The Foolish Zafara

      Behind the overeager Air Faerie was a bright Fire Faerie. Unlike her other two faeries, she flew higher in her attempt to be closer to the sun above. She vainly wished that she could be as beautiful as the burning star, and in her attempts to imitate it, she changed her clothing at least a dozen times a day to be a sun from dawn to dusk. Her unique sense of style earned her the nickname Jauzel Sunskirt: which she was happy to be called.

      The final member of this strange group was a Dark Faerie. She didn’t like anyone knowing her business and whenever asked about her, she would reply:

      “I like the dark. That’s all there is to this Dark Faerie. Nothing strange about me-especially no foolish nicknames! Landlin is all I need to be called!”

     ---

      Down far below their outstretched wings walked three Neopets headed towards Neopia Central with their owner. They each walked along with excitement and joy to go into town, something they only did a handful of times a year. Today was special; their owner had just promised the three of them that if they were good, she would buy them each a special treat at the end of their trip. However, all hopes of earning this reward were dashed before they even arrived.

      “Byl!” a young blue Kyrii whined. “Give me back my plushie! It’s my favorite!”

      “Come and get it!” replied a bright blue Zafara. “Here, catch, Keltsy!”

      He then threw the plushie towards an older blue Kyrii who neglected to catch it and let it fall to the ground.

      “I am too old for your silly games, Byl,” Keltsy retorted. “But I guess you are still just a baby.”

      “No, I’m not!”

      “Yes, you are.”

      “Take it back! I’m not a baby.”

      “Could have fooled me.”

      “Well, at least I’m not some snippy Kyrii who pretends to be so mature.”

      “Give me back my plushie!”

      “Pretending?! Why, you little-”

      “Enough!” shouted their distraught owner. “You each promised to be good and now look at you all! Fighting over something so unimportant! It is obvious you cannot handle the excitement, so I’m going on ahead, alone. You three wait for me by that scraggly looking tree. If any of you are missing when I get back, you all will be eating omelette for a month!”

      With that final word, their owner stomped off, leaving her three admonished pets behind.

     ---

      Time passed, and the three who were once riled up and blaming each other for this mess now lay below the dingy little tree in hopes of earning some relief from the hot sun. They each grew extremely bored, and began to ask each other an idea for a game, but each time one was proposed, they did not have the energy to get up and play, so they continued on for some length before deciding what to do.

      “Kaytia, what do you wanna do?” Keltsy asked monotonously.

      “I dunno,” Kaytia replied listlessly, “Can you think of anything Byl?”

      Just as Byl was about to open his mouth to say he hadn’t a clue of what to do, he spotted something in the sky. He looked closer and saw that there were two other somethings flying behind the first. For a long time he squinted to see what approached before realizing they were-

      “Faeries!” he cried out while pointing towards the three specks; each one slowly becoming larger.

      The other two started at his shout with surprise, and they scrambled to stand up to see what he had discovered.

      “Where?” Kaytia questioned.

      “There they are!” Keltsy shouted with excitement. “They’re just behind that cloud. No, wait... there they are!”

      “Wow!” Kaytia gasped. “I’ve never seen a real faerie before! What should we do now?”

      For a while, the three stood there thinking about all the things they could do with the faeries before Byl stumbled upon what he thought a brilliant idea.

      “I know!” he exclaimed. “We can play a game to see who can knock one of them out of the sky!”

      “Isn’t that mean?” Kaytia inquired. “Won’t that hurt them?”

      “Not at all!” Byl said while shaking his head. “Faeries can heal themselves right up, and besides, if we can catch one of them and put it in a bottle, we won’t be in trouble with our owner anymore! She’ll be so happy!”

      After hearing this, Kaytia and Keltsy quickly agreed to his plan and began to decide who would go first.

      “Well,” Keltsy said haughtily, “I am the oldest. So I should go first!”

      “Then I should go second, since I’m the youngest,” Kaytia replied. “That means you go last, Byl.”

      “Fine,” Byl replied reluctantly. “But we better hurry! The faeries are getting closer!”

      Each of them scrambled around, looking for something to throw. Keltsy found an old rotten boot covered with a thick layer of dust, while Kaytia discovered a bit of barbed wire clinging to the tree. Looking around, Byl could only find a broken pink toothbrush, but it was better than nothing.

      The air faerie approached, and Keltsy started to get ready. Time seemed to slow down as she wound back her arm and launched the old boot as high and fast as she could, but before it was even halfway there, the air faerie had already zipped by in her haste.

      “What rotten luck!” Keltsy complained. “If only it hadn’t been an air faerie, then I would have gotten it for sure!”

      Still grumbling, she went back under the scraggly tree to watch the other two throw.

      “It’s my turn!” Kaytia said happily. “I’m going to knock that faerie down for sure!”

      Then, like before, the faerie began to approach, slower this time. Kaytia winded back her arm as far as she could before throwing it high--as high as the first faerie had flown by, but the fire faerie flew on by being too far above the ground for even Kaytia’s throw.

      “Oh!” Kaytia cried out. “If I had known it was higher, I would have--have--oh! I would have gotten it for sure!”

      With that outburst, she flopped herself down next to Keltsy to watch Byl’s attempt.

      Quietly, Byl gripped his toothbrush in his hand while judging the approaching faerie. He had always been the smartest of the three, so he noticed that this faerie was flying lower and slower than the other two. With quick calculations, he pulled his arm back in anticipation and then with a snap of his wrist, flung the short little toothbrush at the dark faerie.

     THUNK!!!

      “Yes!” Byl shouted. “Ha! Now that is how you hit a faerie!”

      “You just were lucky, Byl,” Kaytia objected. “This game was a complete waste of time. Come on, Keltsy; let’s go sit over by that hill over there.”

      Still smiling, Byl let the other two go and laid himself down under the tree for a quick nap of victory while the thought of the faerie went clear out of his head.

     ---

      THUNK!!!

      “What on Neopia was that?” Landlin exclaimed, rubbing her hurting arm in attempts to ease the pain. She had caught the object that had hit her: a broken pink toothbrush. “Pink? I hate pink! Who threw this at me!?”

      As she gazed around at the ground, she spotted a scrawny little tree with a blue Zafara under it. It was the only Neopet in sight and Landlin felt a wave of rage flow over her.

      “Who does this Zafara think he is?” Landlin griped. “I think I should teach him a little lesson on why you shouldn’t mess with Dark Faeries.”

      With a quick flap of her wings, Landlin dove down towards the unsuspecting Byl.

     ---

      Byl was just starting to drift off to sleep when a shadow fell over him. Opening his eyes, he saw a purple clad figure standing before him: a Dark Faerie! He scrambled to stand up and noticed that the faerie had a scowl across her face and a small bruise on her left arm. Realizing it was the faerie that he had hit, Byl became completely frozen with fear.

      “Are you the one who hit me with a toothbrush, Zafara?” Landlin asked darkly.

      Byl panicked and began talking extremely fast all at once. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to hit you. I was just playing a game, you see. I didn’t think you would actually be hurt or that you were such a... err... important faerie. Yes! I’m very sorry, it was just a game. And it was really just my owner’s fault. If she had taken us with her, then I wouldn’t have even known you existed and I’m dreadfully sorry and I just-”

      “SILENCE!” Landlin thundered. “A game!? A game! You think faeries exist for your amusement, do you? Well, I’ll give you the most amusing spell you have ever seen!”

      Dramatically, she lifted her arms and the sky suddenly became dark with thunder clouds. Byl cowered in fear as Landlin cast a ball of energy towards him. A great bang sounded as the spell collided with him, and when the smoke cleared, only a terrified stone statue stood in his place.

      Smiling in success at her spell, Landlin leapt into the air to catch up with her companions. At the same time, Byl’s owner was just leaving Neopia Central when she noticed a storm cloud hanging around the same spot where she had left her pets.

      “Hmmm,” she mused. “Maybe I should pick up a Tiny Umbrella for Byl; he always hates the rain...”

The End