It all began when the First Dragon had hidden the young Nyte Shade's heart under the waterfall that had been given to the Dragon by the Great Shade. That act changed the water forever! Little did the brook realize the ripple that happened at the moment when the Nyte Shade's remaining love seeped into the flumes of the waterfall. "But that was such a long, long, looooonnng time ago," the Wishing Well pondered. "Time has a way of changing things." The Wishing Well hadn't even existed yet. The new magic gave the babbling brook a whole new way to look at life within the water as well as round it's banks. Things were flush then and so vibrant. At it's best, the babbling brook was forever blabbing about something but now he really had a new way of looking at things that required a whole new language in order to express himself. With the magic that poured through him, he found he could understand any creature, four-legged or two, who came to sip from him. In his excitement he would turn around and start babbling to them in their language. More often then not, it would frighten the creature away. For who would want to drink from something that could talk back to you? But then came the Dragons. Big, small, green or blue, they all came to drink from his waters. The babbling brook though could see a change happening when the Dragons drank from him. They became "more" is all that he could figure out. "Those where the fun times," the Old Well whispered to himself. Since the brook didn't understand the changes within the Dragons, he didn't say anything to them. "Oh, but the parties those Dragons brewed up while gathering around me were so enlightening and lively," remembered the Well fondly. Then things began to change. "I wish I knew what had started it, because maybe I could have changed things," the Old Well said with his melancholy thoughts. For things dried up for the brook and fewer and fewer Dragons came to see him. Finally the Shadows' King came to the small brook. "I am here to help protect you," he told the babbling brook. "You will sink lower into the ground and I will build a well around you. This will keep you safe, for I see a great need for you in the coming Ages."
But then creatures big and small totally stopped coming. Things got dark indeed for the Well. One day he overheard (through a Twitter bird who stopped to rest on the edge of his well wall) that the Dragons had left the Realm. That is when he heard and felt the loud shattering sound that vibrated through the water causing far-reaching ripples. After that the flow of water dried up even more until now the poor Old Wishing Well felt like he was hanging on by a drip. Drip... drip... drip... Everything looked bleak until that fateful day when a small young Dragon discovered him while it was out exploring. The Wishing Well had thought they had all left. The Dragon went on to tell him that he had recently hatched so he didn't know about other Dragons since he had never seen others. The young Dragon then told him that he was Hungry. That took a few minutes of figuring out that Hungry was the young Dragon's name. They enjoyed a lengthy visit until the Dragon truly felt hungry and needed to return to his cave. It was after that visit that the Well discovered a new feeling. A warm fuzzy feeling that flowed through him that actually made him feel a little "more". Not understanding this feeling, the Old Wishing Well didn't think long about it. But he did notice that whenever Hungry came for a visit, he always felt a little bit fuller and more than before.
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Griselda sent them back to the cave and told them to stay there until she could send messages to the other council members to decide what they would do next. "What are you laughing at?" asked Griselda to her son as the rat and Dragon started back to the caves. "Dree told me a new joke. It goes something like this... Knock... Knock... and you are supposed to say 'Who's there?'" The Dowager just shook her head and smiled thinking about how much of a kid her son still was.
"One would think that a coach or something would travel these roads a little more often," he again grumbled. After walking a little more, Aralt decided to sit down on a log near the trail by where he had first overheard the Wysps. "I wonder if those Wysps are still here?" he asked himself. "It would make it easier if I knew which cave they were talking about that had the portal in it." As if by magic, a Wysp did appear! "Ah, stranger. Are you lost?" it asked Aralt. Before thinking, Aralt growled, "That's twice in one day someone has implied that I am lost and don't know where I am going. I will have you know that I have walked these hills long before your kind even turned blue."
"Only if you know where the portal is," Aralt told him while digging another rock out of his shoe that was rubbing his little toe raw. "Ah, that's too easy. How about a nicer cave that has a waterfall in the back of it?" answered the Wysp. It took a minute before Aralt realized what the Wysp had just told him. It knew where the cave was! This time thinking before he answered, the Herald decided that he would trick the Wysp into taking him to the portal. "I don't think you even know what a portal is," he replied. "So, I best be going on my way alone."
Smiling, Aralt soon had the Wysp mad enough that it would show Aralt where the portal and cave were 'just to prove I know what I am talking about'. Shortly, they were entering the cave with Aralt following the glowing blue Wysp. "It's right here. See," as the Wysp hit the portal wall with a stick it had picked up off of the floor which bounced back from the invisible wall. "Nothing can get through it and we tried." Ignoring the Wysp, Aralt started walking towards the invisible barrier. Now it was the Wysp's turn to smile as he expected the stranger to bounce off of the wall just like the Wysps did. The surprise on the Wysp's face would have made Aralt laugh if he had been watching it as the Herald walked right through the barrier and disappeared.
There were so many footprints that Aralt soon realized that he would have just about as much luck in the middle of the busiest street in the village trying to find his own footprints. "Dragonsbreathe!" he muttered disgruntled. "I don't have time to check out all of these caves." But soon it was evident that he wasn't going to be able to do this the easy way and resigned himself to start exploring each cave with every twist and turn. After several hours of searching and just before he was ready to give up thinking that maybe he did have the wrong caves after all-- he heard it. At first he wasn't sure what the noise was, but as he approached the direction it was coming from, he realized that what he was hearing was laughter. The laughter of a Dragon! "I knew I was right," he silently congratulated himself.
As he was listening, the rat started to read the Dragon another joke... "Okay Dree. I have a good one for you. What did the left eye tell the right eye?" The Dragon shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. "I don't know, what?" he asked. Snickering Drat answered, "Something between us smells." It took Dree a few seconds before he figured out the punchline and started to laugh.
Drat and Dree both looked at each other before Dree answered. "My name is Drai'ochtluan but you may call me Dree for short. This is my friend and aid to King Dulbbe, Drat. What is a Dragon Herald might I ask?" Aralt wasn't ready for that question. He had been the Dragon Herald for so long that all of the Dragons knew him and what he did. Why didn't this one? "Why, I announce the Dragons arrival and help to keep the understanding that has long been in place between Dragons and all of the other fae to also include the 'Outies'," answered Aralt. "How is it that you have never heard of me? Where are the other Dragons so that I may talk to them instead?" Aralt asked while thinking that this young Dragon must not be very bright.
Quickly offended Aralt replied, "I need no help finding my way rat" as he turned around and stormed from the caves. Drat followed him to make sure that as he left the caves and he was indeed headed south. As Drat watched, Dree had quietly followed. "He is going to be mad when he finds out there aren't any Dragons in the caves to the south, isn't he?" asked Dree. "Yuppers," replied Drat. "But that should give us plenty of time to tell the others that he has seen you and what happened. We should head to the council hall." "Great and on our way there I heard a new joke," snickered Dree as they started towards the village. "First I say... Knock, Knock... and you say 'who's there'..."
Even for important events (such as the weekly meetings) individual Wsyps have been known to be late or even sometimes sleep through the meeting. Resulting in one of their favorite pranks which is leaving behind the sleeper who fell asleep during the important meeting. It usually requires everyone sneaking out quietly at the end of the meeting so the sleeper is not awakened - again why the Wysps enjoy doing it. As a matter of fact, this happened the night of the "strange occurrence" that made the Wsyps leave the cave and hold their meeting in a bush where Aralt stumbled in to them. Later, when the Wsyp (who had been left behind) found the others to complain about being left behind, he mentioned that when he woke up, his stomach was rumbling because of the cooking smells he thought he had dreamt. Ah, but was it a dream? Is there someone (or something) behind that portal that is blocking the rest of the cave? Allspice (or Al to his friends ) loves to cook. Little do others know about the magic he puts into his cooking which involves him getting up real close and personal with everything he bakes. One of Allspice's favorite things he loves to do is to bring out the music hidden in the cooking.
BUBBLE..BUBBLE...POP...gurgle...Bubble...BUBBLE...POP... When he felt the rhythm, he would begin to bang on the pot with his wooden stirring spoon. Slowly the drum-like noise, drifting up the chimney, would grow louder and louder. Then he would start to blow on a kitchen funnel hanging by the cooking pot, adding the music of a horn to the simmering beat. Gradually, as the melody of the brew continued, he would step on the bellows he had handy to keep the fire glowing to add a whish of steam to the sounds his cooking was creating.
Allspice knows what ingredients that one element of magic requires and how rare they were to find. But ohhhhh, the sweetness that one addition makes to anything he cooks always makes his meals be the best and hardest to resist in his kitchen.
The council meeting broke up as soon as everyone learned that Aralt had managed to leave Meen behind. With him disappearing the Dowager immediately sent Meen to warn Drat that the Herald may be heading towards the caves where Drat and Dree were supposed to be hiding out. Awena also wasted no time and went directly to her library to find the Dragon's Return prophecy to see if there might be a clue to reveal what Aralt's power over the Dragons might be. As she sorted through the many prophecy scrolls, more than once she thought that they should have some sort of index to be able to find the one she was looking for faster. "Once this is over, I will have to meet with the staff to figure something out," she told herself as she put another scroll aside in her search for the right one.
Normally Efem would almost dread having to enter the Sacred Grove to talk to the ancient trees but not this trip. Since learning they could speed talk, she hoped they would respond quickly to her requests for knowledge that only they knew from the roots of the Realm's past. "I hope that the Ol' Yew is not asleep," she thought as she approached the mighty tree. As she stood next to it and looked upon it's shiny green foliage, Efem was awed by a random thought of how much it must have seen during its life cycle. "I remember my mother bringing me here to see the Yew when I was a young sapling and the Yew was ancient even then." As she silently waited for the tree to notice her so she could ask her questions about Aralt the Herald, Efem was contently lost in her own memories of the past. "One of the stories of the ages and I don't know where to start," thought Snoop as he sat at his desk in the Bellwether and tried to put quill to parchment. "I promised the Dowager that I would not print anything that would give Aralt a clue as to Dree, but I have to print something!"
It was his pile of the Herald newspapers that came crashing down from a shelf and just missing hitting him on the head that made him think... "Herald! That's it! I need to write about what we know about Aralt the Dragon Herald. That way I won't give away what we know about Dree. Plus I can get the word out that he has returned. This will be a terrific article!" Right away Snoop was lost in his writing and not even wondering any longer if Aralt might have found the caves where Dree was hiding.
"The council members truly do not understand what is returning and the power I hope to re-claim when "She" returns," thought Aralt to himself. Now Aralt was familiar with the many caves in and around his own home and on the out-skirts of the Village but he wasn't aware of any caves located under the so called Baron's mansion. Maybe he shouldn't have gotten rid of that Pkysee just yet he thought as he continued walking down the path leading out of town and hopefully in the direction of where he figured the Baron's home would be. Since Aralt lived in the opposite direction and had no previous reason to explore this part of the countryside before, it made sense to him that this should be the way to go. "It can't be much further down the road surely?" grumbled Aralt as he pulled out a small rock that had worked it's way into his shoe and was rubbing his toes the wrong way. He had been walking (which wasn't his favorite way to travel) for quite a distance and was getting hot and miserable when he spied something blue flashing ahead. "There! It flashed again!" he said to himself turning his head slightly to catch the glimpse of blue in some nearby bushes.
"We can't drop the stick while standing in some bushes to decide who has to be the leader at the next meeting," one of the Wysps was complaining. "It's got to be in a cave where it's harder to not get hit when it falls. Besides, if we are all in the bushes and the stick hits the bush which hits some of us, then who has to be leader? We should just go back to the meeting cave instead of being here!" Aralt just could not figure out what the problem was. "I would think one of them would want to be the leader and tell the others what to do," he thought. "Wysps are so strange." It was also surprising to Aralt to see so many Wysps together at one time like this. They were usually solitary in planning their next bout of mischief. "It's unusual that they seem more concerned about what they were talking about instead of finding me as a lone walker on a path," he wondered confused. "I can't believe that things have changed that much since I have been gone. Their favorite choice of things to do has always been to prank someone out alone." Aralt wished he could get closer to hear more as his curiosity was now tweaked but he was afraid of making them scatter and disappear. As they continued arguing, all he could hear was a few scattered words but what he heard had his attention. When they complained about a "portal" and "blinding light in their cave" it made Aralt wonder. "Were these the same caves that are under the Baron's house?" he asked himself. After all, that seems the direction they were coming from if he was heading in the right direction to get there. Backing up slowly as to not startle the Wysps while they kept arguing the fine points of dropping a stick, Aralt found new energy and resolve to find those caves hidden below this Baron's house. Once he was far enough away from the Wysps, Aralt quickly turned around and immediately began his trek up the path and to where he hoped were the caves.
They are the blue Wsyps and even though it is dark outside, they prefer to have their meetings in caves where others could not sneak up on them. After all, sneaking up on others was part of what they did. It was during their weekly meeting when it happened... "Next on the agenda is deciding what to do about the Borrower, Arnie, who harassed one of us recently and also threatened to put a Wysp in a magical bottle," spoke the Wysp who currently was holding the leadership stick. This Wysp was the last one to be hit by the leadership stick. Whichever Wysp who was hit with the stick when it was dropped from the ceiling of the meeting cave at the end of each meeting had to be in charge at the next meeting. It was a show of pride among the Wysp's to be able to say that they had never been in charge. It was during the discussion of what to do about Arnie when a flash of light temporarily blinded them all and a Portal appeared blocking the path down further into the caves. The Wysps tried to go around the portal but in failing that they then decided to leave the cave before something else disturbed them in their plotting of revenge.
Since he also lived in a cave instead of under a bridge, he was not required to have a question to ask of any traveler trying to cross. Instead he just wanted someone to talk to as talking to himself was getting boring. Somehow he always knew what the other part of the conversation would be about before it started. "If you don't know what that strange noise is, how would I?" he answered himself. "Maybe I should check it out. It might be someone else to talk to instead of you," again he told himself. (As you can tell - this troll did not get out very often). He got to the entrance of the cave (the same one the Wysp's were having their meeting in earlier) but by now the sounds were causing the walls to shake and the stalactites to occasionally crash to the cave floor causing the Troll to think twice about checking out the inhabitants of the cave. "They must still be moving in... I think I will come back after the noise settles down a bit," both parts of the Troll decided at the same time as he turned around and went back to his cave. "It will be good to have a neighbor I think."
"I have the Nytemares watching the remaining patches, but so far none of them have seen anything out of the ordinary. Several of the known flower patches appear to have every flower blossom picked but none have been found on the ground. Whoever has picked them has also taken them but for what purpose we have not been able to find out," reported Scarlet. It will be several more days before others in the Realms realize that something was happening and even Aralt would be just as surprised as everyone else.
With the new arrivals coming in, that means the creative juices have been flowing too. I have been experimenting with some new claying up techniques and also some body reforms. Don't I wish I could change the look of my own body so easily *lol*. Just a little taste of what is coming up in the near future. I mentioned in an earlier newsletter I was working on a new character series. Their theme is going to be Spices. Now don't tell me why this popped into my head, as I have no idea *lol*. Other than I was thinking the Spices are either to help the Goodie Sisters as assistants or maybe in competition with them. That will be revealed as the Spices begin to share more about their story with me as they develop. What tasty tidbits The Dragons have shared with me though so far is that they have become quite the gourmet eaters since leaving the Realms. That is why the Spices are needed to help develop new recipes of ambrosia to keep the Dragons happy and not tearing up the Realms looking for something sophisticated for their taste buds. The way to a Dragon's heart is definitely through their stomach (or stomachs maybe?).
“Just like the old days,” Griselda thought as she listened to the others for the moment. But shortly she got everyone’s attention just by not saying anything. Soon the entire council stood silently and waited for Griselda to tell them her thoughts. When she did not immediately say anything, her son decided to start the conversation. “Mother,” asked the Baron. “What do you think about the Herald?” All of the others saw her quickly snort as if she was about to laugh, but instead she just shook her head from side to side and looked down. After another moment she finally looked up at everyone and spoke. “I have told you all about what I saw from the magical scroll. Seeing how the Herald spoke long ago when the Dragons first received their magical powers and the trouble it was causing that this is definitely the same Fae. But maybe now even more dangerous. At that meeting long ago, he asked the others for their help to control the Dragons. Today he tried to tell us what we will do under his orders. When he saw that maybe he overstepped, he then tried to persuade us through deception. I had my doubts when I saw him at the magical meeting then, but now I have no doubts. He is a bigger threat than the Dragons returning.”
As Ffion stopped, it was Awena who continued the thought. “We must keep Dree and Aralt apart until we know what that Power is. I will return to my library to see if we have anything about this. At the moment, I know of no prophecy that fits this situation other than a general one that when the Dragons return there will be many changes. We are not even sure that this return of the Dragons is that prophecy.” It was then that Meen returned to the chamber... alone and bewildered. “Where is the Herald?” asked the Dowager when she realized that he was not following behind the pyksee. Without answering Griselda, Meen ran to Queen Ffion and kneeled in front of her wailing. “My Queen, please forgive me. I lost the Herald. He sent me for tea and when I returned he was gone. I tried to check his home but the doors were barred to me and I could find no trace of him other than one of the townspeople thought they saw him heading to the caves."
"I should have made that connection to the Dragon’s lair,” she mumbled to herself as she pulled out her portal stone and disappeared.
Turning around he started addressing the entire group again. "It has been a very long time since I have seen the village and met with the people," Aral said trying to gentle his voice. Looking at the Dowager, since he realized that most of the council deferred to her, he continued, "Is there someone who could show me around?" Both surprise and relief filled Griselda with this request. "This would be a perfect way to get the Herald out of the council chamber so that I can talk with the others," she thought to herself. "But who should go with him?" She would have had Fiddlefaddle as her man servant do it but he was back at the mansion and she did not want to wait for him to arrive if she summoned him. Drat was with Dree and most of the other minions were off or busy. It was Aralt who solved the problem by asking if the pyksee was available. Not having a better choice, and with Ffion’s approval, soon Aralt and Meen were walking down the streets of the village.
“We haven’t been able to play leap the frog lately because my toad friend can’t hop until his leg heals. Do you want to play?” Meen asked. “Not at the moment but I might. I was thinking about a game I used to play as a child but it would take more than just a couple of us and we need someone taller than you or me,” answered Aralt. “As a matter of fact, they would have to be really tall. How about your friend Hungry?” Not realizing what Aralt was doing, Meen answered maybe a little more truthfully than she should have… “You mean Dree? I don’t think he can, the council has him staying in his room in the caves under the Baron’s mansion.” Before the pyksee realized the importance of what she had said, Aralt quickly asked Meen to pick up something to drink for him at the tea shop he had visited earlier that day. As she bounded off, the Herald watched her go and smiled. “Now to get rid of her while I check out the caves,” he said to himself.
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GreetingsWelcome to my blog. This is where I will reveal the magic of my Fae and their stories and share with you some of the success and pitfalls through the journey of doll making, sculpting, and other crafts that all come back to my dolls in many ways. Archives
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