The Faerie Ring Dance

by Kara Skye Smith

  bothering her, and warned him in a ladies voice to keep

  his distance. He said he wouldn’t stay, and grumbled

  something about her sheep’s wool’s price. Honor didn’t

  want to talk any further with the incorrigible and

  extremely unlikable man, so she let go his last comment

  knowing he’d meet his match about that with Blithe.

  She tried not to look in his direction but listened rather

  to his footsteps as they led away; however, she could not

  keep from looking once the sound was closer and she

  ‘felt’ along her arms, the sense that someone approached,

  with what caused goosebumps to form - she turned

  quickly and caught sight of a fox, standing on only two of its legs, watching her with wild, yellow eyes, taking

  very small steps toward her, just one at a time.

  Honor gasped at the sight of the bright colored

  fox. She held her breath, it stepped again. Honor

  jumped back, crouched, but on her feet, in case she had

  to run. Her eyes now wide and wild, too, with fright,

  the fox and Honor stared at each other. It took another

  step toward her and she cried, but the thing refused to

  move away. In fact, a strange and eerie music filled her

  ears at the sound of her own cry; and, Honor sworeshe

  saw a faerie, but then again, a fox.

  “Narn?!” she called. There was no answer, and

  the faerie fox stepped rubbing its tail that curled over its

  shoulder, as though a fine lady wearing a stole.

  “Are you a faerie?” she asked, and suddenly two

  light colored wings glimmered, then disappeared. It

  stepped out from the shadows into an opening, lit by a

  moonbeam, in only the shape, and color of a fox.

  Honor stepped back, “Don’t come any closer!” she said, and heard it snarl a sort of taunting purr, in the

  yip and snarl of a fox.

  “Narn?!” she said again, in its playfulness she

  wondered if faeries, or pixie gnomes, in the woods

  sometimes play like foxes. In fact, they do, but only the

  Twelyth Teg when bad magic and enchantment has run

  amok, enticing humans without a care of whether the

  human’s bad or good or prayed for back at home to enter

  through the door at any hour. Honor heard another

  noise behind her and turned around. A wolf this time,

  though small, stood playing a fiddle, on two legs it

  pranced, lightly, to its tune. Honor, out of fright,

  nearly fell into delirium. Her knees felt weak, her mind

  light-headed from the sound, and her feet began to

  dance.

  That night, Blithe must have cried and prayed for

  Honor to return, because in the end, the enchantment

  didn’t keep Honor entranced; yet, the father of poor,

  young Einion Gloff did not fair so well, with no one at home to care. Caught up into the dark enchantment,

  found just steps away from Honor McGillicutty, Einion

  Gloff’s father is surrounded by the band of faeries

  making up the legend of the Twelyth Teg. With

  glowing eyes and dark, sticky green - which at night,

  under the moon appears like the black of night, the Old

  Soul’s Goblin, joins their magic, having sent the kind and

  harmless band of faeries in the opposite direction,to look

  for Honor where he knew she wasn’t to enter the capture

  of Master Gloff!

  Honor did remember seeing faeries, too, among

  the animal faces which played the tunes. They become

  intense, changing from faerie form to animal faced shapes

  and back again. Music and the playful sounds of yips

  and howls filled her ears and moved her feet, spinning

  her around, her arms held up, and then around again,

  until Honor was whirled right out of their circle and fell

  against the trunk of a tree which caught her fall. The

  only thing she saw, or remembered after that was seeing Einion Gloff’s father, danced wildly off within the

  center of the goblin and faeries playing their strange

  music and turning magically into animal shaped faces

  then back again to faeries as they danced. Playing eerily,

  the playful forms turned dark and frightening whirling

  him off, deeper into the forest an obvious sign that a

  dark magic also lurked within the forest Honor loved. As

  they left Honor, she fell into a deep sleep at thebase of

  the tree. No one was there, to pull Einion Gloff’sfather

  out and stop his dancing. And so it went, that hewas

  never seen, nor heard from, again in Old Soul’s Hollow.

  In later years, it was rumored that the only thing left of

  him was a hill of dust, or ashes, found right outside a

  ring of grass that grew more green than the other grass

  in the Hollow, beneath the Yew tree, across the half

  moon shaped clearing from the tree known in Old Soul’s Hollow as the Six-Shaped Tree.

  The Faerie Ring Dance

  Chapter Twelve * Humans and Faeries Don’t

  Mix

  As with most who’ve made a bad decision in

  acting most unkind, Blithe was given a second chance;

  her prayers were answered, and Honor returned home.

  The goblin, sent word with an owl, once the Twelyth

  Teg had Einion’s father carried off, as to where the band

  of rescuers could find their Miss McGillicutty, sleeping in

  the Wood, at the base of a tree. I woke her, gently, and

  sent the others home with a word of thanks as message

  to their Faerie Queen. Honor awoke apologizing for the

  drama and the worry she had caused us all, and I spoke

  to her as though I weren’t as worried as I was,

  convincing her that after a good sleep in her own bed

  and some chamomile tea she’d feel right as rain, bouncing back to her old self, quickly, once again. Neither of us

  mentioned Blithe, at first, and when we did we both

  burst out laughing from the feeling that being ‘in trouble’

  brings. We were glad we’d got that out, between us,

  before we even thought of walking home. The giggles

  would not have gone over well in front of Blithe.

  “Even though I’m the one out here, I can’t

  imagine how Blithe made it through the night!” Honor

  exclaimed.

  “I’m sure we’ll hear about it - every minute!” I

  added.

  “You think you will?” Honor said, “I will! You’ll

  get to go home. I suppose I’ll have to hear about it for

  days.”

  “Nevertheless, we’ll be home, and happy together

  again. Shall we?” I asked extending my tiny hand in jest,

  unable to actually help her up to standing due to the

  limitations of my size. “Indeed, sir,” she answered, “we must go and face

  our music, courageously,” she said.

  It was quite the opposite of what we’d both

  expected once we arrived inside the gates of the

  McGillicutty home. Blithe had seen her own ghosts that

  night, as she’d termed it, but never quite told either of us

  just what she’d been through. Instead, she insisted on

  drawing Honor a hot bath. She made tea with a squeeze

  of Meyer’s lemon to keep away the cold that could

  follow a night out in the wilderness. She broughtHonor


  freshly ironed bed clothes to change into after her bath

  and saw that she take an entire day in bed, leaving

  reading material on her bedside table and a small lamp lit

  in the corner of the room. She checked on Honor a

  number of times that made us both realize she felt

  downright guilty about Honor’s distressful night. The

  uncharacteristic ‘sweetness’ from Blithe put both Honor

  and I at ease that things would be quite back to normal

  between the two McGillicutty’s, although never again so for Honor and her sewing machine man.

  “He just didn’t believe in faeries,” Honor blurted

  out right before I decided to tell her I was going to

  return to my own little home.

  “I know,” I said, “and for that we can not blame

  him, I suppose.”

  “No,” Honor said, letting the ‘o’ sound trail off

  as she looked out the window.

  “There’ll be others,” I whispered, “suitors, you

  know.”

  “Will there?” she asked, knowing why I

  whispered, as not to set Blithe off again.

  “There will,” I said with encouragement, and

  then I saw myself out and went home to my pond and

  my house, thinking about when I’d see Blossom again.

  Wishfully, I thought about how she and the

  McGillicutty‘s really might have become friends,

  knowing she would have liked them without such a

  scene. I waited two days, then I just couldn’t resist

  calling upon Blossom at her home - the Old Soul’s Tree.

  Her father, answered the door and instead of allowing

  my request to talk to Blossom, he told me I required his

  counsel instead. In the room off the kitchen with the

  chestnut shell stove, and a few of his best friends - the

  birds - he lit his pipe of elderberry leaves, sat back in his

  chair, and looked down at me before he spoke.

  “You’re new, here, so I won’t be quite as harsh

  or even as judgmental - as I would have-” he began,but

  the wren, in a comfortable chair, interrupted twirling its

  tongue in a shrill, but melodic sound, and turned its head

  away as if to say, ‘tsk-tsk‘.

  “No,” he said, “this is some place you don’t come

  from, and something you won’t know. Blossom, and all

  of my children, at this grand tree, are forbidden -”

  I began to interrupt, but he continued to talk,

  growing louder, right over the top of my attempted

  explanation, “inanyway, of interacting - whatsoever the disaster - with the,” he cleared his throat, “thehumans!”

  Again, I started to speak but the same bird,

  interjected sounds again of, “Mm, mm, m!” and looked

  right down its beak at me.

  “It’s a no-no, here,” the wren said.

  “I know that,” I responded.

  “Now, I know this might sound as though I’m

  being quite unfair, but as I said, these terms are not as

  harsh as if you’d been from around these woods for many

  years - you’re going to have to stop seeing Blossom, as

  well, any of my other children altogether.”

  “Uuu,” I sucked in my breath. My mouth hung

  open, just a bit, and I blinked.

  “Is he alright?” another bird asked Blossom’s

  father.

  “He’s fine,” the warbler said.

  “He’ll get over it,” Blossom’s father blew out a

  ring of the old elderberry pipe’s smoke, then asked me, “Youare, alright, aren’t you?”

  I couldn’t speak. Tears filled my eyes, but I

  willed them not to fall. I didn’t want the birds, or

  Blossom’s father, to see me cry at all.

  “You lied!” I wanted to scream, “that is much too

  harsh!” I wanted to say; but instead, I nodded and saw

  myself out, just as the tears spilled over my lashes and

  rolled down my cheeks where I wiped them off with my

  sleeve. My throat burned with the words I’d held back

  and my heart felt like a lump in my throat. I left the

  grand, old tree - where I’d once been proud to be a

  friend, filled with the idea of someday living inside as a

  full-fledged member of the faeries shunned only

  because of my good intentions.

  I would have sulked and cried my eyes out, if it

  hadn’t been that Honor, back home at my pond, was

  found sitting near my little house, doing just those two

  things - sulking and crying, both at once. It was then,

  that I set off to inquire at the Faeries’ Ring - if the Queen would be kind enough to listen - about a human

  enticement, allowing Honor to be brought inside the

  Faerie’s Ring on the night of the full moon and the

  occasion of magic and merriment to celebrate The

  Hunter’s Moon.

  “An intervention,” I explained after nearly a two

  hour wait to see the Queen.

  “To mend her heart,” the Queen agreed, and then

  she said, “at Narn’s request!” She stamped the papers in

  her hand while the finely dressed faeries in the room

  made sounds of gleeful affirmation; and, several repeated

  the words of their Queen in a rousing murmur, “to mend

  her heart!”

  “It just so happens,” said the Queen, “another

  human has been brought to our attention. A suitor,

  maybe?” she asked, and then she looked at me and

  winked! I smiled, and I think I even blushed a bit for

  during that wink, a tiny spark of the most adoring and

  esteemed magic struck the air and filled my heart with the knowledge that I had brought Honor’s sorrow to a

  most fair and reverent Queen.

  “He will be traveling quite a distance, known to

  be back in the North Woods after a long absence,”

  she told the group, “word sent from the fairies who live

  near his cabin further up into the hills, past the Deep

  Wood’s Clearing,” and then her voice lowered a bitand

  became more serious, “theTwelyth Teg,” she said.

  I was excused after discussions with instructions

  from the Court and Queen, herself. I was not to

  mention anything to Honor and to lead her to the

  Faerie’s Ring letting the enticement of the faerie’s music

  coax her inside, as the faeries had a superstition about the

  kind of human who would like to step inside their ring.

  Rather nervous about whether I could carry out these

  plans as given, I instead assured the Queen, repeatedly,

  that I could. I set out for home wishing Blossom was at

  my side to help me understand the firm beliefs the faeries

  had. As it turned out, I didn’t need much help at all.

  Honor called me over to the house to tell me she’d

  planned to go out - picking wild mushrooms, at the peak

  of the harvest, under the Hunter’s Moon. I was

  thrilled when she told me she’d seen some growing in the

  clearing near the Six-shaped Tree. Then, right before

  we left that evening, as the moon rose in the not yet

  dark, night sky, Blossom appeared to tell me she was

  sorry for the words her father had said. She didn’t agree

  with him and had argued with him until he’d alteredhis

  opinion, ever so slightly, but
only about the humans

  Narn knew, he’d said. So, the three left the house as the

  full moon rose and the day gave way toward nightfall.

  “We won’t be in need of a lantern, tonight,”

  Honor said, “we shall work ‘by the light of the moon’.”

  And with three pails we set out to gather wild

  mushrooms in the clearing near the Faeries’ Ring - or so

  Honor thought! Instead, we met the Queen! And

  Honor met Michael McDonnell. While the two engaged each other in conversation about the Six-shaped Tree, I

  climbed into the carriage of the Queen, an honor it was,

  too, to be by her side. We watched Honor while the

  faeries’ music started up to entice the

  two, ‘Come and dance inside the faeries’ ring!’.

  Honor watched in amazement as Blossom stepped

  over the ring of grass more green disappearing from

  Honor and the other human’s sight. Honor gasped and

  so Michael McDonnell turned his attentions away from

  the Six-shaped tree to gaze upon the lovely Honor, now

  the loveliest maiden in Old Soul’s Hollow.

  “What?” he asked and Honor pointed.

  “Look!” she said and Michael and her caught

  sight of the tiny, regal carriage of the Queen’s. The

  music had caused Michael McDonnell to kick up his heels

  and even charm Honor into sharing a dance, but as the

  magical tinkle of the tiny carriage bells crossed over the

  edge of the faerie ring into the realm from where the

  enticing music drifted and the last of the tiny players (of lute, flute, and fiddle) stepped inside its green, grass

  edge, Michael McDonnell grabbed the hand of Honor

  McGillicutty, swift and firm, and stepped too close to

  the edge, disappearing, himself, from Honor’s view. His

  eyes grew wide with wonder and the enchantment of all

  that he saw in the magical world inside the faerie ring.

  But, Honor, grew afraid and pulled, hard upon his wrist

  and arm. Out he stepped, appearing, again, to Honor,

  but disappearing from the magic of the faeries’ realm.

  “Come on!” he implored, smiling at Honor which

  melted the fear she’d felt before and inside they both

  went for the night of their lives filled with faerie magic, music, and unparalleled merriment inside the faeries’ ring.

  The Faerie Ring Dance

  Chapter Thirteen * A Magic All its Own

  As the night in all its fantastic sights and sounds