Now that we’ve caught up briefly with John and Benjamin the Mouse, it’s time to go back and catch up with King Carlyle and Jacob the Frog.
When last we left them, King Carlyle and Jacob the Frog had decided to renew their journey to the Land of the Fairies, and they were carrying the frozen Water Sprite Queen with them.
The Water Sprite Queen was small, but even so, it is hard for frogs to carry anything for any amount of distance. Their tiny little arms are just not designed for a lot of lifting and carrying. So they realized pretty soon they were going to need some help.
“I wish Midor were here,” said Jacob the Frog. “He would be able to ask a favor from any animal in the forest.”
“Yes, well, if Midor were here,” said King Carlyle, “He could use his human arms to just pick the Water Sprite up, so it wouldn’t matter anyway. Besides, you remember what Midor was like, and how reluctant he always was to ask for favors.”
“Well, we’re going to need some help,” said Jacob. “Perhaps the gnomes can help us. If we could find another entrance to one of their tunnels. It’s usually located under the mushrooms.”
“I’ll keep my eyes open for it,” said King Carlyle. “But we can’t wander too far, because we need to stay near the Water Sprite Queen.”
“You stay here and guard the Queen,” said Jacob. “I’m going to hop around and see what I can find.”
And with that, Jacob disappeared into the bushes, leaving King Carlyle left to guard the frozen Water Sprite Queen.
King Carlyle waited for about 20 or 30 minutes or so, and then he heard rustling in the bushes. And pretty soon, out of the bushes, emerged six little creatures. They were only about 3 inches, but they looked roughly human in shape, aside from their pointy ears. They wore green clothing, and had small green hats.
King Carlyle had not lived all his life in the forest for nothing. He knew immediately what these creatures were. “Pixies,” he said.
“Greetings,” said one of them. “I’ve not seen you in this part of the forest before.”
“Well, you know,” said King Carlyle cautiously, “We frogs can hop around from place to place.”
“What about the lady,” said one of them. “She doesn’t look like a pixie. She’s a little person, alright, but she’s about a half inch too big to be one of us.” (“Little person” was the word that the pixies used to refer to all the diminutive human-like creatures in the forest--it included the gnomes, the brownies, the sprites, the fairies, and many others.)
King Carlyle hesitated. He didn’t want to tell the pixies any more than he had to. (He knew of their reputation for mischief.) But he did have to say something, and he didn’t know what other creature to say. (He also didn’t want to make the pixies believe he was trying to hide something from them. That could really bring out their mischief.) “She’s a Water Sprite,” said King Carlyle, deliberately omitting the fact that she was the queen.
“What’s wrong with her?” asked one of the pixies. “She seems to be frozen.”
“She’s sleeping,” said King Carlyle.
“Her eyes are open,” said another pixie. “And her limbs are stiff. She doesn’t look like she’s sleeping to me.”
“Are you hiding something from us?” asked another pixie.
“Why would I hide something from you?” asked King Carlyle. “I’m just a frog. What secrets do frogs have?”
“Frogs can keep secrets just as well as anyone can,” said another one of the pixies.
King Carlyle realized that this wasn’t working. It was time to change tactics. Maybe it was better to be honest with the pixies.
Pixies were mischievous, everyone knew that. But they were not malevolent. Or at least, they were not usually malevolent. If they could be convinced that there was a great evil in the forest, and that healing the Water Sprite Queen was potentially the solution to solving that evil, then maybe they wouldn’t try to hinder him. Maybe they would even try to help him.
“You’re right,” said King Carlyle. “Frogs can indeed have secrets, and I have some. For one thing, I am not really a frog. I was transformed into a frog by magic. I am really King Carlyle of the Castle Tauna.”
“The Castle what?” asked one of the Pixies.
“It’s the human castle, you idiot,” another Pixie said.
“We don’t care about the human castle.”
“He said he was a King. He might have some fine gold.”
“Or fine ale.”
“There are many riches in the Castle,” said King Carlyle. “And I will be glad to share them with you all, once I am returned to my original form, and can regain my castle. But at the moment, I am stuck in this frog’s body, and must journey to the land of the fairies. And this,” King Carlyle gestured to the body, “is the Queen of the Water Sprites. She is, as you have surmised, not actually sleeping, but under an enchantment. I must take her to the Land of the Fairies to try to break the enchantment.”
“We know a little bit of magic ourselves,” said one of the Pixies.
King Carlyle, who had heard stories about the Pixies, was skeptical that they would have enough magic to help him, but he thought it polite to ask anyway. “Can you help me?” he said.
“Well…” said the first one, pausing.
“Well, Pixie magic isn’t the same as Fairy magic,” said another one. “We can’t reverse spells…”
“...and we can’t change one thing into another thing,” finished a third pixie.
“But we can carry just about anything,” said a fourth. “Our magic can make even the heaviest rock as light as a feather.”
King Carlyle remembered the stories he had heard about Pixies carrying away children into the forest. Or sometimes, it was rumored, Pixies would even steal away a full grown adult. This magic spell they were talking about seemed to fit the stories perfectly. If they could make anything feather light, then no wonder they could steal away so many things and people into the forest.
“Could you help me carry the Water Sprite Queen?” said King Carlyle. “I can’t pick her up with my frog hands, and I need to bring her to the Land of the Fairies.”
The pixies looked at each other, and then they looked back at King Carlyle. From their expression, King Carlyle knew he had said something wrong somewhere. “Do you not know anything more about the Pixies than that?” one of them asked.
“Maybe we shouldn’t expect too much of him,” said another. “Remember, he’s not really a frog. He’s a human. Humans don’t know much.”
“But human children have to go to this thing that they call school. Don’t they teach it there?”
“Teach what? What don’t I know?” asked King Carlyle.
“Why, the great war between the Pixies and the Fairies, of course,” said one of them. “It was many years ago now.”
“Hundreds of years ago,” said another.
“Hundreds of years ago now. But the Fairies drove us out from the land. The Land of the Fairies is supposed to be the Land of the Pixies…”
“...but they said we were causing too much mischief. Too much trouble.”
“...so they drove us all out.”
“...and we’ve been forced to hide in the forest ever since.”
“I see,” said King Carlyle. “Yes, I understand now. Of course you wouldn’t want to go to the Land of the Fairies. I’d be afraid too if I were you.”
“It’s not a question of being afraid,” one of the Pixies said hotly.
“We’re not afraid of anything in the forest.”
“It’s more a question of not wanting to be guests of the fairies.”
“It doesn’t sound like they’d have you as guests anyway, based on what you were just telling me,” said King Carlyle.
“Well, they wouldn’t be happy to see us, that’s for sure.”
“They probably would try to turn us away if they saw us coming.”
“And you don’t want to be turned away,” finished off King Carlyle. “Perfectly reasonable, I understand completely. It would be an embarrassment to you to be treated that way again after your history.”
“Well we wouldn’t let them turn us away, of course,” said one of the pixies, now even more heatedly.
“They would only try to turn us away. We would give them a good swift kick in the butt.”
“Oh, well, that’s easy to say now,” said King Carlyle, “when you’re safe in the middle of the forest, away from any fairy magic.”
“Look, frog,” one of the Pixies said, pointing his finger angrily, “We know what you’re trying to do, okay? You want us to help you move the Water Sprite Queen to the land of the Fairies. Well you can’t trick a Pixie. We’re the original tricksters.”
“We’ll do it for you,” said another. “But it’s going to cost you. You say you’re really a human king? Well then, we want your firstborn child.”
“I should have clarified earlier,” King Carlyle said, “I’m an old man. My children are all grown up now.”
“Then we’ll take your oldest grandchild.”
“Even she is practically grown,” said King Carlyle.
“Do you have any great grandchildren?”
“Not yet. Maybe in a few years, but none are on the way now.”
“Well we’ve got to have something in return.”
“When I return to my human form, and get back my castle, I’ll make sure each of you gets a huge plate of gold.”
They scoffed at this. “Don’t you know Pixies any better than that?” said one.
“We don’t want gold,” said another. “We have to have something mischievous. Are you sure you don’t have any babies in the castle?”
“I know you Pixies have a reputation for stealing human children,” said King Carlyle. “But I was wondering if you could make an exception in this case. You see, the Queen of the Water Sprite is the key to keeping the monsters out of the forest.”
“What? How’s that?”
“Well, I don’t fully understand it myself. It’s something about a magic realm, and witches, and I don’t know, but there’s a great evil force that’s lurking around this forest, and if it ever gets loose, it will be bad for everyone. You want to help save the forest, don’t you?”
“Bad even for Pixies?”
“Bad for everyone?”
“How could it be bad for Pixies? The monsters don’t bother us.”
“The monsters can’t even find us.”
“We hide in the trees and in the bushes. No monster can ever find us.”
“And even if they could find us, we Pixies are much too small for the monsters to bother with. No monster would waste his time eating Pixies.”
“It’s all the same to us. If the monsters take over the forest, we’ll just keep doing what we always do--laughing and playing and making mischief.”
“If the monsters take over the forest, there will be no one to make mischief with,” said King Carlyle. “All the humans and animals will flee the forest. There will be no one to steal from and no one to trick.”
The Pixies looked at each other in silence.
“Alright,” one of them said at last. “We’ll help you bring the Water Sprite Queen to the land of the Fairies. But that’s it.”
“That’s all I need,” said King Carlyle.
It was at this moment that Jacob the Frog returned from the bushes. “I found a hedgehog who will help us,” he said, and indeed a little hedgehog was following Jacob.
“Will you still be needing us?” asked one of the pixies.
“What’s going on here?” asked Jacob.
“I may have found some helpers of my own,” said King Carlyle.
“We found him, more like,” said a Pixie.
“We don’t want any trouble,” said Jacob to the Pixies.
“And what are you?” asked another of the Pixies. “Are you a frog, or are you a king like your friend?”
“I’m a frog,” said Jacob, “and nothing more.”
“Then you have nothing to worry about,” said a Pixie. “For when did Pixies ever trouble frogs, or any of the smaller creatures of the forest? We only ever trouble the bigger animals, or sometimes the humans.”
“Nor would we ever harm a hedgehog,” said another, with a nod at the hedgehog.
“Um, thank you,” said the hedgehog, looking around with the face of someone who has just entered into a conversation, and isn’t quite sure what to say.
“How is the hedgehog going to carry the Queen of the Water Sprites?” asked a pixie.
“Well, it will be a bit tricky,” said Jacob. “But I was thinking if we could get the Queen on his back, then maybe I could help to steady it there while he walks.” Jacob could see the skeptical faces of both King Carlyle and also the group of Pixies. “Yes, I know it isn’t ideal,” he said. “But this kind hedgehog was the only one I could find who would agree to help me.”
“Well, it’s a good thing we Pixies are here then,” said one, walking forward. “Come on lads, let’s carry the Water Sprite Queen.” Three of them picked up the Water Sprite Queen and started walking forward. The other three walked alongside King Carlyle, Jacob and the hedgehog. “Stick close to us,” one said. “And you’ll have nothing to fear. No big animals will bother you in this forest.”
Jacob turned to the hedgehog almost apologetically. “I’m sorry to have wasted your time,” he said. “It looks like maybe we won’t need you after all. But we’d be glad of your company if you wanted to travel with us for a while.”
“Based on what you told me about the Water Sprite Queen,” said the hedgehog, “I will travel with you and offer whatever assistance I can. I would do anything to protect this forest.”
“What is your name?” King Carlyle asked the hedgehog.
“They call me Leo,” answered the hedgehog. “And what is your name?”
“My name is Carlyle. At one time, I was king of castle Tauna.”
“What’s that?” asked Leo the hedgehog.
“It’s a big deal to the humans, apparently,” answered one of the Pixies.
“It’s the human castle,” Jacob explained to Leo. “Where the human king is located.”
“What about you all?” asked King Carlyle to the Pixies. “Do Pixies have names?”
“We do. I’m Aiden. That’s Adair, and that’s Conn,” said Aiden, pointing to the three male Pixies. “And over there is Brenna, Arlene, and Alina,” he said, pointing to the three female Pixies.
They all waved hello when their name was called, and King Carlyle waved back his frog hands back as best he could.
“We’ve got a long journey ahead of us,” said Aiden. “And Pixies are seldom known to go without a song. Do you mind if we sing some of the old ballads?”
“Yes, that would be wonderful,” said Jacob the frog. “Pixie singing is said to be one of the most beautiful sounds in the forest.”
And so, the Pixies began to sing.
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