
Both of them opened their eyes. They gasped, spellbound.
There, in the darkness, the Five Sacred Dewdrops shone in all their splendour. They sparkled and shimmered, their magic too strong for the waste above them, their perfume far more powerful than any rotting stench.
Wide-eyed, Ella looked at the perfect, glistening drops, feeling a deep sense of honour to be their Earthly bond and guide. No wonder these were the most precious treasures of Magus. No wonder. She had abandoned them, but they had believed in her still. Why had they done that? Perhaps being the Clearheart was simpler than she had thought.
‘I’ve seen them before,’ Charlie said breathlessly, remembering the lightning bolt that had blasted through his barn. He stared at the Dewdrops in awed silence. They were marvellous. The size of his fist, and as smooth as glass. But it was the light they cast that stunned him, the pure light. It changed him forever in ways he would never understand.
‘I’ll take you to the Queen,’ Ella whispered, remembering her duty. ‘She is the Royal you must trust.’
The Dewdrops began to hum and spin. They spun around Ella, closing in around her, melding together, embracing her, until she was lifted off the floor and encased within one magnificent spinning sphere.
Charlie’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. ‘Cool!’ he sighed.
Ella threw her head back and breathed air into her lungs. She had never felt so fully alive. She reached out her hands. As her fingers touched the liquid walls of the encircling sphere, luminous sparks of electricity flew, and a gentle feeling of supreme accomplishment radiated through her, as though sent by the Dewdrops themselves.
The liquid rippled, making rings like the patterns left by a pebble dropped in a pond. And then an astonishing transformation took place. Ella began to take on the watery form of the Dewdrops. Smoothly, the more she accepted their energy, the more their liquid essence inhabited her body, until she was a perfect mercurial replica of herself.
Taking Charlie by the hand, she closed her eyes and dived back through the curtain of water. Across the lizards she flew, Charlie’s hand held firmly in hers, his legs flying out behind him. Up the dark hole, along the tunnel, into the well, through the water they shot, straight up into the sky.
Hovering for a moment to marvel at their lightness of being, Ella looked out over Snoppit Farm and across the valley to Willow Farm. Then, with a flutter of her wings, she flew down into the thick, dense growth of the Dell, towards the willow tree.
With a sparkle and a pop, Ella set herself and Charlie on the ground at the foot of the tree, just next to the pond. Instantly both of them returned to normal. At the same time the Dewdrops resumed their simple forms, flowing freely out of her and into the hole in the willow tree, one perfectly formed drop after another.
Ella heard the Magicals clapping and cheering, and she was sure that what she was feeling right now was definitely called happiness.
She looked at the pond, and saw that it was beginning to change. The waters of the Mirror of Foreverness were swirling in ever-decreasing circles. In the centre of the whirlpool a circle of still water, like a mirror, reflected the treetops and the clear blue sky.
‘I’ve lost my specs,’ said Charlie, groping about on the ground. Ella groped about with him. She wondered what Dribbles had done with her own spectacles, and it occurred to her that a whole night and day had passed and she could see and sense magic perfectly without them. Her hand touched something cold and hard – the specs.
‘Here you go,’ she said, wiping them down and handing them to Charlie.
Charlie put the specs on, and the Dell lit up for him like a town square on Christmas Eve. There were Funny Folk everywhere! They were coming out of the mirror in the middle of the whirlpool and jumping back in. He stood there, agog.
Wrinkles came up to Ella and threw his arms around her ankles in a grateful embrace. ‘The Dewdrops are with the Queen,’ he said, ‘and as you see, she has instructed them to re-open the Mirrors of Foreverness. They would never have been restored to us if you had not proven yourself worthy of their trust. How can we ever thank you, Clearheart?’
Ella blushed, and scuffed the ground with the toe of her sneaker.
‘Quite simply, we cannot thank you enough,’ Wrinkles continued, his freckles glowing warmly beneath his face powder. He pulled the hooped earring from his ear and handed it to her. ‘A small token of my personal gratitude,’ he said. ‘If you ever need me, just rub it and I will find you, wherever you are.’
Ella took the hoop shyly. ‘Thank you,’ she said.
‘I must get the Queen back to Magus quickly,’ said Wrinkles. ‘But I know Her Majesty will want to say goodbye in person, as will someone else with whom we are both acquainted.’ He nodded towards a small heap of leaves and blew her a kiss. ‘Thank you again, and goodbye,’ he said.
A wet, muddy Dixon, now quite restored to health, flung himself up from under the pile of leaves. ‘Aaaargh, haaargh, aargh,’ he sobbed. ‘I wasn’t going to say goodbye, little fly, because I just couldn’t, wouldn’t, shouldn’t. But, aaarrgh, haaargh, haaargh, I can’t leave you without a cuddle, muddle, my little fuddle-duddle.’ He threw himself back down on the ground in a paroxysm of grief.
Ella’s heart slipped up into her throat. Dixon couldn’t leave her! Not after they’d been through so much together!
‘Aaaarrgh, haaargh, haaargh,’ Dixon cried. He was lying on his face in the mud, so it sounded more like ‘Mmmmrgh, mmmmrgh, mmmmrgh.’
Ella’s heartstrings, pulled in so many directions lately, stretched to capacity as she lifted the little pixie up and wiped him down. He put his hands over his face and refused to look at her.
Tears streamed down Ella’s cheeks. ‘You are the bravest pixie I know,’ she whispered in his ear. Dixon peeked at her through his fingers. ‘And my best friend,’ she added.
‘Aaaarrgh, haaargh, haaargh,’ Dixon began all over again, tossing his head about and beating his chest.
Then he stopped. Just like that. ‘Oh, ditsy pixie,’ he screamed. ‘And noblin’ goblin!’ he yelled at Charlie. Charlie looked puzzled. ‘Gotta catch her tears, fears, cheers, m’dears,’ said Dixon, launching himself out of Ella’s hand, up the side of her dungarees and onto her shoulder. ‘Goodness Magical me, will you never learn, Ella-Bella? Very important, Clearheart tears. Must keep them for magic stuff, puff, enough!’
Ella couldn’t see a thing, her tears were coming so fast. Dixon stretched his arms around her nose and cheeks and squeezed with all his might.
A few paces away, as the gnomes, carrying the Dewdrops carefully in a silk bag, made their way towards the whirling waters of the pond, the Queen said farewell to Samuel of the Flitterwigs.
‘Samuel,’ she whispered, her strength already a little restored by the proximi
ty of the returned Dewdrops, ‘I was wrong about the Flitterwigs. For that I am sorry. You Flitterwigs are good folk who try as we do to protect the planet, and, Magic knows, the planet needs it now. There are some among you who have fallen, but there are those among the Magicals who have fallen too. And I realise now that you have saved and protected many of our kind on Earth when they have been in trouble. For that, I thank you. The Ban was wrong. I was too harsh. I declare here and now that the Ban is broken. I will announce this officially at the end of summer.
‘Flitterwigs are free once more to fraternise legally with Magicals. Use your powers and alliances wisely, however. I will never again permit Magicals to renounce their immortality, or Stretchify them so they can marry a human or a Flitterwig. I think that plain humans have altogether lost their capacity to see magic anyway.
‘I leave you with the task of capturing the Duke and Saul. I request this of you in return for lifting the Ban. But do not, under any circumstances, allow a Flitterwig to pass through the Mirrors of Foreverness. You must stop those who try, at whatever cost. That I ask of you always, Samuel, with trust and love in my heart. Only pure Magicals may pass into Magus.’
Samuel bowed his head respectfully.
‘And thank you, Ella, Clearheart of the Flitterwigs,’ the Queen said, flying over to Ella and resting like a butterfly in her palm. ‘Your powers are beyond even our understanding. We have a lot to learn about one another.’ The Queen looked into her eyes for a long moment, and Ella was transfixed by the kindness she found there.
With a gentle intake of breath, Her Majesty continued: ‘Wrinkles will Bamboozle your grandparents and your governess and the Snoppits, so they will remember nothing of the past week they don’t need to. We have decided not to Bamboozle your father, however. It’s time he remembered how precious you are.