The Piper's Price

by Audrey Greathouse

  “I stole it,” Gwen repeated, appeasing the woman. “I’m grateful anyway.”

  Dawn didn’t stop the engine or get out of the car. She pulled up to Tiger Lily’s house and said her stilted goodbyes to Gwen, neither one ever anticipating seeing the other again. Gwen thanked her for the haircut and clothes, because that was what the woman wanted to be thanked for.

  The dark luxury car drove away for the second time that day, back to the McMansion suburbia where it belonged. Gwen tromped up the squeaky stairs and knocked on the door to the trailer house before testing the knob and realizing it was unlocked. She walked in and found Tiger Lily cooking in the kitchen, listening to the radio. She didn’t hear her guest until the door closed behind her.

  When Tiger Lily turned around and saw Gwen—haircut, new jacket, smoky makeup, and all—she burst into laughter. Gwen couldn’t help herself—she laughed too. Foxglove came out from the spare bedroom at this jubilant sound, but she was unamused.

  “Oh, goodness,” Tiger Lily finally said. “Come tell me all about it. I’ve got peanut butter celery sticks.”

  Tiger Lily made fish for dinner, and Gwen kept her company in the kitchen, crunching on celery while the fish cooked. Foxglove listened too, eager to hear what she had missed and bored to tears after spending so long cooped up inside. She had a glob of peanut butter in her hands and munched on it as she followed their conversation. Tiger Lily had cleaned up from the book club and was happy to hear things had gone so well for Gwen, even if she did come home looking like a poster girl for twenty-first century fashion.

  “You don’t look bad—not at all,” Tiger Lily told her. “You just don’t look like yourself.”

  They ate dinner, and then lingered at the table. Irene had left her boysenberry pie behind, so Tiger Lily put on a pot of tea and they had a quiet, conversational evening over dessert. Foxglove picked berry pulp out of Gwen’s slice of pie while they chatted, and then tore open a tea bag so she could eat the dried chamomile flowers like candy.

  Gwen felt validated, breathing in Tiger Lily’s candid conversation and discussing Neverland with a grown-up who loved it. Her expressions were muted, but genuine, and Gwen appreciated her relaxed demeanor.

  As the evening wore on, conversation became harder. Gwen was only avoiding the inevitable. “So,” Tiger Lily finally asked, swirling her tea mug as if anything was left in it. “Are you going for the music box tonight?”

  Gwen nodded and stared at the blinds, wondering how long ago the night had reached absolute darkness. “I don’t see the point in putting it off another night. If I can get my hands on it tonight, we can send Foxglove back to Neverland to inform Peter we’ve got both the patch and the music box. It’ll probably be afternoon there or something.”

  “Sounds like good logic,” she agreed. “It’s getting close to my bedtime… Unless you need something else, I think I might just head to bed.”

  “I’ll be fine. I think I’ll do some reading until it’s late enough to head out. If I go too early, my parents might still be up and hear me creeping around.”

  Tiger Lily cleared the tea mugs from the table and put them with the other dishes on the counter, to be washed in the morning when she had energy. “I hope it doesn’t have any bearing on your evening… but it’s worth mentioning again—if anything goes wrong, if anyone finds you or tries to follow you, there’s no way you can come back here. I don’t know where to tell you to go if that happens. I would hide you if I thought there was any chance I’d be able to, but as soon as they catch sight of a flying child, they’ll probably investigate me again, even if they don’t follow you back.”

  Gwen pulled her legs up and sat with her feet on the kitchen chair, making herself cozy and compact as she took in this dismal fact. “I know. I won’t come back. I can fly anywhere. If they start to follow me, I’ll run until I lose them.”

  This speculation triggered a temper in Foxglove, who began sputtering all the horrible things she would do to anyone who attempted to apprehend them. She trilled so quickly, neither Gwen nor Tiger Lily could understand a single fairy word out of her tiny mouth.

  A smile crossed Tiger Lily’s face. “I’m glad you’re braced for that reality. I have confidence in you though. Fly high until you get where you’re going and keep Foxglove hidden in spider-silk.”

  On an affectionate impulse she didn’t question, Gwen leapt up from her chair and dashed across the room to hug Tiger Lily.

  “Oh!” Tiger Lily exclaimed at the sudden embrace, but she reflexively reciprocated. Gwen felt herself pulled closer and cherished the warmth of her hold. She felt the woman plant a fond kiss on the top of her head. “Stay safe tonight, Gwen, and have a good adventure,” she whispered.

  After Tiger Lily went to bed, Gwen and Foxglove prepared to take off. Gwen made sure the patch was zippered away in a secure pocket of her satchel, just in case she didn’t have a chance to return to the house. Foxglove kept herself busy punching a hat like it was boxing bag, psyching herself up with her violent energy before they left.

  Again, Gwen hovered an inch above the gravel and pantomimed walking to avoid crunching until she was far enough away from any of the dark houses to feel comfortable springing high into the air. Foxglove tucked herself loosely into the spider-silk jewel bag, and Gwen secured its ties to the strap of her purse. In her hand, she watched her phone’s GPS dot. She knew which direction her house was, and she knew how to get there on the roads, but she was too high to gauge the route in the dark.

  She felt like the trendiest girl who had ever taken to air. In dark blue pants and a cropped trench coat, she was an unlikely candidate for whimsical flight. The shopping trip had her confidence boosted in an unusual direction. Anything was possible. She could have a normal day at the mall and enjoy herself in a typical teenage fashion… somehow, that gave her a sense of power that translated into steady flight. Somewhere in the back of her mind, a thought rustled that suggested if the happiness she needed to stay afloat was derived by a shopping spree, she shouldn’t be flying. It stayed in the far pocket of her brain, and she was smart not to bring it forward and give it any credence while suspended in the air.

  Foxglove buzzed much along the way, which kept Gwen’s mind off the particulars of her own thoughts. She didn’t understand too much of it, but Foxglove was patient and happy to teach Gwen a few new words. By the time Gwen reached her house, she had figured out the fairy words for star and night, and had to shush Foxglove.

  It surprised her how strange her house looked from an aerial perspective. She’d seen a satellite view before online, but that hadn’t seemed real. It took her a minute to find it, and she grew paranoid as she descended. All the lights were off in the house, and she had no idea how she would break in. As fast as possible, she got to the porch’s awning and hovered over to her second-story bedroom window. She tried to trust what Peter had told her, but she found it hard to believe that her parents would still have her window open in December. How many times had she been scolded for leaving it open while the heaters were on, needlessly inflating the energy bill? They wouldn’t leave a window open through the night.

  Yet, they did. The window to Gwen’s bedroom was open and welcoming, waiting for her to climb back in as if she’d never left. Rosemary’s window was open just the same.

  She floated in and landed on her old carpet. It was an eerie sensation, visiting her room like a ghost. It was how she thought she would feel when returning from college—it was the only thing she could imagine comparing the feeling to. She didn’t live here anymore. She’d forsaken this room, and now it was as cold as the December night just beyond her open window.

  Still, it was home. She gave her desk chair a slight swirl and paged through the math composition book still on her desk. A draft of her persuasive speech for Mr. Starkey’s class sat beside it. How foreign this all was! When was the last time she had even written anything? Did letters on the shore of Neverland count, when she played hangman with Rosemary, racing against
the incoming tides?

  She lay down on her bed, neatly made—not at all as she’d left it. Her ancient stuffed lion was propped up on the pillow, his cotton compressed and body sunken from years of cuddling and squishing. He smelled like home—old cloth, her mother’s laundry detergent, and maybe even a bit like the house’s citrus-scented air fresheners.

  The house creaked and Gwen froze. She lifted back into the air, afraid that any little sound might wake her parents. She was on a mission and needed to keep her focus. Foxglove, now safely inside, was conducting a rapid search of the room. Although Anomalous Activity Department’s scanners wouldn’t pick up on her magic inside the confines of a house, she needed to keep in motion. If she was in one place for too long, she risked her trail of fairy dust compiling enough to be noticeable to the human eye.

  Gwen drifted to her closet. She hadn’t used the music box in a long time, but she knew she wouldn’t have ever gotten rid of it. Opening the folding closet doors as slowly and quietly as she could, Gwen then pointed to the top shelf and sent Foxglove up to illuminate it. Flying up, she had a view of her closet that she’d never had without a chair. “Aha,” she whispered as Foxglove flew past the ceramic carousel. Foxglove objected to the sculpture. It wasn’t a box. Gwen picked it up in both of her hands and turned it over to show her fairy the familiar crank on the bottom. Two of the horses were chipped and the device was covered in dust, but it was just as magical to Gwen as it had been when her mother gave it to her on that long-lost day of her fourth birthday. More magical, if Peter and Tiger Lily were right about music boxes and the effect the Piper’s song might have had on it.

  Gwen grabbed it, and then shuffled around until she found her spare cell phone charger as well. Her phone’s battery was wearing down quickly now that she was back in reality. She stuffed it in her purse, and then took the music box with her back out the window. Flying up further, she sat on the black-shingled roof and examined the music box. Foxglove, halfway tucked back into the spider-silk purse, cheered her on as she turned the crank.

  As it unwound, the four horses began their motion around the base of the carousel. They slid up and down as they circled, just like a real carousel. Gwen immediately recognized the song from her childhood, although she had never been able to name it. On a dozen different occasions, she’d sung made-up, gibberish lyrics to the tune, all as long forgotten as her childhood dream of being a pop star.

  Older now, she recognized the song was a waltz, but there was nothing special about it. She watched the porcelain ponies follow each other: the white stallion, the chestnut mare, the black beauty, and the pale pony. Foxglove, peeking out of the purse, hummed her disappointment. “I don’t know,” Gwen answered, only understanding her sentiment, not her words. “I know this is the music box, but maybe it needs some kind of prodding.”

  As the gears stopped churning and the music came to a stop, she thought back to what Peter and Tiger Lily had told her about music boxes. She decided to see what would happen if she added a little magic of her own.

  She turned it over and wound it again, this time with four hard cranks. As the music started, she asked Foxglove, “Can you dance to it?”

  The fairy wiggled out of the spider-silk bag and complied without question. She began waltzing through the air, spinning and twirling in a dance style unique to fairies. Like a ballerina, she glided and leapt, but stayed rooted in the space above the carousel. Gwen tore her eyes away from the enchanting dance to watch the glittering specks of fairy dust fall onto the music box. Those that touched it disappeared with a little flash. She hoped the magic was flooding into the gears, absorbed by the music box, but it was unclear whether it was working.

  The music slowed, and Gwen watched with disappointment as the horses’ mechanical prancing came to a stop. She sighed, announcing, “I don’t think it’s going to—”

  Foxglove flitted back into her spider-silk, sorry her dancing had achieved nothing, only to discover what was happening.

  The music box began to reverse itself. By Foxglove’s faint purple light, Gwen saw the carousel moving backward. It began just as slowly as it had spun to its end. Stray notes chimed in intervals of whole seconds, but the poles to which the horses were fixed began to twist, too. The horses spun counter-clockwise and started moving in the other direction.

  Not just moving, but prancing! The ceramic figurines, once glued into motionless poses, filled with life as their little legs stretched and reached for new ground. As they settled into a natural pace, so did the music.

  Gwen had a sudden desire to cry. There was something about the tune that moved her as she listened to the music box, chiming with a sweeter sound than the notes had carried before. This new song was no waltz, but an alluring, enchanting melody. Full of bright excitement, it remained calm enough to fall asleep to. It was an impossible mix of unadulterated joy and soothing tranquility. It agreed with what little she knew about the Piper—the sound begged her to dance and adventure off, but had her in a wistful, hypnotic daze.

  “It worked,” Gwen whispered in awe.

  The ponies came to a stop and resumed their solidified poses. They still faced the opposite direction. Carefully, Gwen slipped it into her satchel with the prince’s patch and the invisible thread from Irene. Foxglove cheered at this triumph, bouncing in the purse with glee. “Let’s go,” she exclaimed.

  “Wait.”

  Foxglove’s jubilant excitement came to a halt.

  Gwen cast a nervous glance back into the house. She could see her wall clock. It was nearly one in the morning, and with all the lights off in the house, she knew her parents were certainly asleep. They would both be in bed. Her mom might wake up to use the bathroom, and it was within the realm of possibility that her dad would tromp downstairs for a midnight snack, but neither of them would have any reason to be in her father’s office.

  Her father’s office, where he kept all his boring financial documents and work papers that Gwen had never had any reason to wonder about as a child.

  Foxglove was afraid of sneaking deep into a house, particularly one that had no children inside. Gwen offered to tuck her into the spider-silk bag and let her sit outside, hidden in the gutter, but that did not suit her either. The desire to find information that would help them avenge the attacks on Neverland was too powerful a draw for the vengeful fairy to say no to. She stayed tucked in the purse, tied to Gwen’s satchel.

  Gwen closed her bedroom door behind her, but other than that, she did not touch her house. With Foxglove’s diffused light from the purse, she flew through the hall and down the stairs, slow and silent. Eerie nostalgia crept up her spine as Gwen floated by, an intruder in her own home.

  A moaning mew startled Gwen, and she almost fell out of the air before she caught herself. Out of the darkness, a tabby cat came padding toward its estranged owner.

  “Hi, Tootles,” Gwen whispered, reaching down to pet the orange house cat. He purred as she scratched him behind the ears. Foxglove stayed safely in the pixie purse, out of the feline’s reach. Gwen shushed the purring cat, but felt as though she should apologize for her absence. Poor Tootles probably had no idea what had happened to the two happy girls who used to shower so much love on him.

  Gwen continued downstairs, but didn’t put her foot down on the carpet until she had closed the door behind her in her father’s office.

  She clicked the light switch on, acknowledging Foxglove’s buzz of concern. “If we don’t find something in five minutes, we’ll get out.” Her voice stayed hushed. “He works for the Anomalous Resources division. He might have information that’s valuable to us.”

  At no point in her life did Gwen think she would ever steal from her parents. However, whenever she conceptualized the idea, it looked like sneaking money out of her mother’s purse or raiding the wine shelf for an experience getting drunk. She had never imagined she could—much less would—try to steal information about fairylands from her father’s office.

  She scanned the papers
on his desk for anything of significance, but didn’t dare touch them for fear of adjusting them in some noticeable way. After that, she went to the file cabinet between his two massive bookshelves. If he had brought anything interesting home from work, it would be safely tucked away.

  She opened a metal drawer and started paging through the folders, most of them organized by date. After a minute of this, it became apparent that magic was a very small part of her father’s job. Magic was just another line item integrated into adult reality for him. Nothing interesting in his work folders appeared until she came across a file with a single document: a fifteen-page report titled Proposed Distribution of Neverland’s Resources.

  Gwen pulled it out and laid the unstapled pages on the floor. Too excited and apprehensive to read it, she only noticed a variety of keywords that seemed pertinent to her interests. She whipped out her phone and began snapping pictures of the pages, effectively scanning the document to read through later. Foxglove snickered from the purse, thrilled with this find. She tucked it back in its unmarked folder and continued searching to the back of the file cabinet. She found another document, Planned Resource Use for The Invasion of Neverland, and snatched it out of the file. Before she could start photographing it, the office’s phone started to ring.

  Foxglove screamed; it was a tiny noise, overpowered by the phone’s ring. Gwen shoved the document back into the file cabinet and closed it, less worried about noise now that the phone was ringing. She turned off the office light, trying to figure out where she could hide. The office was right underneath her parent’s bedroom… they would certainly hear the phone. They still had a home line and a telephone console capable of conference calls for when her father telecommuted. This was a work call, at three in the morning.

  She heard groggy footsteps hurrying down the stairs. Where could she hide? There was no furniture that could effectively cover her from any angle.