by Gwyneth Rees
‘That’s right. Tooth fairies always work in pairs and each pair covers a particular sector. Bonnie and I collect teeth from all the houses in the sector you live in, but for the last few weeks, whenever we’ve arrived to collect a tooth, it’s already been taken. None of the children has seen the fairy who took it – until last night. That’s why we’ve come back to question Izzy, to see if we can get a description that will help us.’
‘I thought it was mums and dads who took children’s teeth and replaced them with coins,’ Lucy said. ‘I even saw my mum come into my room to do it once!’
‘Oh, well . . .’ Goldie looked a bit shifty all of a sudden. ‘That’s because we play a trick on the mums and dads, you see.’
‘A trick?’ Lucy and Izzy said together.
‘That’s right. You see, a lot of grown-ups don’t believe in fairies, so they think that if their children leave a tooth under the pillow, no fairy will really come and take it. And they don’t want their children to be disappointed, so they come and take the tooth and put a coin there, which they pretend is from us.’
‘But what really happens,’ Bonnie continued, ‘is that if we know a mum or dad is going to interfere like that – and nearly all of them do – then we come and take the tooth away before the mum or dad does, and we leave a false fairy tooth in its place for the mums and dads to exchange for their coin. We leave a gift too, of course, but not under your pillow.’
‘What sort of gift?’ Izzy asked.
‘Something good for the next day,’ Goldie said. ‘It might not be a big thing. It might just be a little thing. But if you look out for it, you’re bound to spot it.’
‘What sort of thing?’ Izzy wanted to know.
‘Well . . . one time we collected a tooth from a little girl who loved ice cream,’ Bonnie said. ‘So the next morning an ice-cream van was in the park when she went there with her dad. That ice-cream van wasn’t usually in the park in the mornings – normally it was only there in the afternoons – but we made the driver decide to change his route that day.’
‘A little boy who left us his tooth found a book in the library that he’d been wanting to read for ages but couldn’t afford to buy,’ Goldie said.
‘One girl saw a whole lot of baby rabbits when she was out walking in the country with her grandma – that made her really happy,’ Bonnie added.
‘Something good always happens the next day to children who leave us their teeth,’ Goldie finished. ‘Only now, all the teeth are getting stolen, which is terrible, because it means we can’t take them back to Fairyland to make them into—’
‘Goldie! ’ Bonnie warned her sharply. Goldie put her hand over her mouth in alarm.
‘We’re not allowed to tell humans what we do with all the teeth we collect,’ Bonnie explained quickly.
‘Oh, please tell us!’ Izzy begged. ‘We won’t tell anyone else, will we, Lucy?’
‘We can’t tell you,’ Bonnie replied. ‘And we really must get on with this interview now. First, I’d better write down the names of all the witnesses. It’s Izzy, Lucy and Teddy, right?’
‘Well, my proper name is Isobel,’ Izzy pointed out. ‘And I’ve got three teddies. This one’s proper name is Fat Bear. Not that it really matters, I suppose.’
‘Oh, but it does matter!’ Bonnie exclaimed, carefully writing down their names in sparkly gold handwriting.
‘Our fairy queen likes everything to be done properly, you see,’ Goldie explained. ‘She says it’s very important that tooth fairies do everything properly because they have such an important job. That’s why we can’t go around acting all fluttery and scatterbrained like the other fairies.’
‘Like what other fairies?’ Lucy asked curiously.
‘All the other fairies besides tooth fairies! Take flower fairies for instance – they can be very fluttery, especially if it’s a breezy day and there’s a lot of pollen in the air. Then there are book fairies. They’re less fluttery and more sensible like us, because they have to stay indoors a lot and look after all those books. But they still don’t work as hard as we do, because books aren’t always falling out at unexpected moments the way teeth are. As for dream fairies, well, they go around with their heads in the clouds all day long!’
‘I’ve seen other fairies a few times,’ Izzy said. ‘Once I saw one on my window ledge.’
‘I expect that was a flower fairy,’ Bonnie said. ‘Flower fairies spend a lot of time checking people’s window ledges to see if anyone’s left them any chocolate.’
‘Do fairies like chocolate then?’ Lucy asked in surprise.
‘All fairies love chocolate!’ Goldie replied. ‘Though our fairy queen makes us brush our teeth straight away after we eat it. Flower fairies don’t have to, and their teeth aren’t nearly as shiny and white as ours.’ As she spoke, she pulled something out of a pocket in her dress, which Lucy and Izzy immediately saw was a tiny gold toothbrush.
‘Is it a magic toothbrush?’ Izzy asked in an awed voice, because the bristles seemed to be sparkling.
‘Of course it is!’ Goldie said, laughing as if she thought the idea of a fairy toothbrush not being magical was extremely silly. ‘Now then . . .’ She waved the brush in the air for silence before beginning the interview with her first question. ‘Isobel, can you describe the fairy you saw removing your tooth from under your pillow last night?’
‘Well . . . she definitely had on a sparkly gold dress,’ Izzy answered, still staring at Goldie’s toothbrush. ‘And I think her hair was dark brown – like Lucy’s.’
‘Long or short?’ Goldie asked.
‘Sort of shoulder length, I think.’
‘Curly or straight?’
‘Straight, I think. Or maybe a little bit wavy.’
‘What colour eyes?’
‘I didn’t really notice her eyes.’
Goldie turned to Lucy. ‘What about you? Did you see what colour her eyes were?’
Lucy shook her head. ‘I didn’t see her at all.’
‘Lucy didn’t even believe in fairies until tonight,’ Izzy reminded them.
Frowning, Goldie turned to Izzy’s teddy for help. ‘Did you see this fairy, Fat Bear?’
Everyone stared at the toy bear, and Lucy and Izzy found themselves half expecting him to suddenly come to life and start talking.
That didn’t happen, but Goldie seemed to be getting some sort of answer from him, just the same. ‘I see,’ she said gravely, after listening intently for a minute or so. ‘Well, that’s very helpful. Thank you, Fat Bear.’ She turned back to the others. ‘Fat Bear didn’t see the colour of her eyes either, but he noticed that the fairy in question was wearing red boots. She actually trod on him on her way to the pillow, which is what woke him up.’
‘Did my teddy really tell you that?’ Izzy asked in disbelief.
‘Toys can’t speak out loud, but fairies can listen to their thoughts,’ Goldie explained. ‘And his thoughts are telling me that the boots were red and shiny with high heels and that the fairy trod on his tummy and didn’t even say, “Excuse me”.’
‘A rude fairy with red shiny boots!’ Bonnie had put down her gold pencil and was staring at Goldie in alarm.
Goldie nodded. ‘I know. It does sound like her, doesn’t it?’
‘Like who?’ Lucy and Izzy demanded together.
‘Like a tooth fairy we know called Precious,’ Goldie told them. ‘She used to live with us in Tooth-fairy Land but she got banished a while ago for being bad. Nobody’s seen her since. We thought it might be a flower fairy or a dream fairy who was taking the teeth, but it’s been her all along! She must want to stop us using them to make—’
‘GOLDIE! ’ Bonnie bellowed.
Goldie quickly clamped her hand over her mouth again.
‘Come on,’ Bonnie told her impatiently. ‘We’d better get back and report our findings to the fairy queen.’
‘Maybe we can help you catch this bad fairy,’ Lucy said, because she had suddenly had an idea.
‘How?’ Goldie and Bonnie asked together, pausing in mid wing-flap.
‘I’ve still got nearly all my baby teeth locked away inside my jewellery box,’ Lucy told them. ‘If you wanted, I could leave them under my pillow to make Precious come back again. Then you could wait for her in my bedroom and catch her.’
‘That wouldn’t work,’ Goldie said quickly. ‘Precious would pick up our scents.’
‘Your scents?’
‘A fairy can always smell when another fairy’s nearby,’ Bonnie explained. ‘But there might be another way we could use your teeth to catch Precious. We’ll speak to our fairy queen and come back tomorrow night to tell you what she says.’
And with that, the two fairies flew out of the window and vanished.
The following afternoon, Thomas and Grandpa arrived having already had an argument in the car.
‘It wasn’t just Thomas’s fault,’ Lucy’s dad was saying to her mum as Lucy walked into the kitchen that evening. ‘Of course Thomas is excited because he hasn’t seen me for a whole month and he’s got lots to tell me. But you know my father! He had plenty to say too – including the fact that in his day children were seen and not heard! He told Thomas off for interrupting him, so after that Thomas made a point of interrupting him even more. I did suggest that since they both wanted to talk so badly, they should try having a conversation with each other and leave me to concentrate on driving – but that idea went down like a lead balloon!’
Just then, Thomas hobbled into the room behind Lucy, leaning heavily on Grandpa’s walking stick and doing a very good imitation of a grumpy old man. ‘Spare the rod and spoil the child, that’s what I say!’ he growled, shaking the stick at Lucy and pulling a very Grandpa-like face.
They all laughed, but then they heard Grandpa shouting that his stick was missing, and Dad sighed and said, ‘You’d better go and give it back to him, Thomas.’
Five minutes later Grandpa and Thomas could be heard arguing loudly again because they wanted to watch different things on TV.
‘Thank goodness it’s nearly bedtime,’ Mum said, sounding tired. ‘Come on, Lucy. I’ve already made up the spare bed for Grandpa, but I need you to come and help me set up Thomas’s camp bed in your room.’
Later, when the children had gone to bed, Lucy waited until her parents had gone back downstairs before telling Thomas everything that had happened the previous night. When she had finished telling him all about Goldie and Bonnie and the bad fairy called Precious, who had stolen Izzy’s tooth, she added excitedly, ‘So we were wrong about tooth fairies not being real. It just seems like it’s your parents who take your tooth away!’
But Thomas responded by laughing at her. ‘Nice try, Lucy, but I’m not that much of a sucker.’
‘I’m not trying to trick you, Thomas!’ she protested. ‘Fairies are real! If you believe in them, even just a little bit, then you’ll be able to see them too. They’re coming back tonight after they’ve had a talk with their fairy queen.’
‘In your dreams, Lucy,’ Thomas grunted, turning on to his side to go to sleep.
Lucy stayed awake for as long as she could, waiting for Goldie and Bonnie to return. But eventually, when they still didn’t come, she found that she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer.
It was the middle of the night and Lucy was sound asleep when Goldie and Bonnie finally flew in through her bedroom window, accompanied by a third fairy, whose wings were much bigger and shinier than theirs. The new fairy wore shimmery white trousers (that were exactly the same colour as the whitest, glossiest tooth enamel), a matching white jacket and dainty white boots. Her long golden hair was coiled up on top of her head and she wore a gold crown made from little tooth-shaped gold droplets. In one hand she held a golden toothbrush with bristles that sparkled and, as she flew across the room, she waved the toothbrush over Lucy like a wand, releasing a shower of golden dust over Lucy’s head.
The dust seemed to be a waking spell because, as it touched her skin, Lucy opened her eyes and was instantly alert.
The fairy smiled at her, then flew off to wake up Izzy.
‘Goldie! Bonnie!’ Lucy gasped as she spotted the two fairies hovering above the camp bed where Thomas was sleeping.
‘Who’s that?’ they asked, peering at him curiously.
‘My brother – he doesn’t believe in fairies so there’s no point waking him up,’ Lucy said. In fact, she had a feeling it would be better not to wake him, judging by the way he had reacted when she’d told him about the fairies. ‘I’m so glad you came back,’ she added. ‘I was starting to think you weren’t going to!’
‘Queen Eldora wanted to make sure all the grown-ups in the house were asleep before we came,’ Bonnie explained. ‘That’s why we’re so late.’
‘Queen Eldora?’
‘Our fairy queen. We told her about your teeth and she decided to come and meet you. She was the one who woke you up just now.’
‘That was Queen Eldora?’
‘That’s right. She’s fetching Izzy so she can interview you both herself.’
‘You tooth fairies seem to have a bit of a thing about interviewing people,’ Lucy said, yawning.
Goldie and Bonnie giggled. ‘Interviews and meetings are Queen Eldora’s favourite things,’ Goldie told her.
Izzy came into the room then, followed by the fairy queen, who was lighting up the darkness like a torch with the glow from her shining wings.
‘I am Queen Eldora, queen of the tooth fairies,’ she said. ‘But I expect you already know that.’
Lucy nodded and Izzy couldn’t help blurting out, ‘You don’t look much like a fairy queen.’
Queen Eldora laughed. ‘Did you expect me to be dressed up in a big frilly frock, waving a wand about all over the place?’
‘I don’t know exactly,’ Izzy replied. ‘But my fairy-queen dress is pink with silver stars on it. And my wand has a flashing light and it plays a tune when you press the button.’
Queen Eldora laughed again. ‘Well, tooth fairies have magic toothbrushes to wave instead of wands.’
‘I think you look really cool,’ Lucy told her quickly.
The fairy queen smiled at Lucy. ‘Thank you. Now . . . I hear you have some teeth that you wish to give us. Is that correct?’
Lucy nodded. ‘I didn’t believe in fairies before, so that’s why I’ve still got them,’ she explained.
‘Thomas said she should make a necklace out of them,’ Izzy put in, ‘but Lucy didn’t want to.’
‘I should think not,’ the fairy queen said. ‘Using teeth to make jewellery is a terrible waste.’ Lucy noticed that, although Queen Eldora had tooth-shaped droplets in her crown and a trouser suit and boots that were exactly the same colour as tooth enamel, she wasn’t wearing any real teeth as part of her outfit.
‘What should teeth be used for then?’ she asked curiously.
‘That’s for fairies to know and children to guess at,’ Queen Eldora replied briskly. ‘Though if you help us, we might tell you.’
‘Of course we’ll help you,’ Lucy said. ‘I’ll get you the teeth right now – there are six of them!’
As Lucy got out of bed and went over to her dressing table, Queen Eldora turned to Goldie and Bonnie and asked in a teacherish voice, ‘So what sort of teeth do you expect these to be?’
‘Incisors!’ the two younger fairies chorused immediately.
‘Excellent!’ the fairy queen said, smiling at them. ‘I can see that you have both been paying attention at your tooth-fairy lectures.’
Lucy unlocked her jewellery box and took out a little blue pouch, which she brought back to her bed and carefully tipped up.
‘Don’t let any teeth touch your pillow,’ Queen Eldora warned her.
‘Why not?’ Lucy asked.
‘Everything will be explained to you later, but first I must examine these teeth,’ the fairy queen replied, flying down on to Lucy’s bed where she touched each of Lucy’s teeth in turn with the bristles of her fairy
toothbrush. Each time she did so, the handle of the brush lit up. ‘These are very fine teeth,’ Queen Eldora pronounced when she had finished. ‘They could be of great use to us.’
‘How—?’ Lucy started to ask, but she was interrupted by Izzy.
‘Lucy, look!’
And that’s when Lucy saw that Thomas had woken up and that he was lying very still on his camp bed, his eyes wide open, watching her.
Before Lucy could speak, Thomas sat up in bed and said, ‘You are totally mad, you know that?’
‘Wait!’ Lucy gasped as Queen Eldora flew away from the bed towards the window, beckoning Goldie and Bonnie to follow her. ‘He can’t hurt you! He doesn’t believe in fairies so he can’t even see you!’
But Thomas was already getting out of bed, looking like he wanted to join in the fun even though he couldn’t actually see the fairies. ‘Who says I don’t believe in fairies?’ he teased, grinning as he watched Lucy quickly scoop up all her baby teeth from the bed. ‘These are tooth fairies, aren’t they? Well, tell them I’ve got something for them!’
‘Where’s he going?’ Izzy whispered as their brother left the room.
Over on the window ledge, Queen Eldora, Goldie and Bonnie were all starting to shiver, despite the fact that it wasn’t cold, and Lucy suddenly remembered what Izzy had told her about fairies getting goosebumps when they stayed in the same room as a child who didn’t believe in them.
‘Thomas has been here the whole time, so how come you haven’t got shivery until now?’ she asked them.
‘All children believe in fairies when they’re asleep,’ the fairy queen answered matter-of-factly. ‘We’ll come back tomorrow night, Lucy. Keep those teeth safe until then.’
‘We will!’ Lucy and Izzy called out together as the three fairies flew off into the night sky and disappeared.
As Izzy rushed to the window to look out, Lucy went to lock the teeth back inside her jewellery box. She was just returning the key to the top drawer, where she kept it hidden under her socks, when Thomas came back into the room with something in his hand.
