was his kindest act.” I smiled softly. “Once I was in the same size area as a human, you could imagine my disorientation. I bumbled and fumbled about for my first hour. I spent most of that hour just touching trees; I was so fascinated by how close they were to my size now. Eventually, I walked until I was thirsty, and then I found a stream. And in the reflection of the stream, a Human stared back…”
The Human was a child. He thought I was one of them, because of the hood that covered my face, and because I had put my pixie wings away. Startled, I fell back on my rump. Silly as it was, I thought he could mean me harm. He was about my size, this Human child. He looked about fifteen years old. Five feet tall with the trademark of a Human; pink flesh, whereas I was ivory in coloring with bright green eyes.
He held my gaze steadily with a smile. “What’s your name, little guy?”
“When asking someone’s name…” I said, dusting my robes off, “isn’t it polite to give yours first?”
“Oh, right. My name’s Pan. Yours?” He looked at me with a squint. He knew something wasn’t quite right about me, he just couldn’t wrap his mind around it.
“Keenan. You startled me, Pan.” I said, glaring at him.
“Sorry. Most Humans aren’t, y’know, surprised to see other Humans.” He said slyly.
I shrugged. Not seeing the harm it could do, I told him the truth. “I am not a Human.”
“Not a Hum…”
I threw back my hood and revealed my sparkling Pixie wings and my large pointed ears that stuck straight up like a fox’s. Feeling like showing off, I fluttered them and shook the Pixie dust from the beautiful crystalline sapphire wings. “I’m a Pixie,” I revealed to a flabbergasted Pan.
“Wow!” He finally managed to say. “You should come to my village! They’d love to see you! Pixies are extremely rare!”
“What am I? Some kind of freakshow?” I said, putting my hands on my hips and leaning back.
“No… but my village could really use the lift of spirit. You see, our village was recently attacked by Dwarves and--”
“Dwarves?” I asked. “What are those?”
“Well, they’re about your size, only much, much uglier. They’re normally a charming people, but they think we’re in league with the Elves, and…”
“Elves?” I interrupted again.
“Have you lived under a rock all your life? Pixies live forever. They should be knowledgeable.” He said impatiently.
“I’m only sixteen. And I only just got big.” I said, my temper rising. Remembering my Anima training, I quelled my rage.
His mouth fell open. “A young Pixie…” he said breathlessly.
“We’re that rare?” I asked.
“Extremely. We have only met old Pixies before.” He was really shocked. It wasn’t long after I met him, in fact, that I found out how little of us were left in the world.
“Well, don’t just stand there; tell me of the Dwafs and Elks.” I insisted.
“Dwarves and Elves.” He corrected. “Now, anyone who’s anyone should know that Dwarves and Elves are always fighting over God knows what…”
“Gods.” I corrected him.
“Ah yes. You have many Gods. We’ll get to that. Anyway, sometimes we Humans and Pixies get caught between their fighting, so I’d stay away from both of them. Whatever their most recent war is about, the Dwarves think we Humans are spying for the Elves because one human, not even connected to this village, happened to be working for the Elves. The Human entered their territory, claiming to need a rest and good food on his journey; they welcomed him, but found he was a spy after a few days. They thought he was from our village, since we’re very near to both the Elves and Dwarves homes. ” He explained.
“Oh I see… but why should you need to lift their spirits?”
His eyelids lowered sadly. “Because of what happened. When they found out about the spy, they came and burned down our church. There were still Humans inside praying when they did…”
“Are you serious?” I really couldn’t believe it.
“Yeah… why would I lie about something so awful?” He asked, wounded that I would even think he would lie about something like that.
“I should like to see your village,” I said finally, clasping my hands behind my back.
“Then c’mon!” He waved me on to his village, running ahead on his long Human legs.
“What made you want to go?” The Order boy interrupted.
“Simple,” I said. “I was alone in the world and I thought I needed some friends. And, really, who could say no to him after hearing that sob-story?”
“Sob-story…? You insult the lives of many who died in that church by making jokes like that.” He said plaintively.
“Wrong, I honor them by smiling at their memory. You see, Mr. Serious, it took me a long time spent with Pan to realize it, but… life is not worth living unless you are laughing. Those who are dead would not wish you to dwell and moan at their deaths. They would want to see you still laughing and joking.” I smiled sadly. I saw so many die in my life-time. I had to laugh just to get myself to smile genuinely sometimes.
There were some I could not smile at the memory of, of course. Those were memories too painful to even think of sometimes… let alone smile.
“A nice thought. But there are always times to be sober, Mr. Aled.” He remarked, quite ashamed of my behavior.
“Wrong again. If nobody was angry and instead they were laughing, there would be no sadness.” I countered.
“Another nice thought. But, I doubt it will happen, so I will continue to take matters seriously when appropriate.”
“That’s why I call you Mr. Serious.” I said with a sour face.
“You know,” he said, rolling up his sleeves as it happened to be a hot day, “Just what happened to you to make you so annoyingly upbeat? You were so depressed and withdrawn before from what you’ve been telling me.”
“I was, and if you recall, I was quite depressed and I would have done anything—anything at all—just to feel something.” I shook my head at the thought of my old silly, confused self. “I really was pathetic.”
“Continue, please,” he pleaded, obviously getting sick of me.
“Very well,” I said. “He led me to his village, where everyone was grasping for words at seeing a young Pixie. I showed them my wings and enjoyed their many ooos and ahhs. I stayed with them for a month, during which I learned many things about Humans. Like how they dress, how their sentences are strained with ‘ums’ and ‘uhs’, the history of their town; which they claimed was built by tiny ants, and….” I drifted for a moment, a frown on my face, lost deeply in thought.
“And…?” He prompted.
“And their religion.” I completed.
I didn’t understand their religion at first. Indeed, compared to my own, I thought it was incredibly silly. Whoever heard of only one God? He would have too much power to know what to do with. I thought it was strange that their God took the form of a mortal in their religion.
Needless to say, their religion was more focused on love and acceptance, while mine was more or less focused on fear and control. And really, it was sensible in my eyes. Mortals needed a firm hand of guidance, I thought. They were reckless and out of control. But of course, we did have our own Gods of love and acceptance, although in our mythologies they had their petty squabbles, to be sure.
Pan often caught me reading their bible. In their house of books, he would lean on a pillar and cross his arms, watching me. “You say you think our religion is silly, but I keep finding you here, reading the bible. You are strange.”
“Well your God really is something,” I commented. “He’s really interesting…kind of willy nilly, deciding he was disgusted with you Humans and washing away the bad people in a flood, then regretting it afterwards. My Gods would never admit they did something wrong… why does yours?”
“Why should it matter to you? You’re not Human
,” he said, giving me a look.
“I suppose not…” I said, closing the book with a sigh. “I’ve been thinking, Pan.”
“That’s dangerous.” He said, sitting down cross-legged across from me.
It took me a moment to realize he was joking. “Ha-ha.” I said sarcastically.
“You are always so serious. And so… literate. You need to go outside and play more often.” He teased.
“Actually,” I got to my feet, slid the bible back onto the bookshelf, and turned around to face him again. “I was thinking I wanted to do some exploring. You know; outside of the village.”
“Ah. I was wondering when you would be curious about what was outside. You’ve just been hanging in our village for days now lying around like a slug,”
“Well, how about you show me around outside, then” I said, exasperated.
“No reason to get testy. It’s just a little bizarre how you weren’t even curious all this time.”
“I used to live in a tiny village. Only Father got to visit the other Pixie villages.”
“So you like being in one place, then. Understandable. But you must have left to find adventure, yet you’re too afraid to seek it.”
“You make me sound one-dimensional,” I was indignant, “you don’t know what it’s like to live your life, thinking you know all there is to know, only to find out nothing is like it is. I haven’t felt like myself since I found out.”
He nodded. “The older Pixie we met mentioned how awful it was for him when he found out about his size. He said he had a perfectly awful