The Misty World of Arial Hollyberry

The sun glistened off of the dragons wings as she carried Ember Innocenzi and Perhluna high into the bright morning sky. With one more wave goodbye, they winked out and were gone, leaving Arial and the Kind One standing in the tall meadow grass.

They walked toward the shade of the forest as Arial explained how their rescue had been achieved. The Kind One was delighted to find out that the shadeberries Perhluna had found gave the two humans the ability to share their thoughts.

*****

I was dizzy from spinning and dancing with my faerie friends. Still laughing, I stopped and bent forward, trying hard not to topple over while I struggled to catch my breath. It was so great to be with the faeries again. My recent brush with the dark side of the realm made me realize how lucky I am to have my faeries with me.

Along with the feelings of gratitude came the memories of the ivy hedge and my family on the mortal side. Still slightly out of breath I jumped up, a renewed look of panic clouding  my eyes. That same irrational urge to dash into the forest flooded my instincts. I had to get to the portal as quickly as I could, but before I could say anything to Arial I felt a calming hand on my arm.

My mind had slipped back into a whirl of racing thoughts and it was all I could do to keep from shaking Arial’s hand off of my arm. Sucking in a quick deep breath, I turned to face the faerie who had become my ethereal mentor and best friend. Struggling to remain calm I waited for Arial’s sage advice.

Her dulcet voice had an instant effect on my frayed nerves. “Kind One, do not go down the same path that delivered you into the arms of certain danger only last night. Heed the lessons of the Fae, calm your mind, focus, only then can you control your doubts and fears. Clarity of purpose will be your reward.”

I felt like cold water had been thrown in my face. She was right, panicking never got me anywhere. I closed my eyes and concentrated on slowing my breathing. I pictured everyone at home, safe and happy. A sense of peace settle around me like a comforting fuzzy blanket. A soft tingling was spreading over the center of my forehead where the third eye chakra is.

Then…I knew what to do, just like that. It was so simple. I opened my eyes and looked straight into the deep green eyes of Arial. “Arial! you were so right! It was right here all along.” Bella, Ferne and Sunny all cheered in high musical voices as they dipped and dived around my head. Arial just stood, a smile on her face, and nodded in understanding.

“I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before, oh, I have so much to learn.” I reached around my neck and pulled a small pouch that hung from a fine silk cord out from under the neck of my gown. The pouch held all of the gifts the queens had given me, well, all but one. The Horn of Aeon Myst that Mab had just given us at the yule ball hung around my neck on its own shinning silver chain.

Holding the small blue velvet bag in one hand I carefully pulled the strings open to inspect the contents.  Orlaith’s crystal was glowing a soft blue-white, when I passed my fingers over it, the stone’s light intensified, illuminating the other objects. Alina’s butterfly settled on my hand, its iridescent blue-green wings pulsed slowly up and down as I carefully readjusted the lid to the tiny box in the bottom of the pouch that held Litha’s gift of lightening.

I had always thought of the gifts as small tokens of friendship bestowed on me by the queens of the four seasons, but now, holding them like this, I realized that they were much, much more. They were tools, each one harnessing great power. Crystal/ Illumination, butterfly/transportation, lightening/protection, and…I reached up to pinch the tiny ivory horn hanging on its silver chain around my neck between my fingers…horn/communication.

“Arial, why didn’t you tell me about the power of these objects?” Arial stepped closer and held out her finger for the butterfly to settle on, then brought it close to her face so that it could flutter around her eyes and nose. This simple action was one of tenderness and respect. Arial returned the butterfly to my hand  as she spoke. “To the uninitiated, these are just mementos, but to those like you, those who are half faerie, half human, they become a tools with purpose. I could not tell you of their powers, you had to come to it. They choose when to reveal themselves.” She smiled. ” All I could do is get you to focus. You must have been ready because the light dawned.”

“There were so many times that I could have used these!” I recalled the ghostly faerie, then Ember and I sitting under the old Oak tree in the dark and further back to the time Odette and I got caught in the crossed energy of Arial’s and Cythia’s wands and ended up in the forest of Elvenwood. It was Odette who pointed out the fact that the crystal glowed when I held it. I scrunched my face up in disgust. “I guess I should have known they were different when I used the crystal to light up the darkness for Odette to look at my knee.”

Arial transformed herself to her usual faerie size and said, “All in due time, all in due time.” She settled herself on my shoulder and continued, “Think Kind One, there is something more, something that can help you now, what is it? I stared at the shadowed path ahead of us, the path that wandered through the forest to the portal in the ivy hedge. It seemed a long walk back…travel,I thought,  it’s about travel! I have it! I reached into the small bag and pulled out the last object, the rose quartz disc with a hole in its center. Arial’s instructions came flooding back to me, “hold the stone to your eye and picture your destination clearly in the center, then close your eyes and say “Take me to…”

Holding the rose quartz up to my eye I pictured my backyard. The Hawthorne trees casting shade on the ivy hedge, Odette and Warren digging in the garden, Bill sticking his head out of the back door to ask me what’s for dinner. Then I closed my eye’s and said out loud, “Take me home.”

I felt a tingling sensation and a rush of warm air, when I opened my eyes again, I was standing on the patio facing a Laurel bush that had been completely destroyed…

© Tami Ruesch, The Misty World of Arial Hollyberry, 2009-2010

The collected power in the golden orb hit the gigantic beast killing it instantly. It began to plummet to the ground through the trees as The Kind One stood transfixed, seemingly unable to move, and in danger of being crushed.

She was pulled out from under the falling monster at the last moment by a girl with fiery-red hair. Shocked and confused by the encounter with the ghostly faerie , the Kind One demanded an  explanation. Undaunted by the harsh words from one who’s life she had just saved, the new comer introduced herself as Ember Innocenzi.

Satisfied that Ember was indeed another human, The Kind One invited her new friend to sit with her and wait for dawn before continuing on the path through the forest, explaining that there were other, more dangerous creatures lurking in the dark.

The Kind One dozed off. When she opened her eyes she found that they were hanging by their feet in the tops of the trees. The Dryads had pulled them to safety and were sheltering them from the hordes of Shahinian below.

~~~~~~~~

Dawn cut through the upper branches of the forest canopy in streaks of hazy sunlight, pooling on the ground in bright splashes of yellow where the beams hit the damp, mossy ground. Funny how the menacing shadows of the forest at night dissolve in the sparkling light of day. Ember had only been gone for a few minutes and  I missed her already. Still, the sadness I felt about her departure on the elegant dragon Illustratia, paled by comparison to the joy I felt having  Arial with me again.

“Arial, where were you? I knew as soon as the woods had closed in around me that I had made a terrible mistake. I thought hard, hoping  that you would find me and come to me, but for some reason it didn’t work. Why?” Arial had chosen to walk with me in her elven form and looked down on me as she answered.

“An energy field fell between us when your friend entered the realm. It disrupted our telepathy and we couldn’t see you in our minds or hear your thoughts. However we were picking up some very unusual vibrations through the walls of the palace. It sounded like when you sit at your writing machine to make words. Click, clicktyclick, clickty, clickty, clickclickclick, click…like that. The sound was hollow and far off. Orlaith has not been able to intuit what it was. Then it just… stopped…it was all very strange.”

I nodded as I remembered what Ember had told me about being from another realm. “The two different realms must have collided causing a riff in reality. Arial, there was a ghostly faerie in a mist that seemed to have a life all its own, with tendrils that wrapped around everything. I thought she was sent from you, that’s what she had me believe anyway.” I shivered as the spectral being took shape in my memory. “She said that if I came with her she would get me safely out of the woods.” I clamped my eyes closed, trying to shut out the cold emptiness of the dark eyes that reached into my very soul.

I was immediately surrounded by Sunny, Ferne, and about a dozen other faeries, their eyes full of sympathy and their wings flapping with anxiety. Arial placed two fingers on the temples at both sides of my head and whispered, “shi eir vaeli.” The words, “be at peace” and the feeling came to me at precisely the same moment and the shivering subsided. The visions of the beast evaporated from my mind. “Thanks. I wish I could do that thing you do…what ever it is.”

Arial smiled. “You can, you just don’t know how yet. No worries though, you will learn.” Her smile faded. What you saw was a shape-shifter, one of the Shahinian. There are many tribes but they all have the same need, to feel alive by stealing the souls of others. When it became clear that we couldn’t penetrate the forest canopy we sent the Trilia in to find you.”

“What is the Trilia?” Or should I say who.”

She turned to me, a thoughtful look on her face. Taping her long thin fingers together she explained. “The Trilia are a sub race of the air-elementals, they would appear to you as small glowing dots. It would look like a mass of fireflies. If they touch you they can look into your heart, sense your intentions.”

“Arial! That’s exactly what happened! I saw these lights coming toward me, they swarmed all around me, my arm and shoulders. I remember, it made me warm and it tickled, and I knew that they were good.” I saw the scene play out again in my mind. “Oh, but Arial, they can do things…” I was there again, seeing the bright ball of fire blast into the creature’s leathery chest, hearing it’s angry screams… falling. The memory made my head spin and I found myself flat on the ground. Arial was bending over me with Sunny and Ferne on either side.

They were all smiling. Not exactly what I would suspect after relating my life threatening adventure. Arial helped me stand up and I brushed the twigs off of my tattered skirt. “Fine, smile if you have to, but I was scared.” Then I thought about the Dryads. “Did you send the Dryads as well?”

Ferne was hanging, mid-air, just behind Arial. She was all smiles. “In a way. We still could not find you, we had no idea the Trilia had accomplished their mission. It wasn’t until this strange little fellow with owl eyes found Ferne that we knew you were OK and that you had company. Orlaith figured out the rest. She had Ferne talk to the Dryads, you know how Ferne loves the trees! They spread the word through the forest and picked you up just before the Shahinian got to you.” Arial paused while Ferne whispered in her ear. ” Ferne tells me his name is Perhluna. He is a hyper little guy but seriously devoted to his human. It was Ferne that led him to the shadeberries.”

“The shadeberries?”

“Yes, these berries are only found growing by the Castle of Umbra, two valleys past the elven-wood. Elendain keeps some in her herbal stash, but he needed to pick some fresh so that your thought transference would be strong.”

“Well, all I can say is, thank goodness for Perh. Hey, is the effect of eating those berries permanent?”

Arial tilted her head and gave me a searching look. “Try to hear my thoughts. Calm your mind, focus. Do you hear anything?”

“Give me a minute! Good grief Arial, a little patience, I can’t hear anything with you asking questions.” I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and concentrated. At first all I heard was the wind in the branches, then slowly I began to hear voices, a lot of voices, they were whispering to each other, praising the sunshine. Then I heard Arial’s voice. “Those are the Dryads you hear Kind One. To the Mundane ear it is just the wind in the trees, but to those with faerie blood, it is the voices of the spirit leaves.”

I jumped a little when I realized that Arial’s musical voice had mixed with those of  the Dryads in my thoughts. “I can hear you Arial! I can hear you!” I grabbed her by the shoulders and spun her around. “This is great! I twirled around and around and the faeries joined in the dance.

Arial stood to one side and watched with delight, knowing that soon enough I would have to return to the ivy hedge and more serious matters that waited on the other side.

© Tami Ruesch, The Misty World of Arial Hollyberry, 2009-2010

Be sure to read these related posts: “What lurks in the Dark Wood”,   “Never Hitchhike with a Ghostly Faerie”, and, “Ember in Faerie Land”

To find out how Ember ended up in Arial’s Misty world you can visit:  “Ember in Whirlogonzia, Episode 7″