Fairy War

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

When we reached the entrance to the tunnel network, I was still worried by the reaction of the General, unsure as to what it was I'd been watching in the clearing.

At first I could see nothing more than the same forest clearing we'd been walking through – surrounded by plants and tree roots, with the sound of birds circling far above our heads – and I was just about to ask how we could find the tunnels when I noticed something: a nearby tree root, though it was different to the others. Whereas most of it was the same dark brown colour of the rest of the tree trunk, one part of the root was a much lighter brown, with veins that travelled vertically, rather than diagonally like the others.

"There's a door," Crystal uttered in surprise, pointing to the barely visible door handle poking out from the lighter section of the root. "How did we not see that before?"

"If the door was that easy to find then the enemy would have discovered our tunnels in no time at all," Arcturus said, his voice barely hiding his frustration. "You're only here because you're our guests; the guardians would have killed you in an instant if you were intruders."

As he said these rather worrying words he pointed up into the tree, where I could just about catch a glimpse of some fairies, only identifiable from the occasional glint of their wings between the leaves. They were draped in long, dark green cloaks – which matched their surroundings – and they were armed with a mixture of weapons, some with short bows and others with sharpened spears and javelins. They had them trained on us.

"Don't worry, Clint," Naarin whispered, "I'm an fairy Prince; they won't attack without me or Arcturus telling them first."

I just hoped Naarin knew what he was talking about.

Slowly and cautiously, we walked towards the door, the fairies around me keeping a hand on their weapons as Naarin opened the door and signalled for us to enter. I ducked as I walked through the doorway, still finding my height too large for the entrance despite my new fairy-esque size.

I gasped as I took my first glimpse at the interior, surprised to see that lanterns were strung on both sides of the tunnel, with what looked like small fireflies winging their way between each light. As each firefly touched the flames of the lanterns, their brightness seemed to increase even further. The tunnel stretched out in front of us in a straight line for as far as the eye could see, undisturbed by any other fairies or animals.

"Those creatures are sprites," Naarin explained, having noticed my curious gaze. "At least I think that's the word you have for them. We call them menninkäinen, and they're weakening just like us. They do, however, do the one task we can't; we barely have enough time to gather food for our meals, never mind keep the tunnels lit."

We walked through the tunnel in silence, Crystal watching the sprites intently as we passed each lantern. Every now and then we saw murals that had been painted on the walls, most of them depicting scenes of battle with fairies and other creatures I didn't recognise, in landscapes ranging from deserts to forests, and even what appeared to be human cities. They were fascinating.

"There were times in the past when humans and fairies existed side by side," Naarin explained, having noticed my interest. "It is the greatest tragedy that the friendship our races had is now all but gone." He walked a bit further along the tunnel and then paused, pointing to one of the murals that hung above a cluster of four especially bright lanterns. "This is what Shadow Glade once looked like. I thought you would especially like to view this."

I looked at the mural – which was far larger than any of the other images – to see a huge city depicted in the paint. It seemed to gleam as if it had been built from diamonds or some other gemstone, and it was surrounded on all sides by tall flowers and trees. A large wall enclosed the city, within which were mostly small buildings, except for the huge structure at the centre.