Faerie Ring, the Complete Story

Once, long ago, there lived a young boy. His father had left his family for the fires of war, so he took up some of his father’s duties, like gathering firewood. It was on one such trip that his adventure began. It was early on a Monday morning, and frost was in the air. His mother had woken up with a bad head cold, so he had left to gather firewood. He headed into the forest that lay about ten yards from their little cottage. He had been into this forest, and knew the best places to hunt for firewood. So he headed for a little hill towards the center of the forest. As he proceeded towards the hill, gathering twigs and broken branches all the while, he began to feel warmer. He that saw the forest was becoming greener and was flowering. When he reached the hill, he was drenched in sweat, as the forest felt like it was in the prime of summer, not in the middle of winter. He saw that the forest floor around the hill was coated with mushrooms and toadstools. Some of them reached up to his knee. He leant towards one and was surprised to see a diminutive man, barely up to his thigh, wearing a tall pointed red cap that made him look a foot taller, sitting on the mushroom. He was smoking a tiny wooden pipe, tiny smoke rings floating up into the forest canopy. He turned to smile at the boy, and said in a surprisingly deep voice, “Go on, sonny, there’s a little party up on the hill I think you’d like to see.” His curiosity piqued, he started up the hill, with a soft tune playing in his ears, growing louder as he reached the summit. When he reached the top, there was a flute and a guitar playing in perfect unison. He saw a circle of small green men with two pairs of cicada wings per fairy. They were spinning in a circle, their tiny green faces facing the sky as joy flowed like water throughout the hill. The young boy was caught up in it all, and was swaying from side to side, his eyes filled with joyous tears. He began to feel quite drowsy; his eyelids drooping like a disappointed dog’s ears, and sleep tugging at the corners of his vision. He toppled over backwards as the relentless tide of sleep overtook him. He woke suddenly, with his fur jacket providing little protection from the cold as he floundered out from a snow bank with a chill wind ruffling his hair. He picked himself up, and scoured the land around him for any sign of the fairies or the little man. He saw nothing but snow, bare black trees, and a few startled deer. He reached up to a tree above him and pulled off a few branches and began the trudge back to his mother’s cottage. Later that night, with a roaring fire and a thick blanket tucked snugly about his toes he began to drop off. Just as the deadness of sleep was creeping over him, the fire was blown out. He eyes opened with a snap, and he scoured the bare board around the fire. He saw nothing. Then he heard a knocking. He looked at the door, but there was nothing interesting there. He turned to the single window and saw that it was open. A small figure, with a tiny woolen cap sat on the windowsill. It hopped in, and twisted its head from side to side, apparently taking in the cabin. Then the door burst and a rush of those tiny figures with their small woolen caps tumbled through the doorway. The young boy sat upright in his bed, his eyes opened wide by these midnight apparitions. The flood of little things immediately stopped. They slowly backed out, making each step was painstakingly slow and deliberate as humanely possible. When they had left, he got up, replaced the door, and restarted the fire. He finally relaxed, falling into a deep and dreamless sleep. The next day, the young boy woke early, at dawn, took a small knife from the wall and headed out into the forest. He finally found a good tall ash tree, and began to climb. He cut a sprig of mistletoe and ran back to the cottage. He found a single rusty nail and nailed the mistletoe to the front door. That night, as the boy drifted away into sleep, he heard a faint rustling outside, but nothing entered the house, unlike the previous night.