Guest Story: A Fairy Tale
By Brother Alexander
Brother Alexander writes about symbology and history and theology on his substacks, probably a good gateway to his work is
. If you like his fiction, you might also enjoy his theological works!Do you write fiction occasionally, but don’t have a place to publish it? Please reach out and let’s talk about how I can help!
A Fairy Tale
Today, 11 June 1977, I have had an extraordinary experience. Standing in the garden, I felt someone behind me, looking at me intensely. I quickly turned around and saw a fairy hovering in the air.
She was 3 inches high with two sets of wings. Her hair was dark, and her skin white. She wore a dress which had an unusual purple patterned design.
In her hand, she held a long bramble, as though it was an angling rod. It was pointing at me and, on reflection, I wonder if I was the fish to be caught. The bramble was attached to the hedge behind her and she appeared to be trying to hook me.
After a moment of shock, she giggled and then began to speak. 'Hello Jack', she said in a way which assumed an old friendship. I stared without speaking. She broke the silence with another giggle.
"Who are you?", I enquired.
"Don't you know?", she said with a broad smile, as though she was in on some joke at my expense. "My name is Andael, and we are old friends"
I was puzzled. I am sure I would have remembered a friendship with a fairy.
"I'm a fairy of the blackberry. When you were younger, you used to play with me", she offered up this extra information as though it would provide a portal in which I could retrieve distant memories.
The mental mist cleared, and I caught a flashing glimpse. I saw her flying in front of me. I am chasing her and in the background, my now departed mother was cooking dinner in the house.
"Oh", I exclaimed, "How could I forget?"
"Quite easily", smirked the fairy, "men do not remember. It's designed that way. Whenever humans come in contact with fairy folk, they tend to forget about us after a short period of time"
Still feeling startled, I was about to ask another question, but then a blackbird arrived with another fairy on its back. The bird was sitting on top of the hedgerow and surveying the area. There was a silent stare between Andael and this wingless fairy, who was wearing a green dress. The silence was uncomfortably long and it was clear they wanted to talk, but I sensed they couldn't, because I was there. And just as quick as she came, the blackbird with the green fairy flew away.
"How many of you are there?", I asked.
"It depends, normally 10 or so", she responded.
Then I asked a strange question, "Are you all girls?"
Andael paused for a moment, and replied, "Yes. Much the same way that all humans are men".
This time, I laughed, "We aren't all men. What makes you think that?"
Andael, with a furrowed brow, said, "But you all act like men. What about the one who died in the house recently. Was he a man?"
"No!", I replied curtly, "that was my mother".
Andael began giggling again. Her laugh was infectious, and I soon joined in, feeling like I was 5 years old all over again.
I thought I saw something out the corner of my eye and turned round to see what was there. By the time I turned back, she was gone. I immediately ran back to the house and wrote down my experiences. I didn’t want to forget a single thing.
On the second day, I awoke early. I barely slept. It was to rain all day. The kind of rain which sticks to the windows and obscures the view of the outside world. So rather than sitting around, I drew up a plan of the garden. I wanted to know exactly where I had met the fairy. If I was to meet her again, I believed I would need to be in the same place.
It was at the end of the garden, near the back hedge. Beyond the hedgerow was a scrubland, a wilderness crossed with undefined paths.
The hedge was made up of many types of plants, including hawthorn, blackthorn, dog rose and many invasive blackberry brambles.
After lunch, the rain continued as before. I found my mother's old binoculus and used them to monitor the back hedge for any movement. Maybe I would see Andael fly past or the mysterious green fairy sitting on the blackbird. Looking through the rain, I found it difficult to make out exactly what I could see. So I gave up looking.
Over dinner, I started going through my mother's boxes of files. Maybe I would find a clue about these fairies. Had she encountered them before? Apart from invoking many memories, the only strange part was some of her diaries had pages missing. The pages hadn't been torn out, but they had been cut out carefully with a knife. Why would my mother be so exact in removing those sheets from her diary?
With all the memories of my childhood running around my mind. I struggled to sleep and hoped for better weather tomorrow.
By the morning, the rain stopped. The weather was considerably better than it had been. After a light breakfast, I hurried outside. Standing in the same spot, with my back to the hedge. I started to spin around quickly to face the hedge, praying I would see the fairy again.
After a few minutes, she appeared. She had a broad mischievous smile. "You're back," she cheered,
"Lovely to see you again. How long has it been?"
"Only two days", I replied puzzled.
"It's one of the problems of being an immortal being, we lose track of time", she said
"Immortal? How?", I said
She paused. I could see on her face that she was summoning up ancient memories. "We are all children of Mother Eve.", she started, "On the day the Angel of the Lord came to Mother Eve's house to bless us, she hadn't finished washing all of her children. Some of us weren't clean enough to meet the Angel. So, Mother Eve pushed us out the back door, to hide us. We got lost, and couldn’t find our way home."
She stopped speaking, looked past me for a moment, and then continued, "The Angel later found us wandering in the wilderness. He wiped away our tears, and welcomed us amongst the angelic host, providing us with immortality. Most of the boys, still upset by our mother's action, ran away from Him and hid in the caves. They became like worms, feeding on the deceased."
This was such a strange story. I asked about the other boys.
"The boys who stayed with us", she said, "have slowly disappeared. They were quiet, and never spoke. They used to wander from place to place, from hedgerow to hedgerow and seemed to stand around doing nothing, like soldiers guarding a treasure.
They never settled. They never offered to help. And we didn't have any room for them in the hedgerows.”
She leaned forward to whisper, ‘Some have said that they’ve joined our brethren underground, while others think they are in hiding. Maybe under stones, waiting for the end of the World."
After a brief pause, she started to ask another question, but stopped herself, looking past my shoulder again. She was staring at something. I didn't want to turn around to look, as I knew she would disappear.
In that silent moment, I began to feel fiery eyes burning into my back. My mind imagined a snake crawling across the grass. Its eyes focused completely on me.
"It's best we stop speaking", she said while slowly turning.
The desire to find out what had interrupted our conversation consumed me.
I turned round, only to see nothing. Quickly I turned back again, but she was gone.
I ran to the house and wrote down everything that happened.
= = =
Dear Reader,
Jack never returned to try and find Andael again. On the dawn of the fourth morning, a scruffy wingless male fairy, wearing long ripped trousers, a loose beige shirt and a knife-like sword, climbed up through the floorboards of his mother's house.
The soldier fairy clambered up onto the table. He found the papers which Jack had been writing on. He placed them in order, folding them up like a huge handkerchief and dropped them over the side of the table onto the floor.
He jumped down from the table and fed the papers through the cracks between the floorboards. They were lost forever, and Jack never remembered any of these events again
Thank you,
for sharing your story with us! If you liked it, please remember to check out his other work at ! | A guest post by
|
Thanks for publishing this. Hope everyone enjoys the little tale 🙂
Thanks for sharing! I enjoyed this a lot.