kissed transformed into a human-sized fairy!
Kendra saw the silver fairy with blue hair plant a kiss
on an obese imp. The imp instantly metamorphosed into a
plump fairy with coppery wings. As the silver fairy glided
away, the plump fairy tackled another imp, forced a kiss,
and in a flash the imp became a thin, Asian-looking fairy
with hummingbird wings.
The fairies streamed into the church. Most did not
bother with the door. They glided through windows or
smashed through the corroded roof.
Kendra’s escorts held her over a gap in the roof. She
saw fairies kissing imps. Other fairies drove back a variety
of foul beasts. One fairy used a golden lash to send a toad-like
monstrosity crashing through the wall. Another fairy
grasped a scabby beast by its mane of white hair and hurled
it through a window. A gray fairy with mothlike wings
chased a brawny minotaur out the front door with a scalding
blast of steam from the end of her rod. Many of the
unsavory creatures voluntarily fled before the terrible
onslaught.
Others fought back.
A demonic dwarf with a hide of black scales bounded
around the room wreaking havoc with a pair of knives. A
rampaging atrocity that looked like a cross between a bear
and an octopus battered fairies with its thrashing tentacles.
A greasy creature coughed globs of slime into the air. It had
the general appearance of a large tortoise without a shell,
its body an amoeboid puddle beneath a long neck. Several
fairies crashed to the church floor, wings snarled in the
goopy substance.
The undaunted fairies counterattacked. The bottom
half of the dwarf was turned to stone. Tentacles severed,
the octobear retreated. A torrent of water flushed away the
greasy creature. Some fairies attended their fallen comrades,
healing injuries and washing away slime.
As the room cleared, fairies charged through the door
to the basement.
Take me to the basement! Kendra said. Her escorts
immediately responded, nearly giving Kendra whiplash as
they plummeted into the church and glided to the basement
door. The fairies had to tuck in their wings to
descend the stairs, so Kendra ran down beside the furry
fairy and the albino.
The basement had expanded. A massive excavation
and renovation had occurred. It was deeper, broader, and
longer. The alcove at the far side had grown as well, now
completely unfettered by knotted ropes.
The basement was not lighted as brightly as before,
although the fairies carried their own luminescence with
them. Hideous carvings sneered from the walls. One
corner was piled with strange treasures-jade idols, spiked
scepters, and jeweled masks.
Kendra scanned the room for her family. The easiest to
spot was Seth. He was inside an enormous jar with breathing
holes punched in the lid. There were some leaves and
branches in it with him. He had grown no taller, but he
looked a hundred years old. Saggy wrinkles creased his face,
and he had only a few wisps of white hair left atop his head.
He placed a pruned palm against the glass.
Kendra guessed that the orangutan chained to the wall
was Grandpa. The large catfish swimming in the tank
beside him was probably Lena. She saw no sign of
Grandma.
Flanked by her fairy escorts, Kendra dashed toward her
family. Scores of hideous imps scuffled with fairies. Those
fights did not last long as kisses transformed the imps back
into their original forms.
Kendra reached the gigantic jar. Are you all right,
Seth?
Her elderly brother nodded feebly. His smile showed
that he had no teeth.
A snarling imp pounced at Kendra. The blue, furry fairy
caught the creature in midflight, pinning its arms to its
sides. It resembled the same imp that had apprehended her
brother earlier. The albino fairy flew up and gave the imp a
kiss on the mouth, and it became a striking fairy with fiery
red hair and iridescent dragonfly wings.
Seth began tapping on the glass. He was pointing
excitedly at the fairy. Kendra realized that it was the fairy
he had unwittingly transformed.
The redheaded fairy approached the jar, shaking a
scolding finger at Seth. I’m sorry, Seth mouthed from
inside the container. He clasped his hands and made pleading
motions. The fairy regarded him through narrowed
eyes. Then she snapped her fingers, and the jar shattered.
She leaned forward and kissed Seth on the forehead. His
wrinkles smoothed and his hair filled in until he promptly
looked like himself again.
Kendra pulled the bottle of milk from her pocket and
handed it to Seth. Save some for Grandma and Grandpa.
But I can see-
An earsplitting roar shook the room. A creature who
could only have been Bahumat emerged from the alcove.
The loathsome demon stood three times as tall as a man
and had the head of a dragon crowned by three horns. The
demon walked upright, possessing three arms, three legs,
and three tails. Oily black scales bristling with barbed
spikes covered its grotesque body. Malevolent eyes gleamed
with wicked intelligence.
To one side of Bahumat floated the spectral woman
Kendra had seen outside her window on Midsummer Eve.
Her ebony wrappings flowed unnaturally, as if she were
underwater. The unearthly apparition made Kendra think
of a negative photograph.
At the other side of Bahumat stood Muriel, now clad
in a gown as black as midnight. She leered at the fairies
and glanced confidently at the towering demon.
No imps remained in the room. A crowd of shining
fairies faced these final opponents.
Bahumat crouched. Inky darkness gathered around
him. The demon sprang forward with a roar like a thousand
cannons firing together. A black wall of shadow flowed
from Bahumat like a wave of tar. Total darkness engulfed
the room. Kendra felt like she had been struck blind. Even
with her hands over her ears, the prolonged bellowing of
the demon was practically deafening.
There seemed to be no substance to the shadow
Bahumat had emitted. It was just darkness. Where were the
fairies? Where was their light?
The ground rumbled, and a sound like an avalanche
overpowered the demon’s roar. Suddenly daylight flooded
the room. Looking up, Kendra beheld a blue sky. The
slanted rays of the rising sun fell into the basement. The
entire church had been hurled aside!
Descending from above, and charging from all directions,
fairies swarmed Bahumat. The demon slashed a fairy
with one of its tails, raked another with an impossibly
quick swipe of its claws. Jaws snapping, the creature swallowed
a yellow fairy whole. Many fairies were falling.
While the majority attacked, other fairies laid hands on the
&n
bsp; injured, curing most of them rapidly.
Muriel stood in a theatrical pose chanting spidery
words. A pair of fairies near her turned to glass and
shattered. She extended a contorted hand, and another
fairy turned to ash and disintegrated in a gray cloud.
Long streamers of ebony fabric flowed from the spectral
woman, entangling nearby fairies. The ensnared fairies
began to lose their luster and wither. The silver fairy
appeared, slicing through the fabric with her ax of fire.
Other fairies joined her, using gleaming swords to sever the
black material.
The fairies swirling around Bahumat now held ropes.
They looked like the ropes that had crisscrossed the front
of the alcove, except now they appeared to be woven out
of gold. Bahumat kept roaring and swinging and biting, but
the ropes were beginning to tangle him up. Knots were
forming in them. The draconic creature was slowing down.
His great jaws clamped shut, tearing off the gauzy wing of
a fairy with markings like a ladybug.
The spectral woman turned and drifted away, her ethereal
wrappings no longer quite as flowing. The fairies
ignored her departure. A pair of fairies had taken hold of
Muriel, and they flung her at Bahumat. Soon she was
bound to the demon by flaxen cords. She screeched as her
body shriveled with age and her gown turned to rags.
Three fairies alighted atop the demon’s head. They
each grabbed a horn and tore it out. The demon wailed.
Dozens of fairies seized the ropes binding the demon and
hurled Bahumat back into the alcove. Busily the fairies
began threading knotted ropes back and forth over the
entrance.
Kendra turned. The blue, furry fairy gestured toward
the orangutan, and the shackles binding it to the wall fell
apart. Another gesture and a burst of light changed the
orangutan into Grandpa Sorenson.
The albino fairy pulled the convulsing catfish from the
aquarium and changed her back into Lena. Where’s my
Grandma? Kendra cried.
The red-haired fairy who had freed Seth approached
the aquarium. She lifted out a small, putrid slug that had
been clinging to the side above the water and changed it
back into Grandma.
Grandma Sorenson massaged her temples. And I
thought my mind was muddy as a chicken, she muttered.
Grandpa hurried over and embraced her.
Do you need milk? Kendra asked, holding out the
bottle to her grandfather.
He shook his head. We have not slept, and so the veil
has not yet covered our eyes.
A group of fairies gathered near the alcove, extending
their arms, palms downward. Soil, clay, and stone began
flowing together and piling up until Hugo was reborn. The
golem stretched and let out a groan to rival the roars of the
banished demon.
The fairies busily healed one another, mending wings
and closing wounds. One circle of fairies spread their arms,
and fragments of glass skittered together, took the form of a
pair of fairies, and came back to life. Several other fairies
joined hands and started humming. Particles of ash swirled
loosely in their midst, but refused to coalesce. The fairies
released one another, and the ash dissipated. Some fairies,
it seemed, were beyond rescue.
Several fairies took hold of Hugo and lifted him out of
the basement. Others did the same for Grandpa, Grandma,
Lena, Seth, and Kendra. Airborne again, Kendra had a
view of the destroyed church. The wreckage spread across
the clearing for a couple hundred yards. The Forgotten
Chapel had not simply been flung aside-it had been
obliterated.
The fairies set them down a good distance from the
wreckage and the basement. All except Lena. Two fairies
were carrying her away. The former naiad was having harsh
words with them in a foreign tongue, struggling in their
grasp.
Kendra touched Grandpa Sorenson’s arm and nodded
toward the commotion.
Nothing to be done about it, he sighed as the fairies
hauled Lena away. He had an arm around Grandma, holding
her close.
Hey! Kendra shouted. Bring Lena back here! The
fairies holding Lena paid her no heed, passing out of sight
into the woods.
The remainder of the fairies assembled above the basement,
floating in an enormous ring. They had more than
tripled their numbers with all the imps they had reclaimed.
Kendra had seen many fairies fall during the battle, but
most had been revived and healed by the magic of their
comrades.
The radiant fairies raised their arms together and
started singing. The music sounded impromptu, full of
hundreds of interweaving melodies with almost no harmonies.
As they sang, the ground in the clearing began to
undulate. The wreckage from the church slid across the
field, clattering into the open basement. The ground began
to quake. The walls of the basement crumbled. The surrounding
area folded in and swallowed it up. The field
heaved like a stormy sea.
As the undulations subsided, the basement had been
replaced by a low hill. The fairy choir became more shrill.
Wildflowers and fruit trees began sprouting throughout the
clearing and on the hill, coming to full bloom in a matter
of seconds. Flowers blossomed all over Hugo, who offered
covered by a fragrant array of brilliant blossoms and mature
fruit trees had replaced the Forgotten Chapel.
They made Hugo look all fruity, Seth complained.
The legion of fairies glided toward them, scooped them
up, and carried them on a breakneck flight for home.
Kendra relished being part of the mercurial procession,
overjoyed at the fortunate ending to the terrible night.
Seth whooped the whole way, as if he were riding the
coolest roller coaster on the planet.
Finally the fairies deposited them in the yard, where
Dale stood waiting. Now I’ve seen everything, he said as
Grandpa and Grandma Sorenson were set down beside
him.
The fairy with short blue hair and silver wings stood
before Kendra. Thank you, Kendra said. You did wonderfully.
We can never repay you.
The silver fairy gave a single nod, eyes glittering.
As if responding to a signal, the fairies crowded Kendra,
each in turn giving her a quick kiss. As each kiss was
bestowed, the fairy reverted to her former size amid dazzling
sparks and darted away. The rapid succession of kisses
brought overpowering sensations. Again Kendra smelled
the earthy aromas of the Fairy Queen-rich soil and young
blossoms. She tasted honey and fruit and berries, all sweet
beyond comparison. She heard the music of rainfall, the cry
of the wind, and the roar of the sea. She felt as if the
warmth of the sun were embracing her, flowing through
her. The fairies kissed
her eyes, her cheeks, her ears, her
brow.
When the last of more than three hundred fairies kissed
her, Kendra stumbled backwards and sat down hard on the
grass. She felt no pain. In fact, she was mildly surprised that
she did not float away, she felt so light and drowsy.
Grandpa and Dale helped Kendra to her feet. I would
wager that this young lady has quite a story to tell,
Grandpa said. And I would also wager that now is not the
time. Hugo, attend to your labors.
Dale was helping Kendra to the house. She felt
euphoric and distant. She was glad her family was safe. But
she felt so inexplicably blissful, and the troubles of the
evening seemed so remote, that she began to wonder
whether it had all been a surreal dream.
Grandpa was holding hands with Grandma. I’m sorry
it took so long to get you back, he said softly.
I can guess at the reasons, she said. We need to talk
about you eating my eggs.
They weren’t your eggs, Grandpa protested. They
were the eggs of the hen your mind was inhabiting.
I’m glad you can be so detached.
There may still be a couple in the fridge.
Kendra stumbled on her way up the porch steps.
Grandpa and Dale helped her onto the porch and into the
house. The furniture was back! Nearly all of it had been
restored, with some alterations. A couch had been reconstructed
as a chair. Some lampshades were made of different
material. Jewels had been added to a picture frame.
Could the brownies have worked so fast? Her eyes were
drooping. Grandpa was holding Grandma’s hand, whispering
something in her ear. Seth was chattering, but the
words made no sense. Dale held her shoulders, guiding her.
They were almost to the stairs, but she could not keep
her eyes open. She felt herself falling, and hands catching
her, and then consciousness fled.
Farewell to Fablehaven
Kendra and Grandpa reclined in the wagon while
Hugo pulled them down the road at a leisurely pace.
The morning was clear and bright, with a few thin, high
clouds barely clinging to existence, accidental brush strokes
on a blue canvas. The day would be hot, but for now it was
pleasant.
A couple of fairies drifting alongside the wagon waved
at Kendra. She waved back and they sped away, weaving
around one another. The garden now teemed with fairies,
and they paid Kendra a lot of special attention. They