Closing Verses - Over goal by 900 words = 50,900 words written

Goldie opened her eyes. The compact mirror was in her hand and she was lying on the bed in the dark room. She rubbed her eyes and hopped off of the bed. She walked straight over to the bookshelf and opened the cupboard doors. She pushed at the back of the cabinet, but the doors did not open into another room. In fact, there were no doors. Just a smooth piece of wood. She checked for the scratches. The fairy ring was still etched into the wall along with the words of terror.
Why had she been able to see those scratches in the other timeline? In that timeline, she hadn't written them. Some sort of fairy magic?
She walked out of the door before realizing she still held the magical compact in her hand. Not that it had any power here. She wished she could keep it, but she knew it belonged to her aunt and she couldn't steal it from her.

Right before she stepped into the living room, Mom's voice said, "That was a long nap!"

Goldie ran over to her mom, who was sitting on the couch, still reading the same book she'd been reading. She gave her the biggest hug in the history of hugs. "I wasn't napping, Mom," she said. "I was kidnapped to fairyland and a fairy disguised as a cat started a new timeline so I could go into fairyland and save the Me that was kidnapped!"

"Wow, that sounds like an amazing story," said Mom.

"I want to hear it," Aunt Mary called from her rocking chair in the corner of the living room, where she sat knitting something intricate.

So, Goldie told them the story.


The next day as Goldie and Mom were leaving Aunt Wilma's house, Aunt Wilma pressed something into Goldie's hands. "Since it was such an important part of your story, I think you should have it."

Goldie hugged the compact to her chest and hugged Aunt Wilma goodbye. "Thank you," she said, through a veil of tears, then she turned and walked out the door.

"What a sensitive little thing," Aunt Wilma said to herself as she closed the front door and went back to her knitting.

I'm sure there are plenty of holes, and I think I'm in need of an epilogue, but this is where I'm going to write:

THE END

Part 3: Untitled Novel, Day 21 - Words to Go: 0

She'd been in the dark for so long, but it took a moment to adjust her eyes again to the darkened room after Goldie's light went out, but Prisoner Goldie screamed as her door came open and she saw the little girl fall to the ground in the dim light of the fires burning outside in the city. She took her first steps outside of her cell in years, fell on her knees, and picked the little girl up from the floor and held her against her chest, screaming and crying as she rocked Goldie's lifeless body. The crusted mud on the little girl's jeans flaked as Prisoner Goldie shook the little girl, trying to wake her again.
Why hadn't she rinsed that mud off when she was out at the spring? No, no, Goldie shook her head. She'd never been at the spring. She'd never been anywere in fairyland except the cell The compact. What made the compact so special?
Right. It's a fairy blessing. Floyd had told her that.
Who is Floyd? Floyd is Turin. He's also in cat form at the moment. That's why he'd never come back to save her. Until now. She had all of the little girl's memories in her head. She remembered it all as if she was there. Was it because they really were exactly the same person, just separated by minutes in time? Goldie from that time didn't exist anymore, except, she did. She is me. I am her. I bet I could still send her back to her time. She can't stay here. Where did that compact go? Goldie walked back into the cell, scanning the ground for the little silver compact. The jewels sparkled in the firelight over at the edge of the back wall, near the window. She picked up the compact. She was unaccustomed to being so tall. The ground seemed so far beneath her.
If it caused problems, she guessed she could always make herself shorter. She had one more prisoner to save. Goldie raised her invisibility shields and marched out of the castle through the front door. Goldie's more mature mind understood the abilities she had with the fairy blessing a little more than her seven year old mind did. She used the blessing to navigate the city, through the crowds of dark fairies, to where she'd discovered Floyd the Cat, otherwise known as Prince Turin, was being held. The King had put him in a box in the court house, next to his court house throne. The one he used instead of the castle throne in emergencies. Goldie walked into the room just as the King was pronouncing his decision to put Prince Turin to death.

"No!" Goldie unveiled herself. She stared directly at the King.

"You!" The king roared, rising to his feet. "Arrest her!" he called to a closeby guard.

Goldie cut off the guards air supply with her mind without removing her eyes from the king. The guard fell to the ground.

"Somebody grab her right now!" The king called again, and six more guards rushed at Goldie. She waved her hands and a huge ball of red energy exploded from her body and threw the guards violently against the walls.

The king growled.
So did Goldie.
He sucked in his breath and blew a gigantic torch of flame from his mouth. Two guards had snuck up behind Goldie. They were turned to cinders in a matter of moments, but Goldie remained unaffected. He blew another streak of flames and Goldie rerouted it with her hands, sending it shooting up toward the roof, setting the ceiling on fire.

"I will burn your entire city to the ground if you don't let Turin go, RIGHT NOW." Goldie bellowed at the top of her lungs. "You cannot destroy me," she added in a whisper.

The king only stared at her as the ceiling began to cave in. Goldie started to laugh.
The king covered his head and ordered the guards to let the cat go.

"No!" Goldie shouted again. "Give him back his true form as well. And, the agreement between you and Turin's father is over. He has learned his lesson."

The king knew he would never win against Goldie. He could see the power eminating from her very veins as she stood there begging for him to threaten her. She wouldn't hesitate to kill him if she needed to. The king nodded to Goldie and snapped his claws together in the direction of the cat.
Suddenly, Turin was a fairy again, though he had no fairy powers, still. That was for his father to return. He still fought against the chains that held him.

"Release him," said the king to the guards. Then to Turin, "Tell your father the agreement has been terminated and I've released you in good will. But if I ever see you here again, I will not hesitate to roast you like a pig." The king laughed a horribly evil laugh. The ceiling was falling in chunks now. Turin ran to Goldie and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her out of the building with him. He didn't stop walking until the two of them were outside of the dark city and walking on the road out of the dark forest.

Goldie studied Turin as they walked.
He was, surprisingly to Goldie, a lot like a normal human being. He was taller than her, just a regular man until the wings at his back peeped out from behind him. Goldie expected him to be small, like Tinkerbell. Then again, when it turned out that Kiffen was a fairy, as well, her pre-conceived ideas about fairyism were smashed into little pieces. But, being that Turin was a good fairy... it seemed logical to Goldie that he'd be a little bitty thing, like when Kiffen was pretending to be good and he made himself tiny. Maybe it was just a notion in her head that the smaller a creature is, the scarier it isn't.
The smoke from the dark city was thick out in the woods. It was hard to breathe. Goldie adjusted her fairy blessing accordingly and breathed a little deeper. In all her years in capitivity... Even she wasn't sure how many. She could tell she'd grown taller, but that didn't tell her much... In her years of captivity, the hate in her heart had been welling up. She hated her captors, she hated herself for having such a need for adventure. She would have been just as content reading a book, rather than exploring the house, but she'd let her curiosity get the better of her. She'd somehow remained positive for the entire time of her captivity. Now that she was away from the darknesss, the bars, the screams, the death. Especially the death, the murder.
She couldn't hold it down anymore. And, Turin was the only one there. She'd been making mindless small talk without listening to what she or Floyd had been saying. Suddenly, she vomited words.

"I can't believe you sent that little girl to save me... you, you sick freak," she shreiked the last word as she walked toward him. "She's dead because of you." Goldie whispered, wagging her finger in his face.

Cat/Floyd the Cat/Light Sprite Prince Turin stopped walking, shocked at Goldie's outburst. His wings twitched behind him as if he was preparing to take flight.

"I didn't send her to be killed," he threw back through gritted teeth. He quieted his voice and spoke sincerely and imploringly. "Goldie, she isn't dead. She is YOU. You feel her, don't you? You have her memories? That girl is not gone. She's still here, standing in front of me. You're older, but she was always you. Do you understand that? The two of you are the same. She'll never be gone."

"It sure feels like she's gone. A little girl walked into my dungeon and she took the time to pay attention to every single one of those prisoners. She took the time to send them where she wanted so badly to go. But, she couldn't go home. She was stuck. And, now she's dead."

"You're not dead."

"Yeah? How do you know? She's dead, so I must be!"

"That timeline is moot, now, because you are alive. You have her memories. She's alive, the same as you are. She's standing right her in front of me!" He rubbed his arm across his nose violently. After pacing on the wooded road for a moment, he held out his hands, palms up, and shrugged his shoulders. "I admit it. Maybe I made a mistake, but changing your timeline was the only way I could figure out to save you. I knew if I changed the timeline, you would return to that room AFTER you'd originally been taken. Kiffen knew that someone was going to come in after you and once I sent the fairy blessing through, there was nothing else to do, but wait till you found it and follow you in. I promised to get you out of that cage, and I did. Can't you at least thank me for that?"

Goldie was prepared to scream bloody murder at him, when she noticed movement behind the trees lining the road.
A growl came from the forest. "You can thank him later," the voice said. "Or, if you hate him so much still after I kill him, I guess you can thank ME later."

Kiffen stepped into the road, a dark laugh rose from his throat. He looked at Turin, shaking his claw at him as he announced, "You know, you had me fooled for a long while. As soon as you disappeared, I knew what the story was. I'd figured it out. I knew I shouldn't have left the girl alone, but I got overly cocky. I thought I'd be able to find you first, because I knew I should have been able to sense you if you were following us. You used the sylphs? To find us? Sylphs speak mostly lies," he said now, speaking to Goldie. "But, because the royal light sprites are so much better than everyone else," he spat. "They do whatever they're bid."

"Go away! There's nothing more you need to do here. You're the one that got her into this mess, I'm the one who got her out."

"That's exactly why I'm going to light your head on fire. I hate it when someone wrecks the things I've worked so hard to accomplish."

He moved toward Turin, now. Goldie had backed up toward the treeline, but Turin stood his ground.

"I don't care what you do to me. She'll never be under your spell again. That's all that matters."

Kiffen still had issues working up the ability to puff fire, he was likely only talking up a big game because he wasn't able to spit fire yet.
Goldie hated bullies and she knew what she had to do. As Kiffen was spouting off another round of threats, he stepped closer to Turin. The prince lashed out at the dark fairy, he likely knew that he had a slight chance, especially if Kiffen had no fire in him, to beat him at his own game. But, Kiffen's claws were sharp. He ran his claw down Turin's arm as he cried out in agony. So, fairies have red blood the same as me, and they feel pain, was what ran through Goldie's mind in her frozen stupor. She was tired of violence and yet she couldn't protect him. She was standing here, watching it happen, with no idea what to do.
Goldie could hear Kiffen's stomach gurgle.

"We had a good run, Prince. Now, it's time to say goodbye."

He gave Turin one last knock on the head and he fell to the ground, beaten once again within an inch of his life, only this time he didn't get in the fight to save his own life. He'd done it to save Goldie. He lay convulsing on the ground.
Kiffen inhaled sharply.
Suddenly, Kiffen was small again, like he had been back in the halfway world. The halfway world where everything started. Kiffen set up his evil fairy ring there, he lured her into it. Even then, Cat had tried to save her. He'd tried to stop everything. When he was sent to her world, he went to find her. He wanted to save her from the first moment he knew her and he'd worked out the perfect plan. The only thing was, he'd have to create a new timeline to do it. And, that took him years. So many years. Goldie had never given up hope that she'd be rescued, she just wasn't prepared for the rescuer.
She knew it was the only thing that he could have done. It made sense that it was the only way. She remembered thinking back in the halfway world that she'd really just like to pick up her foot and stomp on the little Kiffen. He was the perfect size. They were both the perfect size to stomp on.
She realized her head was above the trees. The fairy blessing knew what she wanted.
She giggled and both Kiffen and Turin turned to look at her.
Kiffen's eyes grew wide and he turned and ran away, but in one quick step, Goldie had overtaken him.
When she stepped down on him, a gigantic cloud of glitter rose into the air. A beautiful cloud of glitter, sparkling, glinting, raining down onto the forest road.
And, the bad guys bleed glitter. How unusual.

Kiffen was no more and Goldie was back to her regular 7 year old size and the clothes she'd worn into fairyland. She liked it best that way. She wasn't supposed to be an adult yet.
She stood in the road, next to Prince Turin, whose wounds were healing quite quickly because of his father's blessing and they watched the glitter pieces float to the ground around them.

"I can't stop thinking of you as Floyd the Cat," she said to him.

"Go ahead and call me Floyd. I don't mind." He grunted a laugh, still in quite a lot of pain.

"It'd be fun to just call you Cat, again, like the old days."

"Heh, Cat then. That's fine." He sat up. His ribs had healed well enough to support him, now, though he still groaned in pain. Goldie knelt down to help him. "You know," he said. "Now that you've rescued yourself, there's nothing holding you here anymore." Goldie knew. She'd been thinking about home ever since she walked out of the dungeon.

"I didn't rescue myself. You rescued me," Goldie said.

"You really are her," he said.

"I know I am. It's just so confusing," Goldie sighed and helped Turin stand. "Are you going to be alright?"

"I'll be fine." He limped a couple of steps just to prove he could walk. The cut on his arm was less than half the size it was when it was first inflicted. "Maybe I'll see you around sometime?"

"I hope so." Goldie threw her arms around his waist and hugged him. Not too tight. He was still in a lot of pain. "Thank you so much, Cat. I'll always remember you."


And, then, Goldie wished a doorway into existence that led between her world and the fairy world. Good for one trip. She waved at Cat and stepped through.

Part 2: Untitled Novel, Day 21 - Words to Go: 0

Goldie approached it slowly.
Her shoes scuffed against the ground as she walked. She was afraid. Would she see her own future? The prospect frightened her. She peeked into the cell. There was a surprising addition to this cell that none of the others had. A window to see from. A tall, malnourished girl with long dark hair, wearing a potato sack the same as the rest of the prisoners had been, stood by the window, looking out into the dark city.

"So you finally made it to my cell, huh?" her voice was soft.

Goldie was caught off-guard. She hadn't thought she'd notice her. She didn't say anything before the girl turned around and looked at her. She squinted because Goldie's light was so bright.

"I can see why everyone has been calling you an angel. I can't see your cheeks, but I just want to pinch your cheeks!" she said as a small smile played across her lips. "I gotta say, you're the first person who has freed that many prisoners in one night. I'm so happy for them."

"You're next," Goldie said.

"Don't bother. I'm the only one who can open it," she sighed. "As you can see, I'm in here. I think they gave me the room with the view so that I could see what I was missing. You ought to see it," she looked back through the window. "It looks like some nut lit half the city on fire." She giggled.

"I really can, open it." Goldie said. Apparently, Floyd was lighting the city on fire. Seemed like a good diversion. Strange that creatures with fire in their breath would build their city out of trees.

The prisoner laughed to herself. "Someone else tried to rescue me once. He said he'd be back once he figured out how to get me out. He never came back, but it's OK. I haven't lost hope that maybe someday it could still happen. His name was Turin." "Turin?" Goldie repeated. Hadn't that been the name Floyd had mentioned before he left to cause that big diversion that was going to keep the dark fairies from coming down into the dungeon? Maybe it was working because it'd been almost an hour since the guard had been here last. They must all be out fighting fires.

"I can open this door," said Goldie, again.

"No, you can't."

"Yes, I can," Goldie stated, frowning. "I'll prove it to you."

"The only way you can open that door is if you are me."

Goldie stared at her. Maybe she wasn't too crazy to figure this one out.

After a second, Prisoner Goldie put her hand up to her mouth, "Oh, my gosh. You ARE me." She threw her arms out toward Goldie. "Don't touch that door handle, please, PLEASE!" She ran over to the door and looked through the bars at Goldie.

Goldie was staring at the handle. She'd reached for it, but her fairy blessing would not let her touch it. It was a threat to her.

"Why can't I touch it?" she whispered.

"Stop, stop, stop," Prisoner Goldie repeated over and over again.

Goldie tried to push her hand closer to the handle of the door, but the blessing was holding her hand about an inch from it. "What's going on?" Goldie said, looking at Prisoner Goldie with a confused look on her face.

"He said if I ever opened the door, I would die. I am the only one who can open it and if I open it, I will die."

"Did Turin know that?"

"Yes." She cocked her head to the side. "Why?"

"He's back."

Prisoner Goldie's eyes widened. "What do you mean? Did he bring you here?"

"He said it's my only way home. I have to save you." Goldie kept staring at the handle. She tried wishing the door open, but that didn't work. Why if she had the most powerful fairy magic in the fairy world could she not figure out how to open this door? If I open the door, I will die. But, I'm trying to open the door. If only I can open it, why will it not open. It has to open for me. Floyd said it was cursed by the king, but he never mentioned death. Why wasn't he here with me? Why didn't he come to see Prisoner Goldie. They'd apparently been friends. Why was this all so dependent on me? Couldn't he have figured out a way for her to leave without using the door? Why not get her out through the window? A little bit of fairy magic would have done that, no biggie.

"Don't listen to him. You don't need to save me. You're me. You're already out. Leave me here and go home. You can get home by yourself. Go find Turin and tell him I said to send you home. Also, tell him I hate him."

Goldie looked up at her.

Prisoner Goldie was frowning.

"Does he love you?"

"I hate him. HATE HIM. How could he do this to a little girl like you? I thought he was my friend. I thought he was going to save me himself, not send a little girl to do it. This is utter and complete madness." Prisoner Goldie paced in her cell.

"He's never done anything but protect me. He's out there, lighting those fires, Goldie. He's done all of this for you. He even said he'd die for you if it would free you from your prison. I think I know why they gave you that window, it was to punish him, not you. They wanted him to be able to see you looking out that window from a distance if he ever came back. They wanted him to know that he could never protect you. He had no magic to protect you. They cursed the door because of him. This is all because they hate him. You shouldn't hate him. He's done nothing but work so hard to save you. And, guess what? Here I am to open the door."

Prisoner Goldie started to cry as she paced across her tiny cell.

If the blessing won't let me open the door, how do I do this? Goldie thought. Oh, that's an easy one. She pulled the jewel encrusted compact out of her pocket. Her glowing energy light went out when she threw it through the bars into to Goldie's cell and pulled the door open. A massive shock ran through her body.

Part 1: Untitled Novel, Day 21 - Words to Go: 0

She stood very still on the bottom step, there was a corner ahead of her. She stared into the blank stone wall for a minute. What would she do? She would man up and she would walk into that dungeon and she would save those people.
She straightened her spine and pushed her shoulders back. She was going to walk into that room looking strong, it'd help her to feel more confident, even though she didn't feel it. She stepped off of that last step and she turned the corner into a very dark room.
One torch was lit beside the entrance to cells, but Goldie lit up the fairy blessing's white light instead of that. Inside the room, dungeon cells lined the hall, five on each side of the hall, and one at the very end. She tried to avoid looking at that one. She didn't need to see her yet. She could wait to see her. She glanced between the first door on her right and Goldie's cell.
A wave of emotions washed over her - sadness, excitement, anger, happiness. She put her hand on the handle of the door and wished it would open. She pulled and it opened easily. There was a figure in the back corner of the room, leaning against the wall, one emaciated leg stretched out and the other knee bent. He had a full beard and long, matted hair. He sat up when he saw the door to the cell open. He waited to see what was coming in. He watched Goldie's light as it moved toward him. When she'd almost reached his side, he turned his face away and closed his eyes tightly.
She knelt down beside him and touched him on the shoulder, he was spooked by her touch and pulled his shoulder away.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to startle you."

"Who is that?" he asked in a voice hoarse from lack of use. "Who's there?"

Goldie suddenly understood why he was staring past her. She was still invisible and he probably hadn't heard what she'd said to him, either. She wished to be visible and able to be heard, again. When the man finally met her eyes, she knew he could see her.

"Hi," she said.

"Are you an angel?" he asked. His eyes were deep set, his face skeletal. all of his teeth seemed to be missing. He was wearing what looked like a potato sack to Goldie. His feet looked so large against his atrophied legs.

"I'm not an angel, I'm just a little girl," said Goldie. "I'm here to help you."

The man just blinked his eyes slowly at her.

"What's your name?" she asked.

"I can't remember," he whispered. "Sometimes when I'm able to sleep, I dream of before. In my dreams, my name is Tyler."

"It's nice to meet you, Tyler, I'm Goldie," she said and held out her hand in greeting. He just looked at it, so she wiped it against the front of her shirt, and let it hang back down by her side.

"Are you able to walk?" she asked him.

"Too weak, been like this for days," the man said. Suddenly, his whole body was seized by violent coughing and, afterward, when he wiped his mouth on his arm, it left a dark streak of blood. He leaned his head back against the wall. "I'd really just rather be dead."

Goldie's heart fell. She didn't know what to say. She was seven years old, for goodness sake. She slid down to sit on a floor so dirty, she could barely tell it was made from stone. She put her head in her hands and the two of them sat there like that. Goldie thinking she'd never be able to get the people out of here if they were too weak to walk. She couldn't lead them through the woods, or carry them all. She couldn't leave them here, either.
She wished that Floyd was there with her to help her figure out what to do. Just because she had the most fairy magic in the entire fairy world didn't mean that she knew what to do with it.

Goldie heard the door at the top of the stairs open and the dull thud of footsteps decending the stairs. She whipped around to look into the hallway, only just noticing that she hadn't shut the cell door behind her. She made herself invisible as she ran to the door to pull it shut, locking herself back inside. Everything thing is back the way the dark fairies had it, she thought. She stayed at the cell door. A dark fairie with keys hanging around his neck came into view. He jingled in and walked down the hall. She could hear his breathing, the same as Kiffen's had been. Snort, growl, snort, growl.

"Goldie! Goldie!" Tyler screamed desparately. He'd only just noticed her absence.

His shouts brought the guard back to his cell door. The dark fairy's face came with inches of Goldie's. His teeth were bared and he was growling like an angry dog. His snake eyes were red. Kiffen's were yellow. She liked the color yellow better than red on the dark fairies. Red was scary.

"Shut up!" the guard bellowed through the bars. His voice hurt Goldie's ears. She covered them and ducked to the ground.

"Goldie!" Tyler shouted, again, louder than before.

"Don't make me come in there," the guard pounded his fist against the door.

Tyler sobbed quietly in his corner with his arms over his head. Goldie leaned her head up against the door, listening for him to finish his rounds and walk back up the stairs.
Goldie weighed her options. What would I want to happen if I was trapped in this place? I would want to go home. I would want to go back to before this happened and never let it happen. I would want to be in the place where I felt the safest in the world. I would want to be with my mom. Sitting next to her while she read a story to me. She hadn't read a story to me in a long time, probably not since I learned how to read. I would be leaning on Mom's arm, watching her turn the pages. I loved to look at the pictures. I would want to do that. Just be there in that peaceful moment again. Start life again from that moment. Can I do that for these people? Can I put them back in the place they felt the safest before they were kidnapped by the evil dark fairies? The fairies can navigate time, I know they can. I can do this. I will do this.
When the guard's footsteps could be heard retreating up the stairs, Goldie ran back to Tyler and knelt beside him, yet again.

Tyler grabbed her arm when she put it on his shoulder to comfort him. "I can't see you," he said. "Are you the death angel?"

Goldie changed her invisibility preferences. She made it to where she was only invisible to the bad creatures. The fairy blessing would hide her from anything it considered threatening.

"You're not going to die," she said. "I'm going to save you."

"What if I want to die?"

"You can't." Goldie sniffled and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "You just can't, ok?"

She was trying so hard to save these people. Why didn't he want her help. Did he not believe she could help?

"I'm going to send you back. You will not remember any of what you've suffered while you were here, even though I know it's all you remember right now. Do you believe me?"

"No," he said flatly.

"I guess maybe you never will. But, hey, you won't be sick anymore. You won't remember me when you get there, but I will remember you. Go back to your life, Tyler," she put her palm on his forehead and wished him back to his world. He shuddered for a moment before passing back through to his life before he'd been captured and added to the people collection. She was left with an imprint of his life in her mind. Goldie wept when she saw his childhood, his happiness, she saw his marriage, his kids and their kids, she felt his sorrow at the death of his wife and not long after that, she saw him buried in the ground. He had a good life, he was already dead in Goldie's timeline. But at least he had gotten the chance to have a life. She would never see him after this moment. She dried her eyes and stood up from the hard floor. She didn't know how long she had until the guard came back around. The place would be swarming with dark fairies when they realized the king's people collection was missing.

Goldie traveled from cell to cell freeing the prisoners one at a time. There were men and women, old and young. One said she'd only been here a couple of hours. She was the most emotional of all the prisoners because she hadn't had time to lose the idea that someone would eventually come in and save her, that maybe this place was really just a horrible nightmare. This place was like the center of a time vortex, or something. So many people, from many different countries, all from different eras and she sent many of them back only to find out they would be dead by the time Goldie had been born. This young girl was different, though, she would not even be born for about three decades after Goldie's birth. For some reason that was harder for Goldie to fathom. Goldie could see less of her life than she'd been able to see with all of the other prisoners, could it be because knowledge of the future would effect Goldie's own future?
After little girl from the future, her name was Veronica, only the cell at the end of the hall remained.

Part 3 of Untitled Novel, Day 20 - Words to go: 3566

Part III

Goldie made a mad dash to the end of hallway and turned through the doorway on her left. She stopped at the top of the wooden stairs. They were too far apart. It was like giants lived here!
Mm, well, Kiffen kind of was a giant, but this was ridiculous. She looked around for an easier way to get down the stairs, then started jumping one by one. Her heart was pounding. She wasn't sure that not being able to be seen was the same as not being able to be heard, so she wished again that her approach would be quiet. Suddenly, she laughed to herself. Dangerous mission or not, it was silly of her to forget that she was actually still very small. Small enough to ride on Floyd's back. She wished to be her normal size and the stairs were much easier to manage after that.
She studied the strange wood walls as she navigated the stairs. They were much like in the tunnel, except there was a lot more light here to see by. It was interesting the way the branches intertwined with each other so tightly and yet still formed little alcoves every few steps along the stair that housed burning candles. There, not to far from one of the alcoves was a branch twisted into a heart shape. Everything was so well-shaped as if the trees had naturally grown that way. She knew they hadn't, though, because Floyd had told her it happened because of all the curses the dark fairies had placed on the trees. So many trees and they were still alive and growing as far as she could tell.
She ran her hand along the wall. These stairs lasted forever and they weren't even the ones that led straight into the dungeon. Floyd had said those would be stone stairs. She should be encountering a room soon that's what he'd said. On and on down the stairs.
Wait. Hadn't she seen that tree branch before? It was the one shaped like a heart. Huh. Maybe they had twisted heart shapes as their decoration. She imagined the dark fairy queen picking out the theme for the castle. "I want pink frilly curtains," she probably said. "And hearts twisted into the cursed wood. A big huge one on the outside. Oh, my goodness, I love it!"
Goldie squatted near the heart and pulled a piece of bark off of one of the thinner switches exposing the green innards. Definitely still alive. She'd use that as a marker, just in case. She started down the stairs again. When it seemed like she'd walked down about three stories, the heart shape appeared again, exactly as she'd left it, with the piece of bark peeled off.
She wanted to get out. She thought it. I want to get out. She checked her pocket for the fairy blessing. The compact was still there. Ok. She walked down the stairs again, but found the heart shape, once again. OK, then. She turned and walked up the stairs, but didn't find the door that way, either. A long way up the stairs, her heart showed up again.
She sat down on one of the stairs to think.
Either there was a magic here greater than her fairy blessing, the fairy blessing that Floyd said was greater than any fairy magic in the entire world of fairies, or there was something she was missing. She wasn't frustrated yet. She was only seven years old, but she was up to a challenge. Maybe the door was hidden. Maybe the door was fairy magic. Was it a fairy doorway? What did Goldie know about fairy doorways. The only one that she remembered being through was the one in the halfway world but the only thing she really remembered about it was that it was marked with an etching of a fairy, possibly scratched by Goldie when she was captured by Kiffen's fairy ring. When Floyd, Kiffen, and Goldie had gone through together, they had just pushed on it with all their strength.
She doubted that this was one of the esoteric doors that would shoot her out into just anywhere. Because it was inside a castle which was inside fairy world. It would make no sense. So, just a door. A hidden door. She chose the heart as the door marker. A strange door marker for a doorway that led into the room that led to the stone stairs which led to the dungeon, but this was the dark fairy kingdom. She didn't know much about it, but she wouldn't put it past them. She stood on the step that the heart was resting above, put her hands on the wall, she gritted her teeth, and pushed against the branches with all of her might. She pushed again, her face was almost against the wall, she was exerting as much energy as possible, because that's what it seemed like the door would feed on. Last time, she AND Kiffen pushed and she was sure that Kiffen had plenty more strength and, therefore, more energy than she did. I need more energy, she thought, and suddenly she collapsed into the great room that Floyd had told her was just above the dungeon.
She shreiked as she fell onto the hard stone floor and then again when she realized there were at least six dark fairies in the room with her. She covered her mouth and scooted back against the doorway she had just come through. It was just a wall and yet a door. Crazy stuff. These dark fairies must be the guardians of the people collection in the dungeon. She wondered if it was usual to have this many guards or if that was special because she was in town? Not a single one of the dark fairies even looked at her. She was invisible, and now that she'd tested it, she could tell that she was soundproof as well. That was a relief. She could see the door to the dungeon on the other side. If she opened it, would they see the door open? She was invisible, but that didn't mean she wouldn't have an effect the objects around her. She wasn't a ghost, though, to the dark fairies in this room, she might as well be. She assumed that if she bumped into any of them, they would notice her presence, so she stayed as far away from them as she could. In a room as big as this one, it wasn't too hard, although, one stood up so quickly that she nearly tripped over his tail as he walked by to talk to one of the other dark fairies.
She managed to jump over the top of the tail as it swung by. That guy had an upredictible tail. When she reached the door she wondered if she'd need a key. Probably not. Goldie's personal dungeon cell would only allow one person to open it. Not the king, not Kiffen, it could only be opened by Goldie. Not a problem. Goldie was both inside and outside of that cell. It'd probably be the easiest one to open. So, no need to steal the keys. She eyed the door. It didn't look like it had a latch, just a pull handle. Good, that'd make for a quick entrance, now she just needed to draw their attention away from the door for a moment.

Up on the ceiling, lanterns were suspended from hooks. Perfect. She pointed at one hanging near the dark fairy farthest away from her. I want that one to fall, she thought. And it did. Right before it shattered on the floor, Goldie squeezed through the door and into the cement stairwell.
The first thing that hit her was the stench. The horrible, horrible stench of rot. How could anyone who came down to see the king's people collection stand the smell long enough to even look at the people he'd stolen from their lives on planet earth? She covered her nose. It didn't help, so she fixed her nose with her fairy blessing before proceeding down the stairs. She didn't need to sneak because no one could see her and no one could hear her, but somehow it seemed appropriate here in the dungeon. She walked with less surety. She didn't care if she encountered more dark fairies. They had no abilities if they didn't know what they were fighting. She was suddenly dreading seeing the captured Goldie. Would she know who Goldie was? Would years of being holed up in a stone cold box have driven her crazy? What should she expect? Floyd had said she wouldn't like it, but she wanted to appear strong - to look like a hero to all of them and to save them all. She didn't want to have one of her usual nervous breakdowns with no one to offer comfort.

Part 2 of Untitled Novel, Day 20 - Words to go: 5092

Part II

"We're going to need to be quiet, now." It was so strange to Goldie not hearing his voice but knowing that he'd spoken. She didn't reply, instead, reaching up to give his head a quick pat. She wondered, since he hadn't always been a cat, if things like rubbing him on the head were condescending. He wasn't just a small house pet, he was a fairy. It was so weird to think about. "Since my voice can't be heard, would you like to hear my story? I'm sure you're curious. Especially since I know a lot more about you than you probably realize."

Goldie nodded, but remembered he couldn't see her, so she patted him on the head in an effort to tell him to go on. She did want to hear about him. She wondered what he possibly could know about her. Couldn't be any more than she'd told him. She had told him a lot the first time they met, out on the porch. That day seemed so long ago at this point, she'd forgotten about it for a moment.

"I was the son of the Light Sprite fairy king," Floyd paused a moment. "I was young and naive and full of myself. I thought that nothing could touch me tucked away in my life of luxury. I abused my servants, was disrespectful to the king, my father, and I wreaked havoc wherever and whenever I could. One day, I chose to wreak havoc where I should never have gone.
"I went to the Dark Fairy City and I taunted its people. I threatened them because I thought they should be assymilated into our kingdom instead of creating a kingdom of their own. I thought that I should rule over all of the people in the world of fairies. I brought my sword and I challenged the king to a duel. To the death. I was so haughty, I thought I would win, but the king of the Dark Fairy City beat me to within an inch of my life. The only reason I did not die right there is because my father stepped in and begged the king of the Dark Fairy City not to kill me.
"The king agreed to let me live. 'He gave me charge of his life when he walked through the gates of my Kingdom. I will have his life. We have an agreement, O King.'
"'As it is written in the treaty, so it shall be, King. You will have my son's life for two hundred years to do with as you like. After that time is up, you will give him back to me whole.'
"After my father was done haggling over the terms of my slavery to the king of the Dark Fairy City, he turned to me and said, 'Maybe this will teach you a lesson that I never had the guts to teach you.' He leaned down and touched me, bestowing a blessing upon me that would help to heal my wounds, then he turned and walked away. I haven't seen him since that day. It's been almost a hundred and fifty years." Floyd sighed inaudibly. "My fairy magic was taken away from me and I was thrown into the dungeon to live out the next two hundred years of my life amongst the king's people collection."

Goldie pressed her hand to her mouth to try and keep from speaking, but a small squeak in the form of a "What?" came out anyway. Floyd's back rippled a couple of times. She must have been holding his hair too tight.

"Kiffen is a pawn of the king, he's a human capturer. And, yes," Floyd continued. "The people collection dates back many hundreds of years. Most of which are captured when they're small and kept until they die. Sometimes that happens sooner, sometimes later, but none of them had ever escaped until I got there and told them about the secret tunnels. I kept ties with the outside world, sneaking messages out through my fathers spies, and eventually the people collection started to wane. Not because they were dying, though, it was because they'd learned how to escape. Many, many people escaped back to their own worlds before the king realized it was me who was helping them.
"The king was furious and I guess the next best thing to killing me was cursing me to live in the human world as a cat. And, that, Goldie, is the story of why I am a fairy, and yet, a regular cat. I promised to find my way back to fairy world to stop the evil king, so I kept an eye out on Kiffen's movements in the human world.
"Everyone in the dark fairy world thought that the king had killed me, so Kiffen doesn't realize who I actually am, either. Somehow, no matter where in the fairy world we place a door, they will always open into that spot, in your aunt's house, so I was content to stay there and wait for as long as I needed to. When you arrived, I knew the prospect of a new addition to the collection would bring Kiffen in no time, but all I could do was wait. I couldn't even keep him from capturing you because I hadn't any resources. But, now, I have you, too, and Kiffen can do nothing to stop us."

Goldie and Floyd rode on in silence until Goldie felt him slow to a creep.

"Cut the light," he barked. Which was funny, because he was a cat. Of course, Goldie was trying not to let the seriousness of the situation overwhelm her so she had to allow her brain to find the fun in things. Goldie's light went out. They were approaching an opening in the wall.
The whole castle was alight. Goldie hopped down from Floyd's back.
"That's unusual," said Floyd. "They almost never have any lights. A few fires here and there, never this. Kiffen must know something is up. Well, to be fair he always knew something was up, especially when you re-appeared in the same room he'd stolen you from. He knew who you were, but he didn't know how it had happened that history had changed, but he was up to the challenge of capturing you again. When you came into the halfway world without a fuss, things were even easier for him. He'd just lead you into to fairy world and toss you right into the same cell the first Goldie was staying in. But, he didn't account for a fairy blessing. He's alerted the big guns, though. His tiny brain finally wrapped around the entire situation. I don't like this. You're going to have to go in alone. Do you understand?"

Goldie was pressed up against the tunnel wall again in fear. How was she supposed to do this alone?

"Listen to me, they can't hurt you. They'll be watching for you, but that doesn't matter. You can make it where they won't see you. I'm going to have to cause a diversion. As soon as they tell the king about me, he'll want to see me for himself. I can't change my size and I won't be able to hide very long if they're looking for me." Floyd stared intently into Goldie's eyes. "You need to hide yourself. Think it and it will happen, Goldie, remember. You need to follow the wooden stairs down on your left. I will be turning to the right and going upstairs. Got it so far?"

Goldie nodded, but said nothing. She was about to cry, but she knew this had to be done. If she could find her other self, she would be able to go home. This was the only way.

"You're going to walk through a large room and open the door at the other side of the room. The steps behind that door are stone. This is the entrance to the dungeon. Your cell is the one at the very end of the hall, facing you as you come into the room. You will not like how she looks. She's lived in this world much longer than you have," Floyd twisted his head back and forth, solemnly.

"How long has she been in the dungeon?" Goldie mustered a whisper.

"It took me a long time to drudge up my old friends to help me and then we had to work on a plan to get you back here. I'm not going to lie. It's been years."

Goldie pressed her head into her hands. Years? The Goldie that had come here first has been here for years. She's likely given up hoping that anyone will ever save her. She made up her mind then and there that she would do anything she could to save her, not for her own sake, but for the sake of the girl who had been trapped in a dungeon for years, who had been missing her mother for years, who had given up hope probably years ago that she'd ever escape, and who had no idea why she was being punished. It was that girl that Goldie was going to save. She stopped cowering at the edge of the tunnel and stepped out into the light.

"Goldie, remember that all you have to do is think about what you need and it will happen. I didn't tell you this before, but that compact you hold in your hand holds the power of every light sprite in the world. I asked the fairies to bless it. Every single one of them. At the moment, you are the most powerful fairy in the history of the fairy world. You can save everyone."

"I will save everyone," Goldie stated confidently. "But, what about you? What will happen to you? You might be killed!"

"Don't worry. They can't kill me, my father made sure of it when he blessed me with that healing blessing the last time I saw him. This is the moment where we part." Floyd leaned his head against Goldie and she threw her arms around his neck. Goldie didn't know whether he was sincere about his father's blessing or if he was just saying that to comfort her. Floyd broke the embraced peeked out of the end of the tunnel into the bright castle. "Think yourself invisible. OK. Now, go! Go now!"

Click here for Part III

Part 1 of Untitled Novel, Day 20 - Words to go: 6,890

Part I

It was in the making of this castle that the open spaces they were crawling through remained open. The dark fairies did not close up the wall around Dark Fairy City before they made the castle, so when the trees were being twisted spell after spell into the castle walls and rooms, the areas lowest in the castle where the branches were the thickest left cracks. These areas in the castle were not regularly used. They were below even the servants quarters, above the dungeon. The dungeon itself was made from stone so it had a doubled wall that made the dungeon area nearly impenetrable from directly outside the dungeon.
Now, of course, if you walked directly into the castle, down steep staircases, and through dark, foreboding rooms, it'd be easy to get to the dungeon. But, Floyd and Goldie couldn't do that. So, here they were, crawling... well, Floyd was lucky, actually, he could still prance through the thicket tunnels without hitting his head on the walls that to Goldie felt like they were closing in tighter and tighter.
Goldie was slowing. She was running out of breath, she couldn't keep up the pace anymore. She felt like she was slithering like a snake. She could barely get her knees underneath her to pull herself forward anymore. She whimpered when she looked ahead into what became just pure blackness ahead of her, she covered her mouth with her hand to try and calm what wanted to become a scream. Why did it have to be so dark? She couldn't see Floyd anymore. She collapsed on the tunnel floor and rolled into a fetal position, covered her face with her hands.

"I want to go home," she kept repeating. Tick, tick, tick, tick.

"Goldie! Why'd you stop?" Floyd called urgently into Goldie's mind. She could hear time go by with his footsteps. Tick, tick, ticking as he moved closer to her. Or maybe it was his claws against the tunnel floor. "What's the matter? We need to keep moving."

"I don't fit," she wailed, louder than she meant to. "I want to go home!"

"Quiet!" Floyd urged.

Goldie wouldn't be calm. She was hyperventilating. She was beginning to think that she wouldn't ever be able to get out of this fairy world. She'd never see her mom again. She knew it wasn't a dream. She knew she was stuck here with no way home. Plus, a Goldie from a different reality in her world had already been stuck here for days. How in the world was she going to do any better than the first Goldie?

"Goldie! The fairy blessing. It can do whatever you wish," Floyd said.

"I wish to be home," she cried.

"We have to keep moving forward for you to go home. Keep moving forward. If you want the tunnels to seem bigger, all you have to do is think it and it'll happen, but we have to keep going. If we keep going, we'll get you home. The fairy blessing doesn't recognize when you're in distress, it only recognizes threats. But, think what you want to happen and it will try and help you with whatever resources it can." Floyd sat beside Goldie and stared at her. She didn't move for quiet a while, but she quieted. After a minute or two of mostly silence, a few sniffles here and there, but that was understandable, Goldie stretched out her legs and rolled onto her stomach again. In her mind, she wanted the tunnels to be big enough she didn't have to crawl. She also wished they had the oil lamp with them. Had it been left in the halfway world, she wondered? No, she didn't think so. It had come through the esoteric door with Kiffen, she was pretty sure. That probably meant it was just laying out in a meadow somewhere, lost. As Goldie thought about those things, she started to walk again down the dark tunnel.

It grew lighter as she went, and wait. She was walking, not crawling like the had been before. The tunnels had widened! Incredible! Plus, she could see. She felt a light tickle in the palm of her hand and quickly flicked it, thinking a spider or whatever else might live this deep in a dark forest might have found its way onto her hand. But, after she shook it a few times, the tickle was still there. She lifted her hand to her face and jumped in surprise when she saw a glowing ball of light in her hand. Was something attacking her? Maybe there was a spider and it had been trying to bite her and now the fairy blessing was holding it captive. The compact had created a ball of light earlier, when Kiffen had tried to touch it, but that was rainbow colored. This was pure white light.
Had the fairy blessing given her its best try at an oil lamp? This was much better than an oil lamp. It was amazing. Goldie caught herself giggling, she felt so magical at the moment.
She heard steps in the distance. Hahaha, she laughed silently, Floyd is coming back again to tell me to hurry.
He'd disappeared farther ahead in the tunnel once he could tell she was doing alright, because, just like the dark fairy, Kiffen, Floyd the Light Sprite was no good with crying children.
Goldie hurried along until she noticed that the steps were a lot louder than she'd expected Floyd's to be. She put her hand behind her back, hoping the light would go out, it did, she pressed herself against the tunnel wall and listened as the approaching steps slowed. They stopped.
She could hear it breathing. It was way too big to be Floyd. It could probably smell her. She could hear it sway back and forth between it's feet and paw the ground. Where was Floyd? Had he hidden when the creature made its way past?

"It's me. Floyd. Where'd you go?" Goldie's brain spoke up.

She tried not to yelp in excitement. At least he was alive! But, she couldn't reply. The creature might hear her. She heard the scatch of something sharp against the wood floor, and then, nothing.

"Is that you right there, Goldie?"

She still didn't reply. There was nothing she could do. She heard the creature move closer to her. "I'm going to come stand next to you. Don't freak out and scream." Goldie heard him say. Then, the whole tunnel started shaking with the sound of a purring cat. She stayed pressed to the wall because she still had no idea what to do. She turned her face as far away from the fast approaching creature and sucked in her breath.

Suddenly, brushed past her arm.
Fur.

The sound was eminating from whatever was attached to the fur. She reached down and felt for the compact in her pocket. She felt it, and a lot of mud from the spring bed. If the compact is here, I'm not in danger, she thought, so she drew her hand up and wished for light. Suddenly, the tunnel was filled with light. Sitting to Goldie's left, was Floyd. A gigantic Floyd. What the...

"Floyd, you scared me!" She studied him for a moment. He took the opportunity to chew on one of his claws. "Why are you so big?"

It was funny. Floyd never broke a smile on his expressionless face, but Goldie could tell he was laughing when she heard his voice in her head. "I'm not big," he said.

"Of course, you are. You're huge compared to me. Can't you feel that you've grown?"

"Quiet down. We're too close to Dark Fairy City. Talk in a whisper."

Goldie put her hands on her hips and frowned. She was tired of people not answering her questions. Well, cats... and wyverns, uhm, dark fairies. There weren't any people here. It was kind of sad. In some ways, she felt super alone out here in the midst of these dark tunnels, battling evil, saving herself from a kidnapper she thought was her friend. It was all so weird. "I haven't grown, you've shrunk!" Floyd still laughed.

Goldie looked around the tunnel. The tree branches did seem like they'd gotten bigger, but she just assumed that was because they were getting closer to the city and new trees were growing into the tunnels. There was nothing else to compare against, except for Floyd, who was definitely a lot bigger than he used to be. She had wished to be able to walk upright instead of crawling, maybe the easiest way for the fairy blessing to grant that wish was to make her small and leave the tunnel alone.

"Maybe the best thing now would be for you to ride on my back since you're so small. Then I won't have to wait for you while you have your little bouts of depression once every two minutes. Plus, you're even slower now that you've shrunk. No offense," Floyd added on a whim.

Goldie brushed off the insults. She didn't care too much. Plus, she'd never ridden a cat before, they were too small. It was now or never. She walked to Floyd's side and said, "Let's do this! I don't know why I'm so excited."

"I'm glad YOU'RE happy about this," said Floyd. "Cat's aren't like horses. It hurts when my fur gets pulled. It's like sensitive scalp, except all over my body. So, be careful."

Goldie climbed up onto Floyd's back and smiled as they started to trot down the tunnels. The breeze blew through her, probably, matted hair. It was still braided up, but strands were falling out all over her face. She wasn't sure what sort of shape she was in since she dove into the mud, earlier, but it stood to reason that she wasn't looking so good. She patted her hair down as well as she could. If this is what she looks like when she finally gets back to her own world, mom was going to kill her.

Click Here for Part II

Part 3: Untitled Novel, Day 19 - Words to Go: 8,664

Part III

As they lounged by the spring of water, Goldie leaned against a tree and began to nod off. She closed her eyes for a bit but was startled out of sleep when she couldn't hear the comforting sound of the spring gurgling anymore. She opened her eyes, but remained very still. A wall of darkness had risen up on her left side. She couldn't see what it was and she also couldn't see Floyd. She turned her head to look at what was beside her. Large gray flowers had grown up beside the spring. The spring was not running anymore. Something had stopped it from flowing. The flowers looked like especially large sunflowers, only very dark and not colorful at all. Their stems were dark gray and the petals were lighter gray. Inside the petals was a jewel encrusted disc where a normal sunflower would grow sunflower seeds. Goldie moved closer the the flowers and stood on her tiptoes to look into their jewel covered faces. They were beautiful, like diamonds, kind of like Kiffen's teeth.
Goldie wondered if the flowers had no color because they never received any sunshine. But the flowers hadn't been here before. She'd been watching the scenery change and flowers had not been one of the things she'd noticed as they'd been walking. That meant the flowers had grown up between when she closed her eyes and when she opened them again. Plus the spring wasn't running anymore. Had the flowers taken the spring water in order to grow so big so fast? Where in the world was Floyd. He wouldn't leave her behind to go scout out the area, would he? It was just supposed to be a quick stop, not nap time. Goldie hadn't meant to fall asleep.
Goldie walked around the flowers. Four flowers total, all of them growing from one root ball at their base. The root ball was not underground which was interesting to Goldie. She thought flower roots always grew underground.
Unless, maybe they had found something to grow around and get nutrients from that wasn't underground?

"Oh, gosh!" Goldie yelped. She got down on her hands and knees and crawled toward the root ball. Maybe Floyd had laid down to rest as well and the flowers took that opportunity to steal him for themselves. "Floyd!" she called as she pulled at the roots of the flowers. They were barely budging. In fact, the root ball seemed to tighten up more the more she dug at it. She could see cat fur sticking out here and there from the ball. Poor Floyd was in there dying. She pulled at one of the sections of root until it snapped in half. She had pulled so hard on it that it had cut her hand. She'd had grass cuts before, but this was ten times worse!

"Owch," she said.

She stared at the palm of her hand as the wound began to bleed.
There was something wrong. Did her fairy curse not work this far into the forest. That made no sense, though. From what she knew of it, it should grow more powerful as found their way into scarier places because it would grow more protective of her. It should be protecting her.
She touched her jeans pocket that housed the compact.
It wasn't there.

"What? What?" Goldie said to herself as she searched frantically around feeling all over the ground for where she might have lost it. She crawled back over to where she'd taken her nap, it wasn't there. It could have fallen out of her pocket anywhere. She hadn't needed its protection in a while and she hadn't thought it might fall out of her pocket. Where could it be? She thought about retracing her steps out of the forest, but she doubted that Floyd had that much time before the flowers sucked the life out of him, if they hadn't already. She'd sworn to him that she would protect him. What a horrible friend she'd been. She crawled over the spring and her knee sunk down into the muddy ground. She'd left her fruits on this side of the spring while she drank and then she'd jumped over the top of the spring to the other side for fun. It was no where to be found. Her throat burned and her chest felt tight. She couldn't hear herself breathe. She wondered if she was breathing. She had to save Floyd.
She turned and rushed back across the spring toward the ball of roots and started pulling at her again, when in the back of her mind, she remembered seeing something. She let go of the roots and looked in the spring bed. Inside her knee print, a tiny bit of silver was peeking out. She made a throaty gasping sound and dug her fingers into the mud and came out successful! It was the compact! She shoved it, mud and all, back into her pocket where it belonged and fell on her knees at the roots of the flowers where were already wilting. She pulled the roots away from Floyd and Floyd began to claw the ground, fighting his way out of the root ball. He pulled himself toward the spring of water, and then collapsed. He was breathing hard. He was breathing. That was all that mattered.
Goldie collapsed beside him. The stream had begun to run again.

"I'm so sorry," she said and began to cry.

"It's not your fault," he replied. His breath came in short gasps. "There are dark fairy curses all over the forest floor," Floyd's face looked unconcerned because he was cat, but the mental distress she felt eminating from him convinced her that his face would never tell the whole story until he was back to being a regular light sprite. Not that she knew what one of those looked like, but she assumed they had faces that actually showed more emotion than a cat's face. Even the little sylphs had expressive faces. "I thought I'd be able to recognize them easily. I'll not be so smug next time."

Floyd rested for a while before they started their hike again. He said the flowers were literally stealing his life from him one minute at a time. It reminded Goldie of the death machine in Princess Bride that took one year of Wesley's life at a time. Eventually, Floyd felt like he could continue on. He wasn't hurt, just weak, but he ate some food and drank some more water and felt much more energized, so they continued on their way.
Goldie knew that it was probably not much past noon but the deeper they ventured into the forest the darker it grew. The trees started to twist together at the tops creating a canopy high in air. Further in, the branches began to wind together and even further, the roots rose to the surface intertwining together so fully that the created a rough, but consistent floor on the surface of the earth.
She kept following after the cat. Eventually, they reached the point where there was barely room to crawl through the space between the trees and the ground.
Floyd explained it was because the dark fairies had cursed the forest to grow together into an extremely thick wall of trees with nearly no space between them. The tunnel they were traveling through was found by a fairy explorer who had gone too deep into the forest and barely made it back out alive. This part of the forest was where the dark fairies lived. They had several secret entrances into their city, all guarded by evil creatures. These ways were mostly used by evil creatures who lived outside of the dark city and went there to buy evil wares and spells.
The dark fairies only entered through the roof of the forest. Anyone else who entered that way would be captured on sight and thrown into the dungeon. There was a huge castle made of trees and roots and molded curse by curse. It was in this castle where Kiffen resided. Kiffen's people collection was not enormous because he only went people hunting when he was out of other horrendous things to do, but what there was of his collection was also housed in that castle.

Part 2: Untitled Novel, Day 19 - Words to Go: 10,085

Part II

Floyd stopped straightening up his fur and looked at Goldie intently. "You have to speak so I can hear you, but I need to talk to you first. You're not safe here. The only reason Kiffen hasn't killed you already is because of the fairy blessing you have on your person."

Goldie was about to stand up and dust off her pants. She'd gotten them pretty dirty, but she froze, stooped over to dust her knees, she looked at Floyd. "What?" she said, knowing full well she'd heard exactly what he'd said.

"You're holding a fairy blessing that is protecting you from harm."

"No. I know that. Why would Kiffen want to kill me?"

To any outsider, she was just a little girl, having an intense, one-sided, imaginary conversation with a small gray cat.
Suddenly, Goldie's brain was inundated with the knowledge of what was really happening inside of this world and what had been happening since she'd arrived in this place... the first time? Visions flashed before Goldie's eyes.
She saw herself enter the secret room, crawl on the desk, and look out the window. She knew now that Floyd had hopped into the window because he saw what was happening behind Goldie. Kiffen was setting up his very own fairy ring to capture her because Kiffen was a dark fairy. He wasn't a wyvern. He wasn't a snake. He was a fairy. An evil fairy. The bad fairy in Sleeping Beauty was probably based on a fairy like Kiffen. Kiffen set up his trap and it was Floyd's reaction to that that caused her to fall into the trap in the first place.
When Goldie hit the ground, she landed in the center of Kiffen's dark fairy circle, pulling her completely into the halfway world. As Goldie struggled to breathe, Kiffen's huge form came into focus. He really was used to being big because he was big. That's why he was so graceful.
She hadn't been able to see him before because she didn't enter the halfway world where Kiffen actually was until she was captured by his circle.
As soon as she saw him, she took off for the cupboard as fast as she could, she was moaning in fright both in the possibility that she was going to die by dragon and that she was dying because of knocking the air out of herself. Of course, at that point, she didn't know she'd just winded herself. She thought maybe she had broken her neck. She opened the outside doors of the cupboard and dived through to the inside doors. She expected them to swing wide as easily as the first set of doors had, but she slammed into them. They wouldn't budge. It was as if they were locked from the outside. Goldie found a staple in the carpet and started scratching on the cupboard wall.
Falling into the fairy ring meant that Goldie was bound to Kiffen for forever, or until someone could rescue her from his hold.

In the present, Floyd led Goldie into the forest as latent memories continued to well up before her eyes. It was flashes, like from a dream, but she knew it was real. She could feel the feelings that that Goldie felt, and yet, she wasn't the same Goldie. The Goldie from her visions was Goldie from another reality. That Goldie had not met Floyd until he jumped up into the window to try and save her from Kiffen. She had not played with him out in the yard. She had not seen him sunning himself on the roof. She'd found the secret room because she was bored and wanted to find a book to read and thought maybe there would be something better than the Encyclopedia Britannica in the cupboard doors below the bookshelf.
Goldie was able to focus on Floyd and on the memories at the same time. She knew the reason she was here now. She wasn't on a fairy hunt, she'd already encountered a lot of fairies. She was on a hunt for herself. Floyd had been a fairy once, but he'd done many bad things in the past and was cursed to be a cat for a thousand years before he was would be released from his punishment, but that didn't keep him from trying to fight against the actual evil fairies of this fairy world. Floyd followed Kiffen into the fairy world and knew where he was keeping Goldie. Floyd couldn't save her on his own, he no longer had his fairy magic, but he knew some people who would help if he asked. He had his fairy friends bless an object from Goldie's world, the jewel encrusted compact mirror, and send it and him into the past so he could keep Goldie from entering the room until later. Either way, the original Goldie was stuck in fairy world, it was the way the fairy world worked, but in Goldie's world, she'd never even entered fairy world until now.
Goldie was the only one who could save herself. Kiffen had cursed her dungeon cell so that only she could open it from the outside, since she was inside, it seemed like the perfect and most evil curse, and yet hilarious, because she would always be on the inside.
Goldie shuddered when she heard Kiffen growl. She knew it was only in her visions, but it scared her all the same. The prisoner Goldie had the same feeling when he'd growled through the bars of her dungeon cell.

"Welcome to my collection," he'd said and he laughed a scary, evil laugh. After Kiffen had told her that she would never escape because she was the only one who could open the cell and guess what? she was in the cell. He'd laughed another evil laugh and strode gracefully out of the dark place.

Across the hall of Kiffen's dungeon was another cell.

"Is someone there?" Captured Goldie had whispered.

She heard clanking from the other and an old toothless man had appeared at the barred door. Goldie screamed and hid in a corner. Was this what she was to become? Would she be here so long that her teeth would fall out of her head? She'd cried herself to sleep in the dank cell that night.

Kiffen had the sneaking suspicion that someone was trying to help Goldie and so he'd gone back to the room in the hopes of capturing whoever it was. The thing that dark fairies could not do, and this kept them from being too outrageously powerful, was set up their evil fairy rings in the same place twice, no matter what. So, in the room, all Kiffen could do was wait and see what came in through the door. Floyd had made friends with Kiffen and told him all about being kicked out of fairy life. He'd convinced Kiffen they were on the same side. When Goldie had come back into the room the second time... well, technically, the third time, since the first Goldie had entered once and the second Goldie had entered twice. Both Goldies fell off of the desk and were winded, but only one Goldie made it out of the room.
Kiffen made himself small to convince Goldie that he was no threat to her. He'd brought along a Lady Killer Butterfly in order to kill whoever was coming in after the Goldie he'd captured. Its poison was supposed to cause death within five minutes however Kiffen didn't know that Goldie had a fairy blessing.
The fairy blessing was not nearly as potent in the halfway world as it was in fairy world, but it still protected Goldie from the most harmful effects of the poison when she was bitten. The place where the fairy blessing was commixed with an object was the place where that object was the most powerful. Floyd needed Goldie's blessing to be the most powerful in fairy world, therefore it was weak in the halfway world, and had no power at all in the human world. The gift was full of surprises, though. She'd realized it was protecting her, but hadn't realized she'd be able to understand Floyd's language when she found him again.

Goldie was pretty sure she had most of the facts, now. She knew that nothing could hurt her with the fairy blessing in her pocket, but what about Floyd? She felt betrayed by both Floyd and Kiffen. By Floyd because he'd allowed her to again to be brought into the fairy world without knowing what she was getting into and by Kiffen because he'd convinced her he was a friend.

"What happens if Kiffen finds out you've been helping me the entire time?" asked Goldie as they trudged through the forest in the exact opposite direction that Kiffen had gone to look for Floyd in.

Floyd's answer was exactly what Goldie feared. "I guess he'll probably kill me," he said in a noncommital tone, if a thought could be uncaring, it was exactly what this one felt like.

"He can't do that. Plus, I can't let you do that for me, Floyd."

Floyd didn't respond.

"I'll do my best to protect you. You've done so much for me, it's the least I could do," she stated as she followed him along.

They'd been walking a couple of hours when Goldie and Floyd encountered another spring like the one that Kiffen had shown to Goldie earlier. Floyd tested the water and it was not bitter, so he and Goldie drank from it. Goldie had brought a few of the fruits that the fairies had given her earlier and she shared one those with Floyd, who was very grateful the food. When he'd been missing, he'd actually been tossed out of the esoteric door not very far from Kiffen, but he'd high tailed it away from him to try and find Goldie before he did.
Esoteric doors and halfway worlds were almost always made by dark fairies. The light sprites, of which Floyd was one, would never bring a human back into their world. The only way to get a human into fairy world was to create a fairy world inside of the human world, called a halfway world, and bring the human through in phases. Entering the halfway world was done through a fairy ring. Entering the fairy world was then successfully completed by stepping through an esoteric door. Esoteric doors were volatile and irregular, they were easily effected by the weather, by the number of objects coming through the door, and the amount of magic used to get through. Kiffen counted himself and Floyd as magical creatures, but he hadn't counted on Goldie's compact mirror. If Goldie hadn't had her fairy blessing with her, all three of them may have stepped into the fairy world in roughly the same place. The fairy blessing had caused more disturbance than Kiffen had calculated when he created it. Which caused the esoteric door to throw them all out miles and miles apart from each other. Kiffen had gone to find the fairies. He knew they'd be the only way that he would find her and Kiffen without seaching the entire land. He spoke to the sylphs who flew out as soon as they'd heard. The first sylph who encountered Goldie and the dark fairy, Kiffen, flew directly back to where Floyd was waiting for news.
Once he had a trajectory, with the sylphs help, Floyd was able to catch up with them before too long and follow them along to the campsite where they'd spent the night. From there, he watched until he was able to get to Goldie alone. Kiffen did not need to know he was close by.

Click here for Part III

Part 1: Untitled Novel, Day 19 - Words to Go: 12,109

Part I

Kiffen made folded cups out of the same leaves that he'd wrapped the fish in. The leaves held together nicely when folded, quite resilient. Goldie was surprised. Kiffen led her to a spring which flowed out from under a tree just a little ways into the forest. The water was cool and sweet. She sat by the stream and drank her fill.
"Alright. I've showed you where to get water and the Sylphs brought you plenty of fruit to eat. It'll last you quite a while. I could be gone several hours depending on how far I fly before I find Floyd. Got it?" Kiffen asked, pointedly.

Goldie nodded.

"You know how to get back to the campsite from here?"

Goldie nodded, again, but less confidently as her eyes darted back and forth between the spring and where she thought she'd entered the forest.

"OK. Well, show me the way back to the campsite and I'll be satified that you're not going to get lost while I'm gone." Kiffen growled. He didn't give her any indication of where to go, but she was pretty sure they'd entered the forest from behind the tree that the spring was under. They'd had to skirt the tree to see the spring. She led the way back around the tree and tried to keep track of her steps as she made her way out of the forest. She skipped up to the top of the hill and walked straight to the campfire. It wasn't much a fire at the moment, more like glowing embers. Kiffen's dragon breath had eaten away all of the wood in the fire till the rock was sitting by itself in the middle of ash and a few stray sticks, which were mostly charcoal by now. A few wisps of smoke still rose from the glowing spots.
She wished she could at least call her Mom on the phone, to tell her she was OK, so she wouldn't be worried.

"Kiffen? Is there any way to call Floyd? Like, at home we have phones to call people."

Kiffen growled. "Out here, the only way to send a message would be by Sylph."

"Why haven't we done that then?" Goldie cried with her eyes wide. "We should do that right now. How can I get a sylph to come here?"

"Sylphs aren't actually good messengers. They like to alter stories to make them more exciting. They tell untruths."

"Oh," said Goldie. Her shoulders drooped. Well, at least Kiffen was going to look for Floyd. He could fly pretty fast. He could probably fly around the whole land in seconds! That would be awesome. Goldie wished she had wings. She could go with him.

"I'll get some more kindling and relight the fire, so you have that in case it gets dark." Kiffen left and returned with a lot more wood than Goldie had expected. "If the fire starts to get low, pile some more of this on it, but don't put too much on or you'll smother it before it lights. I'll be back eventually." And with that, he spread out his wings and lifted off the ground as he flapped them. Goldie guarded her eyes as he took off. The wind from his wings had kicked up a lot of dust. She watched as he dove into the river valley and then followed the river north. He disappeared behind a group of trees before long.

Goldie crossed her arms over her chest and turned around in circles. She wished she had a blanket, just for the sake of feeling comfortable, like she could be warmer if she wanted to, especially after waking up cold this morning. She eyed the forest, then the river, then the little patch of flowers. When she was satified nothing was coming out of the forest to get her now that the big, scary wyvern wasn't around to protect her, she laid down to look at the sky for a moment. The suns were just cresting the sky and shadows were long. The spot were she was at was a bare spot in the middle of a lot of trees. So, she was surrounded by trees on this side of the river. She sat up again because the sky was too bright to look at, plus it wasn't that interesting during the day. The only thing it had going for it was the second sun. That was what made it interesting. The hot white light did add a sort of dream-like quality to this place.
She couldn't really tell what was on the other side of the river because the hill on that side was taller than the one on Goldie's side. Plus, it was much steeper and muddier than her side. The path to the river was just really grassy, but it seemed pretty easily accessible. If she wanted to go down there. She didn't, really, though she did wonder if the fairy curse would protect her from drowning.
She didn't know how to swim.
She was intensely listening to everything about her. A breeze blew across the long grass. It waved and bowed and stood again, tall and quivering. The sound it made when the wind blew across it was a drawn out, "shhh." The wind was blowing through the trees behind her and actually making quite a ruckus. The trees cracked and swayed. The rushing water in the river. She imagined she could hear the gurgling of the little spring in the woods, but she knew she couldn't. She recognized another noise in the midst of the symphony of nature and turned to look at the forest once more.
"Shuh, shuh, shhh, shhh. Shuh, shuh, shhh, shhh." The pattern repeated and the noise got closer with each repetition. She searched the grass for movement and finally found the source of the noise, something was snaking its way through the grass toward the campfire. Without taking her eyes off the tell-tale grass, Goldie stood slowly to her feet and walked carefully to the opposite side of the fire, so there was something between her and whatever was coming toward her.
She knew she wouldn't get hurt by whatever it was because of the fairy curse, but that didn't keep her from shuddering in suspense of what might pop out into the open in a few seconds.
She gritted her teeth as the thing got closer and closer. The good news is it was a small thing. At first, she thought maybe it was a huge snake since it was so low to the ground, but then she realized that the grass would be parting in a much bigger area because snakes are so long, the grass would take forever to return to its original grassy position. The grass was very flexible, making way for people and/or things to walk through and then going back to their old ways when the person or thing had passed. Agreeable grass.
She couldn't help but scream when the grass-disturber finally made its appearence in the open area of her campsite. And, she couldn't help but scream again when she realized who it was. She squealed with delight and burst into tears all at the same time, so on the outside, it sounded a lot like she was drowning a pool of her own tears and was happy about it. Gurgling and sniffling and laughing all at the same time as she ran over and dropped to her knees in front of the stray cat. She grabbed him and snuggled him close as he struggled to get away from her.

"Kiffen just flew out to look for you! Oh, I'm so excited you found me, we thought you were lost forever. We didn't know how to find you. Kiffen said that you could have popped out of the exoderrick door at any place in this world! Oh, I'm so happy." Goldie was practically yelling her words as she squeezed the cat close.

"OK, OK. Put me down, now! We have some things to talk about."

Goldie released the cat from her arms and stared at him in shock. He sat down not far from her and started fussing over his messed up fur. She hadn't exactly heard a voice but she knew that Floyd was speaking to her. It was like Floyd had passed a thought into her mind, but there wasn't a voice. It was like she was reading his mind, but only when he wanted her to. Could it be that she could understand him now? Had she been blessed with the gift of understanding cat language? If so, when?

"Do I have to talk out loud to you?" she asked him. "Or, can you understand what I'm thinking?"

Floyd twitched his ears back and forth, like he was listening to something in the distance for a moment. Kiffen had said that you had to read the signals that the cat was giving in order to understand him, but this was purely mental. It had nothing to do with his movements. Maybe Kiffen and Goldie had different gifts, somehow?

Click Here for Part II

Part 3 - Untitled Novel, Day 18 - Words to Go: 13,671

Part III

Goldie opened her eyes to blinding light and a chilly back. Kiffen was gone from her side. Maybe he was flying over the whole world to look for Floyd!
She heard splashing from the stream. Oh, maybe he's just fishing for breakfast, she thought. Her tummy grumbled. She was glad he hadn't left before breakfast. The sad thing about eating fish all the time is Floyd probably would have loved it!
Now that it was light out, Goldie was able to take a look at her surroundings. She knew there was water nearby but what she hadn't realized was it was actually a rushing river, rather than a stream. Their campsite was a bare spot on top of a hill that looked down over the river. The river was farther away than she expected, too. She could see Kiffen down at the river, looking for fish. He was pretty tiny looking. Goldie wondered why he walked so much. It wasn't like he didn't have perfectly good bat wings to fly around with. Maybe flying wore him out more. Or maybe he didn't know how to fly slow. Maybe when he flies, he goes so fast that he'd basically fly over the top of Goldie in a matter of seconds. Kind of like an airplane.
The river was in a valley. Behind the river, the muddy hillside rose beyond her sight. It was much higher on that ridge than it was on the one she was standing on. Downstream from Kiffen and around a slight curve was an animal, drinking water. She couldn't really tell, it was too far away. It looked kind of like a deer. She turned around to see where they'd been already. Trees. A lot of trees. More trees than she'd realized they'd come through. Oh, one of those animals was walking out from the treeline. It looked like a deer just like the one she'd seen at the river did. But, now that she was seeing it at a much closer distance, she could see at least two differences from the deer she had at home. They were tan and fuzzy with white tails, just like at home, but these deer had a third eye right in between the two that regular deer have. They also had big floppy ears, kind of like rabbit ears. Floppy three-eyed deer. Hmmm.
A few more deer walked out into the open and started grazing in the tall grass. A little yearling fawn bounced around the older deer with its tail sticking up in the air, waving the white flag.
Goldie wanted to pet it, but if they were anything like the deer at home, they weren't tame, so she didn't try. Along the upper edge of her ridgeline, a smattering of colorful dots were mixed into the long grass. Flowers! She bounded over toward the flowers. On her left, some of the deer raised their heads, sensing her presence, but went back to eating. Apparently, they'd decided she wasn't a threat. Interesting. It was true, she'd given up on the deer as soon as she'd seen them. As she approached the flowers, she noticed a swarm of bug-like creatures, maybe bees buzzing from flower to flower, but a half-second later figured out that it was hummingbirds. Silks, or whatever Kiffen had called the hummingbird fairies. The silks ignored Goldie for the most part. She sat down in the tall grass near a couple of the little flowers. Mom told her that this type of flower was called a bachelor's button. They were a lot of colors - blue, purple, pink, and yellow, at least. Oh, and white, too. At first the little silk fairies wouldn't visit the flowers she was sitting closest to, but after a while a sitting very still, a few of the bravest ones ventured close.

"Hi, little Silks," she said, and smiled.

They moved very, very quickly just like hummingbirds, but the more she watched them, the more she noticed their faces. They kind of had little human faces. Their noses were long and pointy. Their little mouths were grinning from ear to ear. They put Goldie in a great mood. She found herself smiling, despite the fact that she was stuck in another world, hadn't seen her mom in a day, was missing a friend. How many more days would they walk before they got to where they needed to be? Did Kiffen know how to find the fairies? He was obviously from this world, but he seemed pretty lost. This must be a part of the neighborhood he'd never been to. Maybe he wasn't lost, she hadn't asked him, she just assumed because they didn't seem to be getting anywhere, hadn't met anybody along the way. Sigh. If only Floyd would find them, instead.
A shadow passed over the flowers and the silks and Goldie was sure she heard one of them exclaim, "Oh, my goodness!" as they all fluttered away. Goldie turned to see Kiffen standing behind her. She stood and turned to face him. She noticed that her shadow stretched out toward Kiffen. Wait, but his shadow was stretching out towards her. She turned back toward the flowers. A shadow of her body was thrown over the tall grass.

"Two shadows!" she called to Kiffen, who was making his way toward their blazing campfire. "Peter Pan would have a cow if he could see this!"

Kiffen was holding about twelve fish in one hand. Kiffen ate a lot of food. And, they were big fish, too! He probably wouldn't be able to cook them all at the same time.
It hadn't occured to her until now that it was odd that he cooked his food. Why not eat the fish whole? He's a big dragon wyvern serpent thingy. Why not?
Goldie trailed Kiffen back to the campfire and tried not to watch as he sliced up the fish. She had to admit, he was very graceful. He just seemed like he'd always been a big monster rather than a tiny one for most of his life.

"Did you eat fish when you were small, Kiffen?" she asked. She'd picked up a stick and drawn a fairy in the dirt on the ground. The smoke from the campfire rose straight up into the sky. The wind didn't have such a big problem making up its mind which direction to blow this morning, apparently.

"Yep," said Kiffen.

"Were they big fish?"

"No. They were called sardines."

"You have those here, too?" Goldie clapped her hands. "I know what those are! What are those three-eyed deer called?"

"Deer," said Kiffen with a toss of his head.

"Really?" Goldie cried. Such similarities and yet they didn't have people like her here. It was hard to believe. They'd probably be one eyed people. No, wait, one eyed people were called cyclops, weren't they? A cyclops is a monster. At home a cyclops is a monster. Of course, at home a three eyed deer might be a monster, too.

As Kiffen was placing his wrapped fillets of fish on the rock in the center of the fire, a silk fairy buzzed around Goldie's head.
A little voice whispered in her ear, high pitched and wracked with giggles. "Somebody's watching you," it giggled. It flew rapidly to her other ear and repeated the phrase and giggled as it flew away in a zig-zag pattern toward the forest. Goldie watched it fly up toward the tree tops and disappear. She pressed her lips together and looked at Kiffen.

"Kiffen?" she said.

He growled.

"What are those hummingbird fairies called? Silks?"

"Sylphs," he grumbled, still packing as many fillets on the rock as he could. He breathed some fire, blowing it toward the base of the rock stove, like a blow torch to try to speed up the cooking process.

"Do they talk?" she asked.

"Mostly lies," he muttered between fire breaths. When he was done torching around the entire rock, he flipped all of the fillets over and sat down on his tail to watch them cook.

"Are you going to fly around and look for Floyd, today?"

"I said I would, didn't I?"

Goldie sighed. "Yes," she said. She pressed her palms together and laid them in her lap. If sylphs spoke mostly lies, that must mean that they sometimes tell the truth. She checked the forest for any movement, but she didn't see anything. Maybe the sylph just meant that the sylphs were watching. They seemed like they'd find watching people from afar a good pasttime. They were probably easily entertained. She liked their faces. Why didn't they talk to her while she was watching them play in the flowers?
Goldie turned back to a fish fillet being pressed into her hand.
"What's wrong with you?" Kiffen asked. "You seem preoccupied."

"Thank you," Goldie looked at the fish and lifted it in the air, indicating she was thanking him for the fish, not for what he said. "I was just looking at the forest. I thought I saw something moving out there," she said.

"Probably one of those deer. They like to get most of their grazing in early in the day." Kiffen nodded toward the deer still just walking around with their noses to the ground.

I wonder if that grass tastes any good? Goldie unwrapped her fish. She ate it quickly. The fish here were much more fishy than the fish she'd had at home, but Kiffen had said the leaf helped with the flavor. Goldie's guess was that meant that it soaked up most of the bad flavors. It could be worse, she was sure. Floyd would definitely love it, though. Cats love fish.
Next time she saw Floyd, she really wanted to know whether he was from this world or if he was from back in her world, because it was interesting that he didn't have any strange developmental atrocities like many of the other creatures around here seemed to have. Three eyes on a deer. Wouldn't that just mess up your vision? Maybe? She still really hoped that he had wings tucked away, just waiting to pop out at the moment they're needed most, like while he's falling off a cliff. That'd be the perfect time to have wings. After she swallowed her last bite of fish, she started craving something sweet. What she wouldn't do for an orange. Suddenly in a flutter of wings and buzz of giggles, about a dozen orange-like fruits fell on top of Goldie's head.

"Hey!" she called up at the sylphs, mischievous creatures. Kiffen barely noticed the activity, he was so involved in his meal. How'd they know she wanted fruit?

She picked one of the round, orange fruits up from the ground.

"Kiffen?" She held it out toward him. "Are these edible fruits?"

He nodded his head and pointed his hand at the fruit and went back to eating.

"I'm gonna take that as a yes," Goldie said as she peeled the soft citrus-like peeling off of the fruit. The rind, instead of white, was black. She could smell it - a mix of banana, vanilla, and grapefruit. It was a sectioned fruit, just like an orange, so probably a citrus, just not one she'd ever met before. In the center of each section was a tiny black seed. She ignored them and took a bite.
Mmmm, heaven.
The most perfect strange fruit she'd ever tried. She'd tried starfruit and dragon fruit and she'd tried coffee berries. The coffee berries were the weirdest out of all of those and they didn't even taste very good. Kiwi fruit was another strange fruit she'd tried. Hairy and brown on the outside, bright green on the inside. Peaches were fuzzy, but they weren't ugly like kiwis.
This new strange fruit was like a banana and an orange and even a little bit of an apple flavor all mixed together. Mom had said that the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden probably wasn't an apple, like all the pictures portray. It could have been anything. It could have been this fruit right here. That kind of scared her a little bit, but she forgot about it before long, the fruit was too great to be forbidden. After she was done eating the last section of the first half, she put it down on the leaf that her fish had been on. It was highly saccharine. She needed something to drink.

5,056 words total on day 18!

Part 2 - Untitled Novel, Day 18 - Words to Go: 15,824

Part II

Goldie watched him. Not quite believing his careless stance. Not after that strange display just a few minutes ago. She couldn't believe he didn't care what her answer was. Plus, he had said curse. A fairy curse. And, he seemed to be attributing the curse to her mirror, which she had only brought into the room with her, because she'd thought it was something a fairy might like. Plus, it was from outside this world. Why would the mirror be cursed? Maybe a curse wasn't as bad as it sounded. Then again, maybe it was. She wasn't sure she wanted to know.

"What's a fairy curse?" Goldie stood to her feet and straightened her shoulders, trying to look less fearful. She'd not felt any reason to fear him before this, except, she supposed, when he became huge in a matter of moments. That was scary. She knew he wasn't actually threatening her and that he likely was confused and surprised by her bubble, but it caught her off-guard by a lot.

Kiffen gave Goldie a sideways glance and then moved his gaze back to the fire. He growled. Maybe it was actually a sigh. She knew he didn't like questions, but some questions needed answers whether he wanted to answer them or not.
The fire crackled, highlighting the silence. (Which makes no sense because fire crackling does not equal silence)

"A fairy curse is an incantation which is commixed with an object until the curse and the object are entirely one and cannot be separated. In this case, I think that object is your mirror."

"But, I picked the mirror up while I was still in my world. It wasn't even in the halfway world." Goldie pulled the mirror out of her pocket again and rolled it around in her hands. "How do we know if this is the cursed object?"

"Try giving it to me."

Goldie held the compact out to Kiffen, the jewels on the outside of it glittered in the fire. Glitter reminded her of fairies. She assumed that must have been the reason she'd picked it up in the first place.
Kiffen reached toward the mirror with his sharp claws. When he was within a couple of inches of grabbing it out of her hand, a ball of energy burst out of it and surrounded itself. It was protecting itself from Kiffen. The energy ball glowed in a rainbow of colors a lot like the night sky above them. Goldie tilted her head and stared at the bright light in the palm of her hand. When Kiffen withdrew his hand, the light disappeared, when he reached for the compact again, the same thing happened again, only this time the ball was slightly bigger.

"It's protecting itself from me."

"It's protecting itself from you? But why?" Goldie said, sliding the mirror back into her pocket.

"For some reason, it considers me an enemy." Kiffen reached up and scratched a spot near the orange mohawk on his head. "Sometimes when the curse is meant especially for one certain person, the cursed object may only allow the person it's meant for the carry it."

"The person it's meant for?"

"Goldie, it's not a bad thing. It's kind of like a shield. Like my breastplate. It won't hurt you. In fact, it might actually help you if you're ever in danger." Kiffen perused the colorful sky. "I think we should eat our fish and then should try and get some sleep. The double suns will rise within a few hours."

After dinner, Kiffen smoothed out some of the bare dirt on the ground, brushing away some stray stones and lay down on his side.

"What if I don't want to keep the curse?" asked Goldie.

"The only way you can get rid of it is to discard the object. As long as it is near you, it will protect you night and day."

"Huh," said Goldie. She'd drifted back around the fire. "Kiffen? Would you like me to tell you a bedtime story?"

"You may do what you like, I'm going to go to sleep no matter what."

"OK," said Goldie. "I will tell you a short one. Maybe it will help you sleep." She sat down next to Kiffen and began her story.

"Once, when I was very young, I met a little kitten named Tim. He was the nicest kitten I'd ever met and he had a best friend named Max, who was a rabbit. Although Max liked Tim's food quite a lot, Tim didn't like carrots. The two of them shared most everything, even the same toilet.
"One day, Tim got mad at Max for eating all his food and shut him in the bathroom closet. At dinnertime, Tim enjoyed his usual supper without having Max around to take it away from him. Tim ate and ate and ate all of the food until it was all gone. After he'd eaten it all, he lay on the floor for a long time because he could barely walk, his tummy was so round and full. 'Gosh,' said Tim. 'I wish Max was here to eat my food with me. I wouldn't feel nearly as sick.'
"When Tim felt better days and days later, he was finally able to walk back to the bathroom closet. But when he got there, he opened the closet and saw a gigantic hole had been gnawed into the back of the cupboard. Max had escaped! Tim stepped into the closet hole and was transported to a different place. It was not the house where he lived anymore. It was a big city with cars and people and smoke and lights. Tim looked everywhere for his bunny friend, Max, and finally after days of living on the street and not eating any food at all, he found him.
"Max was excited to see him. He said he'd waited for Tim for a long time at the hole between his cupboard wall and the big city, but every time he checked, the cupboard door was not open.
"Finally Max had decided to get on with his life and find a new home. Tim begged him to come back home, but Max said no. Tim wasn't very nice to lock him in the cupboard and he was afraid it would happen again.
"Tim said, 'Bunny friend, I could never leave you here in the big city alone. I promise to never keep my food from you ever again because I figured out that it is better to share your food with your friends than to have no friends at all and have a tummy ache.'
"Then Max agreed to go back with him to their house where they lived. Afterward, Tim always shared his food with Max and sometimes, when Max offered him a carrot, Tim would eat a few bites and eventually he learned to like them.
"The end," said Goldie, proudly.

Snort, growwwwl, snort, growwwl was all she heard from Kiffen. She must have put him to sleep with her story. She smiled. She didn't mind. She liked when Mom fell asleep while she told her stories, too, because that meant she'd done a really good job. A bedtime story must help you fall asleep or else it just wouldn't be a good bedtime story. Goldie lay between Kiffen and the fire and it was like she had a heater on either side of her body. It was very cozy. She fell asleep dreaming of Floyd. She prayed they'd find him before too long.

Click here for Part III.