The Elves of Trelis

A Dark Cloud and a Peacock

The imp was the first to wake up the next day. All through the night he remained invisible and using his powers had become tiresome.

He wanted to be seen by the fairies but everywhere he went they fled. He was the reason Razu was afraid, he was the reason the butcher birds attacked. They see something unusual and frightening and they react. The little imp was tired of people 'reacting.' He decided he would show himself to the Prince no matter what.

When Phadia woke up the first thing she saw was the imp. "Hey you. You're supposed to stay invisible!"

Phadia stood up but before she could get close, the imp gasped and pointed in her direction. As if to say 'look behind you.' She obeyed and was devastated to find her golden bow was gone.

"What! No! Yasmin, wake up," Phadia shrieked. She sat beside Yasmin's sleeping body and shook her violently.

Yasmin groaned and wailed. "Phadia! What are you–"

"Yasmin, my bow is gone."

Yasmin frowned, she was still a little drowsy, and inspected the place Phadia had left her bow that night.

"What happened to it," Phadia mumbled, she was on the verge of tears.

"Well, it's obvious some goblins came in the middle of the night and took it," Yasmin said calmly. Phadia's eyes popped angrily. "It was a lovely bow but we don't really need it. We can just use our powers to protect ourselves. You wouldn't be able to aim it right, anyway."

Phadia was mad, and when she was mad, she was scary. She grabbed Yasmin by the hair and shrieked. "I was going to practice after we met Prince Francis. Now I don't have anything to protect me because I–"

While Phadia was screaming, the little imp remained visible. Because he could be seen now, he attracted the attention of a single butcher bird. It perched high up a tree where they couldn't see it. It had been watching them for a while.

Now a butcher bird all by itself looks tiny and harmless when it isn't skewering its prey with its hooked beak. But where there is one there is a thousand. And where there's a thousand there's an ambush. Especially when they see something like an imp.

And when they do, they're a nightmare.

Before they knew it Phadia and Yasmin were trapped in a cloud of black birds with knives for beaks.

Yasmin tried using her powers to deflect them but there were too many.

"Use your magic!" She screamed at Phadia.

Phadia didn't do anything.

Both girls were crying their eyes out and bleeding much worse than Rowan did but Phadia wouldn't use her powers. When Yasmin screamed the words a second time, Phadia answered in a voice that was weak compared to the roar of the bird's cries, "I don't know how!"

"What?"

"I don't know how!"

The sound of the birds beating wings was too loud for Phadia to explain herself and they were both in so much pain it was a miracle they spoke clearly at all.

The birds would not cease. They were going to die a death of a thousand cuts.

But somewhere in the distance an elegant creature emerged from a tree. A beautiful bird with a long neck, blue and green feathers and a tail covered in eyes that was larger than itself. 

A peacock.

The peacock was shocked by the cloud of butcher birds he saw up ahead. But unlike all the other creatures, instead of running as far away as possible he ran up to the screeching birds. It's tail flailing behind like a flag in the wind.