Birdie's Book Read online

  I looked down at the page I had just written. My writing was now illustrated with drawings of the tree and the shadow! Not only that, pressed flowers were embedded in the paper, glitter made sparkling stars among the words, and bits of satin, lace, and ribbon bordered the pages. It was beautiful.

  I pressed my hand on my page. The firefly’s glow faded. The moon was gone, and the sky was light purple.

  It was time to go.

  I found the opening in the curtains and walked into the fairy ring. It was empty: no tables, no fairies, nobody at all. I looked down, and I was wearing the clothes I’d chosen from the wardrobe again. I looked back. My fairy bedroom had been on the raised grassy circle where the queen’s table had been. I’d sat writing all night, or at least all of a fairy night. As I watched, the white curtains disappeared into the bright rays of the rising sun that shot through the willow trees. My firefly had disappeared as well.

  I thought for a moment. What did I have to do?

  I had to find Kerka. Then I needed to find the Shadow Tree. I walked to the edge of the circle and was trying to figure out which of the paths to take when Queen P. came down one of them. She was wearing a bathrobe (at least, I think it was a bathrobe) of flowered velvet tied with a white satin sash; her wings somehow came out of the robe, and her hair streamed to her knees.

  The fairy queen smiled and nodded at me. “It went well, I see,” she said.

  “I guess so,” I said, not really knowing how to describe the experience I’d just had. “Do you know where Kerka is?”

  “Right here,” said the fairy queen, waving her hand behind her.

  “Birdie!” called Kerka, striding into the fairy ring. She was licking what looked like an ice cream cone and holding another one. “Breakfast!” she explained, waving a cone. “Granola cone, mango yogurt ice. I have one for you. How’d you sleep? The fairies gave me the most incredible bed—”

  “Kerka!” I interrupted her. “We have to go!”

  “My mother used to say that breakfast was a must,” said Kerka with no sense of urgency at all. “Especially for girls who have things to do!” She held out the breakfast ice cream cone.

  “She’s right, breakfast is a good idea,” said the fairy queen. “Plus, I need to give you something, Birdie.”

  The firefly was flitting around me again, shining like a jewel. “There you are, sweet gift,” said Queen P., pointing to her right shoulder, where the firefly landed obediently. “Give me your hand,” said the queen. “And take the light.”

  The fairy queen took my hand and moved it to her shoulder where the firefly sat. At once, the firefly landed on my finger. Its light moved into my finger and spread to my whole hand. The light, which glowed through my clothes, changed from pale yellow to gold as it traveled up my arm. I watched in wonder as it crept up my shoulder, turned a fiery copper, and then dropped to surround my heart.

  “It’s called a heart gift,” the fairy queen explained. “A piece of magic from all the past fairy godmothers in your lineage is in it.”

  I looked over at Kerka. She had finished her breakfast while the queen had done her magic. Kerka held the other cone out to me, only dripping a little.

  “Oh, all right,” I said, taking it from her and smiling despite myself. Did it bother Kerka that I had gotten this amazing gift? “But we’re leaving as soon as I finish it.”

  Luckily, Kerka didn’t seem bothered or jealous at all. “Where are we going?” she asked as I licked the ice cream cone.

  “To find the tree that the Agminium flowers talked about: the Shadow Tree,” I said. I turned to the fairy queen. “You can point us in the right direction, can’t you?”

  The fairy queen nodded. “Follow me.”

  Kerka was like a classic heroine, striding boldly behind the queen, her bag with the Kalis stick and the map on her back. And me? I slurped on my ice cream, and I am sure I looked worried. Heart gift or no, fighting shadows, healing stones, and saving my family were not things that came easily to me.

  We entered the willow woods again, walking on another glass-shard path through the trees. Then the queen led us through a garden of all orange flowers and plants over a path of crushed shells. From there we took a green moss path that went through a jungle of lilac bushes.

  While we walked, Kerka told me that her pack was filled with fairy food for the journey ahead of us. I imagined that meant pastries filled with amazing fruit, or maybe some with edible flowers, like zucchini blossoms stuffed with rose petal jam. Well, that was something good to look forward to!

  Of course, the lilacs were at the edge of the glass wall, which is where the moss path ended—although this was a different spot from where we’d come in. Not only lilacs pressed against the wall here, but also tall rosebushes.

  The fairy queen stopped and pulled a red satin bag from her bodice. She opened the bag and pulled out two small red feathers. Then she gave one to Kerka and one to me.

  I touched mine; it was like downy silk. “What are these for?” I asked.

  “These are your last gift from me,” said the queen with a smile.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  Kerka smiled. “Will we be flying?” she asked.

  “Something like that,” said the fairy queen. “With these magic redbird feathers, you can ride the Redbird Wind.”

  “Is that good?” I asked.

  “It will be faster than walking to the Shadow Garden,” said the queen, “but it will pose challenges.”

  I sighed. “And I bet you won’t tell us what those challenges are.”

  “That’s right,” said the queen, raising one eyebrow. “But I can tell you not to drop the feathers while you are on the wind, for their magic only works while you hold them.”

  I didn’t say that that seemed kind of obvious to me, but Kerka and I looked at each other, and I could tell she was thinking the same thing.

  As Kerka and I put our feathers into our pockets, the queen continued, “I have given you three things now: the map for direction, the heart gift for strength, and the feathers for flight. Now, here is something to remember.” She reached to gently close my eyelids, and a vision from The Book of Dreams rose in my mind.

  The Green Song

  Don’t give me diamonds

  I don’t need gold

  Just leaves and sunlight

  And a gentle wind to blow

  Green

  Surround and cradle me

  Green

  me breathe and sing

  I can see a patch of blue

  Breaking through

  I can feel a little smile

  Coming to me

  Green

  Surround and cradle me

  Green

  Let me breathe and sing

  I opened my eyes. “That was Mo’s dream!” I said. “But what am I supposed to remember from it?”

  “That is for you to figure out,” said the fairy queen, giving Kerka and me each a kiss on the cheek. “Off you go to find the Redbird Wind.”

  Before I could open my mouth to ask how, Queen P. winked at us. “Just one last bit of fairy help: Follow the scent of cinnamon.” She touched the glass wall, which melted away like ice, leaving enough room for both Kerka and me to walk through.

  We walked into more roses and lilacs on the other side. Kerka and I each sniffed a little. Sure enough, there was the smell of cinnamon. We had to push our way through the lilacs and rosebushes to follow it. I turned around to wave to Queen P. one last time. She was gone, and I could barely make out the glass wall, whole again.

  Kerka and I kept on through the bushes. Tiny thorns scratched my hands like kittens’ claws until I told them to stop, in Latin. I was surprised when they did!

  We emerged from the bushes into a field of wildflowers. Clearly, we were not meant to stop there, for the scent of cinnamon pulled us on. In between sniffing the air like a beautifully dressed bloodhound, I talked to the flowers.

  “Ave, amicas!” I greeted them one after the other.<
br />
  Soon Kerka was greeting them as well, since it was an easy phrase to pick up. We always got happy responses in return.

  At the opposite side of the field was an odd rocky hill, or rather, a hill of rocks, and not just any rocks, but huge gray ones that sparkled with mica. The rocks looked as if giants had been piling them up for some purpose now long forgotten.

  At the bottom of the rock hill, the breeze picked up the cinnamon smell and stirred it around.

  “It smells like those tiny red Valentine candies!” I said.

  “It smells like the coffee cake my mother used to make,” said Kerka.

  I wondered if it made her a little sad, but I didn’t have time to think about that because the wind began to blow in earnest. I had to hold my fairy cloak so it wouldn’t sail off. As the wind swirled up the rocky hill, it turned pink, then deepened in color until it shrouded the rocks at the top in a whirling crimson.

  I leaned toward Kerka. “Do you think this is the Redbird Wind?” I asked.

  Kerka gazed at the crimson wind. She nodded. “It must be. Are you ready?”

  “Yes, very ready,” I said. I am going to save my family’s place here in Aventurine or die trying! I thought. Suddenly I wondered how hurt I could get in this dreamland. Wouldn’t I wake up if something really bad happened? I nearly whimpered but pulled myself back together and decided not to think about it.

  “Let’s go to the wind, then!” Kerka said. “This’ll be fun!” she added. “Didn’t you always want to fly, Birdie?”

  “Uh-huh,” I said, trying to sound excited again. “Always.”

  We clambered up the rocks. I banged my knees and shins more than once, but I was determined to keep up with Kerka. We stopped before the top because that’s where the red wind was now swirling like icing in motion on a cupcake. The scent of cinnamon was overwhelmingly spicy.

  “Let’s get out our feathers and see what happens,” I suggested.

  We both held our magic redbird feathers tightly in front of us. We looked around.

  “I feel like we’re supposed to say some magic words,” I said. I giggled, thinking about how we must look: two girls in fabulous fairy clothes, holding up feathers, hoping we could fly.

  Suddenly the crimson whirlwind came right at me. It pulled at my hair, which was now flying around where it wasn’t held by the purple scarf. I gave a little squeak and tried to back away, but the wind pulled me toward the top of the hill. I looked over at Kerka; she had backed up and wasn’t in the wind’s pull.

  “Help!” I shouted to her.

  “Just relax and let yourself get sucked in,” said Kerka. “I think that’s how it’s done.”

  “WHAT?” I shouted. “No way! That’s easy for you to say—you’re not the one being pulled!”

  Kerka grinned. “Watch me!” she said. She headed over the rocks past me, as nimble as a mountain goat, redbird feather clutched in her hand.

  What could I do? I grabbed Kerka’s hand (my other hand held the feather) just in time for the wind to suck us up together.

  We spun with so much force that Kerka and I were pulled apart. I shut my eyes against the stinging wind. My closed eyes calmed me, and my nose filled with the cinnamon smell. I felt the wind stop whirling. I opened my eyes, feeling a little dizzy. Below me, I could see we had gone well past the rock hill and the fairies’ realm. We were flying along another river that cut through low green hills.

  The wind blew, but the air was clear. The sky was an electric blue, with puffy white clouds here and there. I was in the middle of a flock of redbirds the size of crows, with long feathered tails and crests on their heads. And I was flying! I flapped my arms like wings and went faster through the air. It was like swimming in the air. It made sense that in a dreamland like Aventurine the flying was like dream flying!

  I looked around for Kerka. She was gliding amidst the birds, arms outstretched, surveying the ground below.

  “Kerka!” I called.

  She looked over at me and grinned. “I told you it would be fun!” she called. She turned her body so that she swooped over to me.

  We flew together for a while, both of us checking out our new flying powers, our red feathers held tightly in our hands. Below us, the green hills became bigger mountains, with the turquoise river still running through them. The river crashed down in a series of magnificent waterfalls that sent spray almost all the way up to where we rode the Redbird Wind.

  After the waterfalls, I zipped ahead of Kerka and the birds, right into the cool, damp center of a cloud. I could hear the birds following me, and I could see the flash of their red wings out of the corner of my eye. We burst out of the cloud back into brightness, the sun high above us.

  I shot a glance behind me to see Kerka in the middle of the birds, grinning madly at me. She gave me a thumbs-up. Then I slowed down and let her catch up with me.

  I was feeling deliriously happy until I spotted a patch of dark clouds far in the distance. With the sight of that cloud, it all came back to me. All I was going to have to do. All that rested on my shoulders. Below the dark clouds, the ground was shadowed in darkness. I knew I was looking at Dora’s ink stain, spreading into sky, soil, tree limbs, and roots.

  I turned to Kerka. “The Shadow Tree is there somewhere,” I said.

  “We can do it, Birdie,” Kerka said, but even she sounded a little nervous.

  The dark realm came into focus as we flew on. The birds flew slower as we got closer. Below us, the mountains flattened into rocky fields and the river shrank into a stream. Then the stream shrank into a creek, the creek into a trickle, until there was nothing but rocks and weeds and dead plants. We flew slowly below the dark clouds into the cold shadow below.

  I was about to ask Kerka when she thought we should land, but suddenly the redbird flock dissolved into a chaotic scramble as each bird flew in a different direction to escape the storm clouds. One of them knocked into Kerka, who struggled to stay level. I saw her redbird feather drift down just as Kerka began to fall.

  I dove after her, my arms by my sides to pick up speed. When I caught up to Kerka, I wrapped my arms around her (which was hard, with the pack on her back). Instantly we both stopped falling, but with such a jerk that I nearly let go again.

  “Thanks!” Kerka shouted, her voice sounding funny.

  “No problem!” I said. Kerka’s Kalis stick was in my face. “I can’t see. It feels like we’re still falling!”

  “We are!” said Kerka. “Maybe if I hold the feather, too, we can share it?”

  “Okay!” I answered. “Can you see it?”

  “Yup!” she said. “Got it! Try letting go now.”

  Slowly I let go with my hand that wasn’t holding the feather. Kerka didn’t fall, but we were much lower than before. The wind had died, so only the magic was holding us up.

  “Spread your arms,” I suggested. “It should break our fall!”

  For the last twenty feet or so to the ground, we spread our arms wide. My cloak caught the last of the Redbird Wind. Slowly, slowly, we spun, twirling like a giant moose wing.

  Then we landed not so gracefully—bam!—right on our behinds (even Kerka).

  “Whew!” I exclaimed. “That started out fun, but I’m glad it’s over.”

  Kerka laughed and jumped to her feet. As usual, she looked around as if she were the guide. Now she nodded approvingly in each direction. “Looks safe enough to me,” she announced. “Let’s go, Birdie.” And off she went, without looking back.

  It didn’t feel safe to me. I didn’t even want to breathe in because the smell was like something old that needed a serious bath. There was a feeling of unsettling stillness, like dead air, and it seemed to seep into my skin, making my insides itchy. All around were rocks and dust and dead and dying plants. It made my heart hurt.

  “The living dead,” I murmured. Then I had an idea. I bent down and whispered, “Ave, amici.”

  The plants were still and silent.

  I tried again, but I could tell
there wasn’t a chance. Any dreamland magic was gone from them, as was their life.

  I sighed and stood up; the itchy-aching feeling grew worse. In the distance, the black clouds were occasionally lit by sharp jabs of lightning. Rumbles of thunder followed, and the ground shook even where we were. Kerka was already walking toward the jungle, into that dark rumbling, her clothes grayed by the dust and dirt.

  “Kerka!” I called.

  But she didn’t turn around, and all of a sudden she was making me itchy and unsettled, too. She was leaving me behind as if this were her quest, not mine! I sighed. What had happened to my resolve? It was as if the moment I’d landed, every feeling I had was bad.

  “Wait up!” I hollered to Kerka; I could barely see her now. I felt myself growing furious. She was showing off, thinking that she was stronger and more determined than I was!

  “Wait, Kerka!” I yelled. I started running, until I finally caught up with her and was slightly out of breath. “Why didn’t you stop?” I asked.

  Kerka didn’t answer, just kept marching. Why was she being a jerk, not paying any attention to me?

  “What’s the matter with you?” I asked irritably.

  “We must prepare for action,” she said, her eyes focused straight ahead, her back stiff as my calla lily mother’s.

  “It’s awful here,” I said. “Can’t you feel it? There’s nothing growing at all. Nothing!” Kerka was silent. “It’s worse than the Concrete City,” I went on. “And my butt still hurts from that landing.”

  Kerka stopped short, and without even turning around, she said fiercely, “Will you stop whining, Birdie!”

  “I am not whining!” I said. “This is the ugliest place I’ve ever seen in my life. I don’t know what I’m doing here. We’re supposed to be in a dream, not a nightmare!” There, I thought. That should shut her up.

  Kerka turned back, her blue eyes looking calmly and directly into my green ones. “You are Birdie Cramer Bright, future fairy godmother. You are the last hope of the Arbor Lineage. You have a mission. You need to fulfill it.”