A Fairy Tale

Chapter 3 Aspen

The fairy who opened the door was a wood fairy named Aspen. She was the fairy who had given a tulip to River the night before. Aspen had short blonde hair and green eyes. Aspen showed River in and served her a cup of huckleberry tea. River sat for a while in the main room of the branch sipping her tea. The room had many paintings along the walls. The one that caught River's eye was a painting of an orange butterfly. It was surrounded by green and pink wisp creatures flying all around it. As River was looking at it, Aspen came back into the room.

"I painted that," She said, startling River.

River responded saying, " It's beautiful. But do you know how to get out of the woods?"

"I don't know the way out of the woods. Wood fairies don't leave the woods very often," Aspen answered." But I do know someone who can help you. My friend, Mia could probably help you." Aspen gave instructions to River about how to get to Mia's house.

She said, "Go to the bright side of the forest and go to the first blue flower that you see in the Pumpkin Meadow, then blow the horn next to the door. If the horn is made of green and yellow petals, then it is the correct flower house."

River thanked Aspen and went towards the brighter side of the forest.

Many hours later, River found herself blowing the green and yellow horn on a large, blue flower. A door opened and she went inside the flower. Inside she met Mia. Mia had beautiful white hair and beautiful white eyes that sparkled. Inside the flower, River saw the most beautiful sculpture of a rose. Mia sat her in a chair made of daisy petals.

River said, "Aspen told me you know how I can get home."

Mia answered, "Yes go to the river at the end of the dark side of the forest and follow it to the lake. At the lake, get in and wish to be home."

River started across the forest. Along the way, River met a ice fairy named Princess Nicole. Nicole had short, curly red hair and big blue eyes. Nicole needed help finding her home. She told River that she lived in the kingdom of the Snow Cap Peek Mountain. Nicole had come down the mountain to find a magical flower that would help her find memories that were too

long ago for her to remember.

"Can I help you get back?" River asked. "I know where the mountain peak is."

Nicole responded, "River you might not be treated kindly since you aren't a ice fairy. The ice fairies have been acting violently over the last few months."

But River was determined to help Nicole even if she was not going to be treated kindly. When they had been hiking up the mountain for quite a while, Nicole said,

"We're in Yeti territory now, so be careful not to move any rocks."

Soon River noticed something moving on the mountain.

"What's that?" River asked.

Nicole replied, "It's a snow yeti, which means that someone set off his alarm. When a rock or piece of ice are moved crystals that hang around their necks start to glow letting them know about it." (a snow yeti is a large animal that looks like an overgrown shaggy polar bear that hates fairies and they live under large sheets of ice.)

"What do you mean?" River asked.

"The rocks and pieces of ice are magical. If they're moved, then the yetis come out to find who or what moved it," Nicole replied.

"Do the yetis eat fairies?" River asked.

"No. They just freeze them and use them as territory marks or as trophies of hunting skill. If you don't want to be frozen we need to get to that village before the yeti gets to us," Nicole said pointing to a cave.

Quickly they flew across the freezing snow towards the cave. Before they got to the cave village (a cave village is a village that is in a cave were most ice fairies live) a yeti saw Nicole and started to chase her.

"Go to the village while you still can!" River yelled against the howling wind.

As Nicole flew towards the village, River began to shout spells at the yeti. When River hit the yeti with a spell of fire, the yeti stood still, obviously trying to counter River's spell with ice. River used the delay to quickly fly to the village. They entered through a path lined with torches. As soon as River reached the end of the path, ice fairies screamed that a different fairy was there and began hiding or throwing rocks. As they went up the cave tunnels, the fairies that lived in the caves hit River and cut her. Once, a large ice fairy came out of his house and beat River with an icicle whip.

Finally they reached the peak of the mountain. River had been beaten and cut but she was happy because she had helped Nicole. Inside the castle, the architecture was beautiful. There was a long bridge that led to the throne room with stairs leading up to hundreds of bridges two miles above her head with many bridges even higher. There were also stairs leading down to bridges two miles below with more even further down. Large rooms of ice were all over, they were homes for the ice fairies. As River walked on the ice bridge, Nicole said to not fly because the entire kingdom was made of fragile ice crystal and a breeze might destroy it the reason it was inside a mountain.. They walked into the throne room and River was introduced to King Kay the ruler of all ice fairies. His throne was made of blue crystal and his head adorned a golden crown. Sitting next to him was Nicole's older sister, Saffron.

King Kay joyfully cried, "Thank you so very much for bringing my daughter home."

He made sure that the fairies were kind to River as she traveled down the mountain. Before River left, Saffron gave River an ice crystal. Saffron had red hair and green eyes, she looked nearly identical to her sister. Saffron was a great army leader and she had helped the Lady Tamber win a battle five years before. They had been fighting the goblin king and the battle had lasted for almost two years. The fairies would have lost without Saffron's' help.

"This will help you on your journey," Saffron said.

When River was at the bottom of the mountain she noticed how the ice fairies had been bowing down to her and she wondered why.