An Afternoon In Faerie

Written for the Shorts Shots Contest


An Afternoon in Faerie

It was a beautiful autumn day, the leaves hung loose and crisply golden on the trees, and the sun shone cheerfully in the aging days of the year.  The grass was soft and green, and tickled Daniel’s chubby legs as he ran towards the clump of trees in the distance.  At 10 years old running was still fun and amusement rather than hard work.  His soft dark hair lifted from his forehead as he ran and there was a light breeze that was still warm enough to make him feel like he glowed with autumnal gold.  He was too young to appreciate the beauty around him and understand how the greens, golds and reds of autumn made him feel instinctively free and happy.  It was something that would have a profound effect on him in later years, and he would always associate autumn with memories of golden childhood afternoons among long grasses and gentle warmth enveloping him like a mother’s embrace.

He ran until he could not breathe and collapsed gasping at the edge of the wood in stubborn delight that he had pushed his young body to its limit.  He sat still for a long moment basking in the sunlight.  He had escaped his mother for an afternoon while she tackled the weekly wash with the other village women.  He had been sent out of the way and, as usual, he made a beeline for the sun-dappled and mysterious wood at the edge of the village.  He quivered with anticipation, he had heard that there were fairies in the woods and he meant to catch some.

The trees rustled, their tops waving in the wafts of air that came from the south, he fancied that they were speaking in a secret language of their own and if he listened hard enough he would understand it.  He got to his feet and waded through the long grass to the first of the trees.  Some of these had been cut down to their stumps and he paused for a moment to see if he could see any bugs or insects crawling on their whorled tops.  His task suddenly recalled, he moved further into the forest, he had never been much beyond than the very outskirts; his mother had always given him strict instructions to stay out of it.  His father had been lost in the forest, though the circumstances of his death seemed to be uncertain.

Almost too consumed with excitement, he moved past the evergreen that marked the boundary between already conquered land, and the tantalising forbidden territory ready to be tasted.  He wandered among the trees in the shade listening to the birds and the ever-present whispering of the trees.  It was perhaps half an hour before he decided he was significantly lost to make the outing more of an adventure.  He sat with his back against a tree stump and surveyed his surroundings with satisfaction.  The forest floor was carpeted with dead leaves whose curled edges scratched at his legs.

It was as he sat there ,dozily looking at the trees shifting above him and feeling the cool breeze on his face, that he noticed the door.  It was tiny, seated at the bottom of an aged oak and, unlike the wood around it, relatively new.  The hinges appeared to be made of gold and it was these, gleaming in a stray shaft of sunlight, that had attracted his attention.  His eyes wide, he crawled to the tiny door and reached out with a tentative hand to touch it.  The wood was smooth like the doors at home and not at all like he would have expected a door set in the middle of a tree to feel like.  There was a round brass ring set in it and almost not daring to hope, Daniel reached out and turned it…..

The door swung inwards to inky darkness without as much as a squeak.  He stayed very still, breathing hard, and thinking about every story he’d ever read and that his mother had ever read to him.  He so badly wanted to go through the door but he wouldn’t fit; the door was far too small.  The disappointment was almost too much to bear as he realised that he could only get much as his hand through the small gap.  He retreated, feeling crushed and bitterly frustrated.  It was as he turned away that he heard the creaking.  Dumbstruck, Daniel turned back, large blue eyes wide with expectation, the doorway was growing larger.  Within a minute it was nearly as half as big as the tree.  He didn’t stop to think and charged into the doorway at a flat out run.  The darkness gave way to brilliant sunlight and he went sprawling onto the leafy earth earning another set of scratches and bruises for his mother to fuss over.

Picking himself up and dusting himself off, Daniel stared about him in amazement, where before he had been in a forest at the beginning of autumn, he now stood in the middle of a glade surrounded by a ring of trees in the height of summer.  There was no mistaking it, he could see that all the trees were in full bloom, and in bloom they certainly were, for every single one was laden with beautiful roses of a ruby red akin to the wine he sipped at Mass.  He could smell apples and the warm, heady scent of a summer’s day.  To his left, he could see commanding mountains towering over everything and the sun blazing with a glorious heat.

He could do nothing for a long time except stand and stare at this new world.  He came to his senses with a jerk and pinched himself hastily until his arm was sore and he was satisfied that this was no dozy afternoon dream.  He turned back to the tree and for an alarming moment saw nothing, until he glanced downwards and found the door nestled at the base of the oak just as it had been before.  The tree here too was different.  Where before it had been an aging oak, now it was in its youth, standing proud and tall towards the sky.

Daniel didn’t hesitate for a moment, with a fearlessness only present in children and a certain ilk of adults, he scrambled up the tree.  The view from above was even more spectacular.  He could see lakes of brilliant azure blue that were ripe for swimming and hills of downy green.  It was as he was sitting in the branches of the tree that he felt a soft fluttering beside his face. He turned and let out a yell of surprise, nearly falling from his precarious perch on the branch as he did so.  Not an inch away from his nose was a fairy.

She stared back at him in amazement, lilac wings beating in a state of agitation.  She was about the size of his hand and clothed in a dress made of an oak leaf dyed pink, her hair was wavy and white like snow. Her hypnotic state didn’t last long however, and in a moment she had gone flying away out of the glade.

Daniel clambered down the tree and hurried in the direction he had seen her go. As he left the rose glade, he saw for the first time that he was high on a hill.  He ran down the side of it and marvelled at the grass as it brushed his ankles. Instead of being tickly like the grass at home it was as soft as silk.  After five minutes of running down the steep side of the hill, he realised with some surprise that he wasn’t out of breath. Indeed, he was able to breathe perfectly normally as if he were only walking.

He barely had time to think about this when he had to stop suddenly as the bottom of the hill ended in a lake shore.  The surface gleamed like molten silver and Daniel stood at its edge wondering how to get across.  He could not possibly swim that vast distance.

Just as he was thinking that he would have to turn back or find a way around, a figure came strolling along the stony shore towards him. He smiled kindly at Daniel and his voice when he spoke was gentle and somehow familiar. ‘Hello there lad, my name is Fionn, you’ll want the Ferryman if you hope to cross the lake.’

‘The Ferryman?’  Daniel stared stupidly at the man who just laughed and picked up a stone and hefted it in his palm. ‘Aye this should do well enough.’  He took hold of Daniel’s hand and pressed the stone into it. ‘I knew a lad like you once so I don’t mind being of help. You must throw a stone into the lake.  Only a good one mind, a chipped or broken stone won’t pay your way.’

Daniel stared at the smooth round stone in the palm of his hand.  It was an indigo colour, not unlike the colour of the Fionn’s eyes, and seemed just as magical as everything else.  He reluctantly threw it into the river and waited. Within a few minutes he saw a boat gliding across the water towards him.  An old man stood hunched over in the boat, his gnarled hands wrapped around an oar made of twisted wood.  Without hesitating, Fionn stepped aboard and held out his hand to Daniel.  With some reluctance, the boy allowed himself to be helped into the boat.

The ride was almost dreamlike and as they disappeared into the humid water mist, Daniel found himself dozing.  A shake on his shoulder told him that they had arrived at his destination.  The old ferryman said nothing merely nodded at him and turned away the moment Daniel had left the boat.

Fionn led Daniel to a door in the hillside very like the one in the tree. They stepped through it into a vast hall of beautiful rose stone.  A soft gentle light suffused the whole hall and golden sunlight shone down from high windows.  On a throne at the far end of the hall sat a king with large wings the colour of the sky and a gold crown on his head.  He looked both old and wise but Daniel knew instantly that he was also very powerful.  Fionn knelt before him and bowed his head. ‘My lord, I ask of you a boon.’ The king raised his head to look from Fionn to Daniel.  ‘You know my laws Fionn.’

Fionn looked up pleadingly. ‘I beseech you Yorath, spare him, he came to Faerie by accident. Much as I did.’

The king was silent for a moment thinking and Daniel waited with bated breath to learn his fate. With every minute of looking at the king’s grave expression, the charm of this new world faded and instead he began to feel afraid and long for home.

‘Very well,’ Yorath said finally. ‘Your service to me is ended Fionn and I will spare the boy’s life.’  Golden light seemed to fill the hall until Daniel felt submerged in it.  When the light faded he realised he was standing once more in the wood at the edge of the village under an autumn sky and Fionn was beside him.  As he turned to look at him and the light of Faerie faded, he recognised him for who he really was.

Three hours after he had walked into the forest, Daniel left it with his father beside him, home again after eight long years.  For the rest of his life, the smell of apples and the summer sun shimmering off a lake would remind Daniel of Faerie.


Word Count: 1,959