The Shufae: The Story

(Author's Note: Apologies for the long hiatus. I blame life, school, and...well, more life. I hope to write more from now on.)

The little boy placed a book into his backpack that day. He thought that rather than walking hither and yon, as he had in the past, he might instead find a place on the mountain to simply sit quietly and enjoy a story. The boy had just the place in mind: a clearing not far from his house, where the roots of a particular tree provided an unusually comfortable seat.

On the day of our story, however, the mountain had decided to be a bit different. As you ought to know, this is a very strange quality to find in a mountain; most of them rarely change, and even more rarely will you find one which is able to decide for itself that it desires to change. But this mountain, as you also ought to know by now, was not quite ordinary. As a result, the little boy soon found himself wandering amidst unfamiliar twists and turns in the forest.

After some time, the boy did arrive in a clearing, where the mountain rose up on one side in a solid wall of stone. The comfortable tree roots were not present, though, and the boy finally admitted to himself that he was well and truly lost. With nothing else to do, he sat down to wait for someone from the village to come find him. Removing the book from his backpack, the boy began to read. He was interrupted, however, by a small voice. It simply and politely told him that he was warmly welcomed to the clearing, but he was blocking the sunlight, and would it be too much trouble for him to move a bit please, thank you very much.

The little boy looked down to see a small fairy, no larger than an exceptionally large mouse, staring up at him. Now, I imagine that you most likely have never seen a fairy; they all left our world some time ago, for their own fascinating reasons. Fairies have skin which mimics the life of the forest around them. In the autumn, they turn every shade of red and gold that we are accustomed to seeing among the trees. In the spring and summer they are mostly green, with flower-spots of every beautiful color upon their wings. Winter is a very unfashionable and depressing time for fairies.

This particular fairy wore a pair of glasses and held in her hands a tiny book, which she had very nearly finished reading. The little boy stared for a moment, surprised by her presence. The fairy, however, merely straightened her glasses and repeated herself:

"I said, young sir, that you are quite welcome to my clearing, but would be even more welcome a few feet to your left, where you might not be blocking the sunlight. It's very difficult to read without light, you know, and I have only a few pages left."

The boy scooted a few feet to his left, resting his back against a different tree, but he could not keep himself from staring. The fairy returned to reading her book, but kept glancing up at the boy. Finally, she slammed the book shut.

"I simply can't read when people stare at me." She gave the boy a meaningful look. "It's quite annoying. Do you enjoy people staring at you while you're trying to eat?"

The boy was confused by this. "But you're not eating. You're reading. They're quite different things, you know."

The fairy sighed, "Not for me, young sir. I am a Shufae." She paused. Seeing that the word meant nothing to the little boy, she straightened her glasses again and explained, sounding a bit like a dictionary, "A Shufae is a book fairy. We have no need for food to eat, only books to read. Without them, we grow weak and cannot fly, or move at all. So you see, your staring has interrupted my meal."

The boy started to apologize, but the Shufae waved her hand and said, "Oh, never mind. It was a large book anyway, and I'm quite full. Too much Brontë goes straight to the hips, you know. I really should take in more poetry." She gestured to the clearing. "Welcome to my humble home! My name is Currerbell."

Looking around, the boy noticed for the first time how very quiet the clearing was. One might expect other fairies to be around -- after all, they are quite social creatures. Besides Currerbell, however, the boy could not see a single living thing. He asked the Shufae whether she lived alone in the clearing.

"Oh my, no," she laughed. "Let me introduce you to my friend!" With that, Currerbell flapped her wings a few times, carrying herself over to the wall of stone at one side of the clearing. She called out, "Branwell! Oh, Branwell! We have a guest I'd like you to meet."

From a small hole in the stone came a very large worm. Now, you ought to understand that when I say Branwell was a worm, that is truly an inadequate word to describe him; it is simply the closest thing we have in our world to describe what he was. It is true that he had no legs, like our worms. But where our worms are nasty and slimy and ugly, Branwell was none of these things. Instead, he was a beautiful shade of violet, with intelligent eyes and a winning smile. If ever you were to invite a worm to a party, I expect it would have been Branwell.

Currerbell introduced the two of them to each other and explained, "Branwell and I get along rather famously. He's a bookworm. We have the best discussions about poetry and our favorite characters. In fact, he's currently working on his own book, and I expect it shall be very good."

Branwell blushed. "Of course, I may be able to write, but I haven't yet designed a way to repair this leak." He gestured upward with his head, and the little boy noticed for the first time that a trickle of water was pushing its way out from a crack in the stone, a little way above Branwell's home. It dripped down the face of the stone and disappeared into the damp ground beneath it.

The bookworm looked back toward the little boy. "It's dreadful when the water gets in my eyes. But enough about that, you didn't come here to listen to my housekeeping troubles. You seem to be very much lost. Perhaps we may help you find your way?"

The little boy explained about the village where he lived, and how he had gotten lost even though he thought he knew where he was going. Currerbell and Branwell exchanged a knowing look.

"Well of course you can't expect to always see the mountain the same way," the Shufae said patiently. "It is quite a unique mountain in that way. But in any case, we know your village." She gave him some simple directions, he thanked her, and returned home.

A few weeks later (during which time many more adventures happened, but that is another story -- several of them, in fact), the little boy woke up to find a very curious sight in the field between his house and the mountain. During the night, a large rock had rolled down the mountain, leaving a deep trench in the ground behind it. Water flowed down the mountain through this trench, turning aside once it reached the stone and rolling down towards a nearby creek.

The little boy quickly put on his shoes and ran toward the stone, to see what had happened. When he reached it, he heard a familiar voice saying, "Oh bother, that leak must have been worse than I thought." Resting atop the rock was Branwell the bookworm, looking out over the path cut by the water.

Branwell and the boy discussed the problem for some time. They decided that the water flowing behind the stone must have eventually worn it down, until the bookworm's home broke free of the mountain and rolled down toward the boy's village.

"I could carry you back up there, I suppose," the boy offered. "It would be quite a long way to crawl by yourself, Branwell."

The bookworm considered this offer for a moment, then shook his head. "My home is in this stone, and it is far too heavy to carry back up the mountain. If you would, though, go visit Currerbell and tell her that I am all right, please."

The boy promised that he would, only he had some things to do and could not climb the mountain that day. One busy day became a few busy weeks, and it was some time before the boy found an opportunity to once more go visit Currerbell. He started at Branwell's home and followed the river (which had grown a bit in those few weeks) up the mountain.

What the little boy found there was very surprising. Instead of the quiet and simple clearing he had known, Currerbell's home had become a center of activity. He saw several fairies he didn't recognize, all of them blue with sparkling scales, sitting on the banks of the river. Several more like them swam peacefully in the shallow water. Still others danced and sang near the stone wall.

Looking around, the boy spotted Currerbell to one side of the clearing, leaning against a tree. Near her sat two of the blue fairies. Each of the three held a book in her hands, and the boy could tell that all three books were alike. He walked over to them, and Currerbell looked up.

"Well hello again, young sir!" She saw the boy looking at the blue fairies in confusion, and continued, "This is Ellisbell, and Actonbell. They're Huffae." She paused, then realized that the word didn't mean anything more to him than 'Shufae' had. "The Huffae are river fairies. They came here to live after Branwell...well, after the river broke through the stone."

The little boy suddenly remembered his reason for coming back to the clearing. "Branwell lives near my house now," he said quickly. "He wanted me to tell you that he's OK, but that he can't come back because his home is too heavy to carry."

Currerbell blinked, and straightened her glasses. She looked around, at all the Huffae frolicking about the river. With a small tear in her eye, she asked the boy, "Will you tell him the same for me?"

The little boy smiled, and agreed. After returning home, he told the bookworm about what he had seen on the mountain. Branwell was glad to hear the news. The boy felt that it was very sad for two friends to be separated, but Branwell interrupted him.

"Of course it is sad. But my house no longer leaks, and dear Currerbell has made many friends at the river which pushed me here. Who am I to complain?"

The little boy fell asleep that night, wondering at how something could be so sad and yet contain such blessings.