by Lou Anders
And a figure stood upon the backs of the unhappy kelpies, one foot on each.
Jack o’ the Hunt had returned!
“What are we going to do? What are we going to do?”
Curious ran back and forth across the small space of the raft. He had never been on the water before, and only in the water once. And he didn’t want to go into it again.
“Stop rocking the boat!” said Midnight, who was beginning to snort fire as her panic grew.
“Well, don’t you burn it down!” said Curious. “Then where would we be?”
Pumpkin Jack sang out:
“In the drink
Where you will sink.”
“I wasn’t asking you!” shouted Curious.
“Have no fear, horses,” said Tom, “for the fairy folk have never once set foot upon Poor Mad Tom’s raft.”
This was true. Indeed, Curious and Midnight saw that although Jack was very close now, almost close enough to hop onto the raft, he didn’t. He stayed put upon the backs of the kelpies.
And the way he scowled and grimaced and glowered, it seemed that Jack wasn’t very happy about it either.
But before Curious, Midnight, and Poor Mad Tom could feel anything approaching relief, Jack snapped his fingers on both his hands and two large pumpkins rose up behind his shoulders, swaying on their vines like the heads of fat orange cobras. Jack thrust his hands forward and the pumpkins shot forward.
They sailed through the air, striking Poor Mad Tom’s raft.
Poom! Poom!
The two pumpkins splattered their messy orange guck all over the raft. It was gross. It looked like someone had thrown up a really messy upchuck. But also, it set the raft a-rocking. And maybe one or two of the planks of wood looked like they had been shaken loose.
Jack snapped again. More pumpkins flew.
Poom! Poom! Poom!
“Oh, yuck!” cried Curious. He wasn’t used to being dirty, and while all new experiences should be beneficial to the Scientific Mind, still this one wasn’t very fun.
Midnight could handle the muck and the yuck a little bit better, being a night mare and not a unicorn, but she knew they had other problems.
“He’s tearing up the raft!” she shouted.
“Poor Mad Tom will fix it,” cried Tom, and the boy pulled a hammer from a basket and began rushing about his craft. He drew nails from his pocket, and he drove them into the wood, hammering the planks back in place.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
But…
Poom! Poom! Poom!
Pumpkins came faster and the raft broke apart more quickly than Tom could repair it. In the water, the kelpies laughed. They might not like being ridden very much, but they would enjoy the chance to drown these two pesky ponies. Oh, yes, they would.
But Curious was watching the nails. He’d never seen such devices. And he was Curious, after all. So he took one in his teeth, and he set it on the wood. He raised his hoof.
“Not that way,” said Tom, because Curious had set the nail upside down. “You’ll drive it into your hoof.”
Tom took the nail and turned it around, showing Curious that the point went into the wood.
Curious stomped on the nail hard and drove it into the plank.
Then he took more nails in his teeth and stomped on them as well. Midnight saw and joined in.
But Poom! Poom! Poom! went the pumpkins.
Tom and the horses were getting tired. The pumpkin fairy wasn’t. Or at least he didn’t show it.
And for all their stomping and hammering, the raft was still coming apart. Things were getting quite wobbly on the River Restless. And they were going to get worse.
Only that’s when the music sounded.
Rich, loud, beautiful notes piping through the air.
Sailing on the river. Coming toward them.
A three-headed swan.
That’s right. Three heads.
It was the biggest swan you ever saw. As big as a ship, because it was a ship. On its back was a giant rose made of crystal, as large as a house.
The great glass petals were all curled up, like a flower at night, but they were opening now.
Someone was standing in the rose. A bunch of someones.
They shined, they glowed, they radiated light. And one shone the brightest of all.
“It’s her,” said Curious, smiling in awe. Which is to say respect, but also fear and wonder.
“Her?” said Midnight. She turned to Curious, who had that dopey “we’re saved” adulation on his face. And she turned to Tom, who had taken a knee, but didn’t look quite as happy. And she guessed who was coming just as Curious explained.
“Her,” said the unicorn. “The fairy queen.”
“Her?” said Midnight, straining her eyes to see. “Do you mean behind the little girl?”
“Um, no,” said Curious, embarrassed by Midnight’s remark. “She is the little girl. That’s the queen of the Court of Flowers. Queen Titania.”
“Oh,” said Midnight, who didn’t understand.
I bet you don’t either.
I bet you were expecting someone beautiful and golden.
Well, Titania was beautiful and golden.
She just looked to be about five years old.
Now, don’t be fooled. Queen Titania wasn’t five. Or fifty-five. Or even five hundred and five. She was way older than that. Older than the world. Older than time. She wasn’t even a creature of time at all.
But however old she might be or not be, she was very, very, very powerful.
So she could look however she wanted.
And lately, she wanted to look like a child. Which meant that all the fairies in her court had to change their appearances too. Because no one could look older than the queen.
So they were all five, or slightly younger, because she had to be the oldest.
And the thing about looking five is that sometimes you acted five too.
So Titania stamped her feet and puffed out her cheeks in exasperation.
“Jack, Jack, Jack,” she said. “Naughty Jack. Chasing one of my unicorns.”
“Jack didn’t think that you would mind.
This unicorn had left its kind.
And as you know Jack has a need,
To ride upon a burning—”
“Shut up, Jack,” said the queen. Which wasn’t a very queenly thing to say. But she was angry. “Go back to your wicked woods.”
She clapped her hands. The three-headed swan flipped a giant webbed foot, and a wave rose up and swept Jack across the River Restless, depositing him on the far shore.
Curious wondered what Jack had been about to say. What rhymed with “need”?
But he didn’t have much time to ponder, because a crystal staircase was forming from the flower petals down to the edge of Tom’s raft. Titania descended the staircase, followed by her fairy court.
But when she tried to set a glass-slippered foot on the raft, she yelled, “Ouch!” and drew back.
She snarled for a moment, paused, and smiled sweetly.
“Tom,” she said.
“Yes, mum?” Poor Mad Tom replied.
“We see you’re still using nails in your boat,” she said.
“They hold the boat together, mum,” the boy explained.
“They burn our feet,” said the queen. “You don’t want our feet to burn, do you, Tom?”
“No, mum. But the boat is my home.”
“It doesn’t have to be,” said the queen. And she put on her most endearing smile. “You could come back to the palace with us.”
“The palace, mum?” said Tom. A look of fear filled his face.
“Yes,” said the queen. “You liked it there, didn’t you? Didn’t I always put you back together again after I took yo
u apart?”
“What does she mean?” Midnight whispered to Curious. But maybe she whispered a little bit too loud, because the queen scowled at her.
“Oh, look. A little black horsey. You’re like a shadow that doesn’t know to hide from the sun. Shall I shine my light on you and brighten you up, little horsey?”
“This is Midnight,” said Curious hastily. “She saved my life. Several times.”
“Did she, now?” said the queen. “Well, we’ve returned the favor.”
She nodded to one of the three swan heads. It reached forward with its beak and plucked Midnight right off the boat, lifting her into the air.
Midnight kicked and struggled as she found herself higher in the sky than she had ever been.
“Stop squirming,” said another swan head. “You’re all slippery with pumpkin guck. You don’t want us to drop you now, do you?”
Midnight was deposited right onto the crystal petal platform. She stood there on shaky legs, dripping pumpkin goop, looking around nervously at all the childish fairies.
The queen marched up the staircase.
“What an ugly little pony you are,” she said.
Then she called to the swan heads looming over them.
“Well, what are you waiting for? Bring the other two as well.”
A swan head plucked Curious off the raft, lifting him high into the air. As he swung in the bird’s beak, the horseshoe slid from his horn and clattered to the floor of the raft. Curious had a nagging feeling he should have tried to catch it. But too late. It was gone.
At least for now.
Then another swan head reached for Poor Mad Tom, its beak opening wide. But before it could capture him, the boy ducked and held his nails aloft. The swan head hovered above him, as if it was afraid to approach any closer.
Curious thought this was most curious. They were just nails, after all. And yet the queen had complained about them.
“Tom,” she said, stamping her foot. “Come aboard my boat.”
“Thank you, mum,” said Tom in a very polite voice, “but I must decline your hospitality.”
The queen gave a little pout. “Don’t you want to see all the changes I’ve made to my palace?”
“I’m sure they’re wonderful, mum,” said Poor Mad Tom. “But it’s the changes you might make to me I’m rather worried about.”
“Oh, Tom,” said the queen with a sigh. “Don’t be like that. You know, we always put something in you in place of whatever we took away.”
Curious and Midnight saw Tom quake a little at this, but then the boy seized on the queen’s words.
“That’s just it, mum,” he said. “My raft has lost parts too. I’ve got to put it back together now. It needs fixing, you know.”
“Fine,” said the queen with a little stamp of her little foot. “Be that way. I have other toys to play with now anyway.”
She waggled her fingers and the swan flipped its webbed foot again. Poor Mad Tom was nearly capsized as his broken raft was caught in a large wave and sent bobbing wildly down the River Restless.
Curious and Midnight were alone with the not-children fairies and their childlike queen. She strode up to them and stroked Curious’s neck.
“There, there, little pony,” she said. “You’re safe now.” Her eyes were adoring. But they held a selfish little twinkle.
Then she turned to Midnight, her hand poised to touch the night mare. Midnight stiffened. The fairy queen was no friend to the creatures of the Whisperwood.
“Little wicked horsey,” said the queen, “I bet you have a story to tell. Shall I make you tell it?”
“Tell us your story,” the queen said. “The story of the ugly little pony.”
Well, that wasn’t nice, was it? Normally Midnight wouldn’t stand for it. But she was on a strange ship, in a strange crystal flower, surrounded by strange and powerful fairies. She was really very out of her element. And somehow Curious had been separated from her.
Midnight saw him a little ways off, amid a cluster of smiling childlike fairies who seemed excited to play with a unicorn. The rest of the court fairies were milling around tables piled high with sweets, stuffing their faces with cupcakes and marshmallow treats, sugared rose petals, and bowls of shaved and flavored ice. But all the fairies perked up at the queen’s words.
“Ooooh, a story,” the not-children called. “Tell us a story! Tell us a story!”
“Story?” said Midnight. “There’s no story.”
“No story? Boo!” jeered the not-children. “Boo! Hoo! Boo!”
“Of course there is a story,” continued the queen. “There is always a story. Everything is a story. Tell us, little shadow mare, why are you on a boat on the River Restless with one of my unicorns? What nasty thing were you planning to do to him?”
“Nothing,” said Midnight. “I wasn’t doing anything nasty.”
“I find that hard to believe,” said the queen. “I don’t like hard things.”
This made Midnight feel quite put out.
“I don’t care what you believe,” she said. And all the not-children gasped. They weren’t used to anyone talking back to the Queen of Flowers.
“In fact, I was saving him,” continued Midnight.
“Saving him?” said the little queen. She laughed a high, childish laugh. “You’re an ugly little liar.”
“I am not,” said Midnight.
“Liar, liar, hooves on fire,” taunted the queen.
“Stop it,” said Midnight. But actually her hooves were on fire now. She stomped angrily and a little jet of flame shot out across the deck of the swan boat.
Several of the child fairies jumped away at this, but the queen didn’t even blink.
Then a cupcake sailed through the air and smashed Midnight in the flank. The queen turned an angry eye in the direction it had come from.
“Who threw that?” she demanded.
The not-children looked at their feet and didn’t answer.
“Who was it?” said the queen.
One of the swan heads suddenly dipped to their level.
“It was the Duchess of Daisies,” the swan head said.
“Stupid bird,” said a little not-child with daisies in her hair.
“I am not,” said the swan. “I’m very smart.”
“Anyway,” the Duchess of Daisies continued, “it was only because Baron Buttercup told me to.”
“You tattletale!” hollered a little not-boy who was clearly the baron. “I’ll get you for this!” He snatched a chocolate cupcake off the table and hurled it at the duchess.
It missed.
And struck the Marquis of Marigolds.
He grabbed an entire tray of marshmallow custards and threw them into the air.
The Prince of Primrose and Lady Lilac got the worst of it. The prince began to cry, but the lady grinned like a maniac and yelled, “Food fight!”
“Food fight?” said the first swan head.
“Yes, food fight!” said the second. Then the head snatched up the bowl of shaved ice and upended it over a group of not-children.
“Phbtttttt!” went the third swan head, blowing a raspberry. Then it threw some real raspberries.
Midnight ducked and dodged as the creamy confections flew through the air.
“Watch it!” said Curious. But anytime he got splattered, his shiny coat just sloughed off the sweets in seconds. By the moons, he was irritating!
Meanwhile, Wartle took the occasion to poke out from Curious’s mane, where he had been hiding from the queen—remember, she didn’t like puckles very much—to snatch sweets as they flew by. And occasional marshmallows.
“Gobble, gobble, gobble,” said Wartle happily.
“Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!” yelled the queen.
She stomped her f
eet and shook her fists.
But things didn’t really stop.
Not until a big creamy pie caught her in the face.
Then you could have heard every one of the not-children’s hearts beat. If they’d had hearts. Which I don’t think they did.
Everyone waited to see what the fairy queen would do.
She stuck out a tongue and licked at her cheek.
“I would have preferred strawberry,” she said.
Then she waved her hand and all the sticky sweets flew from everyone’s faces and clothing and from the floor and from the railings and banisters and from the swan’s feathers. And it all went right back onto the table and reformed into all the desserts that were there before, and maybe even a few new ones. And everyone was clean.
Well, everyone but Midnight. Midnight was still sticky and covered in goo.
“I apologize for my courtiers,” said the queen to the two horses. “The problem with looking like children is that everyone decides to act like them too. But never mind, here we are.”
Curious and Midnight saw that the swan boat had stopped on the bank of the River Restless. A little ways offshore there was a wood. But not a nasty and gloomy wood like the Whisperwood. The Willowood was a green and golden wood without any underbrush or prickly thorns or dangerous creatures at all. A wood where the golden light of the sky never failed to shine between the tree limbs, and it was always bright and sunny.
“There you go, uni-boonie,” said the queen. “You’re home. You’ll find your herd frolicking at the Glen of the Golden Goose.”
Curious was relieved to be home.
“You may thank me now,” said the fairy queen.
“Um,” said Curious.
“You’re welcome,” said the fairy queen.
“Er,” said Curious.
“What is it?” said the fairy queen.
“Well, it’s just…what about her?” Curious pointed a hoof at Midnight.
“What about her?” said the fairy queen.
“She needs to get home too.”
“Home?” said the fairy queen.
