Starfell: Willow Moss & the Lost Day

by Dominique Valente

  “This must be it,” she breathed. She tried the door, which was locked, then walked around to the back of the house, going past an assortment of old, discarded furniture. It looked like no one had been here for years.

  The back door was off its hinges, and after a bit of struggling she managed to wedge it open.

  Inside, the house smelled of damp and neglect. It was getting dark, but she could just make out signs of what had once been a family home—an old mustard-colored sofa with a broken leg in one corner, which birds had used as a nest. On the walls, she saw portraits of little old women and men all with white hair, and a young boy smiling while holding up a plant. She stopped to peer at it closely. Now that is unusual, she thought. The plant had funny blinking eyes. Was this who Moreg was referring to . . . ? She walked down the hallway, stepping over discarded bits of crockery and brushing against dusty curtains and disintegrating furniture. Whoever had lived here seemed to have left many years before. . . .

  She peered into a bedroom, which looked like it had belonged to the boy’s parents. There was nothing in it besides an old, sagging bed and an empty wardrobe. She left and went through the last door, then stopped. For just a second she thought she had left the house and walked into a garden. But on closer inspection she realized it was another bedroom, though it was filled with dozens of large pots containing curious plants, which sadly seemed mostly dead now. Their spots and fur had faded, the strange-colored leaves shriveled. One of the walls was covered from floor to ceiling in pictures and sketches of even more plants. Wherever she stepped, her foot crunched dried leaves, feathers, and flowers, and in the corner, the only nod to its being a bedroom at all really, was a single wooden bed.

  She crept closer to the wall covered with pictures. They showed unusual-looking flowers and plants of all colors, shapes, and sizes, with messy handwritten notes in the margins—such as a hairy yellow plant with what looked like bushy eyebrows over odd catlike eyes. A note next to it read “Likes shade. Feeds on old spiders.” There were blue and gold plants, which according to the notes sang lullabies that put children to sleep. Others were translucent and looked like they had been dipped in watercolor paint. And on each sketch at the bottom was a note about where the plant was from.

  It was a collection, she realized. Whoever drew these was interested in the most extraordinary, perhaps even the most magical plants.

  The biggest drawing, however, was in the center of the wall. It was of an enormous pale blue tree. Each branch had different-colored blooms.

  Suddenly she was nine years old again, hiding away in the attic, hiccuping as she cried big angry sobs, because her mother had said that she couldn’t go with her sisters to the Traveling Fortune Fair.

  “She doesn’t love me like she loves them, that’s what it is,” she told Granny Flossy, who had followed her up the stairs and had taken a seat next to Willow on an old bench.

  “Nonsense,” said Granny. “She loves you very much.”

  “Then why can’t I go?”

  “Because yer too young, child. Those fairs aren’t what you think they are—dark places, some of ’em. Creepy, trust me. ’Tis no place fer a child.”

  “Juniper went at my age.”

  “Juniper is different; she could take care of herself.”

  This was true. She could blow things up. Not like Willow. “It’s because I don’t have a power like hers. She’s embarrassed by me. . . .”

  “No, I don’t think it’s that exactly. I think she’s afraid that if you’re not here, I’ll blow the house up again.”

  Willow snorted and couldn’t help a small smile from forming. There was that. Though to be fair to Granny Flossy, it hadn’t been the whole house. Just a big part of the roof. And the spare room. And there was that time that she smashed all the windows in the greenhouse.

  “Tell yer what—why don’ I make us something special? Something you can’t get at any fair?”

  Willow sniffed. “Like what?”

  “Like maybe . . .” She peered into her hairy old green carpetbag, tapping her chin, her lime-green hair swinging in front of her face. “Eternal youth?”

  “So that I can never go to the fair?” scoffed Willow. “That won’t exactly help me, Granny.”

  “Right, right, that one’s tricky anyhow. . . . Last time it went a bit wrong.”

  Willow raised a brow. It had gone very wrong, actually. To be honest, most of Granny’s potions went more than a bit wrong. There was the time when Mrs. Crone-Barrow developed that beard . . . which kept growing back no matter how much she shaved.

  “Ah!” said Granny. “I know, we’ll make the Perfect Sunday Afternoon,” she said, pulling out a big glass jar full of strange green and gold pie-shaped blooms. She opened the jar, and the scent that wafted over to Willow smelled sweet and delicious.

  “What’s that?”

  “These are apple-pie blossoms—they’re a key ingredient.”

  “Apple-pie blossoms?” exclaimed Willow. She’d never heard of such a thing.

  “Oh yes. You get all sorts of strange things growing in the magical forest of Wisperia. Even the trees are different colors. . . . You know, they say that’s where the magic hid when the Brothers of Wol tried to rip it away during the Long War. . . . Anyway, it’s the only place these flowers grow, on the Great Wisperia Tree itself. You can’t miss it—it’s the biggest of the lot and it’s a really strange pale sort of blue. Never seen anything like it. It grows all sorts of things . . . but keep that between ourselves, right? Can’t have everyone knowing my secrets . . . and where to get the best plants and ingredients. . . .”

  The potion hadn’t really worked. It had caused Willow to skip and sing for days, but they’d had a pretty good Sunday anyway.

  “Wisperia,” breathed Willow now. The largest, most magical forest in Starfell. Of course. It made sense. Few—apart from mad people like her granny—ever dared to venture there. It was an unpredictable place with magic fizzing about—they’d all heard the stories of people who’d come back changed as a result. Hooves for feet, hair that turned to flames, leaves for fingers . . .

  It was supposed to be beautiful, and colorful, but it could be dangerous too—especially if you didn’t know what you were looking for. It sounded like the perfect place someone who didn’t want to be found would hide. . . .

  She stared at the picture of the tree, and then looked at the others, noting that most of them had the same handwritten note at the bottom. “Wisperia,” she breathed again, touching one of the pictures. “I think that’s where he’s gone . . . and where we’ll have to head to next.”

  There was faint gasp from the bag. “Oh no.”

  9

  The Dragon’s Tale

  “I JES’ DON’ wanna go back to the Cloud Mountains. Yew don’ understand. . . . ’Tis not right . . . all these big rocks dangling in the sky wiff nuffink around them. . . . ’Tis creepy, and yer eyeballs don’ works. . . . I means, I like the dark . . . but I like the dark whens you can’t also falls off. . . .”

  “The Cloud Mountains?” asked Willow, looking at him with a frown. “But—that’s not where we’re going.” She stopped, then grinned, taking out the StoryPass, which just then pointed to “One Might Have Suspected as Such.” Oswin turned from green to orange, clearly a bit angry at himself as it dawned on him at the same time as Willow said, “Oh—because that’s the way to Wisperia, isn’t it?”

  In answer he put a paw over his eyes, then zipped the bag shut again. Willow could hear Oswin softly cursing his bad luck, and his big mouth, in High Dwarf.

  But as much as Willow wanted to press ahead on their journey, she felt the exhaustion that had been creeping in after their long day start to take hold. She found herself struggling to keep her eyes open and suggested they stop for the night. Oswin’s sigh of relief was the last thing she heard before she fell fast asleep, curled around the hairy carpetbag on the small wooden bed, the air smelling faintly of flowers.

  The next day, when Beady Hi
ll was far behind them, Willow and Oswin passed a sign that read “Cloud Mountains: This Way. But I’d Turn Back If I Were You.” A little farther on one read “Really, You Can Still Turn Back.” But the last one was probably the most ominous as it sort of gave up: “We Did Warn You, Stupid.” Willow took a steadying breath as she went past it.

  Fog was beginning to sweep the ground, and the air was cold as it slithered inside Willow’s cloak, making the hairs on her neck stand on end. She shivered, though she wasn’t sure if it was just the sudden chill. It had grown dark and gray, and she could no longer see her feet as she walked. She could make out odd shapes in the mist; as she neared one she found that it was a large rock, which looked a bit like a child. She swallowed, grabbing her chest when it seemed for a moment to look at her. Clutching the hairy carpetbag tightly, she walked past the rock-child fast and saw through the swirling mist that they had rounded upon a mountain range that was suspended among the clouds so that it appeared to float in the air. These must be the Cloud Mountains, thought Willow. As she got closer, the air grew even thicker with hazy mist and the familiar sound of Oswin’s panicked wailing.

  “OH NO! Oh no! Oh, me greedy aunt! Osbertrude, a curse upon yeh. A curse, I tell yeh! I’m gonna die with only fruit in my bellllly. . . .”

  Willow felt her fear grow. His wails were reaching a deafening crescendo. He’d never been this panicked before, she thought. Not even when the Brothers of Wol or Amora Spell had appeared.

  “What is it?” she asked, narrowing her eyes against the fog, trying to see.

  Oswin shivered violently and zipped himself more securely into the hairy green bag.

  Willow drew the StoryPass out of her pocket and went pale. “Oh dear. It says ‘There Be Dragons,’” she whispered. Her knees starting to knock together. A faint “eep” came from Oswin’s direction.

  Then out of the swirling mist a voice like the wind howling on a cold night corrected her. “Dragon.”

  “P-pardon?” stammered Willow, who took a step forward in spite of her knees, her eyes straining against the swirling mist.

  “Just the one dragon,” said the voice, whistling in her ears. It sounded a little sad.

  Willow felt something soft trail close to her face and she swallowed nervously. One dragon was plenty. The shaking bag in her hand told her that Oswin wholeheartedly agreed.

  “I—I didn’t know there were still dragons in Starfell,” said Willow, thinking that perhaps if she kept talking, he might decide not to eat them.

  “There aren’t many; just me and—” said the voice, which broke slightly.

  “And who?” asked Willow, stepping closer.

  In the haze she could just make out the ENORMOUS shape of the dragon, like a small mountain itself. It was covered in indigo-blue feathers that seemed to glow with an iridescent, pearly sheen; even its barb-like tail was covered in wispy dark blue feathers. He was curled around a very large silver-gold egg about the size of Oswin. As she neared, he turned his massive head and pinned her to the spot with his sad golden eyes.

  “A human child,” he said with what looked almost like a smile. There were certainly a lot of very sharp, glistening white teeth.

  Willow swallowed, managing a nod.

  The dragon looked at her. “What is your name?”

  “W-Willow.”

  “I am called Feathering. For many years I was the last cloud dragon . . . until I found Thundera—my mate,” he said. A large sapphire tear formed at the corner of his eye and landed on the egg. “But she’s left me now,” he said, slumping his head on top of the egg in a rather despondent way.

  “Why did she leave you?” asked Willow, who couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for the dragon.

  “I was supposed to be looking after the egg,” he said, tapping it very softly with a sharp jewel-like claw. His voice sounded like a mournful wail from a broken pipe.

  “It was supposed to hatch last week, you see. Thundera went hunting so that we would have enough food for when it arrived . . . but it never did.”

  Willow gasped. “What happened?”

  “I don’t remember!” he cried, lifting his head off the egg. “I keep trying to—but I can’t. I can’t remember anything that happened that day. When I told Thundera that, she became so angry she burned down the whole side of the mountain,” he said mournfully. “And, look, the egg—it’s empty, though I don’t know how that could have happened. It wasn’t empty before, and I don’t remember it hatching,” he said. Another tear slipped down his snout, landing with a heavy splash on Willow’s foot, drenching it completely.

  Willow felt desperately sad. She looked at the egg he was still cradling and her eyes began to smart. She inched forward and laid a hand on the tip of his wing.

  “Was this last Tuesday?” she asked.

  His golden eyes slowly blinked. “How did you know?”

  In Willow’s mind a purple hat with a long green feather swam before her eyes, her grandmother’s face turned away from her, and she felt something hard and painful twist inside her belly. There was something there, trying to get her attention. She bit her lip and shook the image away. “Someone has stolen it, I think. . . .”

  “Stolen what?” he asked.

  “The day.”

  He lifted his head off the ground. “Someone stole the day? But how? Who? Who would have done that?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know—but that’s what I’m trying to find out. It’s not just you—no one can remember what happened last Tuesday. All our memories of it are gone. It’s like they’ve been taken. . . .” She thought about it and said, “But it’s more than that—it’s not just the memories; it’s everything, really.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Willow looked at the egg. “It’s worse than I imagined. . . .”

  And it was. It was all the births, the deaths, the weddings, the funerals, the arguments, the big things, the small things, all those incredibly special and mundane moments that go into the recipe of one ordinary day, making it something else, something quite extraordinary when you stop and really think about it as Willow did just then. She suddenly saw the incredible value and significance of one ordinary day. Not just what happens on a single day, but how that day informs the next, giving it meaning and structure, and now what it meant to have it simply gone. . . .

  Her lungs forgot to breathe as she realized something. What wasn’t she remembering? And why was it that every time she tried, she saw Granny Flossy’s hat? What did it mean?

  The dragon lifted his large head, hope flickering in his eyes. “If it’s been taken, can we get it back?”

  “I don’t know, but I’m going to try to find it.”

  The dragon looked at her, taking in her small size, the state of her old, worn, rather uneven dress, the fishing net in her rope belt, and the green hairy carpetbag at her heels. “You?” he asked. There couldn’t have been a less likely candidate for saving the day than Willow Moss.

  She shrugged. “Yes. I have to try—I’m the only one who knows about it and can do something about it, you see.”

  The dragon looked at her for some time. Finally he said, “You’re not the only one who knows.”

  “Sorry?”

  “You’re not the only one who knows it’s missing—not anymore. You’ve told me, and I’d like to help, if you’ll have me.”

  Willow blinked. “You would help me?”

  Feathering’s claw tapped the egg very gently. “If you’re right—then maybe things will turn out differently.”

  Willow nodded. “They might.”

  The dragon slowly started to sit up, and the mountain around them started to rumble and shake from the movement. Willow found herself staggering backward, the ground beneath her feet unsteady.

  “What do we need to do?” asked the dragon.

  “Do you know how to get to Wisperia?” she asked.

  “I do.”

  “Can you take me?”

  “I can—if you carry thi
s, please,” he said, handing over the egg. Oswin, still hiding, wasn’t impressed when she opened the carpetbag to put it inside. One eye poked out of the top, turning from green to pumpkin, then back to green again as it took in the enormous size of Feathering. Oswin gave a sheepish smile, then held out his arms and took the egg, giving it a gentle pat and a slight polish, then rather quickly he zipped the bag shut from the inside.

  When Feathering looked from the bag to Willow in surprise, she said, “Don’t ask.”

  He nodded and bent down so that she could climb up onto his back, putting her legs behind his wing joints. She put the carpetbag between her knees and her arms around the dragon’s neck, though they didn’t reach very far.

  “Hold on tight,” said the dragon.

  From within the bag she heard a familiar “Oh no! Oh, me horrid aunt!” as Feathering took a few running steps that shook the mountain, causing an avalanche below, and launched himself into the air.

  10

  The Forgotten Teller

  AS THEY WHOOSHED up, up, and up into the sky, Oswin’s panicked cries of “Oh noooo! Oh, me greedy aunt! Where’s me stove? Oh, Osbertrude!” filled the air.

  A part of Willow’s mind was going Oh nooooo herself. It was one thing being on Whisper, and quite another being on a very large dragon, who flew over vast mountain ranges and wide sweeping rivers faster than she could blink. In fact, it was some time before she was able to open her eyes. When she did, she gasped, though this time it had nothing to do with fear. The wind was icy and cold, but the view was spectacular; she could see the floating Cloud Mountains and, in the distance, a large, colorful forest.

  Wisperia.

  It was unlike anything she’d ever seen before. In the woods near her home in Grinfog the trees were all roughly the same—green leaves, brown bark, and the occasional pretty flower. But this was something else entirely. The leaves were in shades of electric blue, sunset pink, violent orange, and bright magenta. It looked like someone had upended a paint box over the horizon. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. It was like the pictures in the forgotten teller’s room brought to life.