Sunfrost realized his mouth was wide open in astonishment. He shut it quickly and looked at Reck.
“I didn’t know that…” Sunfrost began.
“That’s the point of this place, Mr. Gnome,” Reck cut off Sunfrost again. “It’s in the form of a circle for a reason, though most people think it’s only for fairy tricks and spells. You can trust that a circle, to stay a circle, will never bend, will never have a tricky corner to pass. A circle has to stay perfectly round or it is not a circle. The truth always is the truth or it is a lie.”
Sunfrost refrained from pointing out that that was one of the most obvious things in the world, knowing that Reck would simply cut him off again.
“So now you know why the plants surrounded you,” Reck continued. “They need you, Mr. Gnome. And so does the rest of Kripen.”
Sunfrost nodded, and then frowned. “If this circle represents truth and it isn’t dangerous and such, why are there tea-cup fairies around here trying to hurt creatures?”
Reck laughed heartily. “The tea-cup fairies are not in the circle, Mr. Gnome. They can’t stand the truth.” Reck shook his head and grinned slyly.
Sunfrost waited for the fairy to say more, but, to the gnome’s great astonishment, he did not.
“What else does the fairy circle do?” Sunfrost asked, amazed that he had actually been able to ask two questions without being interrupted.
“Most creatures come in for fun,” Reck said. “Some come inside to see what you saw, of a sort. Many creatures do not understand why they go through things that they do; why they struggle, and so on. To us, the Circle Fairies, everything is simple to understand. We help the creatures see those things. Some of the creatures don’t like the reasons behind their hardships, and they let themselves be captured by the tea-cup fairies when they leave the Circle. Some even become tea-cup fairies to prevent creatures from going inside of the circle.”
“So I could understand all of my struggles?” Sunfrost rushed to ask.
“No; not necessarily,” Reck frowned. “Just certain purposes behind them. For example, you just saw why the foliage guarding the Dragon's resting place surrounded you and tried to catch you. You now understand why they did that, but you don’t understand the main part of the struggle.”
“How could I understand all…” Sunfrost was quickly cut off. Generally this would have bothered him, but the gnome had been a bit concerned about Reck’s sudden loss of rudeness.
“That isn’t the right question, Mr. Gnome,” Reck said hastily. “The question for most creatures is why should I understand? Most creatures have the capability to understand, they just would rather not face it.”
Reck furrowed his brow in thought, and then looked around him. Sunfrost looked away from the fairy, slightly surprised at the pain on the fairy’s face. The Garden sure was gorgeous that day. The creatures all seemed so happy, or at least as joyful as they could be given their different circumstances. The Bell Fairies rang their bells, and Sunfrost could only imagine Sinefill complaining to Aurin about the atrocious noise those blasted fairies made. Sunfrost smiled as baby gnomes piled out of their mint-leave houses; and he laughed when he saw two-year-old male dwarves cry in dismay as they saw that they were beginning to grow beards. He turned when he heard Reck laughing behind him.
“Ah, yes,” the fairy smiled. “It is quite funny, isn’t it? Almost as funny as a gnome running from a trembling daffodil!”
Sunfrost glared at Reck until the fairy stopped laughing. “I’m sorry, Sunfrost,” Reck shrugged. “If it had been anyone but you, and if you did not realize what your thoughts were at the time, would you have laughed to have seen you running away from flowers?”
Sunfrost frowned, not exactly desiring to admit to the fairy that he was right.
“Those dwarves don’t understand that all dwarves have beards!” Reck smiled. “They are simply horrified that they are only two years old and they are growing hair on their faces. None of the gnomes or fairies grow them at so young an age!”
No comments:
Post a Comment