Once Upon a Time in Faerieland: Part Two by dynamitebl |  |
Untitled Document
It was a festivity to remember for years to come! Previously
captured faeries sat around a small nova and told the tales of their journey in
the world below. Some were scary, making the younger listeners quiver in fear,
while others were joyous and told of their release from their entrapment. Some
were sad, of how they lived for long weeks trapped inside the jar, and others
were comical, of all the silly things Neopians did for just a glimpse of the jar
that held them. The most memorable story that night came from a young Light Faerie
named Aurora. Captured by a bounty hunter while roaming the outskirts of the Faerie
Caves, Aurora's fate laid sealed in a jar. Her jar traded hands and owners throughout
Neopia, passing from the desserts of Coltzan to the wintery world of Happy Valley.
Her tale is as follows:
I've always wondered what lay in the Faerie
Caves and whether it was actually hard to get out of. I mean, Garon made it
out so maybe I can too, you know? So I packed a few items and flew over there.
I wasn't really paying attention to my surroundings so I didn't even noticed
when the Quiggle snuck up behind me with his net. I was entangled in the webbing
so badly that I couldn't even reach for my wand. He pinched my wings and pulled
me out of the net. I yelled at him to let me go, but he just laughed and stuffed
me in this glass jar and sealed the lid. Then, he picked up my items and told
me he was going to sell them - and me - at the market in Sakhmet Palace. It
was really hard to breathe inside that jar, even with the holes he clumsily
punched in. I tried yelling for help but it used up too much air and made it
harder to breathe. I could not spread my wings and reach the top of the jar
to try and get out since the jar was too narrow and too tall.
The Quiggle continued searching for more faeries,
though he didn't find any, for which I was extremely happy. Near nightfall of
the next day, he decided to leave Faerieland and boarded the cloud that would
take him back to the Lost Desert. By then, I had fallen hoarse from yelling
and moved on to banging on the walls of the glass jar to attract attention to
the bag he held my jar in. It took about day to make the trip and still no one
heard me. Deprived of sunlight, my natural light started to dim and I got weaker.
When we reached the palace market, bidders raced towards the Quiggle, addressing
him as Dervinn. My auctioning begun.
By daylight I was sold to the highest bidder,
an Usul named Meredith, for 500 NP. She shook my jar around and smiled. "You'll
make me very rich, little one," she told me. She held my jar out in the sun,
giving me a chance to replenish my Faerie light. I soaked up the light as Meredith
bounced happily away. I feel asleep sometime after that. I don't know how long
I slept, but when I woke up, we weren't in the desert anymore. An eerie howling
vibrated against the walls of my jar and a full moon shone in the dark sky above
me.
"We're in the Haunted Woods," I whispered as
I continued looking around. My jar laid on its side, fallen from the Usul's
grasp as she slept on a patch of grass. "This is my chance to get away," I thought
and so I pushed against the lid of the jar. It didn't bulge, so I pressed it
a little harder. My hand slipped and causing me to topple over inside the jar.
The sudden movement caused the glass jar to roll out of control and down a slight
incline in the ground. When it came to a complete stop at the bottom I was breathless
and even dizzier than before, but I was no longer near the Usul and, for that,
I was glad.
Before I even had the chance to shake off the
whirling in my head, someone picked up the jar and peered inside at me. It was
a Kougra cub. She smiled at me and asked me why I was stuck inside a jar. I
almost wept for joy then. Finally someone to set me free! "I'll bless you with
special powers if only you'd open the jar and let me out," I cried. She nodded
her head, with her smile still in place, and tried earnestly to open the jar.
To my disappointment, her hands were too small and too weak to unscrew the lid
to release me. She looked as if she was about to cry too, when suddenly her
face lit up again. She ran inside the Witch's Tower with me in her hand and
shoved me at a grown Kougra male. Without looking twice, he did as she asked
her to, opened the jar, and continued his business with Edna the Witch. Karina
(that was her name) slowly picked me up out of the jar and held me in her palm.
I was weak from the experience of the past few
days and the night sky of the Haunted Woods left me drained of color and light
as well. I couldn't even lift my wings! In the end, Karina took me home with
her, all the way to Happy Valley. I didn't mind though. I slept in a soft bed
that belonged to her Usuki doll and she fed me yummy wintry foods! When I regained
my strength, I didn't want to leave. I loved every moment I spent with her,
helping her read her books and guiding her in the dark around her house. I attended
classes with her, made daring trips into the Snowager's lair, visited the Negg
Faerie, whom I've never met before, and snowboarded on the slopes of Terror
Mountain. Yet I knew I didn't belong there. After a long goodbye, I came back
here, back home. I still think about her a lot. Maybe someday, I'll visit her
again and we can take a trip to see the rest of what her world had to offer.
Takayla sat mesmerized by the story. How would
she react in that situation? Would she be able to handle being captured? And
to see a Kougra! She was never allowed to leave Faerieland - at least, not until
she was older - and had only seen pictures of the other inhabitants of Neopia.
Takayla gazed longingly out into the fields and up towards the night sky. A
sudden thought hit her, Where was the Battle Faerie? She's two hours late… She
should have been here by now.
To be continued...
|
