The Beginning

Jhudora flew hurriedly through Faerieland, fighting back tears. She flew above the thick, fluffy pink clouds, her feet just barely skimming them. She needed a place to hide from them. They were at it again.

      "Oh, Jhudoraaaaa!" called out a mocking, singsong voice from behind her. "As the neopets say, you can run, but you can't hide!"

      "Stop trying to get away, you lame excuse for a dark faerie," shouted a sharp, fierce voice.

     Unbidden tears began to flow from Jhudora's eyes. She wasn't an excuse for a dark faerie! She was a talented and powerful dark faerie. She just didn't waste her time and energy torturing or teasing innocent faeries and neopets, like the dark faeries flying after her! She was always the target of practical jokes, cruel bullying, and every other foul thing from the group of dark faeries.

     She reached the outskirts of the city. Hopefully she would find somewhere to hide there. One of the dark faeries behind her came close enough to grab Jhudora by the hood of her dark purple cloak. Jhudora struggled to get away. She snapped her fingers and the hood of the cloak tore off as the dark faerie tugged at it, and Jhudora got inside the city.

     She looked around for a place to hide. The faeries chasing after her had been delayed by the cloak ripping. Aha! There was a small alley behind Faerie Foods. Jhudora darted into it. A little Faellie was playing behind a large light purple barrel. It was just large enough to hide Jhudora. She dived behind it and scooped the Faellie up into her lap, breathing hard. She heard wings beating outside of the food shop.

      "Where did she go?" asked one of the dark faeries. She had short, spiky black hair, pale whitish skin, and lips painted an eerie, ghostly green. She wore a short black dress, pale, ghostly green gloves the color of her lips, and tall black high heels. Her dark purple bat-like wings were slightly spiky and very large. Her name was Vaethali.

     The group of faeries flooded into the shop, apparently looking for Jhudora there. She breathed a sigh of relief and absentmindedly stroked the Faellie's head with one very pale purple hand. With the other hand, she gathered her long dark purple hair, which was streaked with lime green, up into a ponytail, tying it with a lime green hairband from her wrist. She dusted the bits of cloud dust (it was the closest thing floating Faerieland had to dirt) off of her lime green dress and ruffled out her wings. Then she scooped up the faellie in one hand and looked at it.

      "Are you lost, little guy?" she asked.

     Somebody threw open the back door of Faerie Foods.

      "Paello!" yelled the faerie Lenny, rushing through the alley. "Where'd you go—AAAAH!" She shrieked at Jhudora. "Get your hands off Paello! What are you doing with him, you foul dark faerie?"

     Jhudora set the faellie on the ground.

      "I thought he was lost," she explained to the Lenny. "I was going to help him find his owner, but I can see you're his owner, so I guess I can be going now."

     The Lenny glared at her as she scooped the Faellie up.

      "Don't you EVER touch my petpets AGAIN, dark one!" she shrieked.

      "Is somebody giving you trouble?" asked a gentle voice from inside the shop.

      "It's a dark faerie, Taetiana!" the Lenny screeched.

     The shopkeeper of Faerie Foods, a gentle earth faerie named Taetiana, flew out. She frowned at Jhudora.

      "Who are you?" she asked sharply.

      "I'm Jhudora," the dark faerie explained. "I graduated from the Faerie Academy last year. I didn't mean any harm, honestly. I was just trying to find out who was this Faellie's owner."

      "Really?" said the earth faerie sarcastically. "I know better, dark one. Do not enter this alley again, or you will face my wrath!"

     Jhudora raised her eyebrows. Why was everyone so prejudiced about dark faeries? She didn't mean any harm. Just because she happened to prefer shadow over light, just because she thought that night time was beautiful, just because she was drawn to dimness and duskiness more than brightness did not mean she preferred evil over good!

      "I can assure you, you won't find me here again," she said, flying away before the earth faerie could respond.

      ***

     She flew until her wings ached, as far away from the city as she could get. Finally she landed on a cloud like no other cloud she'd seen before. It was dark, dark purple, the color of her wings. A certain mysterious, intriguing shadow fell about the cloud. She ran her hand along its fluffy surface and sighed. She would not cry. Just because the public believed dark faeries were evil did not mean they couldn't be proved wrong. Sure, some dark faeries were evil, like the Darkest Faerie, and some were just downright cruel, like Vaethali, but some dark faeries were like Jhudora weren't like that at all. They just enjoyed joking around, and sure they liked practical jokes—but they didn't all like being cruel and bullying people and faeries around.

     Somebody flew right into Jhudora. She fell over on the cloud and looked up, dazed. A young earth faerie with very messy light brown hair streaked with forest green had flown into her. She was on the skinny side and wearing a forest green dress that was slightly too big for her. She wore pretty forest green gloves. A pencil was tucked behind her ear and there were a couple pen marks on her face that she evidently wasn't aware of. Jhudora knew what sort of faerie this was. She was obviously still in Faerie Academy, and definitely wasn't one of the more popular faeries. Jhudora remembered her own years at the Academy, which she spent pushing herself to get the best grades possible and being rejected from the rest of the faeries' society, on account of her being a dark faerie, and she felt kindly towards this faerie. The faerie's wings were big and, like most earth faeries' wings, looked like leaves. She was scrambling to pick up a pile of books she'd been carrying. Jhudora thought her freckly face with forest green eyeshadow and lipstick looked as though she'd seen her once or twice. Probably she'd been a year or two below her at the Academy. Jhudora stood up.

      "Sorry about that," said the earth faerie, giving a shaky, stressful laugh. "I was just trying to find a place to get some homework done... it's my last year at the Academy, you see, and it's rather hard."

     Jhudora smiled.

      "It's quite alright," she said. She stepped forward. "My name's Jhudora," she said, sticking out a hand. The earth faerie shook it.

      "I'm Illusen," she said. "You're nice, for a dark faerie."

      "Dark faeries aren't all bad," said Jhudora indignantly. "Some of them are, but there are plenty who aren't! I mean, come on--"

     Illusen smiled warmly.

      "I know," she said calmly. "Do you want to fly back to the city and get some food from Faerie Foods together? I hear they have a new kind of Faerie Bubble in stock."

     Jhudora paused for a moment. On the on hand, she liked this faerie and wanted to get to know her. On the other hand, the shopkeeper of Faerie Foods was angry at her and Vaethali and her friends were probably still hanging around there.

      "Sure," she said finally. "Let's go."

     And they flew off towards the city together.

The End