The Fairy Club

by Moshe Harel

  “I can’t be completely sure, as I told you. We may need to either study this some more or get some expert help, but it does look like the cause.”

  “I know of no experts,” I told them. “The elves may know a bit more, but runes are no longer used even by them except on rare occasions, so there’s no need for experts.”

  “So, what do you say? You already seem to be more of an expert than anybody else, except Dorna, maybe.”

  I didn’t need to think long of that. “Ella also noticed that this seemed misplaced. I think we should correct the power leakage and the curse as soon as possible. We should then learn how to write or carve runes, so we can correct or replace the filtering runes.”

  Dorna had a suggestion. “Carl is very proud of his ability to draw complicated designs. I think he could easily learn to write the runes correctly and do that work for you, unless you have a better candidate, of course.”

  “Will he be ready to come and join us here?” I asked.

  Dorna blushed. I had the impression that she liked the male pixie. “Would you like me to ask him? I may also need to ask our chieftain, but I think she would approve.”

  “Please do it. I’ll let Gran know of these finds and schedule emergency repairs. And Dorna—you should get some sleep. You look dead on your feet.”

  Dorna smiled. “I’ll go sleep for a few hours and then look for Carl after I’m rested.”

  While Dorna was sleeping, Gran was extremely glad about the result of her research. The fact that Ella and I also found the same problem made Dorna’s results more significant. That evening, when Carl joined us for dinner, Gran was all set to move things forward.

  I wasn’t sure how my parents would accept Carl, but this didn’t seem to be a problem. His willingness to share a bed with Dorna, although causing some well-meaning teasing, was accepted immediately, as it provided answers to both their urge for sex and their need for a sleeping space. Gran also promised Carl to help him go to school like Dorna and then help him into an art school. This gave him more than enough incentive to do well.

  It took Carl almost a week before he felt sure enough in his ability to correctly draw the two runes. Gran also took him on a few visits to Avalon, to see the rune stones himself and judge the work he needed to do. It then occurred to me that such a work might be dangerous if we don’t shut off the system for the duration of that work. Dorna was quick to show me the lock-down rune on one of the first circle stones. It was easily turned on or off by powering it with some magic from one side or the other. “Carl can do this before he starts working and when he finishes. As incorrect activation or deactivation of that rune can be very dangerous, I think nobody should be with him at those moments,” she said.

  “Don’t you think somebody should supervise his work?” I asked her.

  “While drawing the runes—of course, but not during these two phases. I would have evacuated the whole palace just for safety, although I don’t like the idea of leaving him alone with such potential danger.”

  “I’ll make sure you’re near enough to encourage him and support him. You already consider him your mate, don’t you?”

  She blushed. “We’ve not been magically mated yet, but I think he feels the same about me. Now that we can both live here on earth, it may turn out better for us in many ways. We can stay as each other’s sex partner and need no others. That would spare me some unwelcome reputation, although the boys I’ve been with until now were very discreet.”

  “If you both want it, you may copulate three times in our presence. That should make you mated, I think, as you’re still fairies. Don’t you agree?”

  “We are. We were warned to never sleep with the same male more than twice and have a different partner for each time if only we can. Being mated as a pixie is not good for the community. It does happen occasionally, so I heard.”

  “Then, if you decide to mate, it may be another innovation for the pixies,” I teased her lightly.

  “I don’t really mind. I no longer think of pixies and fairies as separate beings, only as separate communities. Do you think that’s normal?”

  I shrugged. “I’m not one who can judge, with my life being anything but normal either as a human or as a fairy, but as long as you feel like part of a community I think it should be alright.”

  Gran took Carl to the Fair Palace a few days before Christmas. Dorna went with them. Gran made sure that none but the guards stayed in the palace and then accompanied Carl to the rune circles. After making sure he knew exactly which stone to tap and where, she flew out of the palace, taking the guards along. She only waited a short while before she got Carl’s thought message, ‘System down. Starting working on the runes.’

  Dorna rushed at his side. Both had learned thought messaging as part of preparing for the task, although I was sure they would use it for some fun later. She helped him for about an hour until both considered the corrected runes spot on. She then flew out, joining Gran at a safe distance. ‘We’re ready,’ she told him.

  There was no change one could see or sense, yet a moment later Carl messaged, ‘System up. All seems to work fine.’

  Gran sent the guards back to their stations as Carl came out, smiling widely at Dorna. Without uttering a word, they flew up and started copulating, in full view of Gran and the guards, until they got shrouded in a golden mist. They landed in front of Gran smiling widely and holding hands as soon as the golden mist disappeared.

  “Did you plan it that way?” I asked the new couple after Gran finished telling me of the expedition.

  Dorna smiled. “I didn’t dare do anything before he finished working on the system, knowing the dangers of releasing unexpected magic erroneously. I had no reason to wait when it was over. Besides, the magical mating of two pixies at the Fair Palace makes a kind of statement, don’t you agree?”

  “Yes, a very bold and strong message, that we are one and the same, without uttering a word. I like this kind of message. Let me also congratulate you. Now, do you know if it worked out as expected?”

  Carl didn’t hesitate. He quickly transformed without preparation. He still retained his very attractive proportions. His penis looked only slightly larger than in human form, but well within the safe zone. Brian did it next, and I joined them a moment later, along with Dorna. A few seconds later we were all copulating in the air. That was how Bob and Elrica found us.

  “Is there any reason for this unexpected celebration?” he asked.

  “Try to transform, no preparations,” I told him.

  Bob frowned but did as requested. His surprise and delight were evident, especially when Elrica joined him celebrating just the same way we were, only a few minutes earlier.

  I still wasn’t sure about the power runes and I couldn’t think of a way to test it, although I trusted Carl to have done an excellent job there too. A few hours later I found out.

  Gran came out of her room, looking confused. “I just got a message that the log records are being filled at unprecedented speed. Normally, we need a new logbook every few months. Now it looks like we may need two or three each week. Do you think something went wrong?”

  It was evident that the message had awakened Gran. She wouldn’t normally sound so confused. “I think it all went perfectly fine. The system is now correctly powered and it finds all that would have been missed before. We may consider some larger logbooks, though,” I told her with a wide smile.

  She gave it a thought and then chuckled. “That’s a kind of mixed blessing, you know. We need to make some urgent changes to accommodate the new logging efficiency, but that’s good news, actually.”

  It also spelled good news for the fairy elders. The male and the female elders congregated at the Fair Palace and after a short session found no reason to stay two separate organizations, reuniting both genders in one elder council.

  When we celebrated the new year with our families, even my parents felt a kind of new hope for a better future. Of course, Dorna and Carl were there,
as part of the family.

  40 Changes

  With some of the major problems that had plagued the fairies for too many generations solved, I could finally leave fairy stuff aside, most of the time, and concentrate on being a mother, a wife, and a student. Gran enlisted the help of some gifted fairies to solve the filtering problem and some others to check all faded or worn runes and suggest corrections. Evidently, after her experience with Carl, she wanted nobody else to touch the runes.

  I enjoyed watching Tracey growing up, gaining more control of her mind and body, learning new things, and starting to talk. She was smart enough to comment on my growing belly. “Mommy fat?” she asked.

  I hugged her and tried to explain. “Mommy wants to bring you a brother. Just like you, before you were born, he’s growing inside my womb, as he’s too small to come out. When he’s big enough, he’ll come out and you will become his big sister. At first, he’ll be very small and weak. He’ll need a lot of help and I trust you to help him along with Mommy and Daddy. I’m sure he’ll adore you when he grows a bit bigger.”

  “Mommy brings baby for Tracey?!” she concluded. I nodded and she moved happily to play some more.

  Our studies were also reaching the summit, as the final exams were coming nearer and our grades could influence our future after graduation. Luckily, nobody expected the students to organize a graduation ball. The faculty shouldered that task, intending to let us enjoy it after the graduation ceremony. Yet that ceremony seemed to stay at the horizon. We had homework, quizzes, seminary works, and some independent studies, all scheduled for the end of June and the first week of July—exactly the time our boy was due to arrive.

  We were lucky to get help with Tracey. Some younger students were willing to babysit when Ella and Emily couldn’t. Even Gran was able to come once in a while and spend a few hours with Tracey, times we used for short vacations at Avalon.

  I didn’t think of it initially, but I then realized that our short vacations totaled in roughly a month. That meant that our boy would be early a month and come at the worst time, considering our exams. It was already May when I realized it, leaving me no options to move the date in either direction. Then, a few days into June, my water broke in the middle of an exam.

  The labor pains were still far apart, so I hurried to finish the exam and left the hall with half an hour to spare. Brian was already waiting for me with my maternity bag and an ambulance. I barely made it to the maternity ward when the birthing proper started. An hour later I was already breastfeeding Nick, our newly born son, whose official name was Nicholas.

  Gran arrived another hour later, seeming out of breath. Kathy arrived moments later, bringing Dorna with her. Gran only checked me over, staying silent, and then disappeared, returning a few minutes later with Mom. Only when they all left, about an hour later, I started wondering how they were even allowed in. Evidently, some magic was used, and not only for travel.

  Luckily, I had no other exam that week, and I was fully recuperated (although with a big sleep deficit) by the time I had to be present for the next exam.

  I would never understand how I managed to stay sane those last few weeks of the academic year. With Nick at home, Tracey was also waking up a few times each night and we had to calm both children before being able to go back to bed. Brian did more than his just share in caring for the children but only I could breastfeed.

  We still managed quite nicely. Although not getting the top grades in each and every exam, we were among the top five, which was more than I dared hope, once I found out when the birth was due. At least we had a few weeks of relative rest between the last exams and graduation.

  And it really was only relative rest. We had no chance to even contemplate finding jobs, as Gran had already informed us that the summer’s fairy club would be the biggest ever, although there would be quite a few instructors to share the burden. I didn’t want to even think of that. I only wanted to sleep. I gave up sex almost completely, lacking the energy for it. I couldn’t even escape to Avalon while still breastfeeding. I just didn’t know what to do and nobody seemed to have any advice for me.

  Then, it was Dorna who came up with an idea. It seemed so strange at first but turned out to be a lifesaver. “I can breastfeed your baby and let you rest and regain your powers for the club,” she said.

  “How can you breastfeed? You’re not lactating. You can’t just push your nipple into his mouth, you know.” I may have been more forceful than needed, but I was desperate.

  She smiled, not minding my tone. “We can use magic. If needed, we can urge my breasts to produce milk, but that may not be necessary. We can just direct my body to take the milk from your breasts. That way you can sleep or teach or even enjoy some sex while your milk flows through me to your baby.”

  It took me a while to switch mental gears. Her idea was fantastic, but could we do it? I then remembered Gran’s words at the end of the first fairy club. I could imagine it and I could even visualize it. All that we needed to do was to make it happen. “Are you sure?” I asked her.

  She shrugged. “It’s not as if I’m going to replace you. You’re still his mother, he will still suckle your milk, only it will come out of me, but I can give you some peace for a few hours each day. It’s nothing in comparison with what you’ve already given to me. Now would you like to cast the magic or should I do it?”

  As much as I trusted her, this was my baby and my milk. “I’ll cast it.”

  Magically speaking, this was quite a simple feat. Once done, I could still feed Nick as usual, but if Dorna put him to her breast, he could suckle there and I felt my milk being extracted. Dorna seemed to like it. She caressed his little hands and face as if he was her own. Once he let go of her nipple, she moved him to her shoulder and burped him like an experienced mother. That prompted me to ask, “How are you so knowledgeable about babies? You’re not a mother yet, are you?”

  Dorna blushed. “No, I’m not a mother. I only started enjoying sex a few weeks before joining the club. I used to help other young mothers, though. I’ve liked babies since I can remember and didn’t mind cleaning them if needed, although pixie babies don’t smell as bad as human babies.”

  She then had a question for me. “Do you mind if I let Carl suckle a bit? It won’t be enough to reduce what your baby gets, but I like it when Carl sucks my nipples.”

  I felt a bit enticed by her words. “Fine, as long as you don’t exaggerate, although your milk may have a slightly different taste when the time comes, or so I read.”

  Dorna’s solution helped me save my sanity. I slept for two whole days, only waking up at night to breastfeed. I was then able to pay attention to Gran’s lesson plans. I was overwhelmed by the numbers she had written there: we had to expect more than five hundred students, almost equally divided between the genders. The numbers were not final as the system, that had been upgraded while I was busy with my studies, was still finding several new fairies each day. That number was way above what we had experienced before, but it showed how badly the system had worked before we intervened.

  There were actually twenty locations for the club, each with its own team of instructors, but they were all connected through the Internet so that some lectures would be given by us to all groups at once, also enabling each student to ask questions and get answers online. I also noticed that the group we had as our own included twelve pixies, six of each gender, and twenty fairies of both genders, making our group the largest, yet even the smallest group was larger than the largest group we had instructed until then.

  Luckily, Gran could handle most of the preparations, with the help of some fairies from the first and second clubs. Kathy also wanted to help, but as she was heavily pregnant with her second child, Gran declined her offer, asking her only to give the same lecture as the previous summer, which proved very successful. Ella helped willingly, treating it like some kind of game and enjoying it.

  Our graduation ceremony was bland in comparison with all that we had
experienced since starting college, but our parents were still highly excited. Mom held Nick during the ceremony (with Dorna ready at her side, just in case) and Margaret enjoyed Tracey, despite her multitude of questions. Our two years daughter was becoming so inquisitive that we could barely answer all her questions. I doubted anybody could.

  We only had a token presence at the ball, exchanging some pleasantries with the faculty staff and with our closest friends before excusing ourselves home. We had a club to start the next morning.

  We dislocated to the club’s location. It was a large office in a building in the commercial zone. There was no mall nearby this time, although we hadn’t had much use of the malls the previous times. My first impression was, ‘It’s big!’ Each of the three rooms we were using was about three times the size of the rooms in our previous clubs. Also evident was a large screen at the front of the classroom and a smaller one at the back, with a television camera under it. A portable computer was set on the desk that was tucked at the corner, I remembered Gran telling us, “You’ll get the instructions for using this when we get there.” Gran was already waiting for us. She’d been busy for quite some time, I could guess, as she was leaning at the computer and talking, probably with someone at a remote site.

  She smiled as she saw us. “I’m glad you’re early. There’s still a lot to do until we face the new students. Have you managed to get some sleep?”

  “Oh, we slept quite well, only Tracey decided to wake us early. She’s probably caught up in the excitement of our graduation and then the club.”

  “I thought Nick . . .” Gran started.

  “Dorna took care of Nick. Has she told you about it?”

  She frowned. “Was there anything to tell?”

  I smiled at her. “Dorna suggested a way to free me for other tasks while allowing Nick to be breastfed with my milk.”

  “Are you pumping out some milk?”