The Moonlight Boy | Ferry's Tale # 1

The calling

The last days of school were hard to bear. Even the summer holiday, once so alluring, seemed somehow dull and uninviting. Ferry was the gloomiest of all his classmates. Without Miss Summer and her kind and warm advice. Without Matilda, with her restless spirit. He even missed Billy's teasing, go figure!

Now he was watching the old Biology professor dozing at the teacher's desk; even the naughtiest students were tired to tease him.

Matilda cut her hair short, as she always did during the summer. She looked the same as the day Ferry first met her. Only this time, she wasn't talking to him. Instead, she was pretending to read a book Miss Summer had recommended. Meanwhile, Billy was as sad and absent-minded as usual, since the day of Danny's disappearance.

Even May looked sad for some reason, and she would wring her hands, sobbing.

"Is everything all right, May?" he asked her during the break.

May forced a smile, but tears came to her eyes, "It's Harry, my rabbit. He's gone."

"What do you mean gone?"

"Well, he was going out often, but always came back. Now, he's been missing for three days."

"Izzy's been missing, too," said Ben who overheard their conversation. "But he's done it before. Oh, and I've talked to Matt. Her dog has also been missing for three days."

"What's going on, Ferry?" asked May, now worried.

Ferry couldn't answer. He didn't know what was going on. But he knew his raven was missing, too. And he also knew that it had to do with his journey to the Land of the Unseen.

That afternoon, Ben visited Ferry, as planned. He brought his notebook where he's been writing everything he could find on fairies.

"I couldn't find much," he said. "I've searched at the library, but Mrs. Dear, the librarian, told me there was a burglary years ago and all the books on fairies were stolen. Even colouring books for children. Weird, huh?"

Ferry nodded. When it came to fairies, everything was weird. And everyone in town was silent or changing the subject about fairies, trying to convince him they were just bedtime stories for children.

Ben gave him the seven wooden boxes with the iron filings. He didn't ask why he needed it. Just like he didn't ask anything about his fairy nature. But Ferry knew the things were different, now that Ben knew. He could see him spying on him with the corner of his eye while he was pretending to read something in his notebook.

"You can ask me anything, Ben," he told him.

"Ask you what?" Ben pretended he didn't understand his question.

"Anything about fairies. And I'll tell you, the little that I know."

Ben fussed. Ferry could see he wasn't comfortable with the subject. "Well. I don't know... How long have you known you were a fairy?"

"Since always, I guess," said Ferry. "I didn't know at first. Yet, I've always known I was different."

"Different how?" his friend asked and Ferry could see his eyes glittering with curiosity while the hand grabbed a pen as if ready to take notes.

"Well, I guess everything started a month after my birth, as my mother said. That was the moment her child was switched with me, I think..."

Ben jumped on his feet as if stroke by lightning. "I know! My mother told me about that! You're a changeling! I mean the fairies replaced the real Donovan child with you. I wonder what happened to him," he added, lost in thought.