Cricket201901

(Lars) #1

spilled from an archway that she at first mistook for a
branch in the corridor.
By the time she’d realized the truth, she found herself
staring through the gap in the wall into a gilded room
thronged with faeries. They wore everything from gowns
to hooded cloaks. A young faerie began dancing, the rapid
taps of his shoes at odds with the whistles’ languorous
melody. The king entered the room, followed by cooks who
uncovered trays of warm, wheaten honey cakes. Pegeen had
never smelled anything so delicious.
“Granda warned me,” she whispered, and gaining
strength from the memory, forced herself to whirl and face
the last locked door. Painted in rich blues, it showed clusters
of islands. None of the keys she’d marked or memorized
opened it, nor did their counterparts. The whistles’ voices
grew faint. She pushed on the door, and even kicked it.
Despairing, she gripped the key fob so hard her palm
stung... and she had an idea. Noting the perfect spikes
on the dragon’s tail, Pegeen wondered, Could the fob double
as a one-of-a-kind key?
She plunged the tip of the tail into the lock and turned
the dragon’s body. The lock clicked open, the key ring dis-
appeared, and she jumped through the doorway just before
the music died.
Pegeen landed on the faeries’ flagstone, five gold coins in each hand.
She needed no reel to twirl in joy.


IN TIME, A windsprite told the wizard what had happened. She’d
heard the story from a selkie, who knew the serpent, who’d asked a faerie
sailor. The wizard felt duped to learn about the king’s dishonesty and
thrilled that Pegeen had won the gold anyway.
To celebrate, he recreated a picture of the four winds twined around
three words: his lost magic book’s elaborate title. He wrote the story down
and read it to sailors who shared it again in many lands. In the end, the
tale of “A Wind-Tossed Spell” traveled farther than the wizard’s wondrous
parchment.

Free download pdf