Minor Mendings

[bruorton]

Cassie was just fine with the rain. There had been some thunder earlier as well, and that had been even better. Boom! Yes, that was the stuff. She wished she could make it thunder like that whenever she wanted. She'd see what Penny said then, oh yes.

She flicked her wings, where some of the rain had dripped onto her from overhead. Her house was good -- perfect, really, aesthetically speaking -- but it was admittedly not the most weather proof. It had lovely corded pillars of the yellow birch growing overhead, which formed archways out of its curving golden roots all around. Once there had been a "nurse" stump, where the birch had sprouted, and as the stump had rotted away it had left this open hollow where the birch's roots had come down on every side. As a house, it was magnificent; as a roof, it was serviceable, but every now and then the breeze would splatter rivulets across her.

Not that being wet, or cold, was any bother to a sprite. Cassie was a wood sprite, and the only thing that would make her at all unwell was harm to the wood she dwelt in, but it had been decades since the last time there had been any logging around here. Winters could be tough, of course, with the sap mostly drained away, or thickened like pitch, and so many of her animals hungry so much of the time. Cassie usually slept through the winters, it was just easier that way.

So some blowing rain was no bother; quite the opposite, really. She was only sitting at home because sulking was much better done in private, and honestly the rain only enhanced the mood. Though a little more thunder wouldn't hurt anything.

Because the truth was, she was not at all finished feeling angry with Penny.

Penelope was the sprite from the woods up the steep bank on the other side of the stream, where it was so often sunny and airy and open, up among the beeches with their smooth and supple bark. Even when the sun was out, Cassie's mostly hemlock wood was dark, and moist, and moody. A shaft of light might occasionally fall in through the thicket of branches overhead and set the rich green moss that covered everything to glowing, but such moments only threw into relief its typical daytime twilight.

Not that Cassie envied Penny's wood, not at all. She loved her shadowed, mysterious forest deeply, fiercely, and wouldn't trade it for anything. Certainly not Penny's territory, which was much younger -- the older trees up there still had barbed wire embedded deep in the heartwood, from when it had been just sheep pasture -- and moreover, people were constantly traipsing up and down the trails they'd made in it. That might suit Penny fine, who found humans fascinating and seemed to regard the popularity as a personal compliment, but all in all Cassie much preferred to be left alone.

But Penny's behavior, now that was matter for serious indignation. The hypocrite! When Penny had a thrush whose leg had broken escaping from a kestrel, sure, it was all "Cassie, you've got to help this poor little thing." Or last winter, when Penny had woken her to come out and help a deer who'd caught a bramble in its eye. No greeting, no acknowledgement that she'd just tunneled down through the snow and shaken Cassie awake from a deep midwinter dream -- just: "She's carrying twins and she can't see from one side, she'll be killed for sure but I know you can fix it Cassie, you must. Be a dear." Never mind all does start out carrying twins, and just absorb one if the winter's bad. And no concern for what the lynx and coyote and weasel would survive on until spring.

No, Cassie mended things, and since Penny only thought about what was right in front of her, it was always "Cassie, fix this! Cassie, heal this poor squirrel's tail!"

There was a rustling coming very slowly down the slope near Cassie's house, but a large forked hemlock obscured her view of what it was. She thought about flitting out to see, but was feeling too ornery to give way to her usual curiosity. She simply flicked her wings again, more in irritation this time than because she was wet.

The Faerie Queen had sent out an invitation for gifts in advance of the Solstice Festival, which was perfectly normal. Not everyone was asked in a given year, so that was always an honor, but even more so if she acknowledged your gift at the Jubilee that was the highlight of the celebration. Coming to the Queen's notice, even into her favor, was a treasured reward. And while one rarely needed to ask the Seelie Court for anything, just having Her goodwill could strengthen a sprite, and the land she lived in.

So it had been an exciting day when one of the Queen's drones -- silly, dry little things, as dim as they were self-important -- had swooped by one afternoon and pompously announced to Cassie and Penny, where they were dangling their feet from the bank into the splashing stream, that they were invited to submit a gift to Her Sylvan Majesty.

But producing a worthy gift was a tricky thing, Cassie saw at once, for a sprite whose special talent was mending and healing. What was she supposed to do, send the Queen a thrush with a little note saying: This is a perfectly normal thrush which broke its wing flying into a human's window near where I live, but I mended it. Because all she'd really have, there, was a thrush. Next.

But of course when Cassie had started to pose her concern to Penny, the latter had promptly said, "Oh, well, of course your gifts don't work very well for this sort of thing. But I know what I can give her -- beech saplings that have twined their branches together into a heart! Wait, that's too simplistic, too clichéd. How about a twining wreath of hawthorn enchanted to be always green and in bloom? Ooh, that would be a lot of work, though. Wait! I've got it..."

Cassie would have loved to have had the gift of thunder at that precise moment.

The rustling had gotten closer, and presently ambled around the forked hemlock into view. It proved to be Fezzle, a large bull porcupine that lived in Cassie's wood. Two springs ago, when he was a youngster, she'd found him suffering from scabies, scratching and biting at himself, one whole limb raw and bleeding. It had taken some solid herbal lore to heal him in addition to her natural powers -- including a foul-tasting poultice for his leg after he had healed to break him of the habit he'd fallen into of idly chewing on it.

He had ended up very fond of her, and came by to visit regularly. Cassie carefully scritched his head when he waddled up and poked his nose into her house. She could tell he sensed her grumpiness, and seemed to be checking on her.

Now, she couldn't talk to animals any more than the next sprite -- well, there was that one from the far side of the mountains who claimed to converse with birds and teach them new lyrics, but that sounded like typical fairy nonsense to Cassie. But like most sprites who have formed a bond with an animal -- as Cassie, with her gifts, did on a regular basis -- she could at least read such an animal's senses and feelings, even (vaguely) its memories.

So she felt Fezzle's concern without even really trying. "It's all right, old boy," she told him. She wasn't sure what he'd think of the silly name she'd given him in her head, so she didn't call him that aloud. "I'll be okay eventually. It's just your Aunt Penelope being a jerk again."

It seemed Fezzle did understand names somewhat, because he reacted to this one: Cassie, fingers still in the spiky hairs of his head caught a porcupine's-eye glimpse of tall beeches, shadowed and glum. It looked like Penny's wood, all right, but not the cheery way it usually was.

"Were you over there recently yourself?" she asked him. And then she felt bark under her paws, and found herself looking down at the stream from a log fallen across it. Then the taste of new apple twigs, and she knew he'd paid a visit to the old orchard up in the midst of Penny's wood, near the L of stacked stones marking where a settler's house had stood in another century.

But what were the shadows she'd sensed? It was one thing among her mossy dark gold birches and thick hemlocks, but that wasn't how Penny's wood looked, not on a cloudy day or even an outright stormy one like today. It was more the sort of shadow that one could only feel, not see, and that only if one was tuned into fairy magic. As Fezzle, quite clearly, was. It meant something was not well with Penny.

Her first thought, of course, was: good.

But when one is a sprite, and one who keeps mostly to herself in her delightfully gothic and gloomy wood, one does not tend to have a great many friends. Or even acquaintances, beyond the attentions of the occasional neighborhood porcupine. One ought, she supposed, to check up on one's single main friend when something is the matter, even if that friend has quite recently behaved like a troglodyte with the emotional sensitivity of a toadstool.

~   ~   ~

The rain had nearly stopped when Cassie flitted up to the grand old beech where Penny lived in a hollow, high up in the trunk where she could look out over her wood. (Classic Penny, Cassie thought, as she usually did when having to fly up so high just to see if the sprite was at home.) She paused to listen at the opening of the hollow. No sound of anyone inside -- then, a sniffle. She poked her head inside. It was dark inside. "Penny?"

There was silence. Then, a thin voice that suggested much recent crying said, "Cassandra?"

"What's the matter? I sensed that you were upset about something, so I thought I'd better look in on you. It's not like you not to be sunny, even on rainy days."

Penny came out and sat on a dripping branch next to Cassie. She had been crying. Some thunder echoed, far off now in a remote valley. Penny wiped fiercely at her eyes.

"I'm giving up on my gift for the Queen. It's all a mess. I couldn't just make do with something simple, no, it had to be impressive. Obviously. But I can't get the enchantments right! My abilities don't live up to my high ideals, just like always. Oh, Cassie, I'm such a failure!"

Cassie resisted the urge to roll her eyes at this dramatic outburst. "What are you working on? Can I see it?"

Penny looked at her. She sniffed. "You won't laugh?"

"I don't expect so. I'm not feeling very jolly at the moment, myself."

Penny was biting her lower lip, looking as if she was holding in something that she wanted to say in response. Instead, she went back into her hollow and came out with what looked like a sack of apple blossoms that was itself made out of apple blossoms. It smelled sublime.

"It was supposed to be a dress," she confessed. "And I was hoping the Queen would love it so much, she would wear it to the Solstice Jubilee this year. I even got them to stay perpetually fresh and fragrant." Penny was very good at such niceties, Cassie had to admit. This was not a surprise. Yet she looked like she might burst back into tears at any moment. "But I can't get the weaving enchantment to work, no matter what I do! It all just... falls apart halfway through."

Cassie fingered the blossoms, and saw how some of them were magically stitched together, and could see how the threads of magic were already coming unraveled. She reflexively reached out a finger to one and made it stop.

Then she gave a tremendous sigh.

"Okay, Penny, let's take this down to the ground so we don't lose any of the blossoms. Come on." They did this. Which was fortunate, since the sack was coming apart as they spoke. Penny looked at it hopelessly.

"It'll be ok," Cassie assured her. "We can fix it. Let's lay it out the way it more or less ought to look when it's done." Penny eyed her dubiously, then set to work.

When they'd done that, Cassie said, "Now go slowly with your weaving. I'll follow along behind you, and mend any places the magic wants to come undone."

The look of consternation passed off of Penny's face like the sun coming from behind a cloud. "Oh, of course! Why didn't I think of that, you can fix anything!"

Cassie reflected that she probably would have smacked Penny if she had come and asked her for this favor. But she was somewhat mollified by her friend's praise.

They worked for several hours, on the damp carpet of beech leaves. Chickadees, naturally curious, came by occasionally to observe their progress, but as it did not involve seeds they did not stay too long.

In the end, they had produced an apple blossom gown that Cassie had to admit, stepping back to observe it spread-eagled on a young sapling, would be truly eye-catching. The Queen might well take a shine to it. Cassie wouldn't wear something that showy and cheery -- Penny might, of course, and it was only an idea that a fanciful daydreamer like Penny would even have -- but she could see the appeal. And it did smell heavenly.

Penny turned toward her, a little shy. "Cassie?"

"Hm?" Cassie was not sure how she was going to feel being thanked for this by her friend, the insensitive jerk.

"It was a terribly thoughtless thing I said to you, last week. I was so excited about what I could make that I didn't even think how you felt. I'm sorry. You're so self-sufficient and competent and so, well, not insecure like I am that I was just assuming you wouldn't care about flighty things like pleasing the Queen. But I've... well, I've sensed some things in your woods, too. The thunder was... it was so loud down there today, for one thing. Please don't be angry with me anymore. I really shouldn't have said that."

The thunder? Did Penny think that she had--? Well... maybe it couldn't hurt for her to think that.

She reached over, and gave her friend a hug. "Thanks. I'm not really angry anymore. And your gift for the Queen really is marvelous."

"Oh, Cassie," her friend said to her, at last looking completely like the cheerful little sprite she normally was. "Don't be absurd! Our gift for the Queen looks marvelous. Do you think She'll wear it to the Jubilee? Do you really think it's good enough?"